Chapter 10: To Find Me, My Nine Sisters Hacked Global Surveillance
Shanghai, Mercedes-Benz Arena.
The roars of tens of thousands of spectators in the arena threatened to lift the dome off. On the massive holographic screen, the world championship finals of an esports tournament that determined global glory were underway.
"OMG! We're about to witness history! 'Meng Shen' is on a rampage! Quadra kill! One more kill and it's the first-ever penta kill in world championship history!"
The commentator screamed at the top of his lungs, spittle flying, "If they ace the enemy team right now, Meng Shen will lift that trophy symbolizing the ultimate glory!"
In the center of the stage, inside the soundproof glass booth.
Lin Mengmeng wore oversized pink cat-ear headphones, her fingers a blur on the mechanical keyboard. The assassin hero on the screen moved like a phantom, harvesting the health bars of her opponents. Her eyes were focused and feverish, a confident, almost arrogant smirk curling at the corner of her mouth.
Just one more press of the 'R' key.
Right at this critical moment, the custom phone covered in anime stickers, placed next to the keyboard, suddenly vibrated.
It wasn't a normal vibration, but an urgent, buzzing tremor that made the entire desk resonate—it was the exclusive ringtone reserved only for "Family S-Class Emergency."
Lin Mengmeng's finger froze mid-air.
She frowned, glancing at the caller ID: [Third Sister (ATM Machine)].
"Dammit, why call now? Doesn't she know I'm in the finals?"
She wanted to hang up, but remembering Third Sister's terrifying tactic of "cut off your allowance if you don't pick up," Lin Mengmeng gritted her teeth. Under the watchful eyes of tens of thousands in the arena, she made a move that would give esports fans worldwide a stroke.
She let go of her mouse and answered the call.
On the screen, her assassin hero stood still, allowing the enemy's barely-alive marksman to seize the opportunity and gun her down with two shots.
"Ace!"
Dead silence filled the arena.
The commentator seemed to have been choked, unable to utter a single word for a long moment.
"Hello? Lin Wanyue, this better be important!" Lin Mengmeng completely ignored the exploding public outcry outside, pushing her microphone up, her tone furious. "My penta kill is gone! My trophy flew away! Can you even compensate for this loss?!"
"Lin Ji is missing."
On the other end of the line, Lin Wanyue's voice was as cold as an ice cellar. "Military satellites can't find him. You find him for me, right now."
"What?"
Lin Mengmeng was stunned for a second, then her previously murderous eyes widened in an instant. Her voice changed pitch, shifting from an irritable loli to a panicked little girl. "Brother is missing? How is that possible! He texted me yesterday saying he wanted to eat my cooking... even though it's dark cuisine, but he didn't reply!"
"No nonsense. Three minutes. I want coordinates."
*Beep beep beep—*
The call ended.
Lin Mengmeng sat frozen in her gaming chair, staring at the grayed-out screen and the Nexus being destroyed.
Her teammates were frantically typing curses in the team chat. Her coach was backstage, throwing his headphones in frustration. From the audience seats came waves of boos and shouts of "match-fixing!"
"So noisy! A bunch of noobs!"
Lin Mengmeng violently ripped off her headphones and slammed them onto the keyboard, sending keycaps from the expensive custom keyboard flying everywhere.
She stood up, faced the global live broadcast camera, flipped it the bird, then turned and kicked open the soundproof booth door.
"I'm done with this stupid match! I need to find my brother!"
...
Ten minutes later, backstage lounge.
It had been transformed into a temporary hacker base. Lin Mengmeng had kicked out all her teammates and coaches, locked the door, and set up three top-of-the-line laptops in front of her.
On the screens, only dense, cascading streams of green code flowed.
"Daring to play hide-and-seek with my brother? Lin Ji, you've grown some guts!"
Lin Mengmeng had a lollipop in her mouth, her fingers flying across the keyboard so fast they left afterimages. At this moment, she was no longer the "Meng Shen" of the esports arena, but the "Hand of God" who struck fear in the dark web.
"Infiltrating the Sky Eye system... unlocking permissions... covering the entire Jinghai City area..."
The progress bar loaded rapidly.
However, three seconds later, a glaring red pop-up window appeared on the screen: [Target data lost! Subject to unknown S-Class signal interference!]
"Interference? Even Big Sister's military satellites are being jammed?"
Lin Mengmeng crunched the candy in her mouth, a flash of excitement in her eyes. "Interesting. It seems in these eighteen years, our 'waste' of a brother hasn't been idle. He even managed to get his hands on this level of counter-surveillance tech."
If the regular Sky Eye system couldn't catch his face, then she'd change her approach.
A man's gotta eat.
