Chapter 217
Shencheng, Penguin Headquarters.
Inside a conference room overlooking the entire technology park, the atmosphere was so oppressive that it made it hard to breathe.
Tony stood in front of the projector screen, a fine layer of sweat seeping from his forehead.
On the presentation behind him was the strikingly minimalist green icon of MicroChat.
And an exaggeratedly steep user growth curve.
"...According to our latest data, MicroChat's penetration rate at Qinglin University has exceeded eighty percent. Moreover, through the campus network, it has already begun to spread to several neighboring universities."
Tony's voice was somewhat dry.
"The most critical point is that they just launched version 1.1 yesterday, adding a feature called Moments. Our product managers evaluated it and concluded that the design concept of this feature is at least a year ahead of ours."
At the head of the conference table, Pony listened expressionlessly.
His slender fingers tapped rhythmically against the mahogany tabletop.
"What is the progress over at the Guangyan Institute?"
He asked faintly.
"Well..."
Tony's face turned even uglier.
"Allen's team reported that MicroChat's underlying architecture is extremely complex and uses many optimization algorithms they have never seen before. Achieving a pixel-perfect replica within a month is highly difficult. They... they need more time."
"Time?"
Pony chuckled softly, but the smile did not reach his eyes.
"Will the market give us time?"
He stood up and looked at the endless stream of traffic below.
"Tell Allen that I do not care what methods he uses, whether it is pulling all-nighters or working overtime. Half a month. I will only give him half a month."
"In half a month, if I do not see the closed beta version of WeChat, he can take his entire team to the general office and collect their termination notices."
The temperature in the conference room instantly dropped to the freezing point.
Everyone knew that Pony was truly enraged.
"Also."
Pony turned around, his gaze falling on Tony.
"Go contact that young man named Gu Ran again."
"This time, do not talk about an acquisition."
Pony adjusted his cuffs.
"Tell him directly that Penguin will make a strategic investment. We will provide the money, the traffic, and the technology to support him. The condition is that he must accept our controlling stake and integrate MicroChat into Penguin's ecosystem."
"Is... isn't this a disguised acquisition?"
An executive muttered softly.
"No."
Pony shook his head.
"This is called bringing him into the fold."
"Give him an offer he cannot refuse. If he still does not know what is good for him..."
A cold glint flashed in Pony's eyes.
"Then tell him that the word 'lose' does not exist in Penguin's dictionary."
...
Three days later, Qinglin University.
A black Alphard commercial van with a Guangdong B license plate parked downstairs at the School of Economics and Management's teaching building.
The car door opened, and two men dressed in crisp suits with their hair slicked back stepped out.
Leading the way was the Penguin representative, Manager Liu.
He glanced at the time on his phone: 10:25 AM.
"Hmph, putting on quite the airs."
Manager Liu curled his lips in disdain.
"We agreed on ten-thirty, and he is still not here. He has quite the ego for a student."
The assistant beside him echoed.
"Exactly, Liu. If you ask me, we should have taught him a lesson last time. Mr. Pony personally gave the order, and he still dares to put on airs?"
"Just wait."
Manager Liu adjusted his tie, wearing the arrogance unique to the elites of major tech companies.
The two waited downstairs for a full ten minutes.
Only then did Gu Ran and Ye Zhenzhen slowly stroll out of the teaching building.
"Gu Ran!"
Seeing him, Manager Liu immediately approached with a dark expression.
Looking at the man walking toward him, the young man asked in confusion.
"Are you Manager Liu? I apologize, the teacher kept us late, making you wait."
The teacher kept them late?
Manager Liu glanced at the book in Gu Ran's hand, the cover of which read An Actor Prepares. The corner of his eye twitched violently.
Since when did the Economics and Management Department offer this kind of specialized course?
"Student Gu, time is precious."
Manager Liu could not be bothered to waste words with him and cut straight to the chase.
"Mr. Pony is very interested in your project and specifically sent me to discuss an in-depth collaboration with you."
"An in-depth collaboration?"
Gu Ran raised an eyebrow.
"That is right."
Manager Liu tilted his chin up slightly and spoke in a patronizing tone.
"Penguin has decided to make a strategic investment in your MicroChat. We will provide you with five million in cash, as well as cross-platform traffic support from QQ. In addition, the technical team at the Guangyan Institute will fully assist you with product iteration."
He paused and looked at Gu Ran, as if this were a monumental blessing.
"In return, Penguin requires a fifty-one percent controlling stake in MicroChat."
He thought Gu Ran would be shocked, would be ecstatic.
And would even grasp his hands in tearful gratitude.
However, Gu Ran merely looked at him with a smile.
"Are you finished?"
"I am finished."
"The terms are not bad."
Gu Ran nodded.
A smug smile appeared on Manager Liu's face.
"But..."
Gu Ran suddenly changed the subject.
"I refuse."
Manager Liu's smile froze on his face.
"What... what did you say?"
He suspected he had misheard.
"I said, I refuse."
Gu Ran's tone remained indifferent.
"Manager Liu, please go back and tell your boss. I look down on his money. I do not need his traffic either. As for his technology... heh."
He let out a disdainful laugh.
"As for the controlling stake, that is nothing but a pipe dream."
"You!"
Manager Liu's face instantly turned the color of pig liver.
