Chapter Forty: National Security Alert! There's a Flaw in This Algorithm!

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The complete blueprint for the Hope Valley Smart Campus was like a depth charge dropped into a tranquil lake, unleashing towering waves that swept across the entire Huaxia internet.

Forward-looking, bold, and feasible.

These three words became the internet’s final verdict on the blueprint.

Yet in the deep, unseen waters of the web, a far more turbulent undercurrent was gathering at the speed of light.

Yanjing, Xishan.

Hundreds of meters beneath the surface, inside a metal fortress cut off from the outside world, there was no sense of time passing. There were no windows—only a constant temperature and humidity, accompanied by the low, ceaseless hum of server fans.

The National Cybersecurity Center.

The supercomputer cluster codenamed “Skynet” crouched at the heart of the immense hall like a dormant behemoth. Its bands of indicator lights resembled blue neural networks, slowly breathing through the half-lit server room, while its cold electronic eyes scanned the global network traffic pouring into Huaxia every second of every day.

It never tired. It had no emotions. It obeyed only the deepest logic: identify, analyze, flag, and warn.

Three hours and twenty-seven minutes after Longhai University’s official website published the blueprint, an inconspicuous stream of data was automatically captured by the Skynet system. It originated from Longhai University’s web server and contained part of the core algorithm code publicly displayed in the blueprint.

Amid a torrent of data measured in the trillions, it should have vanished like a single drop of water flowing into a mighty river.

But the instant Skynet’s logic gates scanned it, the steady blue bands of light flowing through the server room abruptly froze.

The next second—

Beep!

A sharp, brief electronic alarm, shrill enough to pierce the eardrums, rang through the entire underground fortress.

All the blue indicator lights went out in an instant. In their place blazed the blood-red glow signifying the highest threat level, enough to make one’s heart seize. Red warning lights spun frantically, bathing the duty engineer’s pale face in crimson.

On Skynet’s main display, a line of automatically generated characters was locked into a highlighted area, stark and terrifying.

[Alert Level: Highest — Red]

[Threat Identification: Potential Unregistered Disruptive High Technology]

[Threat Source: Official Website Server of Longhai University, Nanha Province]

[Recommended Action: Report Immediately; Activate the “Bulwark” Level-One Response Protocol]

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The duty engineer’s mind went blank. It felt as though all the blood in his body had rushed to his head. In ten years on the job, he had never seen Skynet issue an alert of such magnitude.

This was not a virus intrusion or a cyberattack. It was a warning of something far deeper—something that had touched the foundations of national technological security.

An analytical report generated automatically by the Skynet system was encrypted within 0.01 seconds. Bypassing every intermediate level, it was sent through the highest-authority channel directly to the desk of the highest official in the relevant department.

The storm had already taken shape, silently forming above the clouds of cyberspace.

And the first place its edge swept across was Jinling, a thousand miles away.

Jinling Municipal Public Security Bureau, Cybercrime Division.

Late at night, smoke hung over the office. The air was thick with the mingled odors of cheap instant coffee and leftover takeout.

Liu Jie’s eyes were veined with red as he stared intently at the public-opinion analysis report concerning Longhai University. For the past few days, he had practically made the office his home. His mind was filled with that young man named He Yu—and his almost unbelievable “Hope Valley.”

He had always felt that there was more to the matter than met the eye.

How could a freshly graduated university student possess such enormous influence? There had to be some powerful figure behind him.

But just how formidable was this hidden mastermind?

Beep, beep, beep!

A black terminal with an old-fashioned design, which had never sounded before, suddenly emitted a series of urgent alarms from the desk.

Liu Jie jolted. His gaze shifted from the computer screen to the black machine.

It was a secure encrypted terminal with a direct line to the capital, activated only for special cases involving national security. The last time he had seen it come online was several years ago, during an investigation into a major military intelligence leak.

An ominous premonition seized his heart.

He drew a deep breath, stepped forward, and followed the procedure he remembered. After entering his personal key, he retrieved a physical security key from the safe and inserted it into the terminal.

The screen lit up, and a heavily encrypted classified order slowly unfolded.

One glance at the title sent a chill shooting from the base of Liu Jie’s spine to the crown of his head, raising every hair on his body.

The wording of the document could no longer be described as merely stern. It was saturated with an uncompromising, high-pressure command.

“...You are hereby ordered to determine immediately, at all costs, the true origin of the ‘Distributed Resource Recycling’ artificial intelligence algorithm published in the Hope Valley blueprint...”

“...Particular attention must be paid to assessing whether there is any substantial risk of overseas technological infiltration, leakage of core technology, or exploitation by hostile foreign forces...”

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“...This matter concerns our nation’s strategic security in the field of intelligent urban management in the future. Any delay or negligence shall be punished as the highest-level offense of dereliction of duty!”

Every word struck Liu Jie’s nerves like a heavy iron hammer.

He held the thin electronic order in his hands, yet it felt as heavy as a thousand tons, crushing the air from his lungs.

At last, he understood that the nature of the matter had spiraled completely out of control.

It had begun as suspected fraud, then become a commercial miracle, and now had escalated into a threat to national security. In three giant leaps, it had reached a level so far above him that even looking up made his neck ache.

He had always suspected that there was some “mastermind” behind He Yu.

Now it seemed he had been wrong.

Spectacularly wrong.

The abilities of this “mastermind” were utterly beyond his imagination. This was no longer a genius in the commercial sphere, but an existence that had trespassed into a national strategic forbidden zone.

Cold sweat trickled down his temples and dripped onto the desk.

He abruptly snatched up the red internal phone. His extreme tension and surging adrenaline had left his voice dry and hoarse, with a tremor he himself did not notice.

“Immediately! Assemble every member of the task force! Emergency meeting!”

A response came from the other end.

A few minutes later, his subordinates, their eyes bloodshot from exhaustion, gathered sleepily in his office. When they saw the unprecedented gravity on their chief’s face, their hearts jolted. The last trace of ease vanished from the room.

Liu Jie swept his gaze across his team, his eyes sharp as knives.

“Pull yourselves together. Every one of you.”

He paused, then spoke each word distinctly.

“Make the necessary preparations.”

“This time, what we are facing may no longer be a simple economic case.”

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