"I recently arranged an internal cabinet eting on the day you were gone and over the weekend on tackling wealth inequality.
They recomnded introducing so of the tax code. I gave the green light after seeing the number was up to pre-outbreak standard."
Yuqi’s answer instantly raises a few red flags in his head, as hearing such drastic changes felt unsafe.
"What kind of tax code are they putting exactly? There’s no way this doesn’t hinder business growth."
"I can call to re-arrange the eting and have them talk to you in detail if you really want to know more—"
"Never mind. If they think it’s going to be fine, I got no problem with it... Was Liuqian in the eting?"
"He was. But Liuqian didn’t say much... He was willing to cooperate with and assist the State Taxation Services."
The answer surprised Xiaoyun a little, but he soon realized why Liuqian was willing to fold so easily.
"Could you not have the eting while I was here?" Xiaoyun questioned, feeling he had missed out on sothing important.
"I intended to have you be in the eting. But sobody didn’t give a heads-up when they decided to leave town."
Yuqi argued back as the calmness started to disappear from her face. In its place was irritation from his endless questions.
"Okay, that was my bad. I didn’t realize you had planned sothing so important for to attend."
After apologizing, her face seed to have returned to calm. However, she suddenly sat up in her seat before staring down at Xiaoyun’s face.
"Why are you looking at like that?"
Xiaoyun asked, resisting the urge to panic as he could feel the guilty stare from her eyes staring into his soul.
"Nothing. After you sign the check, if you don’t have anything else, you can leave my office now."
"Already giving the cold shoulder? Co on... Okay, fine. I’m really sorry. I promise I’ll tell you in advance when I’m leaving."
"You promise?" Yuqi questioned as her cheek flinched a little.
"I promise."
"You better... Anyway, here’s sothing else you probably should learn about before leaving the office with that check of yours."
As Yuqi handed a whole docunt over, the first thing Xiaoyun saw was the line ’The First Five-Year Plan of Guangdong.’
"You made this?" Xiaoyun curiously asked, feeling the weight in his hand as he held off from opening it.
"The entire governnt put their ideas and effort into this. A few of my staff ca together to compile it into a cohesive plan."
Putting the blank check back down, Xiaoyun carefully opened the first page of the docunt, which introduces the author of the plan.
Several nas were inside it, with the only two recognizable being Chen Yuqi and her assistant, Jianlin.
---
After reading it through, Xiaoyun was a little blown away. Never once had he read sothing so broad in its question, yet detailed in its answer.
It was a comprehensive developnt plan—a long-term, ambitious plan for the governnt to improve the lives of citizens.
Hundreds of different asurents that were asurable needed to be t, from healthcare to energy to food security to even governnt debt.
Every issue he could think of was listed with milestones and a projected tifra of improvent for each departnt to work on.
Even futuristic goals like manufacturing advanced chips and robotics were included, with both public and private businesses alike utilized to achieve them.
"What do you think?" Yuqi curiously asked as she watched Xiaoyun close the docunt for the third ti in a row.
"This is the first ti I have read sothing that I can’t think of anything to improve. It is beyond my scope and technical knowledge."
"If you did manage to understand it all, you would be a genius. Anyway, I’m going to do a press conference later this evening on this."
"This evening? Isn’t that a little too soon?" Xiaoyun questioned, rembering how Yuqi had stated this was compiled while he was gone.
"The earlier it is, the better. You said this yourself, don’t hesitate and stall on sothing when it can be done today."
"When did I say that...?"
"That doesn’t matter. What matters is if you don’t have any problems with it, I’m going to make the entire departnt focus on this goal."
"I got no issue with it."
As Xiaoyun gave his permission, Yuqi looked significantly happier as if soone had just handed her free candies.
"Does this make you that happy?"
"You wouldn’t get it. I had spent countless days in the past formulating a plan for our governnt to focus on."
Xiaoyun didn’t try to stroke her happiness away as she celebrated on her own. Only watching on the side as he pocketed the empty check into his pocket.
"Is there anything else I need to know before I allocate this ten-million-dollar check to the logistics office?"
"You can go now... Oh snap, I forgot to tell him about Kate."
Seeing Xiaoyun had already disappeared from the office, Yuqi took out her phone before dialing his number.
"Deputy governor, the press eting is in an hour."
Jianlin’s voice appeared as she walked past the door without knowing, coming into the room with a piece of paper.
"One hour? Is it that fast? I need to go put so makeup on first before I can go on cara."
---
"Houqin!"
As Xiaoyun yelled out her na, she was sitting near one of the booths at the training field, as the lines had gotten much shorter.
What was originally thousands of people in line had beco less than a hundred as so of the booths closed down early.
"Is there sothing wrong, Commander?" Houqin imdiately asked as they t up midway.
"Let’s talk in a more private area. I had gotten sothing that you might want to see for yourself."
The ambiguous answer made her a little confused, but she didn’t question it as she followed Xiaoyun back over to the logistics building.
After walking for a bit, the two arrived inside Houqin’s office as they sat in their usual spots with Xiaoyun across from her desk.
"I talked to Yuqi earlier, and you wouldn’t believe what she had given ." Xiaoyun teases as he reaches into his pocket.
"What is it?"
"Guess."
"Um... She said yes to the military budget?"
"Not just that. She gave permission for a ten-million-dollar budget increase just for this month."
"That’s great to hear."
Seeing Houqin’s face looking a little down rather than excited, Xiaoyun felt sothing was off. But he didn’t know how to approach it.
"Here’s the check you can use to write the authorization paper. I already signed my na on it."
"Okay..."
"Is there sothing wrong, Houqin? You look a little down since we ca into the office." Xiaoyun softly asked.
"There’s nothing wrong."
Xiaoyun didn’t buy her answer at all. But he didn’t press her any further as he sat there in silence, watching her work.
"Do you need to help?" Xiaoyun offered.
"I’m good."
The more she wrote, the more Xiaoyun felt the anger in her pen. Every character was written so straight that it started becoming illegible.
"Houqin, you might want to type the paper if you can’t write properly."
"Sorry."
As she crushed the paper into the bin and turned her monitor back on, Xiaoyun finally had enough of the distance.
"My dear princess, is there sothing I can do to help you alleviate whatever is on your mind?"
"There’s nothing—"
"Sothing is bothering you. No need to hide it. I’m all ears... Put this aside for a bit. Tell what’s wrong."
After a short silence in the room, Houqin slowly sat back up as she looked back into Xiaoyun’s eyes.
"Xiaoyun... I... I just didn’t expect you to have so many wives and kids already." Houqin quietly murmured.
"Sorry."
It was the only word he could muster in his mind. There was no sugarcoating it at this point, as they all already t in the morning.
"You don’t have to say sorry. A man like you should have multiple wives... I knew what I had gotten myself into."
As Houqin’s eyes looked away to the floor, Xiaoyun’s heart sank. But he didn’t have any way to comfort her.
Xiaoyun didn’t want to give her a fake promise of loving her only. He just couldn’t bring himself to lie about marriages that are already set in stone.
There were no changes, nor was he willing to change his life for just her. Still, he felt an obligation to speak up again.
"Is there anything I can do to make you feel better right now?" Xiaoyun asked softly as he waited for her response.
"Kiss ."
"What?"
Houqin’s request caught him a little offguard as he didn’t expect her to make such a blunt request when she was just fed up with him.
"I want you to kiss ... Sorry, was I asking for too—"
Before she could finish speaking, Xiaoyun leaned forward from his seat, kissing her on the lips as her eyes widened.
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