I See through Everything

Chapter 106: Chapter 89: Coming One After Another

"General Manager Jiang, our Baisan Investment is a world-class strategic investment firm. We have also successfully helped many famous domestic companies go public in North America."

Jiang Miao simply smiled and didn’t speak.

Seeing this, Li Rongyao continued his eloquent pitch, painting a picture of a bright future. "Our firm is very optimistic about Hailufeng Company’s future. We’ve given it a valuation at a 60-times price-to-earnings ratio, which comes to a future valuation of 60 billion Hua Yuan."

"So, what kind of partnership does your company have in mind?" Jiang Miao asked, his eyes crinkling into a smile.

"I’m certain our proposal will satisfy you, General Manager Jiang. A Series A investment of 3 billion Hua Yuan for a 30% stake in your company. We’ll also commit to helping you list in North America and break into the European and American markets."

"Three billion is certainly a good number, but unfortunately, I have no intention of selling any shares," Jiang Miao rejected him outright.

Li Rongyao seemed prepared for Jiang Miao’s firm stance. He smiled, shook his head, and began to persuade him with practiced earnestness, "You’ve misunderstood, General Manager Jiang. We are purely financial investors. We would not interfere with your management of the company. This has always been our investment strategy. I hope you’ll give it serious consideration. After all, it’s a win-win scenario."

"But my company isn’t lacking funds. There’s no need to sell shares for capital." The expression on Jiang Miao’s face remained as pleasant as ever.

Faced with the intractable Jiang Miao, Li Rongyao thought to himself, ’This guy really is impossible to persuade. Looks like I’ll have to find another way. Fine. Let’s see how long you can keep your composure. We’ll see about that.’

Through his appraisal panel, Jiang Miao saw the man’s malicious brainwave signals spike again. He thought, ’This reckless fool has just signed his own death warrant.’

Neither had good intentions, but both kept smiling.

A wry, helpless smile touched Li Rongyao’s lips. "It seems we’re not destined to work together. But as they say, let’s part on good terms even if the deal is off. Here’s my card. If you change your mind, General Manager Jiang, you can call me anytime. The doors of Baisan Investment are always open to Hailufeng Company."

"Heh. Thank you for thinking so highly of us, General Manager Li. I hope we have a chance to work together in the future."

Jiang Miao took the card, then picked up his teacup and raised it in a distant toast.

Despite this blatant dismissal, Li Rongyao showed no sign of the anger he felt. In his mind, he had already marked Jiang Miao and Hailufeng Company for retaliation, but on the surface, he maintained his suave, gentlemanly facade.

"In that case, we’ll take our leave."

"Take care. I won’t see you out."

From a window on the second floor, Jiang Miao toyed with the business card as he watched their car leave the company parking lot.

Beside him, a worried Jiang Haibo asked, "Boss, I’ve heard Baisan Investment has many strategic partners all over the world. By rejecting them so directly, won’t they come to hold a grudge against our company?"

"Don’t worry," Jiang Miao said, his expression perfectly calm. "I’ll handle it."

The moment Jiang Haibo saw that look on Jiang Miao’s face, he was reminded of the past incident with the stolen confidential feed formula. The boss had worn the exact same self-assured expression back then.

Perhaps it was his confidence in his boss, but Jiang Haibo put the matter out of his mind. He left the reception room to attend to other company business.

Jiang Miao, however, didn’t return to his lab.

He went to his chairman’s office—or more precisely, to the private lounge within it.

Though it was called a private lounge, the room was actually filled with all sorts of computers and electronic equipment.

After closing the heavy security door, he sat down in an ergonomic chair, opened a program on his computer, and typed in a phone number.

It was none other than the cell phone number from Li Rongyao’s business card.

In less than ten minutes, he had penetrated the phone’s backend. Using a backdoor in the calling function—a feature built into every phone at the factory—he accessed the call log program.

Now, whenever the man made a call, the entire conversation would be recorded and automatically sent to a cloud storage space Jiang Miao had set up.

At the same time, Jiang Miao copied the phone’s contact list and the account information for all of its social media apps.

Next, he breezed into Baisan Investment Company’s internal network. Their dedicated firewall and even their physical air-gapping measures were completely useless.

They had forgotten one critical fact: as long as they used chips manufactured in North America, South Korea, or Great Ryukyu, even physical isolation was pointless. The micro-systems of the chips themselves had backdoors etched into them from the moment they were designed.

It was these pre-installed backdoors inside various chips that allowed Jiang Miao to move through the internet completely unimpeded.

He used the employees’ own cell phones to send out a special wireless signal, activating the hidden backdoor programs in the chips of nearby laptops.

He then used those same employee phones as signal relays, modifying their data usage limits so that the service providers wouldn’t detect the massive amounts of data being used in such a short time.

Jiang Miao’s eyes scanned ten lines at a time, rapidly browsing the internal network. He was carefully searching for information on the executives and the ultimate owner of Baisan Investment Company.

Soon, he had locked onto eight targets.

’These guys aren’t necessarily the real owners. Let’s have a look at your company’s share structure...’

Over the next three hours, he followed the web of connections and corporate shareholdings of each target, hacking his way into the databases of various offshore financial centers.

Finally, he pieced together a massive tree diagram. It involved 832 individuals and 352 companies. This intricate web of relationships ultimately pointed to a single private enterprise in North America: Albert United Investment, whose owner was a man named David A. Locke.

On the surface web, this David A. Locke was practically a ghost. The only article that even mentioned him was about a donation he’d made to a charity in the Los Angeles area of America.

Just then, Jiang Miao saw that Li Rongyao’s phone was placing a call.