Since the doctor instructed that Yu Zi shouldn’t have any mental stress, Xie Dongcheng took that advice as gospel.

First, he took over the responsibility of recruiting staff for the restaurant. In less than three days, he found a diligent helper for chef Zhao. Then he asked Yang Ke to help recruit a part-time male and female employee from the school.

The doctor prescribed two medications for Yu Zi to aid in his recovery and consolidation. Xie Dongcheng supervised him taking the medication every day, not missing a single dose.

Yu Zi’s only remaining tasks each day were managing the accounts for the restaurant and helping Xie Dongcheng with bathing.

Xie Dongcheng’s arm was in a cast, and the wound on his arm hadn’t completely healed yet, so the doctor instructed him not to get it wet upon discharge.

The showering process for him was simple. Yu Zi brought a chair into the bathroom.

He sat while Yu Zi stood. Yu Zi wet him with the shower head, lathered him with soap, and then rinsed him off with water. However, the soaping step always seemed to go awry, and soon the bathroom was filled with steam and the sound of water, leaving three clear handprints on the white tiles of the wall.

After they came out of the bathroom, it was hard to tell who had bathed whom.

Xie Dongcheng had already moved the bedding back into the bedroom. He lay on his side behind Yu Zi, gently stroking his slightly damp hair.

“Can you cancel the lease on your place?” Xie Dongcheng asked in a low voice.

Yu Zi hadn’t thought about that yet. He had just rented it not long ago, and the landlord would surely be unwilling to let him terminate the lease.

“Let me find someone to sublet it,” he said.

Xie Dongcheng seemed afraid that he would regret it, “I’ll find someone for you to sublet it to. Cancel it as soon as possible.”

“Why? Afraid I’ll run away?” Yu Zi turned around, rubbing against his chest.

Xie Dongcheng tightened his embrace around his arm and kissed the top of his head. “Yes.”

“Childish.” Yu Zi turned away and ignored him.

Subletting wasn’t urgent. He was much more financially comfortable now, so the rent didn’t matter much.

However, the next day, Yu Zi received an unexpected call. The company they were collaborating with for the group meal suddenly changed their minds and wanted to cut the budget again. Originally, they had agreed on a total of 100,000 yuan for the whole package, but now they wanted to reduce it to 80,000 yuan.

Yu Zi felt a headache coming on. Dealing with this company had never been easy. They specialized in high-end events and salon planning, often catering to high net worth clients in the city. However, their boss was extremely stingy, always coming up with unreasonable demands at the last minute.

Previously, Yu Zi had swallowed his pride several times in order to secure deals with them. This time, the contract was already signed, and now they wanted to reduce the budget. But the menu couldn’t be cheaper than the last time. If the total price was lowered by 20,000 yuan, it meant their profit would decrease by 20,000 yuan. After hanging up the phone, Yu Zi almost didn’t want to proceed with this order anymore. In the future, he’d rather not work with such a company.

Seeing him starting to massage his temples again, Xie Dongcheng walked over and asked what was wrong. Yu Zi briefly explained the situation to him.

Xie Dongcheng reached out his hand towards him. “Give me their address.”

Yu Zi looked up at him. “What are you going to do?”

“Negotiate with them, of course,” Xie Dongcheng said matter-of-factly.

“Can you handle it?” Every time they negotiated business before, it was Yu Zi who led the negotiations, with Xie Dongcheng watching from the sidelines. Now, if he had to handle it himself, Yu Zi started to worry.

“It’s just bargaining, right? I can handle it. You don’t need to worry,” Xie Dongcheng replied confidently.

Yu Zi was skeptical but still sent him the address, though his heart remained in his throat.

Early the next morning, Xie Dongcheng went to the cooperating company by himself.

Less than an hour later, Yu Zi heard the sound of him returning home and opening the door. He returned so quickly that Yu Zi wondered if he had even left the neighborhood at all.

After Xie Dongcheng entered the house, he calmly wiped the sweat from his forehead with a clean towel. Then he went to the fridge, opened a bottle of sparkling water, and took a couple of sips.

Yu Zi was more anxious than him and followed behind, asking, “How did it go?”

“We reached an agreement,” Xie Dongcheng said extremely casually.

“What?” Yu Zi couldn’t believe it. Every time he negotiated with this company, it took a lot of back and forth and extensive discussions before reaching a consensus. “How did you manage that?”

“I didn’t negotiate at all,” Xie Dongcheng shook his head.

“You’re just bragging,” Yu Zi scoffed.

Afraid that he wouldn’t believe him, Xie Dongcheng directly took out the order form from his bag. On it, it was written: Total price 100,000 yuan, and it even had a bright red official seal.

Damn. He really managed to negotiate.

“They didn’t give you a hard time?”

“Nope. They were very cooperative.”

“How did you negotiate, then?”

“I just said 100,000. The previous contract was for 100,000, so it should remain 100,000.”

“You only said that?” Yu Zi couldn’t believe it.

“They rambled on a lot, but I didn’t understand most of it. I just said 100,000,” Xie Dongcheng took another sip of sparkling water and continued, “Then I signed the order.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it,” Xie Dongcheng nodded.

