Chapter 66 Fake

Chapter 66: Imitation

When Liu Zhenzhu saw Xie Xinyi at the workshop, she first spent a minute pondering why Xie Xinyi had come to her for the formula. Then, she took another minute to recall the girl's appearance from when she had glimpsed her around a corner in Fruit Lane.

Drawing on her hazy memory, she quickly composed herself and, under the surprised gazes of everyone, stepped forward to grasp Xie Xinyi’s hand.

“Yi Mei,” she cooed, using a term of familial affection.

The endearment made Xie Jianjun shudder when he heard her say it.

Despite going against her own wishes, Liu Zhenzhu continued to use it. The more she said it, the more natural and effortless it became. If not for the fact that she knew she had a mission, she might have almost believed she truly was Xie Xinyi’s close cousin-in-law.

“Your cousin is quite an actress too. She clearly doesn’t like me, but she still puts on a show for outsiders. She doesn’t seem meek and submissive like you described at all—if anything, I’m the one acting meek and submissive around her.”

Liu Zhenzhu shot a frustrated glance at the man who kept his head down and remained silent. “You didn’t see the way she spoke today. She’s clearly not someone to be trifled with.”

Not someone to be trifled with?

After hearing his wife’s description, Xie Jianjun began to wonder if they were even talking about the same person.

In his impression, Xie Xinyi was the type who could hardly utter a word—a real “clam-mouthed gourd.” When did she become so articulate and even capable of making insinuating remarks?

He turned back doubtfully. “Are you sure the person you met is Third Uncle’s Xie Xinyi?”

“Of course.”

“Not just someone with the same name?”

Liu Zhenzhu flicked his forehead. “Same name, my foot. If it were just a coincidence, why would that person come to us?”

That made sense. The director of the suburban county food factory had chosen them precisely because of their relation to Xie Xinyi. If Xie Xinyi weren’t the real Xie Xinyi, this opportunity would never have fallen into their laps.

Liu Zhenzhu’s reasoning was sound. No matter how doubtful Xie Jianjun felt, he could only attribute it to the fact that he hadn’t been home in years and hadn’t seen Xie Xinyi in five or six years. Besides, marriage could change a person’s personality, so it was plausible that Xie Xinyi no longer seemed like her old self.

He nodded silently, accepting Liu Zhenzhu’s words, and was about to comfort her when she let out a long sigh and said worriedly, “The Ice Pop Team formulas are all with Xie Xinyi. How are we supposed to get them from her?”

The suburban county food factory didn’t just want this year’s new product formula—they also wanted last year’s best-selling Doll Head Ice Cream formula.

Before Liu Zhenzhu joined the team, they had told her that all the formulas were held by one person, but they hadn’t mentioned that it was Xie Xinyi, who was as cunning as a fox.

Xie Xinyi was not someone to be trifled with.

After these past few days of interaction, Liu Zhenzhu was certain that trying to use their familial connection to cozy up to her and get the formulas was almost impossible.

Moreover, the Ice Pop Team members were all very sly and didn’t allow temps like them to access the key ingredients.

She had been in the Ice Pop Team for a few days now, but she hadn’t even been allowed into the warehouse, let alone gotten close to the raw materials.

Getting the formulas wouldn’t be easy.

With no other options and the deadline from the suburban county food factory approaching, Liu Zhenzhu thought it over and decided she had to risk it.

—

When Xie Xinyi noticed that the number of rejects was increasing, Old Liu had just returned to work after his medical leave.

After being away from the factory for several months, the old master went straight to inspect each workshop.

When he arrived at Xie Xinyi’s Ice Pop Team, he happened to see her and Cui Jun whispering in a corner.

The two were standing near the factory wall. Since few people passed by that area and it was fairly open, it was a suitable spot for men and women to openly share secrets.

Old Liu had brought Xie Xinyi there before when the R&D team was discussing ideas. Today, taking a shortcut from the non-staple food workshop, he unexpectedly ran into Xie Xinyi and Cui Jun having a hushed conversation.

“What are you two whispering about?”

Noticing their serious expressions and the way they kept pointing at the ice cream bar in their hands, he approached and asked what was going on.

“…What? The rejects are increasing, and the numbers don’t match?”

After hearing Xie Xinyi describe the strange occurrences of the past few days, Old Liu frowned, took the defective ice cream bar from her hand, and tasted it.

