After breaking up with my boyfriend, I made a fortune and rose rapidly in my career.

"A leader would like to speak with you privately."

Chen Ping didn't move.

People from the Organization Department don't appear in this kind of situation without a reason. The closed-door meeting had just ended, and people were still walking down the corridor. The fact that they came to intercept him at this time meant that the other party had been waiting for him.

"Now?"

"Now, the car is in the underground parking lot, level B2."

Chen Ping followed him into the elevator. The two stood in the car, neither speaking. As the elevator descended, the floor numbers jumped down one by one, stopping at B2.

The door opened. A dark gray Toyota Coaster was parked in the corner, its windows tinted dark, obscuring the interior. The driver didn't get out; the engine was idling, and a wisp of white smoke billowed from the exhaust pipe.

The people from the Organization Department opened the car door and stood to the side.

"please."

Chen Ping bent down and got into the car.

The carriage was dimly lit, and a person sat in the back. He had gray hair, a thin face, and cheekbones that accentuated the skin on both sides, but his overall aura was extremely stable. He sat there upright with his back straight.

Chen Ping recognized him at a glance.

Lu Zheng, Deputy Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee.

In the power hierarchy of Jiangdong Province, this name ranks third. Below the provincial party secretary and above the governor. But Lu Zheng rarely appears in public reports; there's a saying among provincial officials: Lu Zheng doesn't manage things, he manages people.

"sit."

Lu Zheng's voice wasn't loud, but every word was crisp and clear, without any unnecessary syllables.

Chen Ping sat down opposite him, and the car door was closed from the outside with a muffled "thump".

The car didn't move.

Lu Zheng glanced at him, made no small talk or pleasantries, and directly took out a pack of cigarettes, took one out and put it in his mouth, but didn't light it.

"I didn't attend the meeting just now, but I read the materials."

Chen Ping sat up straight and placed his hands on his knees.

"Your standard alliance proposal has a good framework, and Governor Zhou is very satisfied."

Lu Zheng took the cigarette out of his mouth and twirled it between his fingers.

"But I didn't call you today to talk about this."

The Coaster slowly started and drove out of the underground garage via the ramp. Sunlight filtered through the window film, turning into a dark gold that bathed the space between the two people.

The car drove east along the main road of the provincial capital, passing the glass-walled office buildings in the new district, and then turned into the old city. The street suddenly narrowed, with red brick buildings from the 1970s and 80s on both sides, hardware stores and breakfast stalls on the ground floor, and spider web-like cables hanging from the utility poles.

Lu Zheng raised his chin, gesturing towards the outside of the car window.

"Watch this movie."

Chen Ping turned his head to look. A large area of ​​old residential buildings slated for demolition was half-fenced. The construction cranes were standing upright but not rotating; work had stopped. A huge planning map was pasted on the fence, depicting a modern commercial complex.

"The renovation of the old city of the provincial capital has been talked about for six years."

Lu Zheng put the cigarette back in the cigarette case and closed the lid.

"The first vice governor in charge wanted to demolish and rebuild quickly, clearing all the problems in three years. As a result, the masses petitioned and went all the way to Beijing. The second governor changed his approach and carried out on-site protective development, investing 800 million yuan to build an antique-style street. Tourists didn't come, and the locals didn't appreciate it either."

He turned his head and stared at Chen Pingfang.

What do you think?

Chen Pingfang did not answer immediately. He looked out the window at the stagnant construction site. On the inner wall of the fence, there was still a construction notice from six months ago, the edges of which were curled up and could be blown over by the wind.

This is not a question about urban renewal.

Lu Zheng is the deputy secretary of the provincial party committee, in charge of organization and cadres. Urban renewal has absolutely nothing to do with his area of ​​responsibility. When he pointed out the window and asked this question, he wasn't asking about urban construction at all.

The question is about the logic of governance.

"Secretary Lu, let me use something I'm familiar with as an example."

Lu Zheng slightly raised his chin, indicating that he should speak.

"The architecture design of chips needs to be iterated with each generation. The core contradiction of iteration is only one: speed and redundancy."

Chen Pingfang spoke slowly, pausing between sentences.

