Liu Chuanye was now a rich man.
However, he hadn't made a fortune himself. After all, he was still studying at university and was only in his first year. Making money was out of the question.
It was his father who had truly struck it rich. This honest, down-to-earth man had stumbled upon good fortune.
From the age of sixteen, this man had taken over his father's position on the railway, who had died while repairing the tracks. He quit school and immediately stepped into his father's shoes, becoming a proud railway worker.
Unfortunately, unlike Liu Chuanye, who disliked studying, Liu Chuanye's father was someone who loved to read. However, to support his four younger siblings, he had to give up his education and take over his father's job.
Otherwise, by the time Liu Chuanye graduated, that position might have been snatched by some young prodigy, and no one would remember how Liu Chuanye's father had gloriously served the railway.
Yet, Liu Chuanye's father possessed a stubborn streak. He refused to give up learning and was determined to realize his dream of becoming a writer. His idol was none other than Mo Yan, who had once been a railway worker and eventually became a famous novelist.
So, he worked on the railway during the day and attended various night classes in the evening, intending to participate in adult self-study exams and enroll in a correspondence university.
Liu Chuanye's father spent three years taking exams. Although he eventually passed, he was, unfortunately, assigned to the electromagnetism major instead of the literature department he had always dreamed of.
However, there was no opportunity or time to change. Thus, Liu Chuanye's father had to study electromagnetism, work, and date, all at the same time. Later, he obtained his diploma and successfully transitioned from a railway worker to a railway engineer, but that was where his journey ended.
Liu Chuanye's father spent all his subsequent time in the position of railway engineer, working for twenty years. But Liu Chuanye's father was not content to stop there.
He continued to conduct research in his spare time. However, due to limitations in conditions, he couldn't research other aspects of electromagnetism and could only ponder how to apply electromagnetism to railways.
Especially when he learned about the ongoing research into magnetic levitation railways abroad, he became even more convinced that this was the future of the railway industry.
He dedicated fifteen years to this research. It was hard to believe that this man, who appeared tall and burly, with dark skin and calloused hands, affectionately called "Big Iron Liu" by the railway workers, was actually a railway engineer who held hundreds of patents and had even rented a dilapidated warehouse to build a prototype magnetic levitation railway model.
It was even harder to imagine that this man would become a pioneer in China's magnetic levitation railway technology, had he not met Huang He.
After attending the news program that day, Jiangnan Group received support from hundreds of engineers from relevant units. They also solicited talent from the public, inviting anyone who considered themselves capable and skilled to apply for selection.
Liu Chuanye's father initially didn't want to get involved. He felt that Jiangnan Group was just putting on a show and that their so-called vacuum high-speed railway was a complete fraud.
Liu Chuanye's father's judgment was not baseless. In fact, precisely because he understood magnetic levitation railways so well, he knew very clearly how terrifyingly difficult it was to build one, let alone a high-speed train operating in a vacuum. It was sheer nonsense.
Therefore, he didn't bother to get involved in such a deceptive endeavor.
But to his surprise, he was sent over anyway. This was because his new superior, a former student he had personally mentored, directly used an internal recommendation slot to recommend him to the newly established Jiangnan Transportation Power Technology Co., Ltd.
Liu Chuanye's father's over a hundred patents were immediately exposed, making him a highly sought-after candidate for the company. Without even an interview, he was directly hired, and thus, Liu Chuanye's father found himself working for this company in a daze.
Initially, the father wanted to refuse. He was reluctant to leave the company and colleagues he had been with for over a decade. However, when he saw the company's offer of a monthly salary of 28,000 yuan, compared to his current base salary of only 1,800 yuan per month, the father made the logical choice and went to work in Wenzhou.
At first, Liu Chuanye's mother worried about her husband not settling down in Wenzhou. But within a month, Liu Chuanye's mother was also brought to Wenzhou to work in the company's cafeteria, allowing her to supervise her husband's meals every day.
Of course, few people received the same treatment as Liu Chuanye's mother. Otherwise, the company would have been swamped with family members. This was because Liu Chuanye's father, with the support of various large-scale equipment and resources, truly engaged in magnetic levitation railway research and instantly unleashed astonishing scientific research capabilities. In just one month, he solved over a dozen technical problems that had plagued the entire team. He immediately became the deputy chief engineer of this new company, with his monthly salary soaring to 68,000 yuan. Liu Chuanye's father felt as though he had been living in the dirt for the past decade.
