We agreed not to date, so why are you crying now that I've become the richest man?

Ye Chen unscrewed the bottle of mineral water and slowly took a sip.

Can "looking at someone with new eyes" be converted into cash?

Zhao Peng was speechless for a moment, his mouth agape.

"I made this thing to make money, not to show off."

Ye Chen turned to look at Zhao Peng, his eyes deep, and patted his good brother on the shoulder.

"You're the only one who knows about this right now."

"Don't go around saying it, especially not in the class group chat. Don't mention it at all."

Zhao Peng scratched his head, looking completely bewildered.

"You can't even tell my parents?"

"cannot."

Ye Chen tightened the bottle cap, his tone conveying absolute control.

"Go tell people now that I can make tens of thousands of dollars a day with a broken pixelated Flappy Bird."

"Others won't think I'm awesome."

"They'll just think you've lost your mind and should see a psychiatrist."

Zhao Peng nodded repeatedly, deeply agreeing.

"Understood."

"Keep quiet and make a fortune. Don't worry, I'm very tight-lipped!"

For the next few days, my life was extremely regular.

I go to driving school to practice driving during the day.

Coach Li was good-tempered to begin with, and seeing Ye Chen's excellent driving skills, he became even more amiable. Later, he simply threw the keys to him and let him practice as he pleased.

Shen Anran received a few occasional, sunny, and casual reminders from Ye Chen.

Reversing into a parking space no longer requires stalling.

The look in her eyes as she looked at Ye Chen now held a hint of scrutiny that she herself was unaware of.

In the afternoon, at Shunda Driving School.

The weather was unusually hot and humid, with the heat rising from the ground.

Zhao Peng climbed out of the training car, sweating profusely, his short-sleeved shirt clinging tightly to his back.

He walked to the shade of a tree, grabbed a mineral water bottle, and gulped it down.

"It's so hot, Chenzi, let's go to the internet cafe and enjoy the air conditioning! I'm going to get that pink lightsaber today!"

Ye Chen closed the driving test guide in his hand.

"I'm not going."

"Not going? You're just abandoning that wretched bird of yours?"

"It's okay, but going to internet cafes every day isn't a long-term solution."

Ye Chen patted Zhao Peng on the shoulder.

"I won't be coming to driving practice tomorrow, please ask for leave for me."

The next morning.

Ye Jianguo and Chen Xiulan went to work at the factory early in the morning.

Ye Chen strolled over to the mobile company's business hall on a street corner in the county.

There weren't many people in the service hall, and a young female sales clerk was sitting behind the counter.

She was wearing a blue short-sleeved uniform from the mobile company, the fitted cut of which perfectly accentuated her slender waist.

Even though she was sitting, you could still see her shapely long legs clad in black stockings under her tight-fitting pencil skirt.

The full curve of the uniform collar adds a touch of mature charm unique to working women.

Ye Chen stepped forward, casually placing his hands on the counter, his face bearing the signature sunny and cheerful smile of a young man:

"Beautiful lady, could you please get me a regular home broadband connection? Could you please arrange for it to be delivered to my home as soon as possible? I need to fill out my college application soon, and I'm really anxious because I don't have internet at home to look up information."

His sweet "beautiful sister" paired with his clean-cut and handsome face made the female sales clerk extremely happy.

With her cheeks slightly flushed, she immediately typed enthusiastically: "Okay, handsome young man, I'll go through the internal expedited process for you, and I'll have the technician come to your house to install the cable this afternoon."

"Thank you, sister. When I get into a good university, I'll definitely send you a banner." Ye Chen joked with a smile, and promptly paid the annual internet fee.

Before 3 p.m., a home broadband connection was successfully installed in Ye Chen's bedroom.

Although the internet speed is not as fast as the top-tier dedicated lines in the internet companies of my previous life.

But it was used to upload the core code of his pixelated game.

And being able to check the latest World Cup data at any time is more than enough.

After seeing the installation technician off, Ye Chen locked the door, turned on the computer screen, and his slender fingers began to fly across the keyboard once again.

The room was dimly lit, with only the screen of the top-of-the-line Apple laptop emitting a cold light.

Three full days have passed since "The Angry Sparrow" was submitted for review.

In 2010, Apple's App Store review process was far less complicated than it would become in later years.

These small, single-player games, with a file size of less than 10MB, can usually be approved within 24 hours.

Ye Chen swiped the touchpad and opened the developer backend.

Enter your account and password, then press Enter.

Page has finished loading.

The status bar is lit up with a green light, indicating that the item has been listed.

It's over.

Ye Chen remained calm as he opened the data dashboard.

He didn't spend a penny on publicity; he relied entirely on organic traffic.

In this era when smartphones were just emerging, any novel application would attract the first wave of early adopters.

This game, however, possesses a bizarrely viral spread attribute.

Ye Chen looked at the data from the first day.

Downloads: 142.

A perfectly normal start.

These 142 bored foreigners became the first victims.

Immediately afterwards, the bar chart for the next day shot up dramatically.

Downloads: 28,500!

It increased two hundredfold!

Ye Chen knew very well why.

Across the ocean, a storm is sweeping across social networks throughout North America.

California, USA.

Pete, a top overseas gaming streamer, is currently doing his daily live stream.

There were over 100,000 viewers in the live stream.

"Brothers, today I found a game in the corner of the new app store chart with a really random name."

"A pixelated bird with a very messy appearance."

"The developers couldn't even be bothered to draw a decent icon for it."

Pitt went on a rant into the camera.

"Watch me beat it in three minutes, and then give it a one-star review."

He tapped the screen.

The bird takes off.

He crashed into the first water pipe and died.

The screen displays the message "Game Over".

The live stream chat paused for a moment, then filled with mockery.

Pete looked a little embarrassed.

"A mistake, absolutely a mistake. This damn gravity sensor is a bit anti-human."

He clicked "start again" again.

The second time, he died on the second water pipe.

The third time, the plane crashed right after takeoff.

Ten minutes later.

Pete's hair was a complete mess from his own mess.

His eyes were bloodshot as he stared intently at the screen, his fingers clicking frantically.

"Get through! Get over there! Fuck! This pipe's definitely been moved!"

The little bird then crashed to the ground again.

Pete completely broke down.

He picked up his brand-new iPhone, which he had just bought not long ago, and slammed it hard on the table.

The crisp sound of the screen shattering echoed throughout the live stream room through the microphone.

"This is not a game! This is torture written by the devil!"

"This developer named 'Chen' is an absolute psychopath!"

The hundreds of thousands of viewers were in an uproar as they watched their usually highly skilled streamer get driven crazy by a pixelated bird.

Human nature is such that people love to watch the excitement and enjoy the drama.

"Is it really that difficult?"

"I'll download it and give it a try."

"Brothers, I'm going to get tortured!"