Chapter 203 Curry Speed, That's How It Is!

Time was like sand slipping through fingers, quietly passing by amidst Rajesh's day-to-day anxiety and hair loss.

It was simply like a dull knife cutting flesh.

30 days.

For a full 30 days, Rajesh and his team of scientists had been restless, working around the clock day and night.

The ISRO laboratory was filled with a thick smell of curry, stale coffee, and the sour stench of sweat fermented from days without bathing.

Everyone was burning their lives and hairlines for that grand blueprint of sixteen satellites on one rocket.

Finally, with half a month left before the deadline given by The Director-General.

They produced the final plan.

...

ISRO, Central Control Hall.

The massive display screen emitted a cold light, reflecting Rajesh's haggard face.

He was currently staring intently at the progress bar on the screen.

That was the crystallization of their sleepless work over the past month, a perfect plan that gathered the wisdom of the entire team.

Now, they were using that supercomputer known as the curry light—which in reality frequently crashed due to heat dissipation issues—to perform one last full-process simulation of this plan.

"It must succeed... it must succeed..."

Rajesh pressed his palms together against his forehead, muttering under his breath, praying to the myriad of gods and Buddhas.

If it didn't succeed, that high-caste Director-General would truly skin him alive.

The surrounding scientists also held their breath; the lead scientist who had once sought spiritual comfort by hugging a monitor lizard was trembling so hard it was as if he were holding a live nuclear bomb instead of thin air.

"Progress 98%..."

"Progress 99%..."

The numbers on the screen jumped, each one making Rajesh's heart skip a beat.

Finally.

"Ding—"

A crisp notification sound rang out. The simulation ended.

Rajesh looked over; at the same time, he estimated the time and noted the supercomputer had calculated quite quickly this time. He couldn't help but feel expectant.

Immediately, he looked toward the screen.

Everyone present also looked over.

They saw—

A line of giant text, so bright it made eyes ache, instantly occupied the entire screen.

[Simulation Ended]

[Estimated Launch Failure Rate: 120%]

Silence fell over the entire control hall.

Everyone stared blankly at that utterly absurd number, their minds going blank.

If the failure rate was 99% or even 100%, though they would be desperate, they could understand it from a scientific perspective—it meant it would definitely explode.

But...

120%?

What the heck are you doing?

Does it mean the launch pad will be blown up too, and we'll even lose 20% of our karma points?

"This... what is going on?"

Rajesh felt as if a ball of dry cotton was stuffed in his throat, his voice incredibly hoarse.

He turned his head to look at the technical director in charge of the computer system, his eyes nearly popping out:

"You explain to me, what is a one hundred and twenty percent failure rate?"

"Can our rocket explode twice in mid-air?"

The technical director was also covered in cold sweat; he tapped rapidly on the keyboard for a while, pulling up the back-end logs.

After a few glances, his face looked worse than if he were crying.

"That... sir..."

The technical director swallowed hard and said cautiously, "The reason has just been identified."

"It's because... because our supercomputer, during the stage of simulating the rocket entering low Earth orbit and conducting a constant-velocity cruise... it... it calculated incorrectly."

"Calculated incorrectly?" Rajesh's mouth twitched, feeling his intelligence had been insulted.

"Yes."

The technical director had a constipated expression and forced himself to explain: "It might... it might be because the server room's air conditioning broke just now, the temperature was too high, causing the CPU to overheat. So while processing basic physics formulas like constant-velocity motion, a slight... logic overflow occurred."

"This caused an error in the original probability accumulation, and it... it became 120%."

After hearing this explanation, Rajesh felt completely numb.

He stared blankly at the ceiling, feeling speechless.

'This is our supercomputer...'

'This is the national treasure we're supposed to use to conquer space and crush Eastern Country...'

'It actually crashed itself while calculating constant-velocity motion?'

A thought surfaced in his mind.

'I heard that when Eastern Country built that mushroom bomb thing back in the day, they could calculate the data accurately using even an abacus.'

'We use a supercomputer, yet we calculate a 120% failure rate.'

'What... what kind of nonsense is this!'

Damn it, what kind of curry speed is this? Does curry speed only care about being fast and not about accuracy?

A deep sense of powerlessness overwhelmed Rajesh.

He didn't get angry, nor did he roar.

Because in the face of such an absurd number, anger felt redundant.

He just found it laughable.

Utterly laughable.

He suddenly understood something.

"Hehe... hehehe..."

Rajesh suddenly began to laugh, his laughter dry and desolate, echoing in the hall and making people's skin crawl.

"Sir?" the scientist beside him looked at him worriedly, thinking he had gone mad.

"I understand... I finally understand."

Rajesh waved his hand, a tragic smile of enlightenment on his face.

"The reason our ISRO failed the last satellite launch wasn't because of bad luck at all."

"On the contrary."

He looked around at this group of elites who drew high salaries but couldn't even handle basic data, saying each word deliberately:

"It was because our luck was too good."

"With our technical level where even a supercomputer calculates wrong, those previous successful launches were simply miracles! It was lord shiva himself descending to the mortal realm to carry the rockets up!"

"If not for god-tier luck, we should have exploded on the launch pad every single time!"

