Chapter 738 - 370: You Guys Are Ridiculous

Chapter 738: Chapter 370: You Guys Are Ridiculous

(Had to delete 2000 characters to get this approved. Some character introductions and forms of address have been skipped!)

...

Chen Jincheng followed Fu Zhan to Jinglan City’s west ticket center.

Lei Xiaojun and Wei Yuan were also invited, of course. They were both curious to see how many tickets Jinglan City would sell upon opening.

Jinglan City had four ticket centers in the Ancient City, all located next to an entrance. They were also converted from parts of the Ancient City and had been given a rather grand name: the "Jinglan City Passage Processing Office."

After all, you needed a ticket to enter Jinglan City.

When their group arrived at the west ticket center, another group was already there. It was led by a middle-aged man, with the others standing respectfully behind him.

Upon seeing the middle-aged man, Fu Zhan immediately went forward and said respectfully, "Mr. Wu, Mr. Chen and President Lei are here."

Then, he immediately made the introduction to Chen Jincheng. "Mr. Chen, this is Mr. Wu. He’s mentioned wanting to meet you several times."

Chen Jincheng, who was of course aware of the man’s identity, immediately shook his hand. "Mr. Wu, it’s an honor to meet you."

Wu Teng looked at Chen Jincheng with admiration in his eyes. "Mr. Chen, Coastal City needs talented young people like you to help build a better city. We really have you to thank for Jinglan City this time. You’ve done an excellent job."

"It was my duty," Chen Jincheng said humbly. "Besides, I just did some talking behind the scenes. Vice Director Fu and his team were the ones who did the real work."

Wu Teng waved his hand. "For something like this, the truly valuable part is the planning. Without a good plan, Xiaofu and his men could run their legs off and still accomplish nothing."

Fu Zhan naturally agreed with his superior’s words. "Mr. Chen, the leader is right. If not for your plan, we could have racked our brains and never come up with any of this."

Wu Teng added, "Mr. Chen, let’s exchange contact information. We can talk about the digital economy when we have time."

"Of course, Mr. Wu." This was exactly what Chen Jincheng had hoped for. He immediately took out his phone to add him on WeChat.

’This was my goal ever since I came up with the Little Sweet Heat Card.’

’To get the attention of the relevant authorities, build connections, and then, when the era of livestream e-commerce arrives, replicate the success of Three Sheep.’

’Now, that goal was basically achieved.’

Moreover, it was clear that Mr. Wu was very interested in this area, especially since he had specifically mentioned the term "digital economy."

Seeing the two of them take out their phones to exchange contact information, Sister Hong and Lao Chen were filled with emotion.

’The boss can now chat and laugh so casually with such a high-ranking leader?’

’They had truly watched the boss get to this point every step of the way, witnessing it with their own eyes.’

’They were so glad they had decided to follow him back then.’

Li Lixing was just an ordinary college freshman, a minor internet celebrity at best. The sight of a major figure like Wu Teng was enough to make her nervous.

To her, he was an even bigger shot than President Lei. After all, once a government official reached a certain level, the pressure they exuded on common folk surpassed that of any businessman.

’The fact that her boss could chat and laugh so easily with such a powerful man filled her with immense admiration. She felt that if she told her old friends about this, their jaws would drop.’

After adding Chen Jincheng on WeChat, Wu Teng immediately turned to Lei Xiaojun and greeted him warmly. "President Lei, it’s a real pleasure to meet you. I hope Coastal City will have the opportunity to cooperate with you in the future."

Anyone could tell that while Wu Teng was more effusive toward Lei Xiaojun, he was less personable than he had been with Chen Jincheng.

It seemed Lei Xiaojun was being treated differently.

"Mr. Wu, I’m sure there will be opportunities," Lei Xiaojun said with a smile and a nod. Given his status, he could naturally read between the lines and understand the reason.

