A heavy, profound silence dominated the digital space of [Channel: Zero]. The dossier on the Prometheus Initiative lay open in the minds of its three members, a testament to a betrayal so vast it was difficult to comprehend. The war against the Abyss was not a simple battle for survival; it was a shadow play, and humans were on both sides of the stage.
Old-Man-Jiang's question—Oracle... what have you gotten us into?—hung in the air, unanswered but understood.
It was Lin Mei who finally broke the silence. Her rage from moments before had cooled, condensing into a hard, diamond-like resolve. The faces of her fallen comrades flashed in her memory. Had their sacrifices been nothing more than collateral damage in some twisted human experiment?
Nomad-Lead: This changes the very nature of the war. It means every Rift, every attack, has to be re-examined. We can't trust the official reports. We can't trust anyone.
Nomad-Lead: This isn't a mission for Contribution Points anymore. This is personal.
Hephaestus, ever the pragmatist, immediately shifted to the tactical realities.
Hephaestus: A human enemy is a different beast entirely. More cowardly, but also more cunning. They have layered security, surveillance, trained guards with brains, not just instinct. Our standard monster-hunting gear—loud, destructive, and flashy—is worse than useless for a mission like this. We'd be announcing our presence from a kilometer away.
As they grappled with the enormity of their new reality, a single, final reply from Oracle appeared in the channel, a cold and definitive answer to Jiang's lingering question.
Oracle: I have gotten you into the truth. How you choose to proceed from here is up to you.
And with that, the Oracle username went dark. He had dropped a bomb on their world and left them to deal with the fallout. It was a test. A test of their resolve.
Old-Man-Jiang let out a long sigh in his quiet tea house. It was a brilliant, ruthless move. By stepping back, Oracle was forcing them to take true ownership of this new war. They would not be his puppets. They had to become his willing collaborators.
Old-Man-Jiang: He is right. The question is not what he has gotten us into. The question is, what are we going to do about it? Let us analyze the bounty. 'The Silent Lab'.
The mood in the channel shifted. The shock and horror were compartmentalized, replaced by the focused professionalism that Oracle had recruited them for. The planning session had begun.
The old general took command, his mind effortlessly breaking down the daunting mission into a series of strategic problems.
Old-Man-Jiang: The objective is clear: infiltrate, retrieve data, and escape unseen. I see four primary challenges. One: Infiltration. How do we find and enter a clandestine facility that is likely hidden underground or within a legitimate corporate structure?
Old-Man-Jiang: Two: Security Systems. Prometheus would not be careless. We must assume they have top-of-the-line digital surveillance, spiritual energy sensors, and Awakened guards.
Old-Man-Jiang: Three: The Data Heist. The dossier implies their research is extensive. We could be looking at petabytes of data. A direct download would take hours, if not days. It's not feasible.
Old-Man-Jiang: Four: Exfiltration. Getting out is always harder than getting in.
He had laid out the chessboard. Now, it was time for the other players to move their pieces.
Nomad-Lead: My squad has experience in urban tracking and reconnaissance. We can handle the initial search for the lab in Sector 9 of City T. But as for the infiltration itself... we are hunters, not spies. Our skills are for open combat. We would be like elephants in an art gallery.
Nomad-Lead: We need specialized gear. Something for stealth. Something to disable their eyes and ears.
Hephaestus, who had been silent, suddenly came alive. This was his domain.
Hephaestus: Specifics. Give me specifics, Captain. You need to bypass their digital security? I can forge a localized EMP device, powerful enough to fry nearby electronics without alerting a central grid. You need to disable cameras? A simple frequency jammer. Stealth? Hmph. I can craft boots with soles woven from 'Shadow-Weave' fiber that dampens sound and absorbs spiritual energy signatures. The user would be a ghost to most sensors. Hephaestus: But the General is right. The data heist is the real problem.
Lin Mei agreed. Nomad-Lead: He's right. We can't afford to be parked at a terminal for hours. We need a way to copy the data quickly or remotely.
