Chapter 54 The First Contestant
Fang Zhuo sat there from 2 p.m. until 10:30 p.m., until the beverage shop across from the factory was about to close, before he finally received Jiang Yu's gesture.
The original book contains very little information about the technological changes in mecha, making this undoubtedly the most crucial and important technological innovation.
According to the subsequent plot described in the original work, after completing his current project, Yang Yurong, the power engineer of Platinum Technology, suddenly made a breakthrough in the research topic he had been studying.
This success was so valuable that he was so excited he couldn't sleep well for several days.
Just as he finished compiling the materials and was about to report to his superiors and apply for further verification funding, he encountered a major problem in the process.
First trial, second trial, third trial... The leaders, who were initially uninterested in this theory, suddenly adopted a stern expression, accusing Yang Yurong of being delusional and wasting company resources, claiming that the theory was completely untenable.
Platinum didn't give him enough funding for subsequent verification experiments, and even Yang Yurong himself gradually began to doubt the feasibility of putting it into production.
After all, the theoretical and technological leap was too great; it was a complete overhaul of the mecha's power system.
He continued to struggle like this for almost a year. The pressure from other projects was increasing. On the one hand, his body couldn't take it anymore, and on the other hand, he felt that there was no hope of getting approval. Disheartened, he left the company.
Just half a month after he left Platinum, the company suddenly gave the research the green light.
The technology that Yang Yurong had spent a great deal of effort researching was injected with a large amount of funding in a short period of time and quickly put into mass production.
His research findings completely changed the way all mechs are powered, triggering an unprecedented mech revolution across the entire Covenant at an alarming pace.
This groundbreaking technological revolution brought huge profits to Platinum Racing, successfully multiplying the company's net revenue several times over that year and further solidifying its leading position in the industry.
The newly produced batch of mechs performed far better in peak competitions than those old relics, and all the media praised the ingenuity of the underlying design of this power supply concept.
Overnight, Platinum became synonymous with a new generation of mecha manufacturers that dared to launch innovations, achieving both fame and fortune and enjoying unparalleled success.
Of course, all of this success had nothing to do with Yang Yurong, the little engineer.
This was just a harmless little joke played on him by a large company like Platinum Drive.
To encourage technological innovation in mechs, the Covenant has special regulations for the mech-related industry—
As long as the employee can prove the originality of their personal research with materials during their employment, and after the company submits the application and obtains approval from the Patent Committee, the employee can receive 1.2% of the benefits from the patent, while the remaining 98.8% still belongs to the company.
However, in front of the media who came to interview her, Yang Yurong's research had been transformed into a technological achievement that the core department of Platinum had collectively produced over several years.
By doing so, Platinum Technology bypassed the prerequisite of "personal research" and directly registered the patent in the company name, thus enjoying all the profits.
If a company can share patent revenue with high-value technical personnel, it can certainly attract more talent.
However, when the potential returns were foreseeably unlimited, Platinum Technology did not hesitate to go against the policy.
Aside from the supporting characters' unrealistically kind personalities, "The Soul of the Broken Army" has a dark, male-oriented feel to it, from its historical setting to the capital decisions of large corporations.
Fortunately, Fang Zhuo arrived at the right time. Yang Yurong should still be trapped in the project. The research is still in the early experimental stage and there has been no major breakthrough.
The company doesn't pay much attention to his small research project, and the most crucial results haven't even been stored in Platinum's technology reserve yet.
Since Platinum was unwilling to share profits with this engineer, and even disdained to give him any honor, Fang Zhuo naturally felt no remorse for intercepting the deal.
Compared to the large corporations in the book that turn on their own people with swords, he believes his company is much more humane.
"I won't buy a house, I don't have the money to buy a house. I'm warning you, let me go, or I'll call the police!"
Jiang Yu held a flyer in one hand and continued to relentlessly chase after Yang Yurong. When she caught a glimpse of Fang Zhuo approaching, she took a half step back.
"Mr. Yang, excuse me, could we have a chat in private?"
Fang Zhuo made a "please" gesture and tried to smile as kindly as possible.
Yang Yurong looked the newcomer up and down. The man was wearing a gray casual suit, with sharp eyebrows and eyes. He looked a bit like a TV star, but his temperament had an inexplicable sharp and decisive business feel.
His peripheral vision then caught sight of the watch on the man's wrist; the diamond-encrusted dial, gleaming under the streetlights, was enough to prove that the man was quite wealthy.
