Can following the rules be called rebirth?

Chapter 249, Section 247: You Must Never Change
Mediation is an art.

Countless legal professionals have learned a great deal from this art.

"But seriously..."

Li Zhi bent her fingers and gently tapped the edge of the car window, her tone like a pebble thrown into a calm lake.

“When I was choosing my major, I often browsed Weibo. It said that studying too much law can make you inhuman.”

"Actually, I think it makes a lot of sense."

"."

Zhou Mingyuan blinked, as if he had caught something from her tone, and turned his head away.

"How to say?"

For example...

Li Zhi swirled the latte in her hand, watching the tiny bubbles continuously form and burst, a subtle smile curving her lips.

"Although I no longer have to run around with Zhuo Lu all the time, she still gives me the case files she has to study every now and then."

"are you busy?"

"It's not just about being busy."

The short-haired girl shook her head: "What I mean is not simply working overtime."

"It should be described as a process of continuously re-understanding the complexity and bottom line of human beings."

"She, a lawyer specializing in marriage and family law, often said something to me."

"What?"

Who isn't an expert in marriage and family matters?

Zhou Mingyuan's curiosity was piqued, and he asked with a smile.

"When you step into our meeting room, you need to put on the highest level of bulletproof vest for your values, plus a psychological shielding field."

Li Zhi shrugged, looking like she didn't want to speak, but hesitated to say anything.

"I used to do mostly administrative work, so I didn't have any deep understanding of it."

"Now~"

The girl couldn't help but let out a meaningful sigh.

"Are you analyzing bizarre cases every day now?"

The man leaned forward slightly, showing great interest and concern.

"Tell me about it."

Having known Li Zhi for so long, he knew about her family background long ago.

Xiao Lizhi's family are all legal professionals; they practically grew up reading thick law books in the study.

Her family was frequented by top judges and lawyers; her worldliness was ingrained in her very being.

A case that she could describe in this tone must be something unprecedented.

"."

Li Zhi chuckled softly, but there was little warmth in her voice.

"Let me tell you about a few cases I've seen recently."

"The customer is a lady, so we'll call her Ms. Wang. She and her husband came to Jiangcheng together in the late 1990s to make a living, starting with a small clothing export store."

"She managed finances, handled customs affairs, and attracted clients. She was even counting and packing in the warehouse when she was seven or eight months pregnant."

“During the most difficult times, the two of them would share a boxed lunch. She would always give the meat to her husband, who was still Xiao Zhang at the time, saying that he needed strength to go out and meet clients.”

Zhou Mingyuan listened silently and nodded.

He's been through it all, so it's not hard to imagine how difficult starting a business can be.

"Later, the company grew bigger and became a group with its own brand and factories."

"The children are grown up and need someone to discipline them, and her husband has become General Manager Zhang, who is incredibly considerate to her."

"Honey, you've worked so hard all these years, it's time to come home and enjoy life. Leave the company matters to me."

Ms. Wang was deeply moved, feeling that her hardships had finally come to an end. She returned home to become a full-time housewife, taking care of her husband and children. Her social circle also became a gathering place for other wealthy women to have afternoon tea and charity galas.

The long line of cars during the morning rush hour seemed endless, moving very slowly and melting into the morning mist.

"That's quite common, isn't it? It's nice to have an easy life when you're not short of money."

Zhou Mingyuan said.

"The most common paths often lead to the most common traps!"

Li Zhi's eyes lit up.

"Over the years, the company has gone through multiple rounds of financing, restructuring, and preparations for overseas listing. The process is very complicated and requires signing a lot of documents."

"Based on her absolute trust in her husband, Ms. Wang signed the document almost without even looking at it. Her husband's excuse was always that it was all for the company's development, that it was done by professionals, and that there was no problem."

The short-haired girl paused, took a sip of coffee, and let the warm liquid slide down her throat.

"Until recently, she accidentally discovered that her husband not only had a stable mistress, but also a son who had already started international kindergarten."

"She was struck dumb, and after the collapse, she remembered to seek legal recourse. That's when she came to consult a lawyer with a stack of blurry photocopies."

"The institute spent a tremendous amount of effort and mobilized almost all its resources to barely uncover the hidden path of the equity transfer."

