KC | Chapter 26

Night had fallen, and all the sales staff on Lanhai’s 20th floor had already gotten off work, leaving the empty office area with only the light in Lin Yiran’s office still on.

Lanhai’s deputy general manager and those above that level had to attend the executive meeting every Monday and report the work progress of each system. Although the meeting moved very fast, there were so many systems that the executive meeting took up the golden time Lin Yiran had for talking to clients, so he had no choice but to adjust his work rhythm. Since his promotion in July, Monday nights had definitely been the latest he left Lanhai.

Lin Yiran attended the executive meeting in the morning, and in the afternoon he handled all the cases piled up from the weekend together. Only at night did he have time to prepare the content for tomorrow’s client meeting. He split his time with precision into three parts, striving to make every section as perfect as possible.

Lanhai assigned a dedicated planning team for KA. Every time Lin Yiran made a proposal, he only needed to send the client side’s requirements to planning, and planning would come up with a方案 within 3-5 working days based on the proposal date. Planning was the backstage worker, while Lin Yiran was the negotiator facing the client side, so he had to have full control over the completeness of the方案, the accuracy of the data, the logic chain… no matter how busy he was, before every proposal, he would go through the 方案 word by word.

Right now he was reviewing the方案 that planning had made according to the client requirements he had relayed.

Lin Yiran had very high demands for himself. In life, in order to keep a good figure, he made strict diet and fitness plans, carrying them out in an almost self-abusive way; at work, in order to cooperate smoothly with the client side, he opened up all kinds of connections and used every possible method, all just to achieve his goal.

A person with firm goals would not be disturbed by outside conditions, would not feel lost because of the social environment. Lin Yiran, in order to complete his established plan, had turned himself into an untiring perpetual machine.

The LanHai access control opened, and sounds came from the corridor. Lin Yiran did not even look up, continuing to revise the proposal.

The footsteps in the corridor were very dense, moving very fast, as if the person coming had some urgent matter. Lin Yiran had to focus completely while going through the proposal, and he felt displeased at the interruption, his brows slightly furrowing.

Coming back to LanHai so late, it should have been some small sales rep who had forgotten to bring something.

Suddenly, the office door opened, and Lin Yiran got annoyed.

Fine if you disturbed me while I was making a proposal, but you still didn’t know the basic etiquette of knocking before entering the office, you’re finished.

Lin Yiran looked up and put on his signature smile, just about to ask who the visitor was so he could狠狠 report him to the department manager later, when he saw that it was Chen Xi, and all his dissatisfaction instantly vanished, the fire going out.

Chen Xi had walked all the way here in a hurry, and his white shirt had not been sorted out in time. It hung wrinkled and crooked, with one corner escaping from outside the belt. The belt could not hold up the slim line of his waist, and it tilted on his hips. At this moment, all his attention was focused on the key client, and he only wanted to sign the contract as soon as possible. “Brother Lin, Shining has agreed to sign. I’ll send the email, you approve the policy, okay?”

Chen Xi casually closed the door, took the bag off his shoulder, and the hem of his white shirt was tugged wider by accident. Under the belt, on the hip bone, the edge of his underwear was exposed.

Lin Yiran saw it.

Gray.

Gray boxer briefs, the ones he had worn that night were white.

Lin Yiran’s Adam’s apple moved, and he subconsciously pressed the button under the desk, then asked in a low voice, “What policy were you negotiating?”

“The client wants 10%, rebate to the individual. I said 3%, and he told me to produce the contract tomorrow. I’ll get the contract template done in a bit, then go straight to find him tomorrow morning. Go through the contract in the morning, payment in the afternoon, and then we can resume the placement.”

Chen Xi could not see Lin Yiran’s expression, and could only hear that fatal low voice: “What’s the client’s average daily spend?”

“Over ten thousand.”

“Be more specific, is it 10,000, 20,000, or 30,000?”

“Let’s count it as 10K for now.”

Lin Yiran pressed on, “Then what about later, if his spend gets higher and he asks you for rebates again, what will you do?”

“Then ask again when it comes up!” Chen Xi frowned slightly. Using a 3% rebate to leverage the client into spending back four times as much already seemed extremely difficult to him. The rebate rates for other LanHai accounts with over ten thousand in spend had never been lower than 5%, and if they were going to approve the policy directly, it would be fine. He did not understand why Lin Yiran had to ask so much.

The beast wearing a human skin in the day always shed its disguise at night. Lin Yiran looked toward the gray edge of the underwear, half close, half distant, his mind wandering.

He wanted to help Chen Xi take off those inconvenient, ill-fitting suit pants, lift up those pair of jade-white, lotus-root-like legs, and see whether he would still be that tough. He wanted to do it while asking Chen Xi how he had talked to the client, and if he did not explain well, he would make him cry.

Chen Xi crying would really be quite pretty.

Work came first, Lin Yiran told himself to stay calm.

Reasonable people were always able to control themselves very well, and clearly knew what they needed to do.

