An Interesting Young Man

"Lin Xu! Run!"

"Run!"

"Lin Xu! Run!"

"You only have 15 seconds left! Run!"

The next day was the weekend, so Lin Xu spent nearly the entire night shuttling between Bracelet World and reality.

He became the most devoted visitor in Skyvault Technology's exhibition hall. Every time he entered the bracelet, he did three things without hesitation.

Strip equipment, enter the exhibition hall, and study the exhibits.

In Bracelet World, he had no way of bringing anything out. The only thing he could rely on was his own memory.

So he had to seize every second and record what he saw before his memories faded.

The bad news was that the more times he entered the bracelet, the more energy it consumed, and the worse his memory became.

The good news was that the Star Traveler One project introduction displayed in the exhibition hall had been written with a certain degree of popular science for clients in mind. As long as he remembered it, he could copy it down directly.

After spending nearly eight hours and entering Bracelet World five times, Lin Xu had finally copied down most of Star Traveler One's overall design plan.

By then, his computer document was already packed with notes.

Next, he needed to organize all of it into a document that was at least presentable.

"Structural systems... Hull design..."

"Use carbon-fiber composite materials for lightweight, high-rigidity components such as the fuselage frame, reducing weight while increasing strength..."

"Use aluminum alloy for fuel storage tanks, and TC4 titanium alloy for high-temperature, high-pressure components..."

"Propulsion system... The main engine uses a variable-cycle engine or an aerospace dual-mode staged-combustion-cycle engine. Model... No need to write the model."

"Solid rocket boosters... Continue Experiment Three's design approach and use recoverable booster rockets..."

"Thermal protection..."

"Navigation, guidance, and control systems..."

"Avionics communications..."

"Life support..."

"Payload..."

Lin Xu went through Star Traveler One's design plan point by point, organizing what he had copied from Skyvault Technology's exhibition hall twenty years in the future.

He had to admit, this thing was absurdly complex.

Although he had learned some general framework design knowledge after entering this field, if he had truly been relying only on himself, he probably would not have been capable of putting together something like this at all.

After all, no one was omnipotent.

He was very familiar with flight control, and he could more or less understand avionics communications. But once it got to rockets and engines, he was completely clueless.

Come on, those were two entirely different disciplines!

Even at the same university, the two majors were worlds apart.

Forget him—even as far as Lin Xu knew, there had never been anyone in human history who could work on both rocket engines and flight control at the same time.

To reach the level of chief designer, one had to rely on enormous resources, knowledge bases, and think tanks to support project design decisions.

Lin Xu obviously had none of those things.

But the bracelet was his knowledge base.

After another two hours or so, Lin Xu had organized the design plan into something that looked reasonably convincing.

To be honest, it was still far from a real preliminary overall design plan, but at least the framework was complete.

If he could find enough technical personnel to fill in that framework, they might actually be able to produce a complete plan in a short amount of time.

Satisfied, Lin Xu looked at the proposal on his desktop. After pressing the shortcut key to save it, he casually opened the internal chat software and sent it to Jiang Xingye.

[File "Preliminary Draft of the Star Traveler One Design Plan" has been received.]

The notification startled Lin Xu.

She still wasn't asleep?

It was almost eight already.

What, had she stayed up all night like him?

He had just been about to send her a message to check on her when Jiang Xingye's messages arrived.

"???"

"You made this???"

"Yeah."

The moment Lin Xu sent those two words, Jiang Xingye called.

"No, Lin Xu, are you serious? Where did you steal this thing from??"

"...Would you believe me if I said I stole it from NASA?"

Lin Xu rubbed his throbbing temples and continued asking, "So? Can it be used?"

"I don't know."

Jiang Xingye clicked her tongue in amazement.

"This is still a long way from being a real overall design plan. First of all, there isn't even a feasibility analysis."

"Second, the overall rocket layout is far too rough, and there are flaws in the propulsion system design."

"An aerospace dual-mode engine? Even if one existed, we couldn't buy it."

"And the flight control and navigation systems—the technologies you listed don't look so easy to implement either..."

"Overall, this isn't an overall design plan."

"This is a collection of fragmented ideas."

"So it's useless?"

Lin Xu was somewhat disappointed.

But the next second, Jiang Xingye said, "On the contrary, it's extremely useful!"

"The design process for rockets and spacecraft has long since matured. For experienced engineers, producing an overall design plan isn't difficult."

"But what they lack are ideas and directions!"

"And this thing of yours provides exactly that—a very good direction!"

"There are problems, but they're problems that can be solved!"

"Forget it, I've already sent it to Chen Yan. He happens to be in a meeting with the boss and the chief designer right now. Let's see what they say!"

"...All right."

Lin Xu lay back down on the bed.

"Then send it. I'm going to sleep first."

"I've been up all night. I really can't hold on anymore."

"Fine, let's sleep together."

Jiang Xingye yawned.

