June 30th, day of settlement…
Pei Qian had a mouthful of Coca Cola. However, even the happy drink for fatties could not cheer him up.
On the third day, Fish-Catching Internet Cafe's popularity exceeded his own imaginations. Chen Lei's fans flew in from various parts of the country. They gave Chen Lei alcohol rewards as if they were insane.
Since his hopes of incurring losses were dashed, Pei Qian had no choice but to return to his own rented apartment. He kept to himself for two days.
In these two days, Pei Qian kept thinking about one question.
Where did he go wrong?
It felt like every time, at the crucial moment, all his work would go down the drain.
From the moment he obtained this cheating system, he had only managed to incur a loss once. What's more, it was a mere loss of twenty thousand yuan. All he had to do was earn two million yuan to cover that loss. The plot was going in a completely opposite direction from what Pei Qian imagined.
At first, he thought that with the system, he would be able to incur losses and become a wealthy man. However, from the looks of the situation, the System Funds were only going to increase. His Personal Wealth was remaining the same. Until now, he had not made more than a hundred thousand yuan.
"This is so strange. Logically, I should not be this poor."
"Yet, why am I this poor…?"
Pei Qian started to doubt his life. He must have been going in the right direction. Before the start of this week, Pei Qian would not have thought that he would be able to earn so much money.
Ocean Stronghold's sudden popularity and Fish-Catching Internet Cafe's unfortunate circumstances were all out of Pei Qian's expectations.
If he knew that he would not be able to incur losses, he would have thought about how he could earn more money. Yet, he would not have been able to tell the future!
What's more, to Pei Qian, there was not much of a difference between a hundred thousand yuan and twenty thousand yuan now.
Now, as long as Pei Qian was spending money on anything vaguely related to work, he could report the expenses to the System. However, what he really needed to spend money on had nothing to do with work. He just wanted to enjoy and improve his home.
Incurring a loss of six or seven hundred thousand yuan would be way faster than sticking to a plan and earning about a hundred thousand yuan each month.
Now, there was five million yuan in the System Funds' starting sum. Next time, it might increase. Logically, with such a huge base to work with, it should not be difficult for Pei Qian to lose six or seven hundred thousand yuan.
Still, he could not incur that loss! He was furious!
"Must I really depend on my profits and work with a conversion ratio of 100:1? That's pathetic, isn't it? I'm not going to give up!"
Pei Qian struggled in his heart as the System's screen lit up automatically.
Pei Qian was speechless.
After working so hard for two months, he only managed to convert over twenty thousand yuan. That was worse than the last time.
Painful!
Seeing his pathetic Personal Wealth, Pei Qian could not help but develop another thought.
"Why not take a break? I should laze around for a week.
"The few games have been earning money during this period. Other things aside, Ocean Stronghold's monthly gross alone is an eight-figure sum. Including the profits that the official games; platform gave us, we would earn about seven to eight million each month.
"Even Fish-Catching Internet Cafe's flagship store is making money now. Although the other branches are incurring losses, they are not incurring as much loss as they were before.
"According to my calculations, if I don't do anything or casually invest in low-investment projects that offer low-reward, even if I maintain my current expenses; I could easily earn about five or six million yuan each month."
Pei Qian did not think about cutting down expenses. He could not bring himself to take away his employees' benefits for the sake of increasing his own wealth.
On the one hand, it would be utterly embarrassing. On the other hand, it would be ineffective.
Getting rid of four hundred thousand yuan worth of employee benefits would only earn him about four thousand yuan. Would he still be human if he did that?
Yet, even if he maintained his expenses, he would continue to make a profit.
"Imagine if the next settlement cycle lasted two months. If I earn five million per month, I would have earned about ten million yuan by the settlement date. Wouldn't it be more worth it than working so hard to lose money, only to convert twenty thousand yuan?"
Pei Qian suddenly felt like being a slacker was a rather decent option!
As he was considering, new messages continued to appear on the System's screen.
Pei Qian, who had just been thinking about slacking for a week, was stunned. He read the special task for this week carefully and could not hold back his desire to curse.
"System, your mama so fat!"
What the f*ck do you mean by 'the owner seems to be caught up with the profit he is making'? I've not been caught up with the profit. I don't even want to make profits. I've been trying to incur losses all along. Can you blame me for not being able to incur losses?
Alas, that was not what the System thought.
For the two most recent settlements, Pei Qian had indeed made profits. If he considered all five settlements, it was profit, profit, loss, profit, profit. If one ignored the process and only looked at the outcome, they might indeed think that Pei Qian was an owner who was caught up with profits.
Pei Qian's heart was filled with different cuss words.
The most absurd thing was the Special Task Completion Reward.
'A mysterious surprise within the System's regulations!'