"This person used a series of extremely complicated operations, including layers of shareholding in overseas BVI companies, family trusts, nominee agreements, and non-transactional transfers. It was all stuff that I couldn't understand even when I was holding the case files."

"Ms. Wang's originally clear shareholding was gradually diluted and transferred, and eventually completely stripped away, broken up into smaller parts, and placed under the names of other people in the form of trust beneficiaries."

"From a legal perspective, this company, valued at hundreds of millions, has almost no direct ownership relationship with Ms. Wang. She has been perfectly ousted from the game."

Li Zhi let out a long sigh.

“He has completely forgotten, or rather selectively forgotten, that the company’s first pot of gold was raised by Ms. Wang’s family, that the first major client was a contract that Ms. Wang obtained after drinking until she had a stomach hemorrhage, and that even the company’s earliest management model was something Ms. Wang learned from a foreign company.”

The short-haired girl leaned against the soft passenger seat, her eyes scanning the scenery rushing past the window.

"Look, when a man gets rich and moves up the social ladder, look at the woman beside him..."

"His partner, who had witnessed all his wretched and humble past, became particularly glaring."

As she spoke, her gaze returned to Zhou Mingyuan's face, scrutinizing him from head to toe.

The man didn't speak, but Li Zhi continued on her own.

"Let me give you another example."

The short-haired girl spoke again.

"This is a textbook example of how wealth manipulates emotions."

"The protagonist is Mr. Li, who is nearly seventy years old and financially independent. He has married his fourth wife, a famous pianist who is under thirty years old."

"They are both talented and beautiful, and appear to be a loving couple in public. Naturally, they have a thick prenuptial agreement, which we consider to be standard practice."

Zhou Mingyuan nodded, indicating his understanding.

"Here comes something interesting."

Li Zhi crossed her arms.

“Mr. Li has established a large charitable trust fund, which mainly supports music education in remote areas.”

"It sounds incredibly noble, doesn't it? It's also full of social responsibility and even has a touch of romance."

"It seems so."

Zhou Mingyuan echoed.

"But the terms of this trust document are so ingenious they send chills down your spine."

Li Zhi lowered her voice, and her tone became icy.

"The terms stipulate that even if Mr. Li himself loses his capacity for civil conduct or even passes away in the future, his fourth wife, as one of the trustees, will have absolutely no right to interfere with any operation of the fund."

"."

Zhou Mingyuan slowed down the pressure on the accelerator.

"What's even more amazing is!"

"The trust terms also stipulate that after his death, Mrs. Li will receive an annual allowance from this charitable trust that is sufficient to maintain her current top-level standard of living."

"But the prerequisite is that she cannot remarry, or even have a publicly acknowledged stable cohabiting partner." "Once verified by the foundation, the allowance will be terminated immediately and permanently."

"Wow, a canary kept in captivity its whole life."

Zhou Mingyuan cleared his throat and commented.

"Very accurate."

Li Zhi clenched her small fists: "He didn't believe in love, nor in the permanence of marriage. He didn't even believe that his young wife would remain faithful to him after he died."

"But he believed in the design of the system, in the provisions of the law, and in the control that was built with money and that transcended life and death."

"He uses the name of noble charity to practice the most extreme possessiveness."

What is a partner in his eyes?

"It is an artwork that he bought at a huge cost, hoping it would belong to him forever."

"He not only wants to possess it during his lifetime, but also wants to ensure through institutional design that it remains pure after his death and continues to exist as his possession."

"Love? Perhaps it exists, but it's more about objectification and control."

"This is the tragedy of older men marrying younger women."

Zhou Mingyuan couldn't help but sigh.

Who can live a life of luxury and extravagance forever?
When young people have money, they can give their loved ones the best life experience when they first fall in love, turning something beautiful into a legend.

Only when you are rich in your youth can you ride a white horse and laugh freely in the west wind.

Only when you have money in your youth can you live a carefree life and enjoy the good things in life.

By the time you're old and have money, it's all too late.

Even if you fulfill your dream and find a stunning beauty, she won't love you.

When you wriggle on top of her with your potbelly, the sight is simply nauseating.

"But everyone is saying that this is how many of the wealthiest people in the real world handle intimate relationships."

