On Monday, the start of a new week, workers began their diligent labor once again.
In an old neighborhood in Baisha City, a young man hunched over as he went downstairs to buy breakfast.
"Handsome, the usual?"
"Yeah, and add an order of fried rice noodles. Thanks." The young man looked pale, as if he had not seen sunlight in years. After paying, he found a nearby seat and started fiddling with his phone.
Why wasn't anyone talking?
He skillfully opened the Flying Pigeon Chat Group. The last message was still from yesterday.
--Can Do a Little: Bring me a box of coffee.
Usually, they only sent one person out to buy food around mealtimes. The rest of the time, they stayed cooped up in their rental, working.
When he had left this morning, everyone had still been discussing how they should officially get to work.
Why was it so quiet now?
ice1/2: ? Did you guys finish it?
One minute passed... then five minutes...
The messages vanished without a trace.
"Something's not right." ice1/2 frowned slightly, vaguely sensing that something was off.
"Could there be a fire? Should we call the police?"
"Go take a look! Go take a look!"
Suddenly, shouting rang out from outside the shop. ice1/2 glanced in the direction of the voices.
That seemed to be... the place they rented?
Black smoke billowed out of the window. Combined with the lack of responses to his messages, he started to panic.
"Boss! I'll come back for it later!"
ice1/2 hurried back to the rental, but in that short time, the fire inside seemed to have already been put out.
The black smoke slowly dispersed anyway. After waiting for a while and seeing no further commotion, the onlookers gradually dispersed as well.
ice1/2 hurriedly pulled out his key. The moment he opened the door, he saw his companions staring in terror at their ruined computers.
"What happened?"
The fire had clearly been caused by a computer malfunction. They were familiar with handling such things, and it had not caused any greater losses.
What was there to be afraid of?
"Fuck! What the hell!"
There were four people in the room now—including ice1/2. Before yesterday, this little team had actually consisted of only three people.
A Japanese man had arrived yesterday, and today all their computers had malfunctioned.
"You set me up, you bastard!" Another Huaxia man in the room grabbed the Japanese man by the collar and pinned him against the wall, cursing nonstop.
The one who had spoken earlier was Li Ming. He was also the person responsible for finding jobs for this little team.
The one throwing punches was Li Man, Li Ming's cousin. Aside from his short temper, he was extremely loyal to his friends.
ice1/2 was also Li Ming's cousin. His real name was Li Yuan, and he was the brains of the team. But as for what exactly was going on, even he was completely baffled.
"Manzi, you tell me! What happened to your computer?"
"This son of a bitch scared the hell out of us!"
Li Man had always considered himself fearless, but this time he had been so frightened that he smashed his computer. Embarrassed and furious, he only wanted to give the man a couple of vicious punches.
The Japanese man pinned against the wall tried to explain himself, but he truly could not understand what had just happened.
Could computer viruses nowadays really cause computers to malfunction and even catch fire?
He hesitated, opening his mouth as he tried to change the subject. "A virus! It must be a counterattack from the other side! Aren't you professionals? I only came here to collect materials!"
The Japanese man spoke fluent Huaxia, so he had clearly been specially selected by the other side.
But the moment he arrived, the little team was nearly wiped out. All anyone could say was that his luck was truly terrible.
"Don't beat him to death!"
Li Ming calmed himself down, gave that warning first, and only then described what had just happened to Li Yuan.
Li Yuan had been smart since childhood. Otherwise, Li Ming would not have gone to such lengths to pull him into this line of work.
But to be honest, Li Ming was still shaken by what had happened.
In fact, the collapse of Liang Xing Toys Factory's official website during this period had been the work of the three of them.
Yesterday, the Japanese man had arrived to deliver the latest instructions. They wanted Liang Xing Toys Factory's official website to be completely paralyzed!
If they had a chance to steal core information, their reward could also be increased.
Although patent restrictions meant they could not claim it directly as their own, with a little repackaging, pushing their own chips should not be a problem.
Plagiarism in the Parallel World was a technical craft!
After all, the mountain that was the platform stood in their way. Without the ability to package things properly, whatever they earned would have to be spat right back out!
That was why they avoided any traceable methods whenever possible.
The Japanese man's task was also simple: to bring the results of Li Ming and the other two back to Japan.
--If they could pull it off.
After all their probing, the little team had already gotten a grasp on Liang Xing Toys Factory's defensive capabilities.
Their tests had also initially shown that someone only repaired the site after it had truly crashed for a while.
That amount of time was absolutely enough for them to completely paralyze Liang Xing Toys Factory's official website!
They did not even need all three of them. Li Ming alone could easily handle it.
At first, Li Ming's operation went very smoothly. It even felt as though there were no obstacles at all.
But as the plan progressed, Li Ming began to feel that something was wrong.
It was going too smoothly!
And ever since he launched the attack, the tool he had written kept detecting several inexplicable data streams lingering nearby.
Whenever he tried to track them down, those mysterious data streams fled incredibly quickly.
Yet if he ignored them, he could never shake the feeling of unease.
To be safe, Li Ming decided to have Li Man help him.
Finish it quickly!
Perhaps he never should have asked Li Man for help.
It was precisely because of Li Man's involvement that those data streams rapidly grew stronger.
Then, the three of them witnessed an unbelievable sight.
There were three computers in the rental, all with naturally high-end configurations.
Leaving aside Li Yuan's computer, which was running idle, a green monster appeared on both Li Ming's and Li Man's computers at the same time.
It was green all over, with sharp claws and fangs, a tuft of red hair atop its head, and a thick wooden club in its hand. There were even traces of screws on the club.
"Ruaa!"
The swinging club seemed ready to smash through the screen. Li Ming, who was wearing headphones, was startled by the sudden sound and flung them off immediately.
Li Man was also startled and punched through his screen. By the time he came to his senses, Li Ming's computer was already whining. Even with the cooling system at maximum, it could not stop the computer from bursting into flames.
"Hehehe!"
The Green Monster grinned wider and laughed more wildly. It did not completely disappear amid that laughter echoing in their ears until the computer was totally destroyed and the screen went black.
Then came the electrical fire. It did not spread through the rental on a large scale, and the three of them worked together to put it out. Before they had time to clean up, Li Yuan returned.
Ding dong—
Hope you like this gift
In the silent room, the email notification sounded especially piercing.
A line of text popped up on its own without permission, every word dripping with mockery.
"We're not taking this job. Brother Ming, return the money!"
Li Yuan stared hard at the line of text. He seemed to see a tiny ball-like thing behind the words, but it vanished in the blink of an eye.
He could not be sure whether his eyes had been playing tricks on him.
But among their three-man team, Li Ming had the strongest practical skills. Even he had somehow been thoroughly exposed. Li Yuan did not need to think to know that if he forcibly took over, the only result would be humiliating himself.
And that green monster... was it some newly released computer virus?
He had never heard of it.
The sound of fire trucks rose outside the window. They did not dare deal with official authorities!
Did this count as arson?