The receptionist was a lady with a bit of baby fat though she was quite pretty and pa.s.sionate in greeting people.
Even after she heard that Su Yang was there to discuss a collaboration, she did not look down on him because of his young age. She took his details carefully and made a call to the office to inform the intermediary that Su Yang contacted.
The intermediary was a young man in his mid-20s around 175 cm tall and slightly worn out. His shirt was a little wrinkled but clean. His hairstyle was not fashionable but was washed and it did not look oily at all.
In short, he looked like the most typical white-collar male or salaryman in Shanghai.
He pa.s.sionately greeted Su Yang when he came out and even shook his hand. He signed the record book at the reception and then brought Su Yang into the office.
The intermediary company was not small by any means. On the office floor, there were almost 50 workstations within Su Yang's sight and there were also some independent offices and meeting rooms, so there were around 60 employees in the company.
The young man brought Su Yang to a small meeting room. He then introduced himself, "Nice to meet you. I'm w.a.n.g Dong, an intermediary of Junqing Intermediary. You seem young enough, so you can just call me Brother Dong."
Su Yang obliged to his kindness. "Brother Dong, I'm Su Yang, a student at Shanghai University."
A tinge of surprise appeared in w.a.n.g Dong's gaze at Su Yang. "That prestigious university? Not bad. I didn't expect that a random call would allow me to meet a student from a prestigious university."
"Maybe it's fate," Su Yang joked.
Both of them clicked together quickly. Su Yang and w.a.n.g Dong chatted for almost 10 minutes and they got a better understanding of each other's situation.
w.a.n.g Dong more or less fit Su Yang's expectations. He was from Shannan Province but came to Shanghai to study interior design. He graduated from university six years ago and continued to stay in this city to make a living though not as what he studied which was an interior designer. Instead, he worked as an intermediary.
The boss of this intermediary company was someone with an impressive background and the benefits were quite attractive. w.a.n.g Dong had been working for over a year and was able to get all kinds of jobs.
Examples of such jobs included buying fake fans for some artist or filling up a certain event with fake tourists, or even attracting potential clients for property companies and finding people to play as potential clients for a property show.
According to w.a.n.g Dong, what he got were considered the simplest cases. His higher-ups were engaged in head-hunting and pulling strings for other companies to meet their potential collaborators. However, all those cases were beyond his pay grade.
After w.a.n.g Dong's introduction, Su Yang got a better understanding of the company background. 'It seems like a well-connected company.'
The two of them moved on to the job after they chatted and got a better understanding of each other. w.a.n.g Dong expressed his concerns about Su Yang's cla.s.smates pretending to be potential clients for a property company.
He rubbed the stubble at his chin and asked, "If all of you are students, visiting a showhouse together would seem fake since those who are capable of buying houses are mostly in their late 20s or early 30s. It's manageable if there were only one or two but a group of students of 18 to 19 years old would give us away in an instant. It'd be obvious that someone paid them to be there."
"Brother Dong, the students in my course aren't printed from the same mold. Some look old whereas some look young, am I right? I'll a.s.sign each of them a character to play. The younger-looking ones can go solo and don't need to fake it. They can just be curious students who want to understand the local properties more," Su Yang explained.
"The older-looking ones will be grouped in pairs of different genders, of course. They can be fresh graduate couples in their 20s who want to do a survey before persuading their parents to buy a unit or a property.
"Since it's our first collaboration, I won't call too many of them—20 of them, tops. With a little work, they will be equally scattered with different ident.i.ties, so they won't catch any attention and their ident.i.ties will work out."
Su Yang also added, "I'll try my best to pick those who appear old. You don't have to worry about that. I want to make this collaboration the first of many, thus I a.s.sure you I won't screw it up."
w.a.n.g Dong was obviously moved by Su Yang's explanation. He pondered it for a while before he nodded. "Okay, let's go with it."
Junqing Intermediary was a legitimate company, so it had a certain set of standard operating procedures to follow before executing a job. After the two of them reached an accord, w.a.n.g Dong brought the proposal to his supervisors. The job got the green light and two sets of contracts were brought over to Su Yang.
Su Yang used his limited legal knowledge to skim through the contract. He did not find any problem with it except for the terms that required him to keep this job confidential. Other than that, it was fine.
The terms about the payment were also clearly stated. The first deposit was 20% and 60% would be paid after the job while the remaining 20% would be cleared at the end of the month.
Su Yang did not know how good or how bad the terms were, and since he was the second party, he did not have the right to change the terms. All he could do was agree and sign the contract.
Su Yang also left his bank account and bank name on the contract. w.a.n.g Dong brought the signed contract to his supervisor and the finance director for their additional signatures. The signed contract was then handed over to the finance department.
The finance department of the company was quite efficient. In less than half an hour, Su Yang received a notification from his phone and received the 480 yuan deposit.
Su Yang ran a quick calculation in his mind. '20 people, 100 each. I get 20% in intermediary fees which is…400. Great!'
The amount was relatively small compared to a million, but the goal could only be reached through acc.u.mulation.
Besides, it was his first collaboration with the company. Su Yang remembered that he still had to find fake fans for Han Yi. That job alone could earn him 5,000 yuan. If these two jobs worked out well, he could get close to Junqing Intermediary and secure himself a stable source of income.
At the very least, if he could work with the company seven to eight times per month, he would be able to earn 10,000 to 20,000 yuan. In six months, he would be able to complete a tenth of the Silver Mission. Was that not great?
It was already 5.30 after everything was settled. w.a.n.g Dong generously asked Su Yang for dinner.
Since Su Yang also wanted to be closer to w.a.n.g Dong, he agreed to the invitation.
After work, the two of them found a little restaurant nearby and settled in. It was not far from Su Yang's campus, but he had never been there before.
As the host, w.a.n.g Dong ordered several dishes and some beer, and the two of them soon dug in.
w.a.n.g Dong popped a bottle of beer for Su Yang and pa.s.sed it to him. "Wanna have some?"
Su Yang shook his head. "I can't drink."
As w.a.n.g Dong laughed, he did not pressure Su Yang. He put the bottle of beer at his side and said sentimentally, "When I first saw you today, I felt a sense of familiarity. It was as though I was looking at my younger self from eight years ago."
When Su Yang looked at w.a.n.g Dong, he saw the man was reminiscing his memories. There was also a tinge of helplessness mixed with a little disappointment in his expression. The man bitterly shook his head and drained the gla.s.s of beer dry.
Su Yang tried to hold him back. "Brother Dong, take it slow."
w.a.n.g Dong smiled at him. "It's fine. I trained myself for this."
After another gla.s.s, w.a.n.g Dong asked, "Su Yang, you aren't local, are you?"
Su Yang nodded.
"Where from? Shannan? Jiujiang? Qingjiang?"
"Jiujiang."
"You're from a farming village, aren't you?"
Su Yang nodded.
w.a.n.g Dong smiled as he shook his head and another gla.s.s of beer was drained dry. He sighed heavily after he put the gla.s.s down. "We are so alike."
Su Yang did not answer. As a matter of fact, he also felt a sense of familiarity when he saw w.a.n.g Dong. It felt as if he was looking at his future self, or what his future self could be.
They shared similar family backgrounds, similar experiences, and similar pa.s.sions about life. It was just that w.a.n.g Dong started eight years earlier.
'Without the system, will I become like Brother Dong in the future?"
