Chapter 22 - 22: The King
Kim Eunji didn't know how many times this man would make her speechless tonight.
'Gosh! This man deserves an Oscar Award!' She thought.
"Brother, aren't you going to introduce us to this beautiful lady beside you?" Bai Longwei asked as he was interested to know who she was and what was her relationship with Nathan. She had already caught his interest the moment he saw her entered the room with Nathan.
If she's his plain friend, the thought of pursuing her and making her his woman came into his mind. But his mind soon changed the moment he witnessed how Nathan was intimately treating her.
"I'm in no position to introduce her. Why don't you try and ask her instead? You'll get lucky if she'll give you her name." Nathan truthfully answered.
However, Bai Longwei misunderstood him and thought that Kim Eunji would only give her name to Nathan because she was already his when in reality, she wasn't, yet...but soon.
"Nathan, aren't you going to greet Ms. Wan?" Patriarch Bai butted in. "I heard you two had shared a quite intimate relationship together." Patriarch Bai added that made the atmosphere in their table turned a bit awkward. However, Nathan continued what he was doing and even was paying more attention to Kim Eunji. But then, Kim Eunji nudged him on the side which made him paused for a bit.
"Hey! Your father's talking to you." Kim Eunji said almost in a whisper.
Kim Eunji could now point out why the woman across her was throwing daggers towards her. She's the woman who confessed her love for Nathan but was cold-heartedly turned down by the man.
"Let him be. He'll get tired of it." Nathan was uninterested to talk to his father.
He did not attend this event to celebrate with them. His main purpose was to stop whatever plans his good-for-nothing father had for his personal life.
"See?! I told you that welcoming him as a part of this family was a big mistake! Yet you didn't listen to me. Look at him disrespecting his own father in front of these special guest that we had invited for tonight." Matriarch Bai saw the opportunity to express her displeasure towards Nathan.
"What can we expect from him? He was raised by that slut, Mei Johnson. Who knew what an uneducated slut could teach her son? All she knew was to force her way towards my husband's lap! Therefore, her son would never be good for this family!" She added that made the guest around them gasped and then immediately shivered as soon as they felt the entire hall became colder and the air became suffocating to breathe. They felt the urge to get out as soon as they could because they felt like dying loosing their breath.
The tension in the atmosphere was too much to bear.
Kim Eunji then looked at the man beside her and frowned when she saw that the spoon was already bent because it got stock in his fist.
Though they were not close and would always argue with each other, she had not seen Nathan this angry. As she looked at the man's darkened blue eyes she could see the strong emotion of hatred and grudge from him.
'What did this people do to deserve his hate?' She asked herself out of curiosity.
Then she recalled what the woman had said that she was sure had triggered this man's strong emotion. 'Uneducated slut'... Well, no child would like to hear someone speaking ill about his/her beloved parents especially when it was spoken in his face, right?
Though social media had not yet existed in the past, a single rumor could still ruin someone's reputation and eventually would lead that person to suffer backlash from the public.
Mei Johnson. The famous A-list model who was at the peak of her career 31 years ago. However, a shocking news broke out that she got pregnant out of wedlock and this received hate and backlash from the people even though there were no enough evidence to support the claims.
Mei Johnson that time was rumored to be involved in an affair with the country's most sought after eligible bachelor at that time, the young Patriarch Bai. However, it was then revealed that Young Master Bai was already engaged to the first daughter of the Wang Family (Matriarch Bai).
She indeed got pregnant with Nathan and in order to protect the innocent life growing in her stomach, she decided to gave up her modeling career which she had worked so hard for years to build.
As Nathan recalled the misfortune his mother had experienced because she got pregnant of him, his expression darkened even more.
"Speaking ill of a mother in front of her son..." his lips then curved up as he evily smiled at her and continued, "Are you done?"
Three words. Three words that made people felt a chill in their spines as they heard it coming from his mouth.
Bai Longwei shook his head as he felt like his mother had gone overboard this time and indeed really angered Nathan. Her mother was doomed this time. Did he felt pity for her? Of course he did but as he thought of how cruel his mother's words was earlier, he felt that his mother deserved what was about to come her way as long as she would learn a lesson or two.
He had tried to change his mother's perspective towards the people who belonged on the ranks lower than them. He wanted her to be more considerate and be aware of her words. Sadly, his mother had so much pride on herself that him asking her to do such things was beyond negotiable.
Therefore, as long as Nathan won't go overboard, he would support him in teaching his mother a lesson.
"Slut?! Why? Did you caught her on the act while she was seducing Patriarch Bai?" Nathan never called Patriarch Bai as 'father' because he felt that he was not worthy to be recognized as one.
"Forcing? Matriarch Bai, among us sitting in this table, only the three of us knew all too well who...forced...who." Nathan then chuckled in disgust after he said that.
He never thought the main culprit of all these had the audacity to still eat his dinner.
"Bai Chunhua that's enough! We're having dinner here and it's not good to argue while everyone's eating. The guest might lose their appetite or may suffer indigestion." Patriarch Bai reprimanded her.