That's strange. Why would a big boss of this caliber come to the gate of some godforsaken industrial plant to stop him?
Is this a "pig butchering scam"? Something fishy is going on?
Scammers have become so sophisticated these days, extending their operations from online to offline.
He didn't have more than two coins in his pocket. After thinking it over, Yang Yurong couldn't think of any special qualities he possessed that could attract two high-level swindlers in one go.
Fearing that the person opposite might be a gang of thugs, Yang Yurong looked around warily and suspiciously, then slowly moved back to a spot where the streetlights were brighter.
"What do you want to talk about? I have a project to work on tomorrow. Are you employees of Platinum Drive?"
Fang Zhuo's lies were so fluent, he didn't need to think beforehand, they just flowed off his tongue:
"My name is Fang Zhuo, and I am the executive director of Giant Technology. Giant Technology is a startup company that integrates mecha teams and technology research and development."
“A headhunter listened to your preliminary presentation on a project within Platinum City and thought it had great potential for development, so they specifically recommended you to us.”
Yang Yurong was initially pleased to hear this, but his guard was high, and he immediately frowned.
"Giant Machines? I've never heard of them before..."
Although he hasn't made a name for himself in the Star Alliance yet, Fang Zhuo has brought over a substantial sum of 160 billion.
It doesn't matter if you haven't heard of it. Even if you don't recognize the company sign, you can at least recognize money.
Fang Zhuo continued his deception: "Our company's senior technical executives greatly admire your research topic. They unanimously believe that your topic is the most promising technology direction they have seen in recent years."
"Although Giant Technology is a startup, it has ample financial reserves and can fully support all your research expenses."
"We have also heard that the salary offered to you by Platinum Drive is far below the industry average. We greatly value technical talent like you. Juke will give you an extra 5% share of this technical achievement, and we can also set your salary at four times your current salary."
He did want to give her more, but given Yang Yurong's cautious nature, giving her too much would easily arouse her suspicion.
Being hit with such a double whammy of emotion and money, it's hard for anyone not to feel dizzy.
If this was a scam tailor-made for him, then Yang Yurong admits the other side won.
His project was indeed reported to the company leadership just last month, but the leaders all seemed drowsy at the time, with the top leader even putting his feet up on the table and rolling his eyes as if he had fallen asleep.
He never expected that someone outside the company would notice him, especially a senior technical executive at a tech company.
Regarding research funding, although Platinum has many idle mechs, very few are available for engineers to conduct experiments. The mech administrators are usually arrogant and stingy when it comes to research projects that don't have direct output value.
Spending tens of thousands of yuan on a ballast truck is like taking the company's life out of it; even the few hundred yuan forklift cost for transporting the mechs has to be reported and approved at every level.
If a big boss were willing to spend money to support his research, he would definitely treat that person like a god of wealth.
Who cares about whether it's a startup or not? As long as they give money, they're a good leader.
Yang Yurong immediately submitted the leave application process for two hours tomorrow morning on the OA system, then gestured to Boss Fang to invite them, and led the two people to a small restaurant near the factory that was open all night.
He wiped the table attentively: "I'm sorry, I got off work a little late, I've kept you waiting."
To ensure his visit wasn't in vain, Yang Yurong laid out the unpleasant truths upfront:
“Mr. Fang, you don’t have a technical background, so you may not understand how much research and development costs are. Let me explain it to you. My project requires at least two Class C mechs, ten energy stones for each level from Class S to Class D, and hundreds of pipes and parts.”
"Back at Platinum City, some resources could be borrowed by queuing, which might have kept the total cost relatively low, but I don't know about your situation..."
Fang Zhuo not only lacked a technical background, but also knew nothing about mecha construction.
He rubbed his temples, feeling that what he had just said made him sound like an uncultured coal mine owner:
"Mr. Yang, just give me a total price."
Yang Yurong tapped the calculator on the foldable terminal screen, fiddled with it for a long time until sweat beaded on her forehead, and finally said a number: "The initial stage alone will cost 7.9 billion, and the subsequent verification experiments will cost at least 2 billion."
Fang Zhuo didn't say a word, but simply opened the foldable terminal and operated it expressionlessly.
Yang Yurong's heart sank.
It's a failure. As expected, the young boss of the startup had no concept of the cost of developing mechs.
Platinum City has complete equipment, and the two major expenses, mechs and energy stones, can be directly used from the warehouse. But small companies are different; they may just be empty shell factories built by a boss on a whim.
