Personal Customization

Personal Customization

He sat down on a bench in the riverside park.

Jiang Hao took off his suit jacket, folded it neatly, and placed it on top of his briefcase to keep it from getting dirty. Loosening his tie, he felt much more relaxed.

He unscrewed his water bottle and took a swig, then opened his bag of bread. Watching the river flow slowly before him, he ate bite by bite.

On a nearby bench, a young couple embraced sweetly as they discussed which restaurant to visit for lunch.

Jiang Hao felt a hint of envy. Ever since leaving campus, love had drifted away from him too. Dating was a luxury to him now.

"Da-da-da-da, da-da."

His phone rang. Jiang Hao picked it up and saw that it was his landlady's number. He paused, took a deep breath, pressed the answer button, and said with a smile, "Hello, Aunt Cheng."

"Little Jiang, you should be on your lunch break, right? There's something I need to tell you," Aunt Cheng said politely.

"Oh, go ahead."

"There are still half a month left before your rent is due. I'll come around in a few days to collect it all together. I'm calling just to remind you," Aunt Cheng said kindly.

"Okay, I understand," Jiang Hao replied with a smile.

"All right, that's it then. I'll hang up now." Aunt Cheng hung up after saying that.

Jiang Hao let out a breath after putting down the phone. The smile gradually faded from his face, replaced by a trace of worry. The day before yesterday, he had just sent 3,000 yuan home. His father needed money for medical treatment, the family needed money to live, and his younger brother and sister needed money for school. There were only 800 yuan left on his card for living expenses.

He lived in a shared apartment with only one small room, barely over ten square meters. The rent was 1,100 yuan a month, and it had to be paid quarterly—3,300 yuan at once. He could not come up with that money now.

Did he have to move?

He swallowed the last bite of bread, which counted as lunch. Just then, his phone rang again. Jiang Hao looked at it and saw it was Xiao Yu, a bespectacled young woman from the office.

"Xiao Yu, why are you calling me now?"

"Brother Jiang, are you out making sales calls?" Xiao Yu asked.

"Yeah. What is it?"

Xiao Yu lowered her voice. "There's something I need to tell you so you can prepare yourself. The manager just announced something in the office. In a couple of days, they'll be reviewing everyone's sales performance. The bottom three this month are going to be cleared out. You should be careful."

Jiang Hao froze slightly. So this day had finally come? Xiao Yu on the other end could sense his low spirits and said, "Brother Jiang, I'll hang up now."

After putting down the phone, Jiang Hao pressed his lips together and gave a bitter smile. "Looks like I won't just be changing apartments. I'll be changing jobs too."

The pressure on college graduates seeking employment was beyond imagination. Jiang Hao had majored in economics at an ordinary second-tier university. Among his classmates, those with connections had entered banks or state-owned enterprises, those with networks had joined major corporations, and those with wealthy fathers had gone home to become bosses. People like him, with nothing at all, could only grit their teeth and struggle through society.

He could not blame anyone else. Who told him to study so poorly back then? He had not gotten into Tsinghua or Peking University, nor had he gotten into a 985 or 211 university.

He was now a salesperson at an insurance company—commonly known as an insurance salesman. These companies recruited the most people every year, and naturally eliminated them the fastest as well. He had originally thought that as long as he worked hard, he would surely make something of himself.

Jiang Hao came from the countryside. He was not afraid of hardship or exhaustion, but reality told him it was not that simple.

Insurance companies recruited huge numbers of salespeople every year mainly for the resources those newcomers could bring. They trained them, brainwashed them, painted them a beautiful blueprint for the future, then encouraged them to sell insurance to their own relatives and friends.

Jiang Hao's family was in the countryside, and he had no roots in this city at all. He had no relatives or friends to pitch to. Besides, even if he did, he would not want to cheat money out of them. He could only bite the bullet and seek out new clients.

But finding new clients was not easy. The moment people heard he was selling insurance, their expressions changed. Those with good attitudes said they had no time; those with bad attitudes even called security to throw him out.

Now, it seemed that even this job was about to slip away.

A year after graduation, and he had truly accomplished nothing!

The couple across from him stood up. It seemed they had decided where to eat. Hand in hand, they left with sweet smiles on their faces.

"Sigh, I can't even support myself. Love is even more of a pipe dream."

He rested both hands on the back of the bench, closed his eyes, and prepared to rest for a few minutes. Muttering to himself, he said, "The weather is clear and bright, sunlight spilling everywhere. Heaven, give me a little blessing. I hope I can gain something this afternoon."

While Jiang Hao rested with his eyes closed, he had no idea that a beam of light invisible to the naked eye was passing through spatial barriers, through the endless void of the universe, and through Earth's atmosphere.

"Arrived in Eighth Universe Space. Suitable planet located. Beginning information collection."

"Information collection complete. Searching for a collector."

"Suitable collector located. Beginning installation of the Collection System."

"Ding. Collection System installation complete. Do you accept this system and become its collector?"

In his daze, Jiang Hao heard a voice ring out in his mind. He jolted awake. "Who's talking to me?!"

He opened his eyes and looked around, but there was no one nearby. What was going on? He had clearly heard someone speaking beside his ear.

"Who is it?!"

But no matter how long he shouted, no one answered. Jiang Hao was puzzled and muttered to himself, "I clearly heard something about a collector and some kind of system. Did I get groggy from resting and start hallucinating?"

Yet the moment he said the word "system," a transparent screen suddenly appeared before his eyes. Jiang Hao froze, his eyes widening in shock. What is this thing?

He looked around, but there was no one nearby. The screen followed his line of sight as it moved, never leaving him.

Jiang Hao was still young and usually quite bold. Taking a deep breath, he prepared to find out what it was.

The moment he focused his eyes on the screen, a flood of information suddenly poured into his mind. After quite a while, Jiang Hao came to understand this so-called "Collection System."

This system came from another high-level dimensional universe known as the Second Universe World. The civilization in that universe had developed to an extremely advanced level. Its technological strength was beyond anything humans on Earth could imagine. Now, they were dedicated to pursuits of the spiritual level and cultivated through them, completing their cultivation by experiencing different sensations in order to reach higher realms.

Perhaps even immortality!

The Second Universe civilization launched these systems into countless dimensions, using them to collect different materials and sensations from each one. Jiang Hao had luckily become Earth's collector in Eighth Universe Space.

If he agreed, he would become Earth's only collector.

He could regard this system as a trading platform. After crossing space to reach Earth, it gathered information about the planet and selected Earth's movie worlds as resource sources. It sent Earth's movies back to the Second Universe. If someone watched those movies and wanted to purchase related items, they could place an order through this platform.

What Jiang Hao had to do was enter movie worlds and help customers collect "items" or "sensations." Once the collection was complete, the goods would automatically be delivered to the customer. As the collector, he could receive corresponding rewards after completing a task.

Jiang Hao was stunned. Was he about to become a delivery guy? A cosmic version of a delivery guy, at that.

But Jiang Hao felt that this was more like a "Personal Customization" business.