10: The first light of dawn and the prelude to a storm

After countless late nights accompanied by the smell of soldering smoke and chemical reagents, after consuming enough components to make any electronics enthusiast's heart ache, and after experiencing numerous failures, frustrations, and the brink of giving up, Excellence's optical camouflage project—dubbed "invisible first step" by the system—finally, like a premature baby, was extremely reluctantly and shakily cobbled together into a demo version that could hardly even be called a "prototype."

The hardships involved were known only to him. The "Zhuo Yue Precision Machining Factory" at home was his strongest support; although his father and Uncle Liu were puzzled, they still provided unconditional support, repeatedly machining parts with astonishing precision according to his "bizarre" requirements, and even optimizing the system blueprints based on their experience. Su Mu's notes, with their neat handwriting and clear logic, became his only lifeline for cramming at the last minute and desperately trying to understand those profound circuit principles, even though he was still lost in a fog most of the time. As for himself, he had squeezed out almost all of his spare time and energy, like an obsessive craftsman, curled up in the narrow space under his dormitory bed, battling with soldering irons, multimeters, and those "treasure" parts from Pinduoduo and secondhand markets.

At this moment, the result—if it could even be called that—sat before him.

Its core was a flexible circuit board only the size of a palm, looking shabby to the extreme. It wasn't a neat product from an industrial production line, but something Excellence had etched himself using the most primitive photosensitive board method; the lines were rough and even a bit crooked, covered in fly-wires like a Chaos-like spiderweb (the marks of his many circuit modifications and connection repairs), and several oddly colored, unevenly applied special coatings. Those were the "Metamaterial" layers he had tried to spray-paint after mixing Nano-zinc Oxide Powder bought from Taobao with specific solvents according to the "Beggar's Version" recipe provided by the system, which theoretically possessed specific electromagnetic response characteristics—but only heaven knew how effective they would be. This circuit board was connected via a few slender wires to several equally crude miniature high-energy pulse capacitors from a "Electronic Component Clearance" shop on Bingxixi, as well as a power module with unstable output crudely modified from old laptop battery cells. The entire device had no protective casing; all its fragility and roughness were exposed nakedly, as if silently recounting the creator's hardships and the limits of his abilities.

Success or failure seemed to hinge on this once again! That familiar, heart-clenching feeling returned, even more intense than when he had started the fusion device last time.

With the previous lesson in mind, Excellence acted even more cautiously this time. He again chose the dead of night when all was silent, the dormitory lights were out, and his roommates had fallen into deep sleep. Only the faint sound of wind outside the window and the steady breathing of his roommates remained in the air. He took the small circuit board that carried all his hopes and fears and, using the gentlest transparent tape, carefully fixed it onto an old, plastic-cased square alarm clock—this was the test object he had meticulously calculated to be closest to the 0.1 square meter coverage target required by the system.

He took a deep breath of the cold, silent air, trying to calm his heart, which was thudding like a drum. His fingers trembled slightly from the long hours of fine operation and tension. He checked those slender connection lines, which seemed as if they would break at a touch, one last time, confirming the power polarity was correct. Then, as if about to detonate an extremely unstable bomb, he held his breath and, with trembling fingers, suddenly flipped the crude, self-made power switch!

An extremely faint but exceptionally clear "sizzling" current sound immediately came from the circuit board in the dead of night, like the dying groan of some tiny creature. The few sesame-sized LED indicators on the board struggled to light up with a faint, almost indistinguishable dark red glow, flickering unsteadily as if they would go out at any moment, signaling that the entire system was on a precarious edge of balance.

Excellence held his breath, his heart pounding so hard it felt like it would jump out of his throat. He stared with bloodshot eyes, unblinking and fixed on the old alarm clock sitting quietly on the desk, as if trying to see through it.

One second... two seconds... three seconds... time passed slowly in the suffocating silence. The alarm clock remained the same alarm clock; under the faint light cast by his phone's flashlight, its red plastic casing, transparent dial glass, and clear hands and numbers showed no change at all.

