Reborn in 2000, starting from the university website

Early spring, 2000

The snow, brought by the late spring cold snap, fell on the streets of Harbin, accumulating into a thin layer.

When Bai Yuhang walked out of the Speedy Internet Cafe in Daoli District, it was already completely dark. He rubbed his frozen hands, and his breath dispersed under the streetlights.

He had just earned 300 yuan in his pocket, which he had earned by helping the internet cafe owner troubleshoot machines and reinstall systems for more than a week. This would cover his living expenses for the month.

In China in the year 2000, not many people knew computers, and those who could install a simple operating system were considered half technicians.

He walked along Central Avenue toward the school, passing a music store. The poster in the window showed two men with different hair lengths—Yu Quan, "Cold to the End." Inside the store, they were playing Pu Shu's "Those Flowers."

Bai Yuhang stopped and stood in the snow for half a minute.

This is the third month since his rebirth. In his previous life, he lived until 2026, was forty-five years old, and worked as a product director at a game company in Shenzhen.

He was on a flight back to China when the plane crashed. When he woke up, he was back at Harbin Institute of Technology, an 18-year-old freshman majoring in computer science.

Rewind twenty-six years.

For the first few days, he suffered from insomnia all night, lying on the top bunk in the eight-person dormitory, listening to his roommates' snoring, repeatedly confirming that this was not a dream.

Under his pillow was a copy of Computerworld magazine that he had found at a secondhand bookstore; the cover headline read, "Internet Bubble Bursts, Nasdaq Plunge."

That was old news from two weeks ago; it's already mid-March.

The bubble has burst, but the real era has just begun.

Bai Yuhang stamped his foot to shake off the snow and continued walking. He needed money and needed to get things started as soon as possible.

In his previous life, he only truly entered the internet industry in 2005, missing the earliest period of opportunity.

In this life, time is on his side.

But the 45-year-old soul inside the 18-year-old body often makes Bai Yuhang feel disoriented. In class, when the professor is lecturing on the basics of C language, he has to force himself to pretend he doesn't understand—in fact, the team he led in his previous life had written a game engine in C++.

While eating in the cafeteria, Bai Yuhang's roommates were discussing the newly released film "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," and he had to resist mentioning that the movie would win four Oscars next year.

But the hardest thing is being poor. My family's financial situation is average. I only have 300 yuan a month for living expenses, and sometimes my family can't give me that, so I have to find a way myself.

He's been thinking a lot these past few months, barely making ends meet. He's puzzled, though. In his previous life, he watched dramas about other people who were reborn with an awesome system, and they could become the richest man and control the world in just a few months. But he still has to struggle to make a living.

Bai Yuhang considered writing programs to sell, but in 2000, the market for copyrighted software hadn't yet formed in China. He also thought about investing in stocks, but he hadn't turned eighteen yet, and even if he had, he wouldn't know which stocks to buy.

It seems that rebirth is not such a thing at all; one must take it one step at a time.

In the end, he could only start from the very basics—repairing computers, installing operating systems, and incidentally observing the internet ecosystem of this era.

Bai Yuhang has noticed three things these past few days. First, internet cafes are expanding rapidly across the country. Four new ones have opened on this street in Harbin in just six months.

Secondly, the vast majority of internet users don't know how to access the internet. Many people, after opening a browser, will blankly ask, "And then what?"

Third, the browser homepage is blank, or worse, it has been hijacked by various internet assistants and turned into a mess of random website addresses.

At this moment, an idea slowly took shape in Bai Yuhang's mind.

It was already eight o'clock when I got back to the dorm. The eight-person room was filled with smoke. The top student, the third one, was practicing his shooting in Counter-Strike. The fifth one, the womanizer, was writing a love letter to his girlfriend. The eldest one was lying on the bed reading "The Smiling, Proud Wanderer". The other four were not there; they must have had class.

Bai Yuhang's upper bunk is next to the balcony, and his desk is piled with computer magazines and several books borrowed from the library.

"Sixth brother's back?" The eldest brother peeked out from behind his book. "Have you eaten? I saved you a steamed bun."

"I've eaten." Bai Yuhang took off his coat, poured a cup of hot water from the thermos, and the steamed buns, filled with cabbage, were still warm on the radiator. The baked dough was a little dry, but he still picked them up and ate them slowly. Experiencing this feeling of being cared for again after a lifetime was quite touching.

In his previous life, he was a loner in college. After graduation, he went to the capital and gradually lost contact with his roommates.

Later, I heard in the classmate group that the eldest brother returned to his hometown to work as a civil servant and wasted more than 20 years, the third brother failed in his business and was heavily in debt, and the fifth brother divorced and remarried.

Life is a vast ocean, and everyone has their own difficulties.

Perhaps in this lifetime, something can be changed.

