The predawn air in Fenyang Town carried the faint, sweet scent of night-blooming jasmine and the ever-present undertone of the Min River's slow current. Lin Yuan arrived at the Cyber Nest precisely at 8:55 AM, five minutes before his scheduled meeting with Chen Guang. The internet café was largely empty at this hour, save for Mr. Hou, the proprietor, who was meticulously wiping down the worn computer desks, his movements slow and deliberate. Lin Yuan chose a corner booth, its plastic seat slightly ripped, offering a modicum of privacy. He pulled out his small, worn notebook, its pages filled with the familiar, meticulous notes of his observations and calculations.
At 9:02 AM, Chen Guang arrived, looking even more haggard than the previous day. His eyes were bloodshot, his clothes rumpled, and a faint tremor ran through his hands as he clutched a cheap plastic bag. "Lin Yuan," he began, his voice raspy with desperation, "I don't know what to do. My sister, Chen Li, she's threatening to cut me off. She says I'm throwing money away, losing 200 yuan here, 300 yuan there. My last driver, Ah Qiang, he just... vanished. And he had a good reputation, for a while. He had five active orders when he disappeared." He pulled out his aging smartphone, its screen cracked like a spiderweb, and then dumped a thick stack of crumpled delivery receipts onto the table from his plastic bag. "Here's everything. All the records. The customer complaints. My profit margins, what little there were. My life, basically." He pushed the pile across the table, a gesture of complete surrender.
Lin Yuan picked up the receipts, his fingers moving methodically, separating them into categories: completed deliveries, pending deliveries, and, most importantly, the disputed or missing orders. He ignored the frantic energy radiating from Chen Guang, focusing instead on the cold, hard data. He noted the addresses, the order values, the names of the customers, even the estimated delivery times. He didn't just read the words; he saw the underlying network of transactions, the points of failure, the potential for optimization.
"First," Lin Yuan began, his voice calm, cutting through Chen Guang's rising anxiety, "you need to understand the fundamental flaws. Your payment model. You pay drivers upfront for delivery, correct? A flat fee of 8 yuan per delivery, plus 10% commission on the order value?"
Chen Guang nodded, bewildered. "Yes, that's standard, isn't it?"
"It's standard for losing money in a low-trust environment," Lin Yuan corrected, his tone dispassionate. "You're incentivizing theft. A driver takes the order, pockets the upfront payment, and then disappears with the goods. There's no consequence, no mechanism for accountability. And your routing is inefficient. You're losing precious minutes, even hours, on poorly planned routes, leading to late deliveries and cold food. This reduces customer satisfaction and increases your customer churn rate, which is already high, based on these complaints." He tapped the stack of complaints. "And your market targeting is too broad. You're trying to deliver everything, everywhere, to everyone. You don't have the infrastructure for that."
He then pulled out his own notebook, flipping to a fresh page, and began to sketch. It wasn't a blueprint for a building, but a diagram for a system. "We implement a cash-on-delivery (COD) model, effective immediately. Drivers are paid only after the customer confirms receipt and satisfaction. Their commission will be held in an escrow account on your phone, released only after verification. This cuts your direct loss. Second, we restructure their compensation to include a performance bonus based on positive customer feedback and on-time delivery percentages. This incentivizes reliability."
Chen Guang stared, wide-eyed. "But... but drivers won't like that! They'll say it's unfair. They need upfront cash for fuel, for living."
"They'll adapt," Lin Yuan stated, his voice firm. "The reliable ones will stay. The unreliable ones will weed themselves out, saving you money and reputation. We filter out the 'bad actors' in your supply chain. For fuel, we provide a small, fixed daily allowance of 10 yuan for fuel, non-refundable, as an incentive for showing up. But the bulk of their earnings comes from successful deliveries."
He moved on, his pencil tracing lines on the paper. "Your current delivery network is a mess. No two orders go the same way. We implement dynamic batch routing. We group orders geographically, by street and neighborhood, ensuring drivers take the most efficient path. This reduces fuel consumption and delivery time. I can map out these routes for you, street by street, based on your current customer addresses. It will cut your current fuel costs by at least 15%, possibly 20%, and increase driver capacity by 30%." He spoke with the quiet confidence of someone who had already run these scenarios a hundred times in his head during his own delivery runs.
"And finally," Lin Yuan continued, looking up, his gaze piercing, "we focus on your core market. What are your most profitable, reliable delivery items? Fresh vegetables? Cooked meals? Specialty products? We cut the dead weight, the unprofitable lines. We market aggressively to your most reliable customers, those who consistently order high-value items, or who order frequently. We build customer loyalty. We create a 'premium member' tier for customers who pay a small monthly subscription fee – say, 10 yuan – in exchange for priority delivery or small discounts. This provides you with recurring revenue, an initial cash injection, and a loyal customer base. It reduces your customer acquisition cost in the long run."
