Chapter 1 Turning Off the Computer

Su Yehao came downstairs.

It was 9:30 in the evening, and the last table of guests in the restaurant on the first floor had just left.

A couple had successfully proposed, and their relatives and friends were celebrating noisily, staying in the store to celebrate.

Closing time was late tonight, delayed for a while.

The soon-to-be-married couple gave generous tips before leaving, and the waiters were very happy. After splitting it, each person received more than a hundred dollars. They didn't mind the delayed off-duty time.

Coming out to work.

As long as the money is in place, everything else is easy to say. The truly difficult jobs are mostly tiring and don't earn much money.

The guests were gone, but the work wasn't all done.

The accounts had to be settled, the cleaning had to be done, and all the pots and pans had to be cleaned before the day could truly end.

The cat café on the second floor also closed on time at 9:00 every night.

A master craftsman came to install a glass sliding door in order to provide the cats with a comfortable resting environment during the day, specially separating an area with cat nests and climbing frames.

The cat litter boxes and food bowls also needed to be cleaned and replaced in a timely manner.

There were far more things to do than Su Yehao had anticipated. The two stores employed a total of fourteen people, plus part-time manager Yin Liuli.

This once made Su Yehao wonder if he could make money, but the business seemed to be quite good.

Because of his parents' reputation, relatives and friends who came to recharge their cards were often quite generous.

A few days ago, the king of gambling's concubine came to support him, not only recharging 30,000 yuan, but also sending a pure copper lucky toad sculpture.

It was just that Su Yehao wasn't in the store at the time and didn't get to greet this aunt.

Restaurants and cafes weren't expensive top brands, so recharging 30,000 was quite a face-saver. It was hard to say whether they would come again in the future, so it was like sending a small red envelope, just to show some support.

There were several such customers every day, which showed that Su Yehao's parents had good relationships.

There was no need to be too high-profile in a small business.

If he had held a grand opening ceremony, more dignitaries would have come.

Now, after hearing the news, elders who were close to the Su and Tang families took the initiative to come. Their total amount of recharged cards was about 300,000 Hong Kong dollars.

In addition, Nangong Tian was also a big member, spending 88,888 at once. Of course, she had to support Su Yehao's business, and he couldn't stop her even if he wanted to.

If she didn't drink alcohol, according to the average restaurant consumption standard of 150 yuan per person, it would be enough for this girl to eat for two years...

A new store opening required a period of adaptation.

Yin Liuli had been very busy recently. Fortunately, when hiring employees, she specifically chose experienced veterans. After these days of exploration, the business was gradually on the right track.

Seeing Yin Liuli putting the restaurant's cash into a bag, Su Yehao said to her, "Something's up at the company. You go ahead and get busy. Will you wait for me for a while, or should I just take a taxi back to the apartment myself? I found a pretty good product and made an appointment to meet someone to discuss it in detail."

"It's so late, and you're going now?" Yin Liuli asked.

"Yeah, there's a competitor, quite difficult to deal with. His online name is actually something like True Man. Which true man talks about this kind of thing? He definitely won't last thirty seconds. I'll get the technology first and see how he competes with me!"

Yin Liuli smiled and lightly spat, telling him, "I'll wait for you. Your business is important. Should I bring some money over?"

Su Yehao shook his head, with a check in his wallet.

What was most valuable at the moment.

First, technology; second, talent.

The predecessor of Tencent, iCQ, had just been launched last year, not even a year old.

America Online's AoL chat room was in a period of rapid expansion, also having become popular just last year, with its performance and user scale constantly soaring.

Whether it was the Southeast Asian market or the mainland, the application of the Internet was slower than in the United States, which meant that if he put in a little effort, he might have the opportunity to replicate the successful model from the United States to the Southeast Asian and mainland markets, and so on.

He suddenly encountered an "A-Qiang" who didn't understand the market, daring to sell the technology for tens of thousands of Hong Kong dollars.

As long as the patent verification was no problem, he could even pay on the spot.

