97: Chapter 97: Watching her shop like that, I feel like I'm being kept by a sugar daddy?

The atmosphere in the office was quiet to the point of being eerie.

Lu Li leaned back against his chair, crossing his arms and waiting patiently.

Shen Qingxue stood by the doorway without coming in, her hat brim pulled down very low, and a face mask covering more than half of her face.

The middle-aged man glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, took it back, and let it fall back onto Lu Li.

"Ten million, where did you get so much money?"

"That is none of your concern."

Lu Li's tone remained calm.

"As long as the money is real, that's all that matters."

The middle-aged man was choked up for a moment, opened his mouth as if to say something, but after thinking about it, he decided there was no need.

Afterwards, he picked up the desk phone and dialed an extension number.

"Xiao Liu, come over here for a moment."

Soon, a young girl wearing glasses knocked on the door and entered, holding a POS machine in her hand.

"Hello, President Wang."

Wang Qicheng nodded and handed her the bank card.

"Check the balance."

Xiao Liu took the card, operated it a few times, then asked Lu Li to enter his password, after which she raised her head and spoke.

"President Wang, the balance is exactly ten million."

Wang Qicheng glanced at Lu Li, then at the bank card, fell silent for two seconds, and then waved his hand at Xiao Liu.

"Alright, you can go out now."

Xiao Liu nodded, took the POS machine, and retreated outside.

The office fell quiet once again.

Wang Qicheng leaned back against his chair, tapped his fingers lightly on the armrest twice, and then spoke.

"Lu Li, are you sure you have thought this through? Your popularity is currently very high, the company can arrange resources for you, as long as—"

"No need."

Lu Li interrupted him, his tone still calm.

"My mind is made up."

Wang Qicheng stared at him for a few seconds, then sighed, took out a folder from the drawer, flipped through a few pages, and pushed it in front of Lu Li.

"Alright, since you've decided, I won't stop you either."

"This is the termination agreement. Take a look, and if there are no problems, sign it."

Lu Li took the folder and read it from start to finish.

Worried that he might have missed something, he even had Shen Qingxue come in to take a look.

The terms were written very clearly: both parties voluntarily terminated the contract, Lu Li paid a penalty of exactly ten million yuan, and from then on, the two parties would have no further ties whatsoever.

After checking it several times and finding no issues, Lu Li put down the folder, took a pen out of his pocket, signed his name, and pressed his fingerprint.

The entire process was neat and decisive, without a trace of hesitation.

Wang Qicheng looked at his composed appearance, the corners of his mouth twitching slightly.

Lu Li pushed the signed agreement back.

"Done."

Wang Qicheng took the folder, lowered his head to take a glance, then took out the official seal from the drawer and stamped it.

"Alright, starting from today, you and Moonlight Entertainment have no further relationship whatsoever."

He handed one of the agreements to Lu Li, then leaned back against the chair, crossed his hands in front of his abdomen, and looked at Lu Li.

"Lu Li, although you have terminated your contract, I still want to say this: you are a talented person, I hope you don't narrow your own path."

Lu Li stood up, folded the agreement and stuffed it into his pants pocket, looking down at the middle-aged man with the corners of his mouth slightly upturned.

"Rest assured, President Wang, my path is wide open."

Wang Qicheng didn't answer, only nodding slightly.

Lu Li turned and walked away, stopped after taking two steps, then looked at Shen Qingxue and slightly raised his chin at her.

"Let's go."

Shen Qingxue nodded and followed behind him.

The two of them walked out of the office one after the other.

The moment the door closed, the middle-aged man's expression finally changed, the corners of his mouth slowly curling into an arc.

He picked up the bank card on the desk, flipped it over between his fingers, and then pulled open the drawer and threw it inside.

"Ten million."

He muttered in a low voice, a hint of smugness in his tone.

"Three songs in exchange for ten million, not a loss, even made a little profit."

In his view, how could a newly popular minor celebrity and three songs that were currently hot but filled with future uncertainties compare to the solidity of cash?

Even if everyone said the quality of these songs was peerless, so what?

Before seeing the real profits they brought, he would never take such song copyrights to heart.

Just a few songs, could they possibly turn the world upside down?

...

Inside the elevator.

Lu Li leaned against the elevator wall, his hands in his pockets, staring at the floor numbers ticking down one by one.

Shen Qingxue stood beside him, her hat brim still pulled down very low, making her expression unclear.

Neither of them spoke.

The elevator reached the first floor, the doors opened, and Lu Li walked out first.

Shen Qingxue followed behind him, the two's pace neither fast nor slow, but inexplicably in sync.

When walking out of the office building's main entrance, Lu Li suddenly stopped in his tracks, raised his head and hand, squinted at the sunlight overhead, and took a deep breath.

"I'm free."

Shen Qingxue stood beside him, turning her head to glance at him.

"Congratulations."

Shen Qingxue said indifferently.

Lu Li turned his head to look at her and grinned broadly.

"Haha, congratulations to you too."

Afterwards, Lu Li took the termination agreement out of his pants pocket, unfolded it to look at it for a couple of times, folded it back up and stuffed it back in, patting his pocket.

"What's next?"

Shen Qingxue raised a hand to adjust her sunglasses, her voice coming from behind the mask sounding a bit muffled.

"Go register."

"Register?"

"Group name, accounts, copyrights, not a single one can be missing."

Lu Li was stunned for a moment, then nodded.

That's right, since they were going to do it, they had to do it more formally; they couldn't just have two people muddle together and start working like this.

Before long, the two of them flagged down a taxi and headed straight for the government affairs center.

The registration process was more tedious than imagined.

Filling out forms, signing, queuing, auditing—going through the whole set of procedures took nearly two hours.

Fortunately, Shen Qingxue was there. She was obviously much more familiar with these procedures than Lu Li, leading him through the whole process, filling in what needed to be filled and signing what needed to be signed.

Lu Li simply followed behind her, only responsible for taking out his ID card and pressing fingerprints.

After all this, he was so leisurely that he felt a bit embarrassed. However, when he wanted to help, Shen Qingxue was unwilling, so he had no choice but to drop it.

When all the formalities were completed and the two came out of the government affairs center, Lu Li had an extra kraft paper bag in his hand, filled with various licenses, certificates, and agreements.

The four characters "Rock Sugar Pear" would no longer be just a casually spoken group name starting today, but were solidly registered on record.

"Done."

Lu Li shook the kraft paper bag in his hand and raised an eyebrow at Shen Qingxue.

Shen Qingxue glanced at him, didn't answer, and turned to walk towards the roadside.

Lu Li hurried two steps to catch up.

"What's next?"

"Buy equipment."

Shen Qingxue didn't even look back.

"Without equipment, how are we going to record songs? Record with our heads?"

Lu Li was choked up for a moment, and rubbed his nose sheepishly.

Fine, you are the boss, you call the shots.

Thus, for the better part of the rest of the day, the two of them basically soaked in various electronics markets and equipment stores.

Shen Qingxue had clearly done her homework on recording equipment; whether it was the microphone parameters or the sound card's characteristics, she could talk about them clearly.

As for Lu Li, he could only follow behind her, completely unable to chime in, and could only be responsible for carrying things, not even able to pay the bills.

Watching Shen Qingxue frantically buying and buying before his eyes, a thought subconsciously arose in Lu Li's heart.

"Holy crap, why is there a feeling of being kept?"