The report on Yang Ruoqian's desk was thin, but he still read it twice. It said the song was odd, sticky, and hard to classify. To other bosses, this was a problem to solve. To him, it was a possible receipt for failure.
His private calculation was colder than his expression. If the matter stayed at the level of a wasteful music redo, the money leaving Xplendi still had a chance to stay gone. The path was legal, the expense was operational, and the system could not accuse him of deliberately throwing funds into a hole.
The cost side also looked friendly to him: revision hours, mixing fees, unused takes, and the sort of professional patience that burned cash quietly. These were not flashy numbers. They were the kind of dull, documented costs that made accountants frown and made Yang Ruoqian feel a little warmth in his heart.