Even if the product wasn't mature enough and the user experience was a bit poor, Su Yehao still saw some highlights... At least they had been chatting for more than twenty minutes, and the simple program hadn't crashed, and the message transmission speed was quite fast.

The accident had only happened in March, and in the blink of an eye it was already mid-May. He had finally encountered a little gadget that seemed like an opportunity.

Even if he really encountered a scammer, it didn't matter, just a few tens of thousands was worth a gamble.

Thinking about it from another perspective.

If it really was a scam, and they went to so much trouble to contact him and He Shaofan and others, it was impossible that it was only for that fifty or sixty thousand dollars. Su Yehao's reputation hadn't fallen to that level.

Just ask around, and who wouldn't know that his... parents were both rich?

After briefly saying goodbye to Yin Liuli, Su Yehao walked to the agreed meeting place - the Ruins of St. Paul's.

It was four or five hundred meters away from the small building. That A-Qiang had told him before that he could be there in ten minutes.

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The Zhao family's mansion on Bishop's Hill.

Zhao Yimeng made an excuse to slip out. She had driven only a handful of times and wasn't very confident on the road.

So she asked the family bodyguard to help, driving her father's extended Mercedes-Benz to the Ruins of St. Paul's.

She shouldn't have been so impulsive, but that "Happy Little Frog" had been sarcastically mocking her online for a long time, and had even directly arranged to meet A-Qiang in the chat room.

This made Zhao Yimeng angry, and she personally went to disrupt the situation.

While waiting for the red light, she calmed down a little and suddenly realized a big problem. Zhao Yimeng's expression instantly froze.

She thought... According to A-Qiang's statement, the other party was likely to be a school classmate, and she had previously asked about some website or other.

Wouldn't going there in person be like walking into a trap?

If the news spread, what would others think of her?

The dignified daughter of the Zhao family was actually secretly running off to browse private websites, which was simply embarrassing beyond belief.

It was even worse than the last time when rumors spread about her "unilaterally pursuing Su Yehao, but being rejected miserably."

Zhao Yimeng was terrified and grateful that she had considered this point in advance.

Now that she was out, she couldn't just turn back.

She blinked her eyes and glanced at her bodyguard, starting to instigate him to go meet the person in her place, striving to buy the technology, with a budget of up to 100,000.

Similar to Su Yehao.

In fact, Zhao Yimeng had considered whether the so-called technology patent was a trap.

Since the funds involved were really too "insignificant," she wouldn't care too much. And she had personally experienced the chat room, so she was willing to take a gamble, at worst directly setting the signing location at the police station.

If "A-Qiang" was okay, he would definitely dare to go to the police station, so there wouldn't be any problems.

Along the way.

Zhao Yimeng was busy entrusting the meeting task to the bodyguard, and temporarily parked her car on the side of the road near the Ruins of St. Paul's Square.

She didn't notice that Su Yehao happened to be on the side of the road.

The conspicuous "As88" license plate number had been seen more than once at the entrance of Donghuang Rose Middle School. Su Yehao still had some impression and knew it was the Zhao family's car.

The disguise of the "True Man" online name unexpectedly came in handy.

Su Yehao only thought that the Zhao family had come to relax, and hadn't thought of Zhao Yimeng yet.

A certain young lady who had originally planned to see the world was completely unaware that she had luckily escaped a disaster at this moment, and was still hiding in the car, busy taking out two stacks of money from her handbag.

A thousand dollars each, totaling 200,000.

Zhao Yimeng handed the money to the bodyguard, telling him to act according to the circumstances.

She had previously eavesdropped on the chat between Happy Little Frog and A-Qiang, and knew that the price they were talking about was only fifty or sixty thousand.

At this moment, she chuckled.

Zhao Yimeng brought 200,000, believing that she had it in the bag, and fantasized about taking down the chat room technology, finding someone to be responsible for managing it, and trying out the program in the surrounding area.

Not seeking to reach the height of AoL, just making a little pocket money would be good too.

Just a little gambling for fun.

Whether it succeeded or not, it didn't matter.

...