Liang Zixin kept up his planned campaign from inside Horizon Tech, even though Grandfather Liang Zhong was putting more pressure on Liang Chen and there were cyber threats from outside. He was going after a big new project that Liang Chen was in charge of. It was a big plan to make global operations run more smoothly, which promised to save the company a lot of money and make it more efficient. This project was very important for Liang Chen's reputation because it showed how good he was at leading. Because of this, Zixin's subtle, corrosive manipulations made it a prime target.
Liang Zixin's method was one of quiet, almost unnoticeable interference, like a thousand paper cuts that kill you. He skillfully navigated the company's internal bureaucracy, using his position as a subsidiary director to his advantage. A critical report on how resources were used would be misfiled on purpose, which would cause a week-long delay in getting the goods. An important email thread between the heads of departments working on Liang Chen's project would mysteriously end up in spam folders, or the attachments would be damaged just enough that they needed to be sent again. He might quietly agree to a small budget change that doesn't seem like a big deal, but a few weeks later, it would leave Liang Chen's project without important money.
The effect on Liang Chen's project was immediate and annoying. Deadlines were missed, important people were stuck waiting on what seemed like small problems, and the initiative's momentum started to fade. Liang Chen, who was already busy fighting the Evotech Solutions cyberattack, felt the strange resistance. He felt an invisible friction, a systemic inefficiency that didn't make sense. It was a fake threat that wasted time and money, and he thought there was wrongdoing, but the proof was too weak and easy to deny to find. He said it was because of unexpected administrative problems, which added more stress to his already full mind.
Liang Zixin felt more and more satisfied as he watched the subtle chaos unfold. Every late report and angry team member hurt Liang Chen's reputation as the perfect leader. He thought of himself as a master chess player who made moves that seemed harmless but had terrible long-term effects. Liang Zixin worked hard to make Liang Chen look bad because his mother was always pushing him to do better and he wanted to be president. This slowly but surely opened the door for him to get to the top.