Chapter 33, Starsea II Released, Theme: Dimensional Reduction Attack

8:00 PM, Donghai City Sports Center.

Searchlights on the dome swung wildly, illuminating half the night sky in a pale white glow.

Tens of thousands of seats were packed so tightly that not even an aisle remained; the crowd was roaring.

Outside the main entrance, scalpers chased away by security were still cursing.

The audience inside the venue had long been unable to contain themselves, waving their glow sticks so fast they left afterimages.

The family seating area in the first row of the VIP section.

Fatty Xu had only been discharged from the hospital a few days ago, his complexion revealing a weak, deathly pallor.

He clutched a thermos filled with goji berries tightly in his hand, his eyes staring straight at the empty stage.

Sitting beside him was the Greater China Region President of Nokia, President Kang Peila.

This executive from the multinational giant sat with his legs crossed, his face full of impatience.

"President Kang, what kind of tricks do you think this kid can pull off?" Fatty Xu leaned in and lowered his voice.

President Kang Peila snorted coldly and reached out to adjust the tie of his haute couture suit.

"Bluffing. Without a Symbian license, the best he can do is make a broken tin box that can crack walnuts."

The venue lights suddenly went out.

The previously noisy stadium instantly quieted down.

A giant circular screen lit up.

A beam of cold white spotlight hit the center of the stage with a "pop." Lu Jingming walked onto the stage.

He wore a black T-shirt, faded straight-leg jeans, and a pair of clean white canvas shoes.

This attire was completely out of place with the suited executives in the audience, yet it exuded an air of indifferent arrogance.

There was no long-winded opening. No talk of brand sentiment, no shouting of corporate slogans.

Lu Jingming stood still, reached directly into his pocket, and pulled out an object.

The camera's telephoto lens zoomed in instantly. The image was projected simultaneously onto the giant screen behind him.

The tens of thousands of people in the audience held their breath for a second.

It was a deep blue phone. There were no thick plastic bezels, no dense grid of physical keypad buttons.

Both the front and back were made of smooth, mirror-like Corning glass. The stage lights swept over it. The glass backplate refracted a gentle, wave-like luster, with a texture so premium it gave people goosebumps.

"Is... is this a phone?" A reporter in the front row looked stunned, forgetting to even press the shutter on their camera.

"Holy crap! This design is insane! Compared to this, plastic shells are just trash!" Someone in the stands yelled out, instantly igniting the entire venue.

Fatty Xu's hand shook. His thermos slipped, and the scalding goji berry water spilled onto his crotch, but he didn't even feel the heat.

He stared fixedly at the glass body, his eyes nearly bulging out of their sockets.

"How low must the manufacturing yield be? He's insane to actually mass-produce double-sided glass!"

On stage, Lu Jingming held the device, a relaxed smile curling the corners of his mouth.

"xinghai gen 2, double-sided Corning scratch-resistant glass, a little gift for everyone."

He turned around and pressed his thumb against the side of the device.

"Looking good isn't enough. Doesn't everyone complain every day about their phones being laggy?"

Lu Jingming glanced at the VIP section. "Today, I'll teach you all what 'smart' really means."

The screen lit up. There was no Nokia handshake animation that never changed. It went straight to a starry sky wallpaper.

At the bottom of the screen, there was a horizontal unlock slider with an arrow. Lu Jingming pressed his thumb against the screen and gently swiped to the right.

With a crisp "click" system sound effect, the screen transitioned to the home screen as smoothly as flowing water.

In the audience, President Kang Peila sat up abruptly. The disdain originally on his face instantly solidified into shock.

"No buttons? He's using his finger to touch the screen directly? That's impossible!" President Kang Peila blurted out in English, a layer of fine cold sweat seeping from his forehead.

In 2007, all touchscreens were crude resistive screens. To tap an app, you had to use a fingernail or a plastic stylus and poke hard.

Lu Jingming's operation—lightly stroking with his finger pad, the screen responding exactly where he pointed—completely exceeded their cognitive limits.

"Don't rush, this is just the basics." Lu Jingming opened the photo album and pulled up a high-resolution landscape photo.

He extended his index finger and thumb, pressed them onto the screen, and gently pinched outward.

On the giant screen, the image zoomed in smoothly and seamlessly, following the movement of his fingertips.

There was no pixelated blur, no half-second lag in loading.

"This is called multi-point capacitive touch." Lu Jingming pinched his fingers, and the image instantly shrank back to its original size.

