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

As Ye Chen was preparing to leave at noon, he casually called out to Zhao Peng, "Fatty, pack up, let's go grab some food together."

Zhao Peng waved his hand, wiped his forehead, and laughed, "You two go ahead. It's the first day of business, and the store is quite busy inside and out. I just called a nearby restaurant to order boxed meals, and they'll be delivered in a bit. I'll just eat with everyone else."

Ye Chen raised an eyebrow and smiled, "Weren't you just saying you were going to rip me off with a seafood feast at noon?"

"Hey, I was just kidding!" Zhao Peng chuckled, winking at Xu Jiao beside him, and teasingly whispered, "They came all this way to see you, I can't just go and be a third wheel and annoy them. Go on, let's have a proper get-together next time!"

Seeing that he insisted on staying to watch the store, Ye Chen didn't force him. He patted him on the shoulder and then took Xu Jiao to a private restaurant outside the school for lunch.

The meal was warm and affectionate. Xu Jiao's heart and eyes were entirely on Ye Chen. She sensibly didn't ask too many questions about the details of the company, but just kept serving him food and soup.

After finishing their meal at the restaurant, Ye Chen led Xu Jiao to a black Mercedes-Benz van parked by the roadside, pressed the key, and opened the door.

Xu Jiao sat in the passenger seat, looking around at the luxurious and spacious interior. A hint of doubt flashed in her eyes. She had only ever ridden in Ye Chen's dignified and imposing Mercedes-Benz S600 before, and this was the first time she had seen him drive this minivan. She couldn't help but ask softly with curiosity, "Ye Chen, is this also your car?"

As Ye Chen fastened his seatbelt and started the car, he casually chuckled and said, "No, this is the company's official vehicle."

Hearing this, Xu Jiao was secretly surprised. Although she didn't know much about car models and didn't know how much this business van was worth, she recognized the huge three-pointed star logo on the front of the car. Mercedes-Benz cars are never cheap. If the company can drive such luxury cars on business trips, how profitable and large must Ye Chen's company be to be so wealthy?

Thinking of this, she quietly turned her head to look at the man beside her who was holding the steering wheel with one hand. The admiration and love in her eyes deepened, and she smiled sweetly.

Half an hour later, Ye Chen dropped her off downstairs at Nanyang Boshi Xinju.

Xu Jiao stood at the entrance of the residential area, watching the black Mercedes-Benz van turn around and merge into the traffic. Only when the taillights disappeared from sight did she walk towards the new house, her steps light as if she were walking on clouds.

At 2 PM, the car came to a smooth stop in the underground parking garage of Building A, Zhangjiang Integrated Circuit Port.

Ye Chen took the elevator directly to the office area of ​​Xingchen Software.

Today is Sunday, and the office building is much quieter than usual. However, the development hall of Xingchen Software is still filled with the crisp sound of keyboards being typed. Those working over the weekend to meet deadlines are all key technical staff. Everyone is focused on their screens, concentrating on debugging the modules they are responsible for. The entire hall is filled with an efficient and compact R&D atmosphere.

Chen Wei strode forward, holding a test report in his hand, looking energetic and full of enthusiasm.

"Mr. Ye, please take a look at this final version of the interface." Chen Wei led Ye Chen to the control panel.

The initial page of the Starry Sky App Market is displayed on the screen.

The overall color scheme is a refreshing blue and white, without any fancy pop-up ads. The top category navigation is clear at a glance, and below the search box is a smart recommendation list.

Ye Chen dragged the mouse over, casually clicked on a 50-megabyte game file, and pressed the download button.

Once the progress bar is full, the background process skips the tedious system permission requests and silently completes the installation within seconds, generating a game icon directly on the desktop.

The entire process was smooth and seamless, without any lag.

Ye Chen released the mouse and pointed to the code box on the left: "The buffering logic of this data packet is still a bit redundant. Delete these few lines of parameters and change it to directly call the local cache, which can save a fraction of a second of response time."

Chen Wei leaned over for a look, then slapped his thigh: "That's right! This change can reduce bandwidth usage! I'll have my people adjust it right away."

