62: Wang Chu's "fishing" plan and Morpheus's "consolation"

During Excellence's recovery, the farcical scene of his "hand-crafted" wheelchair, along with his stubborn drive to tinker—clumsy and foolish as it was amidst his extreme weakness and cognitive impairment—was recorded in painstaking detail by the monitoring agents. A comprehensive report was submitted, word for word, to Wang Jianguo's office, a place as cold and precise as the interior of a fine instrument.

Sitting behind his massive desk, Wang Jianguo swiped across the tablet screen, looking at the descriptions and candid photos. There was Excellence, wearing a ridiculous, self-made "brainwave control headband" fashioned from clothes hangers and springs, fully engrossed (though his eyes were still somewhat vacant) in a pile of junk parts. On Wang Jianguo's face, usually as cold and hard as a frozen lake, the lines softened rarely. A tiny, helpless arc of a smile even tugged at the corner of his mouth, and a complex light—a mix of helplessness, heartache, and a faint, nearly imperceptible trace of admiration—flickered in his eyes.

"This kid... really is..." He shook his head, his deep voice carrying the exasperated yet amused tone of a father seeing his troublesome child get into mischief again. "Even in this state, with his brain nearly formatted, he still can't forget his little hobby of 'hand-crafting.' Is the smell of solder paste and rosin really that addictive? It's a habit carved into his very bones." He paused, his tone turning slightly serious but remaining indulgent. "Still... it's good. Having something to focus on, even if it's just messing around, is better than lying in bed all day overthinking and sinking into a swamp of negative emotions and physical pain. Perhaps... this is a different kind of rehabilitation training. At least it exercises those rusty hands of his."

However, the brief sense of lightness brought by Excellence's childish behavior evaporated quickly, like dew under the sun. The eerie, death-like silence from Morpheus Li's side over the past few days hung over Wang Jianguo's heart like a gathering, suffocating dark cloud. His vigilance did not decrease; instead, it tightened like a bowstring. Knowing that old fox—scheming and unscrupulous in achieving his goals—Excellence's unexpected collapse and near-death recovery would never make the opponent simply stop and call it a day. It was more likely that the other side was licking the wounds from the annihilation of the "Firefly" team in the shadows, while more cautiously and covertly brewing subsequent schemes that would be even more cunning, lethal, and difficult to guard against. Beneath a calm sea, there are often surging undercurrents and bloodthirsty sharks.

"Any new developments regarding Evelyn Li?" Wang Jianguo looked up, his sharp gaze falling on Xiao Zhang, who stood silently nearby like a shadow.

Xiao Zhang immediately stepped forward and reported in a steady, clear voice: "According to peripheral monitoring under the 'Ghost' protocol, the target's emotional fluctuations have been very intense. She has had several fierce arguments with her father, Morpheus Li, in his study. The contents of the arguments were unobtainable due to excellent soundproofing, but lip-reading analysis and emotional model reconstruction suggest they involve disagreements over core project decisions and personnel disposal. There are scattered rumors through non-public channels within The Foundation that she has been cold-shouldered by the top brass and has had her activities restricted due to a 'mistake' or 'lack of resolve' on a 'key project,' with some of her permissions temporarily frozen. Additionally, our deep-web sniffers captured some extremely stealthy, high-tech, unidirectional external communication attempts. The signals were disguised as ordinary commercial data streams, with paths involving multiple encryptions and random jumps, making it impossible to track the specific content or the final destination. However, the transmission method bears a high similarity to how we previously received 'gifts.'"

Wang Jianguo listened quietly, his fingers unconsciously tapping the smooth tabletop in a rhythmic pattern as if calculating. His sharp, calm gaze flickered with the calculation of an old hunter. It seemed his intuition regarding the move with Evelyn had been correct, perhaps even more effective than expected. Her complex guilt and sympathy for Excellence, clashing with her father's cold, cruel, and profit-driven ultimate plan, was gradually transforming her from a carefully cultivated, obedient tool into an unstable, unpredictable factor—one that could be extremely valuable and destructive at a critical moment in the future.

"It seems that old fox Morpheus can't sit still, but he's also unsure of our strength and Excellence's true condition. After taking such a big hit last time, he doesn't dare easily use taboo killing moves like 'pandora' that harm both enemy and self." Wang Jianguo let out a cold laugh, his voice filled with icy mockery. "He must be like an ant on a hot pan right now, desperate to know Excellence's current state: is his brain truly fried, making him a total vegetable; is he just playing dumb to lull us into a false sense of security; or... what would keep him up at night even more is whether Excellence gained some 'unexpected' harvest or evolution beyond his control during that near-death experience!"