Yu Zi felt like this completely overturned his understanding of business negotiations. What kind of crazy luck was this?

Five minutes later, Yu Zi’s phone rang.

He checked it and surprisingly, it was a call from the boss of the cooperating company. He quickly answered.

Contrary to the usual arrogance and difficulty, the tone on the other end was surprisingly calm, even a bit flattering.

“Mr. Yu, hello.”

This greeting left Yu Zi at a loss for words. After a moment of hesitation, he responded, “Hello.”

“It’s like this, we can understand that there were some differences in our previous orders. It’s indeed our fault for not being thoughtful enough, causing difficulties for you.”

Yu Zi was dumbfounded. How did they suddenly make such a 180-degree turn?

Before he could organize his words to respond, the other party continued, “If you have any suggestions next time, just let us know. There’s no need for you to be so aggressive. It’s a legal society now, and everything can be discussed.”

Yu Zi was even more puzzled. What was he talking about? How did they bring up the rule of law society?

He glanced at Xie Dongcheng, who also shook his head in confusion, not understanding what the other party was saying.

Just as the call was about to end, the other party suddenly lowered his voice and said, “Cough, we all understand the rules of the street.”

Yu Zi mumbled a confused response before hanging up the phone.

“You didn’t threaten them, did you?” Yu Zi asked Xie Dongcheng with a belly full of questions, turning to him.

“Nope,” Xie Dongcheng shook his head.

“Then what did they mean by ‘rules of the street’? Think about it carefully, did you really not say anything else to them?”

After thinking for a while, Xie Dongcheng remembered something. “Oh, when I walked in, he greeted me and asked why I had a splint on my arm. I said I got injured while working at night.”

Working at night, got injured.

Yu Zi’s inner world was once again shocked.

Xie Dongcheng wasn’t wrong. He did indeed get injured while working at night. But the other party seemed to have misunderstood.

He looked up at the person in front of him again. With his very short haircut, a bandage around his neck, and a splint on his right arm, and today, inexplicably, he wore a pure black short-sleeved shirt.

He did indeed look a bit too intimidating.

Xie Dongcheng managed to complete his first negotiation in a daze, even though he wasn’t sure how it went so smoothly.

“Oh, and he gave me these,” Xie Dongcheng took out two new envelopes from his bag.

“What are these?” Yu Zi took them and opened one, finding two beautiful hard cards inside.

“It’s the cocktail party we’ll be serving. He described it as very upscale, organized by a well-known real estate developer. He said he caused us trouble before and invited us to join.”

Yu Zi flicked the two cards with his index finger, thinking that wherever there were wealthy people, there was business to be done.

It turned out to be a good day. Yu Zi was in a good mood for a while, so he hugged Xie Dongcheng’s head and kissed him on the cheek.

Xie Dongcheng’s head suddenly heated up, almost wagging his tail at him.

Yu Zi didn’t know if he had recently stepped on some lucky dog poop, but several originally troublesome matters had made good progress.

The next day, just past noon, Xie Dongcheng told him that a netizen had taken a liking to the new apartment he rented and could sublet it at any time.

After finishing work at the restaurant, they went to the neighborhood around 8 o’clock in the evening.

The landlord and the agent were already waiting there. Yu Zi originally thought that the middle-aged landlord would give them a hard time for a while. But when he saw Xie Dongcheng in black clothes and pants behind Yu Zi, his expression softened instantly. In no time, he handed him the contract and returned the deposit with a smile.

When they went out, Yu Zi couldn’t help but marvel at how useful the black-clad bodyguard with the broken hand was.

The two parked the car on the roadside outside the community. Many shops along the street were still brightly lit, and they weren’t in a hurry to go home, so they walked slowly along the sidewalk.

With the arrival of early summer, the evening breeze became warmer. Yu Zi casually rolled up his sleeves and turned to look at him, saying, “Do you know what I was thinking on the first day I moved in here?”

Xie Dongcheng looked back at him and asked, “What were you thinking?”

“I was thinking, am I going to live in a top-floor stairwell apartment for the rest of my life?” he said with a smile.

Upon hearing this, Xie Dongcheng suddenly fell silent, pursing his lips with a somewhat dark expression.

The two continued walking aimlessly forward and unknowingly arrived at the entrance of a real estate agency. There was a huge advertising banner outside the shop, displaying urgent sales listings within a five-kilometer radius.

Xie Dongcheng involuntarily stopped and glanced at the listings. Then, he saw a two-bedroom apartment listed at over two million yuan, with an elevator, north-south facing, labeled with bold red ink as a “super value offer.”

He turned to Yu Zi beside him and said, “With just over two million, we could buy a small two-bedroom apartment with an elevator. I could sell my house as a down payment and get a mortgage for this kind of apartment…”

“No.” Yu Zi interrupted decisively, shaking his head, and reached out to ruffle his hedgehog-like hair. “Don’t bother with your house.”

Xie Dongcheng didn’t understand why he refused.

“What’s the point of a small two-bedroom? If you’re going to buy, aim for big money like this,” Yu Zi pointed to the bottom line of the advertising banner.

—West Suburban Royal Mountain Villa, with a building area of 408 square meters, equipped with a 200-square-meter bidirectional large garden, total price of 30 million.