Although the Covenant has a huge wealth gap and is highly concentrated in certain areas, there are many wealthy people who can afford to drive mechs, but those who can casually pull out nearly 10 billion in cash are rarer than pandas.
But soon, the two folding terminals collided on top of each other, and a card number was transmitted to Yang Yurong's screen.
"There are 11 billion in this card. Let me know when you've spent it all. If you need to hire operators, send me the job requirements and the number of operators tonight."
"The employment contract has also been sent over. The patent revenue sharing will be increased by five percentage points on top of the Star Alliance policy, which is 6.2%. Your current annual salary is 820,000, and there will be additional bonuses if the profitability is good in the future."
"Your salary for the first two months has already been transferred to you. Please check your account. Juke's requirement is that this technological achievement should reach a production level within one month."
Yang Yurong was completely stunned, unsure of which statement to respond to first.
He's really something, managing to bring a billionaire CEO to eat street food.
The folding terminal emitted two beeps, indicating that income had been deposited into the personal bank card, with the transaction amount clearly displayed as 150,000.
To prevent it from being a scam, he immediately transferred the 150,000 yuan to another card and discovered that it was indeed a pure, natural, and readily available sum of money.
He believed it now, he believed it completely.
There's no way a scammer would transfer 150,000 yuan to him right away. If there really were such a professional scammer, he would accept it.
Yang Yurong withdrew her leave application on the OA system and instead submitted her resignation directly, feeling for the first time that she had been so assertive.
"Oh, right, boss, if we need results within a month, then we might have to purchase A-grade armor. The energy stone modules of C-grade mechs operate too slowly, and I'm afraid they won't be efficient enough."
Fang Zhuo nodded: "Whatever, just tell me if you don't have enough money."
Is this heavenly music? There is no other sentence in the world that sounds better than this.
Having heard countless leaders of Platinum City complain about the inability to allocate funds, Yang Yurong almost wished she could put a portrait of the new boss by her bedside.
At the same time that Yang Yurong signed the online contract, Fang Zhuo also received a notification that the contract had been successfully signed.
[Investment Target Number One: Yang Yurong]
[Intelligence: 89][Stamina: 65][Appearance: 36][Emotional Intelligence: 33][Loyalty: 79]
[Recommended career paths: Mechanical power design, energy pipeline design, and other industrial theory-related jobs]
[Skill Talents: 90]
[Initial valuation: 15700]
[The four investment slots in OL33 Star Alliance World will be refreshed. Please be careful when binding investment targets.]
After signing the contract with Yang Yurong, it was already past midnight. The group said goodbye at the stir-fry restaurant.
Self-driving cars were still running on the streets, available whenever needed. Fang Zhuo leaned his head against the cold car and lazily said to Jiang Yu, "Let's study the transportation here and buy a car tomorrow."
Jiang Yu nodded: "Okay, Mr. Fang."
The planet they landed on belonged to the sixth region of the sixteen major regions of the Star Alliance, numbered 6C. It was an industrial planet filled with heavily polluting, outdated factories, and it was already one of the better-developed regions among the more than twenty planets in this region.
As a competition zone whose main pillar industries are agriculture and heavy industry, the lagging industrial development over the years has made it difficult to attract many wealthy people who can afford to play with mechs to settle down here.
Even with various government subsidies and support, the sixth division has consistently maintained a bottom-three position in the main league for many years.
In this vicious cycle of the game, this region is undoubtedly the loser.
Coincidentally, there was a genius player in the original book who came from this extremely barren region, but Fang Zhuo doesn't know the other party's exact location yet.
Tomorrow I'm going on a long trip to rescue someone. Fang Zhuo pulled up the original text of "Broken Army Battle Soul" in the system and asked Yi Diandian:
[How do you use the ability to find a character's location by name given when switching worlds? Do you just recite it silently?]
Yi Dian Dian was awakened in a low-energy state, the light in her mind was very dim, and her tone was very sleepy, speaking whatever came to mind in her dream:
[Yes, that's right! I watched the show, and it was incredibly effective for weight loss. It's also very gentle on sensitive skin, and the product matches the seller's description perfectly. It's like walking through Norwegian Wood!]
Fang Zhuo: [...]
He studied it for a while and found that there was a box next to each character's name in the book. It seemed that clicking on the black box would bring up the address.
The system's ability to search for addresses by name is indeed very useful, preventing us from having to rely on luck to find people like we did in the BC35 world.
Although there is a skill cooldown period, once every 24 hours is definitely enough.
