Ming Dynasty and New Rome and Infinite Magic Machine

Chapter 1622 Arrangement
"So, how did your blind date go yesterday?" Zhu Xianxi asked. "Did you get along well with Zhu Ling?"

"We've always seemed to have a good relationship, and it's not like we only get along well during blind dates. In fact, Zhu Ling would already be arranging my schedule when we went on blind dates."

"Pfft." Zhu Xianxi laughed. "That really is... really the style of our family. When I was chatting with my uncle, he said that my aunt is the same way, she wants to buy every single cabbage herself at the market."

"So, is this considered genetic?"

"Her pursuit of plans can be considered hereditary. In addition, she was raised to be serious about everything she does, so she takes everything very seriously—of course, sometimes too seriously. If there is anything that makes you uncomfortable, I apologize in advance."

"That's not necessary, actually."

"You don't like being bossed around, do you? I don't think so."

“No, that’s not it. I just like things to be done in an organized and efficient way—I’ll get angry if someone bosses me around. But I really like Zhu Ling’s approach. She first determines what we want to achieve, and then we work around that goal. It’s efficient, saves time, and she also brings out specific plans to discuss with me. I think it would be a great experience to work with her.”

"Yu Yuan also gave her a very good evaluation. She's one of the few staff members who are genuinely willing to do field research. She goes wherever it's tough and tiring, completely unconcerned about what others think. I think she's completely free now. No one can control her; she's just immersed in her own world doing her own thing. However, because she has a very good temper, although she doesn't interact with her friends much, she still has quite a few friends—but speaking of which, what are her plans for you later?"

"He arranged for me to have a work experience at the zoo, panda breeding training, a visit to the imperial kitchen, a visit to my aunt, a visit to the Xuanwu Lake Imperial Archives, and a visit to the Imperial Textile Bureau."

"She's assigning you work?! Isn't that her job?"

"So she has a job?"

"As a sub-adult, how did she get led astray? Sub-adult is a term for pandas. Anyway, as a member of the royal family, she certainly has work to do. The Imperial Kitchen, the Yellow Register Treasury at Xuanwu Lake, and the Weaving Bureau are all important institutions directly under the Inner Court, and this is what she should be doing."

"She added me to help her with her workload?"

"I'm afraid not. She probably thinks that adding you to the team will improve work efficiency and produce better results—as for taking you to meet my aunt and uncle, that was arranged by me, but isn't it too early? Are you free? I think the time she's scheduled is already beyond what a blind date should be like."

"I do have some free time."

"What, you still have time?"

"Senior brother, what's this?" Shang Luo was taken aback. When he told Zhu Xianxi that he was free, he meant that he was willing to accept Zhu Ling's arrangements. He didn't expect Zhu Xianxi to ask this, as if he wanted to add more work for him.

"Actually, there's something you've been concerned about that was just completed a couple of days ago. Would you like to go and take a look? I think you'd be interested."

"what's up?"

"Wait a moment, they sent over samples, which are the key products of Zhongguo Technology that you've been mentioning."

Zhu Xianxi opened his drawer and took out a black square sandwiched between two thin pieces of glass. The square was covered with dense golden patterns. Upon closer inspection, one could see that these golden patterns were layered and overlapped, extending into the microscopic structure. The distance between the circuits was approximately 1 nanometer.

"Is this a chip?"

"Yes, it's the chip you mentioned. Last time, Master Lan showed you a batch he made by hand; this is the mass-produced one. We'll start exploring its applications after the first batch of 50 chips. Because there's still some work to be done to truly transform a chip into computer hardware, right?"

"how did you do that?"

"The lithography machine, you said. We can't have people manually carving all the chips, there has to be a machine to handle it."

"What kind of lithography machine is this? How did you do it? Have we mastered the entire process of exposure and etching?"

"Ah, you mean that kind of technology that manufactures chips in large batches like a printing press? We don't have that; we think it's too complicated. These chips are obviously meant to be constantly iterated, like the editions of a novel. Unless it's a book with a particularly large print run, it's not worthwhile to specially carve a printing plate. We expect these chips to be in this state of constant iteration for a long time. If we were to build a machine that requires specially made templates for mass production, it seems that there wouldn't be enough flexibility in terms of production capacity."

"Then what is this?"

“We scan it line by line with a high-energy electron beam—and we found that the technology you mentioned is not accurate enough. By scanning it with an electron beam, we can immediately reach the theoretical limit of performance, and the reliability and yield are impeccable.”

"But it's very slow, isn't it? Only one percent of the speed of the extreme ultraviolet lithography machine I mentioned?"

“We don’t need much anyway,” Zhu Xianxi said, taking a sip of tea. “You’ll know if you’ve seen the rare books in the Golden Chamber – the truly precious books aren’t printed, they’re handwritten. Because handwritten versions are the clearest, most beautiful, and easiest to read, and the font is more expressive. It’s slower, but good work takes time. And besides, if you really think it’s too slow, why don’t you hire more people to do the copying? Actually, we have 200 of these electron beam engraving machines.”

"what?"

"See, the speed has increased, hasn't it? Even if the speed is only one percent, we can just set up two hundred units. Considering that our products need to be iterated frequently, the kind of engraving printing machine you mentioned would require repeated ramp-up of production capacity, which is too rigid. It would be better to just manufacture 200 engraving knives and engraving tables separately."

"How do these carving knives and carving tables work?"

"What? How does it work?" Zhu Xianxi asked in surprise. "It's carving, of course."

"My question is, since it's carving, how does it control the carving knife?"

"Ah, you asked about that." Zhu Xianxi waved his hand. "I didn't realize it yet—you're asking about the automatic method, right? I don't think it needs to be automatic. We have a special training class for Qi cultivators to carve, and they take turns carving."

"Don't we have 200 machines? Do we have that many people who can work in shifts?"

(End of this chapter)