Chapter 243: Hundred Thousand Sparks, Spiritual Manifestation! User Breakthrough 10

April 1st, early morning, Faculty Apartments 0418.

Chen Yansen sat on the sofa and summoned the system panel. March had quarterly bonuses, and the Human Dao Spark was a full hundred thousand.

After Cloud Speed swallowed Whole Peak Express and went on a hiring spree, its total employee count had skyrocketed from 43,000 to 57,000.

The total number of employees across all subsidiaries under Sen-Lian had reached 83,000!

The Human Dao Spark totaled 101,170 strands, which could be synthesized into 1,011 strands of Divine Dao Spark!

"Add points!"

As Chen Yansen focused his mind, the hundred thousand strands of Human Dao Spark instantly transformed into over a thousand strands of Divine Dao Spark.

Golden mist materialized out of thin air, swirling around his body, then abruptly drilled into his brow.

Chen Yansen was long used to the enhancement process. After just a few breaths, everything returned to calm. The Divine Dao Spark was completely consumed, leaving 70 strands in the Human Dao Spark column.

His Spirit stat rose from 24.83 to 34.94!

The coverage area of his 'Divine Sense' expanded once more, extending from a radius of twelve meters to over thirteen meters.

The few books on the coffee table—where the size-four and size-five fonts had previously been nothing but blobs of ink—could now be read with perfect clarity.

Even when pages were stacked on top of one another, his 'Divine Sense' could clearly 'see' the contents of every single page.

In his world of perception, the things around him became vividly clear—like a person who cannot see color, yet possessed a power of awareness beyond the senses.

Chen Yansen smiled faintly. If he paid a visit to Macau, the Gambling King would probably have to change his surname to Chen by tomorrow.

As long as this 'Divine Sense' perception talent kept expanding in range, combined with his reaction speed, he'd be able to dodge bullets when the time came.

"Maybe, I won't even need to dodge!"

Chen Yansen stared at the hundred-plus toothpicks floating in mid-air before him and muttered softly.

Although his Spirit stat had only risen by 10.11, the weight he could 'lift' had clearly multiplied by more than ten times.

A single toothpick weighs 0.5 grams. His previous limit was six; now it was 103—roughly the weight of one chicken egg.

Chen Yansen tried controlling just one toothpick, using his spiritual power to fling it away.

"Thud!"

It sank one millimeter into the door, barely piercing the wood.

Was the control method wrong, or was this all the power he could muster?

Chen Yansen frowned slightly, pondering it over and over.

He thought for a moment, then imagined his spiritual power as a palm-sized recurve bow—the grip, the limbs, and the string gradually taking shape from nothingness.

The toothpick stuck in the wood was 'plucked' out with a sharp snap and nocked onto the bowstring conjured from spiritual power.

"Twang—!"

This time the force was several times stronger; the toothpick pierced the door's wood panel, sinking three or four millimeters in.

Chen Yansen was secretly shocked. He'd known it couldn't be right that hundreds of thousands of strands of Human Dao Spark poured in produced nothing remarkable.

Turns out he just hadn't found the right method!

Thinking of this, he immediately opened his computer, found an engineering blueprint of a Glock 17, and began to visualize it seriously.

The slide, frame, and magazine—including the bullet—were conjured one by one.

Try firing a shot?

Chen Yansen hesitated. This thing was purely a spiritual construct, form without substance, lacking even a primer and gunpowder—how could it possibly fire?

But he didn't dare gamble on it. If it caused some kind of commotion, it would be hard to explain.

Chen Yansen pushed open the door and went downstairs, drove to the northeast corner of the Virtual Academy, and found an empty rapeseed field.

Then, he used his spiritual power to pull the trigger. The firing pin pressed against the base of the bullet—and to his astonishment, the bullet shot out with a whoosh.

But after flying a dozen or so meters, the bullet instantly dissolved back into pure spiritual power and returned to his body.