A bold and risky plan to beat the enemy at their own game quickly took shape in his experienced mind, with details constantly being refined and various possibilities being simulated.

"Since he wants to know so badly, scratching his heart like a cat smelling fish, then we'll be... 'kind souls' and proactively tell him a bit of the 'truth' he wants to hear." A calculating, coldly playful arc formed at the corner of Wang Jianguo's mouth. "Xiao Zhang, make the arrangements. Let our 'seed' appropriately and 'accidentally'... 'sprout' a bit. Let's put on a show for the audience in the shadows."

A few days later, at a carefully selected moment based on intelligence analysis and psychological deduction—one that seemed accidental but coincided with the peak activity period of one of The Foundation's peripheral intelligence nodes—an encrypted piece of intelligence regarding Excellence's latest "condition assessment and cognitive state observation" was "accidentally" leaked. It slipped out like a leaf falling into water through a well-disguised communication channel, seemingly used by a mid-level medical official due to negligence, with a security level that was "just happens" to be low enough. The confidentiality level of this channel was in a delicate state—just enough to require some effort for the other side to capture it, making them believe it wasn't a deliberately placed bait but hard-won, valuable intelligence.

The content of this intelligence was a masterfully crafted smokescreen: it first used a large number of seemingly objective, professional medical terms and detailed data to exaggerate and emphasize the extreme severity of the damage to Excellence's nervous system after an "unknown shock." It described his advanced cognitive functions as severely degraded, his logical thinking chains broken, and his short-term memory as largely missing and chaotic. He was portrayed as a "useless person" unable to care for himself, with dull emotional responses, who did little more than stare blankly at parts and occasionally mutter illogical gibberish. The prognosis was extremely poor, with a recovery chance of less than five percent.

At the same time, in the final appendix of the report, it mentioned in an extremely obscure and ambiguous way—as if it were an interesting anecdote casually noted by the recorder—that nursing staff observed the patient, during his unconscious, child-like "fiddling" (such as when playing with discarded parts), would occasionally use a trembling hand to draw lines and clusters of symbols on paper that "seemed illogical and disorganized, yet faintly hinted at a strange mathematical beauty and complex topological structure." The report cautiously speculated that these might be residual "fragments of subconscious inspiration" in his shattered consciousness that could not be explained by existing medical theory, or perhaps meaningless hallucinations resulting from nerve damage, suggesting continued observation without over-interpretation.

This intelligence was a mix of truth and falsehood—nine parts truth mixed with one part lethal lie. It matched Morpheus Li's psychological expectations of the terrifying power of the "pandora" virus and was cross-verified by his other intelligence sources, which would greatly ease his suspicion and lead him to believe Excellence was no longer a threat. Yet, it also perfectly tossed out a lethal bait—like a drop of blood before a hungry shark—regarding "possibly remaining undigested high-level information," which was enough to provoke his greedy and suspicious nature, making him itch to confirm further.

Sure enough, the intelligence was like a stone dropped into water. After a brief, suffocating period of silence, the frequency of underwater activity from The Foundation's side increased significantly. Several previously dormant sleeper intelligence points were detected with abnormal activation signals. Some normally routine academic exchange visit applications suddenly became active with subtle targets. There were even several extremely stealthy attempts to infiltrate the National Special Bureau's external medical supply chain and waste disposal systems—the opponent was clearly trying to cross-verify the authenticity of the intelligence from multiple angles and find opportunities to contact or obtain the "remnants."

A few days later, a carefully planned "follow-up" arrived as expected. An extremely exquisitely packaged and luxurious "condolence gift," with sincere and appropriate wording filled with "academic concern" and humanitarian spirit, was sent to the National Special Bureau's liaison department through official, impeccable diplomatic parcel channels. It was specifically addressed to "Student Excellence," signed by several internationally prestigious academic institutions and charitable organizations with faint, shimmering links to the "Prophet Foundation."

