Ignition

At exactly eight that evening.

Han Luyi sat in front of his computer and refreshed the 36 Degrees Tech channel page.

The report was live.

Title: <Exclusive Investigation: Flash Tech's Core Operating Data Suspected of Large-Scale Fabrication; Privacy of 23 Million Users May Have Been Leaked>.

He did nothing—did not repost it, did not comment, and did not mention a single word of it on any platform.

Ten minutes later, the tech media circle exploded. Ma Xiaofei sent a string of exclamation marks in the Dorm 404 Group, Zhang Haoran sent a period, and Han Luyi did not reply.

Thirty minutes later, it reached ninth place on Weibo's trending list.

An hour later, it had climbed to third. The topic's views surpassed two hundred million, and the comment section was growing at a rate of new posts every second.

"Flash just stole the privacy of 23 million users like that? Are you serious?"

"Those people at Starlight Capital probably can't sleep now. Their Series B money hadn't even cooled down before everything blew up."

"They even sent the data overseas??? That isn't a leak—that's selling it, isn't it? No wonder I've been getting so many scam calls lately, the kind that even know my name."

Two hours later, Flash Tech released an emergency statement. Its wording was vague, neither confirming nor denying anything: "We are verifying the relevant information and will notify the public at the earliest opportunity."

Translated, that meant: "We're figuring out how to spin this."

Three hours later, Starlight Capital issued a brief statement: "We are aware of the relevant reports and are communicating with Flash's management."

The capital market reacted even faster than public opinion. Flash's Series B closing was suspended, and Tuesday's closed-door investor meeting was cancelled outright.

Han Luyi opened the report page and activated Sight.

[Report views: 2.87 million (rising)]

[Public opinion impact rating: A]

[Flash Tech valuation fluctuation in real time: -22% (falling)]

He closed Sight.

His phone rang.

Gu Siyue.

"Did you see the news?" Han Luyi asked when he answered.

"I did. It was written very carefully, and it relied entirely on the data." Gu Siyue's voice gave nothing away. "Don't worry about the legal side. They won't be able to trace it back to you."

Gu Siyue paused for two seconds on the other end of the line.

"You did well."

Then she hung up.

Han Luyi stared at his phone for several seconds, processing those four words. Gu Siyue saying "You did well" was probably equivalent to Ma Xiaofei saying, "Holy shit, that's awesome."

He smiled and put down his phone.

The comment section was still growing by double digits every minute.

At the same time, the tech world began trying to track down the author of that anonymous technical analysis.

Some people on forums analyzed the report's writing style and technical perspective paragraph by paragraph. Some guessed it was a security engineer from a major tech company; some guessed a rival company was stirring up trouble; some even guessed it was a whistleblower inside Flash. "They're too familiar with the underlying technical architecture. It doesn't feel like an outside intrusion."

A user named "Reverse Engineering Old Wang" posted a lengthy analysis, profiling the author from three angles: the way the report mocked Base64, its habitual descriptions of data pipelines, and the depth of its technical understanding of privacy compliance. His conclusion was: "The author is most likely a backend or algorithm engineer at a major tech company, with over five years of experience and hands-on experience in app behavior analysis."

They were only a few steps away from guessing Han Luyi.

But no one considered the possibility of "a former Dingsheng P7 who had just been laid off." An unemployed programmer had been excluded from everyone's field of vision, never even making the list of suspects.

Han Luyi bookmarked the post and closed the browser.

Gu Siyue's words still echoed in his ears. "Legally, you're clean. They won't be able to trace you."

Doxxing did not follow legal channels.

He needed to remain hidden.

Just then, Sight opened automatically.

A massive system notification flooded his vision, golden and taking up half his field of view.

[Assistance in major vulnerability remediation complete]

[Scope of impact: privacy and security of 23 million users]

[Your actions facilitated the disclosure and remediation of this vulnerability]

[Experience +200]

[Current experience: 212/200]

[Level-up requirements met!]

[Leveling up... Lv.1 → Lv.2]

The world before his eyes shattered, like a computer being forcibly rebooted. Every image flickered, fractured, and reassembled. He felt as though his brain had been formatted, then had an operating system installed all over again.

The reboot lasted several seconds.

When everything stabilized, the Sight panel had changed.

[Upgrade complete]

[Lv.2｜Energy: 83/250]

Han Luyi stared at the panel for a while.

That was it?

His level had changed from 1 to 2, his energy cap had more than doubled, and then... that was all?

But he immediately noticed the difference.

There was more information in his field of view. Previously, he could only sense an area a few meters around him. Now, data from the entire building flooded into his eyes. The panel from Lin Wanqing's home next door faintly appeared at the edge of his vision, while data from the residents above and below overlaid the space in translucent layers.

The amount of information was more than ten times greater than before. He hurriedly turned off full-range scanning, leaving only close-range passive perception enabled.

There was another, even more important change.

He opened his laptop and clicked into the code repository for one of his recent freelance projects.

At Lv.1, when he looked at code, the location of a bug would glow red, with a brief warning floating beside it that identified the type of error. But after spotting it, what then? He still had to analyze it himself, come up with a solution himself, and fix it himself.

Now, things were different.

Behind every red marker was an entire expanded repair path. Which file to change, which line to change, how to change it, and what effects the change would have afterward—it was all listed in perfect detail, like a ready-written prescription.

Han Luyi scrolled up and down the screen.

He casually opened a bug marked severe. It was a database connection pool leak. He had already fixed it manually when he took on the project, but the repair path offered a better solution than his own—not only patching the leak, but also optimizing the connection pool's recycling strategy.

If, before leveling up, he had been someone holding a magnifying glass and looking for bugs, now he had an entire Pest Control Guide in his hands.

He glanced at the panel again. His energy was slowly dropping. Deep scans consumed more energy than before, but the cap had more than doubled as well. It was enough.

Han Luyi closed the code repository and leaned back in his chair.

Only after closing his eyes did he realize how surprisingly good he felt. He had spent days rushing the report, handling the notarization, and running back and forth. His body had been exhausted to death, but now all that fatigue had vanished.

Was that a bonus from leveling up?

Han Luyi sprang out of his chair, feeling completely refreshed.

Time to handle the real business.

Han Luyi picked up his phone.

He wanted to say something to Ma Xiaofei and Zhang Haoran, but then he remembered Gu Siyue's words: "Assume that every word you say to anyone could potentially be used as evidence."

Forget it. Better not say anything.

As he exited WeChat, a new message notification popped up at the top of the screen.

An avatar he had not seen in a very long time.

Su Niannian.

"Luyi? Long time no see. I heard you left Dingsheng?"

Han Luyi stared at the message, stunned for two seconds.

Su Niannian...

They had not been in touch for over two years. The last time they had interacted was during National Day in 2023, when he posted a photo of his overtime workstation on Moments and she replied below, "Take care of yourself."

His finger hovered over the screen without typing. Several scenes flashed through his mind: her waving at him outside the entrance to the Third Cafeteria, her sleeping face as she lay on the table in the library, and the noisy sight of the entire class raising their glasses at their graduation dinner.

They passed quickly, like bullet comments scrolling across a screen.

In the end, he typed four words.

"Yeah, I left."

Less than two seconds after the message was sent, Su Niannian's name in the chat window changed to:

The other party is typing...