The Wealthy Tycoon's Game of Life

Chapter 1299: Chapter 500: ”Karma”_2

”What?”

Guo Wangshan and the others all changed their expressions, quickly glancing down. Sure enough, under the long table was a rectangular object reminiscent of something out of a movie, with a conspicuous timer on its shell, the ”beep beep” sound coming from the timer.

When they discovered it, the timer had only a little over three minutes left.

”Is there really a bomb?”

”The construction doesn’t look fake. We used explosives in engineering before...”

Shen Li calmly moved closer to inspect it, then suddenly his face changed.

”Can it be defused?”

”Are you kidding? You think this is a movie and all you have to do is cut a red or blue wire? Defusing bombs in reality isn’t that simple...”

Even though everyone present was seasoned and experienced, confirming it wasn’t a prank, they all felt panic, and the scene became quite chaotic.

”The door still won’t open!”

He Jinglun was the first to run to the door and tried, but no matter how hard he hit it, the heavy wooden door didn’t budge.

As they watched the countdown on the bomb hastening away, Zhang Shiling, alone in the corner, shrank back and froze for a moment, then muttered, ”Retribution, this is retribution...”

With that, Zhang Shiling suddenly smirked strangely, looking at He Jinglun still by the window trying to find a way out.

”Mr. He, don’t struggle. When you had me probe Sister Qin, you should have anticipated this day, should you not?”

Guo Wangshan and the others were startled by his words, all turning to He Jinglun with confused looks.

The ”Sister Qin” Zhang Shiling mentioned was Mrs. Guo, Guo Sanli’s wife. Listening to Zhang Shiling and He Jinglun’s conversation, it was evident there was some unknown intrigue among them.

”Mr. Zhang, what nonsense are you spouting?”

He Jinglun’s expression changed slightly, speaking solemnly, ”I sent you to find out the whereabouts of Guo Sanli’s illegitimate child just to give him a warning, so he wouldn’t act out of desperation and destroy things directly. I didn’t actually do anything.”

”Is that really true?”

Zhang Shiling chuckled, ”Sister Qin called me the day she jumped off the building. She questioned me on the phone, saying why we wouldn’t let up even though we’d already gotten what we wanted. She said that if we couldn’t be reassured, she’d rather die, as long as we spared her two sons... Mr. He, can you tell me why she’d say that?”

”How would I know?”

He Jinglun shouted angrily, ”After their family went bankrupt, Wei Qin became mentally unstable, babbling nonsense. It’s none of my business!”

After that, He Jinglun looked at Zhang Shiling and sneered:

”Mr. Zhang, it’s laughable how you push everything onto us and clean yourself off completely. Why don’t you mention how you had such a good relationship with Wei Qin, yet you sold her out completely? Wasn’t it you who provided the so-called evidence of their tax evasion?”

”I...”

Zhang Shiling’s face turned pale.

”Enough!”

Guo Wangshan finally reprimanded sternly, giving a deep look at the two of them, ”Let’s talk about all this later. Right now, let’s figure out how to save ourselves...”

Beep beep beep!

As if responding to Guo Wangshan’s words, the timer of the suspected bomb started beeping more urgently. Just as everyone’s hearts were in their throats, the sound suddenly disappeared.

The crowd was astonished, and Guo Wangshan tentatively took a few steps forward, looking down, and then curiously said, ”It seems like... the timer has stopped.”

Stopped?

Everyone moved forward to check, and indeed, the timer had stopped at the countdown position of a few dozen seconds, becoming silent.

As they were puzzled, suddenly, from the corridor behind them, came the sound of a ”click,” and He Jinglun quickly ran over to check, then shouted inside: ”Everyone, the door opened!”

Although Guo Wangshan and the others were suspicious, clearly no one wanted to stay in the room. They quickly moved toward the door.

As soon as they stepped outside, they saw several stern-looking men dressed in standard suits.

”Gentlemen, I’m Xiao Wang, Mr. Zhou’s bodyguard. There have been some unexpected events at tonight’s banquet. Mr. Zhou specifically sent me to ensure your safety. Please come with me, and I’ll lead you to a safe place...”

Guo Wangshan and the others looked at each other, not understanding the situation, but there was nothing they could do except put aside their doubts and wait to see Zhou Wang.

...

Ding!

[”Tribulation’s Windbreaker” energy exhausted, automatically destroyed]

After Guo Wangshan and the others left, Zhou Wang alone in the corner heard the system prompt and looked down to see that his figure seemed to emerge gradually in the air, like breaking free from a pixelated world.

Zhou Wang shook his head quietly.

This ”Tribulation’s Windbreaker” was exchanged from the System Store last time for nearly half a million Reputation Value points to spy on the true life of a senior sister. Although it was marked as a ”permanent item,” it failed after only two uses.

Zhou Wang felt he was cheated by the system, but with no avenue for complaint, he could only let it go.

Still, the windbreaker had fulfilled its role, allowing Zhou Wang to hear what he wanted.

At this moment, Zhou Wang pulled out his phone and opened an encrypted email in his mailbox.

The email, sent by Wang Ruixi shortly after their call, contained a large attachment.

The attachment included key points from news and internal encrypted documents from Cloud Trust, broadly detailing the decline of Jiangnan Guo Family.

Some of it could be found online, such as ”the continuous evaporation of Jiangnan Guo Group’s market value”, ”successive resignations of some high-level staff and legal disputes”, ”large-scale worker protests”, and ”repeated investigations by related departments”.

But there was also information unseen in the news, from Cloud Trust’s internal documents, which was what Zhou Wang really wanted to see.

These records, coupled with Wang Ruixi’s subtle depictions in their call, had given Zhou Wang a rough idea of the outline of past events.

The Jiangnan Guo Family, once glorious, had industries spanning Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai, especially in electronic components and heavy industry, possessing several companies that were considered industry unicorns.

Two years ago, a company under Jiangnan Guo Group specializing in optical systems, experienced an undocumented ”research failure”.

That failure led them to develop a replica of a multilayer reflection mirror with high precision coating...

Zhou Wang didn’t understand the overly technical terms, but according to the report, this high precision optical system was one of the keys to producing EUV lithography machines.

The so-called EUV lithography machine is core equipment for manufacturing advanced chips of 7 nm and below, with only one country, the Netherlands, capable of mass production.

If able to produce EUV lithography machines independently, Huaxia’s progress in the electronic chip field would accelerate by over ten years, breaking foreign monopolies, a matter of significant importance.

However, due to various reasons, Jiangnan Guo Group concealed this ”research failure”.

This was the catalyst for all subsequent events.

How exactly ”myself” knew about this matter was untraceable, but the proverbial Jiangnan Guo Family, caught between colluded powers, fell precipitously in just a few short years, with all their industries divided and taken away...

Cloud Trust’s internal documents also contain some seemingly unrelated past events, and together with the information revealed by Guo Wangshan and the others, Zhou Wang has basically deduced all causes and effects.

...

”Time to have a chat with Guo Nansheng.”

With a complex expression, Zhou Wang withdrew his gaze from his phone, got up, and went out alone, heading downstairs.