(Thanks to Snow Night 1995 for the donation.)
Late at night, Li Zhou was sleeping soundly, while some netizens were already arguing fiercely with people overseas.
Everyone claimed the other side's hackers had attacked their country, causing widespread network disruptions and preventing normal internet access. Worse still, American netizens openly cursed Xia Country for secretly developing cyber weapons.
Meanwhile, Yuan Jingsong sat in a helicopter, staring blankly into the night outside. This network disruption had clearly been caused by Li Zhou. Two minutes of severe network instability had had an enormous impact. Even Yuan Jingsong had never seen a disruption on such a massive scale. He was starting to believe the Americans' speculation—perhaps Li Zhou really was developing cyber weapons.
If Li Zhou had been developing cyber weapons, Yuan Jingsong would not have been overly worried. What concerned him most at this moment was Li Zhou's previous claim that he had made a breakthrough in Artificial Intelligence. This network disruption was highly likely to have been caused by Li Zhou's Artificial Intelligence going out of control. If that was really the case, then this was serious.
Who could guarantee that an out-of-control Artificial Intelligence would not become humanity's enemy, like in the movies, with the goal of wiping out mankind? That was why Yuan Jingsong had rushed over by plane in the middle of the night after being unable to reach Li Zhou by phone.
At three in the morning, when Yuan Jingsong arrived at Li Zhou's home, he found security equipment everywhere around Li Zhou's new house.
Yuan Jingsong stood at the entrance for a while before seeing Zhou Song hurrying over from the courtyard, opening the door while putting on his clothes.
Keeping his voice down, Zhou Song asked softly, "Squad leader, why are you here in the middle of the night?"
After entering the courtyard, Yuan Jingsong directly asked where Li Zhou was.
"Where's Li Zhou? I need to see him urgently!"
Zhou Song was somewhat baffled. Why had the squad leader suddenly come looking for the boss in the middle of the night, and with some urgent matter at that?
"The boss is already asleep. I'll go wake him up right away."
Zhou Song had just been about to head upstairs to wake his boss when Yuan Jingsong stopped him.
Yuan Jingsong stared intently at Zhou Song.
"Did your boss do anything unusual last night?"
"Unusual? No. He came back and went straight to sleep. Hmm! He did look a little tired, though. Kind of worn out."
Zhou Song's eyes suddenly widened. No way! No way! What had the boss been doing underground?!
For some reason, hearing that Li Zhou had gone straight to sleep actually put Yuan Jingsong at ease.
"I'll go with you."
Li Zhou was sleeping soundly when, in his haze, he felt someone shaking him.
Who was it? Who was trying to assassinate me?! Guards! Hurry, guards! Protect me! Protect me!
The moment Li Zhou groggily opened his eyes, he saw a pair of wide eyes staring fixedly at him.
Li Zhou jolted in fright and instinctively kicked out.
"Fuck!"
After kicking out, Li Zhou sprang straight up on the bed and pressed himself against the wall.
Li Zhou, who had kicked through the wooden bedframe, quickly switched on the bedside lamp.
The instant the light came on, Li Zhou saw Zhou Song and Yuan Jingsong, who was clutching his chest, staring at him in shock.
We were just waking you up. Were you serious about all that?
During that awkward moment when the three stared at one another, Li Zhou's parents and several security guards had already switched on every light in the villa and rushed into Li Zhou's room.
When Li Zhou's parents saw Yuan Jingsong in the room, they exchanged a glance and, with perfect mutual understanding, turned around and left.
Once only Li Zhou, Yuan Jingsong, and Zhou Song remained in the room again, Li Zhou tugged at his blanket, leaned against the wall, and forced a smile at Yuan Jingsong.
"Old Yuan, you could've let me know before coming. Showing up in the middle of the night is terrifying."
Yuan Jingsong stared expressionlessly at Li Zhou. I'm not saying anything.
Li Zhou's scalp prickled under Yuan Jingsong's stare. He gave an awkward smile, knowing the man had come over because of last night's incident. It seemed he had underestimated the impact of those two minutes.
"Old Yuan, so you found out."
"Heh! The entire internet experienced network disruptions for two whole minutes, and the source was your company's headquarters. Why do you think I came looking for you in the middle of the night?"
Seeing Yuan Jingsong speak, Li Zhou knew things were not too bad yet.
Yuan Jingsong asked Li Zhou solemnly, "Tell me honestly, what exactly happened? The USA is already accusing us of secretly developing cyber weapons. Even if we deny it, there's nothing they can do to us, but the fact that the two-minute network disruption originated from our country cannot be denied!"
Li Zhou scratched at the hair he had been too exhausted to wash last night and replied embarrassedly, "I was running a test last night. I knew there would be some network disruption, but I really didn't expect it to be this severe."
"Were you really developing cyber weapons?"
Li Zhou shook his head, then nodded. Artificial Intelligence was the god of the internet. If its purpose was destruction, then calling it a cyber weapon would not be wrong.
"It's not a cyber weapon, but it's stronger than one!"
Before Yuan Jingsong could react, Li Zhou quickly jumped out of bed and put on a pair of shorts.
"Come on. I'll take you to headquarters, and you'll understand."
Li Zhou's new home was less than a thousand meters from the company headquarters.
Li Zhou, Yuan Jingsong, and Zhou Song reached the company entrance in five minutes.
The three remained silent the entire way.
Zhou Song was caught in the middle and knew nothing, so he did not dare make a sound.
Li Zhou was somewhat embarrassed.
Yuan Jingsong, meanwhile, was in a grave mood.
After taking the elevator from the first floor down to the tenth basement level, Li Zhou led Yuan Jingsong and Zhou Song to the elevator leading to the lowest ten floors.
Li Zhou turned to Zhou Song. "Old Zhou, stay here and keep watch. Old Yuan and I are going down for a bit."
Zhou Song nodded and turned around to stand guard at the elevator entrance.
Li Zhou glanced at the camera by the elevator and winked at it.
The next second, the elevator doors opened automatically.
Preoccupied with his thoughts, Yuan Jingsong did not notice this detail at all.
But once they entered the elevator, Yuan Jingsong sensed something wrong. There was not a single button inside! Yet as soon as he and Li Zhou entered and the doors closed, the elevator began moving.
He had seen the construction plans for Future Technology's headquarters. There were still ten floors below this level!
Five seconds later, the elevator came to a smooth stop. Yuan Jingsong glanced at the display inside the elevator, which showed that they were now on B20.
The moment Li Zhou led Yuan Jingsong out of the elevator, every light on B20 lit up one after another.
"Welcome back, Boss."
Weixi's surround-sound voice boomed beside Yuan Jingsong's ears like thunder.
Yuan Jingsong looked at Li Zhou in utter shock, as if asking, Is this Artificial Intelligence?
Li Zhou turned back and smiled confidently at Yuan Jingsong. As he walked toward the laboratory where Weixi's main body was located, he called out into the empty hall.
"Weixi, introduce yourself to Old Yuan."
The next second, beams of laser light shot out from every direction. This was the still-immature air laser projection technology.
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