Li Zhi cupped her cheeks in her hands, her tone tinged with a hint of frustration.

“They used lawyers, private investigators, and trust agreements to turn an uncertain romantic relationship into a cold game with clear rules.”

“I didn’t understand before, but I’m starting to understand more and more why some young and beautiful girls are willing to enter into marriages with clearly marked prices but cruel rules.”

"Because at least the rules are clear, and the costs and benefits are written down."

"Compared to those relationships that seem pure but are actually full of variables, and may end up with nothing and being ridiculed for being love-struck, this kind of naked monetary transaction seems fairer in terms of risk-reward and certainty."

silence.

There was a long silence.

The car was filled only with cheerful background music.

"Hey, you say it."

"."

Traffic jam.

A long traffic jam.

It was impossible to walk an inch on the long street.

Zhou Mingyuan rested his chin on his hand, meeting the girl's gaze with a half-smile, waiting for her to finish her question.

When a person's wealth and social resources change dramatically, will their definition of a partner change?

Li Zhi's bright pupils reflected the man's profile, his expression serious.

Will his perception of relationships shift from mutual support and companionship to possession and renewal?

This is actually a relatively pessimistic issue.

Back in the small space of Leying Law Firm, several older lawyers had already discussed this issue.

Human nature is to constantly seek novelty.

If one has the ability and does not need to pay any price, there is almost no solution.

In fact, if Zhou Mingyuan's wealth hadn't increased several times in a short period of time, the story of earning 100,000 yuan a day would have been too fantastical and given Li Zhi a little bit of a shock about money printing.

She wouldn't think about this issue in depth.

The clients in those law firm cases are all men in their thirties or forties. What does that have to do with me?
They're completely unrelated!
"Um"

Zhou Mingyuan also started to take it seriously.

He frowned and analyzed, "Morally speaking, this matter is of course universally condemned."

"But moral constraints are very weak for people with enormous wealth and top-notch legal resources."

He put it very tactfully, but it was all very true.

How to protect hard-earned wealth from being divided by law, how to help people safeguard their rights through legitimate means, and how to exploit loopholes in the system?
These are some of the topics and services that Attorney Zhou explored in depth in his previous life.

"Yes."

Li Zhi nodded vigorously.

"This case made me clearly see that wealth not only changes the quality of life, but also profoundly restructures people's emotional patterns and values."

"Loyalty, gratitude, and sharing—these qualities seem somewhat traditional and fragile in the face of certain things."

She gently ran her fingertips across the leather seat, her eyes lowered.

"So, I don't quite understand."

"Is this the real world?"

"."

The emotions were overwhelming.

This is a good time to joke around and change the subject.

Because men and women are bound to have different perspectives when discussing such serious social issues, it is difficult for them to truly understand each other.

What's even more frightening is that Zhou Mingyuan in his previous life happened to be on the opposite side of what Li Zhi said.

He himself was a lawyer who helped those wealthy people get things done.

But he didn't dodge, nor did he try to beat around the bush with jokes.

Zhou Mingyuan pondered for a moment, then looked into her eyes and spoke slowly.

I think so.

"Wealth can amplify many things, but it doesn't create something out of nothing."

"A person who doesn't know how to love and has no sense of responsibility will become even more reckless after becoming rich."

"But for those who truly cherish relationships, wealth will only make them more grateful for the companionship they once shared and more capable of protecting that affection."

"At least that's how it is for me."

"Whether it's A8, A9, A10, or even A11 in the future, I will never change."

The man raised an eyebrow, his tone remaining nonchalant.

"puff"

Li Zhi met his gaze and couldn't help but chuckle.

"You're bragging!"

"You've made a little money and you're already getting cocky?"

"You just spout nonsense, talking about A9, A10, and A11? You're dreaming. You want to build a giant company from scratch to rival Jack Ma and Pony Ma, right?"

The short-haired girl is also a seasoned internet surfer, so of course she understands these nonsensical jargon about net worth.

A8 represents assets worth tens of millions, A9 represents assets worth hundreds of millions, and so on.

She looked at Zhou Mingyuan for a few seconds, staring into the man's bright eyes, and her smile seemed a little more genuine.

"Okay~"

"No matter how much money you make, hope."

"You must never change."

(End of this chapter)