Patent Application

After returning to the factory, Xiao Hua was already machining Zhu Gang's parts when she saw Zhang Yi come in carrying a large stack of books.

"Big Brother, you bought the books back? Let me see." As she spoke, she temporarily shut down the machine tool and skipped over to Zhang Yi.

Since Xiao Hua had formally acknowledged Zhang Yi's Mother as her godmother the previous night, she had been upgraded from Zhang Yi's employee to his little sister. Zhang Yi was utterly speechless. He had never expected to gain a sister overnight.

And this sister had been hired from the Genius Store with his own money. She was not human—or rather, not entirely human.

He could imagine that if he stopped employing Xiao Hua a year from now, his mother would definitely make him pay for it.

After the two of them carried the books into the office, Xiao Hua casually flipped through them.

"Big Brother! You only bought these books? A lot of the content overlaps, and several of these books are completely useless." As she spoke, Xiao Hua picked out several books from the dozen or so volumes and carefully set them aside.

Then she said to Zhang Yi, "Big Brother, only these books are useful to me. The rest, things like Fundamentals of Mechanical Engineering, are useless to me. After all, I'm not a beginner in machining. Besides, even for beginners, many of these books are useless."

Hearing Xiao Hua's words, Zhang Yi felt a little depressed. He had spent the whole morning painstakingly buying these books, only to find that most of them were completely useless. How could that not be frustrating?

But in their small county town, Xinhua Bookstore only had these mechanical engineering books. If he wanted to buy more, he could only go to large bookstores in the city or provincial capital.

Just as Zhang Yi was worrying about where to buy books, he suddenly realized how stupid he had been. Humanity had long entered the internet age. Why not buy them online? Yet he had foolishly been planning to rush to Xinhua Bookstore in the city or provincial capital.

He immediately turned on the office computer, skillfully entered a certain shopping website, and typed in "machining books." Countless books on machining immediately appeared.

Xiao Hua had not left yet and was very curious about Zhang Yi's actions. Computers were not unique to the Earth civilization Zhang Yi belonged to; the Dwarves had them as well. However, their computers differed from those on Earth. They were essentially standalone computers, incapable of large-scale networking. Their civilization also had no internet like Earth's, so naturally there was no such thing as online shopping.

Seeing that Xiao Hua had not gone out, Zhang Yi let her choose some useful books from the website herself. However, after selecting a few, she stopped because she felt they were enough for now.

So she said, "Let's finish reading these first. If we need more later, we can buy them then."

"Alright! We'll do as you say!" Zhang Yi replied.

"Big Brother! Then I'll get back to work first."

After saying that, Xiao Hua went straight out, turned on the machine tool, and continued machining the parts. After all, five thousand parts had to be completed within four days, which was also stressful for Xiao Hua. She was made of flesh and blood, not a machine. She needed to eat and rest too.

In fact, in less than a single morning, Xiao Hua had already machined quite a few parts. According to Zhang Feng's rough estimate, she had produced at least four hundred. At that rate, completing the batch within four days still seemed a little difficult.

Afterward, Zhang Yi also walked out and went over to Xiao Hua. After one part had been machined, he said to her, "Xiao Hua! I'm heading out for a while. Go home for lunch yourself later. I'm going to register some patents."

"Mm! Got it! Go ahead! I can handle things here!" Xiao Hua said without even raising her head.

Then Zhang Yi returned to the office, took out the drawings he had put away earlier, got into the small truck parked outside, and drove toward Zhou Tai City.

Zhou Tai City was about a two-hour drive from his home in Xian County. In other words, even if he left Xian County now, he would not arrive until noon.

There was heavy traffic all the way, and Zhang Yi did not reach the Patent Office until after one in the afternoon.

Although patent reviews were now very fast and did not involve many procedures, it was Zhang Yi's first time applying for patents, so he still made quite a few embarrassing mistakes during the application review.

Fortunately, with the help of a Patent Office employee named Zhang Yingying, Zhang Yi completed the applications for the Aerodynamic Bicycle itself and its related patents.

Although the structure of the pneumatic bicycle did not look complicated, it generated more than a dozen patents. While many of them seemed of little use to Zhang Yi, he applied for them all anyway.

Of course, many of these patents were highly practical, such as the Pneumatic Motor, Mechanical Tire, Pressure Relief Valve, and so on. These patents could be used for more than just Zhang Yi's Aerodynamic Bicycle.

For example, besides being used on Zhang Yi's Aerodynamic Bicycle, the Pneumatic Motor could also be used in pneumatic tools such as impact wrenches, air hammers, and Pneumatic Drills. The Pressure Relief Valve had even broader applications, while the Mechanical Tire could also be used on vehicles such as cars. It was not until around four in the afternoon that everything was completed.

"Ms. Zhang! Thank you for your help this afternoon. Otherwise, I wouldn't have known what to do. Would I have the honor of treating you to a meal?" When the patent applications were nearly finished, he said this to Zhang Yingying, the Patent Office employee who had been helping him all along.

After hearing Zhang Yi's words, Zhang Yingying did not answer immediately. Instead, she looked up at him before saying, "No need. I have something to do after work today, so maybe next time."

After hearing Zhang Yingying's response, he said, "Alright then. But Ms. Zhang, don't refuse next time."

By the time Zhang Yi got home, it was already evening. Xiao Hua had returned as well, and after dinner, she hurried off to rest.

"Big Brother, all the parts are finished! You have to treat me to dinner tonight." Time passed quickly. On the afternoon of the fourth day, as Zhang Yi was carefully studying the Aerodynamic Bicycle drawings, Xiao Hua's cheerful shout came from outside.

Zhang Yi put away the drawings and said to Xiao Hua, who had just come in, "Alright! We'll go have a big meal together tonight."

Then Zhang Yi and Xiao Hua loaded all the machined parts onto the small truck and transported them to Zhu Gang's factory.

"Little Boss Zhang, you're really something. You finished machining five thousand parts so quickly. Even if our factory used a CNC Machine, it would be very difficult to complete so many parts in such a short time. Impressive. Are we doing a bank transfer again this time? I'll transfer the money to you now." As he spoke, Zhu Gang picked up his phone and transferred the money to Zhang Yi.

"Little Boss Zhang, are you interested in taking another order? If you are, I happen to have a Jili order on hand. The deadline is tight, but the profit is very considerable." After Zhu Gang finished the transfer, he said this to Zhang Yi.

Zhang Yi did not answer immediately. After thinking it over, he said to Zhu Gang, "Alright! Then thank you, Boss Zhu."

In the end, Zhang Yi agreed. After all, his factory was still extremely small. Other than one old-fashioned machine tool, it had no other equipment. Since Zhu Gang had an order for him, Zhang Yi naturally had to take it.

After all, the machining industry differed from other industries. For a factory to produce and grow, it had to have orders. Of course, he could manufacture his own products and establish sales channels. But that was still too far off for Zhang Yi's little workshop. He did not even have a decent factory building yet, much less sales channels.

Although he already had a product, producing it required far more than one or two pieces of equipment. If he wanted to manufacture Aerodynamic Bicycles, he would need to buy a great deal of equipment, and the little money he had on hand was nowhere near enough.