kvmb Chapter 117 The Translator of the Tower of Babel
Chapter 117 The Translator of the Tower of Babel
October 2, 1988, Funabashi City, Chiba Prefecture, Coastal Industrial Zone.
The damp, cold sea breeze, carrying the smell of sulfur and the sea, relentlessly battered the newly renovated, silver-gray behemoth. This was originally a frozen storage warehouse for a deep-sea fishing company. Now, the exterior walls have been repainted, and the huge exhaust fan blades stand motionless under the gray sky, like rows of silent black eyeballs watching the murky surface of Tokyo Bay.
The automatic sensor door slides open to both sides.
Saionji Satsuki stepped into this pure white space.
Today, instead of wearing those mature haute couture suits, she wore the autumn uniform of St. Hua Academy—a dark gray pleated skirt with a pair of black flat loafers, a neatly tailored navy blue double-breasted short coat, and a beige cashmere scarf around her neck.
Although she was dressed as a student, the group of adult men following behind her were all very careful, slowing down their pace in sync with Satsuki.
They didn't know who Satsuki was; all they needed to know was that she was their boss's boss's boss.
"President."
The factory manager, Kobayashi, was a bald man in his fifties, wearing a full set of sterile clothing, with only his bloodshot eyes showing. He jogged to keep up with Satsuki's pace, wiping the fog from the edges of his goggles with a handkerchief, his voice sounding somewhat weak in the empty factory.
"The hardware testing is all complete. Automatic rice washing machine, high-pressure cooking pot, vacuum cooling machine... Just give the order, and this place can produce 20,000 standard servings of curry rice per hour."
Satsuki stopped and stood on the second-floor visitor corridor, looking down at the work area through the huge glass curtain wall.
There were rows of cold stainless steel pipes and robotic arms, like the entrails of a sleeping steel behemoth.
"Where are the raw materials?" Satsuki's voice sounded somewhat low, muffled by her mask.
"The first batch of potatoes and onions that arrived from Hokkaido last night has been stored in the warehouse," Kobayashi said, pointing to the storage area behind them. "The cold storage temperature is set at 4 degrees Celsius. But..."
He hesitated for a moment, looking at the stationary machines with a hint of confusion in his eyes.
"President, if we don't start production soon, the freshness of these vegetables is decreasing every hour. The spoilage rate will be factored into the costs. Oh, of course, I'm not questioning the decision from above, just offering a preliminary suggestion..."
"Alright, alright, what's the rush?"
Satsuki turned around and waved her hand.
"The deals with the distributors haven't been finalized yet. If you start production now, who will you sell your goods to?"
Huh? You haven't settled on the sales channels yet? This...
Kobayashi was beginning to suspect that the factory was just something the young lady would use to play with.
Satsuki had no intention of explaining anything to Kobayashi and turned to walk towards the freight elevator at the end of the corridor that led to the underground.
"Where is that American?"
Upon hearing this address, Xiaolin's expression twitched as if she had a toothache, and she pointed to the ground.
"Mr. Shimomura is in the underground server room... He's been there for three days now and hasn't come out once. Um, the smell down there might not be very pleasant."
……
Two underground floors.
As soon as the elevator doors opened, a mixture of burnt smells from overheated electronic components, stale dust, and a strong aroma of spicy sausage pizza hit the doorway.
There were no windows, and hundreds of server fans were idling at low speeds, emitting a low-frequency hum that was irritating to the ears. On the control panel in the center of the server room, empty Coke cans and tangled cables of various colors were piled up, like a giant, chaotic spider web.
Tsutomu Shimomura was sitting cross-legged on a Sun Microsystems workstation chassis.
He was still wearing that gray hoodie with "Los Alamos" printed on it, one flip-flop dangling from his foot, the other seemingly kicked somewhere. He had a slice of cold pizza dangling from his mouth, and his hands were flying across the keyboard, the green code on the screen flowing like a waterfall, reflected in his thick-rimmed glasses.
"Damn NEC...damn closed protocol..."
Shimomura Tsutomu mumbled curses incoherently as he chewed on his pizza.