A cold, massive wave of disappointment and panic instantly flooded Excellence. Had he failed again? Had all his efforts gone down the drain once more? Was the material recipe fundamentally wrong? Or was there a fatal error in the circuit design? Or was it that damned, unstable power source? Countless thoughts of failure flashed wildly in his mind, nearly crushing his last shred of sanity.

Just as he was despairing and about to close his eyes, preparing to receive the system's cold and heartless punishment notification, and even starting to imagine the social death scenario of his browser history being turned into memes and spread across the entire internet—

His visual nerves, his peripheral vision which had become exceptionally sensitive due to extreme focus, seemed to catch an extremely subtle, almost imperceptible anomaly!

He suddenly concentrated, focusing all his attention there—yes! It wasn't a hallucination! Absolutely not!

The edge of the old alarm clock near the circuit board area was starting to become a bit... blurred and subject to an elusive shaking?

It was just like the subtle, distorted, shimmering heatwave effect produced when observing distant objects through air baked scorching hot by the blazing sun in the height of summer!

Although the effect was so weak it was almost negligible, and was a hundred thousand miles away from the perfect "invisibility" of melting into the background seen in movies, it was undeniably an interference with light! It was a real, visible optical distortion phenomenon!

[Warning: Optical Camouflage Demonstration Device in operation! Energy output is extremely unstable, with severe fluctuations. Effect Assessment: Extremely weak (Visible light distortion rate < 3.7%), and extremely unstable (Fluctuation amplitude ± 2.1%). Effective coverage area: About 0.078 square meters. Estimated duration: About 7 minutes and 52 seconds.]

[Task: "invisible first step" completion 85%. Judged as 'partially complete'.]

[Based on the completion rate, the fatal punishment is waived. Task rewards are issued at half value. [Low-cost Optical Camouflage (Beggar's Version) Principles and Implementation Plan (Simplified Version).docx] has been issued to the system space.]

"I succeeded! Although not completely... the effect is terrible... but at least! At least I passed! No social death!!" Excellence suddenly exhaled a long-held breath, a massive, survival-like joy instantly washing away all his fatigue and anxiety. He was so excited he almost jumped out of his chair, only managing to forcibly suppress the cheer that nearly escaped his lips for fear of waking his roommates.

Although the effect was barely satisfactory and far from the ideal state required by the task, and the reward had been ruthlessly cut in half by the system into a stripped-down "Simplified Version" plan, this was undoubtedly an epoch-making personal breakthrough for him! This proved the path he had chosen was correct! It proved that he had indeed used these scavenged "junk" materials to tinker out something that surpassed current common perceptions and understanding in a nearly primitive way! An indescribable emotion, a mix of pride, excitement, and a huge sense of achievement, swelled violently in his heart.

Like a child seeing the principle of a magic trick for the first time, he excitedly and greedily observed that faint and strange distortion effect that seemed as if it would dissipate at any moment. He even carefully extended a finger, slowly waving it back and forth in the area where the visual distortion occurred, obsessively feeling the marvelous sense of visual displacement brought by the distorted light, as if touching the edge of the future.

However, Excellence, immersed in the immense joy of his preliminary success, did not know that the energy fluctuations produced by his crude device this time, while even weaker and shorter than the disturbance from the previous miniature fusion experiment, possessed a unique, strange spectral characteristic biased toward high-frequency precision optical modulation. It was like a small pebble thrown into an extremely sensitive listening net; though light, it still created unique ripples that were again accurately captured and recorded by the "Wide-Area Low-Intensity Abnormal Energy Sensing Network" belonging to the national power hidden beneath the city's bustling surface.

Huaxia National Security and Technology Investigation Bureau (National Special Bureau), Ninth Division Command Center.

