Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Fat Wu’s description was accurate. Sorting out packages was as easy as kicking a football.
They would point their toes at the parcel and strongly kick it. The package would fly for ten meters. No one cared about the sellers or the buyers. Nothing mattered as long as the package was delivered.
Actually, it was not that these workers did not want to be more responsible. The regular workers were even rougher on the packages. When the conveyor belt started, there was no time for you to handle the packages carefully. It did not matter whether it said fragile or expensive. If the cardboard box broke, there were designated people to collect them, taped them up, and put them back on the conveyor belt.
“This package broke. It seems to be wine or something. I can smell the alcohol.”
“Don’t bother with it. It’s fine as long as the delivery receipt doesn’t get wet. Throw it back on the conveyor belt. Remember, the delivery receipt faces up.”
The group of workers had a clear designated parking space to work at. Two people stood next to the truck, took out the packages and threw them on the ground. The other two people threw the packages onto the conveyor belt. As for the rest, they were responsible for “passing the ball”. After a while, it was surprisingly fun.
Fat Wu was “passing the ball”. He even started to brag to the regular workers’ boss and asked for a competition.
There was a guy standing next to Lu Zhou who was taking out the packages from the truck. He saw his classmates kicking the packages around and was unhappy. He could not tolerate it anymore and said quietly, “Take it easy, guys. My package could be in there.”
Of course, no one heard him. Even if they did, they would not have listened.
There were so many packages. If they passed them around gently, it would take them all night just to finish a few trucks.
Wu Dahai did not tell them how many packages to sort out. He just told them to listen to him. Lu Zhou estimated that the packaging facility must have had a contract with Wu Dahai. Wu Dahai probably got paid by the number of packages sorted.
For example, assuming five yuan for each package, if they just sorted out two thousand packages tonight, Fat Wu would get a big fat check. If they sorted a thousand more packages, that would be an extra five thousand yuan.
Lu Zhou calculated that there were ten other people here, working for eight hours. They could at least sort thirty thousand packages, right? Maybe even forty thousand. Counting himself and Fat Wu, there were twelve workers.
Lu Zhou suddenly did not feel so good.
Everyone else only got a measly hundred yuan for working all night, but this Fat Wu would probably earn a thousand or two. That’s enough for an average student’s monthly living expenses! Everyone else received money from home but this guy probably sends money back home.
However, no matter how jealous Lu Zhou got, he knew that if he tried to do it himself, he might not be able to even do it.
First of all, he had to find a lot of workers. Then, he had to organize these workers. Not only did he had to organize, but he also needed to have the ability to negotiate. He had to convince the people at the sorting center to trust him with the task. Also, he had to negotiate a reasonable price that both parties would be satisfied with.
Everything required a high emotional intelligence that one could not learn just by doing practice questions. Lu Zhou observed Fat Wu proficiently delegating the task and knew that there was no way for him to do the same, and neither could those football kicking people.
Otherwise, the person earning thousands a night would not be Fat Wu. It would be one of them.
Ah, what a greedy capitalist!
Lu Zhou’s hands were operating like a machine as he unloaded the packages from the truck. He was desperately trying to diverge his thinking so he that would not be so bored. He looked around the warehouse and his mind wandered.
Honestly speaking, from a modern university student’s perspective, he felt that the logistics of the sorting center was completely illogical. First of all, it was not intelligently designed. Also, it wasted a lot of manpower on repetitive and skill-less operations.
Of course, he knew that hindsight was 20/20.
Upgrading technology would cost a lot of money. This type of sorting center would not be able to get the necessary fundings needed for an upgrade. Even if the sorting center shareholders had the necessary capital, they obviously would not spend it on upgrading.
Using the risk parity investment principle, the money would either be invested in the housing market or be used to purchase various financial products. This was because the ultimate goal was to get a return on investment. It was not for improving the lives of everyone.
Even if people generally thought that the interests of the two were the same, in reality, they were completely unrelated.
“They can add a conveyor belt to the gate of the sorting center and use intelligent machines to sort the packages. Not only would this decrease the damages done to the packages, but it would also increase the efficiency of the center’s delivery rate,” thought Lu Zhou as his eyebrows furrowed.
Suddenly, as he was thinking about the problem, he felt that his vision was becoming blurry.
He tried to concentrate but suddenly a semi-transparent holographic window appeared in front of him.
[Number 001 Intelligent sorting system design blueprint (Intelligent machine program). Required: Level 1 information science, level 2 engineering.]
[Required general points: 5000]
“The f*ck!”
Lu Zhou was surprised by the sudden appearance of the system. He was even more surprised by the required general points.
5000 f*cking general points!
Why is this high tech system so hungry for general points?
“What happened?” asked the guy next to him as he stared at him blankly, wondering what got on his nerves.
“Uh, nothing. I suddenly remembered that I screwed up a question in my exam.”
Lu Zhou laughed and quickly dismissed the guy. His focus went back to looking at the holographic window that only he could see while his brain was spinning a million miles per second.
The system could solve real-life problems by consuming general points. Turned out, the problem did not have to be a specific question. It could even be an imagination, with the system filling in the details.
To simplify, it was like writing a good thesis. The user came up with an idea, so he was the creator. The system was like a hired gunman and it was responsible for making it happened.
For example, the 001 blueprint came from his imaginary scheme of the current situation of the sorting center. Of course, his set up was low resolution, resulting in the system designing components that were overly complicated.
In addition, the general points required was determined by the problem’s difficulty and skill level.
Suddenly, Lu Zhou thought about something that made his heart skip a beat.
“If I specify the problem to making an intelligence sorting machine arm...”
Lu Zhou shook his head and focused on the new problem. Shortly after, the holographic window popped up a line of text.
[Sorting center intelligent arm machine (XX sorting center). Required: Level 1 information science.]
[Required general points: 1570]
As expected!
Lu Zhou squeezed his fists in excitement.
This is how you properly use the system!
For example, if he wanted to make a phone, he did not have to make the system solve it entirely. Rather, he should split it into many small ideas and only use the system to solve the parts that he could not.
For example, to be specific, take a Xiaomi 4 and yelled, “System, upgrade 10% capabilities”. The system could price the upgrade from anywhere between 1000-10000 general points and it would assume that he wanted a complete phone upgrade.
He could disassemble his Xiaomi 4 and took out the Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 chip. Then, if he asked the system to upgrade the chip, under the conditions that the chip process technology did not change, the system would give the design for increasing the chip’s performance by 10%.
By specifying the instructions, it might only cost less than 1000 general points for the system to solve the problem. It would give him the blueprint to increase the Qualcomm Snapdragon 801’s performance.
Lu Zhou was immediately filled with joy. He had finally discovered a way to monetize the general points of the system.
However, he calmed down quickly.
He remembered that he had only 35 general points left.
Even if he found a way to monetize it, he still needed general points. With his current amount of general points, he could only solve a math problem.
After he thought about this, Lu Zhou was not as happy anymore.