At 3 a.m., after a long boot-up process, Yi Diandian suddenly jolted awake: [Wait, host, why aren't you asleep yet?]
[Oh right, host, I was thinking of saying this during the day, haven't we strayed a bit from our goal?]
Investing so much money in technology all at once seems unlikely to recoup our costs. Shouldn't we hurry up and get the team into the secondary league first? QAQ
[Those supporting characters whose addresses couldn't be found had never even been in a team and had never trained before.]
[We still have so much money left, we could totally throw it all at those established actors, like the male lead who's surrounded by a whole bunch of ready-made supporting roles—]
Yi Dian Dian was interrupted by Fang Zhuo when he had only made half of his suggestion. He calmly browsed through the system.
Yi Dian Dian's tone was very enthusiastic: [Host, what are you looking for? Is there anything I can help you with?]
Fang Zhuo: [Looking for the system's forced shutdown button... Your suggestion is good, but don't suggest it yet. Someone as stupid as you wouldn't even survive the imperial examination in a palace drama.]
In an instant, Yi Dian Dian became obedient, shrinking into a semi-transparent ball of light in his mind.
The next morning, Fang Zhuo and Jiang Yu first went to the largest car dealership in the sixth competition zone.
Unlike the oval-shaped self-driving cars on the road, most of the vehicles here have shells similar to those on Blue Star, with only slight changes to the base structure.
Knowing that a major client would be arriving in the morning, two rows of two-seater sports cars were lined up at the entrance of the showroom, and the store manager was guarding the door with seven or eight employees.
Fang Zhuo glanced at it and said, "I don't want a sports car, I want a business van with more space."
"Okay, sir, this way please."
The store manager bowed slightly throughout, with a solicitous smile on his face.
As soon as the two customers entered the store, the manager looked the one in front up and down.
The basic skill of sales is judging a customer's financial capacity; this boss clearly has more than just a little money.
Sure enough, after looking around the exhibition area for less than ten minutes, the boss pointed directly to one of the specially made extended vans and said, "Give me two. Pick one up now, and deliver the other to the factory address I'll send you."
"Okay, sir. This is the new VNS series that Rolls-Royce just released last quarter. The base price is 3.05 million, plus a purchase tax of 790,000 and a private vehicle road tax of 25% of the vehicle price."
"The price of a single bicycle is 4.6 million, and the two bicycles together are 9.2 million. How would you like to pay?"
Without Fang Zhuo saying a word, Jiang Yu had already skillfully stepped forward and swiped the card.
Even after the two drove away, the store employees were still chattering among themselves about the experience that had lasted only ten minutes.
"Who is this boss? Our 6C Star is such a small place, how come this tall, handsome, rich second-generation isn't on our customer list?"
"You're here for a visit, right? Maybe your old car was in an accident and you bought a new one temporarily."
"Sigh, there's really nothing fun about this lousy place. Maybe they're planning to relocate some of the more polluting factories here and are just coming to check it out beforehand."
"That's incredibly wealthy. Buying a car worth over four million is as easy as buying groceries. I spend ages picking out fruit at the supermarket, and the owner only said two or three words the whole time..."
"Hey, but when I was verifying the owner's identity information just now, I found out that he didn't have a private car registered under his name before."
"??? That can't be right, are you sure you're not mistaken?"
"Where is that factory he left behind? Let me see... JR team, no way, they really are natives of our Star 6C, and they're going to set up a team here, holy crap."
"Help! I checked the official website, and the JR team achieved a record of six wins and eighteen losses in the Duxing Competition. Why don't you give it a try?"
"Could the big boss use the money he would have spent on buying a car to bring in some good players? I sincerely pray that 6C can produce a strong team."
Fang Zhuo was sitting in the car at this moment. The van was suspended on the third level of the road and was speeding forward along the road.
The journey that took more than two hours on Earth has now been reduced to just over ten minutes. Before 10 a.m., they had already arrived at the interstellar train station on Planet 6C with great speed.
Jiang Yu quickly unbuckled his seatbelt and got out of the car to figure out how to process the boarding procedures.
According to the map, before reaching the third household in the second row east of the village head of Liuyi Xingxiangtou Village, they still had to manually drive for more than four hours on a dirt road.
When Fang Zhuo found this address in the black box last night, he remained silent for a long time.
I knew the conditions here would be tough, but I never imagined they would be this bad.
He found it hard to imagine that in a technologically advanced world where mechs existed, there were still inhabitants of remote planets who survived by the most primitive agricultural labor.