Chen Guang was speechless, overwhelmed. He'd been struggling with basic operational issues, and Lin Yuan was speaking a language of strategic business restructuring, of ROI and market segmentation. "But... how do I implement all this? I don't know how to track all that on my phone. My app is too basic."
"That's where I come in," Lin Yuan said, his voice dropping slightly, the first hint of his personal terms. "I will manage your entire logistics and driver network. I will optimize your routes, implement the new payment system, handle driver onboarding and performance tracking. I will oversee customer relations and manage your marketing. I will turn Fenyang FreshGo into a reliable, profitable enterprise. In return, I take 30% of your net profits for the first six months. After that, we re-negotiate based on a pre-defined growth target. You maintain ownership of the app and the overall business. I provide the strategy and the execution." He paused. "And you cover the 200 yuan loss for the vanished orders immediately. Consider it my first investment in your business, a demonstration of faith."
Chen Guang stared, aghast. 30% of net profits? It sounded enormous, but what was 30% of nothing? And Lin Yuan had just offered to personally cover his immediate 200 yuan liability. The young man hesitated, then a slow, dawning realization spread across his face. He had been drowning, and Lin Yuan had just thrown him a very complex, very demanding lifeline. "You... you'd do all that?"
"I don't offer services I can't deliver," Lin Yuan said, his eyes unwavering. "But I demand results. No excuses. Complete transparency on your part. And you must commit to my system fully. No more cutting corners, no more shortcuts. If you agree, we start today."
Chen Guang, exhausted, desperate, and seeing a glimmer of hope for the first time in months, nodded vehemently. "Yes! Yes, I agree! Anything! Just... please, make it work." He shoved the crumpled receipts back into his bag, then hesitated. "But what about drivers? I only have two reliable ones left, A-Kuan and Xiao Zhao, and they're always complaining about the pay. The others... they just come and go."
"We retrain the ones you have, and we find new ones," Lin Yuan stated, already shifting his focus. "We'll put up new hiring notices. And I will personally handle the onboarding process, explaining the new system clearly. The key is transparency and a fair, albeit performance-based, system. Reliability breeds reliability." He took out another piece of paper. "First step: We call your five affected customers. I will personally apologize for the lost orders, explain the immediate refund, and offer them a 10 yuan discount on their next order. This is a small cost, but it will significantly improve your customer retention and mitigate negative word-of-mouth in the WeChat groups. Reputation, Chen Guang, is worth more than gold in Fenyang."
As they began their first task – compiling the refund list and preparing to call the customers – Lin Yuan's mind was already three steps ahead. This small, seemingly insignificant venture, with its initial capital investment of 200 yuan (which he could barely afford), was his first tangible step. It was a micro-ecosystem of logistics and trust, a proving ground for his larger ambitions. If he could streamline Chen Guang's chaotic operation, turn a failing local app into a reliable service, it would not only generate much-needed capital (his 30% net profit was a direct line to funding the mill project), but it would also demonstrate his unparalleled ability to organize, to optimize, to control. It would be a small, but undeniable, testament to his capabilities.
He spent the rest of the morning, nearly four hours, meticulously restructuring Chen Guang's order management, creating a simple, color-coded tracking system on Chen Guang's phone, and even drafting a polite, formal apology script for the customers. He coached Chen Guang on how to manage the customer calls, emphasizing calm and reassurance. He then drafted new hiring notices for drivers, outlining the revised payment structure in simple, clear terms, emphasizing stability and performance-based earnings. He made a mental note to observe the market for old bicycles or scooters for new, reliable drivers who might not have their own transport, a small capital expenditure that could yield significant returns.
Just as the sun began to dip below the distant peaks of the Sichuan mountains, casting long, purple shadows, Lin Yuan received an anonymous text message on his old flip phone. A single, cryptic line: "Some big fish are territorial. Be careful where you swim, boy. The pond has teeth." There was no sender ID, no way to trace it. It was clearly a message from Boss Wei, a silent, chilling reminder that his earlier confrontation had not gone unnoticed. The shadow of the throne, indeed, had teeth. Lin Yuan felt a cold, hard knot of resolve tighten in his stomach. This was not just about making money; it was about survival, and about proving that a quiet, meticulous mind could outmaneuver brute force and entrenched power. The first stone of his empire was being laid, not with mortar, but with calculated risk and an unwavering belief in his own unseen algorithm.