Chapter 4: Secretary Zhou Doesn’t Eat People

With the house-hunting temporarily on hold, Gu Yao thought it through and concluded that the long commute might actually be a good motivator for her to save money.

For example—maybe she could scrape together a down payment before she turned thirty and buy a two-bedroom apartment near Qionghai. Then, once her parents retired, she could bring them over to enjoy their twilight years together.

Of course, while it’s nice to dream when you’re young, you also can’t ignore the harshness of reality.

And what is reality?

Housing prices keep climbing, while salaries just barely cover the cost of living.

If she wanted to take out a mortgage using her housing fund, she’d need to prepare around 400,000 yuan. At her current savings rate, that would only take… twenty years?

So really, the key is getting promoted.

It’s funny how a psychological nudge can completely shift your work attitude.

Which explains why, on Monday morning, Gu Yao walked into the office feeling fully recharged—only to realize the place was practically empty. She’d shown up twenty minutes early.

As the saying goes, “The early worm gets eaten by the bird.”

Munching on a breakfast pancake, Gu Yao looked up to find someone both expected and unexpected walking into the office.

“Director Meng.” She stood up from her chair.

Meng Changjun glanced around, then smiled and asked, “Here this early?”

She put down her pancake and pointed at the digital clock on the wall.

The message was clear: Not earlier than you.

After all, he was newly appointed, and no one sleeps well when a superior has asked for a written report—especially not after Secretary Zhou had directly called him out last Friday on the sixth floor.

Youth had its perks—endless energy and no worries. Meng Changjun couldn’t help but envy that a little.

But now it was time to bring the mood back down to earth.

He got straight to the point.

“You’ve been with the Economic Planning Division for a year now—how’s it going?”

He used “Economic Planning Division,” not “Project Office.”

Smart as she was, Gu Yao immediately caught the implication.

She nodded. “It’s good. Pretty much what the public imagines government work to be.”

Sure enough, a sharp one. Secretary Zhou hadn’t misjudged her.

Meng Changjun gave a faint smile and handed over a stack of forms. “Find some time to have everyone fill these out and return them to my office by Thursday after work.”

It was a system performance questionnaire.

At the bottom, it read: Anonymous responses encouraged.

Before she could fully register the moment, she heard his voice at the door again:
“Make sure to eat your pancake while it’s hot. Next time, pair it with some milk—better nutrition.”

“……”

Actually, milk tea would be even better.

Every generation had its own taste preferences. She recalled that Director Meng was around thirty.

Hopefully, he’d live up to the label “young and promising.”

—

Before she knew it, it was mid-June.

The day before Cheng Mu’s birthday, he sent a driver to her office with a hotel key card. He said it was the venue for the celebration—all she had to do was show up. Everything else was taken care of.

Gu Yao was busy at the time and simply took the card and returned to the office to finish processing data. She didn’t really stop to think about what her boyfriend was planning.

It wasn’t until lunchtime in the cafeteria that she overheard some gossip at the next table:
“Did you see the local news? The city’s first seven-star hotel is officially opening tomorrow—and someone’s doing a live proposal event!”

“What’s so exciting about a live-streamed proposal? It’s all staged.”

“That’s not the point.”

A male colleague lowered his voice mysteriously: “Apparently, whether the proposal works or not, the hotel is going to randomly select five lucky viewers from the livestream and give each one a luxury car worth over a million.”

“Seriously? Which hotel is this?” a female colleague asked, pulling out her phone.

The rustle of tapping screens followed.

“Hyatt Shenting, under the Hengyuan Group,” the guy read aloud.

That name—Hyatt Shenting—sounded way too familiar.

Gu Yao quietly pulled out the hotel card.

And instantly froze.

The coincidence was too bizarre. She couldn’t help but message Cheng Mu to probe.

She asked what exactly he had planned for tomorrow.

His reply was vague:

[Got a surprise for you. No matter how late I work, I’ll wait for you. Don’t be late.]

