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"Finally, I can be independent."

In the end, Huang Ji boarded the train to Magic City.

Although school did not start until September, Fan Lingli and Zheng Xuan had to return to work that week, so the three of them traveled to Magic City together on April 12.

Since he was going to attend school, they thought he should get used to life in YC City sooner rather than later. They believed Huang Ji probably still lacked some basic social knowledge, so they planned to have him spend four months in Magic City to familiarize himself with things.

Huang Ji wholeheartedly agreed. He had never come to attend school in the first place. He simply wanted to get out into the world.

"Let Huang Ji stay with you. You have so much free time anyway, so teach him a few things," Fan Lingli said.

"Well..." Zheng Xuan hesitated. His real profession was hacking. Although Huang Ji had a mild intellectual disability, he still felt that living with him would be inconvenient.

"Let's rent him a separate place."

Fan Lingli shook her head. "What? You promised his grandfather you'd take good care of him, and now you don't want to bother?"

"Can't we just rent the place across the hall? I promise I'll take good care of him," Zheng Xuan said awkwardly.

Fan Lingli narrowed her eyes. "What's the problem? It's not like I've never been to your place. Got some treasure hidden there? Or are you planning to bring other women over and think he'd get in the way?"

"Of course not! My place is just too small. Fine, I'll stop arguing. Leave him to me, all right?" Zheng Xuan said.

"His grandfather entrusted him to us, along with the money. You'd better take this seriously!" Fan Lingli said.

"Don't worry," Zheng Xuan said, patting his chest.

Fan Lingli nodded. She was usually busy with work, whereas Zheng Xuan's job was relatively undemanding and left him plenty of time off, so it was best to leave Huang Ji in his care for now.

Only after Zheng Xuan promised to take it seriously did she feel reassured.

Once they arrived in Magic City, the two took Huang Ji out for a meal, then helped him buy a phone and various everyday necessities.

Afterward, Zheng Xuan took him home.

As soon as Zheng Xuan returned, he called the landlord and rented Huang Ji a room across the hall.

That way, he and Huang Ji could live separately, each with his own private space.

He did not explain his actions, but Huang Ji understood perfectly.

He simply did not want anyone watching when he did certain things. Zheng Xuan had his secrets, and so did Huang Ji. This arrangement suited him just fine.

"You noticed that home-style restaurant downstairs, right? I usually have them deliver my meals. You can do that too. Just put it on my tab. But you'd better not wander around. Just come over to my place at mealtimes and eat with me."

Zheng Xuan rambled on. After listening, Huang Ji said, "I saw a Xinhua Bookstore on the way up. I'd like to go read some books."

"Sure. I'll go with you." Zheng Xuan took him downstairs.

The apartment building stood right beside the street, with restaurants, bookstores, supermarkets, and everything else nearby.

When they reached the bookstore, Huang Ji picked up a copy of Ten Thousand Whys and began reading.

Zheng Xuan smiled and pulled out a book on economics to browse.

Half an hour later, however, he had run out of patience. Looking at Huang Ji again, he found that he had not moved at all, as though he were completely immersed in an ocean of knowledge.

How is that a short attention span? His patience is actually better than most people's, Zheng Xuan thought. Of course, he could not rule out the possibility that Huang Ji was simply spacing out...

Zheng Xuan looked around and paced back and forth, having lost his own ability to sit still.

He was getting very impatient, but could not bring himself to rush Huang Ji. He merely said, "Just buy whatever books you like and read them at home."

Seeing this, Huang Ji smiled. "I don't know what I like yet..."

"If you have something to do, Xuan, go ahead. I'll be fine on my own."

Since he had said that and was behaving so well, he did not seem likely to wander off. After some thought, Zheng Xuan nodded. "Then I'll head upstairs first. Remember to come back for dinner. Actually, never mind. I'll come down to get you."

Huang Ji nodded. Zheng Xuan gave him a few more reminders, then left.

After watching Zheng Xuan return to the apartment building, Huang Ji put down the book and walked straight out of the bookstore.

He went to the subway station, studied the route map, then bought a ticket and boarded without a hitch.

Never in his wildest dreams would Zheng Xuan have imagined that Huang Ji would simply leave on the subway.

Magic City mail sorting and transfer station.

Huang Ji needed to check whether his money had arrived.

Before leaving his hometown, Huang Ji had used a few tricks to send the box ahead of him, addressed to the home of one of Zheng Xuan's friends.

Of course, Huang Ji would not actually let those three million yuan reach a stranger's home.

He only needed to collect the parcel himself with his ID before it was sent out for delivery.

Even if he missed it, though, it would not matter. The ID number of Zheng Xuan's friend would not match, so he could not collect the box. Eventually, the parcel would be returned and spend some more time at this transfer station, giving Huang Ji another chance.

All Huang Ji had to do now was come straight to the transfer station and collect the box of money before it reached its designated destination.

"That was fast. It's already here."

After confirming that his parcel had arrived, Huang Ji immediately collected it.

The box weighed thirty-five kilograms and was too cumbersome to carry, so Huang Ji hailed a taxi to transport it.

Of course, he did not take it back to Zheng Xuan's apartment building. Instead, he headed to a high-rise apartment building in Magic City's eastern suburbs, where he had already arranged to meet the landlord for a viewing.

Huang Ji had no intention of pinching pennies. In no time, he paid cash to rent an apartment with four bedrooms and two living rooms.