“The taste is up to standard, but the shape is off. Big Chen noticed it during quality inspection.”

Cui Jun repeated the doubts Xie Xinyi had shared with him and added his own opinion. “It was probably an accident during demolding.”

He pointed to the slightly crooked part. “The curve is subtle and covered by the cone. It doesn’t look intentional. Only someone as meticulous as Big Chen would notice. If Xie Xinyi hadn’t mentioned it, I wouldn’t have noticed either.”

Old Liu held the ice cream bar up for a closer look.

It was indeed hard to spot—just a slight, subtle curve. He turned to Xie Xinyi. “Do you think it was deliberate?”

Ignoring Cui Jun’s thoughts, he directly voiced Xie Xinyi’s suspicion. Old Liu not only understood the product well but also understood Xie Xinyi.

Xie Xinyi did find the situation strange. From the first time she saw the defective product, she felt something was off.

She had developed the sandwich ice cream herself and knew its strengths and weaknesses better than anyone.

Yes, the flaw in the defective product was subtle, but precisely because it was so subtle, she felt the situation was more suspicious.

“It doesn’t seem accidental,” she said with certainty. “If it were a mistake during demolding, Ms. Liu would’ve noticed it immediately, not waited until quality inspection for Big Chen to find it.”

Xie Xinyi explained her doubts. After the defective products increased over the past two days, she had specifically kept a close watch with Big Chen.

“We noticed that the defective products have been appearing in a very regular pattern.”

“A regular pattern?” Old Liu’s frown deepened.

“Yes. I calculated—one per batch. However many batches we produce in a day, that’s how many defective products there are.”

At first, Xie Xinyi wasn’t entirely sure and thought she might have miscalculated. How could it be so regular? So she called Big Chen over, and after carefully counting, they confirmed that indeed, for every batch produced, there was one defective product.

“I think someone must have tampered with the mold.”

If one mold was altered, it would result in one defective product per batch.

Aside from this explanation, Xie Xinyi couldn’t explain it otherwise.

Big Chen thought so too, but they hadn’t had time to inspect each mold yet. They planned to report to Aunt Cui first but ran into Old Liu, who had just returned from his leave.

Having worked in the food industry for so many years, Liu Yinsheng had never heard of such a strange occurrence.

By the time Xie Xinyi finished her analysis, his frown was deep enough to trap a mosquito.

“Do you suspect anyone?”

He asked Xie Xinyi.

"No," she said.

In the previous incident with Wu Guifen, they could analyze it from the motive, but this time, Xie Xinyi was completely clueless.

Although she suspected someone was doing it intentionally, she'd thought for days but couldn't figure out the motive behind the suspect's actions.

The damage wasn't serious, and there weren't many of them. The discrepancy in the count had only started a few days ago. The most plausible motive she could think of was that someone wanted to get sandwich ice pops for free.

Just like before, when Gu Ying said she couldn't buy sandwich ice pops and really wanted to eat them, she would ask Xie Xinyi to bring back some imperfect ones for her.

But Xie Xinyi thought this possibility was unlikely. After all, the workshop staff's families had already had their fill of ice pops. Even though sandwich ice pops were very popular with the public, their families were already used to them and were no longer impressed by them.

Moreover, they had employee discounts and priority buying rights. Although there were quotas, that was sufficient. There was no need to go to all that trouble to damage the ice pops and then risk being fired just to take a few home.

Xie Xinyi felt that no one on their team was that dumb. At least old-timers like Ms. Liu wouldn't do it, and temps like Guo Lishu probably wouldn't risk so much for a few ice pops either.

So when Old Liu asked if she had any suspects, she gave him her honest opinion.

Cui Jun also felt it couldn't be someone from their team, and he had always believed this wasn't done on purpose.

"It's normal for molds to warp; we've encountered it many times before."

He didn't say Xie Xinyi was overreacting but simply told her not to worry.

"We'll play it by ear," Old Liu suggested. "Keep this under wraps for now. Tonight, you and Big Chen stay late to weed out the faulty molds."

By first identifying the faulty molds and leaving only the good ones, they wouldn't produce any rejects in the next day's production.

If it was indeed intentional, whoever was behind it would likely take action once they noticed this.

If it was just a coincidence, even better—they would have fixed the problem along the way.

