Sure enough.
Five minutes later, Tartaglia's phone rang.
A glance at the screen showed it was Pantalone calling.
Tartaglia instantly broke into a radiant smile.
Answer!
"Boss!"
Tartaglia's voice was brimming with enthusiasm.
"How much do you want?"
Pantalone's voice on the other end was low.
Though they weren't face-to-face, Tartaglia could easily picture his expression—smiling, eyes narrowed, yet exuding an unsettling aura.
But no matter!
"Bro, got a spare 10 billion?" Tartaglia asked excitedly.
"You wish you were worth 10 billion," Pantalone snapped, clearly irritated.
You really dare to ask!
"I'll transfer one billion from Snezhnaya to you. Make it count." Pantalone hung up without another word.
Was one billion a lot for Pantalone?
Of course not!
But would the Fatui's resources be concentrated on Tartaglia alone?
Obviously not.
Even if the Tsaritsa trusted Tartaglia implicitly, that was simply impossible.
Though one billion wasn't much, Tartaglia was thrilled.
After all, he still had plenty of Mora left from the Liyue branch's funds!
Add that one billion, and it's another hefty sum!
Sweet!
Tartaglia felt refreshed. "Go book a table at Xinyue Kiosk. We had Liuli Pavilion yesterday—let's see what Xinyue's got for lunch today!"
"Yes, sir!" Andrei replied respectfully.
Tartaglia casually wiped his face and cheerfully headed out.
In this foreign land, sticking close to a reliable big brother was essential.
Without a doubt, Lu Xuan was his go-to guy!
After breakfast.
The lively, boundless-energy Klee started crafting bombs.
Meanwhile, Lu Xuan and the other two sat by the counter chatting.
Ding~
Lu Xuan's phone chimed.
"Oh? Just woke up at this hour?" Venti teased with a smirk.
Zhongli also nodded knowingly.
Lu Xuan picked up his phone.
It wasn't a message from Furina.
But from the Civilization Core!
The Civilization Core could create artificial intelligence—it itself possessed AI capabilities, so it could send messages to Lu Xuan.
The message was brief:
「Genshin Impact」 has been successfully developed!
For the Civilization Core, creating Genshin Impact wasn't difficult at all!
It could've finished the game in minutes!
But the Civilization Core's task queue was packed!
Plus, Lu Xuan had quite a few demands for this version of Genshin.
The underlying code had to be groundbreaking, right?
Lu Xuan downloaded the game package it sent and installed it.
Wait—only about a hundred megabytes?
After a moment's thought, it made sense. Given the advanced tech, it probably used some insane compression or streaming tech.
In other words:
This version of Genshin would feature only the Traveler as the playable character.
So, the Genshin crafted by the Civilization Core would have better effects, a vastly larger open world, and far more intricate details!
Aside from characters appearing in the story as anime-style avatars, it essentially recreated all of Teyvat at a 1:1 scale!
For the Civilization Core, this workload was massive.
Lu Xuan was pretty excited for this new Genshin.
Notably, Lu Xuan had instructed the Civilization Core to make the female characters' outfits more conservative.
Also, this Genshin wouldn't have gacha for characters—only for skill modules.
These four skill modules were essentially team comps from the original game.
Lu Xuan shook his head.
"Can I take a peek?" Venti asked curiously.
"I'll just send you a copy."
Lu Xuan forwarded the files to him.
Venti picked up his phone and skimmed through.
The protagonist's design wasn't Aether or Lumine—instead, players could customize their own avatar, choosing from four skill modules.
Take the "Raiden National" team, for example: the player would activate Raiden's E, Bennett's Q, Kazuha's Q, and Sara's EQ, then pull a sword from their chest to go ham.
At a glance, many changes had been made, resolving a ton of issues.
Lu Xuan browsed through the character profiles the Civilization Core had sent.
"This info is this detailed?" Venti marveled.
What on earth did Furina send him?
"I'm reading the data docs."
Since they'd find out eventually, no point hiding it.
When Venti saw his own profile, he paused after a quick scan: "Damn, Boss Lu, you've got me figured out! You wouldn't happen to know what color my undies are today, would you?"
Hey!
Don't even ask , because you really don't wanna know!
Lu Xuan made a face like the "metro old man staring at phone" meme.
"Boss Lu, with your skills, you could probably—"
But never mind, Venti didn't actually care much.
Zhongli was also perusing the documents.
There were cutscenes included.
He saw the one where Osial was unleashed.
Zhongli mused, "This aligns with my earlier thoughts—is this the future?"
"Yep."
Lu Xuan nodded. "The future of Teyvat without the existence of the Card Shop."
Venti side-eyed Zhongli.
"Think you can keep anything hidden?"
This matter—he could actually know!
The Future Computer (what Lu Xuan called the "Cyber Fortune-Telling" card) had its power linked to all of Teyvat!
Every movement, every action was being recorded and calculated by its core.
"You actually know?!"
Seeing Lu Xuan's expression, Venti immediately understood.
"Before I take action, I don't know! And frankly, I don't want to know!"
Lu Xuan shook his head.
But hey, at least he had some decency—he wasn't interested in that kind of thing.
"So… you can't keep it hidden?"
Lu Xuan shook his head again. "Nope."
"Alright."
Venti hadn't held out much hope anyway. After all, Lu Xuan was running a business—it's like selling lottery tickets. Would the seller tell you which one's a winner?
With big data calculations, you could practically predict the future—why bother with trivialities like Venti's underwear color?
Once you realize someone's unfathomably deep, and everything about you is laid bare, it starts to feel… normal.
Zhongli chuckled softly and opened a cutscene featuring Venti—the gang lounging on Dvalin's back as they flew toward Mondstadt.
"Seriously?" Venti scratched his head.
"Whatever!"
His mood bounced back quickly.
It's not like he was the only one with no secrets!
He'd just roll with it!
Still, Venti was amazed by Lu Xuan's future-predicting prowess.
"Speaking of which, Boss Lu, can you calculate when I'll pull a gold card?" Venti grinned, rubbing his hands in anticipation.
For cyber fortune-telling, the closer the predicted event is to the "present," the more accurate it is.
For example, if it predicts the next year, the accuracy within the first month could be as high as 90%!
But beyond that, accuracy drops the further out you go.
People change—who knows when someone's personality might shift? That's a variable.
As for predicting card pulls, the Future Computer itself is only a 5-star card!
Even boosted by Lu Xuan's 9-star equipment, its max capability is 6-star—it can't predict this stuff at all!
This was a rule-bound impossibility. Unless you transcended the system's constraints, it's unbreakable.
Even if Lu Xuan could do it, he wouldn't set that precedent—let alone the fact that he can't.
Wait, actually… never mind. Point is, Lu Xuan wouldn't spill the beans.
"When are you planning to release it?" Zhongli asked.
"Hmm… we've already got Inazuma done. Might as well launch soon."
The release of Genshin would serve many purposes.
Selling character skill modules could also rake in a fair bit of profit.
Heh! The card [Money is Power] was practically glowing!
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T/N:
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