"...Can you stop casually saying things like that? If I really come downstairs to find you later, you'll behave yourself."

"Behave, my ass!"

Jiang Xingye spat and said, "If you're tired, drink some codonopsis and goji berry tea. Isn't my cup still at your place?"

"All right, I'm sleeping. Bye!"

The call ended. Lin Xu tossed aside his phone and closed his eyes.

In just a few seconds, he was completely asleep...

Meanwhile, in the chairman's office at Skyvault Technology.

Chairman Ren Jian sat across from Experiment Three's chief designer, Chu Xu. Chen Yan, seated in the corner, was presenting the results gathered during the past two days of project launch briefings.

"...So, after considering the opinions and suggestions from the staff below, we can tentatively conclude that everyone is quite receptive to the vision of 'interstellar travel' proposed by the boss and the chief designer."

"People generally feel that this vision aligns with their original aspirations in choosing civilian aerospace, and it has also rekindled their passion for work."

"Although there are still many technical challenges and difficulties, we all believe that at Skyvault Technology's current rate of development, these problems will be solved in the future."

"The resistance to the project has basically been eliminated. I believe the conditions for launching the project are now in place."

As soon as he finished speaking, the two leaders across from him nodded at the same time.

"That's certainly good. Young people still have drive."

Ren Jian turned to Chu Xu and said with a smile, "Engineer Chu, when we were young, how could we have dared to propose something like this?"

"Space travel... Forget doing it, we wouldn't even have dared to think about it!"

"The times have changed."

Chu Xu spread his hands.

"These days, the difficulty of working on an aerospace project is actually about the same as the difficulty faced by our country's first generation of entrepreneurs when they built domestic cars."

"Someone has to blaze this trail. Since we're the ones blazing it, it's only right that we take another step forward."

"That's true."

Ren Jian nodded in agreement.

"But unfortunately, these young people still haven't put forward many concrete ideas."

"I had originally hoped to guide their thinking this way, so that once the project got underway, things would proceed more smoothly."

"But it seems that expectation has fallen a little short."

Chu Xu flicked ash from his cigarette and echoed, "Take it slowly. Young people lack experience, after all, and they have their concerns. We..."

"Ding!"

Before he could finish, Chen Yan's computer suddenly chimed.

All three of them immediately looked over. Chen Yan awkwardly closed the pop-up window and explained, "A team member sent me a file..."

"I saw it."

Ren Jian suddenly became interested.

"Star Traveler One? The file name was Star Traveler One, wasn't it?"

"What is it? Open it and let's take a look."

Chen Yan repeatedly waved his hands. "It's something one of the young people in the project team came up with. I'll bring it to you after it's been revised."

"Why later? Let's look at it now!"

At Ren Jian's words, Chen Yan put on a troubled expression.

"It's mainly because it isn't mature yet. I'm afraid you might..."

In reality, he was already secretly delighted.

He had seen the message Jiang Xingye had sent earlier. This was the so-called proposal Lin Xu had come up with.

Good lord, he had made a bold promise yesterday, and today he had already produced something?

What good could possibly come out of something made in one night?

He actually could not wait to open the file for the boss. The less mature it was, the better.

The rougher it was, the more it would prove that this young man was impetuous. Then, when he wanted to kick him out later, he would have more than enough reason.

—To be honest, he did not really have any prejudice against Lin Xu.

But he truly did not want some troublemaker appearing in his project team.

So he would just have to wrong Lin Xu.

Seeing the boss's brow beginning to furrow, Chen Yan hurriedly opened the file Jiang Xingye had sent.

"Actually, I haven't looked at this file either. I'm not sure whether it's suitable to show you..."

"Let's look at it together. It's the weekend—what's wrong with taking a look?"

Ren Jian interrupted Chen Yan, who wisely shut his mouth.

The three quietly read Lin Xu's proposal. At first, Ren Jian and Chu Xu smiled and made a few teasing remarks, but as they continued reading, Chen Yan suddenly realized something was off.

Neither of them was speaking anymore.

In the spacious office, only one monotonous sound remained.

"Next page."

"Next page."

"Next page."

Chen Yan's eyes widened.

He could tell that the two leaders were genuinely engrossed in it.

What the hell?!

This thing was actually readable??

Then again, it was a dozen-page proposal produced overnight. Even if it were full of garbage, it would still be worth looking at, right?

But it seemed... these two leaders did not think it was garbage at all??

At last, they reached the final page of the proposal.

Ren Jian let out a long breath and looked at Chu Xu as he asked:

"Engineer Chu, what do you think?"

Chu Xu's eyes gleamed.

He said:

"It's rough, simplistic, even a little naive."

"But the ideas it demonstrates, the concepts it reflects, and its keen sensitivity to new technology... are truly rare!"

"What was this young man's name again? His ID on the document is Lin Xu?"

"President Ren, arrange a time. Shall we... meet him?"