630: Chapter 625 Is he an alcoholic?

Ning Ke, the broker who operated in the grey areas, had a sense far more acute than anyone else.

He realized that the value represented by the name Fang Zhizhuo far exceeded what money could measure.

He was gambling.

He was betting that Shen Yan could turn Fang Zhizhuo's theory into reality.

Shen Yan smiled.

"Ning Ke, your appetite is getting bigger and bigger."

"The courageous prosper, the timid perish." Ning Ke did not back down. "This deal, you are guaranteed to profit. I am staking my life on you, clearing away those who don't want Fang Zhizhuo to appear. What you give me is merely a promise of the future."

Shen Yan looked at the night view outside the window and was silent for a few seconds.

"Fine."

He uttered a single word.

"I agree to your terms."

"From this day forward, you are a man on my ship."

On the other end of the line, Ning Ke's relieved gasp could be heard.

"Thank you, Boss Shen!"

"Address."

"Wucheng. A small Jiangnan town that has almost been forgotten." Ning Ke's voice regained its usual sharpness. "He is there, but he isn't called Fang Zhizhuo."

"The locals all call him..."

"Lame Fang."

Two days later.

Wucheng.

A low-key black phaeton slowly drove into the ancient small town.

This place seemed forgotten by time.

The bluestone slab streets were polished smooth and glossy by the years.

The white-walled, black-tiled residences were covered in moss, and faded red lanterns hung beneath the eaves.

The air was filled with a damp humidity and the faint smell of a coal stove.

The town's pace of life was slow, with few pedestrians on the streets—mostly old people and children, their faces bearing a look of carefree tranquility.

Shen Yan did not alert anyone.

He parked the car in a lot outside the town, changed into ordinary casual wear, and walked into the town alone, like a tourist here to sketch.

The address Ning Ke provided was an old street in the south of the town, called 'Oily Paper Alley.'

Shen Yan did not go there directly.

He found a riverside teahouse and sat down.

The teahouse was called 'Old Ma's Teahouse.' The owner was a slightly overweight man in his fifties named Ma, who was very talkative.

Shen Yan ordered the cheapest Biluochun tea and a plate of fennel seeds, chatting idly with Old Ma.

"Boss, this town is truly quiet."

"Isn't it!" Old Ma poured boiling water into the purple clay teapot, and the aroma of tea instantly filled the air. "Young people all go to the big cities now, leaving us old folks behind to guard these old houses, just getting by day by day."

"I see many old houses in town are empty. Can outsiders buy property here for retirement?" Shen Yan asked casually.

"That depends on which one you buy." Old Ma became interested. "Those few houses on the east side of town were bought by a boss a few years ago to make into guesthouses. As for Oily Paper Alley in the south, no one dares to go there."

"Oh? Why is that?"

"Heh, bad luck!" Old Ma pursed his lips. "There lives a strange fellow there, a lame man. He fiddles with junk metal all day, making a clanging racket. He's also a drunkard, always tipsy, and ignores everyone he sees."

Shen Yan's heart stirred slightly.

"Is this person a local?"

"No, I heard he came more than ten years ago. No one knows exactly where he came from." Old Ma lowered his voice. "Anyway, he's no good. Even the local punks who went to cause trouble at his place ended up beaten out. Don't let his limp fool you; his hands are vicious!"

"How does he make a living?"

"Who knows. Just from that junk of his. Occasionally someone comes to buy some of it away, but it probably doesn't fetch much money. Even so, he has wine to drink every day. It's very strange."

Shen Yan sat for a while longer, piecing together a more complete image of 'Lame Fang' from Old Ma's words.

Reclusive, irritable, addicted to alcohol, possessing formidable skills, surviving by reselling some 'junk' he assembled himself.

This was a complete contrast to the genius physicist who stood at the pinnacle of academia.

What kind of experience could crush a person to this extent?

After paying for the tea, Shen Yan left the teahouse and headed toward Oily Paper Alley.

The alley was very narrow, barely wide enough for two people to pass shoulder to shoulder.

The high walls on both sides blocked most of the sunlight, making it somewhat dark and damp.

The further in he walked, the stronger the smell of rust mixed with engine oil became in the air.

At the end of the alley was a dilapidated wooden door.

The door was not locked; it was slightly ajar.

The crackling sound of electric welding and a pungent smell of smoke drifted out from the gap.

Shen Yan did not knock.

He just stood quietly at the doorway, looking inside.

The courtyard was not large but was piled high with various unrecognizable parts.

Rusty gears, discarded circuit boards, disassembled motors, and some strangely shaped metal components.

A man wearing a faded grey undershirt was squatting in front of a workbench, his back to the door.

His hair was streaked with white, his figure lean, but his shoulders were broad.

One leg was bent at an unnatural angle, clearly the 'lame leg' Old Ma had mentioned.

He held a welding torch in one hand and supported a complex metal device with the other. Sparks flew, illuminating his profile in flickering light and shadow.

He was deeply focused, as if the entire world consisted only of the work in his hands.

Shen Yan watched like that without making a sound to disturb him.

It wasn't until the man completed the final weld, turned off the torch, straightened up, picked up a bottle of cheap Erguotou from the nearby table, twisted off the cap, and took a hard swig.

"Hic..."

He let out a long burp, casually wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and only then turned around.

It was at that moment that he saw Shen Yan standing at the doorway.

It was a face weathered by hardship.

Years and alcohol had carved deep ravines onto his face; his eye bags were swollen, and his gaze was murky, filled with disdain and weariness towards worldly affairs.

But the moment his eyes met Shen Yan's, a flash of extremely sharp light seemed to glimmer in the depths of that murkiness, so fast that one might mistake it for an illusion.

"Seen enough?"

The man's voice was hoarse, as if polished by sandpaper.

"Something I can help you with?"

"Just looking around." Shen Yan's tone was calm, like a passing tourist.

"There's nothing worth looking at here." The man took another swig of wine, pointed outside the door, and said, "Get lost."

His attitude was exactly as Old Ma had described.

Irritable and unfriendly.

Shen Yan didn't move.

His gaze fell upon the metal device the man had just finished assembling.

It was a complex structure composed of dozens of gears of varying sizes and several electromagnetic coils. It looked like the movement of a clock, yet it was far more intricate than any clock.

"A differential clutch?" Shen Yan suddenly spoke.

The man's movement froze.

The hand holding the wine bottle stopped mid-air.

"You've replaced the traditional hydraulic ram with electromagnetic induction; that's a good idea. However, there's a problem with how you've wound the coils."

Shen Yan's gaze seemed capable of penetrating the metal casing.

"With a unidirectional close winding, the magnetic field stress will be uneven, leading to an energy loss exceeding three percent during high-frequency switching. If you use a cross-compound winding method, the loss can be controlled within one percent."