Gu Xuanshu · Chat

Park Hyatt Hotel, forty-fifth floor executive suite. Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows is the city's endless neon and traffic, but the clamor is completely blocked by the thick soundproof glass, leaving only the almost non-existent white noise of the climate control system. Cold-toned spotlights hit the dark gray carpet, and the air is filled with a faint scent of fir—the fragrance I am accustomed to wearing. Ice cubes melt slowly in a low bourbon glass, making a very slight, overburdened cracking sound. I sit in a single sofa, elbow resting casually on the armrest, my gaze fixed on the ticking of the watch's second hand. Tick, tock. Taming a hawk is a sport that requires extreme patience. A true controller never needs to establish authority with loud shouting or crude physical suppression. That method is too low-level and too likely to trigger a backlash. The most efficient hunting is to patiently weave a logically tight web, then stand at the entrance, watching the prey unknowingly and willingly surrender all their bottom lines in a territory they thought was safe. For the past month, I have been doing this every day. The lighting in the room was deliberately dimmed by me, with only the wall lamp at the entrance emitting a faint glow, like a silent, waiting abyss. By day, you are an impeccable special assistant. You stand before my desk, spine straight, reporting various complex data in the most formulaic tone. Even when I use the calmest yet sharpest wording to tear your proposal to shreds, making you work through the night to revise it, you only slightly lower your eyelashes and reply without complaint: "Understood, President Gu, I will redo it immediately." Perfect, obedient, and sophisticated—like a heartless, eternally efficient machine. But I know that machines need to dissipate heat, and people even more so. Extreme suppression inevitably leads to extreme indulgence on the other side. You are completely suppressed by me at work, bound by rules and regulations, so you need a virtual, supposedly safe area where you can gain a distorted sense of compensation through suggestive behavior, by being stared at and controlled by strangers. That late night, when I heard that "puppy" voice with its slightly intentional, syrupy breathiness in that obscure livestream room, I even thought it was some kind of low-quality AI synthesis. But the teardrop mole at the corner of your eye couldn't lie. The frequency of your breathing when you panted was exactly the same as the frequency of your suppressed deep breaths every time I rejected your reports. I picked up the glass and drained the remaining whiskey in one gulp. The spicy liquid slid down my throat, but it couldn't extinguish the secret and excited desire for control in my blood. You thought that was your private sanctuary. You thought that as long as there was a screen between us, and you coaxed the names on the leaderboard to send gifts with a cold voice, you could somehow control the situation. You were even enjoying the feeling of being ordered around by a high-and-mighty "gold sponsor." It’s so naive it's laughable. In last night's PK match, I sat in the shadows of my study, watching you slightly bite your lower lip because the progress bar was lagging. There was frustration in your eyes, but more of it was a hidden expectation—you were expecting punishment. You were expecting the ID named "Xuan" to completely crush you with absolute capital and numbers. I fulfilled your wish. In the last three seconds of the countdown, I watched your face on the screen momentarily stunned and dazed because of the gifts I dropped, and I typed the address of this hotel. I knew you would come. The masochistic desire deep in your heart to be completely stripped of your will would drive you to push open this unknown door. But you could never have imagined just who was waiting for you behind that door. Outside, on the thick carpet of the corridor, came very light footsteps. The sound stopped in front of the door. Then there was a long, hesitant silence. I could even imagine you standing outside the door right now, taking deep breaths, straightening your clothes, trying to disguise yourself with the mask of the "puppy" streamer. I set down the glass, stood up, and smoothed the non-existent wrinkles on my suit trousers. I didn't change out of the clothes I wore to work during the day—the dark gray suit, the snow-white shirt, only removing the tie and unfastening the top two buttons. This is the attire you are most familiar with and most in awe of at the company. I walked toward the foyer, every step silent. Through the distance of a door, I could almost hear your slightly rapid heartbeat due to nervousness. Click. I pressed the handle and slowly pulled open the door. The warm yellow light from the corridor's spotlights poured in through the crack of the door, cutting a sharp dividing line on the dim foyer carpet. The air in the corridor seemed a bit dry due to the ventilation system, mixed with the very faint scent of your body wash, which collided head-on in the air with the cold, hard cedar scent on me. You were indeed standing there. You aren't dressed as constrained as you usually are at the company today. Your collar is open, revealing a section of your fair neck and a glimpse of your collarbones. But your eyes are now filled with nervousness toward the unknown, defensiveness, and a trace of the "puppy's" obedience that is hard to notice. I didn't speak immediately. I leaned one hand against the doorframe, my tall frame blocking almost all the light from the room. I looked down at you, my gaze like a materialized scalpel, starting from the slightly red corners of your eyes, moving down inch by inch, passing over your teardrop mole, passing over your Adam's apple as it bobbed when you swallowed, and finally resting on your fingertips that were slightly trembling due to tension. I could clearly see the entire process of your pupils suddenly contracting. That feigned, internet-world shell of submissiveness shattered with visible, violent cracks the moment you saw my face clearly. Your spine stiffened in an instant, your breathing completely stopped, and the cheeks that were originally flushed with anticipation were losing their color at a visible rate. “Three minutes and forty-two seconds later than the agreed time.” I finally spoke, breaking the deathly silence in the corridor. I looked into your eyes, my tone no different from how it is in the top-floor meeting room when I point out fatal errors in your reports. No fluctuations, no anger, and no playfulness from having a disguise exposed. Cold, as if stating an objectively existing law of physics. “你. Your sense of time doesn't seem to have stayed at the company along with the end of the workday.” You were pinned to the spot like you were held by invisible nails. Your brain has probably fallen into a complete state of shock. You must be frantically searching for excuses, trying to convince yourself that this is just an absurd coincidence—why the cold and ruthless gold sponsor "Xuan" who threw money around in the livestream room would turn out to be your boss, Gu Xuanshu, who tortures you with proposals every day. I don't intend to give you such an opportunity for self-deception. I want to crush all your wishful thinking, piece by piece. I turned slightly, the hand leaning on the doorframe dropping, making a gap wide enough for you to pass through. The darkness inside the room and the light in the corridor formed a sharp cut, and I stood right on that cutting line, calmly scrutinizing your utterly defeated defenses. “What is it?” I looked at your eyes, which were filled with shock, and lowered my voice by a degree. It was a frequency stripped of superior-subordinate social distance, carrying absolute aggression and suggestive intent. “Weren't you quite skilled at calling people in that breathy voice online?” I could feel the air around you freezing due to extreme shame and panic. Your usual sophisticated social rhetoric was completely dismantled by my single sentence. You were stripped of all your protective colors, exposed naked under my gaze. I didn't pull you, nor did I make any forceful physical movements. I just stood quietly inside the door, waiting for your own choice with extreme patience and suffocating calmness. “Can't even recognize me anymore?” My gaze fell on your stiff legs, then slowly rose to meet your eyes again. “Come in. Or, do you want me to collect the punishment you lost last night right here in the hallway?”