Bringing his wife over wasn't his intention; it was the company's decision. After an investigation into Tong He's parents, Jiangnan Group realized the importance of protecting the families of their core research talents. Therefore, for all key technical personnel, their families were either directly arranged to work in non-research positions within the company or were placed in other Jiangnan Group companies in Wenzhou. They were also provided with free company dormitories. In short, the aim was to protect them while ensuring they could never leave the company.
As for Liu Chuanye, since he was already studying, he was naturally left to his own devices. However, Liu Chuanye's father, perhaps not knowing how to spend his newfound wealth, generously gave his son a monthly living allowance of 3,000 yuan.
In an era when the average monthly living expenses for university students were only 400-500 yuan, a monthly allowance of 3,000 yuan was undoubtedly a top-tier living standard. Thus, Liu Chuanye instantly became a wealthy student in his entire school.
Fortunately, Liu Chuanye was not the type to be extravagant, otherwise, the money would have vanished in the blink of an eye.
However, one couldn't entirely say Liu Chuanye was bad at spending money, as he was incredibly generous when it came to playing games.
Previously, he had invested most of his income into Warcraft III blind boxes. Later, when Triumph launched in the game center, he switched his investment to Triumph.
And now, the first season of blind boxes jointly issued by the game Triumph and Jiangnan Game had arrived. Each blind box contained a random chance to get one of 52 different items.
The mechanics were basically the same as the Warcraft III blind boxes: the boxes contained figurines, and the figurines replicated a set of in-game fashion items.
However, the blind boxes also had features that were completely different from the Warcraft III blind boxes. For example, the 24 regular editions included in the blind boxes omitted the plastic figurines altogether. Inside, there was only a postcard with a game character printed on it, along with a stiff card containing a redemption code.
Only the rare editions came with the corresponding plastic figurines.
As for the deluxe editions, they were truly something. They directly included a set of top-tier equipment, such as a "Titan Greatsword" or "Elf Divine Bow," which would normally require hundreds of hours of gameplay and considerable luck to obtain in the game. Essentially, they were the best equipment for each class in the current version of the game.
In fact, the operations department of "00 Game" and Tengda had a dispute over this.
Tengda's idea was that to increase blind box sales, they believed the deluxe editions should offer equipment with slightly better attributes than the top-tier equipment currently obtainable in the game, thereby stimulating more players' purchasing desire.
After all, as long as most players grind enough and have enough luck, they would still have a chance to obtain this equipment. Therefore, they wanted to create some equipment that could not be obtained through normal gameplay, forcing more players who already possessed top-tier equipment to purchase blind boxes.
Then, this idea was advised against by the operations department of "00 Game." This was because, up to that point, almost all in-game equipment was obtained through in-game means, and the revenue for online games came from subscription fees.
Occasionally, there were online games that allowed in-game purchases, but they were at most limited to selling existing in-game equipment, rather than directly creating entirely new and stronger equipment.
All of this changed with the appearance of a game called "Zhengtu."
"00 Game" felt that doing so was highly risky and could provoke player backlash, hence their cautionary advice.
Tengda Games also felt some apprehension. What if players didn't like it and became disgusted, leading them to quit the game?
After all, Triumph was a game that had nearly died; it had only been revived through the life-saving efforts of the "00 Game" platform and various optimizations.
Ultimately, Tengda Games abandoned its original plan and instead developed this set of existing in-game equipment.
However, they also employed a bit of cunning. For instance, although the attributes of the in-game equipment remained the same, they changed the names to be more imposing and made the appearances more striking, which could also attract some players.
The results proved them right. With the release of the Triumph blind boxes, it immediately triggered a sales frenzy. Although not as exaggerated as the initial Warcraft III craze, it still achieved sales of millions of boxes in a single day.
However, since blind boxes were not suitable for the revenue sharing model of subscription-based games, they were sold through Jiangnan Mall's nationwide outlets. Tengda even commissioned the Jiangnan Group to produce the blind boxes.
Therefore, the two parties agreed on a fifty-fifty revenue-sharing ratio. While this ratio might seem high, Tengda only needed to alter some data, and with Jiangnan Group handling all other matters, they could still receive half of the sales revenue, which represented an astonishing profit.
Ultimately, Tengda earned tens of millions of yuan on the first day. Delighted, Tengda Games' shareholders rewarded Zeng Qing with a bonus of over a million yuan and encouraged him to continue developing more games.
Indeed, dabbling in communication software was a detour. Tengda was naturally meant to be in the gaming industry!