’He knew that the other man was aware that his Rice Group was unlikely to relocate to Coastal City, nor would its business operations be based here. Therefore, Mr. Wu was only maintaining basic courtesy and had no intention of a deeper discussion. After all, they were on different, parallel paths.’

’But President Chen was different. The success of Jinglan City would bring enormous benefits to Coastal City. And clearly, this Mr. Wu was intentionally trying to get closer to President Chen, which meant he wanted something from him.’

’On this point, he felt he should give President Chen a heads-up later and tell him to be careful.’

"Mr. Chen, President Lei, shall we go in?" Wu Teng gestured, then led the group into the west ticketing hall.

Inside, staff members from Jinglan City were already waiting. The person in charge of Jinglan City was also standing by. He had no standing to speak on this occasion; his only job tonight was to properly carry out any orders given by Wu Teng and Fu Zhan.

In other words, he was just an errand boy.

Fu Zhan immediately asked the person in charge, "Are the ticketing systems ready?"

The person in charge replied instantly, "Vice Director Fu, everything is ready. 150,000 tickets are set to go on sale. To be safe, we’ve also prepared 20,000 backup tickets."

Releasing tickets for a scenic area isn’t a simple matter, especially for a place like Jinglan City, which involved official management and shareholding. It entailed ticketing regulations, various restrictions, and financial issues.

Anyone without experience in this area wouldn’t understand and would probably assume they could just release tickets at will, like any other tourist spot.

In reality, even regular attractions can’t just release tickets indiscriminately. When you see a scenic area sell out and then immediately offer more tickets, it’s because they’ve started selling their backup stock. Under normal circumstances, they rarely even exhaust their backup supply.

In fact, many attractions don’t even sell out their regular ticket allocation.

Anyway, ordinary people don’t care about these details, nor would they understand them. They just assume that if customers want to buy tickets, the attraction should just sell them. Why make it so complicated?

Hearing this, Fu Zhan smiled and said, "Excellent. Get ready, and open the ticket sales immediately."

When Chen Jincheng heard this, he was suddenly taken aback. He hurried to ask Fu Zhan, "Wait, Vice President Fu, you only prepared 150,000 tickets?"

"Only??" Fu Zhan looked at Chen Jincheng, confused.

Chen Jincheng realized something even more serious and asked again, "Vice President Fu, don’t tell me you only have enough staff at Jinglan City to handle 150,000 people?"

Fu Zhan seemed to catch on to what Chen Jincheng was implying. He asked subconsciously, "Mr. Chen, are you saying that’s not enough?"

"Holy shit, of course it’s not enough." Chen Jincheng was floored.

’He had been busy with Second-Life Star business before and hadn’t paid attention to this aspect. He had assumed Vice President Fu’s side would handle it properly and hadn’t asked any questions.’

’But now he suddenly discovered he had placed too much trust in them.’

’It was only then that he remembered: in his previous life, Coastal City never developed much in this area. Their promotions were a complete mess, and they never produced any viral tourist attractions. It was all because the people here in Coastal City were genuinely bad at online marketing.’

’The key was, if you don’t understand, you should ask. But they didn’t understand, and they didn’t ask. They just forged ahead blindly... This was...’

But Fu Zhan asked in disbelief, "Our department ran the numbers, and we felt 150,000 was about right. After all, this attraction was doing terribly before. And this projected number already exceeds the number of tourists that the Zhu Ling incident at Radiant Square drew."

Chen Jincheng was even more speechless.

’This was a matter of perception. In that case, the people working under him were all idiots, or just plain dense.’

’Seriously, after all the promotion for the Jinglan City project, for them to screw up on something like this was almost comical.’

Just then, Wei Weili suddenly spoke up. "Vice Director Fu, I told you your method for calculating the numbers was wrong. Now Mr. Chen is also saying that this many tickets isn’t enough. We should have gone with our group’s estimate of 250,000 from the start."

"It’ll be more than 250,000," Chen Jincheng said immediately.

’In his past life, the Hanfu travel day attracted more than 250,000 people with just some crude promotions. Jinglan City would definitely draw an even bigger crowd.’

