Chapter 92: The Former Idol
After Fan Ren told Li Jiandong about his idea to meet Mark, the other party appeared at Xinghai Aerospace Base the next day.
In the office, Zeng Yingying was smiling particularly charmingly today.
She brewed tea for the two of them and then very sensibly withdrew.
Li Jiandong watched her delicate figure disappear at the door and smiled at Fan Ren.
“I was wondering why you kept the sister from the sibling pair arranged by Elder Ye in Linhai and brought the younger brother to Aerospace City. So there’s this connection involved.”
Hearing this, Fan Ren didn’t feel embarrassed at all and smiled, saying, “These years, thanks to Yingying always taking care of my daily life, I can’t let her down.”
Appreciation showed in Li Jiandong’s eyes; he knew Zeng Yingying’s background—her family wasn’t well-off.
Of course, that was in the past; now this girl had an annual salary of a million, and her family had long since changed dramatically.
But Fan Ren didn’t care about these things and openly showed their relationship.
Indeed, with this young man’s current achievements, he didn’t need to consider his future wife’s family conditions at all.
“Why did you suddenly think of meeting Mark? Is there some news from Mars?”
Li Jiandong pulled his thoughts back and got down to business.
“Mars definitely has development value, but for humanity’s current technological level, it’s extremely unrealistic—too far away.” Fan Ren sighed softly.
Indeed, because Mars and Earth orbit the Sun, their relative positions are constantly changing.
Plus, the orbital paths are not circular but elliptical.
The farthest distance between Earth and Mars reaches 400 million kilometers, while the closest is 57.6 million kilometers.
A difference of nearly 7 times.
And in Mark’s plan, during the Earth-close launch window three years from now, their spacecraft would still need to fly 180 days in deep space to reach Mars.
It was really too far.
Even if there were extremely precious resources on Mars right now, they wouldn’t mean much to current human development.
Li Jiandong nodded; not only did he know this, but so did the scientists at Great Xia Aerospace Department, and even Elder Ye, who wasn’t very technically savvy, understood it. That’s why Great Xia had always paid little attention to Mars, merely launching a few probe satellites.
After Mark proposed this plan several years ago, though it was shelved for a time, now they had finally taken the first step toward this great goal.
“So what do you mean?”
Li Jiandong was puzzled again; he knew that Spitz Company had recently contacted Xinghai, wanting to buy their high-voltage radio technology and graphene chip.
But Jin Qiaoying had rejected them on the grounds of Great Xia security issues.
“I don’t care what high-value products are on Mars; all our current efforts remain focused on the Moon mining project—this won’t change.
But you should also know that their Hunter Nine Rocket has 20 tons less payload capacity than ours.”
At this point, a glint of sharpness appeared in Fan Ren’s eyes.
Li Jiandong nodded, still puzzled about the meaning.
“A 20-ton gap—that’s too important for an ultra-long-distance spaceflight.
I think, why not take this opportunity to cooperate with Mark?”
Hearing this, Li Jiandong gradually caught on; the puzzlement on his face slowly turned to contemplation, then to surprise.
“You mean, we provide them with launch vehicles?”
“Yes!”
Fan Ren nodded emphatically.
“Although we can’t sell them the technology, we can provide transport service. The importance of that 20-ton gap on the long journey between Earth and Mars is something he understands better than we do.”
Li Jiandong’s mind gradually opened up; he stood and paced back and forth for a bit, murmuring, “As long as we provide them launch vehicle service at an extremely low price, given Spitz Company’s nature as a listed company and the huge gap with us, they won’t focus on rocket technology research and development for a long time. This ensures Great Xia’s absolute leading position in this domain!”
“Yes, exactly. Not only that, in this process, we can also collect navigation data between Earth and Mars for future needs, saving us a lot of time. And we can use it for propaganda, fully providing deep space transport service to global users.”
To be honest, initially Fan Ren just wanted to provide some feasible help to his former idol; after all, the extra 20 tons of payload would greatly increase the success rate of the Mars Project.
But later he discovered the many clever uses of this idea.
Total win.
“Alright then, I’ll go back to Kyoto and report this idea to Elder Ye. If all goes well, I’ll arrange for you to meet Mark in the next few days!”
Li Jiandong was a decisive man; after saying this, he got up and hurriedly left.
Three days later, Xinghai Aerospace Base.
After receiving the message from Great Xia, Mark immediately took his private jet, crossing tens of thousands of kilometers straight to the nearest airport.
In the reception room, Fan Ren looked at this man who was high-spirited in his memories; now his expression was no longer as it was back then, giving off a slick feeling instead.
“Haha, General Manager Fan, I’ve long admired your name, but never had the chance to meet you. As soon as I got the message about the meeting from your side, I set off immediately.”
“Mark, please sit.”
Tired of pleasantries, Fan Ren directly led him to take a seat.
Mark awkwardly sat down with him; his secretary behind him very sensibly pretended not to notice.
“For the Hunter Nine spacecraft used in Phase One of Spitz Company’s ‘Mars Project,’ doesn’t General Manager Ma think the payload is somewhat inadequate?”
Fan Ren got straight to the point, not wanting to beat around the bush with him.
Hearing this, Mark looked puzzled.
He had come prepared to spend a fortune buying Xinghai’s high-voltage radio and graphene chip technologies.
But now this young chairman had shifted the topic to their company’s ‘Mars Project.’
Mark dropped his slick demeanor and asked, “General Manager Fan, sorry, I don’t quite understand what you mean. You know the purpose of our visit this time is for Xinghai’s high-voltage”
“Those two technologies can’t be sold to you; it’s not up to me to decide. You understand?”
Fan Ren directly interrupted him, pointing upward with his finger—the meaning was obvious.
Seeing this, endless disappointment filled Mark’s eyes.
If that was the case, what was the point of his long journey to Great Xia?
“The next Mars launch window is about 70 million kilometers from Earth. Spitz’s Hunter Nine heavy launch vehicle has only 60-ton-class payload, and it’s 30 meters shorter than our Star Transport series but 400 tons heavier. I don’t need to say it—you know it has no qualification to compare with our Star Transport series rockets in range.”
Listening to these merciless comparison data, Mark’s face gradually darkened.
