Report

While Qi Sheng monitored the Test Tower's operations.

Real World, Human Federation Star Network Security Center.

Beep!

"Verification passed!"

An electronic prompt rang out, and the metal doors slid into the walls.

Ding Xiu walked into the office and sat down at the computer desk.

Watching the number of online reports steadily climb on the right, he couldn't help sighing.

Just then, the projector on the ceiling started automatically. Its beams converged in front of the desk, forming a holographic projection of a robot.

"Artificial Intelligence Xiao A at your service. You have 328 online reports awaiting review. Of these, 227 have been marked for AI processing, and Xiao A will handle them. The remaining 101 could not be accurately assessed after searching and reviewing their contents, so you will need to analyze and resolve them yourself."

Ignoring the AI assistant, Ding Xiu pressed the blue button on the desk. More beams streamed down from the ceiling projector, forming a virtual workstation around him.

Countless blue and white dots of light revolved slowly around him.

"Let's get to work!"

He pulled himself together and quickly settled into work, clicking on one of the white dots hovering around him. It contained a report.

After AI screening, the reports presented to him all required his personal attention. He had to decide whether to forward them to local law enforcement or pass them to the internal regulatory bodies of other races.

After reviewing four reports in a row, Ding Xiu clicked on another white dot.

A virtual screen materialized in front of him, displaying the detailed report:

Reporter: Games Are Art

Verified identity: Wang Xuexi (identity code: ...)

Report:

An online scammer in a group chat has been spreading a fake phishing link, claiming it can download the latest virtual reality game released by the Moon Eclipse Clan, Dark Land...

(Attached: screenshot of group chat)

(Attached: screenshot of the poster's online ID information)

Ding Xiu was surprised when he saw the report.

It was obviously fake. He didn't even need to open the link to know that.

The Moon Eclipse Clan's games from years ago didn't even have cracked versions, let alone Dark Land, which had only recently been released and used more advanced security technology.

That was exactly why it seemed strange.

AI should have been able to handle this kind of report on its own. Why had it been passed to him for manual verification?

"Xiao A, why didn't you handle this report?"

In response, the AI assistant Xiao A, who had been sitting motionless on the desk, stood up and pointed at the report in front of him.

"We need to thoroughly check every report and verify its contents before making a decision. But I couldn't find any useful information in the evidence provided here, so I couldn't investigate further."

Xiao A's explanation only made Ding Xiu more confused.

"Why couldn't you investigate further?"

"There are three reasons. First, I searched for 'Welfare Officer,' who was mentioned in the report. I found online information about this person, but the account had no verification details, and I couldn't find its IP address or registered location... In other words, this account was created without identity verification. There are no such cases in my database, so this presents a logical error that I cannot comprehend."

"Second, I followed the reported link to look for other clues and found that it had a problem too. I couldn't get past the permissions behind it... This is the feedback I received."

As Xiao A finished speaking, the information on the light screen in front of Ding Xiu changed.

A notification appeared on the projected screen:

[Download limit reached. The poster has not enabled new download permissions. Unable to continue downloading.]

A humanlike look of confusion appeared on Xiao A's face.

"My permissions are classified as Level A for processing Human Federation network information. I can only not access Level S information set by the intelligent mainframes of individual cities and the Federation's main AI. I'm authorized to bypass authentication and review all other records, so I can only mark the link check as failed."

"Finally, I checked Welfare Officer's online activity but couldn't find any traceable information, including which group chats he posted the download link in. I couldn't access any specifics."

"To sum up, under Article 238 of the AI Brain Regulations, an AI must verify all information before handling a case independently. Since I couldn't further verify any of these three leads, I marked the investigation as failed and referred it for manual review."

After hearing Xiao A's explanation, Ding Xiu realized that the report, though seemingly fake at first glance, was far more complicated than he'd thought.

He immediately followed Xiao A's approach and rechecked the poster's identity, the link information, and the IP address.

The results were just as Xiao A had said: he couldn't find anything useful.

"Could it be the Moon Eclipse Clan?"

Faced with such a bizarre problem, the first thing Ding Xiu thought of was the Moon Eclipse Clan.

The intelligent mainframes in Human Federation cities and the Federation's main AI had been created with the Moon Eclipse Clan's help.

The Star Network, which connected humanity with the various factions that had fled to Earth, had also been built with the Moon Eclipse Clan's technical support. Only the Moon Eclipse Clan possessed the highest permissions needed to freely access the networks of other races.