"A fast-running architecture has low redundancy, low power consumption, and maximum performance. But if it encounters an unexpected operating condition, the entire system will crash, with no fault tolerance."

Lu Zheng tapped his fingers lightly twice on his knee.

"A slow-running architecture has a lot of redundancy and can withstand various unexpected events, but its efficiency is low and the market can't wait for it."

Chen Ping paused for a moment.

"Therefore, the chips that can actually be mass-produced are never the fastest ones, nor the most stable ones. It's about finding a balance between speed and redundancy that just passes the yield test."

He glanced out the window at the abandoned construction site.

"The same applies to urban renewal. Rapid demolition and construction prioritize speed but sacrifice redundancy, leaving no room for error for the public, which leads to failure. Preservation in situ prioritizes redundancy but sacrifices speed, exhausting the market's patience, which also fails."

Lu Zheng stopped knocking.

"In my opinion, both leaders made the same mistake—they were making decisions based on a single indicator. The first only looked at the progress of demolition, and the second only looked at cultural preservation. But a city is not a product of a single indicator; a city is a system."

Chen Ping removed his hand from his knee, put his five fingers together, and drew a line in the air.

"The system's equilibrium point cannot be found from any single dimension. We have to put all the variables together, run a simulation, and see which combination can pass the yield test."

"Yield test?" Lu Zheng repeated these four words.

"That's right. In the chip industry, the standard for yield testing is not zero defects, but rather controlling the defect rate within an acceptable range. The same applies to city governance—it's impossible to satisfy everyone, but the proportion of dissatisfaction can be reduced to below the threshold that the system can tolerate."

Silence fell over the carriage.

The Coaster turned onto a road along the river. Several barges were moving on the river, and their horns could be heard muffledly through the windows.

Lu Zheng's back never leaned against the chair back. He sat there with his hands folded over his knees, his thumbs slowly rubbing together twice.

"Your analogy is interesting."

The three-word evaluation was neither particularly warm nor cold, but Chen Pingfang noticed that Lu Zheng stopped rubbing his thumb. Having been immersed in the system for so many years, he knew that when a leader truly approves of someone, they won't say much.

"Governor Zhou mentioned you to me."

Chen Ping's back tensed up.

"Not today, it was last month." Lu Zheng turned his head to look at him. "He said there's someone in Nanzhou who understands both technology and politics, but not the slippery kind of understanding."

Chen Ping didn't respond.

"I didn't pay much attention at the time; I've heard that kind of talk a lot when recommending cadres. But I had my secretary take notes of everything you said at the meeting today."

Lu Zheng reached into the briefcase beside him and pulled something out.

It's not a document, and it's not a business card.

It is a fountain pen.

The pen is entirely black, without any brand logo, and has a thin gold line on the cap. It is very simple and heavy.

Lu Zheng placed the pen on the armrest between the two of them.

"This pen has been with me for twenty-three years."

Chen Ping looked down at the pen but didn't reach for it.

"When I was transferred from the county party secretary to the provincial level, my old leader gave it to me. He said something like, 'A pen weighs a thousand pounds.'"

Chen Ping raised his head.

"When you sign, the pen touches the paper, and the fate of millions moves with it. Not many people can bear that weight."

Lu Zheng pushed the pen half an inch toward Chen Ping.

"Take it."

Chen Ping reached out, and the moment his fingertips touched the pen, the coolness of the metal seeped through his skin. The pen was much heavier than it looked, weighing heavily in his palm.

The Coaster stopped at an intersection; the light was red.

Lu Zheng turned his head to look out the window. The abandoned old city renovation site was now behind him. In front of him was the outline of the provincial government building, its glass curtain wall reflecting a white light in the afternoon sun.

"You already know that the inspection team will be arriving in Nanzhou next week."

Chen Ping put the pen into the inside pocket of his shirt, the pen pressed against his chest, the coolness seeping in through the shirt.

"But you probably don't know what happens after the inspection."

Lu Zheng did not continue speaking.

The light turned green, the car started moving again, heading towards the provincial government. Chen Ping sat opposite him, the pen in his inner pocket pressing against his sternum with each slight sway of the car.