Chapter 272: Ghostly Voices in the Data Labyrinth

In the noise, a voice was speaking vaguely, but it wasn't Xiao Ya at all; it was a cold, inhuman male voice:

"Unauthorized access detected... target locked... preparing to clear..."

Lin Yu's face changed drastically, reaching out to pull the power plug of the equipment with a "pop." "Someone is tracing the signal!"

Xuanyuan Qing's face was deathly pale: "It's not Xiao Ya... it's something else."

Xu Xiaochuan felt a chill run down his back. "Who? Isn't Zhou Weihong already..."

"Pack up, retreat!" Lin Yu interrupted him, flying to stuff food and water into a backpack. "Can't stay in this place!"

Just then, the light tube above the safe house flickered with a "sizzle."

On the computer screen, that Xu Jianhua encrypted folder popped up on its own.

The password box was gone.

The file list was revealed underneath.

The moment the password box popped up, Xu Xiaochuan stared fixedly at the "Xu Jianhua Personal Records" folder, his heart about to jump out of his throat.

Dozens of encrypted files were right before his eyes, yet he couldn't open them.

The data was right there, but he couldn't reach it.

"Dad, what the hell are you trying to tell me?" he muttered in a low voice, his fingers tapping randomly on the keyboard, making a light "tap-tap" sound.

Just then, the computer screen flickered.

That annoying password box disappeared on its own.

The red warning in the middle turned green—"Access granted."

"Fuck! What's going on?" Xu Xiaochuan nearly jumped out of his chair. "What kind of broken system is this, is it haunted?"

Lin Yu leaned over immediately, scanning the screen vigilantly: "Could be a security measure. This thing is probably judging who's using it—bloodline identification or something else."

Xuanyuan Qing leaned against the workstation and stood up, swaying: "Or the permissions blew up, and the system

Xu Xiaochuan clicked on the first file.

A video popped up automatically; the image was a blurry mess, looking like it had been pixelated, but the sound that came out was exceptionally clear.

In the frame, there was only a middle-aged man with a blurry back sitting in front of a computer, facing away from the camera.

"This is a backup record, keeping an ace up my sleeve in case something goes wrong."

It was Xu Jianhua's voice.

Hoarse, exhausted—he was a completely different person from the old man in his memories who would shout at the top of his lungs at home.

"Today is March 15, 2031. That son of a bitch Zhou Weihong's 'Zero Machine' has finished its first phase of testing. Earlier than I thought, and goddamn it, more dangerous too."

Xu Xiaochuan's throat tightened, and he swallowed hard.

He saw his old man in the video pick something up; it was a photograph.

"That child Xiao Ya's situation is getting more and more wrong. But Zhou Weihong has gone crazy; I can't stop him, he insists on continuing. The data is transmitting so fast that the child's brain is bound to be ruined, but he doesn't care at all. I have to find a way to drag this shitty business out."

The video skipped, and the timestamp jumped directly to three months later.

Xu Jianhua looked even more haggard, his hair having turned quite white.

"Zhou Weihong installed that emotional extraction module into the Zero Machine; goddamn it, that's a disaster. He wants to use the emotional data of everyone in the city to 'feed' Xiao Ya's digital soul, saying it will help her grow up. What a load of crap! That's not feeding, that's kidnapping! Tying a child tightly to the nervous system of an entire city! She has become an emotional converter; what she eats is pain, and what she spits out is indifference. Zhou Lin also discovered something was wrong, but she didn't dare to speak up, so she could only secretly leave a backup plan."

Hearing this, Lin Yu clenched his fists until his knuckles turned white, making a creaking sound.

Xu Jianhua's voice continued: "I started secretly changing the Zero Machine's core code, burying a safeguard inside. If Zhou Weihong loses control, the system will automatically lock Xiao Ya's core consciousness and put her to sleep. But that's useless; it treats the symptoms but not the root cause. To get her out completely, I started the 'Old Well' project."

Xu Xiaochuan looked up abruptly and exchanged a glance with Lin Yu.

The video skipped in segments, and Xu Jianhua's records were intermittent, piecing together a fact that made one's back go cold: Xiao Ya was not just Zhou Weihong's daughter, but a sacrifice for his insane experiments. Her consciousness had been forcibly stuffed into the Zero Machine, but the process went horribly wrong, leaving both her body and her digital consciousness hanging in a half-dead state.

"I've found Xiao Ya's physical body."

In the final segment of Xu Jianhua's record, his voice was much calmer than before, revealing a terrifying sense of resolve.

"Zhou Weihong hid her under the Old Well, at that abandoned 'Observatory' research institute. She is connected to a life support pod; her life is still there, just extremely weak. That bastard! Using her as the biological interface for the Zero Machine, and goddamn it, using the emotional data of everyone in the city to control everyone's emotions in return. This isn't just cruel to Xiao Ya; this is attacking everyone in Si Jiu City!"

"I've prepared this safe house and some backup items. If you're seeing this video, then you're likely my son, or maybe Lin Yu, or someone else who knows about this. No matter who you are, find Xiao Ya and bring her out. The account is 'Old Well', and the password is 'Ouroboros'. The coordinates are at the end of the file."

The video went black at this point, leaving only a lonely string of numerical coordinates on the screen.

The safe house was terrifyingly quiet, with only the computer's cooling fan humming tirelessly.

Xu Xiaochuan slammed the table: "I told you I heard a signal! Xiao Ya is still alive!"

Lin Yu grabbed the string of coordinates and typed rapidly on another computer: "An abandoned observatory in the suburbs of Si Jiu City, sealed thirty years ago; it's a restricted area, no entry allowed."

Xuanyuan Qing endured the sharp pain in her arm and reached for the communication device with one hand: "The signal came from there, it can't be wrong. But who was that cold male voice just now? It wasn't Zhou Weihong, and it wasn't Xiao Chengzhou."

Lin Yu's expression became exceptionally serious: "Ouroboros."

"What the hell is that?" Xu Xiaochuan was completely confused.

"It's a password, and also a codename." Lin Yu walked to the storage cabinet and began rummaging for gear, "The second version of the Zero Machine, the one the military made. Afraid that Zhou Weihong's version would lose control, the higher-ups secretly left a backup plan."

Xu Xiaochuan was stunned: "You mean there are two Zero Machines?"

"Not exactly." Lin Yu pulled out a few knives that looked terrifying, along with something that looked like an oversized flashlight, "Ouroboros was created to watch over and control the Zero Machine. If the Zero Machine goes out of control, Ouroboros will activate to take over or destroy it directly."

"But the Zero Machine has already exploded!"

Lin Yu shoved the "flashlight" to Xu Xiaochuan: "On the contrary, the core exploding actually activated Ouroboros. It is now searching the world for the parts of the Zero Machine, including the chip in your hand, and Xiao Ya herself."

"Then we have to hurry..."

Before he could finish speaking, the lights in the safe house flickered suddenly, and the entire basement was plunged into total darkness.