"Oh, right," the eldest brother suddenly sat up, "while you were out today, a woman came looking for you. She was quite pretty and said she was your high school classmate."

Bai Yuhang paused, then asked, "What's your name?"

"He didn't say his name, but left a note." The eldest brother pulled a folded piece of paper from under his pillow.

Unfold, and at the top is a line of neat handwriting:

"Bai Yuhang, I'm in Harbin. Call me when you see this message, Mu Qing."

The next part was a pager number.

Bai Yuhang stared at that line of text for a long time: Su Muqing, his high school deskmate. After the division of arts and sciences, she went to the arts class and was admitted to the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing.

In their past life, they occasionally corresponded during their university years. Later, she went abroad to pursue a master's degree and stayed to work on Wall Street. And then... Bai Yuhang couldn't remember anymore.

I only remember at a class reunion, someone said that she had always been single.

Why did she come to Harbin?

The dormitory phone was in the first-floor hallway. Bai Yuhang put on his coat and went out. He dialed the pager, gave the number, and left a message: "This is Bai Yuhang. See you at the main gate of the university tomorrow morning at 10:00."

After hanging up the phone, Bai Yuhang stood in the corridor for a while.

The snow was still falling outside the window, and in the distance, neon lights blurred into indistinct spots of light in the snow curtain.

In 2000, Harbin had not yet undergone the renovation of Central Street, nor did it have the scale of the Ice and Snow World. The area around St. Sophia Cathedral was still a dilapidated residential area.

But in this city, some people are already spending the night chatting on OICQ in internet cafes, some are posting on forums discussing "A Chinese Odyssey" and "The Matrix," and some are using 56K modems at home to dial up and wait for an image to slowly load.

The times are like a green train that has just started moving—slow and cumbersome, but once it starts, it will not stop.

Bai Yuhang returned to his dormitory, took out a notebook from his drawer, and opened it. Inside were sketches and thought processes he had drawn over the past two months. One page contained several keywords: navigation website, internet cafe channel, bundled installation, traffic monetization;

He turned to a new page, wrote down the date: March 17, 2000, and then began making a list.

In his previous life, Bai Yuhang suffered from the mistakes of his team when he started his business. In this life, he wants to find the right people from the very beginning.

The brothers in the dormitory each have their own characteristics: the eldest is calm and steady, the third is technically skilled, and the fifth has a wide network of connections... But they are all still teenagers of eighteen or nineteen years old, who have not experienced the harsh realities of society, nor have they witnessed the golden age of the Internet.

We have to take it slowly.

"Let's solve the money problem first..."

Bai Yuhang closed his laptop and lay down on the bed.

The dormitory lights were already off, except for Lao San's computer screen, which was still lit up, reflecting a focused face. The sound effects of the CS game were very soft, as he was playing with headphones on, with only the sounds of the keyboard and mouse.

"Third brother," Bai Yuhang got out of bed, patting his shoulder as he spoke, "did you make the system disk yourself or buy it?"

The third brother took off one earphone: "I bought it, five yuan apiece at the computer mall, so what?"

"If I could make a better disk, with commonly used software included and one-click installation, and give it to them for free, do you think internet cafe owners would want it?"

The third brother turned his head, the screen light dancing on his face. "Free? What are you after then?"

"They use the navigation website I made."

The third brother paused for a few seconds, then laughed: "Sixth brother, have you been reading some kind of book that's gone crazy lately? Navigation websites can make money?"

"Yes," Bai Yuhang said, "and very quickly."

After a moment of silence, the third brother's voice rang out in the darkness: "If you really want to do it in bulk... I know a few people in the computer mall who sell pirated discs, they'll definitely be happy to help."

"Thanks. Buy me a few blank ones later."

"Okay, but," the third brother added, "you have to make it first and let us see. Talking is useless."

"clear."

Bai Yuhang closed his eyes and began to envision the website in his mind: a simple page layout, clear categories, and the most frequently used URLs placed in the most prominent position.

It shouldn't be as densely packed as hao123 later on; it needs white space and a clean, refreshing feel.

He had already thought of a name: "Qihang Navigation"—Qihang means both a beginning and a subtle reference to his name.

But first, I need to see Su Muqing tomorrow.

Bai Yuhang didn't know why she had come, but his intuition told him that this might be an opportunity. In his previous life, she had studied finance and possessed a far deeper understanding of capital and markets than most people. She later worked in investment banking. If she could join...

Thinking about this, Bai Yuhang chuckled self-deprecatingly. He was thinking too far ahead. Right now, his entire net worth was less than five hundred yuan, and his website was barely a thing of the past, yet he was already thinking about bringing in people with Wall Street backgrounds.

take it easy.

The snow outside the window gradually subsided, and the sound of a train whistle drifted from afar, long and desolate, piercing through the snowy night of 2000, like a footnote to a certain era.