Chapter 7: Crawler (1)

7 - Crawler (1)

His body had undergone changes—positive ones at that.

And all he had done was write an infinite loop program in a mysterious space.

If explained using Old Man Huo's cultivation theories, this infinite loop program meant he had begun "Foundation Establishment."

If this was what happened just after starting Foundation Establishment, what would his body become ten days later, once the process was complete?

Lin Xun gazed at the hawthorn tree's swaying branches in the gentle breeze and pursed his lips.

He stepped out of his room.

Wang Anquan and Zhao Jiagou had already finished lunch and were taking their midday break—playing games.

Seeing him come out, the two greeted him.

Lin Xun sat on the sofa, took a heavy-hearted sip of cola through a straw, and completely flattened the straw's tip with his teeth.

Then, he said, "I have something to tell you."

Perhaps because his tone was so serious, Wang Anquan and Zhao Jiagou both went AFK and looked up to listen.

Lin Xun recounted the entire matter in detail.

The two fell silent for a long moment. Finally, Wang Anquan said, "Are you sure it's not just your imagination? I suggest you go back to the psychiatry department."

Zhao Jiagou added, "Anyone with half a brain wouldn't believe what you're saying. I'm dialing 120."

Wang Anquan chimed in, "I never knew you were such a fantasist."

Lin Xun: "..."

Lin Xun: "Fine."

But he refused to accept their mockery, so he declared, "I predict that in ten days, our company will receive an unexpected income, in units of 50."

Zhao Jiagou resumed his game and said while playing, "Algorithm, remember this—the world is materialistic."

Wang Anquan added, "Your mental stress is really too high. We need to hire a programmer as soon as possible to lighten your workload."

Alright then.

According to the progress, ten days later, once his Foundation Establishment was complete, the system would award him "Sect Funds 50." When that happened, he would make these two eat their words.

Pretending he no longer cared about the matter, he said, "Let's not talk about this."

Wang Anquan said, "Let's discuss what kind of programmer to hire and how much salary to offer."

Lin Xun replied, "Our code is difficult to write."

Goddess of the Luo River was still just a prototype, an engine that could run normally, but the features to be presented to users hadn't been fully implemented yet. Achieving that would require a massive amount of code.

—Before this, the three of them had written the code for "Goddess of the Luo River" together. While each excelled in their respective professional fields, none were exceptionally skilled in actual programming. As a result, the core code of Goddess of the Luo River was both ugly and bloated, and Lin Xun was working hard to design optimization algorithms.

Now, the workload required for programming had grown beyond what the three of them could handle, necessitating a fourth person—someone with exceptional skills who was also proficient in Python and C++. This meant their salary would have to be high.

Wang Anquan proposed a hypothetical: "Suppose we hire a programmer with a monthly salary of ten thousand."

Lin Xun responded, "You'd get a programmer who codes by relying on Baidu and CSDN."

"If their salary rises to twenty thousand—"

Zhao Jiagou added, "They'd become proficient at coding with Google and GitHub."

Wang Anquan suggested, "What if we offer fifty thousand?"

Lin Xun: "He's a competent programmer, but he still can't adapt to the programming difficulty of the Goddess of the Luo River."

Wang Anquan sighed: "Why is a coder so extravagant?"

"Think about our worth, Anquan." Zhao Jiagou shrugged: "EAS offered us sixty or seventy thousand a year in the first year, which was already too low. They even added extra stock options, which is why you and I were somewhat tempted."

Wang Anquan: "How much did Eagle offer you?"

Seeing that they were about to fall into an endless debate about Python and Java due to one-upmanship, Lin Xun quickly cut in: "I think his monthly salary range should be between seventy thousand and a hundred thousand..."

"And then our funding is cut in half, and we still have to rent servers on top of that." Wang Anquan crossed his arms: "So, Algorithm, do you know what your task is tonight?"

Lin Xun: "...I know."

—Ask Dong Jun for money.

God knows, he’s someone who hesitates even to call Dong Jun.

But the night always comes so quickly.

He stood in front of the mirror: "Are you sure you want me to wear this?"

Zhao Jiagou: "I suggest you trust me."

Lin Xun examined himself in the mirror.

A white high-neck sweater, with a not-too-formal coat—a beige-like trench coat.