The System did not make clear what it was, but the description alone made Pei Qian feel like the reward was especially valuable. It would probably make all the hard work worth
Up until now, the System had only been giving Pei Qian cash by converting money to his Personal Wealth on the settlement date.
However, 'a mysterious surprise within the System's regulations' left so much to his imagination.
Maybe it would be a special tool? Or maybe it would alter the conversion ratios by huge margins!
Pei Qian understood that this might well turn out to be a pit, but he could not help but jump! There was a possibility that he would get a useless 'surprise' reward once he completed the mission. Yet, what if he got something useful?
Pei Qian could not give up this 'mysterious surprise within the System's regulations' for a mere hundred thousand yuan. That would be too stupid.
After cursing for a long while, Pei Qian finally calmed down.
"Stupid System, on account of your integrity thus far, I will believe you this once."
In any case, the settlement is complete. I have a Special Task now. I'll leave the unhappy events of the past week behind me.
In order to complete this Special Task, Pei Qian quickly regained his composure. He had to think of more ways to incur losses.
However, the good news was that the settlement cycle was longer this time. Last time, it lasted two months. This time, it was going to last four months. In four months, Pei Qian could probably show his true worth. He could do things that he had no time to do in the last cycle.
Chapter 186 Think of Another Way to Make Money
Reflecting on his painful experience, Pei Qian decided to take his lessons to heart and look to the future.
To get the 'mysterious surprise within the System's regulations', Pei Qian had to work hard to make a loss in the next cycle.
However, as one learned from experience, Pei Qian had already grown much.
This time, he definitely would be able to learn from experiences; he would definitely not make the same mistakes again!
First, he definitely could not put all his hopes of making money into wealth conversion!
Previously, Pei Qian had always looked down on income of ten or twenty thousand; he had always thought that as long as he made a slight loss, he could convert and make hundreds of thousands at one go. This way of thinking evidently had issues.
After the previous two rounds of settlement, he had only made thirty-odd thousand and twenty-odd thousand; that was only ten thousand-odd on average monthly.
It was too little!
Pei Qian decided to think of other ways to make money.
He had immediately made thirty-odd thousand when he acted in Boss Pei's Daily Life; wasn't that already much more reliable than the System?
Evidently, he couldn't eke out a living for himself by relying on his main job; he ultimately still had to do something on the side.
As for what exactly he could do, Pei Qian had not thought it through yet. However, he already had a rough idea.
All in all, as long as the System permitted it, he was going to use labor to exchange for remuneration; he just had to make sure he didn't go overboard. He still had to test the System before he could firm up his plans.
Second, he had to know how to properly generate losses. Pei Qian now knew how the System worked more or less. The System actually had many restrictions. Products couldn't be inferior ones masquerading as quality ones while rubbish goods could not be forcibly sold at a high price; high-value goods could also not be sold cheaply. Basically, while all product prices could fluctuate, they had to be within a reasonable range.
This restriction had basically prohibited Pei Qian from intentionally creating losses.
If he invested little, he could only sell the products at a low price; only the poor would be interested in them. If he invested much, he could only sell it at a high price; when the reputation of his products grew, the ballers would be attracted.
Hence, Pei Qian had not managed to do anything unscrupulous; the System had prevented him from such.
However, Pei Qian had discovered a phenomenon: when the System evaluated a product's quality, it would consider it from the 'income' and 'reputation' points of view.
That meant that if he burned money to build up a good reputation, that was doable. If he wanted to make less money, he had to try his best to increase the product's reputation.
This was an insight he gained from the Coming Out of the Cocoon as a Butterfly documentary!
As long as there was a huge and wide response
—even if the documentary couldn't be monetized and couldn't generate any profits, the System would not bother.
Of course, the documentary had resulted in Li Zhengwei promoting Ocean Stronghold and led to its players and income rising; this could be considered to be a minor flaw.
However, this one flaw did not outweigh the benefits; filming documentaries was still a good idea.
Furthermore, this experience had not been limited to just filming documentaries; he could apply this thinking to making games as well. If he invested enough money and made a game with niche appeal that everyone praised and lauded, but no one spent money on it.
Wouldn't that be perfect?
Pei Qian thought that this should be the next objective of Tengda Games.
In the previous cycle, Tengda Games had only created new downloadable content for all its existing games. If Tengda did not start developing new games and everyone was left in limbo every day, that would not be very acceptable.
Fortunately, although Pei Qian had been rather confused and unsure previously, he had now found a new direction.
If this was successful, it would not be a problem making a game that created millions in losses!
As for Shang Yang Games…
It had continuously made losses; this proved that Pei Qian's plan was still rather successful, and he didn't need to bother too much with it now. If he encountered such loss-making treasures in the future, Pei Qian also wouldn't mind taking over a few more companies.