Xie Xinyi thought this was a good idea. Without a better solution, it was their only shot at finding the truth without affecting production progress.

She nodded in agreement. "I'll let Eldest Brother Chen know."

To avoid any hiccups, they had to keep it quiet. Not only could Guo Lishu and the others not know, but even Ms. Liu and Xiao Jiang were left out of the loop.

That night, she stayed behind to lock up. Big Chen first found an excuse to hang back in the Sweet Rice Ball Team area. After everyone had left, the three of them went to the Ice Pop Team and went over the molds one by one.

The next day, when work started, no one knew what had happened. Not even the fact that there wasn't a single defective product all day drew any attention.

Was she overthinking it?

Xie Xinyi scanned the people working hard at their stations.

Nothing shady, no sneaking around, no absent-mindedness...

Big Chen was stumped, too.

No one was acting unusual, and this continued for several days in a row.

When Liu Yinsheng came to ask about the situation, Xie Xinyi and Big Chen were at a loss.

"Maybe I really was seeing things."

Xie Xinyi smiled apologetically. It was the first time in years that she had second-guessed her intuition—that strong gut feeling.

Big Chen felt defeated. After all, he was the first to notice the issue and the one who had asked Xie Xinyi to report it to Cui Mama.

Maybe it really was just a coincidence.

He smiled helplessly and, following Old Liu's advice, decided to drop it for the time being and focus on meeting production targets.

The production workload was getting heavier.

Since hiring temporary workers like Liu Zhenzhu, Lin Wei had increased their output quota by another twenty percent.

The machinery remained the same; they had only added more people.

Everyone in the Ice Pop Team was run off their feet—changing clothes quickly, wolfing down their meals. If it weren't for Xie Xinyi's arrangements tailored to each person's situation, they might have had to work more than just an extra hour.

The entire Ice Pop Team was making the most of their resources, pushing themselves to their limits. But just as they were working their tails off, the market outside was quietly changing.

Xie Xinyi learned about the counterfeit sandwich ice pops on the market from Gu Ying.

"The packaging looks exactly the same. I didn't realize I'd bought a fake until I took a bite. Then I checked the manufacturer carefully and found it wasn't produced by your factory at all."

Xie Xinyi glanced at the bag Gu Ying handed her.

On the milky-white bag was a large sandwich pattern. At first glance, it indeed looked identical to their packaging.

She examined the manufacturer's name more closely.

Hongguang Food Factory.

Xie Xinyi had never heard of this name, so early the next morning, she brought the counterfeit product in a thermos to Old Liu.

"Counterfeit" was maybe too strong a word, as there was no concept of infringement in those days, and the other party had cleverly sidestepped all key similarities.

For example, the name: they called it "sandwich ice pops," while the other party called it "Samingzhi ice pops."

The packaging was also similar: they used a creamy yellow color, and so did the other party, with an ice pop pattern on it.

To the naked eye, they were practically the same. But when opened, the ice pop itself was made to mimic their style—cream-flavored ice pop sandwiched between two wafers.

Old Liu opened it and took a taste.

The flavor was indeed quite different—the cream taste was lighter, there was more sugar, and the wafers were soft and stuck to the cream.

But these were subtle differences, and only someone like Gu Ying, who was used to their factory's sandwich ice pops, could tell.

The average person wouldn't spot the difference. However, the appearance of counterfeits so soon after the sandwich ice pops hit the market could significantly impact their factory's sales.

Sure enough, just as Xie Xinyi showed the counterfeit to Old Liu, Yuan Kang came looking for Old Liu across the factory, holding ice pops brought back by the research team.

"Something's wrong, Master. Hongguang Food Factory stole the recipe for our new ice pop."

Seeing Old Liu and Xie Xinyi talking at the entrance of the Frozen Products Workshop, Yuan Kang rushed over and eagerly reported what the research team had discovered while delivering goods that morning.

"Right now, their product is almost as common as ours on the market." Yuan Kang waved the counterfeit in his hand. "I want to know how Hongguang managed to produce something exactly like ours?"

He was red in the face and practically sputtering. Xie Xinyi had never seen the usually good-tempered deputy factory manager Yuan so angry. She stepped forward and explained what she and Old Liu had just discovered.

"The taste is different?"