Both were very light colors, and the soft high neck made him look...

Lin Xun: "This is the style my sister would like."

"Exactly," Zhao Jiagou circled him a few times: "You look as docile as a little rabbit that just left its nest."

"Jia Gou." Lin Xun: "Your metaphor skills have improved again."

"Thanks for the compliment." Zhao Jiagou straightened his collar and continued: "But it’s not overly soft, because your own demeanor is very calm. So, it’s uplifting, youthful, and bright."

Lin Xun: "Your word choice is starting to get inappropriate."

"Sorry," Jia Gou said: "Then let me put it another way—you look like a younger brother now."

Lin Xun: "..."

Wang Anquan burst out laughing.

"The best choice for an older sister-younger brother romance, a pretty little wolf cub. The kind where women see you and loudly say—little brother, I can." Zhao Jiagou added.

Lin Xun could no longer understand Jia Gou’s nonsense. Not only had he become a younger brother, but he had also become an animal that hadn’t been weaned.

But, no matter what, just like his language skills, Jia Gou’s aesthetic sense was the highest among the three of them.

And he also trusted his own wardrobe.

His sister, Lin Ting, was four years older than him, currently studying art abroad, and undoubtedly had excellent taste.

Lin Xun’s wardrobe was carefully coordinated and organized by Ms. Lin Ting for different occasions, and it had never failed him.

"Anyway," Wang Anquan summarized: "Tonight, you need to use your youthful charm and young mind to move Dong Jun and get him to invest additional funds."

Lin Xun: "Will you pick me up and drop me off?"

"No, you’ve grown up, Algorithm. You have to take the bus yourself and use that to evoke Dong Jun’s sympathy—a genius who can only ride the bus because he’s unappreciated."

Lin Xun no longer intended to pay him any mind and turned to leave.

At the moment of leaving, he could still hear Zhao Jiagou chattering away: "Anquan, look at tonight's algorithm—he looks only nineteen, capable of evoking maternal instincts in all female creatures."

Lin Xun couldn't help but turn back and say, "But I'm going to meet Dong Jun."

Zhao Jiagou: "You have to believe that human nature is universal."

Zhao Jiagou—he was truly a sophist.

Lin Xun arrived at the agreed-upon location.

This place was near Galaxy Tower, a seemingly low-key Western restaurant, but the interior was exquisitely designed. Soft music flowed through the air, along with the scent of rose petals.

There were quite a few red lights on the way, so he arrived about five minutes earlier than the scheduled time.

Dong Jun was already there.

He wore a simple black shirt with the cuffs rolled up, revealing a section of his wrist. Apart from a silver watch, there were no other accessories. The collar was undone by one button.

His glasses frames had been replaced with dark gray ones, paired with a matching chain. His expression was neutral, making him seem both serious and not entirely so—Lin Xun's language skills weren't sufficient to accurately describe it.

"You're here," Dong Jun said.

"You've been waiting," Lin Xun replied as he sat down.

"Not for long," Dong Jun said, pushing a glass of sherry toward him.

The outer wall of the wine glass was covered in a thin layer of white mist—it had been chilled.

Lin Xun was reminded of the glass of ice water his idol had given him yesterday in his office.

He thought perhaps his idol shared a similar habit in this regard—also disliking hot things.

"Is Mr. Lin's residence far from here?"

"Six kilometers, not too far," Lin Xun said, pursing his lips slightly. "You don't need to call me 'Mr. Lin'—just use my name. I'm... Lin Xun."

"Lin Xun..." Dong Jun repeated the name and asked, "Do your friends call you that too?"

"Sometimes," Lin Xun replied. "They often call me 'Algorithm.'"

A hint of a smile seemed to flicker in Dong Jun's eyes.

Lin Xun explained, "Because one of them is called 'Anquan' and the other 'Jiagou.'"

Dong Jun said, "Then your team is still missing a 'Code.'"

"That's right, we're looking for one," Lin Xun replied. "But it's not easy to find."

"The Luoshen Algorithm is an entirely new structure."

"Yes, that's one reason, along with budget constraints... We can't afford to hire top-tier programmers with the salaries we can offer." Lin Xun said this in a half-joking tone—though he was somewhat dazzled by his idol, he hadn't forgotten Wang Anquan's earnest reminders.