’But the attraction had only prepared staff to handle 150,000 people. When the time came, they would be overloaded, the service quality would definitely be poor, and it would absolutely get exposed online. Wouldn’t that be a huge slap in the face?’

Wu Teng’s face was full of astonishment as he heard this. "Mr. Chen, are you sure?"

’His expression was now one of pure, pleasant surprise. Previously, they had calculated based on 100,000 people. That influx would have boosted Coastal City’s GDP by 1-2%. If what Mr. Chen said was true, wouldn’t the number of people be at least three times that?’

An irrepressible look of joy instantly appeared on his face.

’Then the GDP growth from Jinglan City this time could be 3-6%! For a single tourist attraction to bring about such incredible growth... how staggering was that?’

’Most importantly, this attraction was a long-term project. Even if the numbers dropped later, retaining half of the visitors should be possible, right? And returning to this peak during holidays wouldn’t be a problem, would it?’

’If they could really achieve this, he would go back and propose making the annual November 22nd Hanfu Day an official special holiday for Coastal City.’

’That alone could become a crucial asset for his next career move.’

With that in mind, he immediately gave the order: "Regardless, release the 150,000 tickets first. I’ll make arrangements to release more tickets right away. We’ll sell as many as we can today."

Chen Jincheng inwardly cursed again when he heard this and quickly reminded him, "Mr. Wu, the attraction’s preparations are completely inadequate right now. If we attract too many tourists and the service can’t keep up, it will damage our reputation."

Mr. Wu immediately said, "Don’t worry. However many tickets we sell, I’ll issue a directive to have staff from other scenic areas in the city come and support us. If that’s not enough, I’ll spend all night mobilizing personnel from the various counties. I guarantee Jinglan City will have a smooth opening tomorrow."

His words put Chen Jincheng at ease.

’That’s true. If it came to that, the Coastal City authorities would care about this matter even more than he did. They would naturally handle everything. He believed that if an entire city was determined to do something, it could be solved.’

Fu Zhan’s heart began to race. ’If what Mr. Chen said was true, the credit this time would be immense. Even if their forecast was wrong, it would be a minor issue in comparison.’

He immediately said to the person in charge, "Open the ticket sales for Jinglan City now."

"Yes, Vice Director Fu." The person in charge nodded, made the arrangements at once, and then turned on a large LCD screen. A countdown to the ticket sale opening appeared on it.

Online, the videos of traditional arts and crafts that Chen Jincheng had previously uploaded to his account had already hyped up the excitement for Jinglan City to an even greater level.

Many people were watching for when Jinglan City would start selling tickets. Having already bought their Hanfu, they were eager to go. Lured by the promise of those traditional arts, they were getting truly impatient.

So now, seeing the countdown to the ticket sale, many people took notice and began to wait expectantly.

’After waiting so long, we can finally buy tickets!’

’They were genuinely afraid of being too late, afraid they wouldn’t be able to snag a ticket for the first day.’

Even the various internet celebrities were doing the same thing. They all knew that the Jinglan City created by Chen Jincheng would be the epicenter of all the hype on Tiao Yin tomorrow.

Finally, under the expectant gazes of Wu Teng, Fu Zhan, Lei Xiaojun, Wei Yuan, and the others, the countdown ended. The person in charge pressed the button to display the sales statistics.

The next moment, the number of remaining tickets and the number of sold tickets appeared on the screen.

The number of remaining tickets started, of course, at 150,000.

But just a moment later, everyone saw the data refresh, and they were all left completely dumbfounded.

Because in just a few short seconds, they watched the remaining 150,000 tickets instantly drop to 0, while the number of sold tickets instantly jumped to 150,000.

Fu Zhan’s eyes went wide with shock.

’This was insane!’

’Their estimate of 150,000 tickets had been ridiculously off the mark.’

Even a man of Wu Teng’s stature couldn’t help but stare wide-eyed at that moment.