The condolences consisted of several beautifully bound, gold-leafed limited edition classic works on art history and classical philosophy (content that seemed harmless and full of humanistic care), along with a box of top-tier herbal health tea said to be produced in a specific high-altitude region of the Free Confederacy. It was supposedly cultivated using ancient techniques and was "greatly beneficial" for nervous system repair and soothing anxiety, complete with detailed ingredient descriptions and certifications from authoritative bodies. The accompanying letter was even more heartfelt, expressing "deep sympathy and regret" for the "unexpected illness" of this "highly potential young scholar," and "sincerely wishing" him a speedy recovery and return to scientific research to "add more bricks to the expansion of the frontiers of human knowledge." Between the lines, it was filled with the earnest care of senior scholars for a junior (and an almost unmaskable anxiety to probe the truth).

Wang Jianguo held the box of luxuriously packaged herbal tea, which emitted a strange, faint fragrance. He weighed it in his hand, a cold, knowing sneer forming at the corner of his mouth as he handed it directly to the technical analysis department that had been on standby. "Check it inch by inch; don't let a single molecule escape."

The test results came back quickly, the speed indicating they had a plan ready: the ink and specific pages of those expensive books had been treated with a special chemical process. They contained extremely trace amounts of nano-pheromones that could be slowly and continuously released, affecting emotional stability and cognitive focus through skin contact or inhalation; long-term exposure would exacerbate mental disorder. As for that box of seemingly natural, harmless top-tier herbal tea, the tea leaves had been meticulously soaked in a special inducer that was highly bio-inert and difficult to detect through conventional means! The inducer itself was non-toxic, but once it entered the human body, it could create an extremely stealthy biochemical resonance and information interaction with the remnants of the "pandora" virus lurking within Excellence, attempting to quietly activate its dormant state or at least detect its current presence and activity level! The stealth of the method, the malice of the design, and the depth of the calculation were enough to make one's skin crawl!

"He really couldn't help but take the bait; it's still the same old treacherous tricks." A cold light flashed in Wang Jianguo's eyes like an unsheathed blade. "It seems Morpheus still can't bear to completely destroy this 'seed' he painstakingly selected. His mindset is quite contradictory. He hopes Excellence is completely ruined to eliminate future trouble, yet he can't help but harbor a sense of luck, wanting to test and see if he can 'recycle' some scraps... or at least personally confirm if this pawn is truly of no further use."

"Director Wang, how should we handle these things?" Xiao Zhang asked for instructions, his tone calm as if he had already anticipated the result.

"Keep the condolence letter and register it. In the name of the liaison department, send a formally worded, grateful official reply stating the condolences have been received and the sentiment is appreciated, and wishing for the flourishing of international academic exchanges." Wang Jianguo instructed calmly, his tone carrying a hint of the flawless indifference characteristic of officials. "As for these books and tea... what a shame. During transport, they 'accidentally' suffered from unknown contamination (perhaps a minor leak of warehouse pesticide?), resulting in damaged packaging and contents, making them unsafe to use. Express deep regret. Following the standard protocol for handling biochemical contaminants, destroy them immediately, thoroughly, and safely. Remember to keep a 'complete' and compliant record of the disposal for future reference."

This was a strategy to kill two birds with one stone. It cleanly rejected the opponent's probing and schemes, cutting off the reaching hand, while using this "accidental" disposal method to send a clear and firm signal: we know what you're trying to do, your little tricks won't work on us, don't waste your effort. At the same time... Wang Jianguo paused, a deeper calculation flashing in his eyes as he added: "Additionally, take the core conclusions of our analysis report, especially the part about the specific resonance mechanism between the inducer and the 'pandora' remnants, and find a way to... 'accidentally' leak some fragmented information through that special channel we control that Evelyn might come into contact with. Let her 'accidentally' glimpse what kind of 'gentle' and 'humane' care her great father used on the person she wants to protect."

This would further deepen the rift between Evelyn's inner guilt and fear and her father's cold plan, laying a deeper foundation and creating more favorable conditions for potentially utilizing this unpredictable pawn deep within the enemy's ranks in the future.

Morpheus Li's painstakingly planned "condolences" ultimately turned into a complete failure—a probe that lost both the bait and the hook. Not only did it fail to achieve any purpose, but it also allowed Wang Jianguo to more clearly feel the opponent's pulse, bottom line, and current state of anxiety.

The chess game continued amidst silent smoke. Both sides placed their pieces more cautiously, with deeper calculations, waiting for the next moment to break the balance. And Excellence's small hospital room remained the most critical and fragile focus of this silent war.