A consulting company

Ring, ring, ring.

The bell rang, signaling the end of the school day.

Having settled their part-time "agreement" at noon, Xia Xu and Tang Youxin left the school together, hailed a taxi, and headed straight for the Brilliant Human Resources Market.

This time, however, they did not go directly into the market. Instead, they turned into a nearby residential complex.

The complex was not purely residential. The upper floors served as housing, while the ground floors housed all sorts of shops: supermarkets, grain and cooking oil stores, vegetable shops, snack shops, print shops, general stores, and more. The layout was quite chaotic.

Business at these shops tended to be poor, though. There was barely any foot traffic throughout the complex; the street directly facing the human resources market had drawn all the customers away. Few people bothered turning off the main street and venturing deeper into the residential area.

Perhaps because of the poor layout, even the roads between the buildings received little sunlight, leaving the place quiet and chilly.

After passing through corridors and alleys, Xia Xu led Tang Youxin to a roadside storefront with a white-framed glass door.

The shop was small, probably less than twenty square meters. And although it was technically a roadside storefront, the road was merely one inside the complex. One look at its deserted interior made it clear that business would not be good.

"Are we here?"

Tang Youxin peered through the glass door with mild curiosity.

The place had probably been a noodle shop or some other small eatery. Tables and chairs still lay scattered haphazardly inside. Fortunately, there was not much grease, and at least the walls looked fairly new.

"That's right. Your job today is to clean this place up."

Xia Xu took out a key and unlocked the door. It was a sliding door, opening sideways like a window.

He had already rented the place.

Although the surrounding area was rather quiet and out of the way, that did not matter. He did not actually intend to open a shop for business. He just needed a base and an office where he could put on a convincing front for outsiders.

If he happened to meet someone with a high-star talent, he naturally could not let them slip away. Geniuses like that were rare finds, and once he missed his chance, he might never encounter them again.

Yet no matter how good he was at sweet-talking people, recruiting still required resources. Those resources were not just money, but also a legitimate pretext and an organizational framework.

In ancient times, that could mean a landowner taking in tenant farmers and keeping serfs, a general recruiting soldiers, or an emperor enlisting capable ministers and commanders. In modern times, however, there was only one way to do something similar: start a company.

Of course, that referred only to the usual option with the lowest barrier to entry for ordinary people. Secret organizations, charitable associations, governments, and the like were another matter.

At present, Xia Xu had no time to actually register a company, and his funds were not exactly abundant. He had enough to meet his own needs, but genuinely starting a company or opening a shop would stretch his budget thin. So he simply rented a storefront and decided to put up a fake sign for now.

"Oh, okay."

Tang Youxin nodded obediently at Xia Xu's instructions. Seeing that there really was work for her to do actually made her feel relieved. With that weight off her mind, she grew a little livelier and took the initiative to ask curiously, "Can you tell me what kind of shop you're planning to open?"

"You'll find out in a moment."

Xia Xu smiled and let her go in first. Rather than follow her, he turned and went to a print and advertising shop across the road.

Nearly every residential complex had one or two shops like this. Their main services were printing flyers and making illuminated advertising signs, but in practice, their most frequent business was photocopying and printing documents.

"Boss, is my sign ready?"

The moment Xia Xu entered, he called cheerfully to the owner.

The print shop's owner was a skinny young man in glasses. He looked like a shut-in who could barely be bothered to run his business, usually hiding behind his computer playing games. Only when he heard Xia Xu call did he stand up.

"It's ready. Over there. Help yourself."

The bespectacled owner pointed to a corner near the entrance.

An illuminated sign stood there, with white lettering on a blue background. A few large words were written across it.

[Nine Suns Comprehensive Consulting Company]

Below the large lettering were several lines of smaller text listing services such as relationship consulting, business consulting, and psychological consulting.

Xia Xu had ordered this sign two days earlier. Along with it, he had also prepared a business license.

Of course, both were fake. The company had never been registered; he was merely putting up a sign. He had made the business license himself with image-editing software.

He would only be using them temporarily anyway, just to coax someone into working under him as a "detective."

Apparently, many domestic detective agencies operated under the guise of consulting companies. It was the perfect pretext for recruiting, and small storefronts like this usually did not attract anyone checking business licenses.

"Your job here is to tidy up and clean. Throw away any of these battered tables and chairs that need to go. I have some business to take care of outside in a bit. Once I'm done, I'll come pick you up and take you home."

After some work, Xia Xu mounted the illuminated sign above the entrance. As he gave Tang Youxin instructions, he walked into the shop and retrieved a backpack.

He had left it here earlier. Inside was a suit.

There was no helping it: his face looked too young, and wearing a school uniform made him seem anything but credible. He certainly could not recruit people looking like that, so the day after his previous visit, he had made a special trip to buy a suit.

Clothes made the man, just as a saddle dressed a horse. Suits were rarely worn casually in China and were generally reserved for more formal occasions. Putting one on would conceal much of his high-school-boy youthfulness.

Combined with Xia Xu's already mature adult mindset and bearing, it meant that although his face still looked young, at least he would not come across as some little brat people could dismiss. Someone might even praise him as young and accomplished.

"Well? Don't I look handsome?"

Taking a little care to preserve his modesty, Xia Xu hid behind a table to change out of his school uniform and into the suit, then turned toward Tang Youxin with a showy flourish.

Tang Youxin had probably been sneaking glances at him. Only when he looked over did she hastily avert her eyes, lowering her head and bending down to pretend to clean. Her little face flushed red, and when he asked his question, she merely stammered without giving an answer.

Fortunately, Xia Xu was in a hurry and had only asked casually. Seeing that Tang Youxin was too shy to answer, he did not press her. He rushed out and headed for the Brilliant Human Resources Market.

"Very handsome..."

Once the shop fell silent again, a shy, soft voice suddenly sounded, no louder than a mosquito's hum. She was only talking to herself.

Clearly, with only one person left inside the shop, the voice could belong to no one but Tang Youxin.

To be fair, Xia Xu was not bad-looking.

He was not breathtakingly handsome, but he could at least be considered good-looking. Though he was not muscular, he had a fairly tall, broad frame, and his upright figure suited the suit well. Wearing it made him look even more imposing.

But what mattered most was his bearing.

Children from poor families learned responsibility early. Tang Youxin was introverted, but mentally she was far more mature than others her age. Whenever she watched her classmates' antics, she could not help finding them a little childish.

Xia Xu alone was different. Not only did she sense no childishness in him, he also had something of a father's or an older brother's bearing, something no "mature" peer could imitate.

Maybe the handsome older men Lingling and the others talk about are men like Xia Xu...

The thought drifted unbidden through Tang Youxin's mind, and her cheeks immediately flushed.

Although she never deliberately eavesdropped, she still overheard some of the girls in her class discussing television dramas and romance novels. For a while, the plots they talked about always seemed to involve young girls falling in love with handsome older men.

At the time, she had found it difficult to understand. If they were already sleazy middle-aged men, how could they possibly be handsome? Besides, wasn't falling for someone old enough to be your uncle far too strange?

Now she seemed to understand a little.

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