A vulnerability discovered

The temperature of the wire surged from 37 degrees to 60 degrees, and Ye Mo's finger hovered above the Enter key without moving. He suddenly closed his eyes, his Thermal Vision instantly shutting off like a searchlight that had lost power, and his entire consciousness sank into darkness.

Tony glared at him. "What are you doing?"

Ye Mo raised his hand to signal for quiet and slowed his breathing. He knew that the wire was "watching"—as long as the system was still scanning, the virus would continue to escalate, and might even trigger the self-destruct protocol. The only way now was to make it think the danger had passed.

Three seconds later, the data stream on the lab's main screen returned to normal, and the temperature of the wire also began to drop, stabilizing at 37 degrees Celsius again.

"It believed it." Ye Mo opened his eyes, his voice low. "It mistook that last scan for an accidental trigger, and now it's pretending to be dead again."

Tony stared at the armor model in the holographic projection, his brow furrowed. "So what's next? Scan it again? Don't forget it turned on us last time when we were only halfway through the investigation."

"I'm not sweeping anymore." Ye Mo shook his head. "I'll change the rhythm."

After he finished speaking, he turned on the Thermal Vision again, but this time it wasn't a continuous scan. Instead, it was activated in very short intervals—on for 0.3 seconds, off for 0.5 seconds, flashing like a signal light. This method doesn't create continuous energy fluctuations, making it difficult for the virus to detect the abnormality.

The image flickered intermittently. Each time it lit up, Ye Mo stared intently at the energy flow near his right arm joint. He found nothing the first two times, but on the third time, he detected a faint but regular leakage path among a bunch of normal Circuit —the current burrowed deep into the buffer layer like an earthworm and then disappeared.

"Found it," Ye Mo said in a low voice. "It's not the wire on the left shoulder transmitting data; that's a decoy. The real core is hidden in the buffer layer of the right arm; there's a tiny module that's constantly generating heat."

Tony zoomed in on the screen, pulling up a diagram. "There are no interfaces here, who can fit anything in?"

"That's the problem," Ye Mo sneered. "It wasn't stuffed in, it was welded in. Look here, the outer shell has traces of secondary welding, and the surface is coated with heat-insulating material to disguise it as an ordinary part, but its internal temperature is consistently above 82 degrees Celsius, clearly running a high-load program."

Tony reached out and touched the virtual model's right shoulder, his expression changing. "This thing wasn't added later; it was installed during the manufacturing process. In other words... someone tampered with it during production."

"Yes," Ye Mo nodded, "And the privileges are very high, allowing them to bypass quality control processes and directly modify the hardware architecture."

"Damn it." Tony slammed his fist on the table. "Half of my armor was reworked after Afghanistan, the timeline matches perfectly."

"Now is not the time to assign blame," Ye Mo interrupted him. "The module is still working; we need to take it apart, otherwise it could bring the entire system down at any moment."

Tony took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. "How do we take it apart? This thing is fused to the main control circuitry; pulling it off forcefully will cause a short circuit."

"Use ice," Ye Mo said. "First, freeze the power supply port, cutting off the energy input while simulating voltage output to fool its self-destruct mechanism. Once it thinks it's still operating normally, we'll peel it off."

"Are you sure?" Tony frowned. "What if the ice melts too quickly?"

"No." Ye Mo raised his right hand, a thin layer of ice forming in his palm. "I can now Ice Manipulation with nanometer-level precision, sealing only the interface without touching the surrounding circuitry, ensuring it doesn't affect other modules."

Tony looked at him for a few seconds and finally nodded. "Okay, you control the temperature, I'll cut it."

Ye Mo stopped wasting words, placed his left hand on the control panel, and the chill spread through the metal into the armor system. His Thermal Vision locked onto the power supply node, while his right hand simultaneously Ice Manipulation to envelop the module's power input point. The temperature dropped rapidly, and the data flow began to slow down, but the voltage reading remained stable.

"It's done," Ye Mo said softly. "It thought it was still powered on."

Tony immediately picked up the micro laser scalpel and slowly cut along the frozen edge. Every millimeter had to avoid the sensor lines; the slightest deviation would trigger an alarm. Beads of sweat appeared on his forehead, and his fingers were incredibly steady.

With a soft click, the connection point broke.

"Got it!" Tony used tweezers to pick up the black module, about the size of a fingernail, and placed it on the testing table. A line of small print was written on the surface: STK-MKX-REV3, with the serial number deliberately erased.

"As expected, it's an older batch of modified parts," Tony sneered. "No wonder it managed to bypass the firewall."

He connected the module to the analyzer, and a few seconds later the results popped up on the screen: the built-in two-way communication chip supports three major functions: remote wake-up, energy theft, and instruction overwrite. The last time it went online was ten minutes ago, and the signal endpoint went through seven layers of hops and could not be traced.