【……】

A growing sense of unease crept over her.

If it was a proposal, it wouldn’t be a surprise—it’d be a full-on shock.

They’d only been dating six months. What exactly was Cheng Mu thinking?

Using a marriage proposal to promote a hotel opening… and giving away cars?

The gossip had completely derailed her focus for the entire afternoon.

But the confusion didn’t stop there. Around 3 p.m., Director Meng summoned her to the fourth floor and told her to prepare—she’d be accompanying him to the municipal building in thirty minutes.

As for what they were going to do, he didn’t say.

But Gu Yao had a pretty good guess—it probably had something to do with the project system.

The municipal building was located in the main urban district, about a twenty-minute drive from their office.

Halfway there, Meng Changjun gave her a heads-up: “There’s a small briefing coming up. Make sure to take careful notes—especially any instructions from Secretary Zhou. Highlight those. They might come in handy later.”

??

That line instantly snapped Gu Yao into high alert.

Seeing her tense up like she was heading to war, Meng Changjun chuckled and offered a few words of comfort. “No need to be too nervous. Once we’re there, just keep your head down and do the work. Secretary Zhou doesn’t eat people.”

Even if he did eat people, the first course would be his department head—not her.

The logic made sense.

But Gu Yao still couldn’t relax. The image of that last system demo kept replaying in her mind.

Someone who sat in that kind of position—every word they spoke carried massive weight.

Who could bear that kind of pressure?

They arrived at the municipal building right at 4 p.m. and took the elevator straight to the seventh floor.

As the elevator doors opened, they happened to bump into Secretary Xu. Greetings were exchanged, and he gestured toward a nearby meeting room. “Secretary Zhou is still tied up—go ahead and wait in the office for a few minutes.”

Meng Changjun nodded, then suddenly remembered something. “Did the 5/18 case get resolved?”

“Completely nailed down,” Xu replied. “The official notice should come out in the next few days.”

That case had caused a stir throughout the entire city. At this point, it was basically an open secret—no need to keep it under wraps.

Still, Xu offered a reminder: “Be cautious with your words in front of Secretary Zhou.”

“Understood. I know where the line is.”

With that brief exchange, Meng Changjun led Gu Yao further down the hall.

The southeast corner of the top floor housed the offices of the top brass.

Standing at the doorway, she took a glance around the office and estimated the space to be several dozen square meters. The overall tone was elegant and understated—authoritative without feeling cold.

In the seating area, three sets of ivory jacquard fabric sofas were arranged around a large tea table made of ebony inlaid with marble. On the left wall, a built-in bookshelf stretched floor to ceiling. It held rows of hardbound books with gold-lettered spines, interspersed with medals and honorary plaques the city had received over the years.

In the corner, a two-meter-tall fiddle-leaf fig tree stretched toward the ceiling from a blue-and-white porcelain planter. It swayed gently in sync with the blinds by the window, creating a scene full of life and calm that eased both the eye and the mind.

They hadn’t even been seated a full minute when a phone rang, breaking the peaceful silence.

“I’m stepping out to take a call,” Meng Changjun said with a quick gesture.

And just like that, Gu Yao was alone in the oversized office.

It was a leader’s turf, after all. Sitting there by herself felt odd, so she stood up, intending to wait outside instead.

As she passed the front area of the office, her peripheral vision caught sight of something hanging on the wall. A piece of calligraphy.

Her footsteps stopped instinctively.

—“The people are the foundation of the nation.”

The brushwork was strong and steady, but not the kind of sharp, imposing script one would expect from a government official.

In fact, the more she looked at the handwriting, the brush pressure, the entire style… the more familiar it seemed.

Where had she seen it before?

She was still staring in deep concentration when a deep, calm voice sounded behind her.

“What do you think?”

Startled, Gu Yao reflexively turned around.

And then—

That dazed expression on her face landed squarely in Secretary Zhou Zhengliang’s line of sight.