The video opened on a simple frame: me, sitting at a desk with nothing but a laptop and a stack of documents in front of me. No luxury branding. No polished set. Just white light, plain background, and my voice.
"Sanctions," I began, steady but sharp, "are supposed to be about fairness. Safety. Protecting markets from instability. But what if they're being used for something else?"
The shot cut (thank you, Rui Ming's editing)—to a chart. Weekly sales numbers. A jagged drop, perfectly aligned with the day sanctions were announced.
"Look at this," my voice narrated. "The moment these sanctions were declared, our products in the EU and North America didn't just slow. They plummeted."
Cut again. Headlines from Western outlets scrolled too fast to read. Phrases bolded in red: 'Questionable Testing Practices' … 'Unverified Ingredients' … 'Sudden Ban'.
"All in the same twenty-four-hour window. Articles that take weeks of research, written and published overnight."
The video snapped back to me. I leaned forward in the frame, eyes locking with the camera.
"That's not coincidence. That's coordination."
Behind me, Rui Ming had layered faint overlays—screenshots of lobbying groups, snippets of correspondence Ningyao had flagged during her time in France. Not enough to be sued over, but sharp enough to sting.
"These aren't just sanctions. They're sabotage. And not just against Xuhuang and YSHT, but against every company daring to exist outside their monopoly."
My hand tapped the papers in front of me. "They want you to believe this is about safety. About standards. But look closer: when was the last time they applied the same scrutiny to their own products?"
Final cut: side-by-side. Western beauty brands with histories of recalls and toxic ingredients … next to Xuhuang's spotless safety record.
The silence after that spoke louder than anything I could've added.
Then my voice returned, softer. "We're not afraid of competition. But competition isn't what this is. This is fear, dressed up as policy. And the only way to fight fear… is to show the truth."
The video ended on the Xuhuang logo. Not slick, not flashy—just a clean white screen with one line underneath:
Truth ages better than lies.
What happened after that was… unspeakable, at least at first.
The morning after the video went live, stocks plummeted by 8%.
Numbers don't lie, and the red arrows on the finance screen looked like blood dripping down the page. My stomach dropped with them. My eyes went cartoon-wide before I could stop them, like the screen had just slapped me in the face.
The office atmosphere was a mess of hushed phone calls, clattering keyboards, and too-loud sighs. Some people looked like they wanted to throw me into the nearest recycling bin.
"Stocks are down six percent—what was she thinking?" I caught one senior manager muttering in the hallway.
Heat climbed my neck, my fingers twitching like they needed to defend me even though my brain had zero ammo. My eyes darted around too fast, bunny-coded instincts in overdrive, and—yeah—I probably looked like a guilty meme.
But just as loud, in corners and group chats, came a different hum:
"Did you see the comments? People are calling it brave."
"She said what we all wanted to."
"Girlboss. Straight up."
My eyes widened again—this time not in panic, but in shock. Because half the floor was glaring like I'd set fire to the company… and the other half looked at me like I'd just invented oxygen.
And then there was Jinyu.
Unreadable, as ever. No sighs, no scolding. Just watching the storm unfold with that maddening calm that made it impossible to tell whether he thought I'd doomed us—or lit the first spark we actually needed.
I couldn't tell if he was silently impressed… or if he was silently preparing my funeral.
By mid-morning, the office had split itself into unofficial factions.
On one side: the "doom squad," whispering by the water cooler like stock graphs were funeral notices.
[Finance Groupchat]:We're cooked. Pack it up.
[Finance Groupchat]:8% down is unrecoverable in this climate.
[Finance Groupchat]:Also who LET HER PRESS UPLOAD—
On the other: the chaos fans.
[Interns Only]:SHE DID THAT.
[Interns Only]:Our girl just nuked three monopolies with one Canva slideshow??
[Interns Only]:idc if stocks dipped, this is iconic behavior.
Even the usually boring middle ground—Marketing—was in flames.
[Marketing Chat]:Damage control??? Or lean into it???
[Marketing Chat]:She just gave us the tagline of the year: Truth ages better than lies.
[Marketing Chat]:Lowkey kind of chic.
Walking across the floor was like being two different people at once. From one cubicle: death glares sharp enough to pierce. From the next: tiny, secret thumbs-ups.
It was dizzying. And I couldn't even ask which side Jinyu was on, because he hadn't said a single word to me since the video dropped. Just one unreadable glance across the glass office, like I was a chess piece he'd moved three turns ago.
I plopped into my chair, phone buzzing nonstop in my pocket. For a second, I considered pulling the covers over my head (metaphorically—because office dress code). But then I caught Rui Ming's reflection in the glass, calm as ever, eyes glittering with the faintest trace of approval.
"Girlboss," I muttered under my breath, just to psych myself up.
And somewhere behind me, an intern coughed like they were holding back a laugh.
The next morning, the international headlines were already rolling in.
BBC Business: "Viral Video Puts Spotlight on Little-Known Xuhuang Staffer."
Bloomberg: "Mystery Employee Behind Allegations of Collusion in Global Beauty Market."
The Guardian: "Anonymous Assistant Sparks Controversy With Claims Against Western Brands."
Daily Mail (of course): "Who Is the Girl Behind Xuhuang's Viral Video? Rumors Swirl Around CEO's 'New Assistant.'"
The articles all danced around the same theme: Who was I, and why should anyone take me seriously?
Some were measured, calling me "an unverified voice" or "a figure with no proven authority." Others were sharper, suggesting I was "reckless," "unqualified," or worse—"a planted distraction."
And then came the personal digs. Screenshots from my WeChat posts when I was still an intern. Grainy photos of me in the office, clearly leaked. Daily Mail even ran a whole sidebar speculating on my clothes, my lipstick shade, and whether "an intern could really write such a speech without coaching."
It didn't matter that Rui Ming had triple-checked the citations or that Jinyu himself had sat down to refine the draft. In their eyes, I wasn't a whistleblower. I was a girl who didn't belong at the table.
The office was still humming with whispers, screens flashing with plummeting numbers, when I finally dared to glance at Jinyu.
He stood at the window, back to me, the skyline gleaming like a chessboard behind him. For once, I couldn't read a thing on his face.
"Do you regret it?" he asked suddenly, his voice low enough that only I could hear.
My chest tightened. "…Should I?"
He turned then, eyes meeting mine with that steady, unflinching weight that always made me feel seen and cornered all at once.
"No." A pause, deliberate. "You've only lit the first match. Now we see what burns."
The words settled in me like sparks on dry tinder, terrifying and thrilling all at once.
—
Somewhere across the city, a phone screen glowed in a dim office.
Wu Zhaoyuan sat alone, watching the same video—my video—play back in silence. Headlines crawled beneath it, angry comments piling in faster than anyone could read.
A board member's voice buzzed faintly through the speaker: "Reckless. Amateur. Xuhuang's finished."
But Wu Zhaoyuan didn't answer. He just closed the app, his jaw set tight, eyes lingering on the black screen like it had challenged him personally.
The storm had only just begun.