Moon Mansion hired consultants.
Yang Ruoqian received this news at 9:17 and felt honest joy.
Consultants were expensive.
Consultants produced slides.
Slides produced meetings.
Meetings produced phrases that sounded useful and actions that arrived too late.
If Moon Mansion wanted to spend money understanding Xplendi's accidental rejection window, Yang wished them a long and expensive education.
Then Lu Shuyuan said, "They are asking venue owners what Xplendi's rejection process felt like."
Yang's joy weakened.
"Why ask venue owners?"
"Because we will not answer them."
"Correct."
"So they are studying the people we rejected."
Yang looked at the ceiling.
The ceiling had no advice.
By ten, excerpts from Moon Mansion's consultant survey leaked into industry groups.
The survey asked:
Did Xplendi provide clear response boundaries?
Did Xplendi request unnecessary future discussion?
Did Xplendi protect venue identity during internal handling?
