“Is this the type of trash that you’re hiring in my company?” Romeo Young roared at the PR manager. “Get out of my office! Do your job properly and follow my exact instructions, do you hear me?!”

“Y-yes, sir!” The PR manager and her team all escaped from his wrath.

Romeo Young picked up a random item on his desk—an empty coffee mug—and flung it across the room. It broke in an instant. The broken pieces scattered on the floor reflected his current tolerance for failures.

His personal phone rang. He didn’t bother checking the caller ID before barking, “What?!”

A creepy, robotic voice chuckled. Romeo Young froze at the sound and felt like a bucket of ice water had been poured over him, completely chilling his hot fury and turning it into apprehension instead.

“O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?” the robotic voice mocked him using the famous classic line. “Using that tone to speak to me, it seems that your head had become bigger once again. Ah, Romeo. Would you like me to send someone to, hm, discipline you and remind you of your purpose?”

He shuddered, unable to control his body’s reaction to the creepy robotic voice. To him, it sounded like the devil incarnate himself. He swallowed hard and forced himself to laugh. It sounded ugly. “Mr. El Payaso, no need, sir! Please don’t take my earlier tone to heart. I didn’t mean it, not at all! I was just having a bad day. Yes, that’s right! I’m just so busy dealing with everything that is going on.”

“Hmmm.”

What did that sound mean? Romeo Young held his breath and waited for the robotic voice’s verdict. It was nerve-wracking. He was almost soaked in his own sweat in an instant. [Read official chapters on W e b n o v e l (dot) com. Please stop supporting piracy. Also follow author on Instagram: @arriacross]

“Alright, I’ll let you off for now,” the robotic voice finally said.

“T-thank you, Mr. El Payaso.” He pulled out a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the sweat from his face and neck. He cleared his throat and spoke in a servile tone. “Mr. El Payaso, I would like to ask you for a favour. You must have already seen the news. My family’s reputation has been deteriorating because of it. If you could just…you know, uh, help us a bit? My whole Young family and I will greatly appreciate it and be forever thankful to you.”

Ten-second silence.

Then loud robotic laughter.

Romeo Young could hear the ridicule in the digitally modified voice. He gritted his teeth, rage flashing in his eyes, but he didn’t dare to express his displeasure out loud. Instead, he endured it. The feeling was so unpleasant that he almost choked on his own tongue which became stiff from anger just like his tense jaw.

“Oh, Romeo. I think you are forgetting something very, very, very important.”

He frowned and thought about it but came up blank. “I don’t think so but please enlighten me if I’m really forgetting something.”

“I, El Payaso, and all of my people are not your dogs. You, Romeo and everyone else in your Young family, are OUR dogs. You work for US. Not the other way around. Do you remember now? Have you been enlightened?”

His nostrils flared as the rage inside him almost burst out but he quickly tamped it down. He knew that going against El Payaso and the powerful organization in which the hacker belonged would mean a massacre for his entire Young family. He couldn’t risk that.

They already came this far. He just needed to endure this much insult to his dignity. He could take it. He had to. If he and his family held on, El Payaso and the organization would help them gain the wealth, status and power that they had been coveting for a long time now.

They no longer wanted to stay as mere vassals to Jin Corporation. No, what they wanted was to become the true kings of their own kingdom. Jin Corporation would become theirs. Just imagining it was enough to calm Romeo Young’s indignation at being called a dog.

“Yes, I remember now, Mr. El Payaso,” he replied through gritted teeth.

“I know you’re smart, Romeo. That’s what I like about you. Your daughter, on the other hand, is an idiot.”

The rage that just calmed down returned once again. Romeo closed his eyes and performed another set of deep, calming breaths. If it were someone else, he would have already given the person a piece of his mind. Before his daughter’s recent fall from grace, Rose was his pride and joy. She was a high achiever who always stood out among her peers. If not for her obsession with Jin Liwei, she wouldn’t have fallen so low like this. It was Jin Liwei and his starlet wife’s fault, that Iris Long!

Romeo Young redirected his anger from El Payaso’s insulting jabs at the married couple, Jin Liwei and Iris Long. Sure, his daughter also had faults, but at the end of the day, Rose was still his one and only daughter. There was no way that he would allow her to suffer too much.

Even so, he had no choice but to set her situation aside for now and focus on improving the family’s reputation first. In the future, if they got their hands on the entire Jin Corporation, Rose’s tainted reputation wouldn’t matter anyway. She would become the heiress of such a large multinational business that everyone would kiss up her ass regardless of how clean or dirty her reputation would be at that time. Thus, Romeo Young stayed silent and didn’t dare contradict the master hacker’s words.

“Our original plan should have already progressed farther than this if not for your daughter’s stupidity. What is the point of having an elite education at an Ivy-league university if her IQ plunges to negative digits every time Liam Jin is involved? What’s even more disappointing is how you always spoil her and support her foolishness to the detriment of our plan. Then you always run to me crying for help.

“Romeo, oh my Romeo. Your daughter is your biggest flaw! Are you aware of that?”

The robotic voice paused before it changed its lighthearted tone into a cold, menacing one.

“Disappoint me again because of your daughter and I’ll have her killed. Stop testing my patience and tolerance, Romeo.”