Old-Man-Jiang: Then we do not attempt a full download. We plant a bug. A 'data sniffer'. A small hardware device that we can attach directly to their central server. It will then copy their data slowly, over weeks, and transmit it packet by packet. A silent, long-term bleed.
Hephaestus: A brilliant solution, but it presents a new problem. A data sniffer capable of handling that volume of information and transmitting it without being detected requires a software protocol far beyond my expertise. I can build the most sophisticated piece of hardware imaginable, but the soul of the device—the code that makes it a ghost—is another matter entirely. I am a smith, not a programmer of that caliber.
The team had hit a wall. They had a plan, a brilliant one, but they were missing the single, most critical piece of technology. The key that would unlock the entire operation.
As if summoned by their impasse, the Oracle username blinked back to life in the channel. He had been watching, listening to their entire deliberation.
He uploaded a single file. It was tiny, less than a kilobyte, but it felt heavier than any blueprint they had ever seen.
[ALGORITHM: 'Ghost-Stream' Data Protocol]
Oracle: Hephaestus. This is the software component you require. Oracle: It is a data transmission protocol from... an alternate technological path. It does not transmit in a linear stream. It breaks data down into trillions of microscopic, encrypted packets. Each packet is then disguised as benign background noise—'digital static'—and piggybacked onto millions of different civilian communication networks. The packets are individually meaningless and untraceable. They only reassemble into coherent data when they reach the designated receiver, which knows the quantum encryption key.
Oracle: Integrate this protocol into the hardware of your data sniffer. It will be undetectable.
The three members stared at the explanation, a profound sense of awe silencing them. This wasn't just advanced technology. This was a concept of data transfer that defied known physics. It was a miracle.
Hephaestus was the first to recover, his fingers flying across his keyboard as he analyzed the code.
Hephaestus: This... this isn't code. It's art. It's... beautiful. The elegance of the encryption... Oracle, what *are* you?
Oracle did not answer. He had provided the key. The rest was up to them.
The final plan was solidified with a newfound, almost fanatical confidence. Hephaestus would forge the complete infiltration kit: the signature-dampening boots, the EMP grenades, the camera jammers, and the 'Ghost-Stream' data sniffer. Old-Man-Jiang would use his networks to gather intelligence on City T's industrial sector, identifying potential locations for the lab. Lin Mei would personally lead the small, elite infiltration team, hand-picking the best from her squad and the Iron Vultures.
Across the city, Su Liying was unaware of the detailed planning. But she was not idle. She was watching the Oracle Alliance platform, specifically the new, high-value bounty. She couldn't see the planning channel, but she could see the objective: find a secret lab in City T.
Her mind was racing. If she could contribute, if she could find a piece of information that helped solve this bounty, she could earn more CP and gain more standing within the Alliance. More importantly, she could prove to Oracle—to Qin Mo—that she was a capable asset, not just a curious classmate. It was her own secret test. She began to use her access to the environmental agency's databases, searching for any anomalies in City T's industrial sector—unusual power consumption, strange chemical traces, anything out of the ordinary.
From his bedroom, Qin Mo observed all the moving pieces on his board. He saw the confidence and determination of his core team in [Channel: Zero]. He saw the fervor of the hunters in the Outer Court, who were speculating wildly about the new bounty.
And he saw the activity log of one Crystalline_Mind. He saw her accessing public records, cross-referencing maps, and running data queries focused on City T. She was running her own parallel investigation.
He opened a private, encrypted log, a diary of his grand strategy.
'Subject Su Liying's independent analytical behavior is accelerating. She is actively attempting to solve Bounty 2001 in parallel to the primary operational cell. This presents both a significant risk of unforeseen interference and a unique opportunity for asset evaluation under pressure.'
He paused, a flicker of something almost human, a hint of contemplation, crossing his mind.
'A decision is required. Do I warn her off, preserving operational security? Or do I let her continue, using her as an unwitting scout, a variable to test the Prometheus Initiative's reactive defenses?'
The fate of his most promising—and most dangerous—follower now rested on a single, cold, strategic calculation.