Besides all these, he also wanted to break through into a new industry.
Fish-Catching Take-Out had also been a rather positive experiment; however, it wasn't losing enough money.
As for the Fish-Catching Internet Cafe…
Strictly speaking, the flagship store growing popular because of Chen Lei was indeed something a little preposterous; Pei Qian still couldn't accept this fact to date.
However, only the flagship store had become a tourist spot while the other branches were still making minor losses. As such, the general idea of opening physical stores seemed to be feasible. Only some minor problems had surfaced in operations; Boss Pei's luck was also not very good.
He could still continue with this idea.
Besides already planning to open a high-end restaurant to splurge on, Pei Qian also intended to dabble in logistics and storageexpress delivery.
If he could really generate losses like JD.com had done for years, Pei Qian would definitely even laugh out loud in his dreams. Furthermore, if he focused his energies on labor-intensive industries and operations-if every employee had more benefits, he would be in a much better position at splurging.
Pei Qian reorganized his thoughts, and he thought that generating some losses in the next cycle wasn't going to be that hard!
First things first: finding a side job!
It was a proven fact that he couldn't rely on the System entirely to make money. If Pei Qian didn't go overboard in using his own labor to exchange for remuneration, the System would not stop him.
As for how much wages he could draw from the System Funds…
He still had to ask the System.
Pei Qian asked quietly in his heart: "If I invested, opened a company, and used labor to exchange for reasonable compensation, how much salary could I give myself?"
Pei Qian was speechless. "…"
This didn't sound very optimistic.
Pei Qian didn't have any operating abilities at all. Although Pei Qian felt that being a boss was rather easy, if he had to really hold an actual role and position, he might not be able to do so.
This was equivalent to Pei Qian letting go of his current position and status and going for an interview. That would be the highest wages he could draw.
Furthermore, he had to work on this job as per normal working hours before he could earn that amount of money.
For example, if Pei Qian went to wash dishes at a restaurant now, he could at most earn two to three thousand monthly; he had to work eight hours a day at that.
"This is not feasible! It was precisely because I did not have technical and professional skills. That's why I placed my hopes on the System!"
It was evident that the System could not be reasoned with at all regarding this.
However, Pei Qian's mind churned as he thought: there seemed to be a loophole here. It was easier for some simpler jobs for the job scope to be properly defined. Dishwashing, waiting, etc. were jobs that had fixed salary levels.
However, what if it was something more abstract and complicated?
Like… being an actor.
The difference in remuneration for a movie actor and an actor in an opera was vast. Furthermore, even if two actors were of the same standard, if they were hired to act in different movies; the pay difference would be huge as well.
How could the System calculate this?
The System screen soon surfaced
Pei Qian was confused.
This was treated differently as well?
After thinking about this, Pei Qian understood.
This was a rule that the System had set to prevent Pei Qian from using the System Funds for his own purposes.
For example, if Pei Qian bought a filming company and spent a million to pay himself to shoot a movie, that would not be allowed. It would be considered as maliciously using System Funds.
If he put his own money in, he could at most earn one thousand five hundred daily. When Pei Qian had acted in Boss Pei's Daily Life, he had earned a thousand a day. As this was within the System's range, the System had not prevented it.
Based on this calculation-if Pei Qian spent ten days a month shooting, he could earn fifteen thousand a month.
This was rather significant considering how much Pei Qian was earning now. However… it didn't seem that much either.
However, if it was an unrelated company that wanted to hire Pei Qian to act in movies, however much that company gave Pei Qian; the System would not care.
After all, there would be no misappropriating System Funds this way.
Chapter 187 Boss Pei's Mini Experiment
However, this did not mean that Pei Qian could do as he pleased.
If it was a company that had no relationship with the System Funds at all, that company wouldn't be familiar with Pei Qian; how could it give Pei Qian a high pay?
Pei Qian also couldn't do any secret deals or negotiations; the System would not allow anyone to suspect the presence of it or the existence of the challenges it posed.
That meant that the other party had to wholeheartedly, without any doubt, and reasonably give Pei Qian a high pay.
If these criteria were fulfilled, the System wouldn't care how high a pay Pei Qian received.
However, these conditions were a tall order.
"The System is indeed strict; basically, all side paths that I wish to take have been blocked."
Pei Qian actually had a very rough idea in mind. However, this required someone to collaborate with him; and he could only shelve this plan for now.
At this time, his phone rang; Ma Yang had called.
"Brother Qian! Boss Lin has said that he wishes to meet you and discuss some matters. Do you want to make a trip?"
Fish-Catching Internet Cafe branch…
Lin Chang and Pei Qian were not meeting at the flagship store this time; too many people were there, and it was too noisy. Ma Yang had suggested for them to meet at one of Fish-Catching Internet Cafe's branches instead.