He looked up, his gaze as sharp as a knife. "Throw away those anti-human styluses in your hands." "The best interaction tool is your own fingers."

The entire sports center exploded. Tens of thousands of audience members stood up, pushing forward desperately. The railings in the front row creaked under the pressure.

"God-tier technology! Is this f*cking magic?" "Zooming in with two fingers? Does this screen have eyes to recognize how many fingers are used?" "Get it on the market! I'm going to smash my Nokia right now!"

The roar threatened to lift the roof off. Chu Xuan stood on the side stage, watching the crazy crowd below, grinning so wide his molars were visible.

"I give Lu Jingming a perfect score for this aura." He chuckled at Niu Dazhuang beside him.

Old Li took off his thick-rimmed glasses and wiped away the tears in the corners of his eyes. All the nights spent pulling all-nighters in the workshop during this time were worth it.

Downstage, Fatty Xu slumped in his chair. He was like a bighead carp drained of water, panting heavily.

He understood hardware; he knew all too well the difficulty of adapting this kind of capacitive screen to the underlying system. This was a dimensional reduction strike.

Even if Bolang Mobile spent another five years in R&D, they wouldn't be able to catch up to this sliding damping feel.

President Kang Peila looked even more ashen. His beloved Symbian empire, in front of this glass monster, looked like a primitive man holding a stone axe—ridiculous and pathetic.

"How on earth did he solve the underlying lag?" President Kang Peila muttered to himself, pulling at his blonde hair.

Lu Jingming didn't give them a chance to catch their breath. His fingers danced frantically on the screen. He opened a dozen apps in a row, including music, browser, and memo. The background was stacked full.

He pressed the Home button and switched back to the desktop in a second. He tapped on the music app again, and the song played instantly without a hint of lag.

"Xinghai OS, exclusive Tombstone Mechanism." Lu Jingming held up the phone, his voice carrying through the microphone across the entire venue.

"Kill all resource-hogging background processes." "Dedicate all performance to the very second in front of you."

This domineering system logic made the digital geeks in the audience boil with excitement. This was what you called curing all kinds of dissatisfaction!

The demonstration was over. Lu Jingming stuffed the phone back into his pocket. The giant circular screen behind him suddenly plunged into pitch blackness.

The whole audience held their breath. They knew the most critical part was coming.

Double-sided Corning glass, epoch-making multi-point capacitive screen, Xinghai OS that crushed Symbian. If a big company created this heaven-defying configuration, it would have to sell for at least five or six thousand.

"President Kang, how much do you think he'll sell this device for?" Fatty Xu asked, his pale lips trembling.

"With the cost right there, if it's below four thousand, he'll lose his shirt!" President Kang Peila gritted his teeth tightly, struggling to maintain the last shred of dignity of a multinational giant.

Lu Jingming smiled. He raised his hand and snapped his fingers in front of the microphone. "Snap!"

The giant screen lit up suddenly. Four bold, scarlet Arabic numerals slammed into everyone's faces like a brick. 1999 Yuan!

Beside it was a line of arrogant small text: One million units in stock, on sale today, no reservation codes needed.

Silence. The entire sports center fell into a three-second deathly silence. Then, it erupted into screams and roars loud enough to shatter bulletproof glass.

"Holy crap! One thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine! Boss Lu, you are my real father!"

"He's crazy! Buying alien technology at this price? Is Xinghai doing charity!"

"Hurry up and order online! The website is going to be crashed again in a minute!"

Reporters in the front row pressed their shutters like madmen. Several cameramen, carrying dozens of pounds of equipment, rushed onto the stage without a second thought.

Fatty Xu's vision went black. This time he really fainted, and his assistant scrambled to pinch his philtrum.

President Kang Peila's face was completely distorted. This price sentenced Nokia's mid-to-high-end market to death!

The scene was chaos. The audience took out their PHS phones and old mobiles, hurriedly calling their families to snap one up.

Lu Jingming stood at the edge of the stage, watching the boiling sea of people below. He raised his hand and gently pressed it downward.

His slightly playful voice came through the microphone. The roar in the venue miraculously quieted down a bit.

"Everyone, don't rush to open your wallets just yet." Lu Jingming smiled slightly. His gaze swept over the ashen-faced executives in the front row.

"Since you're switching to a new phone, isn't it quite difficult to export the contacts and photos from your old one?"

He pulled a white data cable out of his jeans pocket and waved it in mid-air.

"Don't worry, to make it easier for everyone to abandon the laggy old machines in your hands, I've prepared a little feature for you."