Although that guy Lin Ji is a superman with maxed-out life skills, he has a fatal weakness—he's broke. Running away from home, he definitely didn't bring much cash. As long as he spends money, as long as he uses mobile payment, or even just orders takeout...
"Capturing all small mobile payment data within Jinghai City from the past 24 hours..."
"Filter criteria: street food stalls, fried dough sticks, tofu pudding, cheap motels..."
"Cross-referencing with behavioral habit models..."
The data streams on the screen refreshed frantically, like a data storm without gunpowder smoke.
In just two minutes.
"Found him!"
Lin Mengmeng slammed the enter key. The screen instantly froze on an image.
It was a blurry screenshot from an intersection surveillance camera. Although the face was deliberately obscured, those canvas shoes and the way he held the fried dough stick—Lin Mengmeng could recognize them with her eyes closed.
"urban village, Grandpa Zhang's breakfast stall... Well done, Lin Ji. Hiding out and eating alone at that greasy spoon joint I've been to too!"
She gritted her little fangs, wishing she could crawl through the internet and bite him.
But then, she let out a sigh of relief.
Good, he's okay. He wasn't captured by Big Sister in her crazed state to be dissected, nor was he lured away by some bad woman.
"Coordinates locked: Near No. 404, Laoya Alley, West District, Jinghai City."
Lin Mengmeng quickly opened another map, which marked the Sisters' spheres of influence within Jinghai City.
"The closest one to there is..."
Her gaze fell on a glowing red dot on the map. That location was Jinghai Ability Academy, which was Seventh Sister Lin Chuxia's territory.
"Seventh Sister?"
Lin Mengmeng wrinkled her little nose.
That old seventh, on the surface she seems like an intellectual, gentle university professor, but she's actually a severe glasses fetishist and a hidden yandere. If she finds brother first...
"Forget it, still better than Big Sister finding him first. Big Sister is a powder keg right now."
Lin Mengmeng tapped lightly, packaged the precise coordinates, and sent them out.
[To Seventh Sister: Found him. He's in the urban village right next to your school. Don't say I didn't warn you. First come, first served. If Big Sister gets there first, we're all done for.]
Send.
Lin Mengmeng closed her laptop, casually grabbed the esports team jacket nearby and threw it on, then pulled open the lounge door.
Outside, event organizers and media reporters had already blocked the hallway.
"Miss Lin Mengmeng! Why did you go AFK at the critical moment of the finals?"
"This is a desecration of professional spirit! You must give an explanation to your fans!"
Facing countless flashing lights and microphones, Lin Mengmeng put on her sunglasses, a scornful sneer curling at her lips.
"Explanation? My brother is missing, what do I care about professional spirit?"
She pushed past the reporters blocking her way and strode out. "Out of my way. I'm going home to catch someone. And tell that opponent, he got lucky this time. Next time we meet, I'll knock his head off."
...
Jinghai Ability Academy, Professor's Office.
Sunlight filtered through the blinds onto the desk piled with books. The air carried a faint scent of sandalwood.
A woman in a white blouse, black pencil skirt, and gold-rimmed glasses sat at the desk grading papers. She was beautiful, with an intellectual, scholarly beauty, but at the moment, she had already snapped two red pens in her hand.
"Lin Ji..."
Lin Chuxia looked at the cropped group photo in the frame on the corner of her desk, her gaze somewhat dazed. "Where on earth are you hiding? Without you reading to me, I can't even focus on these papers..."
Her mental state was also at its limit. The desire to hear his voice, to touch his skin, grew like poisonous weeds in her heart.
Just then, her phone on the desk vibrated.
It was an encrypted message from Ninth Sister.
Lin Chuxia glanced at the coordinates on the screen. The light in her previously dim eyes instantly ignited with astonishing brilliance.
"urban village? Right on the street behind the school's back gate?"
She slowly stood up, took off her glasses and wiped them, a gentle smile that was hard to decipher curling at her lips.
"So close... You've been hiding right under my nose all along."
"Perfect. The evening anatomy class is short an assistant. Little brother, since you've come to your sister's territory, don't even think about leaving."
She took off her stiff teacher's uniform jacket, pulled out a trench coat she would never normally wear from the wardrobe, and walked out of the office.
Students passing by saw Professor Lin, usually gentle yet strict, now humming a tune, walking with purpose, and even... was that a trace of something like drool glistening at the corner of her mouth?
"What's wrong with the professor?"
"No idea. Feels like she's going to eat some amazing feast..."
Lin Chuxia licked her slightly dry lips. The gentleness in her eyes was gradually replaced by a deep, bottomless possessiveness.
"Xiao Ji, your sister is coming to get you."