How did it feel to become worth hundreds of millions overnight?

If someone were to interview Lin Jingzhe now, he might’ve replied: “I feel like I have achieved a minor step :).”

The company that won the auction was the current leader in its industry and the largest real estate company in China. Even so, this half-million square meters piece of land would be the biggest project they’d developed so far. One could imagine how optimistic they were about the future development of Yan City.

After all the formalities were completed, the “flower” at Shiku Lane fell into another’s hand. Lin Jingzhe was left with a hefty sales invoice and a nine-digit figure in his bank account.

After deducting the sum total of his loan and interest (the loan had been provided by the same bank), and adding the money from the loan that was left over, Lin Jingzhe was now worth over a hundred million yuan.

Although the inflation rate had already begun to rise—for example, unskilled workers’ incomes had nearly doubled since the mid-to-late 80s—in this era where a few hundred yuan a month was considered a high salary, the value represented by 100 million yuan was absolutely incomparable with its buying power in the future. Two decades later, when the commercial and economic development of China would be more or less mature, there could be countless small entrepreneurs worth a similar amount. At present, however, even in Yan City, there were a scant few companies whose current assets could reach a nine-digit figure.

The “land king’s” auction shook the whole real estate industry. The small and medium-sized enterprise owners’ hearts trembled when they recalled the giants constantly increasing their bids as they competed that day. When the development of this now high-profile piece of land began, attracting a fresh wave of attention, New Beginnings Real Estate got their share of the publicity as well.

Without giving Deng Mai much time to digest the news, Lin Jingzhe pushed the poor sod who had just finished his short-term business course to the front stage. As such, Deng Mai had the privilege of becoming the first employee of New Beginnings Real Estate since its inception and was probably the youngest “general manager” of any real estate business.

Although he was called the general manager, there was hardly anything to manage in the company at the moment. Lin Jingzhe’s main aim was to let him gain some experience and see the real, dog-eat-dog business world which differed from its civilized portrayal in textbooks.

This was the best time for some hands-on learning. Before New Beginnings Real Estate undertook a new project, the majority of what Deng Mai needed to do was to participate in some inconsequential social activities. During this period of time, the mistakes he’d make would not have much impact on the company, even if he screwed up a few times.

Lin Jingzhe had no choice but to train Deng Mai using this method. Of course, in these early days of the company, he’d prefer to have someone who was an old hand at business management, but from the early 90s to the early 2000s, this type of resource was extremely scarce in China—and reliable ones were harder to find than an abominable Yeti. In addition, the initial stage of a company’s development was its most vulnerable time; any senior executive admitted at this juncture could influence the culture and future course of the company to a great extent. Strangers with unclear backgrounds were inherently untrustworthy, and the waters of Yan City ran deep—if they unsuspectingly let a wolf in the house, getting devoured would be only a matter of time.

Lin Jingzhe had long stopped believing in the goodness of human nature. The misfortunes he suffered in his last life had been caused by humans, so it was inevitable that he was now extremely cautious about trusting anyone.

Fortunately, Deng Mai lived up to Lin Jingzhe’s expectations.

Some people were born with innate interpersonal skills and Deng Mai was one of them. Despite his inexperience and literally getting thrown into the deep end, he performed well on every occasion. He was tight-lipped and had an agile mind, and furthermore, he was neither timid nor battle-shy. Facing a group of wily old foxes the same age as his father, he was still able to handle them with ease, not revealing any of Lin Jingzhe’s cards or insider information regardless of how he was coaxed and pressured.

Like Hu Shaofeng and Fang Wenhao, he possessed the kind of vigor and confidence distinct to young entrepreneurs, quite different from Lin Jingzhe and Xiao Chi’s cool style. Of course, the latter were better at controlling the situation at a negotiating table, but when the negotiations took place at a banquet table, charm and wit was much more effective.

The record-breaking auction instantly pushed New Beginnings Real Estate into the spotlight. Naturally, this was a good thing and Lin Jingzhe had already foreseen this in his plans, but it also came with some downsides, like countless dinner invitations. Everyone in the industry was curious about this company which seemed to have appeared out of thin air.

Accepting invitations from the bigshots went without saying, but smaller players should not be underestimated either. The most important thing to have in the business world was a network—making your business thrive without good connections was nigh impossible.

Lin Jingzhe accompanied Deng Mai to two of the more important events. Once Deng Mai got used to them and had no trouble avoiding attempts to probe for information, he took this as an official pardon and stopped attending any events except for those where he was absolutely required to show up in person.

After all, with the company barely taking off, he had much important work to do and needed to balance it with his studies on top of that. He really had no time to spare.