153: Chapter 153 No appointments, no entry; Little Ma waits humbly at the front desk.

Su Qingxue's hand holding the phone paused.

Ma Huateng.

The head of the Penguin Group.

The first-generation overlord of the Chinese internet.

Social networking, gaming, payments, cloud computing—in twenty years, this man had built a digital empire that covered the lives of 1.4 billion people.

At its peak, Penguin's market value once approached the top five in the world.

In the Chinese internet circle, a saying had circulated: "From the first day of starting a business, you have to think about how you will survive if Penguin decides to do the same thing you are doing."

That was Ma Huateng.

The absolute king of the old era.

A name that kept all entrepreneurs awake at night.

And now, this name appeared in the reception logbook of the Guanghui Technology building.

No prior appointment.

No assistant team brought along.

No fanfare whatsoever.

He came alone.

Su Qingxue put down her phone and leaned back in her chair.

She knew all too well what this meant.

The release of the Virtual Helmet was not just a nuclear bomb in the consumer electronics field.

It was bombing the foundation of the entire internet.

When humans could directly enter a virtual world more real than reality using their consciousness—

Was there still any need for WeChat?

Would people still play Honor of Kings?

Would anyone still watch Penguin Video?

Ma Huateng had come.

He wasn't here for a tour.

He was here to seek a way to survive.

He was here to apologize.

Thinking of this, Su Qingxue's lips curled slightly.

She picked up her phone and sent a message to Lu Li:

"Honey, Ma Huateng from Penguin is here. He's alone, has no appointment, and specifically asked for you. Are you coming?"

The reply came in a second with two words.

"Not coming."

Su Qingxue: "..."

Immediately after, another message popped up.

"You entertain him first, find out what his intentions are, and we'll talk when I get home tonight."

Then came the third message.

"I'll make braised pork ribs for dinner."

Su Qingxue stared at the screen for three seconds.

She took a deep breath, flipped her phone face down on the desk, and decided not to dwell on this man's habit of always putting food before major events for now.

...

Guanghui Technology building, first-floor lobby.

Ma Huateng stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows, hands behind his back, quietly watching the Guanghui Technology employees coming and going in the lobby.

He was wearing a dark gray suit, his gold-rimmed glasses were polished spotless, and his overall temperament was refined and introverted.

In any setting, he looked like a university professor, not a man who controlled a trillion-dollar empire.

But at this moment, in his eyes, there was something that only those who had truly experienced great storms would have.

Anxiety.

Yesterday's press conference, he watched from beginning to end.

Those parameters of the Virtual Helmet—

His hands were truly cold.

Neural connection.

Direct consciousness link.

An ultimate portal that could replace all screens, all apps, and all social platforms.

When users could directly communicate, collaborate, and be entertained face-to-face in the virtual world—

WeChat would be redundant.

When the virtual world itself was an infinitely large immersive game—

Honor of Kings would be the Tetris of the last century.

When human senses were completely taken over by the virtual world—

All two-dimensional content platforms would become scrap paper.

Ma Huateng had sat in his study all night long.

He pulled out the data for all of Penguin's business lines and ran a sandbox simulation against the functions of the Virtual Helmet, one by one.

The conclusion made his back go cold—

If Guanghui Technology's virtual ecosystem successfully rolled out, Penguin Group's existing core business would lose over 60% of its users within eighteen months.

Within two years, this number would become 90%.

After three years—

Maybe Penguin wouldn't exist anymore.

Not defeated.

But replaced.

Just like how smartphones replaced feature phones.

It wasn't that you did anything wrong.

It was that the era had changed, and you were still standing on the foundation of the old era.

Guanghui Technology didn't do social networking, didn't do gaming, didn't do payments, yet it conquered the Penguin empire with just one device.

That was why he came.

He didn't bring assistants, didn't bring people from the board of directors, and flew alone from Pengcheng to Mingzhu, then went straight to Guanghui Technology from Mingzhu.

What would it look like to bring a group of people?

Like coming to negotiate? Like applying pressure?

No.

He knew his status now very well.

He wasn't here to negotiate.

He was here to present his calling card.

The king of the old era had come to pay his respects to the master of the new era.

The receptionist had recovered from her initial shock, but the look in her eyes as she gazed at Ma Huateng still held a sense of unreality.

She had worked in this lobby for two years and had seen many big shots.

But Ma Huateng?

This name in the Chinese internet world meant just three words—the ceiling.

But now, the ceiling was standing in their company's lobby, his posture extremely humble, his tone as gentle as if he were here for a job interview.

She couldn't help but sneakily send a message in the work group:

"Sisters, Ma Huateng is in front of me, alive, the breathing kind."

The group exploded instantly.

"Stop kidding! Take a picture!"

"Are you sure it's not a cosplayer?"

"Cut the crap, ask him if he can give a discount on my Honor of Kings skins—never mind, forget I said that, I need to save money to buy a helmet."

The receptionist quickly locked her screen and put back on her professional smile.

"Mr. Ma, President Su invites you to wait in the VIP room on the thirty-second floor."

Ma Huateng nodded and straightened his cuffs.

As he walked toward the elevator, his back remained straight.

But only he knew—

In his heart, for the first time, he felt genuine respect for someone more than twenty years his junior.

And, a fear that went deep into his bones.

The moment the elevator doors closed, he took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose.

He whispered a sentence that only he could hear:

"Lu Li... where on earth did you pop out from, kid."