"How's the server expansion going?" Ye Chen got up and walked towards the break room.

Chen Wei followed behind, took a glass of warm water and handed it to him: "As you instructed, we have rented top-tier domestic node services. Even if 100,000 users flood in on the first day, we can handle it steadily."

"100,000 is too conservative." Ye Chen took a sip of water, his tone as calm as if he were talking about a trivial matter. "This is the eve of the complete explosion of smartphones. The app store will be the entrance to all traffic in the future. Tell the brothers down here, if you can get through these few days, your bonus will double at the end of the month."

Someone in the lobby heard this and shouted it out. The technicians who were engrossed in coding immediately cheered, and their morale was instantly boosted.

Afterwards, Ye Chen finalized the pre-launch schedule with Chen Wei in the office and processed all the signed documents.

Closing the folder, Ye Chen reached into his pocket and pulled out the car key to the black Mercedes-Benz van. He weighed it in his hand. Now that he was back in Zhangjiang, he naturally had to return the car key to Xingchen Interactive downstairs, so that he wouldn't be unable to find it when needed for administrative or fieldwork on Monday.

Pushing open the glass door of Xingchen Software, the only sound in the corridor was the wind from the central air conditioning vents.

Ye Chen took the elevator down to the eighth floor. The office area of ​​Xingchen Interactive was much more spacious than the upper floors.

Most employees rest on weekends, with only the customer service team and two operations and maintenance staff sitting at their workstations monitoring the backend.

Hearing footsteps, a boy near the door turned around, quickly pulled off his headphones, and stood up.

Ye Chen waved for him to sit down.

There was no one at the front desk on the weekend, and the counter was spotless.

He walked over, casually placed the keys to the Mercedes-Benz van on the marble countertop, then turned and entered the elevator, heading straight to the underground parking garage.

He walked to his designated parking space, pressed the unlock button, opened the car door, and got into the black Mercedes-Benz S600.

There was a faint smell of leather in the carriage.

Instead of turning the key to start the engine, he leaned back in his chair, took out his phone, found Xia Shiqing's number, and dialed it.

The phone rang three times before it was answered.

A low, slow jazz tune drifted out, accompanied by the sound of a coffee grinder crushing coffee beans in the background.

"Didn't you go to the store today?"

Ye Chen rested his hands on the steering wheel, speaking casually.

Xia Shiqing's suppressed laughter came from the other end of the phone.

"It's the weekend today, so I gave myself a break and dragged Tongtong out."

"It's a boutique coffee shop in Xujiahui now."

"We ordered two of their signature drinks, and also to check out their service process and plating."

"She's got the awareness of a boss lady."

Ye Chen casually replied.

Xia Shiqing paused on the other end of the phone, and then softened her voice.

"Of course, you've invested so much money, I can't just shut myself away and do nothing."

Xia Shiqing took a sip of water and casually asked him, "What about you? What were you up to this weekend?"

"At the company."

Ye Chen looked at the concrete pillar in front of the garage.

"A new software project is about to go live, and I have to keep an eye on everything. I can't get away these next few days."

"I've been too busy these past few days, but I'll come see you at the new house after I'm done with this week."

Hearing the sounds coming from the receiver, Xia Shiqing held her phone and softly hummed in agreement.

She understood that Ye Chen was taking big steps right now, so she didn't want to say anything more at this juncture.

"You go about your business, don't worry about me."

"Remember to eat on time, and don't stay up all day."

She gave a couple of instructions.

The two then exchanged a few more words about the equipment being brought into the shop before Xia Shiqing hung up the phone.

The carriage fell silent again.

Ye Chen put away his phone, glanced at the time on the watch face, and remembered that he had made an appointment with Gu Yuxuan to have dinner together. It was about time.

Without further delay, he reached out and turned the key to start the engine, and a deep, resonant engine sound followed.

I shifted gears, lightly pressed the accelerator, and the black Mercedes-Benz S600 smoothly drove out of the parking space, slowly turned up the ramp along the underpass, merged into the traffic on the ground, and drove straight towards the school.