Chapter 310

Zhao Jianguo's fingers tapped twice on the edge of the control console; the screen still showed the live surveillance feed from the summit venue. The figure of Guest G-739 had already vanished into the crowd, but the screenshot of that anomalous code remained in the temporary folder, labeled 'To Check'. He didn't move or call anyone; he simply set the emotional resonators on his cuff to silent mode—the slight acceleration of his heartbeat from earlier hadn't fully subsided.

The wall clock pointed to 9:17, forty minutes left until the summit ended. But his private line red light suddenly flashed on and off, as if someone was urging him.

"Here?" he whispered, and casually pressed the answer key.

A holographic projection rose slowly from the ground; the Special Forces Captain, wearing a combat uniform, stood before a gray-blue light screen, with the background showing the standard structural diagram of an underground bunker. He held a palm-sized black box whose shell bore the small words "Quantum Communication Terminal Trial Version".

"The equipment has been distributed to the unit; all eight team members have completed biometric binding." The Special Forces Captain spoke in his usual unhurried tone, "Shall we try connecting to your side now?"

"Let's try." Zhao Jianguo nodded, his finger sliding over the main control screen, "Initiate triple-key verification; I'll sync in from my end."

Each entered their command, and three dynamic verification codes popped up on the screen, shifting from blue to green to gold; with a soft 'click', the connection was established successfully. The projection cleared, and the Special Forces Captain's face became as clear as if he stood before them in person, even the old scar on his nose bridge visible.

"The signal is rock solid, latency under 0.1 seconds." The Special Forces Captain grinned, "It's far better than the walkie-talkies I used back then."

Zhao Jianguo also let out a sigh of relief: "Finally we have a reliable way to contact. Before we relied on encrypted text messages to send news, always afraid of being intercepted."

"That's right." The Special Forces Captain put the terminal on the table, "This thing is called 'quantum', sounds mysterious, but actually it's simple to operate—just turn it on and do facial recognition. Old Li the first time he used it, he thought it was a mirror."

As the two were speaking, a silver-white Light Pattern suddenly flashed in the corner of the Projection, as if someone had drawn a line in the air with a pen. Immediately, a figure materialized out of thin air, wearing an old-style Zhongshan suit, glasses, and a gaunt face.

"Chen Jianguo?" Zhao Jianguo sat up straight.

The man in the projection didn't look at him, only fixed his gaze on the terminal beside the Special Forces Captain, his voice low and clear: "The communication protocol you're currently using has its underlying architecture infiltrated."

The Special Forces Captain reacted extremely quickly, immediately reaching to turn off the equipment's power. But the projection raised a hand and pressed down; though the motion was insubstantial, it made the air in the whole room feel heavier.

"Don't cut it off." He said, "Cutting it off is useless too. They can activate a backdoor program even in a network‑disconnected state."

Zhao Jianguo didn't move, his eyes locked on that face. The voiceprint comparison system was already running in the background, the green progress bar inching forward bit by bit.

"Are you the real thing?" he asked.

"I am a data remnant from three years in the future." Chen Jianguo said, "Stored in distributed nodes, triggered when 'quantum communication is first activated'."

The room fell silent for a few seconds.

"So you are… a preset warning program set up in advance?" Zhao Jianguo asked.

"More or less." Chen Jianguo's image flickered slightly, as if the signal were unstable, "Listen, don't trust surface safety. This virus isn't an isolated incident; behind it is an organization pulling the strings, transnational, codename 'Dark River'."

The Special Forces Captain frowned: "What do you mean? A hacker gang?"

"Not just that." Chen Jianguo shook his head, "Their people have already infiltrated multiple project teams, some even right beside you. Don't readily trust newly online modules, especially those from external partners."

Zhao Jianguo quickly glanced at the system log—voiceprint match 98.7%, behavior model consistent with historical records, basically ruling out forgery.

"How do you prove what you're saying is true?" he asked.

