Chapter 43: Eye-opener

After a whole day’s rest, Chen Xu came to work fully energized. It was like the fatigue he had experienced in the previous half month was completely swept away, and he had been revived to full health.

Even he hadn’t realized that all the hardships that he had gone through during that half a year time-period in the post-cataclysmic world had toughened his spirit and will, which was why he didn’t feel that exhausted even after half a month of OTs.

When he got upstairs, he bumped into Director He of the human resource department who was escorting four to five people. He said they were his new colleagues at the department.

All members of the electronic sales department applauded enthusiastically. The only thing they didn’t do was shout “Long live Mr. Liu.”

Now, there were so many things that had to be done in the department. Absolutely nobody would say no to a few extra hands coming to share the workload.

Speaking of Liu Kun, he then arrived, gave them some words of encouragement, and conveniently made an announcement, “To speed up the integration of our new members into the group and enhance the tacit understanding between each of you, after discussing with Ms. Luo, it has been decided that we will have a team-building activity held sometime this week.”

This time, the energy of everyone’s applause was much weaker.

Not everybody liked to partake in team-building activities. Chen Xu, for example, preferred to be alone. Even for vacations, he didn’t like for too many people to be involved.

Since he joined the company, he had participated in such activities twice, each of which involved the whole company. It hadn’t been a wonderful experience. After all, the higher-ups of the company were relatively older and were somewhat out of touch with youngsters like them. The events were too formal and were simply a disappointment.

Moreover, the weather was freezing outside. Were they supposed to go out and get frozen in the cold?

“A team-building activity. Hmm, I wonder where we will be going?” Dai Zixin said with hope, “I hope we go to a fun place.”

Chen Xu glanced at her. He thought that everyone in the department was young, and even Liu Kun, who was the oldest, was less than forty. He was more of an open-minded person as well. By all means, this trip seemed like it would be more enjoyable than in the past.

This matter didn’t trigger too much of a splash. Subsequently, work that could see no end came to drown them, completely stealing away their time to think about the trip.

On Wednesday, after the regular meeting in the morning, Liu Kun announced that the time for the team building activity would be the following day, and the location would be in a county more than 100 kilometers away from the city.

“The weather is cold now, just right for some bubbling hot springs. Everyone can loosen up and relax for a while.”

Chen Xu was a little surprised, once again feeling the distinct difference of a department taken care of by a person of authority. Visiting the hot springs – such welfare would make the advertising department a few streets away jealous.

Someone asked, “Mr. Liu, aren’t you going with us?”

“I have to stay at the company. Miss Luo will be leading the trip this time. Besides, Miss Luo is the one that planned this team building activity. She even chose the location herself,” Liu Kun finished his sentence smiling. Then, he declared that the meeting had ended and left.

When Chen Xu heard that Luo Xiyun would be leading the trip, he knew that it wouldn’t be anywhere near relaxing.

In everyday life, Luo Xiyun placed everything around her in order. The same went for her life at work. She imposed strict demands on her subordinates and wouldn’t allow even the slightest flaw. Everything had to be perfect. Over the past half a month, she had been martyrizing her group of subordinates.

Besides, he thought it was odd that the trip set on a Thursday. Weren’t these things usually on weekends?

He couldn’t seem to come up with the logic to answer every question that cropped up in his mind.

He felt that, more or less, something wasn’t quite right about this.

……

Thursday morning, Chen Xu arrived at the rendezvous point at the agreed time. Luo Xiyun had rented a bus, and after everyone arrived, they immediately set off.

On the bus, in addition to the people in their department, there were several people he didn’t know.

Luo Xiyun introduced them as the team building hosts she had invited who would be responsible for leading the team building activities.

These few people were experts in energizing the atmosphere. After an hour on road, they had already managed to make everyone let go of their restrained attitudes. Many had gotten into the mode of having fun. There was laughter all along the way.

Eventually, the bus stopped at a four-star hotel, and everyone got off.

Chen Xu couldn’t help getting struck by his feelings again. Having a generous leader was great. Yesterday, Luo Xiyun had mentioned that the team building would last for two days and one night.

He had never expected Luo Xiyun to book a four-star hotel for them to stay in.