These words made everyone present feel a burning sensation on their faces.

But no one dared to refute him.

Because that bright red 120% was the most heartless mockery.

...

Ten minutes later.

Rajesh returned to his office, looking soul-shattered.

He slumped in his chair, looking at the resignation letter on his desk that had long been written but never submitted, and the bottle of sleeping pills in the drawer next to it.

In this desperate dead end, that arrogant and jealousy-filled sentence from The Director-General a month ago suddenly surfaced in his mind as if by divine intervention:

"Eastern Country has Eastern Country speed, so we must have an even more impressive curry speed!"

"Eastern Country speed..."

Rajesh muttered to himself, a faint light suddenly flashing in his originally dead eyes.

Although he hated his arrogant superior, as a pragmatic technocrat in the technical field, he had to admit that the massive Eastern Country next door had indeed created too many unbelievable miracles over the years.

Whether it was infrastructure, aerospace, or the internet.

Then, he wanted to see the internet of Eastern Country, wanting to see Eastern Country's current development through the web.

"Maybe I can find some inspiration there?"

He murmured to himself.

Although he was a Curry person, he had learned Chinese during his studies abroad in his early years and was something of a half-baked expert on Eastern Country.

He skillfully operated his laptop.

Next, he surfed the web aimlessly.

Then, he clicked onto the web version of the short video platform, TikTok.

Suddenly.

A live stream room with extremely high popularity and a sensational title caught his attention.

On the cover of that live stream room was a young, handsome man facing the camera, waving his arms with a face full of grief and indignation.

And below the cover was a line of Chinese text that made his heart skip a beat:

[Crying out for justice online! Factory Director Li's blood and tearful complaint! That wretched leader!]

"Wretched leader?"

Rajesh was stunned for a moment.

What is this?

Is there some internal power struggle?

With a secret excitement of peeking at a neighboring country's scandals, and a hint of sympathy for his own fate (after all, he had also encountered a wretched leader), he clicked in as if possessed.

...

Inside the live stream room, it was exactly when Li Jiajun was hoarsely denouncing Liu Jianguo.

"Everyone, judge for yourselves!"

"What kind of person am I, Li Jiajun? Don't you all know?"

"I'm just an ordinary, unremarkable factory director of a toy factory who only wants to benefit the people and make everyone's life more convenient!"

...

"This robot dog project, from beginning to end, was not something I wanted to do!"

"Someone pointed the direction for me! Someone forced the parameters on me!"

"It's our most respected, most reliable Uncle Liu, who represents authority and justice!"

"It was his pit... ahem, it was his suggestion to me!"

"Back then I asked him, I said Uncle Liu, I don't want to make those dangerous things anymore, I want to make something safe, for civilian use, something that definitely won't be requisitioned."

As soon as Rajesh entered, he heard this deafening roar.

Although he wasn't particularly proficient in Chinese, he still understood the words 'robot dog,' 'parameters,' 'Uncle Liu,' and 'wretched.'

Immediately after, he saw the screen filled with flying bullet comments.

"Is this something that can be said out loud?"

"Uncle Liu? Are you talking about that Minister Liu?"

"Streamer, stop talking! I'm scared!"

"What did I just hear? National secrets?"

"Streamer, you're trying to drag us all down into the grave with you!"

Seeing shocking words like 'Minister Liu,' 'national secrets,' and 'buried with you,' Rajesh only felt a chill rush from the soles of his feet to the top of his head, his scalp instantly going numb.

'Holy crap!'

'What kind of incredible place have I clicked into?'

As someone engaged in classified work, he had a natural sensitivity and fear toward things like 'secrets.'

Snap!

Almost instinctively, he slammed his laptop shut, his heart pounding wildly as if it were about to jump out of his chest.

He gasped for air, looking at the black-screened computer in shock, as if a man-eating monster were hidden inside.

However.

A few seconds later.

As his heartbeat gradually calmed, Rajesh's brain, which had crashed due to fear, finally began to function again.

He looked out the window at Bangalore's iconic, chaotic, and noisy streets.

Then he looked at his own curry-scented office.

Suddenly, he realized.

"Wait a minute..."

"I'm in Curry Country, I'm a Curry person!"

"What am I afraid of?"

"Even if that Streamer leaked a massive secret, even if Eastern Country's cyber police are incredible, could they really enforce the law across borders and come to Bangalore to catch me?"

"Aren't I just... eavesdropping online?"

Once he thought through this point, Rajesh's fear instantly vanished into thin air.

Replacing it was an unprecedentedly huge curiosity.

Who exactly was that Streamer?

What on earth was that robot dog?

Why would a toy factory director be involved with national secrets and Minister Liu?

And what was the deal with that 'Militia General' mentioned in the comments?

This series of questions made his heart itch with curiosity.

"Since everything is going to end anyway, why not... watch the show?"

Rajesh took a deep breath, reopened his computer, and entered the live stream's URL again.

This time, he was no longer afraid.

With immense curiosity, he returned to Li Jiajun's live stream.

Then.

As he watched the stream.

His eyes, which were originally full of despair, began to light up bit by bit.

Brighter and brighter.

It was the kind of light one only has when seeing a lighthouse in endless darkness.