Dong Qiangqiang's Story of Leaving Germany

Chapter 1154. Whistleblower

Lei Lanting was much more straightforward than Lao Bai had expected. He swiftly took out the financing and financial advisory agreement template that he had prepared long ago, quickly filled in the numbers, signed his name, and then handed it to Lao Bai.

Lao Bai quickly read through the contents and found nothing unusual. He signed the agreement with a flourish and returned one of the two agreements to Lei Lanting: "Do I need to stamp it for you?"

"No, a signature is enough." Lei Lanting folded the agreement and carefully put it into the inner pocket of his jeans. He pointed behind Lao Bai and said, "Go through the door behind you to the restaurant. The third person from the left by the window is the person you want to meet."

Lao Bai heard the other meaning in his words and raised his eyebrows: "What? Don't you need to be present as a middleman? You are making too much money."

Lei Lanting grinned bitterly and said, "Boss Bai, I also want to go over and say a few good words for you, but not everyone has the opportunity to sit at the table, and they specifically want to see you. But don't worry, I want to earn the brokerage fee, and if you need anything from me during the negotiation, just call me and I'll coordinate. But now I advise you to go over quickly, Boss Lin's patience is probably running out. Oh, by the way, he is very rich, but rich people have bad tempers, so if you want to get money from him, you have to control your temper. Don't you want to make a fortune? Don't you want to get rid of the restrictions imposed on you by Lao Tang and others? Don't you want to gather a group of big wine drinkers? The money is over there." Lei Lanting winked in the direction of the restaurant.

When Lao Bai heard this, he didn't even look at Lei Lanting again. He put away his agreement, turned around and strode towards the restaurant.

"Good luck to you," Lei Lanting called out from behind him, a weird, sly grin on his face.

Walking outside from the air-conditioned coffee shop, Lei Lanting felt the hot and humid air rushing in from all directions, making it almost hard for him to breathe. He endured the discomfort in breathing and jogged quickly towards the McDonald's on the edge of Wangfujing Pedestrian Street a hundred meters away. When he stepped into the dining hall of McDonald's, the cold air enveloped his whole body again.

The hall was packed with people, half of them were eating and half were enjoying the cool air. The shouting and yelling made his head buzz, and with so many people, he couldn't find the person he wanted to see. He took the time to ask the staff for a simple plastic fan, and while fanning himself, he took out his cell phone and dialed a number.

The phone was quickly connected, and a woman's voice came from the phone: "Where are you? How long will it take?"

"I'm at the door," Lei Lanting said, "Where are you?"

The other party did not answer his question. At this time, he saw a person wearing a sun hat near the window suddenly take off the hat, and his long hair rolled out of the hat and fell onto his shoulders. The other person turned his shoulders and he saw a pair of exaggerated large sunglasses covering half of his face.

Lei Lanting knew that this was the person he wanted to meet, so he took two quick steps towards him.

"Hello, Mr. Xu Tongying. I've heard a lot about you. I'm Lei Lanting." Lei Lanting extended his hand to him even though there were still a few tourists between them. "I've wanted to meet you for a long time, but I never had the chance. Today I finally get my wish."

"I don't like people who are late," the woman seemed not to have heard his overtures at all. She turned her face to the window again, looking at the tourists from all over the world outside the window, and said, "especially those who are late for the first meeting."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Xu. Normally, I shouldn't be late for our first meeting, but I do have something to do. Not only will you be interested in my story, but Mr. Tang and the others will be as well." Lei Lanting said, "Old White is raising funds."

The woman remained silent, seemingly not surprised by his news.

"I introduced the investor," Lei Lanting said with a hint of boasting, "but the other party is neither a RMB (fund) nor a US dollar (fund). He is just a coal boss from Shanxi who has some money and wants to learn how to invest. They are chatting in the restaurant of the Beijing Hotel next door right now."

Xu Tongying didn't say anything else. She reached out and picked up her handbag from the seat next to her and put it on the windowsill in front of her, obviously making room for Lei Lanting, and then pushed one of the two drinks in front of her towards her.

Noticing that the other party's attitude suddenly became friendly, Lei Lanting was secretly delighted. While saying "Thank you, Mr. Xu", he sat down next to the other party and took a big gulp of the cold drink.

"Just say what you want to say. I have something to do later." Xu Tongying leisurely turned the Kun watch on his wrist.

"Since Mr. Xu is busy, I'll be frank," Lei Lanting turned his head and burped the cold air that had just come up, "I'd like to trouble Mr. Xu to introduce me to Mr. Tang and Mr. Ji."

"Lei Lanting, you are not even a small shareholder of Lebai, and you are not in the company's employee option pool. Why do you want to meet with Mr. Tang and others?" "Report Lao Bai." Lei Lanting spoke without changing his expression or heartbeat, as if he was talking about a commonplace matter.

