Courtyard House: A Major Power's Heavy Industry, Hand-Crafted Nuclear Fusion

September 1979, Palo Alto, California.

This is the heart of Silicon Valley. Stanford University's palm-lined avenue gleams in the California sun, and in the cafes along University Avenue, you can see young people in T-shirts and jeans, passionately debating Moore's Law and integrated circuits.

Beneath this seemingly free and easy atmosphere, undercurrents are surging.

In an inconspicuous coffee shop called "48 University Road".

Su was sitting in a corner by the window, with an untouched cup of black coffee in front of him. He was still wearing the gray jacket he was used to wearing back home, but he had put on a fine trench coat over it, making him look like an Eastern scholar who had come to conduct research.

Ye Xinyi sat beside him, holding a thick English original copy of "IEEE Transactions on Solid State Circuits". She seemed to be reading, but in fact, she kept glancing warily out the window.

"Minister Su, the fat white man reading the newspaper at three o'clock is an FBI agent. He's changed his posture three times, but he hasn't turned a single page."

"At nine o'clock, there's a black Chevrolet sedan with a fake license plate belonging to Langley."

Ye Xinyi's voice was very soft, only Su Zheng could hear it, "It seems that your 'value' has increased in their eyes again."

"As expected."

Su Zheng remained calm, even leisurely stirring his coffee. "As the core designer of the 'Two Bombs, One Satellite' project, and now the behind-the-scenes boss of 'Red Star Electronics,' if they send fewer people, that would be a sign of disrespect."

He turned his head slightly and glanced at the two "tourists" sitting at the next table not far away.

They were two muscular Chinese men, eating sandwiches with their heads down.

They were special agents sent by the Central Security Bureau, codenamed "Falcon" team.

Since Su Zheng was promoted to Vice Minister of the Ministry of Machinery and gained access to so many core secrets, the state has raised his security level to "Level 1A," the same level as visiting state leaders.

Just ten minutes earlier, the Falcon team had quietly taken care of a "mechanic" who was trying to plant a bomb under Su Zheng's car in the back alley.

"They've arrived," Ye Xinyi suddenly said.

The door to the cafe was pushed open.

A young Asian man wearing a plaid shirt, thick-rimmed glasses, and somewhat messy hair walked in. He looked to be in his early twenties, with a youthful and tired expression, and was carrying a stack of blueprints.

It was the young Hwang In-hoon.

"Excuse me, are you Mr. Su?"

Huang Renxun asked somewhat reservedly. He was still a little incredulous when he received the call from the headhunter that someone was willing to invest in his "crazy graphics acceleration idea".

"Please sit down."

Su Zheng smiled and switched to fluent English, "Don't be shy, shall we talk in Chinese or English?"

"I'll try Chinese, though I'm not very fluent..." Hwang In-hoon scratched his head.

"I heard you're not doing too well at LSI Logic?"

Su Zheng cut to the chase, "Your boss thinks that computers only need a CPU, and that creating a dedicated GPU for graphics processing is pointless?"

"Yes!"

Mentioning this, Huang Renxun's eyes immediately lit up. "They don't understand! The computer interface of the future will definitely be graphical! CPUs are good at logical operations, but they're too slow at processing pixels. We need a dedicated 'artist'!"

"I understand."

Su Zheng pulled a folded blueprint from his briefcase—the one Ye Xinyi always kept tightly under her wing.

"Take a look at this."

Huang Renxun accepted the blueprint.

After only a few glances, his breathing became rapid.

"This...this is..."

"This is the prototype of a 'parallel computing architecture'," Su Zheng said, pointing to the core logic on the blueprint. "It breaks down complex tasks into countless smaller tasks, which are then processed simultaneously by hundreds or thousands of small cores. Isn't this exactly the GPU you've been looking for?"

"Oh my god..."

Huang Renxun's hands trembled. "You...you're already working on it? Which company's proposal is this? IBM? Or Texas Instruments?"

"Neither."

Su Zheng leaned forward, staring into Huang Renxun's eyes. "This is the 'Red Star' plan. It's our own Chinese plan."

"China?" Huang Renxun was stunned.

In his memory, that distant hometown was still a synonym for poverty and backwardness.

"If you'd like, this blueprint, and this laboratory..."

