Chapter 2

One hour later.

Inside Meeting Room One, the air was so heavy it felt like you could wring water from it.

On the projection screen flashed a set of glaringly harsh words: [Project Elysium: Brand Team Decides to Cut Total Service Fee by 10%]

Ten percent?

My expression darkened.

The total service fee for Project Elysium was £800,000. Cutting 10% meant the company had just lost £80,000 in revenue.

"Just moments ago, the client sent over the final settlement statement," Helen, the Head of Finance, said coldly, tapping the whiteboard. "The reason they provided is: Major, sudden adjustments occurred during project execution, subjecting the brand to extremely high risks, and the visual output deviated from initial promises."

"Did you hear that, Bella?"

Sitting at the head of the table, Charlotte couldn't wait to launch her attack. She looked at me with a face full of fabricated agony. "You took it upon yourself to use your £24,000 to upgrade resources, making unauthorized rush-hour dispatches. It made the client think our original quote was entirely inflated, resulting in a massive financial loss for the company!"

"That is absolutely absurd!" I retorted, letting out a sharp, cold laugh.

Not only were they refusing to reimburse the money I fronted, but they were now trying to seamlessly pin the blame for the client's penalty on my head?

"But..." Maya, the project assistant sitting in the corner, couldn't listen to this anymore. She raised her hand weakly and tried to clarify: "If we hadn't replaced the equipment, there would have been a catastrophe at the venue yesterday! Bella worked through the night to—"

Bang!

Charlotte slammed her hands onto the table, aggressively cutting Maya off. Eyes wide with rage, she yelled, "Who gave a junior assistant the right to speak here! Do you know the first thing about profit margins and compliance protocols? If you don’t want your job, pack your things and get out!"

Maya’s shoulders trembled in fear. Her eyes instantly turned red, and she lowered her head, biting her lip so hard she didn't dare make a sound.

Every regular employee in the room fell completely silent, paralyzed by the chilling atmosphere.

Watching my colleague—who had suffered through hunger and sleepless nights right alongside me—bullied like this, the roaring fire in my chest finally burned right through my last thread of rationality.

I slammed my hands down on the conference table and shot up, locking eyes with Charlotte. Due to sheer, unadulterated fury, my voice turned icy and piercingly sharp:

"Me? Unauthorized resource upgrades?

Who was it that went to the client making grandiose, fake technological promises without even looking at the interactive prototype?!

Who was it that completely messed up the venue schedule, causing the construction team's window to shrink by more than half?!

And who was it that, to save a pathetic £3,000, went behind my back to hire an uncertified, shady manufacturer, causing a short circuit on the main stage that nearly resulted in a fire?!"

My words hit her face like rapid machine-gun fire.

"It was you, Charlotte! When the fire was burning right at our doorstep, you turned off your phone and went AWOL! I paid £24,000 to replace the destroyed safety gear. I used that money to hire emergency overnight crew. I filled in the massive technological holes you bragged about, dragging this project back to a passing grade through sheer force of will! And now you dare turn around and bite me, claiming I caused the deficit?!"

Charlotte’s face flashed red and white under my barrage, temporarily rendered speechless.

"Enough!"

Bastian, sitting at the very front of the table, spoke up with a glacial expression.

His gaze was dipped in ice, glaring at me with unfiltered disgust and impatience.

"Bella, I have always taught you to look at the big picture, yet here you are being petty and calculating your personal vendettas. The client docking our pay is an undeniable fact. When there's a financial hole, someone internally must take the fall!"

I stared in utter disbelief at the man in front of me.

Even if he was a social-climbing sycophant, how could he blatantly call black white to this absolute extreme?

He didn't give me a single chance to defend myself. In an absolute, dictatorial tone, he announced the verdict right then and there:

"Since you refuse to admit your mistake, we’ll stick to policy. Effective immediately, you are demoted from Creative Lead to a Standard Planner, and your base salary is halved. The £20,000 project bonus that was supposed to be paid out to you will be fully confiscated to compensate for the company's loss. As for the remaining balance of the damages, it will be automatically deducted from your future monthly wages."

Silence.

A dead, suffocating silence.

I put £24,000 on the line to save them; not only did he ban my reimbursement, he was robbing me of my hard-earned £20,000 bonus, and even trying to garnish my salary for the next few years just to wipe Charlotte’s ass.

I had bled and sweat to save this project, and he was forcefully twisting me into a villain buried in massive corporate debt!

Seizing the moment, Charlotte pushed a Cost Recovery Acknowledgement Form in front of me and tossed a pen on top of it. "Sign it and leave your thumbprint. Otherwise, I’ll report you to the industry association for a major compliance breach, and you'll never work in this field again."

Beside me, Maya secretly gave my sleeve a gentle tug from under the table.

"Bella," she warned in a desperate, barely-there whisper. "Whatever you do, don't sign it. They’re trying to permanently solidify the legal liability on you. Once your name is on it, this black mark is welded to you wherever you go..."

I took a deep breath. My churning stomach acid gradually settled, morphing into absolute, crystalline clarity and a bone-deep coldness.

Instead of picking up the pen, I took out my phone.

Click.

I took a crystal-clear photo of the utterly absurd recovery form and the financial statements on the table.

Saved. Backed up. Uploaded to the cloud automatically.

No screaming. No crying.

I swept my eyes over Bastian and Charlotte's suddenly darkening faces, grabbed my laptop, turned around, pulled the boardroom door open, and walked straight back to my desk.

Opening the OA (Office Automation) system, I fluidly clicked on the Resignation Application page and typed a single paragraph:

[Given that the company has unilaterally demoted me and slashed my salary without any fault on my part, and has attempted to forcefully strip me of my earned bonus, this constitutes a severe breach of the employment contract. I am formally submitting my resignation. I will complete a basic handover and automatically depart in seven days. Please await correspondence from my lawyer.]

Click. Send.

Less than a minute after the email was sent, heavy footsteps thudded down the hallway.

Bastian charged over to my cubicle, his face livid.

I was fully prepared to scream at him right then and there, but instead, he took a deep breath, forcibly suppressed his anger, and actually started gaslighting me—

"Bella, do you really have to throw this childish temper tantrum at a critical juncture like this?"

He lowered his voice, putting on a pretense of doing this 'all for my own good.' "I demoted you publicly to shut up the shareholders and the client. Can't you see this is just a stopgap measure?"

"Do you honestly think resigning solves anything? So what if you suffer a little grievance? We are a couple; isn't my company your company? Be a good girl, go rescind the resignation, and later just bow your head and apologize to Charlotte. I give you my word, once you do that, we can let this whole thing slide."

My hands clenched into tight, white-knuckled fists.

This absolute bastard! He carves off my flesh to feed it to his precious heiress, and then expects me to fall to my knees and thank him for it?