Chen Jianguo didn't answer; instead he raised his hand and lightly tapped in the air. The main screen before Zhao Jianguo suddenly popped up a segment of code, archaic in format, with obvious military encryption features. He recognized it at a glance: it was the original instruction set from the first crystal he had found in the Siheyuan basement when he first crossed over.

"Only I know the deletion password for this code." Chen Jianguo said, "It's you who, before you learned how to input it, personally had me delete it."

Zhao Jianguo's breath caught. That was something from when he first arrived in this world, known to no one.

"Message received." He said softly, "What do we do next?"

"Wait for the attack to come." Chen Jianguo's image began to distort, "They will use your new equipment to launch a reverse intrusion. Remember, the first wave isn't for destruction, but to mark the location. Once you detect an abnormal response, immediately physically isolate all terminals—do not attempt remote cleanup."

Before his words even finished, the projection suddenly emitted a burst of high‑frequency noise, the whole figure shattering into countless points of light that vanished in the blink of an eye.

Only the two of them remained in the room, staring at each other.

"You heard that clear?" Zhao Jianguo turned to look at the Special Forces Captain.

"I heard it loud and clear." The Special Forces Captain's face turned grim, "Prepare to cut power and collect the equipment."

"Wait." Zhao Jianguo stared at the main screen, his brow jumping, "Look over there."

On the big screen, the normally normal communication interface suddenly went black, then a full‑red countdown window popped up:

【System Locking｜Remaining Time: 05:59】

The numbers ticked down one second at a time, the font bold and glaring, covering all operation panels.

"Damn!" the Special Forces Captain slammed his fist on the table corner, "It came that fast?"

Zhao Jianguo had already rushed to the main unit and yanked out the power cord. The machine hummed a few times, the screen flickered, yet it kept running. That countdown didn't stop—instead it sped up even more.

"It's not an external network intrusion." He gritted his teeth, "It's the built‑in protocol that got activated. This equipment was flawed from the factory."

"Who did it?" the Special Forces Captain roared.

"I don't know." Zhao Jianguo quickly opened a backup terminal, plugged in an offline hard drive, "But now we need to buy time. I want to copy out that residual log just now."

His fingers flew over the keyboard, the progress bar crept up slowly. The countdown on the main screen had already reached 05:32.

"How much longer can we hold?" the Special Forces Captain went to the doorway, picking up a metal rod on the way as a makeshift weapon.

"It must be done within three minutes." Zhao Jianguo stared at the transfer progress, "Otherwise the hard drive will also get chained and locked."

Footsteps came from the hallway outside, drawing nearer from afar, light but with a steady rhythm, as if a group were marching in formation.

"Not our people." The Special Forces Captain flattened himself against the wall, crouching, ear to the Door Gap, "The steps are too uniform."

Zhao Jianguo said nothing, his hands moving even faster. Transfer progress 97%…98%…

The main screen suddenly popped up a new window, a line of white text appearing on a red background:

【Your location has been marked｜Welcome to join Dark River】

His eyelid twitched, his hand didn't shake, and he kept pressing the final confirm key.

"Done!" He yanked out the hard drive, clenched it in his hand, looked up at the Special Forces Captain, "Notify the team members—everyone must immediately withdraw from the equipment currently in use, switch to hand signals for communication, no speaking, no networking, even take off your watches."

The Special Forces Captain nodded, pulled out his pocket notebook, wrote down a string of symbols, preparing to take a photo and send it.

At that very moment, Zhao Jianguo caught out of the corner of his eye a faint blue flash at the interface of the main power cord he had just pulled out—so brief it seemed like an illusion.

He lowered his head to look at the hard drive in his hand. The casing was icy cold, the indicator light blinking normally.

Transfer complete.

He slipped it into his chest pocket, turned and walked toward the emergency switch box in the corner of the room.

"Prepare to cut the main breaker." He said, "This whole area—total power loss."