125: Chapter 125 This technology has a bug; it crashes as soon as it's turned on.

US National Laboratory, core control room.

Dozens of high-power air conditioners were roaring, pressing the room temperature down to an icy absolute zero. But even so, everyone at the scene was sweating.

US Secretary of Commerce Johnson was wearing a crisp, high-end tailored suit, standing behind bulletproof glass, tightly gripping the crumpled speech in his hand. That was the 'US Tech Renaissance Manifesto' he prepared to read to the whole world after the 'successful ignition.'

"Dr. Wilson."

Johnson glanced at the Patek Philippe on his wrist, his tone filled with impatient anxiety. "Three more minutes. The connection to The White House is established, and the President is watching us. Do not mess this up."

"Don't worry, Mr. Secretary."

Dr. Wilson took a deep breath and put on anti-static gloves. He carefully took out the Photonic Chip from the constant temperature box—a chip that cost hundreds of billions and was refined using half the nation's nuclear waste.

It was a crystal emitting an eerie blue-purple light.

Although it looked a bit like a plastic gem from a street stall, in Wilson's eyes, this was the key to the future, the scepter God had left on earth.

"All parameters are normal."

"Cooling system running at full power."

"Logic gate self-test passed."

As instructions were issued, the atmosphere in the entire laboratory became tense to the extreme. Everyone held their breath, staring fixedly at the supercomputer symbolizing the US's highest computing power—titan.

"Insert the chip!"

Wilson flicked his wrist and steadily pushed the crystal into the specially made slot.

"Click."

The crisp locking sound was like the firing of a starting gun.

"Start!"

Wilson slammed the red power button.

"Buzz—!!!"

A massive amount of energy surged into the mainframe along the thick cables. In an instant, the dormant chip was like a beast being awakened, erupting with a blinding light.

The screen lit up.

On the previously pitch-black main screen, a waterfall of data streams flashed instantly. That was the trajectory of photons running at the speed of light in the circuit, a computing speed beyond human imagination.

"It succeeded!"

The assistant screamed with excitement, "Look at this reading! Three quadrillion operations per second! It's still rising! This is simply a miracle!"

A look of ecstatic joy instantly bloomed on Secretary Johnson's face.

He straightened his tie and faced the camera, preparing to start the speech he had long memorized:

"Ladies and gentlemen, today, we will witness history..."

However.

The moment he said the word "history."

The data stream on the screen suddenly froze.

Without any warning, it was like a Ferrari traveling at high speed suddenly hitting an invisible wall.

Immediately after.

The blue interface, which was full of technological sense and represented the future, suddenly flickered twice.

"Zzz—"

A teeth-grinding electrical noise sounded.

Subsequently, a huge, mocking blue pattern popped up, occupying the entire screen.

It was a crying face.

**: ( **

Below it was a line of extremely retro white error code, as if returning to the Windows 98 era:

** [SYSTEM ERROR: Your computer has encountered a problem and needs to restart.] **

** [Error Code: 0x00000000 (Logic Infinite Loop)] **

Secretary Johnson's smile froze on his face, his mouth wide enough to fit a light bulb.

"What... what is this?"

He pointed at the huge crying face on the screen, his voice trembling. "This is the one hundred billion dollar achievement you talked about? A blue screen?!"

"Don't panic! Don't panic!"

Dr. Wilson rushed to the console, sweating profusely, his fingers tapping the keyboard rapidly. "This is just... just a system compatibility issue! After all, it's cross-era technology, it's normal to have a little temper! Restart! Restart immediately!"

"Force a power cut! Do it again!"

As the power was cut and reconnected, titan roared again.

This time, the chip lasted a bit longer.

About five minutes.

Just when everyone breathed a sigh of relief, thinking the previous incident was just an accident.

An extremely pungent, scorched smell, like burning plastic and metal mixed together, suddenly drifted out of the mainframe.

"What's that smell?"

Johnson sniffed. "Did someone bring an oven in here?"

"Alarm! Alarm!"

The harsh red alarm light suddenly began to rotate wildly.

"Core temperature abnormal!"

"Cooling system overloaded!"

"Current chip temperature: 800 degrees Celsius! And still rising!"

"What?!"

Wilson was scared out of his wits.

He watched helplessly as the liquid in the specially made liquid nitrogen cooling tank instantly boiled, turning into white mist. And that Photonic Chip inserted in the slot was no longer glowing.

It turned red.