Inside, he opened the box, took out two hundred thousand yuan, and put it in his backpack before heading out to shop nearby.

His main purchase was a computer. Through Zheng Xuan, Huang Ji had already learned how useful these things were. This was the internet age.

He bought a computer with exactly the same specifications as Zheng Xuan's setup, arranged for fiber-optic internet service, and added a multifunction printer.

After seeing off the young man who had helped install the printer, Huang Ji gazed at the computer with a smile.

There really is a difference between theory and practice...

Huang Ji sat eagerly at the computer, handling the mouse with stiff, awkward movements.

He had never touched one before. Although he had gained a basic understanding of computers through Zheng Xuan, he was still a complete beginner when it came to actually using one.

With a browser, I can visit thousands of web portals. I can also use powerful search engines to find what I need. Wonderful...

Like anyone experiencing the internet for the first time, Huang Ji browsed with a sense of novelty and excitement.

News recommendations, other people's comments, and any text that caught his interest—he did not want to miss any of it.

For Huang Ji, however, there was something even more extraordinary: he could see through the surface information online to the vast amounts of hidden information behind it!

Whoa, there's too much information...

The moment he probed a little deeper, Huang Ji felt dizzy and overwhelmed. He hurriedly blocked most of it out again.

I'll explore more deeply when I find something interesting.

Huang Ji opened Du Niang and typed "aliens," entering the pinyin one syllable at a time.

However, the results were either movies, company names, or electronic products.

Unable to find what he wanted, Huang Ji thought for a moment, then added "moon" after "aliens."

This finally brought up some claims about the real world, such as "Aliens on the far side of the moon," "America's moon landing astronauts saw a UFO," and "A base on the far side of the moon houses alien spacecraft."

All sorts of UFO enthusiasts discussed these subjects on their own forums or on Baidu Tieba.

Huang Ji read with interest. All of this was new to him; he had never seen anything like it.

So many people believe in aliens, just like me. They don't have my ability, yet they can confirm the existence of aliens from scattered clues.

Aliens have been among us all along? Yes, he's absolutely right!

An alien base on the moon? The one I know about is inside it, not on the surface, but perhaps there was one on the surface too. So America's astronauts have already seen it? But... why was this never mentioned at school?

Huang Ji quickly found the original poster who had made that claim on Baidu Tieba and looked at the account's username.

Na Mei Ke Jin Ren?

Huang Ji blinked, and information about the username immediately flooded his mind.

The registration location and ID used, the current IP address, the login account, previous passwords, the active password...

Even whether the account was currently online, which posts it had made, what it had browsed, every login time, and the contents of all its private messages—read, unread, saved, or deleted...

Notably, all of this was true information, regardless of whether the website's servers had any record of it.

Whether a post had been deleted or not, Huang Ji could perceive it. Even content the website's own company could no longer retrieve was accessible to him, as long as this account named "Na Mei Ke Jin Ren" had once posted or viewed it!

Huang Ji even knew that this person was currently online at a place called the Star Diamond Internet Cafe in Jin Men... seated at computer 112, with fifteen yuan of credit remaining.

In fact, this fellow called "Na Mei Ke Jin Ren" had not registered the account with his own real ID at all. He had simply found someone else's ID number online.

When Huang Ji perceived the person's true identity, he could tell that the ID used for registration did not match the "actual account owner" at all.

The information I perceive exists somewhere unseen... or is it simply part of the universe itself? It doesn't need any physical medium in reality to store it...

He didn't register under his real identity at all, yet I can still find it... If I were a security expert, every hacker in the world could end up in prison...

By perceiving Zheng Xuan, Huang Ji had learned something about a hacker's work. At least, he understood Zheng Xuan's work: he had once hacked into the personal computer of the president of Wall Securities Company on Wall Street in America and obtained evidence of the man's "financial fraud." With the simple threat, "I'm very close with the FBI," Zheng Xuan had easily extorted a million US dollars.

That was where the money in his American Morgan Bank account had come from. Of course, timing mattered too. Since the supposed Wall Street tycoon had dirty hands himself, he had chosen to pay to make the trouble go away. He had not dared pursue the matter seriously, making only a token effort to trace the hacker who had blackmailed him.

After all, it was only a million. If the FBI obtained the evidence and brought charges, his legal fees alone would exceed that amount. If convicted, he would face a fine fifty times that size, along with prison time.

With technical skills at one's disposal, making money really was that easy.

Of course, Zheng Xuan had not withdrawn the money. The annual interest alone was enough to support his outwardly ordinary life in Magic City.

All of this depended on technical ability. Without solid skills, an easy mark could turn into a vicious wolf.

Now, on his first-ever visit to the internet, Huang Ji could learn someone's true identity merely by looking at their account, and even know where they were accessing the internet...

Through any of a person's online accounts, he could learn their location as long as they were online. Even if they were offline, he could still learn where they had last logged in...

This probably was not limited to ordinary accounts. It likely included anonymous signatures left behind by hackers during intrusions.

Even in the most extreme case, if a hacker left nothing behind at all, as long as they sent a single sentence over the internet—or even one letter—for him to see...

Huang Ji could still know who had sent that information...

Without a doubt, he realized that he was every hacker's nemesis.

Online anonymity? Disguised information? Erased traces? Compromised machines used as proxies? None of it meant anything.

P.S. Sorry.