Yan Fei closed the dorm door quietly behind her. The hallway noise—students laughing, footsteps, the hum of vending machines—faded until only the rain tapping on the window remained.
Liang Shen studied her like a blueprint.
"Sit," he said.
She hesitated, then perched on the edge of the desk chair, her raincoat dripping onto the tiled floor.
Up close, she looked younger than he expected—no more than twenty, but her gaze was older, like someone who'd been forced to read the fine print of contracts signed in blood. She opened her paper notebook and slid a page across the desk.
A hand-drawn diagram.
Yan Group's internal structure. Branches of subsidiaries. Security divisions. Asset flows. All annotated with red ink.
"I've been watching them," she said softly. "Ever since my uncle took control of the board."
Liang leaned over the paper, heart thrumming. In his last life it had taken him years to map even a fraction of this. Now it was handed to him like an offering.
"You're either extremely brave," Liang murmured, "or extremely reckless."
"Both." Her lips flickered with a humorless smile. "I heard about your app. 'Shortcuts.' It's spreading faster than you think."
Liang glanced at his laptop. The Glass Pulse dashboard blinked: Node Expansion: 238% Growth.
He shut the lid before she could see it.
"What do you want?" he asked.
She looked down at her notebook, then back at him. "A future where my family isn't the only empire. And I think you're building it."
The Lotus Engine inside Liang's head vibrated like a struck chord. Partnership? Trap?
He took a slow breath. "You understand what you're stepping into?"
Yan Fei's eyes didn't flinch. "You're not the only one who wants to redraw the blueprint."
Lightning cracked outside. For a heartbeat the entire room glowed white. Liang saw their reflections in the window—his face, hers, and between them the shimmering ghost of a city yet to be built.
He reached out and tapped the paper diagram once.
"Then let's begin," he said. "But every piece you move, every line you draw—there will be people who'd rather kill us than let us finish."
Yan Fei nodded, as if she'd been waiting for that warning all her life.