Chapter 2776

And at this moment he no longer worried about those messy things either; whatever came to mind, he said it, even if it meant offending Mr. Wang.

So the next instant, without the slightest hesitation, he said directly: "Mr. Wang, surely you are still worrying about the situation ahead? In my view, this matter must be acted on first and reported afterward. No matter why that Mr. Zhang hung up the phone earlier, whether it was truly a coincidence or not, we must seize the chance to prove ourselves right now!"

"If our people can step into the middle to mediate, satisfy Team One of the Archaeological Expedition, and dissolve this conflict, then I believe Mr. Zhang—even if he really did hang up on us deliberately—will give us another chance, given that we have already done this."

That was what this trusted subordinate had in mind at the moment, and he said it without the slightest hesitation. Hearing this, Mr. Wang's eyes lit up at once; he never in his wildest dreams expected the other man to harbor such an idea, and at the same time he kept blaming himself for truly being a doddering old fool.

Because this was a very simple logic: sometimes acting first and reporting afterward only invites the displeasure of the one pulling the strings behind the scenes. Right now everything was proceeding according to Zhang Lin's wishes, and the same had been true in the past.

If at those critical moments the Wang family suddenly appeared and, under the banner of helping Zhang Lin, went off doing things, then clearly they would gain nothing at all and would only draw Zhang Lin's wrath, which would then become utterly unmanageable.

Even if the Wang family had a chance, it would be squandered into nothing—that was the root of the problem. And now, as Mr. Wang often said, "stick your neck out and it's the blade, pull it back and it's still the blade"—the outcome seemed already fated. Given that, what was there left to worry about?

So Mr. Wang felt he had truly grown old, his mind slowed; the other's reaction had been so fast that before he even realized how it all should unfold, his trusted subordinate had already laid a sound piece of logic right in front of him.

It wasn't that using this method to do the thing would necessarily bring any return, but at least it would let Zhang Lin see the point—far better than staying silent.

Even if he believed there was one last chance to do all this, if he did not search for a point of infiltration in the cracks and merely waited open-mouthed for the so-called opportunity to arrive—

Then any opportunity would dissolve into foam. To put it most bluntly: every opportunity is reserved for those who are prepared.

What Mr. Wang was doing now was, in effect, preparing in disguise. And if one day Zhang Lin looked back at them, he would surely recognize the efforts they had made, and would also see the corresponding returns those repeated actions had brought.

As long as all of it benefited Team One of the Archaeological Expedition, Mr. Wang was confident he could find a chance in the cracks and magnify it without limit—that would be the true salvation of the Wang family.

Freedom, too, perhaps; at least through such a method he could, in the true sense, wash the Wang family clean, rather than, as now, thinking of nothing else, single-mindedly dreaming of pies falling from the sky.

In fact, Mr. Wang felt he should have realized long ago how naive, laughable, and childish his original thinking was—because in this world there has never been such a thing as a pie falling from the sky. Perhaps for Wang Hu, his chance encounter with Wang Canghai was the greatest gift of fate.

Unfortunately that was no pie, but a trap. Mr. Wang was no fool like Wang Hu; once he realized all this, he knew exactly what to do next.

At this moment Mr. Wang was extraordinarily resolute. The trusted subordinate himself had thought Mr. Wang would not change the decision he had made earlier; now, seeing that look on his face, he knew he had won his gamble.

At this point he no longer concerned himself with those worldly niceties—or rather, he deliberately cast aside those troublesome things. He felt that settling the matter at hand quickly was the most critical thing; everything else was utterly unimportant.

Having thought this through, he hurriedly said: "Mr. Wang, shall I give the order right now?"

Mr. Wang could not possibly attend to such things personally; issuing orders to those people was always done by his trusted subordinate on his behalf. He only needed to give one command, and naturally someone would handle it—that was one of Mr. Wang's advantages.

But anyone with eyes could see this was also one of his vulnerabilities. If the Wang family did not have this "ratio" thing, presumably Mr. Wang would not have made such a choice before anything was certain—that would be completely unrealistic. There was only one reason: no one could guarantee another's eternal loyalty.

Yet the Wang family was precisely the exception. Even now the ratio could still be displayed. Under such circumstances, many people's ratios were fluctuating, but there was a small portion of them whose ratios remained permanently stable, never changing in the slightest.

As for those whose ratios were unstable, whatever choices they made could not affect the overall situation. Mr. Wang only needed to confirm one thing: these people would not, at present, turn their spears toward the inside of the Wang family.

Because they might once have been granted authority by him, but now the Wang family's target was too big—whoever gained leadership would become the target of all arrows.

In that case, there was no need for them to keep agonizing over these things; getting out of here quickly was the right path. If Mr. Wang had not led everyone away from here at the start, they would still carry a certain burden in their hearts, and the ratios would not even be fluctuating so violently.

But as subsequent events unfolded, even Mr. Wang took on the appearance of a headlong flight, which caused the loyalty and faith in the hearts of many remaining Wang family members to waver. This wavering mindset was actually the same as doubt—once it arose, it would not simply subside.

And there was another most important point: every single one of them harbored selfish motives. The reason Mr. Wang said more Wang family members than his trusted subordinate expected would stay was that he understood human nature better, and understood better the mechanism of the ratio the Wang family had established.

One could never make inferences with one hundred percent certainty based on that ratio—Mr. Wang was more convinced of this than anyone. In fact, at the very beginning, when Wang Canghai established the Yunsuanbu Sect, Mr. Wang had fallen into that very misconception.

When Wang Canghai told him what the Yunsuanbu Sect actually did, he was overjoyed, thinking he had gained control of something extraordinary.

Being able to project the changes of events fifty years into the future was by no means an easy thing—in plain terms, it was foreseeing the future.