Reborn not to be a beast of burden, I set the rules.

It was 1 p.m. in Mr. Zhang Bingwen's office.

Ye Ming turned his laptop toward Teacher Zhang and quickly demonstrated the new UI-integrated "Rebirth Simulator," explaining that the application to Baidu was stuck in manual review and the urgency of the Challenge Cup final review on Thursday.

Teacher Zhang listened attentively, tapping her fingers lightly on the table: "Content review... their process is necessary. However, Ye Ming, what I really want to ask is, if, and I mean if, a company the size of Tencent also sets its sights on this market, what will you do?"

Ye Ming knew the real test was coming. He sat up straight, his tone calm but clear:

"Teacher Zhang, we don't intend to confront them head-on. Our approach is to keep them from keeping up. It's mainly about three levels."

"The first layer is the update frequency." He held up his first finger. "Our event library is updated irregularly every week, with dozens of new events each time, taking into account trending topics and seasonality. They can copy the current library, but as soon as they start copying, our new content for the following week will already be out. Before the MOD ecosystem takes off, we'll use 'content guerrilla warfare' to keep them always one step behind."

Teacher Zhang's eyes lit up slightly.

"The second layer is the iteration of community and features." Ye Ming held up his second finger. "We will quickly launch new features, but the core is to retain people and make them enjoy 'playing' and 'talking' here. We will build a lightweight player forum. When players feel that this is not just a game, but a group of interesting people together, stickiness will come. Big companies don't have this kind of patience."

"The third layer is the MOD ecosystem." Ye Ming's voice was even more steady. "In the early stages, we'll create a few benchmark MODs to show off our capabilities. Then, we'll release the tools and engage the players."

"We will design a mod leaderboard and creator certification. More importantly, we plan to allocate 50% of the GG revenue generated by each mod to the top ten creators. We'll use real money to attract the highest quality content."

After he finished speaking, he looked at Teacher Zhang and said, "So, if they really want to copy us, firstly, they can't copy all the new content we continuously produce. Secondly, they can't copy the community atmosphere we've already established. Thirdly, it's very difficult to quickly replicate a high-quality creator ecosystem bound together by mutual benefits. By the time they realize it, we'll have already built these 'three walls'."

The office was silent for a few seconds.

Teacher Zhang looked at Ye Ming, a smile slowly spreading across his face. Finally, he slammed his hand on the table: "Good! Keep the updates going, keep the community engaged, and tie the interests together! Ye Ming, you've truly mastered the internet strategy! This isn't just a student project; it's a complete business plan!"

Without further hesitation, he picked up the phone and dialed: "Hey, Lao Liu, this is Bingwen. I need your help with something... Yes, my student's project, the idea is really clear... but it's stuck in your Baidu Alliance's content review process, the materials are all there... The school's Challenge Cup final review is on Thursday, and they're waiting to upload the data... Okay, please take a look, expedite it..."

After hanging up the phone, Teacher Zhang said to Ye Ming, "Quickly, send the materials back to the system again, marking it 'Urgent, already communicated by phone.' My old classmate is in charge of the review; he'll be personally overseeing it. If all goes well, we should have results before the end of the day."

"Thank you, Teacher Zhang!"

……

Four o'clock in the afternoon, in the computer room.

The sound of keyboards clicking was still constant.

Li Yue was making final adjustments to the new UI details, while Zhang Yuan was conducting another round of stress testing.

Xu Wei and her content team are conducting the final verification of the event database.

Ruan Xing ran around collecting everyone's feedback.

Ye Ming sat in front of the computer, waiting for a message from Qiandu while helping Zhang Yuan review a piece of code for a high-concurrency architecture.

It was an optimization of thread pool task allocation, but there was a hidden race condition bug that Zhang Yuan struggled with for a while.

Ye Ming studied it carefully for two minutes, then pointed to a line of code on the screen: "Here, the granularity of the lock can be finer. Let's try separating read and write locks."

Zhang Yuan followed the instructions, made the changes, and rerun the test; the bug disappeared. He looked at Ye Ming and nodded: "That's good. Your technical skills have improved rapidly."

With everything sorted out, Ye Ming breathed a sigh of relief.

He was about to stretch his neck when the QQ icon in the lower right corner of his computer started flashing.