Chen Yansen thought briefly, then fired several shots at the ground. To his surprise, the effect he'd anticipated didn't appear; the spots hit by the bullets looked as if wind had blown over them, with only a scattering of loose gravel.

What if it hit a person?

Chen Yansen raised his arm and looked at it, then thought better of it. Using his Divine Sense to scan the area, he quickly found a frog.

Brother Frog, sorry about this!

Chen Yansen didn't hesitate—he pulled the trigger. The frog's two legs kicked out, and it passed out cold.

So, this is a spiritual attack?

Chen Yansen caught on quickly, but he still didn't dare test it on a person.

He knew in his heart that even if it had no effect on people now, once his Spirit stat broke through 100, 1,000, 10,000 in the future, ordinary people wouldn't be able to withstand it—even an elephant wouldn't hold up.

Chen Yansen sucked in a cold breath, finally realizing the terrifying nature of Divine Sense.

He stood in place, pondering for a long moment, then turned and got into the car, driving toward the Tech Park.

'At the very least, I am probably, possibly, maybe still human.'

Chen Yansen thought silently.

Ten minutes later, he parked his car on the first floor and stepped into Building 9.

Today's Headlines had already gone live, and he needed to check the download, install, and registration data.

Just as he stepped out of the elevator, he saw Liang Bo stationed in front of the screen, staring tensely at the data.

"How much longer until the Creator Backend is finished developing?" Chen Yansen walked up and asked.

The moment Liang Bo saw his boss, he hurriedly stood up to report: "It's expected to launch by the end of April. The data, revenue, and fan management modules are quite complex, and I was afraid of mistakes in the rush, so I gave the development and testing teams ample time."

"Downloads are 1.37 million, installs are 1.28 million, registered users are 910,000. We're losing too many users at the registration step—simplify the registration flow as much as possible, reduce the information fields, and add joint login options through QQ, WeChat, Sister Chengzi Pay, and Pinbei…"

Chen Yansen instructed.

"Understood, boss. I've made three versions of the login interface—A, B, and C. Once tomorrow's data comes in, I'll have the product team make adjustments." Liang Bo nodded in acknowledgment.

"Pay close attention to user retention. If Today's Headlines' new-user retention can't match the three major portal sites, that means our recommendation engine technology has problems and user stickiness isn't strong enough."

Chen Yansen added.

"Mm, I understand." Liang Bo responded, nodding heavily.

Half an hour earlier, Zhang Yiming had called him, and the two had a fierce argument — their falling-out was complete.

For him, Today's Headlines could only succeed.

Otherwise, once he lost the big boss's support and trust, his position would become awkward.

Chen Yansen was unaware of this, but even if he had known, he wouldn't have cared about Zhang Yiming's thoughts.

Domestically, there were no shortage of R&D engineers skilled in algorithms and big data; Mama Ali, Baidu, and Penguin had long since built up technical reserves in this area.

It was just that everyone's R&D direction differed — Mama Ali wanted to do Products on the surface, personalized product recommendations, optimizing the efficiency of traffic utilization, and further boosting the platform's sales.

Therefore, regardless of whether Liang Bo agreed to join Today's Headlines, Chen Yansen would launch this project.

The only difference was that the product lead would become Zhou Bo, Zhao Bo, Wang Bo, and so on.

Meanwhile.

Users in Yanjing, Hucheng, Shencheng, Jin Ling, and other places, after installing the Today's Headlines app, held their phones, swiped and swiped, and several hours passed before they knew it.

When they came back to their senses, they only felt this software was super easy to use, and eagerly shared it with colleagues, classmates, and relatives.

Because Today's Headlines had obtained the news API interfaces of Sohu, Sina, Penguin, and NetEase, it was not short on content at all; many users opened the app and were hooked before long.

But some people were startled to realize that this app was analyzing their browsing preferences — those who liked digital and tech news found eight out of ten items were related content; the same went for users fond of entertainment news, sports news, novels, or pictures.

