King

As Zhan Fei agonized over his circumstances, inside a business office building in the center of Shangdu City, a stern-faced man in a suit stared fixedly at his computer.

Unlike the disheveled Zhan Fei, the man sat in a spacious office, his fists braced against the desk, the expensive face of a watch faintly visible beneath his cuff.

The gleaming obsidian floor, the brilliantly lit floor-to-ceiling windows behind him, and the bustling traffic outside all spoke of the man's extraordinary status.

Yet this man, who exuded an air of luxury, had an exceedingly rustic name.

Guo Dazhuang.

At that moment, Guo Dazhuang's brows were tightly furrowed. Not even the newly hired young female secretary, dressed in a white blouse and black stockings with her collar unbuttoned nearly to her waist, could stir the slightest interest in him.

Because early that morning, he had received an email.

The email contained a translation software program that had never been released. As an elite of the IT industry, he had seen its potential at a glance.

It was no exaggeration to say that any company possessing this software alone could become a technological empire far surpassing its current achievements.

But why would someone send such a revolutionary product to him?

Just as he was puzzling over it, Guo Dazhuang received another phone call.

The caller was someone who called himself X. Although he used a childlike voice, what he said was anything but pleasant.

The other party had actually threatened him using his identity on the Dark Web.

That was right. Guo Dazhuang's name in the hacker world was King.

King meant sovereign or monarch, and just like the name suggested, King himself was an extremely terrifying figure among hackers.

As one of the higher-ups in Anonymous, the world's largest hacker organization, King had launched more than a dozen internet-wide attacks, including attacks on Sony's website, support for WikiLeaks, and even a declaration of war against the ISIS terrorist organization.

King had even infiltrated the North American Zone Department of Defense database alone and obtained information worth tens of millions of dollars. The North American Zone Department of Defense did not learn of it until after the information had been completely purchased by buyers.

Many people online had speculated that King might be from the North Sea Continent, Oceania, or even the Sand Continent.

But no one knew that King was actually a genuine native of the Central Continent Region.

Although Guo Dazhuang had never done anything outrageously criminal in the Central Continent Region under the identity of King, one had to remember that the North American Zone still had a five-million-dollar bounty on his head.

If his identity were exposed, it would definitely be a huge problem.

Still, if the other party thought he could make him submit with just that, they were underestimating him too much.

Guo Dazhuang snorted coldly. From their previous conversation, he had learned that the other party wanted him to invest in a company called "Blacklight Biotechnology." That was his opening.

With that thought, Guo Dazhuang immediately put his skills to work. He easily hacked into the government's official website and followed the trail to find all the information on the company's legal representative.

"Chen Chen? School of Life Sciences at Shangdu University of Communications? Nineteen years old?"

That easy?

Looking at the young man's information on the computer, Guo Dazhuang fell into thought.

Something was wrong! Very wrong!

The other party could not possibly have failed to realize that once he knew even a little information, he could dig up everything about them. So what was the purpose of directly giving him the company's name?

Guo Dazhuang frowned deeply when a light knock suddenly came from the office door.

"Come in."

Guo Dazhuang spoke flatly.

"Boss, it's time for today's meeting."

The new secretary pushed open the door and walked to the desk, speaking softly.

"Notify everyone that today's regular meeting is canceled."

Guo Dazhuang said it without a second thought. He had no mind for meetings right now.

"Understood, Boss. Then you mean..." The secretary bit her lip and moved as though she wanted to walk around the desk toward him.

Generally speaking, there was only one reason for canceling a regular meeting, and that was...

Seeing the secretary preparing to circle around the desk, Guo Dazhuang's heart clenched. He turned the monitor away to prevent her from seeing the screen and shouted sternly:

"Get out!"

"Yes..."

The secretary froze, then her face turned pale as she hurriedly backed out.

By the time Guo Dazhuang came to his senses, he realized he had lost his composure. His once-unruffled state of mind had been utterly destroyed by the person called X.

But now was not the time to dwell on that. Guo Dazhuang stared at the photograph on the screen for a long time without speaking.

"It must be a decoy."

Guo Dazhuang sneered inwardly. "The other party couldn't possibly let me uncover his identity so easily. In other words, this Chen Chen is merely a cover as well."

With that thought, Guo Dazhuang closed the webpage and began tracing the anonymous email address.

But before he could find anything, the fax machine beside him suddenly started operating on its own.

At first, Guo Dazhuang paid it no mind, assuming the secretary had sent him something. But when the contents emerging from the fax machine were only halfway out, his hands suddenly stopped moving.

What came out of the fax machine was not some ordinary document, but a file.

A file on King.

It contained detailed records of all his illegally obtained money and anonymous accounts. Guo Dazhuang had no idea how the other party had done it, but if this file ended up in the hands of any government, he would be in serious trouble.

At the sight of it, Guo Dazhuang panicked completely.

"What's going on? When did he hack into my work computer?"

Guo Dazhuang immediately began using software he had written himself to inspect every corner of the computer, but no matter what he did, he found no trace of a Trojan or virus.

Besides, even if someone had broken into his computer, how could they have obtained such detailed information?

"Creak, creak, creak..."

The fax machine was still running nonstop, spitting out sheet after sheet of paper. The sound threw him into a frenzy. Guo Dazhuang clenched his teeth and suddenly yanked out the fax machine's power cord.

Only then did that irritating sound finally stop.

Huff. Guo Dazhuang let out a long breath.

But before he could calm himself down, his printer suddenly started up as well.

Guo Dazhuang swore that he had not used the printer once since coming to work that day. Yet now, the printer before him seemed to have come alive, printing all by itself!

Guo Dazhuang stared fixedly at the printer, watching A4 sheets slide out one after another. He felt cold to the very marrow.

Printed on the pages was the image of a man sitting at his desk.

Because they were black-and-white prints, the pages came out quickly, one after another. If they were lined up, they could even form a flipbook animation. But Guo Dazhuang recognized the man on the paper at once—it was him!

And judging from the angle of the printouts, it was the feed from one of the two surveillance cameras in the office.

The other party had completely taken over the company network.

Guo Dazhuang understood. This was a warning: his attempt to track them down just now had been completely discovered...