The Blooming Flower of Virus

"Also, Boss, the development of our new virus is nearing completion. Soon, we'll be able to make a killing with it."

"About that, how are we going to utilize the black funds from overseas?" Tang Yi gestured with his hands as if rubbing money together.

"Once our number of Splitters reaches ninety, I will send the Brood Mother abroad. The final ten Splitters will serve as the foundation for our expansion overseas." Tang Shizhe waved his hand dismissively. He had his own plans for money that couldn't be spent openly. Isn't the Dark Continent in desperate need of investors like him? Who there would care whether the money is clean or dirty?

Tang Yi nodded, unconditionally agreeing with Tang Shizhe's idea.

More than ten hours later, inside the Splitter Chamber.

A completely naked man was spat out onto the floor by the Brood Mother.

Fortunately, Tang Yi and the others had anticipated this and laid down thick cushions, preventing the new "brother" from being jolted awake by the fall.

Having completed the split, the Brood Mother's body shifted back into the likeness of Zhao Yin, and the tentacles retracted from the floor back into her body.

After watching the Brood Mother's incubation form, Tang Shizhe felt absolutely no interest in this "person" who looked like Zhao Yin; in other words, he felt nothing.

"This is your persona. From now on, you will follow the information in this file to disguise yourself as this Zhao Yin."

"Remember, unless absolutely necessary, do not have any physical contact with others, and try to minimize contact with outsiders."

"I'll give you one day to adapt to your new identity. Once the car is repaired, go to the repair shop and pick it up." Tang Shizhe handed the file to Zhao Yin, or rather, the Brood Mother.

"Understood!" Zhao Yin replied in a hoarse voice; she had yet to adapt to the vocal cords within her body.

Tang Yi handed Zhao Yin the clothes he had retrieved from Zhao Yin's home. Once she was dressed, he drove her home in the van.

Watching Zhao Yin return to her house, Tang Yi drove back to the stronghold.

Back "home," Zhao Yin began to practice according to the information in the file.

"Ah~ ah~ ah~" The first thing to learn was pronunciation. Based on the audio materials compiled by Tang Yi and the others, she needed to first master Zhao Yin's voice.

On the other side, in the newly added conference room on the second floor of the stronghold, Tang Shizhe sat on a massive leather sofa, facing a giant projection that occupied an entire wall.

Several computers were placed on a table to the side, their screens displaying exactly what was on the projection: a world map stitched together from three monitors.

On both sides of the world map were rows of values, including the price of Leiden Coin, infection counts, recovery counts, activation counts, and projected revenue.

"You guys did a good job on this page!" Tang Shizhe nodded with satisfaction, picked up a bottle of iced cola with a straw from the table, and took a sip.

For some reason, whenever his wallet was about to get fatter, he would get excited and break into a sweat—perhaps the room's air conditioning was set too high.

"Boss, we've finished it. We've already uploaded the new virus to the official website of Shield Software and several partner download sites."

"As soon as people download this security software or install the patch update, they'll be infected with our virus!" Tang Yi chuckled sinisterly, looking every bit the villainous big boss.

In contrast, Tang Shizhe, who was sipping his straw, looked more like a villainous cannon fodder.

"Very good! In two hours, Shield Software will push their latest update. Let's see how many people catch our virus then!" Tang Shizhe narrowed his eyes in anticipation.

The observant Tang Er stood behind Tang Shizhe, carefully kneading his shoulders and neck. Tang Shizhe certainly wouldn't admit that he was the one who made them learn massage techniques!

Two hours flew by as Tang Shizhe scrolled through his phone. At this moment, Shield Software released their first major update.

On the surface, this update was meant to strengthen virus protection, but rumors suggested it would actually add ad-push functionality to Shield Software.

After all, software couldn't stay free forever; using ads to make money was the only way for such free software to survive.

100,000,000, the infection count on the screen kept climbing, and large numbers of red dots began to appear on the world map.

As the number of these red dots grew, some regions were completely stained in red.

Within a mere ten minutes, the number of infected computers had already reached ten million.

Of course, this was related to the fact that Shield Software updated automatically as long as it was connected to the internet; these ten million users were all people with their machines turned on and connected.

"The number is a bit low!" Tang Shizhe frowned on the sofa. Only ten million infections—it was too few!

"Don't worry, Boss. We've secretly bundled Shield Software into the download links of several websites, and our internet trolls have started writing advertorials on forums around the world to promote Shield Software." Tang Yi let out a sly, wheezing laugh.

Meanwhile, in the Shield Software office building, the staff were also feeling puzzled.

Why had the download count for their software suddenly surged, and why were there advertorials promoting their software appearing on various forums?

If they weren't also moonlighting as promotional staff, they would have suspected the company was burning money on marketing.

They didn't know what kind soul was helping them with publicity, but that wasn't a bad thing, was it?

As long as the download count increased a bit more, their bonuses for this month would be enough to buy a car!

At this moment, the staff at Shield Software had yet to grasp the Chinese saying: there is no such thing as a free lunch.

In their joy, they had no idea what kind of nightmare they were about to fall into.

As time passed, more and more people turned on their computers, and more and more people updated Shield Software.

Coupled with the promotion from Tang Yi and his team's advertorials, the number of infections gradually reached the one-hundred-million mark, half of which were on mobile platforms.

"That's enough. Activate those viruses!" Tang Shizhe nodded; this number had reached his planned threshold.

"Understood!" Tang Yi hit the Enter key again. In an instant, one hundred million computers and mobile phones across the world suddenly went black.

"Do you want to know the truth of the world? Do you want to recover your contacts and documents? Click the purchase button below and pay 0.01 Leiden Coin to redeem your device!" A string of subtitles, translated into various languages, appeared on the infected devices.

"WTF? How did I suddenly get a virus? Didn't I download Shield???" On the street, a man stared at his phone in disbelief.

Sharing the same expression were nearly one hundred million other people—all of whom had downloaded Shield Software.

They couldn't believe their devices had actually been infected! Didn't Shield Software brag about how invincible it was? How were they going to explain this now!