"Are these old Japanese remnants' brains filled with mush? Insisting on using this twenty-year-old SNA architecture is like trying to control a space shuttle with an abacus..."
Satsuki walked behind him, kicked an empty soda can on the ground with her toe, and frowned slightly.
No, while Genius is useful, I still need to remind him to pay attention to personal hygiene...
"Clang!"
The crisp metallic clanging made Shimomura Tsutomu pause for a moment. He turned around, saw it was Satsuki, but made no move to get up and greet her. He simply swallowed the pizza in his mouth and adjusted his glasses.
"Hey boss, you're here. This job is impossible to do."
Tsutomu Shimomura pointed to a bulky gray machine next to him—an old-fashioned POS machine borrowed from Seibu Department Store, which is the standard terminal currently used in FamilyMart stores.
"This thing is mute. It only understands the old dialect of IBM mainframes, and it has to slowly transmit a day's worth of data back via a dedicated telephone line in the middle of the night when no one is using it."
He jumped off the server, stomped around on the ground with one bare foot, and scratched his hair in frustration.
"The inventory system we're using runs on UNIX and uses TCP/IP. It's like asking an old man who only knows ancient Greek to argue with a rapper who speaks modern English. If we don't solve this problem, your 'real-time replenishment' is just a dream."
Factory Director Lin, who was following behind, was completely confused, but the word "dream" still made him turn pale.
Satsuki did not speak.
She walked up to the tangled mess of cables, her gaze sweeping over the complex equipment and settling on an inconspicuous beige metal box.
The box had a rough exterior, without any fancy decorations, and only a few green indicator lights flashing irregularly.
Cisco AGS multiprotocol router.
That was the "Babel key" she had gone to great lengths to get from the garage of that couple in Silicon Valley.
"Mr. Shimomura, I remember you boasting to me that with this thing, you could make stones talk."
Satsuki took off her gloves and threw them on the control panel, then looked at Shimomura Tsutomu with a smile.
"What, you can't even be a good translator anymore?"
Shimomura Tsutomu was provoked, and a haughty smile spread across his face.
"Who says I can't do a good job?"
He pulled a screwdriver out of his pocket and twirled it in his hand.
"I've spent the last three days patching this damn router. NEC's protocols are really difficult to work with, but I've 'torn it apart'."
He squatted down, grabbed a specially made thick cable, plugged one end into the parallel interface of the old POS machine, and roughly shoved the other end into the back panel of the Cisco router.
"Click".
The sound of the joints meshing together is crisp and pleasant.
"Watch closely. This is the aesthetics of violence."
Shimomura Tsutomu sat back down at the keyboard, his fingers flying across the keyboard. As he typed the last line of instructions, he slammed down the Enter key.
"Snapped!"
The red error code on the screen disappeared instantly, replaced by lines of green "Connected".
"The road is open."
Shimomura Tsutomu turned around and gestured with his lip towards Kobayashi Factory Director, who was still in a daze.
"Hey, sir. Go scan it on that POS machine."
Xiao Lin paused for a moment, then realized what was happening. He quickly walked to the old-fashioned POS machine and picked up the scanner.
On the table was a plastic rice ball model as a sample, with a barcode attached to it.
He swallowed hard and pulled the trigger.
"drop."
A crisp buzzing sound rang out.
Almost the same millisecond.
On the huge LCD monitoring screen directly in front of the computer room, the previously static inventory data table suddenly jumped up without warning.
Product Name: Tuna Mayonnaise Rice Ball
[Simulated deduction: -1]
[Production Order: Generate]
A line of red text suddenly exploded on the screen.
The latency is almost negligible.
The feeling is like you flipped a switch in Tokyo and a light bulb in Osaka instantly turned on.
In 1988, an era when most data transmission still relied on manual handling via magnetic tape and floppy disks, this "millisecond-level" synchronization was nothing short of a miracle.
"this……"
Factory Director Kobayashi stared wide-eyed at the fluctuating number and blinked.
"How is this possible... so fast? Shouldn't we wait until tonight to make the call?"