The admonition took effect, and Lin Yiran came back to his senses, only feeling heat rising. He loosened his tie, undid two buttons of his shirt, and no longer looked at Chen Xi.

“I suggest you sign a framework agreement, post-rebate,” Lin Yiran said. “10K a day, 300K monthly average spend, 900K quarterly spend. According to what you said, after the ad spend is used up, give him 3% at the beginning of next quarter. Try to give the rebate by quarter, because you’re assessed by quarter. If you really can’t agree, giving it by month is also fine.”

Chen Xi had indeed not considered the rebate method carefully enough. Lin Yiran thought it through completely, but private points could not be written into the contract.

“That’s private points being given, it can’t be signed on the surface. Their company legal team has to review the contract,” Chen Xi said in annoyance. “When I negotiated, I didn’t think of this much.”

“It’s fine, you can sign two contracts,” Lin Yiran said. “One for the client-side person in charge, one for the client company to see. For the one for the person in charge, have him sign and leave his fingerprint. Next time you negotiate, remember to record it. Some client-side people in charge won’t agree to leave a fingerprint, but if you have a recording, it still counts as archived evidence. When it involves利益, you have to be careful.”

Chen Xi nodded.

Lin Yiran continued, “Next time you can also talk to him about tiered rebates. For example, if the daily spend is 15K, give him 4%, and 20K gives 5%. But if you don’t talk it through well, he may end up asking for 4%-5% this time too. You need to control the scale yourself.”

“Mm.” Lin Yiran was like Chen Xi’s treasure box. No matter what happened at work, Lin Yiran always had a solution.

What he did not know was that Lin Yiran’s solutions had been formed after countless client meetings. He shared without reservation the solutions built up over ten years.

After 18:00, the office area in Lihua Tower no longer turned on the central air conditioning. The warm summer wind drifted in from outside the window, blowing against the collar of Lin Yiran’s suit shirt, blowing against Chen Xi’s snow-white cheek.

He was alone with Lin Yiran in the closed space at night, as if he had returned to that humid night at the start of the month.

Only then did Chen Xi realize that there was no one left on the 20th floor.

Being alone with Lin Yiran at night, had I fucking lost my mind?

He had only wanted to finish the contract quickly just now, and had not paid attention to so much else. Chen Xi swallowed, slowly retreating toward the door.

“I… I just remembered, the contract department has gotten off work. I’ll get up early tomorrow and make the contract template. I’ll go first, Brother Lin should also go home early.” Lin Yiran helped him come up with an idea, and Chen Xi could not just run away directly, so he exchanged a few perfunctory polite words as a token gesture, then greased the soles of his feet and prepared to slip away. He did not expect the office door to not open.

Chen Xi: ?

When he had just started doing KA, in order to sign orders quickly, Lin Yiran had not played by the rules, and many clients came straight to the company. In order to prevent clients from going back on their word, he had even stayed up all night to find a worker to change to soundproof glass and an inward-opening lock.

After Chen Xi entered the office, he casually pulled the door shut. When Lin Yiran saw the gray underwear edge, he subconsciously pressed the lock under the desk.

Lin Yiran: …I did have that kind of thought, but locking the door really was not intentional.

“What’s going on with this door,” Chen Xi twisted the handle twice but could not open it, and then he figured out what was happening.

The door had been locked by Lin Yiran. What did he want to do?

I fucking even thought yesterday, “If Shining doesn’t sign, then just sleep with you and let you help me sign the deal,” but today Shining has already signed!

I didn’t use you, I handled it myself!

It’s already signed, what else is there to drag on with you?

“Not bad,” Lin Yiran said, unlocking the access control beneath the desk, his thin lips slightly curling up. “Chen Xi, only you can sign this Shining account. You did well this time.”

Chen Xi turned back and crashed into Lin Yiran’s deep eyes.

His only key client was Shining. Since it had gone invalid last week, the damaged performance gap had become like a huge black hole, devouring Chen Xi and leaving him unable to eat or sleep.

After reaching cooperation with Sun Xingshun again today, the black hole had gradually been filled, but that force of devouring gravity had not disappeared. It was as if there had been a hand constantly grabbing at Chen Xi, wanting to drag him into hell.

In order to resist the pulling force downward, Chen Xi had no choice but to keep himself tense at all times, holding himself up.

That hand grabbing him was Lin Yiran.

Lin Yiran had always had a huge attraction to him.

Chen Xi was afraid that he would not be able to resist the temptation, cross the red line of morality, and fall into hell.

Only at this moment did Chen Xi know that all the worries of these days had been unnecessary. The hand that could have dragged him into hell had pushed him toward the clouds.

He signed Shining under the pressure of sales assessment, and under Lin Yiran’s guidance, the negotiation ability that had been forced out temporarily.

It was not that Lin Yiran did not help me negotiate orders, but that he wanted me to grow. He was forcing me to grow, not trying to drag me into hell.

Growth was a kind of tempering.