Pei Qian came to the entrance as he pushed the door and entered.
It was quite visible that more people were present inside than before.
This was evidently because of Chen Lei.
As Chen Lei had made it big on The Voice of China, his back story with Fish-Catching Internet Cafe had been discussed in gusto by viewers; that had given Fish-Catching Internet Cafe a gold branding.
Most of Chen Lei's fans all headed to the Fish-Catching Internet Cafe flagship store; after all, that was where Chen Lei had been previously.
As for the Fish-Catching Internet Cafe branches; they had also benefited from this positive branding
Many people had originally felt that Fish-Catching Internet Cafe's prices were very high; now, they were willing to pay for Fish-Catching Internet Cafe's branding.
Of course, due to the bad locations of these branches, there were only that many customers with a certain amount of spending power in the area. Hence, Fish-Catching Internet Cafe branches were still barely breaking even.
Pei Qian sat opposite Lin Chang.
Although this person had forked out hundreds of thousands at one shot, Pei Qian didn't feel that appreciative towards him. After all, he had only gotten a few thousand when the money finally trickled down to him.
Lin Chang evidently didn't think much about the money he had spent.
"Boss Pei, nice to see you again.
"My little sister had been under your care for this time. Me booking the entire place that day was purely a small gesture of thanks," Lin Chang smiled and said.
Mentioning this, Pei Qian was triggered.
You had spent hundreds of thousands; however, they had not landed in my pocket!
Pei Qian smiled slightly and said, "Boss Lin, saying all these makes it sound as if you lack sincerity. You had spent hundreds of thousands and postured as a big shot in front of everyone; how could you consider this a gesture of thanks now?"
Lin Chang was stunned for a moment. He then laughed and said, "That's true, that's true."
After this joke, the two strangers grew slightly closer to each other.
Lin Chang sighed emotively and said, "My little sister has always been the most stubborn among all the siblings. Even my dad can't manage her. However, I heard that she is actually very well-behaved in your company and very down-to-earth; that really surprised me. Hence, I had specially made a trip to Jingzhou to see who on earth this Boss Pei is."
Pei Qian was speechless. "…"
She was very well-behaved and down-to-earth?! I was almost duped by her!
Pei Qian wanted to diss so badly; however, he drank a sip of his coffee quietly as he decided not to respond to Lin Chang's statement. He wanted the conversation to carry on.
"It seems as if your father doesn't want her to continue working in the game industry." Pei Qian used a casual tone as he tested waters.
He wasn't sure if Lin Chang had the same thinking as Lin Wan's dad; he also wasn't sure what the family situation was like for the Lins. By probing this way, he could know the situation better and find out more about Lin Chang's thinking.
This way, when he sent Lin Wan away next time, he wouldn't get into trouble.
Lin Chang was a little helpless as he replied, "I am also very conflicted about this.
"By right, Ah Wan's actions now serve no purpose. If she is willing to take over the family business, she could definitely invest in and be in charge of her own games company. However, she is quite stubborn; she insists that she must personally be the game designer.
"If I reasoned this out, I am more inclined to support my father's views. However, from an emotional and sentimental point of view, I understand Ah Wan's choice.
"After all… my dream back then had been to be a singer in a band. Come to think of it, I still have some regrets for not being adamant back then…"
Pei Qian's lips twitched.
Not bad, all four of you siblings have so many talents and hobbies!
From Lin Chang's words, he was saying that he had wanted to chase his dreams; but he hadn't been as stubborn as his father. Lin Chang had abandoned his dreams and returned to take over the family business and became the President of Shenhua Film and Media Co. Ltd.
Lin Chang drank his coffee and continued, "Actually, I feel that letting Ah Wan gain some experience and hone her skills is also a good thing.
"She is still young, and she still has time to squander. If she experiences more hardships, she would also be in a better position to take over the family business in the future.
"Hence, I hope that Boss Pei could take good care of Ah Wan.
"This might be troublesome for you, and I am very sorry about that. How about this, Boss Pei? Tengda is a games company, and I also like Ocean Stronghold very much.
"I'll buy five hundred Red Kilins as a sign of my sincerity; how's that?"
Pei Qian was stunned.
Five hundred Red Kilins?
That was four hundred thousand!
Why can't you just give me four hundred thousand directly? Why must you go and buy what rubbish Red Kilins?
Evidently, Lin Chang thought that buying Red Kilins was the same thing as gifting Pei Qian money, right? That would also raise the revenue of the game and would be beneficial overall.
However, this was a huge loss to Pei Qian. If he did a thirty-seventy split of the four hundred-odd thousand and then used the profit conversion ratio, he would only get at most two thousand over in the end.
"There's no need for that."
