Both men knew clearly what this meeting was about, so there was no need to beat around the bush. Pei Qian didn’t take Meng Chang too seriously either—this was merely a smaller issue among his many troubles. He needed to resolve it quickly so he could move on to other matters.

Pei Qian said: “You already know the general nature of the work. Today I mainly need to discuss salary matters with you.”

“You can freely choose between two models: The first is a fixed salary of 40,000 yuan per month. As long as you complete your work tasks, you won’t miss a penny; The second option is a low base salary plus commission—a base salary of 3,000 yuan with commission ranging from zero to 200,000 yuan.”

“The specific calculation method for commission is naturally tied to the advertising marketing’s promotional effectiveness. I’ll specially assign someone to analyze the data, calculating your commission based on money spent on each advertising plan, the hype generated, and the promotional results.”

“Under the premise of not insulting consumers, not violating relevant laws and regulations, and using normal marketing methods, the more money spent, the lower the hype, and the worse the promotional effect, the higher the commission.”

Meng Chang immediately said: “I choose the second option… wait, the lower the hype, the higher the commission?”

“Inversely proportional???”

When Meng Chang heard the earlier content, he found it quite normal.

Low base salary with high commission was exactly the model he was hoping for.

Although a monthly salary of 40,000 yuan was already considered high income for most people, for Meng Chang it was completely unsatisfactory. After all, when he was a senior executive at a large company, his salary had far exceeded this amount. Even now, without going to a large corporation, there were plenty of places that could offer him a 40,000 yuan monthly salary. There was absolutely no need to nervously take this fixed 40,000 yuan salary under General Pei.

Moreover, using a 40,000 yuan monthly salary to repay debts—after taxes and miscellaneous living expenses—even if he could repay 300,000 yuan a year, his outstanding debts would take twenty years to clear.

How many twenty-year periods can one have in life?

During this time, he would continuously be under the status of a judgment debtor, facing too many restrictions. He couldn’t even take high-speed trains or flights for travel, and buying property, tourism, vacations, going abroad, and so forth would all be out of the question.

By the time he finished repaying his debts, he’d be nearing retirement age. Essentially, his entire life would pass by in a daze. He couldn’t possibly think about making a comeback at the age of fifty or sixty—that simply wasn’t realistic.

If this were several decades earlier, perhaps there might be a chance, but now it was impossible.

Sometimes Meng Chang even thought that if he could serve three years in prison and wipe out all these debts, he’d rather go to jail. After all, there were quite a few people who started new businesses after being released from prison—certainly better than repaying debts for twenty years.

But if calculating according to General Pei’s maximum commission of 200,000 yuan, in an optimistic scenario, he might grit his teeth and clear these debts in five or six years. This was an opportunity no other job could offer.

The only issue was… why were hype and commission inversely proportional?

The worse the advertising promotional effect, the more money General Pei would pay?

What kind of logic was this?

Meng Chang thought he must have misheard and asked again: “General Pei, did you just say inversely proportional?”

Pei Qian nodded, his determined tone revealing confidence: “Yes.”

Pei Qian didn’t intend to explain, nor did he need to. As long as he appeared sufficiently confident, Meng Chang would eventually rationalize a reasonable explanation himself.

He took a contract from nearby: “These are the detailed rules. You can read through them carefully. Fill in the time period yourself—three years, five years, ten years… The longer the contract period, the higher the commission.”

Meng Chang fell into silence for a moment. He took the contract and examined it repeatedly, word by word, feeling that enormous dangers lurked behind this.

Could General Pei be trying to scheme against him?

His sixth sense told him there was a trap, but he couldn’t figure out where it was despite thinking back and forth.

If it were “better promotional effects equal more money,” that would be easy to understand. Meng Chang was very confident in himself—he’d definitely handle marketing and promotion clearly and effectively, securing high commissions almost certainly.

But General Pei’s condition was: the more money spent and the lower the hype, the higher the commission.

In simpler terms, spend as much money as possible, but the worse the promotional effect, the better.

What benefit would this bring to Tenda Group? Were they worried about having too much promotional budget? Troubled by not being able to spend it all?

That made no sense!

Meng Chang felt this arrangement offered no benefit to General Pei, unless… Meng Chang’s promotional plans consistently backfired spectacularly. In that case, Meng Chang would only receive the 3,000 yuan base salary, and he’d probably never repay his debts in this lifetime. The better he performed at work, the more he’d suffer personally.

But Meng Chang believed such a scenario was impossible.

Many giant corporations spent tens of billions annually on marketing. The heads of their advertising and marketing departments were all hired at high salaries precisely because this was skilled work. While doing it well wasn’t easy, there were countless people who couldn’t do it well.

For Meng Chang, such work would actually be more relaxing. He wouldn’t need to rack his brains thinking of various marketing strategies—just go through the motions half-heartedly to earn high commissions.

Although he instinctively felt something was off, after repeatedly examining the contract many times, Meng Chang couldn’t identify any actual problems.

Meng Chang was also an old hand; he had plenty of knowledge about finance and law. He could tell this contract itself had no pitfalls—it even seemed somewhat unreal to him.