Although at its core, Today's Headlines and Lingxi Browser were about the same, their starting points were worlds apart.

In just three days, Today's Headlines' cumulative downloads broke ten million, and the proportion of organic traffic was also rising.

In 2012, an era when the number of application software had not yet proliferated, when users found an app useful, they were still quite willing to share and recommend it to friends.

Xiaomi's MIUI system and Sister Chengzi Tech's AuroraOS system had grown up step by step in precisely this kind of relaxed internet environment.

On the other side.

Zhang Yifeng brought his team and personally headed to the Aux headquarters building in Yongcheng.

Chairman Zheng Jianjiang personally came downstairs to greet them. Strictly speaking, given his net worth, there was no need to do this — having the head of the wireless business unit receive them would have sufficed.

But in the past half year, Pin Duo Duo had become Aux's most important online sales channel.

Compared with Gree and Midea, Aux's brand power was somewhat weaker; in past Taobao and JD. com promotions, it simply couldn't get much free traffic.

Unless it paid for resource slots and various paid promotion products, it couldn't get sufficient exposure.

But Pin Duo Duo was different.

As long as the price was low and sales were high, the platform's algorithm system would keep upgrading Aux's products into higher traffic pools.

Added to the fact that Zhang Yifeng had been promoted to Director of Pin Duo Duo's Merchant Operations Department, that was why Zheng Jianjiang was giving him so much face.

"President Zheng, I'm really sorry to trouble you with coming down personally! This time I've brought many brand-new cooperation proposals, and I hope we can have an in-depth discussion with you."

Zhang Yifeng exchanged polite pleasantries, shook Zheng Jianjiang's hand, and said.

Although Aux couldn't compare with Gree, Midea, or Haier, it was still a major home-appliance brand with annual sales of over 40 billion and 20,000 employees.

"President Zhang, you're too kind. Let me take you up for a tour first, and I've made arrangements for the evening — I'll definitely make President Zhang feel right at home."

Zheng Jianjiang gave an ambiguous smile and pulled Zhang Yifeng toward the elevator.

This freaking guy was Aux's God of Wealth — of course he had to be kept happy.

Zhang Yifeng hurried to refuse, but Zheng Jianjiang paid no heed. A veteran of the appliance industry who had made his fortune since the late '80s, reading people was as easy as turning over his hand.

In his view, handling a greenhorn like Zhang Yifeng was a total piece of cake.

Zhang Yifeng was indeed green in business experience and interpersonal skills before Zheng Jianjiang, but he was young and sharp-minded, and lost no ground in negotiations.

This 418 Appliance Festival, although Pin Duo Duo needed Aux's support and assistance, Aux also needed Pin Duo Duo's traffic resources — the two sides hit it off at once.

Communication went especially smoothly!

Zheng Jianjiang couldn't openly tilt the price strategy in Pin Duo Duo's favor, but he noted in the contract that if Pin Duo Duo hit fixed sales targets within a fixed time, Aux would give a 5% to 10% rebate.

In effect, on top of the Hundred Billion Subsidy price, Aux was giving up another 5% to 10% of gross margin.

Zhang Yifeng appeared outwardly grateful, but inwardly couldn't help muttering: This guy — he wouldn't be giving every platform the same policy, would he?

But since the other party didn't say, he couldn't be sure either.

The next day, Zhang Yifeng once again brought his people, rushing to Shuaikang's headquarters in the same city, and arranged to meet with Fotile's online business lead the following day.

Yuan Wei, Li Hui, and others were likewise running around the country, making final preparations for the Pin Duo Duo 418 Appliance Festival.

Far away in Jin Ling, Zhang Jindong kicked off store-tour mode and notified Suning's 4,000 headquarters employees that as long as the price war didn't end, overtime wouldn't stop.

For a time, the office kept echoing with curses — "dumbass," "fucking useless," "son of a bitch" — though no one knew whether they were cursing Liu Qiangdong or their own boss.

(End of chapter)