He watched as Dong Jun took a shallow sip of his wine. The lighting in this environment was dim, creating an ambiguous atmosphere, and the glass shimmered with shifting reflections.

Then he heard Dong Jun say, "When do you plan to start the first round of financing?"

Huh?

"We... aren't we..." Lin Xun met his gaze. "Currently in the first round of financing?"

"You may have some misunderstanding," Dong Jun said. "Purchasing equity was a personal gesture on my part."

Lin Xun blinked.

"In that case, when you begin your first round of financing, you might prioritize Galaxy's venture capital over... others like Eagle."

Lin Xun thought for a moment. "But only you chose us."

Dong Jun said, "I like mathematics."

Lin Xun: "So, do you mean that Galaxy will invest in Luoshen during the first round of financing?"

"As long as you produce a preliminary result," Dong Jun said, "You've convinced me with your algorithm now, and next you'll need to persuade the venture capital department with a tangible outcome."

Lin Xun looked into Dong Jun's eyes and felt that after just two brief encounters, he had developed trust in him.

The personality Dong Jun displayed now was not as cold and domineering as he appeared in front of the media. Lin Xun even felt he was quite approachable.

He didn’t want to attribute this to a businessman’s tactics—he already held a favorable impression of Dong Jun.

Following this topic, he brought up his next steps, such as the features he wanted to implement.

"Theoretically, Goddess of the Luo River can perform all the functions of current intelligent systems. As for new features, I don’t have any ideas for now, but... its processing efficiency, according to the formula, will far surpass that of the neural network engine. I want to start from this point."

The neural network engine can make judgments approximating "intelligence" through the analysis of massive data, but this also creates a problem: the closer it gets to true intelligence, the more data it requires. Enormous data volumes bring disasters, placing extremely high demands on both hardware and software, especially now that data mining technology has hit a bottleneck.

A perplexing question—why can’t the rapid judgments and learning capabilities of 1,200 grams of brain tissue be replicated on machines with extreme computational power and storage capacity far exceeding the human brain?

But Goddess of the Luo River can narrow the gap between them.

This implies a possibility, an exciting possibility—perhaps one day, it can be achieved.

Lin Xun had always been clear about what he had been working on over the past three years, which was why he never wavered, even when Wang Anquan repeatedly suggested "breaking up the partnership."

Dong Jun asked, "Do you have data to support this?"

"Not yet," Lin Xun replied. "We plan to rent servers tomorrow and start running calculations."

Dong Jun lightly tapped the table with his fingertips. "The Galaxy headquarters server room currently has spare servers available and can allocate them to Goddess of the Luo River. Contact Ruan Zhi when you need them."

Lin Xun said, "Thank you..."

If the cost of renting servers wasn’t considered, the budget would be significantly reduced again. His meeting with Dong Jun could already be considered a great success.

Next came confirming the contract. Once everything was settled, Dong Jun inquired about his progress.

Lin Xun suddenly realized—Goddess of the Luo River had achieved a great success, but he himself hadn’t yet.

—This person was Dong Jun, a legendary-level programmer with hands blessed by Apollo!

And he happened to have unresolved confusion regarding code!

He began seeking advice.

—He had brought paper and pen today.

It wasn’t until the waiter started serving the dishes that his inquiries came to an end—though he still felt a bit unsatisfied and reluctant to put away his pen and paper.

Dong Jun suddenly said something he didn’t quite understand: "I only ordered one dessert."

Lin Xun remained silent to express his confusion.

Then he saw a faint smile in Dong Jun’s eyes: "But your appearance today makes me feel like I should order more."

Lin Xun: "..."

He recalled Zhao Jiagou’s nonsense before he left, something like "you look like a little rabbit that just left its nest."

Oh, no—a little bunny.

He pretended he hadn’t heard anything and hadn’t remembered anything.

After dinner, Dong Jun asked, "How are you getting back?"

Lin Xun replied, "By bus."

Dong Jun offered, "Shall I give you a ride?"

And so, Lin Xun found himself seated in his idol's black Bentley, with a question he hadn't fully grasped yet—one he could continue to ask about on the way.

As he buckled his seatbelt, he thought, Zhao Jiagou is a jerk, but Wang Anquan—he truly is a genius.