New Generation

"I was careless."

Watching the number of orders surge again, Han Yang silently wiped away a cold sweat.

He had thought that after raising prices, he could balance the number of orders with his computing power. But now Han Yang realized that he had forgotten to account for word-of-mouth causing the number of orders to rise again.

Now, as his reputation spread, even after one price increase, there were still more orders than Han Yang could handle.

There was no helping it. Han Yang offered good service, fast speed, and low prices. After completing an order, many old customers voluntarily promoted him, bringing in even more customers. By now, old customers had to book their next order several days in advance after finishing one. Otherwise, their order would have to wait in line when the time came.

Raise the prices again?

After thinking it over briefly, Han Yang rejected the idea.

Frequent price hikes would seem like taking advantage of people's desperation, damaging his reputation to some extent while bringing little additional profit.

For now, he should maintain things as they were. Once his computing power improved and his equipment was in place, allowing him to take however many orders came in, that would be a fundamental solution.

But for the moment, Han Yang was suffering. Faced with customers grumbling endlessly about having to wait in line, he could only tread carefully and placate them everywhere.

"Sorry, sorry. Our shop is small, and there are too many orders. We really can't finish them all."

"Our power-leveling guy has been working nonstop around the clock. We really can't squeeze out any more time. Don't worry, we'll get to you as soon as possible."

"Sorry, brother. Our shop values credibility. Think about it—if you were waiting your turn properly, only to have someone who paid more cut ahead of you, you wouldn't be happy either, right?"

"You people are pretty decent. If there are so many orders, hurry up and expand. Hire some people."

"Thank you for the compliment. Your recognition is our greatest motivation. We're already preparing to hire staff and expand as quickly as possible, but that takes time. New hires need training, and the equipment needs to be assembled. Don't worry. Within two months at most, our shop will expand, and there won't be any need to wait in line then."

"Seriously, this is the first time I've seen people like you, leaving money on the table."

"Sorry, brother. I'm truly sorry. It's all our fault."

For all twenty-four hours of the day, Han Yang was practically apologizing and placating people. By now, whenever he saw a bird fly into the yard, he almost reflexively apologized to it.

At that moment, another old customer's order was successfully completed. Han Yang operated his phone and sent over a message directly: "Dear customer, your task has been completed. Please log in and inspect it as soon as possible. If you're satisfied, please leave our little shop a positive review~"

"Holy shit, as expected of Revival. You cleared it that fast? Those two days of waiting weren't for nothing. By the way, how exactly did you do it? I found several experts for this stage's boss, and none of them could beat it."

"It wasn't actually that difficult. The controls and positioning just had to be more precise."

"You're incredible. By the way, why don't you make videos? Self-media is so popular these days. With skills as good as yours, wouldn't making some extreme-clear videos earn more than grinding away at power-leveling jobs?"

The customer's words gave Han Yang something to think about.

That was indeed true. If he made videos and became a content creator, Han Yang was certain he could make a great deal of money. Maybe he could even become an internet celebrity.

But after thinking for a moment, Han Yang still rejected the idea.

Ordinary people wanted fame because fame brought money. But fame was precisely what Han Yang feared most.

He did not want to become famous. He was even afraid of becoming famous.

If he drew the Ita's attention and exposed his secret, he would be doomed beyond redemption.

His current situation was quite good: running an online game studio and completing his initial accumulation of capital without attracting anyone else's attention. Once his computing power was high enough, he would have plenty of ways to make more money without becoming famous.

"Still, that customer had a point. Efficiency this high will also attract attention. From now on, I shouldn't push things to the limit. I won't take boss orders with terrible stats. Even if I take orders for bosses with better stats, I'll deliberately drag things out for a while. I can't clear them so quickly."

This would inevitably reduce the number of orders he could take and affect his income. But for the sake of safety, necessary sacrifices were worthwhile. Besides, it would free up some computing power. He happened to be starting research on a new generation of chips, so that computing power would come in handy.

"Thank you for your suggestion. Our shop will consider it."

After sending that customer away, Han Yang immediately began deliberately reducing the efficiency of subsequent power-leveling jobs. As expected, the longer waiting times prompted many more customer complaints.

A few days later, the new batch of materials finally arrived.

On this batch of circuit boards, the mounting holes for different semiconductors were closer together, and the semiconductors themselves were smaller. Even the wires were much thinner.

If he could successfully use these materials to manufacture a new generation CPU, it would use a 2.72-millimeter process, nearly doubling the previous generation CPU's performance. At the same time, the number of semiconductors integrated onto it would reach around twenty thousand.

Its frequency would also reach roughly 200 KHZ. All told, its computing power should increase by around fifteen times.

But improved performance also meant improved machining precision. Before, as long as he had a lamp for lighting, Han Yang could easily solder semiconductors or install capacitors and resistors. But now that more circuits had to be integrated into the same volume, it was no longer so simple.

Han Yang even had to buy specialized lighting and a smaller soldering iron. Sometimes, he had to use a magnifying glass just to keep the work moving.

And that was not all. Developing an entirely new generation of CPUs also involved software. Han Yang had to write things like this CPU's instruction set himself, and entering the code was extremely tedious. He had to repeatedly flip several switch-like mechanisms on and off, inputting the code bit by bit.

If not for the computing power he had saved by deliberately slowing down his power-leveling efficiency earlier, Han Yang felt he would have gone mad long ago.

"This generation of CPU can barely still be made by hand. When I develop the next generation, I'll have to find a way to create some tools to assist me. Right, I also need to develop a programming language of my own. Otherwise, if I keep writing code in assembly language or even machine language, I'll work myself to death sooner or later."

After finally completing the day's work, Han Yang was still exhausted, even with the chip's assistance.

By his calculations, today marked exactly one month since he had adopted the Nash Equilibrium Strategy. After a month of hard work and busyness, the time had finally come to reap the rewards.

"This month's total income... seventy-six thousand. Expenses were twenty-seven thousand, leaving forty-nine thousand. Not bad, not bad."

Looking at the enormous sum of forty-nine thousand sitting in his bank account, Han Yang felt deeply satisfied.