The room allocation was two people per room. After everyone had moved their luggage into their rooms, they returned to gather downstairs, and the team building activities officially began…

Everyone had to acknowledge that hiring the hosts was worth every single cent. Professionals were, after all, professionals. After a couple of games, even Chen Xu was well-engaged in them. He started to feel that the team building activities weren’t all that bad.

In the afternoon, they even had a basketball game with his department going against the host team.

The few hosts often exercised. Although they did not have too much of an advantage in height, their skills weren’t something office workers could compete against. Swiftly, the hosts bested them miserably.

Even Chen Xu couldn’t stand to watch anymore. How could he watch his own department get defeated so badly after he had only just established a sense of pride towards his team? Seizing the opportunity when the host team scored and his side was about to put the ball back into play, he held the person who would be throwing it in and said, “Swap me in for a while.”

“Alright.” This colleague of his was obviously not an active person. He was already a little breathless. Hearing Chen Xu say that he wanted to get on the court, he agreed to let him.

“Swap.”

Chen Xu shouted, stood at the baseline, and passed the ball in.

“Go get ’em, Chen Xu!” Dai Zixin was the first to shout when she saw him on the court.

Chen Xu waved at her and ran to the opponent’s side of the court.

Back in high school, his only hobby had been basketball. But of course, he was the amateur among the amateurs. He hadn’t touched basketball for a very long time and probably couldn’t even dribble well.

However, nothing mattered as long as the ball went into the hoop.

Earlier on when everyone else was warming up, he had gone over to shoot a few balls and had already gotten the hang of it.

He stood outside the three-point line and saw that the defenders were farther away. This was normal. On the court, there were usually fewer three-point shooters. He shouted, “Pass me the ball.”

The abilities of his point guards were also limited. Seeing the enemy defenders getting into formation, they felt that they were incapable of dribbling through, and neither were they confident in shooting at that distance. They heard what Chen Xu said and passed the ball to him.

Chen Xu took the ball, took a second to aim, and shot the ball.

Woosh! The ball swished into the basket.

Thereafter was his time to shine. For every basket the opponent acquired, he would score a three-pointer. After scoring three three-pointers in a row, the morale of his team immediately rose. Everyone began to trust him and would pass the ball to him whenever they could.

The opponent too came to realize the threat he posed. When he received the ball for the fourth time, his defender came hurtling over to him.

If it were him during high school, he could’ve still got through. Now, he wasn’t even bold enough to dribble as he would’ve lost the ball at any time.

In such a situation, he couldn’t even get into his shooting posture.

“I bet you’re just lucky with those three-pointers,” the defender who was guarding him couldn’t help but taunt. Judging on his reaction after receiving the ball, he was no more than a rookie who couldn’t even dribble. However, sometimes, as unrealistic it might seem, when a rookie tapped into the adrenaline of the atmosphere, they could score no matter how they shot the ball.

“You think I can’t shoot in this way?” Chen Xu grinned. He blocked the defender with his left shoulder and hurled the ball out with a right-handed hook shot.

For such a hook shot, unless his defender was another 20 centimeters taller, he would never have blocked it. He could only watch as the ball flew past him.

“Wait for the rebound!” he shouted. A hook shot beyond the three-point field goal was no different from a random hurl. His first reaction was to snatch the ball.

Woosh.

Another ball in the basket.

“What the heck?” The guy froze, dumbfounded.

…

The fifth time Chen Xu received the ball, that person was still reluctant to believe in heresy. He once again came to put a body on Chen Xu, “I do not believe that your luck is that good.”

Chen Xu took a glance at him and shot the ball in the same exact posture.

Wooosh.

“Fifth!” Dai Zixin screamed all of a sudden, and the others followed.

The defender opened his mouth slightly, and his eyes were a little blank.

…

It was the sixth time.

The same guy went to guard Chen Xu without saying a word.

It was another hook shot.

Woosh.

“Sixth!” This time, all his colleagues screamed together.

“What the hell? What is this sorcery?” the defender wondered, shocked. Three high difficulty shots in a row. How was that possible?

Later on, people no longer cared about losing or winning. Everyone wanted to know how many balls Chen Xu could get into the hoop.

“Seventh!”

“Eighth!”

…

“Tenth!”

Aside from the person who was guarding Chen Xu, the other hosts were looking at Chen Xu like they were looking at a deity.

“What a real eye-opener today,” one of them murmured.