The department heads all thought Mr. Pei was being modest and trying to reassure them, but Pei Qian knew clearly that he meant every word.

And they were rather helpless truths at that.

Had Tenda Group’s development to its current scale been the result of all employees’ collective efforts, or was it because Mr. Pei was simply destined for greatness, with each instance of his reverse guidance achieving tremendous success?

This had become an unsolvable riddle with no clear answer!

However, from Pei Qian’s perspective, he firmly believed that the company could still operate smoothly without him.

After all, no one knew better than he did that as CEO, he hadn’t really done any actual work. Besides creating trouble, he was merely a mascot for show.

If he had to say, he felt his existence might be similar in significance to Little Tang’s.

Seeing the department heads still looking puzzled, many raising their hands to ask questions, Pei Qian quickly said, “Alright, this matter is settled. Everyone should focus their energy on the negative profit activity for the next two months.”

“I won’t come to the company during these two months, but I’ll continue thinking about how the company will develop in the future. After two months, I’ll hold another meeting to make new arrangements and assignments.”

“Perhaps by then I’ll have changed my mind.”

The department heads looked at each other but remained silent.

They could clearly see that Mr. Pei had made up his mind, and in such a situation, persuasion from anyone would be futile.

Moreover, Mr. Pei hadn’t made his decision final. Since he would be seriously considering Tenda Group’s future development direction over these two months, perhaps he would make some new discoveries during this reflection and change his mind.

So they would wait and see after two months.

If by then Mr. Pei still insisted on his decision, perhaps it truly meant this decision was the better choice for Tenda Group!

At that point, all the department heads would have no choice but to comply and carefully analyze the deeper meaning behind Mr. Pei’s actions.

Pei Qian raised his glass: “Everyone has worked hard during this period, but I still hope you can all continue your efforts and achieve great results in the upcoming negative profit activity!”

…

After the dinner, Pei Qian, accompanied by Zhang Yuan, strolled to the nearby “E-sports Holy Land Ruins.”

The reason this place was called the “E-sports Holy Land Ruins” was because this area once gathered the vast majority of teams from the entire GPL league, and many domestic e-sports clubs had developed from here.

However, with the rapid development of the domestic e-sports industry, mobile villas alone were completely insufficient to support the daily training of these large teams. So the major teams gradually began to move their bases to other areas of Jingzhou, and the e-sports base buildings were built increasingly taller.

As for the few old bases here, they were preserved as tourist areas for e-sports enthusiasts from around the country to regularly visit and pay homage.

Coming to Jingzhou to watch a match at the arena, then visiting these old headquarters of the major bases had become quite an attractive itinerary for many e-sports spectators.

Pei Qian arrived at the old site of DGE E-sports Club and sat on the sofa, recalling various past events from when he established this e-sports club, feeling somewhat emotional.

“How are the preparations for the new league coming along?” Pei Qian asked.

Zhang Yuan replied, “From the current situation, everything is going smoothly. For players on both sides, although there are different aspects where they might lose out or gain advantages, overall everyone is starting from the same line. This merger will inevitably cause a batch of newcomers to emerge and some veterans to retire, which is unavoidable.”

“We’re doing our best to expand the e-sports industry and find the most suitable jobs for these eliminated athletes.”

“I think this is a difficult but necessary task that can’t be rushed. It might take two to three years or even longer to completely integrate the players and viewing audiences of both games.”

Pei Qian nodded slightly, then after thinking for a moment, he added, “The growing popularity of e-sports is certainly a good thing, but we must always be mindful of guiding this popularity appropriately.”

“Although it’s common in intense competitions for fans of both sides to become overly invested, leading to mutual attacks and insults, we should still strive to avoid this and maintain a relatively healthy environment.”

“Many things are worth doing precisely because they are difficult.”

Zhang Yuan quickly nodded: “Yes, Mr. Pei, I understand.”

Pei Qian stood up, preparing to leave, when Zhang Yuan hastily asked, “Mr. Pei, are you really leaving Tenda Group? I don’t quite understand why this is necessary.”

Pei Qian was silent for a moment before saying, “I can’t give you a very compelling explanation right now, but I believe this choice is the right one.”

…

Returning home, Pei Qian leaned back on his sofa, suddenly feeling a sense of relief.

Since the great success of “The Future You Choose” game and film, Pei Qian had barely visited the company for about half a month, instead staying at home.

At first, he felt a bit desperate and questioned his life choices.

Because he couldn’t understand how such an inevitably losing situation could be turned around.

The Anti-Tenda Alliance had clearly delivered a fatal blow, yet Tenda Group had somehow inexplicably turned crisis into opportunity!