Deputy Factory Manager Yuan froze for a moment, looked at Xie Xinyi, then Old Liu, and finally stared at the knockoff ice cream in his hand...

When the news first broke, he had been so focused on finding Old Liu that he hadn’t even tasted the counterfeit product.

Once he realized this, he immediately opened the package and took a bite.

“It tastes the same,” he said, looking up puzzled at the two standing before him. “I don’t notice any difference.”

See? Someone like Yuan Kang couldn’t taste the subtle differences.

And it wasn’t just Yuan Kang—most people couldn’t tell the difference either, which was why Hongguang Food Factory’s counterfeit had broken into the market so quickly.

When shopping, people often go by looks and rarely pay attention to the manufacturer. The counterfeiters had capitalized on this, focused all their effort on copying the packaging rather than perfecting the recipe.

“Only Xie Xinyi and I know about the improved recipe. The formula sheet we shared earlier was the first draft, not the final version.”

Moreover, Fang Mingan had took it back immediately after they looked at it—no one could've memorized the formula in such a short time.

There was no way the recipe had been leaked.

That was Old Liu’s take, and Xie Xinyi agreed.

“Sister Guo and the others only saw the first draft. Old Liu and I made lots of changes after that—they had no idea which version we ultimately used.”

No one knew the final formula.

“Besides, the sandwich ice pop just hit the market. Before its release, there was no way for others to get a sample to copy.”

As Old Liu raised this point, Xie Xinyi went over everything that had happened at the factory since the new product launch...

Hold on!

Suddenly, she remembered the inexplicably missing rejects from a few days earlier.

“Could Hongguang Food Factory have stolen our defective items?”

Reverse-engineering an ice cream recipe isn’t difficult—an experienced technician could approximate it after tasting a few samples.

To prevent this, Xie Xinyi and Old Liu had agreed not to publicly announce the sandwich ice pop’s release date. Instead, they’d first launched the new ice pops developed by Big Chen and Cui Jun to test the waters.

If Big Chen’s new ice pops did well, they could boost sales and pave the way for the sandwich ice pop. If those two varieties didn’t do well, the eye-catching sandwich ice pop could help drive their sales.

Old Liu wanted the three ice pop varieties to support each other in capturing the market. He also hoped the sandwich ice pop, into which he and Xie Xinyi had put their hearts, would become an instant hit. So, he kept a tight schedule—even the early production runs were calculated based on the maximum daily output of Xie Xinyi’s team, not a day earlier or later.

Despite all their precautions, someone had still found a way in.

Xie Xinyi thought back to the defective products that had disappeared not long ago.

At that time, their sandwich ice pop had just launched, and the market response was so positive that it was sold out everywhere across the city.

Moreover, according to Deputy Factory Manager Yuan, they hadn’t seen anyone from Hongguang Food Factory bringing new ice creams for pricing at the Commerce Bureau this year.

If they weren’t there during the pricing session, it meant they hadn’t developed any new products.

If they hadn’t developed anything new, could they be planning to rip off someone else’s hit product? And since samples were unavailable due to citywide shortages, they might have targeted the defective products.

When this idea first occurred to Xie Xinyi, she honestly found it pretty ridiculous.

Though she didn’t know much about Hongguang Food Factory’s standing in the capital, as a state-owned food factory, not developing your own products and instead copying others’ successful items seemed a disgrace to the title.

Xie Xinyi could hardly imagine what kind of enterprise would pull something like this. But Old Liu and Yuan Kang both went quiet after she suggested that someone had stolen their defective products.

The missing defective items weren’t just limited to Big Chen’s new ice pop or Cui Jun’s lemon ice—they also included their factory’s best-selling sandwich ice pop and last year’s smash hit, the Doll Head Ice Cream.

All four of their newly developed products were affected, every one quietly snuck out of the factory.

The thief had used this as a smokescreen, making them think it was a problem with the molds, when in fact the target had always been the defective sandwich ice pops.

Unable to buy samples, they had resorted to theft. Hongguang Food Factory had a backup plan ready—a sneaky move, to be sure.

It was even more underhanded than when Ma Xinsheng had secretly jumped ship to Hongguang Food Factory with the factory’s latest technology.

Once Yuan Kang grasped the situation, he couldn’t help himself. Right in front of Xie Xinyi, he started swearing.

