Chapter 223

Lawrence’s hands gripped the steering wheel tightly as his gaze flickered nervously to Carlisle in the

rearview mirror.

Who would’ve thought the newbie he disciplined on the first day of training was Francis‘ boss?

He worried if there were repercussions, they’d be aimed at Francis. Or perhaps Carlisle would settle scores with him in front of Francis.

Lawrence wondered if he should take the initiative to apologize to smooth things over.

“Mr. Hanson…” Carlisle turned and abruptly called out to Lawrence

Lawrence was already worrying about Carlisle possibly confronting him in front of Francis, so his heart raced when Carlisle called out to him.

“Mr–Mr. Zahn… Do you need something?”

Feeling like he was facing Francis‘ superior, Lawrence was on edge.

Carlisle noticed Lawrence’s tension and couldn’t help but smirk.

“I’ve got a bit of business to attend to tomorrow morning, so I need to ask for some time off from military

training.

With the recent acquisition, Carlisle now controlled five companies. However, paperwork at the business registration office could only be handled on weekdays, leaving Monday as the only option.

“Sure,” Lawrence replied, feeling relieved that Carlisle wasn’t there to settle any scores.

Although freshmen were generally only allowed sick leave during military training, exceptions could be

made.

To ensure Carlisle treated Francis well in the future, Lawrence was willing to bend the rules a little and

offer some assistance.

Carlisle grinned.

“Thanks a lot, Mr. Hanson.'”

Lawrence chuckled warmly.

“No problem at all. Just make sure to take good care of Sergeant Gable for me.”

“I won’t let my people down,” Carlisle replied with an innocent smile.

In truth, Carlisle would have treated Francis well even without knowing he was connected to Lawrence.

But having this connection certainly wouldn’t hurt. He figured it probably meant he wouldn’t face any more punishments during the rest of military training.

2/2

Half an hour later, they arrived at A1 Seafood Restaurant.

Sean and Lily met Carlisle’s group downstairs. After exchanging pleasantries in the private room, Carlisle and Sean got down to business.

Carlisle skipped past the early version of SociableNet, formerly known as SchoolSpace, and delved into explaining the integrated SociableNet model. Sean listened with keen interest and was clearly intrigued by Carlisle’s visio

Sitting near Carlisle, Lily’s eyes widened with amazement as she heard his ideas and the business potential within the online realm.

“Carlisle, your imagination is incredible! I can’t believe you thought of a website like this!”

Taking a sip of his beer, Carlisle smiled calmly.

“Having ideas is one thing, but we must bring this to life and make it work.”

Creating the platform wasn’t the hard part. The real challenge lay in its successful operation.

With Electronic Arts recently going public and Messenger’s user base still growing, Carlisle knew his social networking platform had to seize the market quickly.

Sean licked his dry lips and whispered, “This idea is really solid. It creates an online platform for college. students to connect and also brings in ad revenue. If we can expand this nationwide, our site will be a talent hub in just a few years.”

Back in the day, there weren’t as many college students. However, with industrial growth and improvements in education, even students from rural areas could attend university. The present day college students were the ones who would drive future economic growth.

Sipping his soup, Carlisle continued, “In the next few weeks, you should recruit a few talented seniors from your school to form a company. Let’s get this website up and running as soon as possible.”

Sean’s school specialty was in computer science.

Locating a few seniors with decent computer skills shouldn’t pose a challenge.

With some guidance from Carlisle, they would perform just as well as any top engineering graduate from a prestigious university.

It was akin to untangling a knotted ball of yarn–Carlisle would show them how to find the loose end and straighten everything out.