The only restrictions were that Meng Chang couldn’t mess around arbitrarily. For instance, directly insulting consumers in advertisements, engaging in regional or gender discrimination, or violating advertising laws were absolutely forbidden, and someone would supervise this.

But to Meng Chang, this clause still seemed reasonable—protective clauses to prevent him from exploiting loopholes that he could understand.

Thinking about the several million yuan debt burden he carried, Meng Chang said: “Fine, I’ll sign.”

“The maximum period is… ten years?”

Pei Qian nodded: “Yes, if you sign for ten years, the maximum monthly commission is 200,000 yuan. If you sign for three years, the maximum monthly commission is 100,000 yuan. The longer you sign, the higher the commission.”

Meng Chang was silent for a moment, then decisively took the signing pen, signed his name, and filled in “ten years” in the duration field.

Ten years it was—of course he’d take the higher commission!

Meng Chang was well aware that if he signed for three years and later discovered he could have earned 200,000 yuan commission, he’d deeply regret it.

Although at 200,000 yuan monthly commission, he wouldn’t need ten years to repay all debts, even after clearing debts, he could earn money for several more years.

Ten years later, he’d still be in his prime. With some accumulated wealth, whether enjoying life or taking another entrepreneurial shot, both would be decent choices.

Pei Qian was extremely satisfied. After putting away the contract, he smiled and said: “Good, then I wish you an early debt clearance!”

Meng Chang: “?”

For some reason, he felt General Pei’s words were dripping with maximum sarcasm.

…

Leaving Dreamland Ventures, Meng Chang still felt somewhat unreal.

He took out the contract he carried and carefully read it once more. There really was no problem?

“Whatever, it’s already signed. No point overthinking now.”

Meng Chang felt worrying about gains and losses was useless at this point—this was currently his best option.

According to General Pei, work would officially begin next month. During this period, Meng Chang could rest and adjust his mindset.

He had just turned to leave when he spotted a somewhat familiar long face hurrying toward him from across the way.

Meng Chang instinctively flinched—wasn’t this General Ma?

He still remembered how at the Cold Noodle Girl press conference, General Ma had pretended to be somewhat dim-witted, successfully deceiving him before producing two soul-piercing questions that struck at the core issues, causing the entire press conference to completely miss its intended goals.

How could someone who was General Pei’s right-hand man be ordinary?

Meng Chang quickly lowered his head and hurried away.

Ma Yang passed by Meng Chang. After walking a few steps, he stopped and turned to look back.

“Huh, this person seems familiar. When did I meet him before?”

“Uh… can’t remember.”

Ma Yang scratched his head. He’d been quite busy lately, especially having spent a long time in seclusion studying for exams. With all the people one meets daily, how could anyone remember every single person?

Ma Yang quickly forgot this small incident and cheerfully headed toward Dreamland Ventures.

…

“Brother Qian!”

Pei Qian hadn’t yet seen Ma Yang’s long face but heard his boisterous shouting first.

The next second, Ma Yang had already pushed open the meeting room door and entered.

Pei Qian put down the documents he was holding: “Hm? Old Ma, why are you here?”

Ma Yang chuckled: “I’ve been preparing for exams for a while, so I haven’t had time to report on work. Now that exams are finished, I should refocus my energy on work.”

“By the way, Brother Qian, I think the Academic Affairs Office website posted grades today. Have you checked?”

Pei Qian immediately perked up: “Hm? Grades are out? Let me check now.”

He immediately grabbed a laptop nearby, opened the Academic Affairs Office website, logged in, and checked his grades.

“Ha! I scored 72 on that closed-book exam!”

Pei Qian couldn’t help feeling somewhat proud.

For university liberal arts majors, closed-book exams were the most difficult. Although closed-book exam questions were much easier than open-book ones, most people were simply too lazy to memorize.

In high school, memorizing this material would be easy, but university was completely different.

In liberal arts majors, courses with closed-book exams usually had the highest failure rates annually, with males typically accounting for more than half the failures.

No other reason—mainly laziness.

Pei Qian scoring 72 meant his studying had paid off. If the professor had given sympathy points, it would probably be in the low 60s at most. Every extra point came from Pei Qian’s own effort!

“Old Ma, what did you score?” Pei Qian asked.

Ma Yang chuckled: “I just scored slightly higher than you, Brother Qian.”

Pei Qian’s smile instantly disappeared: “How much higher is ‘slightly’?”

Ma Yang said: “81 points.”

Pei Qian was silent for a moment: “What about this open-book exam then? I scored 79.”

Ma Yang looked: “Brother Qian, I’m just a tiny bit higher than you—82.”

Pei Qian asked about several more courses, and surprisingly, Ma Yang scored higher than him in all of them.

Finally, when asking about the last course, Ma Yang scratched his head: “For this one, I didn’t score higher than you. I got 74, just one point higher than you.”

Pei Qian breathed a sigh of relief, his expression finally improving somewhat.

Good, good! From freshman to junior year, he finally scored one point more than Old Ma in one course!

It seemed his serious studying had paid off. Although it was just one point in one subject, this was a very good start!