179: The rats in the kingdom

Eve's consciousness sank into the deep sea of data.

In the real world, the laboratory's pungent smell of nutrient solution and the cold touch of metal had faded away. Here, she was a god. Countless light-ribbon-like streams of code whistled past her, each representing a tiny fragment of the production base's history.

Her eyes, or rather the focus of her consciousness, scanned this universe she had built with her own hands like a hawk.

"Using my highest authority, pull up all encrypted and archived access logs from the lowest level of the production system. Starting from the day the first production line was installed and debugged, I want every single one."

[Executing. The volume of data is immense; estimated time required...]

"I don't care." Eve's voice echoed in the data dimension, devoid of warmth. "I'm going to find the rat hiding in my kingdom."

The streams of light reorganized and aligned under her will. Time was compressed, and months of logs flashed before her eyes.

Suddenly, she stopped.

"Stop."

The surging river of data froze instantly. She extracted an extremely thin, almost invisible dark-red data line from the billions of light streams.

"What is this?"

[An abnormal access record. It occurred on the day the core firmware was modified. The energy peak was extremely high, but the duration was very short; the system judged it as a benign fluctuation.]

"Source?"

[Tracking...] A hint of confusion appeared in the AI's voice. [Access key... belongs to automated cleaning robot number 7-C-3412. Permission verification... perfect.]

Eve's consciousness condensed into a cold humanoid form. She "stared" at that perfect authorization record and fell silent for a moment.

"A flawless disguise," she commented coldly. "Pull up the work logs of all robots from that day and cross-reference them with the time of this intrusion."

[Command received. Performing petabyte-level data cross-matching...]

On the light screen, the movement trajectories of countless robots were mapped out like a complex spiderweb. At that precise point in time, on the line representing cleaning robot 7-C-3412, an almost imperceptible pause of only one-hundredth of a second appeared.

A data interruption.

"That's it." There was no joy in Eve's voice, only the coldness of a confirmed hypothesis.

"Immediately pull up the file of the Technician responsible for maintaining this robot."

A photo popped up.

A man in his early thirties with a flawless resume; the smile in the photo was as kind as a big brother next door.

Name: Simon.

Eve's gaze became colder than the data abyss itself.

She tried to investigate further but hit an invisible wall. Simon had a perfect alibi for that day; all his communication records and movement trajectories were as clean as a blank sheet of paper. All clues pointed to him, yet all the evidence defended him.

A deep sense of powerlessness seized her. To find the true culprit but be unable to convict them—this feeling was more humiliating to her than designing a flawed product.

"Enough."

At the peak of her frustration, she gave up.

"Stop tracking the culprit," she ordered the AI. "Let's change our approach."

"Rescan all blueprints for the first-generation energy blocks, as well as all modified firmware code."

[Scan target? Logic vulnerabilities?]

"No." Eve closed her eyes, remembering that algorithm full of "errors." "Activate the 'Biological Chaos Algorithm.' The goal isn't to find 'errors,' but to find 'abnormalities.'"

[Warning: 'Biological Chaos Algorithm'...]

"Execute."

The AI stopped arguing. Massive computing power was mobilized, and streams of data that seemed chaotic, contradictory, and redundant—like wildly growing vines—instantly enveloped the entire codebase.

Eve didn't look at the normal areas marked as "possessing chaotic characteristics." She was looking for only one thing.

In her ocean of code, what would look "abnormal"?

The answer soon surfaced.

[Alert: 'Abnormal' code segment discovered.] The AI's voice carried a hint of mechanical surprise. [The logic of this code segment is rigorous, the structure is perfect, and there is no redundancy. Efficiency... as high as one hundred percent.]

Eve snapped her eyes open.

In her world, in that ocean of code filled with an organic sense and the redundant aesthetics of life, "perfection" was the greatest abnormality!

She dragged out that "perfect" code, isolated it in a virtual cage, and used the most violent means to deconstruct it layer by layer.

The truth was laid bare before her.

"A... Logic Bomb disguised as a hardware driver," she murmured to herself, her voice trembling slightly with anger.

"It silently counts production volume. After reaching a certain threshold, it receives a specific remote signal... then it tampers with all production line safety protocols, triggering a chain overload..."

Her gaze fell upon the deepest part of the code, on a hard-coded date.

Two weeks later.

Coinciding with the opening of the Interstellar Industrial Expo.

Stealing her technology, producing imitations, and then detonating all her production lines at her most glorious moment when production capacity was at its peak.

A fatal blow.

What a vicious plan.

An extreme, icy shiver, mixed with the excitement of a hunter finding a prey's tracks, rose from her spine.

All exhaustion and all self-doubt were completely burned away at this moment.

She exited the data abyss.

The light of the real world stung her eyes, but she didn't care. She didn't even wipe away the tear stains on her face and directly connected to Chen Feng's office.

In the Command Center, Chen Feng was looking at the only thing left on the screen—the bright red "12:00:00" bankruptcy countdown—and thinking about a final plan.

Suddenly, an encrypted communication request forced its way in.

It was Eve.

Chen Feng answered the call.

On the screen, Eve's face was terrifyingly pale, but her eyes were startlingly bright. All exhaustion had faded, replaced by a predator-like calmness and excitement.

Her voice was clear and cold, every word like a bullet.

"Chen Feng."

"I found it."

"They didn't just steal something; they left a gift."

The corners of her mouth twitched into a grim smile devoid of any mirth.

"Now, I know how to pay them back twofold."