"Report?" Xu Tongying's right eyelid twitched. "What crime?"

"Malfeasance, um, and financial embezzlement."

Xu Tongying's heart skipped a beat. Lei Lanting's words were beyond her expectations. She took off her sunglasses, stared at Lei Lanting, and said carefully, "Do you know what you are saying?"

"Of course I know, Mr. Xu. I'm not the kind of person who likes to talk nonsense," Lei Lanting sucked on the straw again and said softly, "I have evidence in my hand."

Xu Tongying stared at him silently for a minute and put on his sunglasses again: "If the evidence in your hand is true, President Tang may sue Lao Bai because of the problems you mentioned. Regardless of whether Lao Bai will step down because of these in the end, internal or external investigations are inevitable. By then, time will be wasted, business will be delayed, and the money of all investors and shareholders may be wasted. So do you want to bring down Lebai?" Xu Tongying's tone was a little harsh when he said the last sentence, and his voice became high-pitched.

"Of course not. I put a lot of effort into Le Bai. How could I just watch it go to waste?" Lei Lanting explained with a smile while holding a straw in his mouth. "Although President Tang and President Ji wiped out all my shares from the employee option pool when they invested in Le Bai, I never minded. Really, I didn't mind at all."

"If I didn't know your real purpose, I wouldn't have introduced you to Mr. Tang."

"Let Lao Bai step down. At the same time, in order to maintain the normal development of Le Bai's business, I hope to get the support of President Tang and President Ji, and of course, President Xu."

"How long have you known Lao Bai?" Xu Tongying suddenly changed the subject, "How long have you two been working together?"

"It started before Le Bai was founded. I encouraged him to found Le Bai," Lei Lanting said nonsense. "I know all his details, and there are many inside stories that I didn't tell you when you did the due diligence on the investment."

Lao Bai walked through a corridor into the restaurant and easily found the person Lei Lanting mentioned.

"Mr. Lin, right? Hello, my name is Bai Zhouyu, you can just call me Lao Bai. I'm sorry for being late. I'm sorry. I apologize." Lao Bai said sincerely while standing in front of the dining table.

The man had a short haircut with a moustache, and wore sunglasses crookedly under his scowl. His face was so fat that it was hard to tell his actual age. He wore a blue shirt with vertical stripes on the upper body and black overalls on the lower body. The round flesh on his belly flowed between the two weak overalls strings. Lao Bai had heard that men usually chose overalls when they couldn't wear belts. A gold necklace as thick as a little finger could be vaguely seen at the collar of his shirt. He wore a shiny Vacheron Constantin on his left wrist and a gold bracelet on his right wrist. There were three shiny gold rings and a jade ring on his hands. Lao Bai dealt with all kinds of luxury goods all year round. He could tell at a glance that the man's clothes were worth hundreds of thousands. He didn't know if the man was really rich, but he was definitely a face-saving person.

The man called "Boss Lin" pointed at the whole bottle of 53% alcohol liquor in front of Lao Bai and said, "I don't care about your background or your company's data. If you want to talk to me, drink the wine first. If you can't drink it, get out."

"Okay, Mr. Lin, I accept the penalty for being late." Lao Bai grabbed an empty wine glass and placed it next to the plate. He picked up the white wine and was about to remove the seal when Mr. Lin corrected him, "You're still using a glass? Are you a man? Use a bottle (to drink)."

Lao Bai thought he had misheard. How could he know how much he had drunk with a bottle? Did the other party want him to... drink a bottle? Although he had accompanied investors for a few drinks during previous rounds of financing, he had never encountered an investor who only poured him a bottle without drinking. Only then did he realize that he had been tricked by Lei Lanting: this grandson deliberately made him late, and made up a lie that the other party only wanted to see him, in fact, to avoid drinking.

Seeing Lao Bai stop what he was doing, Mr. Lin smiled contemptuously, stretched out his index finger, poked the air downward with disdain, then waved his hand impatiently, signaling Lao Bai to put down the wine and disappear from his sight.

Lao Bai's face turned ugly and his silence lasted for dozens of seconds. He neither turned around and left nor put down the bottle.

Mr. Lin had an ugly expression on his face and cursed without any hesitation. The northern dialect is not difficult to understand. Lao Bai could hear it clearly. Mr. Lin was calling him a coward.

The scolding did not anger Lao Bai's sensitive nerves. Instead, it reminded him of the faces of the two investor-shareholders named Tang and Ji when they were suppressing him, the various rules and regulations that restricted his performance, the frustration he felt when SARS was rampant in the first half of the year, and the performance he failed to achieve in the second half of the year after working hard for a long time.

He slowly unscrewed the bottle cap, slowly put it on the table, and raised the bottle towards Mr. Lin.