From now on, Tenda Group’s development would be smooth sailing, and no other company could pose a real obstacle to Tenda.

Of course, currently Tenda Group was only a giant domestically; internationally, its influence wasn’t particularly strong.

But the problem was that how far a company’s business could go internationally didn’t actually depend on the company’s true strength.

It depended more on various other factors.

Objectively speaking, Tenda Group, at its current level and scale, had actually briefly reached its peak.

This peak didn’t refer to how much of the global market it occupied or how large its volume was, but rather that it was on the most correct path. Its vigorous development trend and the appeal and brand image established in the hearts of domestic consumers had already formed a cross-dimensional strike against other companies.

It was like a large-scale battle.

The true moment of victory might be when one invades the enemy’s headquarters and brings the war’s chief culprit to justice. But in reality, the outcome was determined long before, at the turning point of the key battles.

Pei Qian now stood at this turning point. Looking back at Tenda Group’s past development and forward to its future, he saw a curve soaring skyward.

And at this moment, he felt confused and lost.

This confusion and bewilderment were no longer just about his worry over losing money in this cycle’s settlement. It stemmed more from the unbridgeable gap between how the outside world viewed Tenda Group and Mr. Pei versus the real Tenda Group and Pei Qian himself.

No one else in the world could empathize with this gap.

Pei Qian had never accepted any of the outside world’s praise of him; he had always considered himself just an ordinary person with a bit of determination who could uphold basic moral principles.

But now the outside world’s praise and admiration for him had reached increasingly ridiculous levels!

There’s a saying: “When virtue doesn’t match one’s position, calamity will follow.”

Pei Qian felt this saying described him perfectly.

So despite the conclusion of this final business war, Pei Qian became unprecedentedly confused about his future and Tenda Group’s future.

On one hand, Pei Qian worried that being elevated so high, he would someday fall and shatter completely. On the other hand, he worried that Tenda Group, having developed into such a behemoth and controlling such vast resources, might one day encounter some unexpected incident.

Sometimes, controlling resources itself is a kind of danger.

The scenario depicted in “The Future You Choose” wasn’t just Pei Qian wanting to mock himself; it reflected his genuine underlying concerns.

Tenda Group had become too powerful—so powerful that even he, as CEO, hadn’t completely controlled it.

Perhaps others believed that once Tenda Group strayed from its path, Mr. Pei would immediately step in and use iron-handed measures to bring Tenda Group back on track.

But at this point, Pei Qian might ask an additional question: Am I worthy?

Internet users, including Qiao Liang, had deeply analyzed “The Future You Choose” game and film. Pei Qian had naturally seen many such analyses. Although these people completely misinterpreted Mr. Pei’s original intentions and motivations, the content of these analyses was still meaningful.

So what Pei Qian worried about now wasn’t just how to complete the cycle settlement or how to extract one last big payout from the system. He was more concerned about where Tenda Group should go in the future.

He had been thinking for half a month but had only developed some preliminary ideas. He would need another two months, a year, or even longer to think more deeply about this issue.

Pei Qian truly regretted creating Tenda.

His initial goal was just to get a villa from the system, but now he had inexplicably received much undeserved praise and naturally put on shackles.

If Tenda Group encountered any problems in the future, he, as the CEO, would be the first person held responsible.

Thinking of this, Pei Qian sighed softly, feeling somewhat melancholic.

“Anyway, things have already developed to this point. I won’t think about anything for these two months. I’ll leave the matter of losses to the department heads. Whether we can incur losses in the end will depend on fate—I’m powerless anyway.”

Pei Qian noticed that the system’s restrictions on him seemed to be decreasing.

If one or two years ago, Pei Qian had directly issued orders for negative profit activities to department heads, such commands would definitely have been warned by the system.

But now he could speak directly.

If one were to investigate the reason, it was very likely because the original department heads would have considered “negative profit” as deliberately losing money, but now they wouldn’t. Even if Pei Qian announced a negative profit activity, these department heads would only think that Mr. Pei had some special requirements for the company’s development.

It was hard to say whether the removal of this system restriction was a good thing or a bad thing.

On the positive side, this removal meant Pei Qian could issue increasingly clear instructions to achieve his goal of losing money. But from a pessimistic perspective, perhaps it meant that everyone had already misunderstood Pei Qian, and even if he spoke sincerely, people would always interpret it in other ways.

Undeniably, this scene seemed to exude a dark humor, full of irony.

Pei Qian leaned back on the sofa, looking up at the ceiling, filled with melancholy.