Pei Qian maintained his calm expression as he said slowly, "If Boss Lin wishes to express his sincerity, I actually have a suggestion. Recently, I want to spend a little money on an experiment; if Boss Lin can reimburse me for it, I wouldn't mind."
Lin Chang was stunned as he then revealed a very interested look.
"A little money? No problem. How much does Boss Pei need?"
Pei Qian said indifferently, "Two hundred thousand. A hundred thousand would be my remuneration while the hundred thousand would be expenses. I wish to film a series of short videos with twenty episodes.
"However, Boss Lin should make preparations that you might not get any money back."
Lin Chang did his own calculations. "Boss Pei's remuneration is only five thousand an episode? That's too low; I'll give ten thousand!"
He had originally intended to spend four hundred thousand to buy Red Kilins. However, since Pei Qian had a better idea, Lin Chang was going to do as Pei Qian wanted.
Lin Chang looked at Pei Qian's calm and indifferent expression as he understood something.
For Boss Pei, four hundred thousand was like pocket money. He had evidently wanted to use this four hundred thousand to try out something; as we had just talked about money, he decided to do me a favor and let me fork out this amount.
This is good; I have done him a favor at the same time and have pulled our relationship closer; not bad.
Lin Chang was very happy; he felt that Boss Pei was treating him as an insider already!
This was just like two good friends. One of them was celebrating his birthday, and the other friend asked what present he wanted. The birthday boy had said, 'I have been eyeing a game recently; it costs two hundred-odd. You could gift me that.' This was the same
thing.
Based on Lin Chang's understanding, this four hundred thousand was just like a courtesy gift to a good friend as well as a 'thank you' gift for taking care of Lin Wan.
Pei Qian, on the other hand, was a little stunned; and he actually didn't manage to react in time.
The System actually didn't caution me? I had gotten two hundred thousand so easily? What had I been working so hard to convert losses into profits all this while for?
Chapter 188 A Few 'Outstanding Students!
After sending Lin Chang off, Pei Qian quickly received a notification of payment.
It was a total of three hundred thousand yuan. All of it went into Pei Qian's Personal Wealth.
It was obvious that the System would not be bothered if others gave Pei Qian money. As long as it was reasonable for him to keep the money and others would not become suspicious of the existence of the System, everything would be alright.
However, Pei Qian could not spend all of this money. He had to take a portion out and use it as fees for props. He could not be stingy with this either.
To put it bluntly, he had to do this so that Lin Chang would not grow suspicious of Pei Qian.
Pei Qian could not take this sum of money and splurge on himself. If Lin Chang did not hear a sound from him after that, it would not look reasonable.
There was a possibility that Lin Chang would not care how Pei Qian spent this three hundred thousand yuan. However, there was also a possibility that he would. One could not be too sure.
If Lin Chang began to ask questions, Pei Qian had to have a reasonable answer. Although the possibility of this happening was not high, he had to err on the side of caution.
Thus, Pei Qian set aside two hundred thousand yuan as remuneration and left a hundred thousand yuan to buy props. He had to put on an act and produce something.
This project was bound to fail, but that did not matter. Lin Chang was well-prepared to make ducks and drakes of this three hundred thousand yuan.
Pei Qian just had to act as if he did not really need this money, and he was just playing around. As long as Lin Chang did not grow suspicious, he would be alright.
He looked at the three hundred thousand yuan sitting quietly in his bank card. Then, he looked at the remaining sum in his Personal Wealth-slightly more than 370,000 yuan. Pei Qian could not help but feel sorrowful.
He had expended so much effort in running his company and earning ten million yuan, and yet he could only convert it to a hundred thousand yuan. On the other hand, casually running a side business easily earned him two hundred thousand yuan.
After discovering this method of playing punk, there seemed to be even fewer reasons for Pei Qian to convert Personal Wealth from profit.
July 1st…
Pei Qian opened his laptop and checked his own grades.
Yes, I just barely passed everything…
"I feel like I've been infected by Old Ma. Forget it. I still have to think of ways to lose money. I have no more energy to think about academics. It's good enough that I managed to pass."
Pei Qian comforted himself.
He was studying for a major in humanities. His examinations mainly required him to memorize huge amounts of content. Therefore, it was not difficult for him to pass even though he only put in an effort at the last minute.
Pei Qian did not want to drop out of school now.
It was not that he desired a graduation certificate. To him, the graduation certificate would be useless. However, the main problem was… he would have nothing else to do if he dropped out of school.
These days, Pei Qian had been attending classes out of obligation. Whenever he felt lazy, he would go to his rented apartment to take a nap or play some games. It was only when the settlement was nearing that he had to keep a closer eye on the company and work hard to incur losses.
Even if he did drop out of school, he would be cooping himself up in the rented apartment all day. There would be no huge change in his life.
