41 DTD

Irene Zhou took Lina around the 22nd floor to show her the entire Marketing department.

There were two large conference rooms, the offices for the bosses in the department, a rest area with a cafeteria and several cubicles for the employees to work at.

The biggest office there belonged to Stuart Bai and the smallest which was empty earlier would be given to Lina.

Irene received a phone call and handed over the job of familiarising Lina with the office to Anthony Shen who had silently followed the two ladies.

He led Lina to her new work space, her office.

"Mr Bai and Ms Zhou's offices are on the opposite side of the floor, whereas ours on this side." He pointed towards the three offices next to each other.

The first door had *ANTHONY SHEN, MANAGER* written on it. The next had *MAXENE KANG, RESEARCH ANALYST* and the last door had no name on it.

"This must be mine." Lina pointed at the last door and Anthony opened the door for her.

As they walked in and closed the door, the employees who were busy typing on their keyboards instantly peeped to look at the door that they had entered.

"Who do you think she is? A new employee?" A man with a scruffy and unkempt beard asked the lady who sat beside him, filing her nails.

"I don't think so, I have not seen Mr. Bai taking any interviews recently." She shook her head as she examined her nails.

"Maybe she's just a relative and is touring the office." The guy said scratching his beard.

------

Inside Lina's new office.

"Wow, dude look at the view!" She exclaimed looking out the window at the view of the busy city.

"Umm.. You are not angry?" Anthony was taken back at how friendly she was despite how he had laughed at her education earlier.

"Does me being angry solve anything? You are entitled to your opinions as long as it doesn't interfere with my work." She said as she went to check out the restroom in her office.

'Thank God that Wade gave me an office with a toilet in it. I can't pee in common restrooms.' She sighed and walked out.

Actually every office in the building has its own restrooms, while the secretaries and normal employees had to use the common restrooms.

"I like your work attitude and I am sorry for that. I rarely see Mr Bai being sassy and that caught me off guard." He apologized.

"It's fine now, I hope we get along well and become friends." She excitedly shook his hands and sat at her desk.

"That would be nice. I'll send you the details and rules of the office soon. Right now there isn't much work, so just relax." He smiled and walked out.

Lina stretched on the comfy chair and twirled around in it.

'Of course there's no work right now because I still haven't released the new collection. That reminds me, I have to discuss the details of my new pieces with Wade.' She took out her phone from her pocket to pass her time.

'Aww… Wade is so thoughtful!' She read his message and sent him a reply.

*Thanks, big bro. I'll be there on time.*

Having nothing to do, Lina spent her morning playing games and snacking on the dry fruits that she had asked Suzie to pack for her.

*Knock Knock*

"Come in!" Not looking up from her game, Lina just asked the person to enter.

"Excuse me? Ms?" she heard a voice and Lina looked up.

*Game over!* Came the loud notification from her phone.

"Dammit! I was shot dead!" She threw her phone on the desk and glared at the man who has distracted her just now.

"Ummm.. Manager Shen asked me to pass this onto you." The bearded guy handed over the file to Lina and just stood there.

"Thanks. I'm Lina by the way." Standing up, she shook his hand.

"Hello, Ms Lina. I am Manager Shen's personal assistant, Leon Jiu." He smiled at her.

The man looked like he was in his thirties and had a beard which was definitely not managed properly. He was as tall as Anthony Shen but was not as muscular as his boss.

"Can I ask you a question?" He timidly asked.

"Sure." She sat back down and gestured for him to follow.

"Was that *Doom to the Dynasty* that I heard when I entered?" His eyes shone with excitement.

"Yes! You know the game?" Lina was surprised to find a fellow gamer, that too such an old one.

*Doom to the Dynasty* was a multiplayer game that had an ancient historical setting but with all the modern day weapons. You need to make groups  and form clans to fight from the borders of the kingdom and work your way to the centre. The final boss was the Emperor who was undefeated till date. One of the reasons the game gained popularity was the super hard final level that made people become obsessed to clear it.

"Of course, it's my favorite game! Wow, it's the first time I have met a girl who plays this game." He said enthusiastically.

Girls usually avoided the game because of its graphic and gory scenes that were not meant for the feeble minded.

"I'm sure many girls play DTD. But I'm shocked that DTD is famous in your age group as well." Lina nodded her head in appreciation.

"Age group? And that would be?" Leon asked her with a grim face.

'Fuck! I think I offended him.' She tried to salvage her situation.

"Not that old people can't play DTD. Anyone can play it, I'm sure!" She did not do a very good job at it.

"I'm 27! That's not old!" He stood up and stared at Lina.

"27? Are you sure?" She asked him once again and gained a nasty look from him.

'Why does this keep happening to me!' Pulling out his Drivers License, Leon showed his age to Lina.

"Dude! You really are 27!" Her mouth was a 'O' now.

"Told you!" Shoving his ID back in his wallet, he sat down again.

"I'll let this go if you can tell me what level you are on." Leon said with a calculative smile.

DTD was known for its complete secrecy of identity. You only know the players through their avatars and usernames.  So Leon knew better than to ask her player name, but asking her level was alright.

"I'm at Level 24. Stuck with that stupid General Onn, bastard just doesn't die!" She remembered her frustration from earlier.

"You've gone too far inside, I'm still stuck at the mid city level." Leon was surprised to hear that Lina was at the inner city level.

'Of course I'm at a higher level. I've been playing this game since they first launched it!' She withheld this information.

"I've spent too much time inside, I better get back to work." Leon got up and walked to the door.

"Let's talk again some other time, bye Leo!" She happily waved at him.

'Leo huh? She seems like an alright person.' He just closed the door and walked to his seat.

"What took you so long? You've been inside for 15 minutes now. Do you know who she is?" The lady next to him questioned.

"Yes, She is Lina." Leon replied while sending his boss a text that he had completed his task.

"Lina? Lina what? What's her position? Why is she here?"  She asked him, all her laziness and indifference from earlier was gone.

"I don't know. But why are you so bothered, Julia?" He shot a look at her.

Julia Chang looked around and moved closer and whispered in his ear.

"Because someone saw her coming out of the elevator with VP Luo this morning. Do you think she used her connections to work here?" She looked at Lina's closed door.

"I don't know. Let's just wait till she's introduced." He too looked at her door and shook his head.

'She'll be gone soon if that is true.' He felt bad that he would soon lose a fellow DTD fan.

----

Inside her office, Lina sat and imagined how she would improve the room to make it her own.

'I'll ask Wade to get them done by tomorrow.' She nodded after deciding what to do.

Soon it was lunch time and she walked out of her office and towards the common elevator.

'Looks like everyone left to eat at the cafeteria but I still can't risk being seen entering the VP's private elevator.' Rolling her eyes, she pressed the 25th floor's button and waited.

Reaching the top floor, she walked past the row of secretary desks and moved towards Wade's office.

'How many secretaries does he need? That lazy bum!' She cursed him and directly entered his office without knocking.

'Why was I expecting him to be working? Look at him drooling on the files!' She sneaked to his side and yelled  "Boo.." right next to his ear.

Wade was startled from his sleep and frantically looked around.

"Fuck! Nana! You'll give me a heart attack someday." Rubbing his pounding heart, he looked at the time.

"You are early, genius! It's still 10 min before lunch." He said and got up to wash his face.

"Not my fault that the marketing department was not busy today." She shrugged her shoulders and sat on the soft bouncy couch.

"It is exactly your fault! With no new pieces in the market, they have no work to do right now!" He informed her.

"Right! I wanted to talk to you about this matter." She looked at him with her serious work mode eyes as he sat opposite to her seat.