Could these be products that coexisted in the same era?
The gap between people is astonishing. Children from wealthy families start playing with children's mechs at the age of ten, while here, people are still maintaining a simple farming life.
Moreover, satellite maps show that the farmland there is not fully automated, with many small, scattered plots of land still in existence, and some crops are still covered with plastic film manually.
The Covenant does have automated machinery for planting, watering, fertilizing, and harvesting. The only possible reason for this situation is that the inhabitants of Planet 6Y are so poor that they have to be frugal in buying machinery and use manual labor as much as possible whenever possible.
This desolate, impoverished village, out of touch with the times, is the hometown of Cheng Che, a young prodigy.
It was for this reason that Fang Zhuo rushed here as soon as he finished arranging the research project.
He was afraid that if he arrived late, Cheng Che would be so poor that he would starve to death.
Most of the investment targets he had previously secured were able to maintain basic survival needs, but Cheng Che's family was different. If there was a more devastating start than being abandoned in a hospital, it would be being born into a rural family with a debt of up to a million.
Cheng Che's mother was born with a disability in her right hand. After accumulating hundreds of thousands of yuan in gambling debts, his father committed suicide by drinking pesticide in front of a dozen creditors during a snowy Spring Festival, leaving Cheng Che with five younger siblings who needed care.
His older brother tried hard to save the family, planting an orchard and raising pigs, but neither succeeded. Instead, he added more than 100,000 yuan in debt to the family, making all his efforts more of a hindrance than a help.
In the original book, all of this changed when Cheng Che was thirteen years old.
In order to select promising mech combat pilots, all residents aged thirteen and above can participate in free ability tests organized by the Star Covenant.
Children who pass the test will be selected for training in the youth training team of a large mecha team until they are allowed to compete at the age of sixteen.
Only one in ten thousand people can pass the qualification test, and this poor rural family has produced a child who has won the genetic lottery.
Their luck didn't stop there. When Cheng Che first stepped onto the field, he used his amazing talent to crush all his opponents and set a record for the fastest five-kill in the main league.
He was not only the strongest rookie among that year's youth training team, but was also hailed by the media as the potential successor to the previous Star Alliance GOAT.
He was placed on high hopes by the team, leading this team, which had a mediocre record last season, to a series of victories. He was regarded as the absolute core of the team and the most impeccable genius in both long and short blade positions.
He was only sixteen years old when he first appeared on screen.
He took a low-paying debut player contract of two million, but he managed to prove himself to be a star player. During his six months as a professional player, he actively cooperated with the team in all business communications, quickly paid off half of his family's debts, and even allowed his two younger sisters to continue their studies.
Everything seems to be going in the right direction. He debuted earlier than many other contestants, and if he takes good care of himself, he may have a long professional career of nearly twenty years to come.
During the break before Cheng Che prepared to face the male lead's team, he helped his younger brother tend to the newly built strawberry greenhouse. On his way to deliver strawberries to the town's supermarket, his car overturned.
Strawberries were scattered all over the ground, and his arm was slightly injured. The town doctor told him that there was nothing wrong, it was just a twist, but he needed to rest.
Born into a poor family, Cheng Che is resilient and reserved. He didn't usually experience any significant pain in his upper arm, so he didn't tell the team and just endured it until the competition.
This is the most crucial main league match, and Cheng Che doesn't want to miss an important game because of a minor injury.
Anyway, I've suffered many injuries, big and small, on the field before, so this time there shouldn't be any problems.
But Lady Luck did not smile upon him again. The town's doctor underestimated the severity of his injuries, and he himself underestimated the opponent's ability to target him.
The most brilliant genius fell from grace just six months after his debut and disappeared from the Star Alliance.
The van bumped along through the mud, and Fang Zhuo leaned back in the back seat, reading about the basic information of this world.
He looked out the window at the vast fields of corn. This time, the plot had taken a turn. Cheng Che had not passed the ability selection organized by the Star Alliance at the age of thirteen, but instead stayed in this small village.
According to the timeline, Cheng Che will turn sixteen in just over a month.
Fang Zhuo didn't think it was Cheng Che's personal problem that caused him to fail the ability test this time. After all, judging from his performance in the later competition, Cheng Che's talent far exceeded that of most famous players of the same era.
But Fang Zhuo was genuinely curious to know just how far a genius could go without any training.
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Author's Note: Beep! [Sprinkling flowers] The Team Manager Simulator is now live!
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