Of course he didn't want his wife to spill more of their family's dirty secrets in public.
"Let's continue this talk later." He added.
"I apologize Master Bai but I disagree with you." Nathan resounded.
Nathan then stood up and was about to walked away however before he could even do so, Patriarch Bai called him out.
"Where do you think you're going?!"
But Nathan was unbothered and walked towards the direction of the stage.
Nathan then took the microphone and ppaced it near his mouth as he spoke.
"I think it would be appropriate to greet you all a pleasant evening as we all knew that this night had already turned unpleasant." He started which earned a chuckle from the guests.
'Is he some kind of a lunatic? Acting like he was about to take someone's life in a second and now his acting nice to everyone else by cracking some jokes?' Kim Eunji thought.
However to her surprise, Nathan's expression suddenly became serious as he scanned the entire hall.
"Since I could see that most of you had already lost the appetite to eat because of how the atmosphere turned out. So, I felt the need to end this celebration quickly." Nathan was now looking in their table.
"As you can see, I'm the newly appointed Chairman of the Board of Directors and also the son of Mei Johnson." Nathan confirmed.
"Therefore as the new Chairman, I felt the urge to make some changes. Starting today, The name Bai Enterprise will now become Bai Corp." He then scanned on his surroundings and saw that majority of the Bai Branch Families protested especially the elders.
"Impudent! How dare you change the name of the company. Patriarch Bai do something!" One of the elders bellowed.
Patriarch Bai himself was taken aback by his son's announcement.
"Nathan!" He called out.
However, Nathan did not listen to him.
"Isn't it right for this King to reform this Kingdom as I take over the throne?" He asked everyone.
"But you aren't the major shareholder of the company!" Someone protested. They thought Nathan became the Chairman because Patriarch Bai had only appointed him. Ridiculous!
"Patriarch Bai." Nathan calmly called Patriarch Bai as he threw a meaningful look.
Patriarch Bai inhaled a mouthful of air and then he answered.
"My son, Nathan holds 30% of shares making him the biggest stockholder of the company." He announced that made everyone be shocked.
It was not hidden from the public how much the Bai Enterprise share cost. And he, the man whom they had treated as a bastard all this time had managed to pull off a great amount? No it must be gifted by Patriarch Bai.
They preferred to believe the latter over the former though it was beyond impossible.
"Patriarch. I'm so disappointed of you." Another Elder voiced out.
"Right! You should have given those shares to Bai Longwei. He's more than capable than this outsider."
While they were arguing, Kim Eunji chuckled as she thought that Nathan's family was ridiculous. They thought that the Chairmanship position could be easily gifted to someone.
Before the other elders could voice out the screen flashed the stock transfer certificate and the proof that the shares which were now on Nathan's hands were bought by him and not gifted just like what they thought.
These people underestimated Nathan's wealth and power. Why? Because they were in denial.
As mentioned, Nathan came back to China from overseas and created quite a stir in the market. They thought that someone powerful was backing him that's why he had the audacity to do so.
Also, he was immediately given the CEO position immediately right after he was recognized by his father six months ago. Four months after, he had managed to snatch away the chairmanship position.
Because of these, they were so careful to not mess up with the man.
Had they known that he had planned all of this to happen from the very beginning and he was the man behind those scandals the company had faced six months ago until now, they would surely vomit blood in anger.
"I'm no ones dummy." Nathan's deep voice announced that cleared everyone's thoughts about him.
"Now tell me who have more rights to make changes in the company. You should be thankful that I kept the Bai name in it and not changed it into my mother's name."
Nathan was answered by silence.
"Speaking of my mother... Speak ill once about her and I'll come after your family." His message was loud and clear.
"What a petty." Someone commented that caught everyone's attention.
"Which family are you?" Nathan called him out the young man.
"Tang." He proudly said.
Nathan then fished his phone from his pocket and called out someone.
After he finished his phone call, the young man's phone rang. He immediately paled as soon as he received the call.
"Master Bai!" He immediately ran towards below the stage and kneel down with pleading eyes.
However Nathan seriously ignored him.
"Now. Who's next?"
Matriarch Bai who was angered to the core kept silent this time.
"Come to me if you're all able." Nathan then placed the microphone back to the table and walked towards the table.
He then sat down back on his seat and continued his meal as if nothing happened.
Kim Eunji looked at him with an amused expression.
"Did I do good love?" Nathan asked Kim Eunji who had the urge to punch the man on the face.
"Are we done here?" Kim Eunji asked him. She could no longer take the weirdness of this man.
"Not yet." Nathan answered after he ate his last meat.
"Ms. Wan. I thought I made everything clear to you the other night. If you want to be married in this family, you could marry one of my half-brothers." His statement made Wan Baozhai paled.
"Nathan, I..." Wan Baozhai was about to say something but Nathan didn't allow her as he continued.
"The woman that I'm about to marry is the one I'm sitting beside right now." He nonchalantly said.
"--__--"