Su Zheng pointed to the three-story building across the street outside the window, which had just been given a sign that read "Future Technology".

"They're all yours."

"I bought that building, along with all the equipment inside. It originally belonged to a bankrupt chip design company; now, it's the 'Future Technology Silicon Valley R&D Center'."

Su Zheng threw out the final bait:

"Annual salary of $100,000. Plus 5% stock options. The only condition is that you become the chief architect of this chip."

"One hundred thousand?!"

Hwang In-hoon nearly slipped off his chair. His internship salary was only a few hundred dollars!

"But...but I'm of Chinese descent..." He hesitated, glancing out the window. "I know the situation is tense lately, and the FBI is keeping a close eye on Chinese engineers..."

"You don't need to worry about that."

Su Zheng smiled. "This 'Future Technology' is an offshore company registered in the Cayman Islands, and the investor is Mr. Li Guohao, a Chinese-American. Legally, it's a genuine American company. You work for an American company and receive an American salary, so who can say anything?"

"As for the technology..."

Su Zheng lowered his voice, "Some things don't need to be written down; they just need to be stored in your mind. Your mind is the best encrypted hard drive."

Just then.

The coffee shop's glass window suddenly shattered without warning!

Whoosh!

A bullet whistled through the glass and headed straight for Su Zheng's forehead!

"Be careful!"

Ye Xinyi reacted incredibly quickly. The instant the glass shattered, she lunged at Su Zheng, shielding him with her body and pinning him under the table.

puff!

The bullet struck the back of the sofa behind Su Zheng, sending down feathers flying.

Almost at the same time.

The two "tourists" at the next table made a move.

A Falcon team member instantly overturned a table and stood in front of the window, a Black Star pistol appearing in his hand at some point. He fired three shots in the direction of the opposite rooftop to suppress the enemy.

Another team member dashed out of the back door like a ghost and pounced toward the sniper's position.

Screams erupted in the café as customers scattered and fled.

Under the table, Su Zheng was tightly shielded by Ye Xinyi. He could feel her rapid heartbeat and the hand gripping his collar tightly.

"Are you alright?" Su Zheng asked.

"It's nothing." Ye Xinyi's voice remained calm, but it carried a hint of murderous intent. "It's a sniper. Four hundred meters away, with an old-fashioned rifle."

Su Zheng patted the back of her hand, signaling her to relax.

Then, he peeked out from under the table and glanced at Hwang In-hoon, who was already terrified.

"Mr. Huang, welcome to the real world."

Su Zheng brushed the shards of glass off his clothes and sat back down in his chair as if nothing had happened. "It seems some people don't want us to cooperate. What does that mean? It means our cooperation has hit a nerve with them."

Looking at the man who had just experienced a brush with death but was still chatting and laughing, the fear in Huang Renxun's eyes gradually turned into...admiration.

Is this the legendary... great figure from the East?

so cool!

Even cooler than Schwarzenegger!

Five minutes later.

A large number of police cars arrived with sirens blaring.

The team was led by FBI senior agent Smith. He looked at the chaotic scene with a grim expression.

"Mr. Su, it seems you are not very popular in the United States."

Smith said sarcastically, "For your safety, I suggest you leave the country immediately."

"Is this how you treat your guests?"

Attorney Li Guohao arrived just in time with a group of reporters, loudly proclaiming into the cameras, "The renowned international entrepreneur, Mr. Su Zheng, was assassinated in Silicon Valley! This is a disgrace to American security! We must protest to the State Department!"

Under the flash of the cameras, Smith had no choice but to shut up.

……

That evening, at the Future Technology Research and Development Center.

Although a shooting occurred during the day, it did not deter Su Zheng's plans.

On the contrary, this assassination turned out to be the best possible outcome.

Huang Renxun has officially signed a contract and joined the company.

Not only him, but also Zhang Rujing, who was ostracized by Texas Instruments, and several other Chinese engineers who were frustrated in Silicon Valley, were all lured away by Li Guohao with high salaries and "dreams".

The laboratory was brightly lit.

"Mr. Su, the equipment is all set up."

Zhang Rujing pointed to the second-hand ion implanter that had just been snatched from a bankruptcy liquidation auction, "Although it's used, its precision is much better than domestic ones. With it, we can verify processes below 1 micrometer."

"very good."