What's more, Pei Qian did not want to expose his own identity.
Currently, many people around Pei Qianincluding a few of his classmates-knew that Pei Qian had starred in Boss Pei's Daily Life. They took him as an internet celebrity. However, none of them were aware that he was the boss of Tengda.
Pei Qian had three main worries.
First, he was worried about his parents.
Second, he was worried that if his classmates found out he was a boss, their relationship with him would become a mess. Then, Pei Qian could expect people to approach him for jobs or money every day. That would be extremely annoying
Third, although Pei Qian was a boss, the amount of money he could actually use in his Personal Wealth was too little. He was afraid that people who hated the rich or who were extremely hot-headed would have their eyes on him and wait for opportunities to blow small conflicts.
Pei Qian could not reveal the existence of the System. Thus, he wanted to avoid unnecessary trouble. As much as possible, he wanted to keep his identity hidden from others and minimize risks.
He was living in relative comfort these days. For now, Pei Qian had no plans to change his lifestyle.
Of course, if he could lose millions of yuan every once in a while, it would be great.
The holidays were approaching. Many classmates who had completed their examinations and checked their results had gone home in advance. Yet, for Pei Qian, the week of trying hard to incur losses had just begun.
Pei Qian was prepared to make a list of the various projects he had on hand. He wanted to analyze their profit and loss situation and come up with a plan to incur more losses.
He created a digital spreadsheet and wrote two lines of words. Then, he ran a search for some information. Finally, out of habit, he entered Aili Island's website and began to catch up on some shows he had been watching.
Without realizing it, an hour had passed.
"Eh, what did I want to do just now?" Pei Qian suddenly thought about this question.
At that moment, Pei Qian's phone rang. When he saw the name displayed on his phone, he hesitated.
"Er… Teacher Zhang?"
It was his Zhang Wei, one of the instructors at his university.
Pei Qian felt slightly confused as to why Zhang Wei was calling him.
He had not taken on any roles in school. With grades like his, he guessed that he would not qualify for any scholarships or awards either. As for the other things… they were even more unlikely.
Zhang Wei sounded very kind. "Pei Qian, I heard that you starred in a small-scale show, and you even joined a workspace. You're doing pretty well, right?"
A realization dawned on Pei Qian. Oh, he's asking about Fei Huang Workspace.
His classmates knew that he had starred in Boss Pei's Daily Life and that he normally could not be found in the dormitory all year round. Thus, his classmates thought that he had been busy with this project. News of this must have reached Zhang Wei through various channels.
Pei Qian immediately admitted this. "That's right. Is there something wrong, Teacher Zhang?"
"Not bad, not bad. I noticed you've always been quite well-hidden. It turns out that you have been busy with your career. Even so, you've been able to maintain your excellent grades. Good job!"
What the hell did he mean by 'excellent grades!?!
I clearly barely passed…
Zhang Wei's exaggerated praise made Pei Qian feel like something was wrong.
This was normal. Instructors in other universities could not be bothered about their students' grades. Comparatively, they cared much more about their employment rate.
There was a good chance that someone like Pei Qian would immediately be able to find a job upon graduation. The employment rate was of no concern to him whatsoever. As an instructor at the university, there was not much for Zhang Wei to be worried about.
Zhang Wei must have had a motive for praising Pei Qian in this manner.
"It's like this. It's almost graduation season. Some outstanding students in their final year in our university have not managed to find a job. I am wondering if you could make a recommendation to the boss of your workspace and try to get them one."
Outstanding students? You're talking to the wrong person.
Instinctively, Pei Qian tried to shift the responsibility. "Can't they go through the recruitment drives organized by the school?"
Zhang Wei cleared his throat and said, "Recruitment drives by the school… I guess they have not found suitable jobs for them. Otherwise, the problem would not have dragged until now."
A realization dawned on Pei Qian.
Oh, they haven't found jobs!
It was obvious now that referring to these students as 'outstanding' was just a tactful way of speech. Pei Qian nearly misunderstood Zhang Wei. In actual fact, they were the leftover students after the school's recruitment drives were completed.
Handong University was a key university, and their employment rate was about 90%. However, it was expected that a small group of students would not be able to find a job upon graduation.
What's more, this 90% was an overstatement. After all, each year was termed the 'most difficult season for graduates'. It was extremely difficult to find a job that one would be satisfied with. Most students settled for jobs temporarily and quit after two or three months.
People who worked under their relative's wing were also considered employed.
To the university-and especially to instructors like Zhang Wei, increasing the employment rate was extremely difficult. One could say that these employment rates acted like report cards for the university and for the instructors. They had to think of all sorts of ways and means to improve it.
Apart from pushing their students to participate actively in recruitment drives, they would also reach out to various companies. Each graduate that they could get employed was a win.
