ctOS

Chicago's industry was highly developed and diverse, making it an excellent place to establish a branch office.

Harry had always wanted to find somewhere to expand the company and move some of its production capacity outside New York, so the Battle of New York would not have too great an impact on the company.

Previously, he had lacked the means to control places too far away, but now, as long as he laid down the power grid, Leining could control the entire area.

That was why he had always been curious about what exactly was wrong with Chicago that they refused to allow the power grid to be installed.

"Mr. Osborn, thank you for coming to Chicago. There are many opportunities here, and many people would like to meet with you."

The one receiving Harry was the mayor, a bloated fat man.

Harry had taken his words as background noise—the man had been going on from the moment they met about who wanted to meet Harry for talks and where banquets would be held, leaving him rather irritated.

Sitting in the car, Harry suddenly spotted a futuristic-looking advertisement on a billboard across the street.

"...CtOS. Connecting everything, embracing intelligent living, making the world a better place."

The advertisement suddenly distorted the next second—

Screech—

The piercing sound of tires skidding across the pavement made everyone's hearts tense. A blue car slammed into a white sedan, and the lights at the intersection suddenly began flashing. Traffic that had been orderly just seconds ago descended into chaos, and a multi-car pileup unfolded right before Harry's eyes!

Amid the chaos, a blood-covered man crawled out of the white sedan that had been hit first, his face filled with panic—

Then another man stepped out of the blue car. He wore a baseball cap, had a black scarf wrapped around his face, and held a pistol in his hand...

Bang!

The man had murdered someone in broad daylight, right in the street!

Amid the chaos, the man in the baseball cap walked over to glance at the body, then immediately stole a motorcycle and vanished into the disorder.

"What is going on?! Get the police—" Donald was clearly panicking. After shouting a few words at the people in the front seats, he hurriedly turned to Harry, intending to explain himself.

But he saw Harry smiling, his expression impossible to read.

"Every city has absurd criminals. I can understand that much, Mayor Donald." Harry indicated that he would not be frightened. "But... is this ctOS system really as impressive as the advertisement claims?"

At that, Donald's face immediately flushed with excitement.

"Of course! Is Mr. Osborn interested in it?"

"Interested." He was far more than interested. "It is a great invention."

[Abnormal project discovered: ctOS (from the Watchdog series)]

[Description: A super central control system integrating surveillance, the Internet of Things, data analysis and prediction, targeted recommendations, and other functions. To its owner, a city is a giant movable toy.]

[Control or destroy ctOS to obtain one technology]

"Yeah, I also think it is an extremely great invention!" At the mention of it, Mayor Donald beamed.

It was by relying on this system and its master that he had turned the tide and secured his position as Chicago's mayor.

As he spoke, Donald hurriedly tapped at his phone a few times and instructed the control room to clear a route for the convoy.

The street, which had just been in complete chaos, actually began slowly opening up a path for Harry. Like Moses parting the Red Sea, ctOS parted the traffic for him.

And Harry knew that this system could do far more than that.

As long as a device was connected to the internet—indeed, with ctOS's rollout, nearly every device in Chicago had been networked. Even the heating valves by the roadside and the drawbridges connecting the city could all be operated in real time.

And using ctOS as a foundation, its developers had also created a data prediction system called "Bellwether," used to predict all kinds of data, including lottery results, stock trends, and even each person's probability of committing a crime.

More than that, it could continuously push information to subtly suggest and guide you into doing what it wanted you to do.

For example, if it wanted you to divorce your husband, it would send you articles on how to test whether your husband was cheating, what signs indicated infidelity, and even how a woman could obtain more property after a divorce. The reverse worked as well.

With this system's assistance and the manipulation of the person behind the scenes, Donald had successfully reversed his fortunes and been elected mayor of Chicago.

And once Bellwether successfully predicted Donald's election, promoting it became much easier. The more data it had, the more it could do. It was easy to imagine just how much power this system would eventually possess.

It bore a striking resemblance to how Hydra had used Dr. Zola to monitor the world after World War II.

"A remarkable system. The person who developed it must be a genius. Perhaps I should find time to meet him."

"That would be wonderful! Actually, their investors also want to meet with you."

Harry smiled. The people Donald wanted to introduce to him were not the development team, but the "investors"—in other words, Donald's puppet master, Quinn, a highly powerful Gang boss.

But Harry had no interest in Quinn. If things went smoothly, he could resolve this matter without even meeting him.

"Still... there are always some people who are not very smart and insist on resisting progress," Donald said with a sigh.

"Oh? That really is foolish. Who are they?"

"A hacker organization called DedSec. They insist that we are violating citizens' privacy rights. It is utterly ridiculous!"

"Hmm... this system does indeed have that capability, so their concerns are not entirely unreasonable. But I trust you are not that kind of person, right?"

"Of course not. It would be one thing if they only opposed the rollout of ctOS, but now they have been obstructing your company's project at every turn. Last week, they even openly blocked construction at the site!"

Harry now understood what trouble Max had been referring to.

Presumably, those hackers believed Osborn and Quinn, the man behind ctOS, were working together. Or perhaps someone had made them believe that he and Quinn were allies.

But Harry really was not on Quinn's side. He had never liked working with Gangsters.

Even if this Gang had propped up the mayor as a puppet, it made no difference.

"Hmm... I think I understand where the problem lies."

Solving this would be simple: replace the mayor and take Quinn down.

That was also what Aiden Pearce, the protagonist of the original story, had done. All Harry needed to do now was fund the original protagonist's group, then recruit them to work for him.

After returning home, Harry saw Donald off, then called Heli.

"Heli, look into Bloom Company for me. It should be an emerging tech company. Roughly how much would it cost to buy it?"

"What? Fine, you really are a willful CEO. I'll look into it..."

Just then, Leining informed Harry that something abnormal was happening with his phone—someone was trying to hack into it.

Harry smiled and had Leining block the intrusion.

"It's an emerging information company, with most of its operations centered in Chicago. They don't seem short on money, but I think you should take note of something:"

"Hmm... this company seems to be involved in a lot of controversies. A hacker group has accused them of using illegal means to monitor citizens' privacy... and..." Heli paused.

"They're paying high salaries to hire mercenaries with shady backgrounds to guard their facilities. Are you sure you want to buy them?"

"Then find out which mercenaries they've hired and offer them better contracts. Also, look into private military contractors near Chicago. I want to hire a few armed squads."

Taking it down would work too. CtOS was his no matter what.