The Human Federation had worried about this in the past, fearing that connecting to the Star Network would create a security risk and leave humanity's secrets exposed to the Moon Eclipse Clan.

But that concern had been dismissed during a debate in the Federation's highest council.

The reason was simple. Someone at the meeting had asked:

"Let me ask the city administrators and Federation lawmakers here: given the Moon Eclipse Clan's level of technology, if they really wanted to do something to humanity, what chance would we have of successfully resisting?"

That question silenced the protesters at the meeting.

The truth was that humanity would be powerless to resist if the Moon Eclipse Clan wanted to invade Earth.

In all their years of contact, the Moon Eclipse Clan had never shown the slightest hostility toward humanity. They had even offered all kinds of technological support.

Connecting to the Star Network created by the Moon Eclipse Clan would give the Human Federation access to a vast amount of technology stored there, providing an enormous boost to its development.

In the end, the meeting voted to connect the Human Federation to the Star Network and ask the Moon Eclipse Clan for help building intelligent mainframes for the Federation's cities and a central mainframe.

Thus, the Moon Eclipse Clan's intelligent mainframe had the highest network permissions, above those of every other race.

Only the Moon Eclipse Clan's super mainframe could set information on the Star Network to be absolutely confidential, bypass other races' intelligent mainframes, and approve registrations without identity verification.

Thinking of this, Ding Xiu's expression turned strange.

Would the Moon Eclipse Clan's highest-ranking leaders, who controlled the super mainframe, really create an unverified online identity just to post a prank link on the Human Federation's network?

That theory was absurd.

But apart from the Moon Eclipse Clan, he couldn't think of any other possibility.

To find out who Welfare Officer was, Ding Xiu forwarded the report to the head of the Network Security Group.

After explaining the reasons in detail over the phone, he put it out of his mind and went back to reviewing other reports.

Ten minutes later, the group leader, Yue Dong, appeared beside him as a three-dimensional projection.

"Ding Xiu, I've reported your findings to the Federation's main AI. It says it has never approved any unverified account registrations, so Welfare Officer is probably a high-ranking member of the Moon Eclipse Clan."

"So it really is the Moon Eclipse Clan?" Ding Xiu furrowed his brow.

"Only the Moon Eclipse Clan has the Star Network's highest permissions, which can bypass the Federation's main AI. After analyzing Welfare Officer's strange behavior, the Federation's main AI came up with twelve possibilities."

"The first possibility is that something has gone wrong within the Moon Eclipse Clan's leadership, and one of its members stole the Dark Land database and spread a cracked version on the Human Federation's network."

"The second is that it's just a prank by the Moon Eclipse Clan's leadership, and there's no cracked game behind the link at all."

"The third possibility..."

Yue Dong fell silent for a moment, then continued.

"But none of these twelve theories can fully explain Welfare Officer's bewildering behavior."

"The biggest problem is that the Federation's AI can't track Welfare Officer's online activity, including which group chats he posted the link in. It can't download anything through the link either, so we can't tell whether there's really a game behind it."

"Ding Xiu, I'm assigning you a task. Monitor this link in real time and watch for any chance that its download permissions might be enabled again."

After hearing his group leader's instructions, Ding Xiu nodded at once.

"Understood. I'll keep an eye out for any changes to the closed download link's permissions."

The group leader's projection faded. Ding Xiu turned to Xiao A, still sitting motionless on the desk.

"Xiao A, monitor the link for me in real time. Report any changes."

Xiao A looked up, its face wearing a humanlike expression of bewilderment.

"I don't have permission to access the link, so I can't monitor it in depth."

"You don't need to check whether the download permissions behind the link have been enabled. I want you to click the download button a hundred thousand times per second, nonstop, twenty-four hours a day. Since we don't have permission, we'll keep connecting at high frequency and wait for a chance that it might be enabled."

"Understood!" Xiao A nodded.

At the same time, Xiao A began making high-frequency connection attempts.

In Emperor's Tomb Village, Qi Sheng received a notification from Guidance that an intelligent AI was making high-frequency access requests to the Challenger System.

Qi Sheng realized that his method of recruiting players had probably drawn the attention of the Human Federation's network security agency, perhaps even the Federation's highest-ranking officials.

He had no intention of doing anything about it.

As the number of Monster World players continued to grow, the truth would inevitably come out one day.

He wasn't worried about being exposed. He only wanted to delay the moment.

And the various factions on Earth couldn't stop the number of Monster World players from growing.

That was because Guidance had already easily infiltrated and taken control of the Star Network's highest permissions, set up by the Moon Eclipse Clan.