Chapter 244: Chapter 244: Birthday Banquet Face-Slapping (2) Chapter 244: Chapter 244: Birthday Banquet Face-Slapping (2) Meng Liao’s identity and the incident of his forced liquidation and heavy losses from the market attracted the attention of the entire financial world.

Because it was a major holiday in the Dragon Emperor Country, the stock market was closed, so the average small retail investors didn’t know about the major storm they had endured—if there was a problem with Meng Liao, these retail investors who put their money in would lose everything down to their underpants.

But other countries were watching closely, and their stock markets remained open despite no special holidays.

Of course, Qin Jingchen couldn’t ignore such a major event.

Fen Ye, sitting beside him, said, “These financial tycoons obviously want to eradicate Meng Liao, tear off a piece of flesh from the financial market of the Dragon Emperor Country. It seems they had been preparing for a while and took immediate action when those two countries started firing. By taking down Meng Liao, they can move on to other financial figures in the Dragon Emperor Country, disrupting the entire nation’s financial economy. Indeed, the intent of these people to eliminate us never dies; they seize any opportunity to cause trouble.”

This was a market economy behavior, and Qin Jingchen couldn’t directly intervene.

However, if Meng Liao couldn’t get through this, it would trigger a domino effect, dealing a tremendous blow to the Dragon Emperor Country.

Qin Jingchen asked, “How is Meng Liao’s side being handled?”

“It’s not clear yet. But he has always had a hidden expert helping him, and he has smoothed over similar incidents in the past few years. However, those were minor compared to this one.”

Qin Jingchen said, “If he comes to me, connect him immediately.”

For issues that the market economy couldn’t solve, maybe only state intervention could help.

But that would only happen if Meng Liao himself asked for it.

A financial tycoon like Meng Liao didn’t want to deal with Qin Jingchen, fearing that getting involved with him would be more troublesome than with his Western adversaries and it would be even harder to extricate himself.

Qin Jingchen didn’t expect him to seek help from him right away.

Fen Ye acknowledged.

Qin Jingchen was about to open Jiang Zhe’s contact information on his phone, but Fen Ye exclaimed in surprise, “Jingchen, the market is closed, and Meng Liao wasn’t forcibly liquidated!”

Qin Jingchen skimmed through the information and quickly noticed something amiss.

“Where did Meng Liao’s backup funds come from? Didn’t the Neutral Country Bank’s system completely collapse?”

“Yes, although the system collapse is an excuse, one can imagine that those banks directly locked the funds, preventing any transaction. With so much money, what’s going on with Meng Liao?” Fen Ye was puzzled as well.

Qin Jingchen frowned slightly, “Unless… someone helped him access the Neutral Bank’s back end.”

“Who could be that powerful?” Fen Ye couldn’t think of anyone. The Qin Jingchen sitting across from him could do it, but he had no reason to engage in such things.

Members of the Starshine Alliance might be able to, but he hadn’t seen any trade orders from Meng Liao.

“No matter who it is, it’s good for us. After this incident, there will be a brief period of chaos in the financial market. Fen Ye, before the market opens after the New Year, eliminate any remaining financial risks, and pass all the information for my review.” Qin Jingchen quickly sorted out the matter—regardless of who helped Meng Liao, what mattered was to prevent the Meng Liao incident from causing major fluctuations in the financial market of the Dragon Emperor Country.

Jiang Zhe settled all the affairs; though it didn’t take long, it was mentally exhausting.

She fell asleep as soon as she put down her phone.

She didn’t even see the compensation transferred from Meng Liao.

…

The location Jiang Cheng booked for Jiang Zhe’s birthday banquet was indeed nothing to scoff at.

It was a famous and prestigious hotel in Beijing, on the fifth-floor banquet hall.

Since it was a hall that could accommodate fifty people, and for the possible addition of guests, the hotel had prepared an extra table; in reality, it could fit more than sixty people.

At three in the afternoon, Jiang Xiruo, a newly dressed Xia Enci, and Xiao Meng went over to see if there was anything that needed to be prepared.

Jiang Zhe was napping, and Jiang Xiruo and the others purposely didn’t wake her.

…

At the Jiang Family home, Jiang Cheng was changing his clothes, tying his necktie.

While helping him with his tie, Ding Yuehua began, “It’s also Madam Fen’s birthday today, and I’ve heard a lot of people are going over. I’ve been thinking, why don’t we go too?”

“Why didn’t you say earlier that you wanted to go to Madam Fen’s place?” Jiang Cheng, upon hearing Ding Yuehua say this, felt a bit troubled.

“We didn’t think of it earlier either. It was only when Xuexue’s friends mentioned it yesterday that I remembered. Haven’t we gone over a couple of times before? Although the Fen Family hasn’t announced any grand celebration, since others are organizing it, it wouldn’t be right for us not to attend, would it?” Ding Yuehua said with a helpless look on her face.

After all, she wasn’t wrong. Going over to the Fen Family was also about considering her husband’s career and the family’s future, wasn’t it?

Ding Xuexue suggested, “How about this, Dad? Mom and I will swing by Xiaozhe’s birthday party first, offer our well-wishes, and then head to the Fen Family. If Xiaozhe knows we have important matters to attend to, he won’t blame us. As for you, it doesn’t matter whether you accompany Mom and me to the Fen’s or not; we can go by ourselves.”

With her saying this, how could Jiang Cheng possibly not accompany them?

He always cherished his wife and daughter, and when forced to choose, Jiang Zhe was, after all, an outsider and had to be put second.

“Then let’s go to Jiang Zhe’s place first,” Jiang Cheng said.

When Jiang Zhe arrived at the hotel, it was almost four in the afternoon.

She had gone to bed late the night before and specifically took a long nap today. When she woke up, she found that Jiang Xiruo and the others had already left, so she got ready and headed out.

After her nap, her face wore a faint, natural pink blush.

It added a touch of softness to her beauty.

Even after washing her face with cold water, the blush did not fade, and Jiang Zhe was quite resigned to it.

Jiang Zhe didn’t like such tenderness and purposely wore a mask on her way over.

Xiao Meng and Xia Enci ran towards her with smiles: “Xiaozhe, you’re here! We just tidied up the place a bit. The guests haven’t arrived yet, and we realized there wasn’t much to clean, so we bought some flowers to place on the seats.”

Jiang Zhe glanced over and indeed saw beautiful fresh flowers at each spot. They had specifically chosen celebratory red hues with a touch of other colors for embellishment, looking very pretty.

“They look quite nice.”

Jiang Zhe’s approval made Xiao Meng and Xia Enci exchange smiles.

“Oh, and Song Xingyu and Four-Eyes just arrived, they’re about to come upstairs,” Xiao Meng said.

Jiang Zhe knew they were coming; Song Xingyu had told her on WeChat yesterday.

She couldn’t refuse and agreed.

Sure enough, within seconds, Song Xingyu arrived, entering jokingly and playfully with Four-Eyes.

Si Qing followed behind them.

“Jiang Zhe! I made it just in time, right? I haven’t missed anything, have I?” asked Song Xingyu.

“Nothing has even started yet; you’re always the best at arriving right on time for the food,” Xia Enci said.

“Stop it, I clearly came for the birthday star’s celebration.”

Si Qing approached, slightly embarrassed: “Jiang Zhe, I came without telling you, hope you don’t mind.”