Su Zheng looked at these busy geniuses.

"But how do we get these technologies back to China?" Ye Xinyi asked worriedly. "The FBI is keeping a close eye on us now. We can't take a single blueprint or chip out of customs."

"Who said we needed to transport blueprints and chips?"

Su Zheng walked up to a huge server.

The server was connected to a thick telephone line.

"Half of the three hundred million dollars we earned in Chapter 317 was spent here."

Su Zheng patted the server. "I leased a submarine cable data line that runs directly from San Francisco to Tokyo, and then connects to Hong Kong. Although the bandwidth is only a few tens of KB, it's enough."

"You mean..." Ye Xinyi's eyes lit up.

"Data transmission".

Su Zheng nodded. "During the day, they conduct experiments in Silicon Valley and generate data. At night, they transmit the core data back to the 001 base in China via this dedicated line. The Red Star 2 computer in China verifies the data, and then transmits the results back the next morning."

"This is what they call... the research and development of the 'Eternal Sun'."

A glint of wisdom flashed in Su Zheng's eyes. "The FBI can seize physical objects, but they can't seize electronic signals that travel at the speed of light on this planet. I not only have a line in Silicon Valley, I also have an... invisible network."

"and……"

Su Zheng looked at the group of young white men who were having a heated discussion with Huang Renxun in the corner.

Those were American college students that Su Zheng had specifically recruited.

"Using American people and spending American money to develop Chinese technology on American soil."

"This is the true meaning of 'learning from the barbarians' superior techniques to subdue them'."

……

Three days later, Su Zheng set off to return to China.

Airport security checkpoint.

Agent Smith personally led a team to conduct the most rigorous inspection of Su Zheng and Ye Xinyi's luggage.

They even squeezed out their toothpaste to take a look.

"No blueprints, no chips, no disks."

The subordinate reports to the leader.

Smith was somewhat unwilling. He stared intently at Su Zheng, "Mr. Su, I don't believe you came empty-handed and left empty-handed."

"Who said I went empty-handed?"

Su Zheng pointed to his head. "Everything I took is here. Go ahead and cut my head off if you dare!"

Smith's face turned ashen, but he was helpless.

After all, Su Zheng is now a major investor with orders worth hundreds of millions of dollars and a VIP invited by the Ministry of Commerce.

The plane takes off.

Looking down at the gradually shrinking San Francisco Bay Area, Su Zheng breathed a sigh of relief.

"Is that dedicated line up yet?" he asked Ye Xinyi, who was sitting next to him.

"It's connected."

Ye Xinyi opened the miniature terminal she was carrying, and a line of green characters appeared on the screen:

LINK ESTABLISHED.

Data Transfer... 12%

"Huang Renxun's first GPU architecture sketch is being transmitted to Base 001 at a speed of 5KB per second."

Ye Xinyi's lips curled slightly, "By the time you get back to Beijing, they should have already started the film production process."

Su Zheng smiled.

He held Ye Xinyi's hand and looked out at the vast Pacific Ocean through the porthole.

"The seeds of Silicon Valley have been sown."

"Next, it's time to go back and harvest our own crops."

"I heard that the domestic 'Red Flag OS' has also reached a critical moment?"

"Yes." Ye Xinyi nodded. "Professor Ni Guangnan sent a telegram saying that the underlying logic of Chinese character encoding has been established, but the interaction of the graphical interface is still stuck on the problem of the 'mouse'."

"mouse?"

Su Zheng took a small gadget out of his pocket.

It was a simple device made from a soapbox with a small ball at the bottom.

He found this in a junk shop in Silicon Valley; it was supposedly an experimental waste thrown away by some weirdo named Douglas Engelbart.

"Go back and tell Lao Ni."

Su Zheng placed the simple mouse on the small table. "Regarding the mouse issue, I brought him back a 'sample'."

At this moment.

Base 001, across the ocean.

The receiver is printing data coming back from Silicon Valley.

The old factory director was so moved by the design drawings that appeared out of nowhere that he burst into tears.

"Amazing! Amazing!"

"Minister Su has opened a window for us from heaven!"

This data cable, spanning the Pacific Ocean, has become the most secretive and resilient artery of China's semiconductor industry.

A continuous stream of nutrients is nourishing the red giant that is rising in the desert.

……