Chapter 130 The Golden Age of Mobile Internet: Xinghai Firmly Assumes the Throne

A crushed aluminum soda can traced a sharp parabola in mid-air. With a crisp "clang," it landed precisely into the metal trash can in the corner, resonating with a few dull echoes in the empty office.

Time, that blind butcher's knife, had ruthlessly hacked forward by three months. The leaves on the street trees in Donghai City had turned yellow, and gusts of autumn wind began to blow. But in the global tech circle, what blew in these three months wasn't just wind; it was a Category 12 hurricane capable of chewing the old era to pieces, skin and bone included. The landscape had completely changed.

In a cold, rainy night in Seattle, that fat guy named Ballmer at Microsoft had slashed the promotional budget for desktop PCs overnight. They were like a turtle with its shell smashed, retreating sheepishly into the iron cage of the enterprise-level server market, no longer daring to mention the words "moat."

As for Apple's headquarters in California? Although Cook managed to keep his position by playing politics with the board of directors, he was left with only half a life. Having lost China's cheap assembly lines and top-tier components, the yield rate of Apple's new models was so terrible it was unwatchable; the gaps were large enough to fit a coin. They could only rely on the die-hard fans they had accumulated previously, forcibly raising the unit price, turning their phones into luxury toys that couldn't even sell a few million units a year, struggling bitterly on the line between life and death.

And Xinghai Technology, this Eastern behemoth, which had crawled out of a dilapidated factory in Donghai City, had officially reached the top.

Basement level one, core server room. The air coolers puffed out white mist with a roar, keeping the room temperature firmly at eighteen degrees. Xia Weiliang was squatting on a wide gaming chair, her feet bare, and her toes were subconsciously digging into the edge of the leather cushion. That yellowed, dirty lab coat was draped loosely over her, the hem dragging on the anti-static floor, picking up a ring of dust. She was biting on a peeled instant noodle companion ham sausage, her cheeks puffed out, chewing energetically with "crunch, crunch" sounds. Her ten fingers, stained with oil spots, hammered against the mechanical keyboard like a torrential rain.

"Click." The Enter key was struck heavily. The dense stream of green code on the screen instantly stopped scrolling, converging into a massive "100%" progress bar.

"Done." Xia Weiliang swallowed the last bite of the sausage and let out a burp full of artificial flavor. She kicked the mainframe chassis next to her with her toe. "Old Li, stop drooling over that broken screen of yours. Come over and inspect the goods."

Old Li was hunched over the workbench, his thick, bottle-bottom glasses almost touching a circuit board. Hearing the noise, he straightened his back abruptly and strode over to Xia Weiliang's screen. "Sister Weiliang, did you really get Pandora 2.0 to run?" Old Li swallowed dryly, his Adam's Apple moving up and down with difficulty.

"Duh." Xia Weiliang rolled her eyes dramatically and pulled a lollipop out of her pocket, tearing it open. "Version 1.0 just bridged the physical barrier. For 2.0, I wrote a computing power black hole directly into the underlying layer." She popped the lollipop into her mouth, the plastic stick bobbing up and down. "Now, applications in Xinghai OS don't need to occupy too many local hardware resources. The system will automatically borrow computing power from the cloud. I've pushed the redundancy to 300%."

Old Li's head "buzzed." It felt like he had been struck in the back of the head with a hammer, his scalp tingling. 300% computing power redundancy? This meant that even the worst-configured old phones from three years ago, as long as they flashed Xinghai OS, could still run the most hardware-demanding 3A masterpieces at full frame rate! How were hardware manufacturers supposed to drip-feed updates now? This was practically digging up the ancestral graves of chip manufacturers worldwide. "Good heavens..." Old Li's hands trembled as he pushed up his thick glasses, "If this gets released, domestic software developers are going to go crazy."

They were already crazy. At this moment, outside the main gate of the Xinghai Technology Park, luxury cars were lined up in a long row, blocking the road completely. The heavy rain had just stopped, and the asphalt road was full of puddles. Boss Ma from the Penguin factory, Boss Zhang from Ali—these big shots who usually walked sideways in the internet circle were now all standing obediently in the reception hall, clutching their queue numbers.

The country had completely ushered in the golden explosion of the mobile internet. Xinghai OS had achieved absolute dominance with 85% of the global market share, spanning both mobile and PC. This was a piece of fat meat that stretched as far as the eye could see. Countless developers were breaking their heads and sharpening their brains to squeeze into Xinghai's ecosystem.

