Chapter Fifty-Four: On the Eve of the Exam

After booking a flight for the same day, Zhou Jingchen hurried to the Hangzhou company. He had already conducted a rough test of the results at home, but to confirm the details, he still needed to be at the office.

Jia Le and Zhu Fan had received the news early and were waiting for him in the programming department.

“President Zhou!” As soon as he walked in, both of their eyes lit up, staring intently at the box he was carrying. “It’s so small?” They exchanged glances; that’s not what a server usually looks like.

“Yes, I tried it at home—it works,” Zhou Jingchen replied, immediately guessing what they were thinking from their expressions. “I heard the person who made this is incredibly talented. No one in the country can match them right now. As for whether it can handle and guarantee the proper functioning of multiple software programs at once, I’m not sure. We’ll have to test it.”

Taking the box, the two silently headed to the server room.

Other programmers who were free also followed to watch. Zhou Jingchen settled on the sofa to wait for news.

Three hours later, Jia Le came to find him. “President Zhou, where did you find such an expert? Can you introduce us?”

“It works?” Zhou Jingchen asked, sipping his tea.

“It does!” Jia Le wiped his face, then continued, “President Zhou, can you introduce us? Everyone in the department wants to learn a trick or two.”

Zhou Jingchen’s lips twitched. “No. He’s a friend of a friend, helping out as a favor, and he doesn’t want to show his face.”

Jia Le opened his mouth as if to say more, but Zhou Jingchen cut him off. “Don’t even think about it. He won’t come forward.”

“All right,” Jia Le replied, shoulders sagging in disappointment.

Patting Jia Le on the shoulder, Zhou Jingchen said, “You have the finished product here—if you want to learn, study it yourselves. I’m heading back now. I’ll leave the development of Yunzhou Video to you.”

With that, he shoved one hand in his pocket and headed home.

He had booked a flight for nine o’clock the next morning. After getting some sleep at home, the timing would be perfect; he could go straight to pick up his little sweetheart at the entrance of Provincial No. 1 High School.

During the three hours he was waiting for results, the video team’s planner had already approached him to settle on the new project’s name.

They named it after the company: Yunzhou Video.

After the honing brought by the Yunbo and “Ghostly Beauty” teams, all departments and groups at Yunzhou had undergone a dramatic transformation. Now, Zhou Jingchen no longer needed to keep a constant watch over them—they were fully capable of meeting requirements on their own.

The professional manager they’d hired, Liu Yan, reported the company’s status to him every week. Apart from the three projects Zhou Jingchen had established from the outset, Liu Yan was now responsible for planning all subsequent projects.

These days, all Zhou Jingchen had to do was oversee the big picture. Otherwise, he could take a hands-off approach and only step in when necessary to keep order.

After showering, he logged onto Penguin and sent Yu Qian a video call, but she declined it instantly.

“Still angry, I see,” Zhou Jingchen smiled to himself.

Yu Qian had never acted petulant in front of him before. Now that she suddenly was, he found it especially endearing.

[Jing]: “I’ll be back tomorrow.”

[Qian]: “Oh.”

Yu Qian replied coldly.

[Jing]: “Don’t be mad. I’ll take you out for something delicious when I get back.”

[Qian]: “I don’t want to eat. I have exams.”

[Jing]: “Sleep early, and we’ll go out after your exams. I’m going to bed too. Good night, sweetheart.”

He pretended not to notice her refusal, said his piece, and shut down his computer to go to sleep.

“What is this? Who makes such demands?” Yu Qian grumbled. She hadn’t even managed to send her second rejection before Zhou Jingchen’s avatar had already gone dark.

She felt a knot in her chest, neither rising nor falling.

She shut off her computer and went to bed, burying her head under the covers.

Sleep, sleep—whatever problems there were could wait until after her exams in a couple of days.

...

At six in the morning, Yu Qian’s biological clock woke her right on time.

She opened the curtains to discover the road outside was damp—it had rained overnight.

After her morning run and breakfast, she grabbed her exam permit and pen and set out.

Maybe because of the rain, the air was cool even though the sun was already up.

The refreshing weather gradually dissipated the irritation Yu Qian had felt after last night’s conversation. “So nice and cool,” she murmured.

Off to the exam she went.