"Gu Ran! Do not be ungrateful! Do you know what you are rejecting? This is Penguin! An internet empire worth hundreds of billions! We can crush your little student project to pieces with a flick of our little finger!"
"Is that so?"
The young man's smile widened.
"Then I will be waiting."
He took Ye Zhenzhen's hand and turned to leave.
"Young man, do not be too arrogant."
Manager Liu roared behind him in exasperation.
"Without us, you are nothing! Within a month, our WeChat will be online, and when that time comes, your MicroChat will be nothing but cannon fodder!"
Gu Ran stopped in his tracks and turned around.
He looked at the flustered middle-aged man with a trace of pity in his eyes.
"Manager Liu, there is a saying: you cannot discuss ice with a summer insect."
"A month?"
The young man smiled meaningfully.
"In a month, you will thank me for not selling it to you today."
After saying that, he ignored Manager Liu, who was on the verge of exploding with anger.
Holding Ye Zhenzhen's hand, he walked straight toward the parking lot.
The young girl followed obediently by his side.
"You... you just offended them like that, is it really going to be okay?"
She asked softly.
"Offended?"
He started the car, looking at the shrinking figure in the rearview mirror, and said faintly.
"From the moment I decided to create MicroChat, the war with Penguin had already begun."
"There is no need to show mercy to our enemies."
He tightened his grip on the steering wheel, his unwavering gaze seeming to pierce through time itself.
"What we must do is put a bullet straight through their hearts before they even have a chance to react."
......
young master of the Shen family—a figure of immense power and wealth beyond measure—and awakened the "Destined Ultimate Villain System"! His starting scenario? Running into his icy fiancée who shows up with a mountain-descending divine doctor to break off their engagement. The divine doctor arrogantly taunts: "What does your Shen family have besides a bit of stinking money? You're not even worthy of tying Qingxue's shoelaces!" Shen Fei just smiled. He completely defied the usual script: "Fine, I agree to break off the engagement. Also, notify the finance department to withdraw all investments from the Su family." Minutes later, with its capital chain severed, the Su Group teetered on the brink of bankruptcy! The once aloof and proud ice queen CEO was thrown into utter panic. That very night, she went to Shen Fei's villa, casting aside all dignity to beg and plead desperately... From then on, in this world teeming with Sons of Destiny, Shen Fei embarked on a path of extreme dimensional suppression! A mountain-descending divine doctor? Peerless medical skills? Shen Fei: "Reporting you for practicing medicine without a license! I'll gladly take your ancient medicinal cauldron and twin sister assassins." The Crooked-Smiling Dragon King? Commanding a hundred thousand soldiers with a single order? Shen Fei: "Illegal assembly and suspected treason! Let a fleet of attack helicopters sanitize the area and teach you what the state apparatus really means!" A reborn tycoon? Knows all the golden opportunities of the next decade? Shen Fei: "A trillion in capital to reverse and pump the stock market, making you blow your margin and jump on the very first day of your rebirth!" What Chosen Ones? What bearers of Heavenly Fortune? In Shen Fei's eyes, they're all just chives (i.e., suckers/marks) waiting to be harvested! Shen Fei: "Sorry, but as the Destined Ultimate Villain, I don't play by the rules of honor. I only play the game of dimensional suppression."
transmigrates into the world as the sect master of the Heavenly Yan Sect, which is on the verge of being wiped out. He binds a system that grants him cultivation power based on the number of disciples he has: for each disciple, he automatically gains a year's worth of cultivation every single day! Take one disciple: every day he gains 1 year of cultivation power. While others struggle through a year of bitter training, he gets the same just by sleeping through a single night. Take ten disciples: every day he gains 10 years of cultivation power. Foundation Establishment, Core Formation, Nascent Soul—he breezes through all bottlenecks without lifting a finger. Take one hundred disciples: every day he gains 100 years of cultivation power. Even a Soul Transformation Venerable before him can’t survive a single blow. Take ten thousand disciples: every day he gains 10,000 years of cultivation power! With a wave of his hand, he topples empires. With a single step, he crushes the sacred grounds of the universe. ... While others fight tooth and nail for secret techniques, Lin Yan casually hands out Nascent Soul-level cultivation manuals as beginner textbooks. While others strain to find talented recruits, Lin Yan opens his doors to anyone—so long as they’re human. In just three short years, the Heavenly Yan Sect went from a backwater sect made up of three crumbling huts to a sacred land that every cultivator under heaven would kill to enter. ... One day, otherworldly demon gods invade, with a million demon soldiers pressing down upon the realm. Lin Yan, yawning, rises from his lounge chair and glances at the system panel: [Current Disciples: 1.28 million] [Daily Cultivation Increase: 1.28 million years] He waves his hand casually, and the countless demon soldiers are reduced to ashes in an instant. “So noisy… interrupting my fishing.”
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
m back to his original world. In the end, he realized he had overthought things. [Hey, why is Shen Manni, the female lead, acting strange? Shouldn't she be fawning over the male lead at this point?] [Zhou Qiaoqiao, are you sick? Weren't you supposed to break off your engagement today?] [Damn it! An Youyi, please do your job as an undercover agent and sell my information to the protagonist, you idiot!] ... At this moment, Xu Mo himself didn't know that these female leads had already heard his inner thoughts. Then they decided not to play by the rules. Xu Mo: Please respect my profession as the big villain!
