"Mr. Zhou, Mr. Zhou... Zhou! Don’t go, listen to me."

"I won’t listen, I won’t go, at my age, with old folks above and little ones below, how could I possibly leave?"

Lin Ju had anticipated not being able to persuade Zhou and Tong, and turned to inform Principal Jiang right away.

Upon hearing this, Jiang was intrigued, Oh, manned spaceflight, conducting scientific experiments—that’s a major project!

Now they needed someone from their institute to be an astronaut, and that was an opportunity Southern Machinery Institute couldn’t refuse.

The school had just organized physical exams for the teachers before the semester started, and he directly pulled out Zhou and Tong’s reports.

Tong Peiqiang had chronic bronchitis and was at risk of asthma, so he was definitely out of the question.

But Zhou Rui’s health was unexpectedly good, his physical indicators were very healthy. He could withstand the training for going into space, meeting all the requirements.

So when Zhou Rui had just emerged from the classroom, he was stopped at the door by Jiang.

"Zhou, it’s exactly because you have the elderly and children to care for, your grandson is old enough to buy soy sauce, your mother passed away early, and your father has your elder sister to look after him. What are you afraid of?

I’m of similar age myself; if it weren’t for my high blood pressure, I’d shamelessly go to Lin and offer myself. After all, I graduated as a master’s student from the Department of Electrical and Mechanical Engineering. They’d be thrilled to have me go up.

You can go with peace of mind; I’ve arranged everything in the department. Some other person will take over managing a few students, there will absolutely be no issues."

"I’m not going, I’m not, what kind of twisted logic is that... manned missions and satellites aren’t the same thing..."

The two of them were talking in the corridor, occasionally pushing and shoving each other.

Just then, two graduate students looking for Zhou Rui happened to come up, only to be pulled over by Principal Jiang immediately.

"Your mentor is doing something amazing, he’s going to fly into space as an astronaut, to conduct space experiments, but he can’t bear to leave you students, doesn’t want to go. Come on, persuade him."

"What?"

The two graduate students wore a look of confusion, taking several seconds to process this.

"Mr. Zhou is going to space? He’d definitely have to train... what about our theses...?"

"There are three other teachers in the department; I’ll ask them to help with revisions. This won’t delay your graduation! As long as Mr. Zhou goes into space, if you want to apply for a Ph.D. later, I’ll find a way to help you all."

Looking at the principal’s confident expression, the two students who were slacking off only felt as if they were being struck by a pie, and suddenly they both clung to Zhou Rui’s legs.

"Mr. Zhou, go with confidence. I, your junior, will take good care of the equipment and absolutely won’t mess it up."

"With Mr. Zhao and Mr. Tong helping, we will absolutely not let you down with our theses!"

"Teacher, we will miss you, but we are more excited to see you return like Lightning!"

"Mr. Zhou x2!"

"..."

Zhou Rui watched the two bootlickers perform with disdain, but at the same time, he was wavering.

"Actually, my main concern is about safety, going up within a year seems a bit unreliable..."

"What are you afraid of, Mr. Zhou? New Yuan could be sending rockets with astronauts within a month, you might just make it. Just go for it."

The speaker was a young male teacher, Zhao Xiaowen, from the Physics department who specialized in lasers and had previously been involved in rocket projects, though not to great effect. He just happened to be passing by and overheard the conversation, chiming in.

However, before Zhou Rui could respond, Principal Jiang’s eyes suddenly lit up as he turned his head.

The sight of those titanium alloy dog eyes made Zhao Xiaowen feel a little scared, sensing that something bad was about to happen to him.

He only heard Jiang’s voice whispering like a devil:

"Zhao, I remember you are in good physical shape. You even came third in the teachers’ sports event last year!"

"No, no, no, that was third in our physics department, and there were only four teachers, one of whom didn’t even participate."

"Eh! I see you have the potential of an astronaut. Come, come, come, go for a health exam with Zhou. It’s just right up your alley, and surely lasers in space are different!"

...

Lin Ju: One phone call, and I had two strapping fellows caught for me.

After the health exams, both of them were fit, fully capable of undergoing training to go to space. Anyway, they wouldn’t be controlling the rockets, just mere passengers, so there were no issues.

The training wasn’t hard either. With Deng Lei around, we could directly purchase the ground training facilities for pilots, and after going through the process for a year, there wouldn’t be much of a problem.

Commander + passengers*2, the three people were all set; the payload was much simpler.

Southern Machinery Institute had taken on 1000 kilograms of payload for the crew cabin - scientific experiments - and of course, this time it wasn’t just to make up numbers, they were really prepared to undertake a project.

This 1-ton worth of equipment placed in the crew cabin was mainly for material experiments and high-energy laser experiments from the physics department, capable of translating into tangible outcomes, truly high-value projects.

The Institute had plans to apply for 300 million yuan in funding for this project, of which 60 million yuan would be allocated to payload launch and personnel expenses, virtually betting all available resources on it.

The remaining 2.6 tons of cargo bay payload couldn’t be wasted, either. In fact, when carrying three people, the space shuttle could still carry 4.2 tons of payload, which meant an extra 600 kilograms beyond the system’s requirements.

That is, there was still 3.2 tons of available weight in the cargo bay, which would, of course, be used for satellite deployment, returning the space shuttle to its initial purpose, effectively going back to its roots.

The cargo bay of the H1 space shuttle was very spacious, able to accommodate a large satellite or several small satellites. However, from a profit-making perspective, bigger was definitely better, as industry standards dictated that the bigger and heavier the satellite, the more one could charge.

Lin Ju thought that after the successful mission of New Yuan No. 1C in November, fame would bring large customers knocking on his door.

The large satellites were primarily spy satellites and television broadcast satellites. The former couldn’t possibly entrust a commercial company for launch, but the latter should pose no problem.

This cooperation with Southern Machinery Institute once again brought funding and personnel support. Could it sustain the company for a year, perhaps?

Perhaps... right?

"Boss, we must proceed with the K120 upgrade project. Otherwise, there will be no engines available for future heavy rockets!"

The moment they learned the company’s funds had been replenished, Guo Shen and another system engineer came knocking.

Their objective, of course, was what any scientific research institution always sought: funding.

When funding was ample, play poor; when it was manageable, clamor for it; when it was scarce, camp out at the leader’s home and refuse to leave. These were the norms for the heads of Chinese scientific research institutions.

Lin Ju, when calculating the budget, only considered the main mission and a few profitable projects. It wasn’t that he wasn’t interested in long-term investment, but that it really cost a lot!

System Research Institute approaches funding by approving budgets in reality, then some miraculous force ensures every penny is well spent, although this didn’t come cheap.

The system engineers were very confident. With ample resources at their disposal, they would spontaneously plan various projects.

Such as developing a new high-thrust kerosene-liquid oxygen engine based on the K120, high-specific-impulse hydrogen-oxygen engines, large-thrust solid rocket engines, super-large diameter rocket bodies and fuel tanks, common bulkhead tanks, and glide-autonomous rocket recovery...

Just the project names alone spanned several pages, and they had convincingly justifiable answers for each, making you feel their necessity.

This was the ease of insiders bamboozling outsiders; you would find their reasoning sound and naturally trust the professionals.

Lin was no different. Within just a few minutes, he was convinced that not developing new engines meant ruining the future, so he signed off: funds -10 million yuan, scientific project +1.