CHAPTER 717: CABINET REFORMS

"Why do you look so relaxed all of a sudden?"

Yuqi curiously asked as Xiaoyun walked into her office, sitting right across from her with the most relaxed face since the start of the emergency.

"Because we don’t have to worry about needing to run away anymore," Xiaoyun answered as he leaned back onto the chair.

"The emergency is over? Those giants are gone?"

"They aren’t returning any time soon, that’s for sure... You don’t have to worry about needing to raise more money anymore."

"You sure? I’m going to call Shen Wen to cancel the press release for the emergency fund, then?" Yuqi questioned as she took out her phone.

"Go for it."

As Yuqi started dialing on her phone and getting into a call with the other side, Xiaoyun suddenly got a little curious about the paper on her desk.

"What’s this?"

Reading the first few lines, he soon realized it was the printed script for the cancelled press release they were supposed to do later.

"You done with the call?" Xiaoyun asked as Yuqi already put her phone back into her pocket.

"Yeah... Shame I spent half a week on this for nothing." Yuqi grumpily murmured as she threw the paper straight into the trash bin.

"Whoa, no need to throw it into the bin. Who knows if we might face another emergency in the future?"

Xiaoyun quickly picked it up, going over to the file cabinet behind her before noticing all of them looked awfully emptier than usual.

"Yuqi, what happened to all the documents you had in the file cabinet?" Xiaoyun asked, knowing how much she likes to keep records of things.

"I moved it into the archive on the 7th floor... You need something from it or something?" Yuqi asked back.

"Nope, I was just curious."

After putting the paper into one of the empty files, Xiaoyun quickly went back to his seat before watching her work in silence.

"Crap." Xiaoyun suddenly murmured as he sat up in his seat.

"What?"

"I almost forgot. I haven’t finished writing the cabinet reform yet... Call me if you need me for anything."

"Like I ever need your input——"

Before Yuqi could finish talking, Xiaoyun had already left her office, with the door slamming shut.

"Asshole."

---

As Xiaoyun went back downstairs to his own private office, he quickly took out all of the progress he had left since he had last left off.

"Huh? Did someone write in my notebook... Oh, right, I left this part for Yuqi to do."

Reading just the first page of the positions that Yuqi chose to consolidate, he was a little surprised, as she was genuine in creating a new cabinet system.

There was no attempt at foul play. A complete 180 from the old Yuqi, who had always kept the majority of the planning power to herself.

"She really took my advice seriously this time, huh?" Xiaoyun murmured to himself as he started flipping to the next page.

After going through the entire thing until the end, he soon realized Yuqi herself had completed the entire document for him.

"Why didn’t she tell me it’s already finished?"

Unable to think of a reason behind it, Xiaoyun didn’t waste any more time trying to figure it out as he started proofreading it again.

Two hours later...

As the sun set on the horizon, Xiaoyun’s neck was beyond exhausted as he had been looking back and forth between the notebook and the computer.

There was new information he needed to double-check, and new adjustments he needed to make for some of the cabinet positions.

Ironically, he was being the more conservative one, dividing and adding new positions rather than consolidating them.

Xiaoyun just couldn’t believe how much power she was really giving up to the department head, to the point that it made him a little scared.

"Okay, now fifteenth department out of the way... Just the last one."

As he started reading the last few pages of the notebook, he froze for a second as he saw the power listed for the Secretary of State Security.

Yueyue was in charge of the secret service branch, the head of the police department, and most importantly, the new head of military security.

The first role was what she already has, just renamed from the Department of Intelligence, both foreign and interior, into a single secret service.

The second role of being above the police wasn’t that big of a deal, as Yueyue already acts as de facto above the police department.

The third role, however, was what made him concerned.

It was supposed role was to act as oversight to the military, checking the soldiers’ loyalty and ideology, and to assist the military when needed.

Despite all these connections, it was still a part of the civilian government. In other words, Yuqi was creating a civilian commissioner in the military.

"What the hell is she thinking?"

Just as Xiaoyun was about to write this part off, he stopped right at the very last second as he thought back to all the previous changes in the document.

"Is she really focusing her attention on wresting the military into her hands?" Xiaoyun murmured to himself.

The more he read the roles again, the more he felt disjointed and even a little scared by her blatant attempt to grab power.

It just didn’t make sense to him when he was already the military’s commander-in-chief and the head of the civilian government as the governor.

"Xiaoyun, can I come in?"

"You can come in."

As the door opened, Yuqi quickly walked over beside him, grabbing his arm as she pointed at the clock.

"It’s already past work time. I didn’t bring my car today." Yuqi complained as she tried to get him up.

"Wait, I’m almost done reading this... Yuqi, I need to ask you something."

Hearing the seriousness in Xiaoyun’s voice, she finally stopped hurrying him as she let his arm go before taking a seat next to him.

"What do you want to ask about?"

"You wrote in my notebook, right?" Xiaoyun asked.

"Yeah. You told me to work on it while you’re busy making up the logistics department missing Houqin."

"So everything that I didn’t write is written by you, right?"

"Yeah... Unless someone else has a key to your room. What’s wrong?" Yuqi asked in confusion, noticing the concerned look on his face.

"Did you write the role for the Secretary of State Security?" Xiaoyun asked, not answering her question.

"Yeah. What about it?"

"Why?"

"What do you mean by why? Did I do something wrong?" Yuqi questioned as she looked even more confused than before.

"You wrote Yuqi’s role as the military security. To ’oversee the military loyalty and ideology teaching’ as the civilian branch?"

"Huh?"

As Yuqi picked up the notebook and read it for herself, she looked a little stunned, as if it were her first time seeing it.

"I-I never wrote this. I-I only wrote the first two parts. S-Someone must have come into this room and written it."

Xiaoyun couldn’t tell anything about her story as he stared at her dead in the eyes. But he still felt something was off.

"Then who else could have written it? Ghosts? The janitor?" Xiaoyun questioned.

"I don’t know. But I never wrote that section. Whoever wrote it is clearly trying to frame me against you."

"Mhm..."

"Whoever wrote it isn’t wrong, though, aren’t they? Why does the military need to be separate from the military in the first place?"

As Yuqi started siding with the alleged writer, Xiaoyun’s suspicion immediately grew tenfold.

"Because I don’t want outsiders directing what the military needs to do. The logistics department already has a safeguard against the officers."

"Yeah, but the logistics department isn’t a part of the civilian government... Xiaoyun, why can’t the civilian government just be supreme?"

The question caught Xiaoyun a little off guard, but he quickly came up with a response for her.

"The civilian government is already above the military. I don’t know what makes you think the military is above the civilian government."

"Really? Then how come I can’t direct any of the soldiers? Or refuse Houqin’s request when she sends her officers to take our supplies?"

"You aren’t the commander in chief."

"So the civilian government is equal to the military. Not above as you’re trying to suggest." Yuqi immediately argued back.

"That’s... That’s only a case-by-case scenario. You can’t argue to stop a military’s need when it’s urgently needed on the front line——"

"Like packs of cigarettes and stockpiling more than enough medicine from the hospital despite the shortages patients face?"

As Yuqi pinpointed her argument, Xiaoyun once again ran out of words. He didn’t want to admit it, but he had always viewed the military as more important.

"It’s still a zombie apocalypse. The military must come first before the civilian government."

"There, you said it yourself. We, as civilian government, will always be enslaved to the military’s endless demand."

"Why do you have to put it like that? Why do you always have a feud with the military? Do they make you that insecure?"