Xiao Yu sat on the sofa, smiling sweetly as she watched a variety show on her laptop. Chen Mo stood behind her, gently drying her hair with a hairdryer.
"This surprise today was pretty big," Chen Mo said, fluffing her hair with his fingers. "When did you start planning it?"
"I started the moment I said I'd give you a surprise," Xiao Yu huffed, wrinkling her nose playfully. "But since you lied to me back then, I decided to delay it. Gotta teach you a lesson for being sneaky."
"And if I lie to you again?" Chen Mo teased.
"Try it. I'll move out, and you can wash your own stinky socks," she said with a cheeky grin.
"So serious? No room for negotiation?"
"Nope. If I don't drill it into you now, you'll keep bullying me in the future," she said, poking his forehead.
Once her hair was dry, Chen Mo set the dryer down and flopped beside her, pulling her into his arms.
"I have work tomorrow," Xiao Yu murmured shyly, her face nestled in his chest.
"Don't worry. You're already mine anyway," Chen Mo said with a smirk. "Just tell me when you're ready."
"Who says I'm yours?" she pouted, but a small smile tugged at her lips.
"Ever since I threw you over my shoulder in the library, you were destined to be caught in my trap."
The next morning, Xiao Yu had breakfast ready when Chen Mo got up. After eating, they went their separate ways—Chen Mo to his store, and Xiao Yu to her new job.
"Xiao Yu, you're so lucky. I'm actually a little jealous," Li Ruoyi said as they walked shoulder to shoulder into the company lobby. "You show up on day one and the president notices you, promotes you straight to her assistant. That's every intern's dream."
"I'm still not sure how that happened," Xiao Yu admitted. "Honestly, I'm a little nervous. I don't have any experience."
"You'll get used to it. Everyone starts out unsure. Just don't forget me when you're CEO one day." Ruoyi laughed. "Alright, time to split. Good luck!"
"Thanks," Xiao Yu said with a smile and headed toward Zhao Min's office.
Despite her cheerful exterior, her heart pounded as she stepped through the door. She had heard Zhao Min was a strong, no-nonsense leader, and this was her first day—she couldn't afford to mess up.
"President Zhao," she greeted softly.
Zhao Min looked up, her eyes scanning Xiao Yu carefully.
Delicate features, kind eyes, and a gentle but quietly resilient air. Not stunning in the traditional sense, but something about her stood out—graceful, grounded.
"Come in. Sit down," Zhao Min said warmly. "So, your name is He Xiaoyu?"
"Yes. 'Yu' as in fishing," Xiao Yu nodded, nervous but trying to stay composed.
"Nice name. I'll just call you Xiao Yu from now on. You don't have to be formal with me—'Zhao Jie' or 'Min Jie' is fine."
Xiao Yu blinked, momentarily stunned by how casual Zhao Min was being.
"Zhao Jie," she said quickly, regaining her footing.
"Good. Minister Li explained your duties yesterday, right? Today, just focus on settling in. If there's anything you don't understand, ask me directly. Here's some company information—go through it when you have time."
Zhao Min handed her a folder. Xiao Yu breathed a small sigh of relief—Zhao Min wasn't nearly as intimidating as the rumors had made her out to be.
"Thank you, Zhao Jie."
Meanwhile, Chen Mo was in his store, surrounded by four running computers, wearing headphones and giving rapid instructions to Ink Girl.
"Ink Girl, change the third eye's color to a blue gradient. The center eye is the camera position. Shift the surrounding lines to black…"
Ink Girl's execution was fast, but translating his mental image into words was tough. Reproducing the exact look of the Butterfly Eye design from the tech library took all of Chen Mo's concentration and memory.
This design wasn't something you could just slap together—it was delicate, elegant. A single color out of place ruined the whole aesthetic.
After two hours, four complete designs were finally done—exact matches of the ones from the library. Chen Mo leaned back, exhausted.
Designing phone casings is harder than the circuit boards, he thought.
With motherboards, he just described components and connections; Ink Girl handled the rest. But design required creativity, intuition, and detail work.
"Ink Girl, send the phone's design and motherboard schematics to President Zhao Min," he said.
"Okay, Mo-ge. Email sent successfully," her soft voice chimed.
A few seconds later, Chen Mo's phone rang.
"Answer it," he said casually.
"It's connected," Ink Girl replied.
Zhao Min's voice came through immediately. "Chairman, I got your designs. I swear, I want to crack your skull open and study your brain. How do you even have this much artistic talent? You missed your calling as an artist."
"I'm not interested in art," Chen Mo said lazily. "And don't exaggerate—it's just four designs. I've got a few more in my head. I'll send them later so you don't have to keep bugging me."
"Fine, fine," Zhao Min said, amused. "By the way, your little fish is doing well. She's just getting settled in. Want to drop by and check on her?"
"I'm waiting on the lab to finish," Chen Mo replied.
"She still doesn't know you own the company?"
Chen Mo laughed. "When the time comes, she'll find out. It's not like I'm hiding it forever."
"Better be careful. If she finds out from someone else first, don't come crying when she slaps you," Zhao Min teased.
"Haha, let's cross that bridge when we get to it."
He hung up and turned back to the screen.
"Ink Girl, embed the smart assistant into the Marching Ant OS."
The main selling point of the new phone was the integrated smart assistant. No phone on the market yet offered true contactless voice control. With this, Butterfly Eye 2 was about to stir up a storm.
"On it, Mo-ge," Ink Girl chirped.
As soon as she spoke, the decoder software opened. Dense lines of code began flying across the screen.
"Done embedding!"
"Good. Now update my personal phone to the new system with the embedded assistant."
"Please wait, Mo-ge…"
After a moment of silence, Chen Mo's phone restarted. When it powered back on, a new option had appeared under system settings: Smart Assistant.
"Ink Girl, I'm going to test the assistant now—don't interfere."
"Okay!"
"Open browser."
The phone lit up, voiceprint verified, and the browser opened automatically.
Five minutes later, the assistant had passed its basic functionality test. Chen Mo exhaled in satisfaction and uploaded the full assistant module into the main Marching Ant OS source repository.