Like a piece of red-hot iron just pulled from a steel furnace, it radiated terrifying high heat.

The surrounding circuit boards melted and blackened rapidly under the high heat, emitting rolling thick smoke.

"Quick! Put out the fire!"

"What the hell is this chip! This is clearly an electric stove!"

The laboratory was instantly in chaos.

Scientists hugged fire extinguishers and sprayed wildly, white dry powder mixed with black smoke, choking people so they couldn't open their eyes.

After finally extinguishing the fire.

The supercomputer worth hundreds of millions of dollars was completely scrapped, turned into a pile of scrap metal still sizzling with oil. And that "hundred-billion-dollar chip" was still stubbornly stuck in the slot; although it was a bit black, the structure was surprisingly intact.

"How could this happen..."

Wilson slumped on the ground, his face covered in black ash, his eyes dull. "The theory was perfect! The formula was correct too! Why did it overheat? Why did it loop?"

He didn't believe it.

"Change the computer! Try again!"

"Maybe the cooling is not enough! This time use liquid helium directly!"

The next two hours were a nightmare for the US National Laboratory.

They changed three mainframes.

Burned out three top-tier cooling systems.

The result was without exception.

As long as it was turned on for more than five minutes, this chip was like it was cursed; it would definitely blue screen, definitely crash, and then definitely turn into a violent incendiary bomb, setting everything around it on fire.

"This is not a technical problem at all!"

Wilson finally collapsed. He grabbed his hair and let out a desperate roar, "This is a trap! This is a logic trap set by that Dragon Country person! He buried an infinite loop in the optical path!"

"A trap?"

Secretary Johnson emerged from the smoke, his expensive high-end tailored suit already ruined like a rag.

He rushed over, grabbed Wilson by the collar, and roared:

"I don't care if it's a trap! I'm asking you, how do you solve it?! The President is still online waiting!"

"Maybe... maybe there's still hope!"

Wilson suddenly thought of something and crawled towards the spare terminal that had just been connected. "Just before it crashed, the system seemed to pop up a special prompt box! That might be the key to solving the bug!"

Everyone immediately gathered around.

Sure enough, in the center of the screen full of static, there was a dialog box stubbornly flickering.

It was a line of code composed of strange characters.

Not English, nor any known computer language.

** [N.M.S.L] **

"What does this mean?"

Johnson frowned, staring at the four letters. "Is it an abbreviation for some advanced encryption algorithm? Nuclear? Magnetic? Super? Link?"

"No... not right."

A young Chinese-American assistant nearby who knew a little bit about Chinese culture looked at the four letters, his face instantly turning pale, his whole body trembling.

"What's wrong? Do you recognize it?" Johnson asked urgently.

The assistant swallowed his saliva, glanced at the furious Secretary, then at the nearly insane Wilson, hesitated for a long time, and then said tremblingly:

"Mr. Secretary, this... this is a kind of internet slang from the Dragon Country."

"It means..."

The assistant took a deep breath. For the sake of his own life, he decided to "artistically process" it slightly:

"It means... 'No Money Service Locked'."

"Membership fee?"

Johnson was stunned.

"Yes." The assistant explained, biting the bullet, "Jiang Chen's meaning should be... this technology is a paid subscription system. Although we bought out the blueprints, we didn't purchase the follow-up 'cloud key service'. So... if you don't pay, it locks the machine."

"Pfft—!!!"

Johnson only felt a rush of hot blood hitting his head, his heart feeling like it had been violently grabbed.

One hundred billion!

I spent one hundred billion dollars!

And the result I bought back is just a computer case? I have to pay extra membership fees to turn it on?!

This is treating the US like a pig to be slaughtered!

"Jiang Chen!!!"

Johnson let out a heart-wrenching roar, his vision went black, and he fell straight backward.

"Secretary! Secretary!"

"Call an ambulance! The Secretary has a cerebral hemorrhage!"

In the midst of the chaos.

The ** [N.M.S.L] ** on the screen was still flickering happily, as if an invisible smiley face was silently greeting everyone's mother.

And far across the ocean.

Jiang Chen, who was eating hot pot, suddenly sneezed.

"Who is talking about me?"

He rubbed his nose, stuffed a piece of tripe into his mouth, and mumbled vaguely:

"It must be those people in the US who received the goods."

"Hey, I don't know if they like that boot-up Easter egg. I specifically added it to reflect 'Dragon Country cultural export'."