"This is TCP/IP."
Shimomura Tsutomu took a piece of chewing gum out of his pocket, unwrapped it, and popped it into his mouth, chewing it with relish.
"It doesn't take a straight line or a detour; it uses 'packet switching.' This Cisco box breaks down your scanning action into countless small data packets, then throws them into the network like stones, where they are reassembled."
He patted the beige router, his movements as rough as if he were hitting an old television set.
"Now, even if you sell a rice ball in a convenience store in Hokkaido, the boilers here in Chiba can immediately tell you to cook two more ounces of rice."
Satsuki looked at the line of red text on the screen.
The red light reflected in her pupils, like a burning fire.
She knew what this meant.
This means that Saionji is no longer just a supplier of rice balls, but a monster that controls the nervous system of the entire retail network. While 7-Eleven, FamilyMart, and Lawson are still using yesterday's sales to guess today's demand, S-Food is already able to adjust its production lines based on real-time data every second.
Efficiency equals profit.
This is a revolutionary and overwhelming victory.
"very good."
Satsuki turned around and looked at the still-shocked factory manager, Kobayashi.
"Director Kobayashi."
"Yes...yes!" Kobayashi snapped out of his daze and stood at attention.
"Now that Mr. Shimomura has already debugged the system to a preliminary level, I'd like you to test how well the system integrates with the production line."
Satsuki's voice was exceptionally clear even amidst the roar of the computer room.
"Start production line A. But I don't want mass production."
She stretched out her wrist, adorned with a delicate watch, and glanced at the time.
"I only want 500 servings. 500 standard curry beef rice bowls." (Note: The beef used here is not Hokkaido beef; according to the production cycle, the cattle cannot be slaughtered until next year.)
"I want you to use this system to precisely control the thickness of each piece of beef and the weight of each spoonful of sauce. The error cannot exceed 0.5 grams."
"These 500 portions are not for sale."
Satsuki's gaze swept over the flashing indicator lights, finally settling on Kobayashi's tense face.
"They are bullets."
"Tomorrow, I'm going to the Akasaka Prince Hotel with these hot bullets to meet a big shot."
"If the taste doesn't satisfy him, this priceless system is just a pile of expensive electronic waste."
"Did you understand?"
"Yes! I understand!"
Factory Director Kobayashi bowed, turned and ran towards the elevator, appearing somewhat excited.
Fortunately...it seems the boss invested so much, it's probably not just a casual project...
Only Satsuki and Shimomura Tsutomu remained in the computer room.
"Boss."
Shimomura Tsutomu leaned against the server rack and blew a bubble.
"Even though the road is open, if those old guys at NTT find out we're running this proprietary protocol on their phone lines, or even bypassing their PBX, they'll probably be furious, right?"
"Then let them jump."
Satsuki walked up to the old-fashioned POS machine, stretched out her finger, and gently stroked the handle of the scanner.
"By the time they realized what was happening, our blood was already flowing in the veins of Tokyo."
She looked up and glanced at the dense, spiderweb-like cables overhead.
"Shimomura."
"exist."
"Keep this machine running. Twenty-four hours a day, without stopping. If the power goes out, you will be held responsible."
"Don't worry, unless Tokyo experiences a power outage, it's beating more steadily than my heart."
Tsutomu Shimomura turned around and continued typing code on the screen. Green characters flowed across his glasses, reflecting a face of fervent focus.
Is Tokyo experiencing a power outage?
Upon hearing Shimomura's words, Satsuki turned and walked thoughtfully toward the elevator.
The elevator doors slowly closed.
With her last glance, she saw the green indicator light on the beige router flashing rapidly.
Night had fallen in Chiba. The sea breeze howled across the empty factory area, swirling up fallen leaves.
But deep underground, in that tangled network of fiber optic cables, dawn had already arrived ahead of schedule.
"Are you ready, Mr. Tsutsumi Yoshiaki?"
Satsuki leaned against the cold elevator wall and murmured to herself.
"I hope your appetite is worthy of this expensive menu."