Obviously, Zhang Wei had figured out that Pei Qian had connections to the man in charge of Fei Huang Workspace. He wanted to try his luck and get the remaining students employed. At the very least, he wanted to help one or two of those students enter the company.
Although the chances were not high, there was a possibility he would succeed.
Pei Qian could not help but rejoice. You've approached the right person, then!
Handong University was a key university. People who could enter it weren't all that stupid. That was a fact.However, now, the people whom Zhang Wei was recommending were all people who had been rejected by other industries!
It was graduation season, and it was July. People who would go on to postgraduate studies were already celebrating their holidays. People who had found jobs had already begun or were going to begin soon. Those preparing to re-take their examinations had already informed their instructors as well.
Now, the name list in Zhang Wei's hands contained people who wanted to find jobs and who had gone through multiple interviews without receiving any offers.
Didn't that align with Pei Qian's requirements completely?
Pei Qian immediately answered, "Don't worry, Teacher. Count on me. Why don't you send me the name list? Perhaps I will inform them to come down to the company for an interview."
Zhang Wei did not expect Pei Qian to agree so quickly. "Ah, alright."
After exchanging some more pleasantries, Pei Qian hung up.
Soon after, Zhang Wei sent these people's resumes to Pei Qian via email.
Chapter 189 What Should the New Game be About?
Pei Qian opened the email. En, there were males and females, and a total of twenty-odd of them. Since they were all history majors, there were more females than males. Most of these people's resumes were clean. Basically, they had not gotten many awards. They did not even have many strong points.
As for their looks—to put it politely, they were ordinary.
That was expected. Companies would probably be willing to hire beautiful ladies. Even if they did not have many skills, they would be pleasing to the eyes.
These were leftovers in July. Basically, they had the following merits:
Their grades were poor, and they did not qualify for postgraduate studies. They had no connections, and nobody could find jobs on their behalf. They had not done any student jobs or worked part-time and could not find jobs for themselves.
All in all, they were perfect!
En, he would really be taking in a bunch of hoodlums this time, wouldn't he?
Pei Qian was very satisfied. After looking through their resumes, he decided that he would take every last one of them!
There was a particularly apt saying: 'There is no rubbish in the world; there are only misplaced resources.'
To Pei Qian, these people were appropriately referred to as misplaced resources!
"However, I have to think about what job to give them."
Pei Qian began to ponder about the positions he had on hand.
Could he send them to the games department?
That wouldn't be right.
The games department's framework was largely complete. Their operations were proceeding without any problems as well.
At the very most, these people would be doing odd jobs in the games department. No matter how horrible their skills were, they would not be able to cause real disturbance to the games.
Pei Qian could not possibly parachute them into management positions in the games department as well. It would be too illogical, and he would arouse suspicions.
Can I send them to Fish-Catching Internet Cafe?
The roles there were more physical—they would be waiters or deliverymen. These people were his seniors after all. It would not look nice on his part to send them to clear tables or serve food.
What's more, anyone could do jobs like these. Their true value would not be realized.
"I should start a new company for these people."
Pei Qian's eyes lit up. He had an idea.
He would start a new company and send all of these people in. They would be able to fully realize their potential. How great would that be?!
Of course, the boss of this new company had to be one of his own. On one hand, this boss could not be someone who made cheap shots and evaded taxes. These people were his seniors, but they were strangers after all. Pei Qian could not trust them. On the other hand, immediately placing them in management positions would not make any sense. People would get suspicious.
Pei Qian began to look for a lucky man from his own company. He would make this man the boss of the new company and put people under him to be in charge of finance, administrative work, and the like. Then, he would recruit this new batch of employees into that company. That would make much more sense.
After that, the company would start running and incurring losses. Everything sounded perfect.
Pei Qian pondered over this for two more minutes and suddenly thought of another idea.
Don't I still have hidden danger to deal with? That's just as well. I'll settle it once and for all!
Ma Yiqun is still writing plots and plans for Tengda Games. Pei Qian had hired him initially to act as a lucky charm so that he could neutralize his own luck. However, he could not come up with any more reasons to allow Ma Yiqun to continue idling. That was why he reluctantly arranged for him to be in charge of plots for the games.
In the end, Ma Yiqun beautified the synopses and added a bunch of points to the game narratives of several games.
Pei Qian had to think of a way to send someone like that away!
This time, he had a chance to. As for how he should do it… Pei Qian had thought about this a long time ago.
He would create a website for webnovels!
First, this was Ma Yiqun's dream. Helping employees achieve their dreams was Boss Pei's mission.
Second, Ma Yiqun failed consecutively each time he tried to write novels. This proved that he did not have what it took to make it in this line. If Pei Qian put him in charge of this company, he could relax.
Last, it would be relatively easy for Pei Qian to incur losses in the online novel industry.