“It must be that shameless Ma Xinsheng’s idea. That bastard—after all his underhanded schemes, he really thinks he can take whatever he wants.”

He crushed the counterfeit ice pop in his hand with a “smack.” Melted ice cream dribbled down his fingers and onto the ground, but it did nothing to calm him down.

Yuan Kang gritted his teeth and unleashed a string of curses aimed at Ma Xinsheng. Ignoring Xie Xinyi’s puzzled expression, he turned to Old Liu and asked, “Master, how do we fight back?”

Fight back?

Liu Yinsheng hadn’t thought that far ahead yet.

What he was most worried about was: Who was helping Hongguang Food Factory? When did this start? Were they behind the missing defective products that Xie Xinyi and Big Chen had discovered earlier?

He asked Xie Xinyi, “Do we know who took those defective products before?”

Xie Xinyi shook her head. “No.”

A few days earlier, they had followed Old Liu’s method and removed the faulty molds. The next day, no defective products were produced, and no one reported anything unusual.

At the time, no one suspected theft—they thought it was just a coincidence, that the molds had happened to break. As for the missing defective products, they assumed someone with a sweet tooth had quietly taken them home, and no one paid much attention to the team members.

Now, with the counterfeit products undeniably on the market, they connected the dots to the earlier missing items.

But as for who took them, Xie Xinyi honestly had no idea.

Not only did she not know, she had no leads.

Though she had a strong feeling that the disappearance of the defective products was suspicious, the person behind it was lying low and too deep—simply observing wouldn’t reveal anything.

Moreover, Hongguang Food Factory already had the formula. Even if it differed from theirs, they had quickly taken over the market.

By this point, the thief’s mission was accomplished, so finding them now wouldn’t be easy.

Xie Xinyi understood what Old Liu was getting at. After answering his question, she proposed a solution: “I think we should actively track her down.”

The thief’s task is complete. If we don’t act proactively, we might never catch them.

She reasoned that Hongguang Food Factory wouldn’t have gone to the trouble of planting someone just for one new ice pop recipe.

If they wanted to uncover the person behind it, they needed to exploit human greed and force them out.

Waiting and watching wouldn’t work—Xie Xinyi wanted to take charge.

Even before Xie Xinyi suggested this, Liu Yinsheng had also been thinking that they couldn’t just sit back and do nothing.

Hongguang Food Factory has already pushed them around this much; if they just wait here for the thief to come forward on their own, they’d be laughed out of town.

Liu Yinsheng cared about a lot of things in life, but his pride... he valued it more than his own life.

With products almost identical to theirs appearing on the market, what will outsiders think? How will they see it?

They’ll definitely say that he, the head technician of the state-owned food factory, is incompetent.

After working so hard for so long to develop a new ice cream, someone else managed to create something almost identical in such a short time.

What does that say?

It’s a slap in his face, plain and simple.

Having worked in the food industry for so many years, this is the first time Liu Yinsheng has been disrespected so openly.

He turned to Xie Xinyi, who was standing nearby, and asked, “Got any ideas?”

After interacting with the young woman so many times, Liu Yinsheng knew her personality well. If she didn’t have a plan, she never would have said what she just did.

The fact that Xie Xinyi said what she did meant she already had a plan.

In fact, she had started thinking about it back when she first suspected the mold had been tampered with.

But since the counterfeit incident hadn’t happened yet, Xie Xinyi hadn't fleshed it out. Now that Old Liu was asking, she laid out her general idea.

“We should publicly announce that we’re about to launch a new ice cream—an upgraded version of the sandwich ice cream. And we should make as big a splash as possible.”

“A new ice cream?” Yuan Kang was puzzled. “How come I didn’t know about this?”

Old Liu thought for a moment, then laughed. “That's news to me, too.”

“Even you didn’t know?” Now Yuan Kang was even more confused.

There's a new product, and he, as the deputy factory manager and the person responsible for pricing, didn't know about it?

Yuan Kang looked questioningly at the old man and the young woman standing in front of him, both smiling at him.

A new product, a public announcement, and making as big a splash as possible…

He thought for a moment, then it dawned on him. A sly glint flashed in his eyes.

“I'm on my way to the delivery area right now.”

His earlier anger gone, a smile reappeared on Yuan Kang’s face. He gave Xie Xinyi a thumbs-up, then dashed off toward the factory gate.