It's Teacher Zhang.

He clicked on it immediately.

Teacher Zhang: Approved! Lao Liu just replied that the review is complete and the code has been distributed. Go check the backend now!

Ye Ming's spirits lifted, and he immediately refreshed the backend page of the Qiandu Network Alliance. The status had indeed changed to "Approved," and below it appeared the management interface for the GG slot and the option to obtain the code.

"Passed!" he raised his voice.

The server room fell silent instantly, and everyone turned to look at him.

"Qiandu Alliance, application approved. GG code, you can get it." Ye Ming repeated clearly.

After a brief silence—

"Awesome!!" Li Yue was the first to jump up and throw the cookie in her hand into the air.

"Great!!" Ruan Xing clapped her hands happily, her pale yellow figure bouncing lightly between the seats.

Zhang Yuan leaned back in his chair, let out a long sigh, and a rare smile appeared on his lips.

Chen Mo, Sun Cheng, Zhao Kai, and other male students from the School of Humanities cheered quietly and high-fived each other.

Ye Ming's gaze unconsciously searched for Xu Wei.

She sat there, not as excited as the others, but simply gazing at him quietly.

Their eyes met in mid-air, and he saw a faint, genuine smile appear in her usually calm eyes.

But only for a brief moment, she lowered her eyes and looked down at the screen in front of her, as if what had just happened was just his imagination.

Xu Wei's heart pounded. In that instant, she really wanted to celebrate with him.

But the thought of holding hands that night and him saying "a good business partner" makes me incredibly angry.

Let's see how long you can keep up this act!

I'm just not going to talk to you, hmph...

"Alright!" Ye Ming raised his voice, drawing everyone's attention back. "The door's open, but the work has only just begun. Sister Yue, the GG code integration must be finished tonight; it can't affect the main workflow."

"Don't worry, it's no big deal." Li Yue gave an OK sign.

"Brother Yuan, run the end-to-end load test one last time. I need to confirm that the performance meets the standards after integrating Google Chrome."

"Um."

"Everyone else, finish up your work. Tomorrow we'll simulate the Challenge Cup defense process." Ye Ming looked around. "Meeting adjourned. Hurry up and eat. We'll have a final summary at 8 PM tonight."

Everyone responded and busied themselves, the atmosphere transforming into one of high spirits, as if the gates were about to open and preparations were underway.

Ye Ming sat back down and began configuring the GG seat.

The backend of the software offers a variety of GG styles. He chose the text links and static image positions that would least interfere with the game experience, carefully embedded the code, and repeatedly tested the display and click effects.

After finishing all that, it was already dark outside the window, and the night was deep.

Ruan Xing went back early to prepare the materials for the Challenge Cup roadshow.

The people in the computer room also left one after another.

Ye Ming leaned back in his chair, rubbed his sore eyes, and picked up his phone.

There is an unread text message from Shen Zhiyi.

The time was one hour ago.

"The chip has arrived, let's start replacing it. Teacher Shi borrowed a 3.2-inch screen, we'll test it after soldering."

It's very short, like a work log.

Ye Ming thought for a moment and replied, "Okay, be careful not to burn your hands. I've already applied for it through Baidu."

Ye Ming put down his phone and was about to get up when he heard very light footsteps beside him.

Xu Wei, carrying her schoolbag and water bottle, seemed to be preparing to leave. She walked to Ye Ming's desk and paused for a moment.

Ye Ming looked up at her.

The smile that had graced her in the afternoon had vanished, and she had returned to her usual calm demeanor.

She looked at Ye Ming and said softly, "I'm leaving."

"Okay, be careful on the road," Ye Ming said.

Xu Wei didn't say anything more and turned to walk towards the door.

As she reached the door, she raised her hand to tuck a stray strand of hair behind her ear, revealing her fair earlobe and a small section of her neck, before pushing the door open and leaving.

Ye Ming watched her disappear through the door, then looked away, shaking his head and chuckling.

He packed his things and got up to leave the computer room.

The door to Qiandu has finally opened.

The next two days will be the final sprint.

My phone vibrated again.

He picked it up and saw it was Shen Zhiyi's new reply.

"Okay, I've got it."

Still brief.