There was already a very developed and established website for online literature in this world, and it was called Limitless Chinese Language Network. It was now a large-scale website with a huge scope. Other people had tried entering the market, but very few of them succeeded. Most of them failed.
Pei Qian could enter the market and act as if he were completely fooling around. He would invest a sum of money into nurturing a group of editors and authors. Under Ma Yiqun's leadership, the company would incur losses for sure!
Actually, on second thought, he should have started a website for online literature long ago. The range of money one could invest in a business like this was huge. There were ways to invest a million yuan, and there were ways to invest a hundred billion yuan.
He could buy over the goods of various websites with high prices, pour huge sums of money into establishing marketing channels and dealing with copyrights, and so on. This would result in extremely high expenses.
However, if he just wanted to create an ordinary website, he only needed to hire a group of editors and buy lousy manuscripts at low prices. He could pay token sums as remuneration and spend a little money to rent a cloud server and domain name online. In fact, a million yuan would probably be enough to set up a website like that.
Pei Qian pondered for a while and decided that he could give Ma Yiqun a million or so yuan to play around with. If he could really incur losses, he would pour more money into the venture.
At that thought, Pei Qian's mood improved vastly.
Pei Qian arrived at the office in the afternoon.
The first thing he had to do was assign the work in the games department. After updating the downloadable content, the games department was allowed to skive off for a while. Now, since the new cycle had begun, Pei Qian had to start giving them work to do.
After all, the system mandated that employees could not remain passive and slack at work. They had to release new products every once in a while. Everyone was waiting hopefully for the research plan for the next game to be announced.
However, Pei Qian did not ask everyone to gather for a meeting this time. There were too many people in the office now. The conference room could no longer accommodate everyone.
He only asked Lu Mingliang, Bao Xu, and the other core members of the various departments to attend the meeting
This time, Pei Qian planned to explain the general concept he had in his head to all of them. He would set a rigid template for the direction of the game and allow them to think about the details on their own.
The main problem was that Pei Qian could not set the details even if he wanted to. He just did not have the necessary skills to think about them…
Soon, everyone arrived in the conference room.
Lin Wan was present as well. She held onto her small notebook, ready to take notes. Ma Yiqun was in the conference room, too. He did not have a notebook in hand, but he looked especially serious.
Silently, Pei Qian thought about them. I'll deal with the two of you once the meeting ends!
Pei Qian pondered for a long time about the concept of the new game. By now, he roughly knew what had to be done. He had to learn from his experience and not commit the same mistakes that he made before.
Pei Qian could not create a lousy game and sell it at a high price to con others because of the system's rules. Although he had the freedom to set the price within a fixed range, he still had to make sure the price he set largely corresponded to the amount of money and effort he invested into the game.
At the same time, thanks to the first few wildly popular games, many gamers now had their eyes on new games produced by Tengda.
This new game would probably be popular even before its release. Pei Qian could not hope for the same circumstances as The Lonely Desert Road and Ghost General. He could not just plan not to market the game and hope that nobody would find out about it.
Since that was the case, he had to create a niche, public game. He had to invest huge amounts of money into it. He had to create a game that people would not buy and play even if they knew about it!
Pei Qian knew many games like that. Souls-like games and difficult 2D platform games were examples of such games.
Pei Qian had no plans to create a 2D platform game because it did not require much investment. This meant that he could not incur much loss. If he wanted to create a game, he had to make it complex. He needed to spend more money on art resources.
Of course, Pei Qian also knew that Miyazaki Hidetaka's Souls-like games were extremely successful. Their sales were high, and they were not loss-incurring products.
However, when considering a problem, one had to think about multiple factors. For any type of game genre, there were unpopular and popular games. The key was in the details.
Many game producers wanted to produce Souls-like games as well, but how many of them actually succeeded? In the end, they all failed, one by one. This proved that only Miyazaki Hidetaka had relevant expertise.
Pei Qian did not think that he would be as skillful as Miyazaki Hidetaka.
What's more, even if he wanted to persist and create perfect Souls-like games, he would not be able to do so. He did not have that much money. Considering the eight million yuan that the system had and the income from various games and other areas and then deducting the various expenses…
Pei Qian guessed that the most he would be able to spend on this game was about twenty million yuan or so.
This sum would not be enough for him to create a true AAA game.
He probably had enough researchers and developers. After all, it took thirty people to create a game like Metro 2033. Pei Qian had about sixty to seventy researchers and developers on hand. He was even going to recruit more after this.
However, considering that they only had four months to research and develop a new game, the employees would probably still have a lot on their plate. They would still have to find ways to compress the game's content.
In other words, he would only be able to create a compressed version of the game. The contents of the game would be greatly reduced.
This would further increase the chances of the game failing!