"Is it cleared?" Ye Mo asked.

"Cleared." Tony pressed the clear button, confirming that the module data had been destroyed. "The physical carrier has been removed, and no trace of a backdoor was left in the system logs."

He turned around and reconnected the armor diagnostic system, and the holographic model lit up one by one. The output of the thoracic reactor stabilized, the propulsion units of the limbs returned to normal response, and the energy efficiency returned to the baseline value.

"He's alive." Tony grinned. "My baby's finally back."

Ye Mo breathed a sigh of relief, leaned against the control panel, and closed his eyes. Just when he thought it was all over, a mechanical voice suddenly sounded in his mind:

[Thermal Vision application enhanced, Gene Spiral Tower unlocks seventh level]

He paused for a moment, then opened his eyes. Deep within his consciousness, the tower composed of countless spiral staircases slowly rotated; the sixth floor's light had not yet dissipated, while the seventh floor had quietly opened. A brand-new ability combination slot appeared, currently empty, but already capable of pre-loading the analysis mode.

"What's wrong?" Tony asked, noticing his strange expression.

"It's nothing," Ye Mo smiled. "It just feels like... I have an extra slot in my brain."

"You make it sound like I'm upgrading my armor system," Tony patted him on the shoulder. "But your eyes are truly amazing, Thermal Vision plus Ice Manipulation, they're practically a human diagnostic instrument."

"I'll charge you double for the next repair," Ye Mo shrugged. "After all, high-end technical services require professional technicians."

"Come on," Tony rolled his eyes. "If you dare raise prices, I'll put you on Stark Industries' blacklist, and you won't even be allowed to use their screws anymore."

"Threatening me?" Ye Mo laughed. "Then you'd better explain why you stole my Vibranium fragment yesterday."

"That's called borrowing!" Tony immediately retorted. "Don't you understand the concept of sharing research resources? Besides, I'll return it to you!"

"What you returned was a fragment." Ye Mo squinted. "A corner is missing. Don't think I didn't notice."

As the two were arguing, a notification suddenly popped up on the secondary screen of the main console: [System integrity check complete, no residual anomalies found]

Tony glanced down, his smile slowly fading. He pulled up the log details, quickly flipping through it, his brows furrowing deeper and deeper.

"What?" Ye Mo also walked over.

"That module just now..." Tony pointed to a line of records, "... uploaded data packets three times, the last time being two minutes before you interrupted the scan."

"To whom should it be sent?"

"The address is encrypted." Tony tapped a few times on the keyboard, "But I captured an IP segment—it's linked to the Hellfire Club's old servers."

Ye Mo's eyes turned cold. "They not only knew there was a problem with the armor, but they've also been receiving feedback."

"It's not just that they knew," Tony's voice lowered, "They deliberately left this module there. Like... leaving a window open."

What is the purpose?

"I don't know," Tony shook his head, "But it's definitely not as simple as controlling the armor. If they just wanted to take me down, they would have done it already."

Ye Mo was silent for a few seconds, then suddenly asked, "Have you received any maintenance requests from the 'Logistics Support Center' recently?"

"Yes." Tony looked up. "I approved a routine checklist last week, saying to replace the coolant filter. What's up?"

"After the press conference that day, I saw someone wearing anti-detection earpieces being transferred over there," Ye Mo said slowly. "His movements were very practiced, like a veteran employee."

Tony stared at him for a few seconds, then suddenly turned around, opened the internal access log, and entered a set of codes. The screen scrolled, eventually stopping on a name:

Carl Ryan

Position: Senior Hardware Maintenance Engineer

Date of employment: 2009

Current status: Employed

Note: Participated in the assembly of prototypes from MK1 to MKV.

"This man..." Tony's voice was a little hoarse, "Was one of my father's old subordinates. He disappeared nine years ago, and everyone thought he was dead."

Ye Mo didn't speak, but simply placed his hand on the control panel, the chill spreading into it once more. He activated Thermal Vision, aimed it at the host's underlying data stream, and began to reverse trace the complete path of that IP segment.

The lines on the screen gradually extend, passing through three layers of firewalls, bypassing two fake target servers, and finally pointing to a physical location.

Tony's pupils contracted sharply when he saw the coordinates.

"This is..." his voice tightened, "The seventh basement level of Stark Tower, storage room in Block B."

"It's not a storage room." Ye Mo stared at the red light. "That's the storage area for the abandoned MKIII prototype. The batch of old armor you said you were going to destroy three years ago wasn't burned at all."

Tony jumped up, his chair slamming against the wall with a loud thud.

"Someone built a stealth command center on my turf, using my technology."