It was still that vast space filled with a sense of future technology and slightly dim lighting, with countless screens silent-ly flickering, flowing with massive amounts of data from all over the country. Analyst Xiao Liu's gaze was like a precision radar, once again locking onto a familiar set of coordinates. He skillfully called up advanced algorithms to amplify, denoise, and perform spectral analysis and pattern recognition on this extremely weak signal, the expression on his face gradually shifting from routine calmness to a gravity mixed with confusion and amazement.

"Director Wang!" His voice carried a hint of unusual urgency, catching the attention of Wang Jianguo, who was flipping through reports not far away. "It's back! Almost the same geographical coordinates. The signal strength is an Order of magnitude lower than the fusion characteristics recorded last time, weak enough to be almost indistinguishable from environmental background noise, but... the 'fingerprint' similarity of the spectral characteristics is very high, yet the energy release modulation pattern is completely different! This time the characteristics are more like... an extremely high-frequency, ultra-fine electromagnetic beam control. It looks like... some kind of extremely crude but fundamentally bizarre, even somewhat... advanced attempt at Optical Phased Array Modulation Technology?"

Deputy Director Wang Jianguo put down the documents in his hand and walked over quickly. He leaned over, his sharp gaze focusing like a hawk's on the infinitesimal pulse waveform diagram that required special processing to be displayed clearly, his fingers again unconsciously and rhythmically tapping the edge of the cold metal console.

One abnormal signal could be categorized as a fluke, a misoperation in some lab, or a reckless experiment by some genius (or madman) student.

But for a second one to appear in the same location within such a short time? Although the energy level was so low it posed no direct threat, the technical characteristics it displayed pointed toward another field completely different from fusion, yet equally cutting-edge or even more niche and mysterious.

This could no longer be easily explained as a simple "accident" or "mischief."

"This is getting interesting..." Wang Jianguo rubbed his clean-shaven chin, his eyes no longer filled with pure ease and banter, but with a touch of genuine seriousness, inquiry, and the focus of a veteran hunter who had found an interesting trail. "The energy level is laughably low, like a child's toy... but the choice of technical path and the method of implementation... are very wild and unconventional, very special. That University Town area... is it a place of hidden dragons and crouching tigers? Or is there some new situation we haven't noticed?"

He pondered for about ten seconds, his gaze still fixed on that bizarre signal curve, and then issued new instructions, his tone steady but with a clear sense of purpose: "Have the field comrades pay a little more attention," he emphasized "a little" and "attention," handling the scale with extreme precision. "There's no need for a grand spectacle; absolutely avoid disturbing the normal teaching and research Order. First, do some preliminary scouting to understand from the sidelines if any of the labs in the University Town involving physical optics, advanced materials, microwave electromagnetics, and electronic engineering have had any unrecorded, special, or sensitive projects recently. Or... if any professor, or even a graduate or undergraduate student, has shown unusual behavior patterns, such as purchasing large quantities of certain special or rare consumables, frequently borrowing unconventional equipment, or having abnormal attendance records. Pay attention to your methods; be natural and leave no trace."

"Understood!" Xiao Liu immediately grasped his superior's intent. This wasn't a formal investigation, but rather a focus on background intelligence gathering and preliminary screening of potential risk sources, requiring high levels of stealth and skill.

An invisible but more focused gaze began to quietly cast toward the University Town area where Excellence was located, like a slowly tightening net, attempting to distinguish those unusual, faint, but persistent technological ripples from the daily, noisy academic atmosphere.

As for our protagonist, Excellence, he was still completely immersed in the immense joy of escaping the social death punishment and the success of his preliminary technical verification, entirely unaware of the quiet attention from the country's mysterious department triggered by his minor, barely passing "success."

His originally destined-to-be-ordinary salted fish life, which could have been clearly foreseen to continue struggling at the passing line, was now violently deviating from its original, safe orbit with an acceleration he himself could not imagine or control, heading resolutely toward a magnificent future filled with infinite possibilities and opportunities, but also inevitably fraught with unknown thorns and profound crises.

The sea ahead seemed calm, but undercurrents were already surging, and a storm was quietly gathering on the distant horizon.