Chu Xuan stood in the center of the hall. Today he was wearing a short-sleeved shirt with a purple leopard print, his tie pulled loose. He was clutching that wad of tissues he always kept on hand. He wiped the oily sweat from his forehead while shouting at the top of his lungs. "Queue up! Everyone, queue up!" Chu Xuan's voice cracked, "There are only five hundred interface slots for the Xinghai developer backend today! Boss Ma, don't push! Follow the numbers!"

Nearby, Old Zhou was wrapped in a military overcoat. He was holding that chipped enamel mug in his hands, slurping a sip of hot tea. Watching Chu Xuan give orders in front of this group of multi-billionaire big shots, Old Zhou was so happy that the wrinkles on his face bunched up like a chrysanthemum. "Boss Lu's methods are truly superb." He touched his dentures, his eyes slightly red. "Making these giants, who spend every day thinking about how to earn one yuan from the common people, all come here to work and code for us."

In the top-floor office, the air conditioner was running quietly. Lu Jingming leaned back in the leather boss chair. He was still wearing that faded black T-shirt and old jeans, his legs casually crossed, resting on the edge of the dark desk. There was no one else in the office, only the holographic panel flickering with a faint blue light in front of his retina. That was the system's intermediate defense-breaking redemption mall. Global reputation value had long overflowed, and defense-breaking points were as astronomical as a string of numbers.

Lu Jingming's gaze was nailed firmly to a dark gold icon at the very top of the mall. It was a blueprint fragment with a structure so complex it was perverted. [Holographic Neuron Projection Module]. Below it was a line of small text exuding an arrogant aura. [Free from the constraints of any physical medium.] [Photon-level naked-eye 3D imaging, directly connected to the optic nerve reflex zone.]

Lu Jingming stared at that line of text. His pupils contracted slightly, and the rhythm of his breathing slowly became heavier, his chest heaving. He felt a fire burning in his lungs. Free from physical media. This meant no need for screens, no need for LCD panels, no need for Corning's Gorilla Glass.

Accompanied by the "click-clack" sound of high heels on the wool carpet, Shen Qingqiu pushed open the solid wood door and walked in. The collar of her white shirt was buttoned meticulously. Behind her gold-rimmed glasses, those cold eyes swept across the desk. "The repatriation channel for overseas funds has been completely opened." Shen Qingqiu slapped a thick financial report onto the desk, making a dull thud. She rested her hands on the edge of the desk, leaning forward slightly. "Just last month, the net profit from the Xinghai ecosystem exceeded 50 billion USD." Shen Qingqiu pushed up her glasses, "There is so much money in the account that even the tycoons on Wall Street would get green with envy."

Lu Jingming didn't respond. He took his legs off the desk, his gaze remaining on the system panel in the void.

Immediately after, "Bang!" The heavy solid wood door was slammed open by someone with their shoulder. The door panel hit the sound-absorbing pad hard, bouncing back half a foot. Chu Xuan stumbled in. His iconic center-part hairstyle was already a mess like a chicken coop. His face was flushed, looking like he had just drunk two catties of fake liquor. "Lu, Boss Lu!" Chu Xuan was panting heavily, the tissues in his hand soaked through with sweat. He held another market research report over his head, the pages rustling as they shook. "We've got it! We are firmly sitting on the throne!" Chu Xuan's voice was completely hoarse, like a broken erhu with snapped strings. "85% global market share! The entire mobile internet market has been completely devoured by us, Xinghai!"

Lu Jingming didn't even glance at the report. He leaned back, his right hand reaching into the pocket of his faded jeans, pulling out that green plastic lighter with the paint peeling off. His thumb pressed against the metal grinding wheel, rubbing it hard twice. "Click." A crisp mechanical sound echoed in the office. A faint blue flame suddenly flared up, bringing with it a pungent smell of low-quality kerosene. The firelight reflected on the glass of the explosion-proof floor-to-ceiling window, illuminating half of Lu Jingming's sharp, white canine teeth. He stared at the flickering blue flame, his eyes revealing a ferocity that wanted to smash the world and rebuild it. "I'm tired of playing with these things like phones and computers. Weiliang, prepare to start a new project. I want to completely erase this piece of glass called a screen from this world."