“Is he that good? You wouldn’t be falling for him, would you?”

“What do you mean ‘falling’? I’m just saying what you really think…”

“Alright, let’s head back.”

Ding Lan didn’t continue the conversation. She just took one last look at the direction where the car disappeared, pursed her lips, and seemed lost in thought.

The next day was the Mid-Autumn Festival.

Chen Zhiyu indeed had no time to come out, leaving only Gao Bo and Gu Ji to have a simple meal at home. Compared to the complex and ever-changing work at the National Security Bureau, the special patrol police’s job was much simpler. The following days went on like before: duty, off-duty, training, duty again…

During this time, Gu Ji continuously kept an eye on information from Japan and the latest developments in the New York bombing case.

Until September 27th, after more than half a month, the United States finally released the official announcement of the case.

Of the six main culprits in the bombing case, four died, two were injured, and the accomplice McLean is still at large;

The case also uncovered a military scandal. Sauva, a high-ranking officer of the Marine Corps’ Land-Air Task Force at the Quantico Base, was accused of leaking military secrets, endangering national security, embezzling state property, illegal arms trading, and bribing customs officials, with the amount involved reaching hundreds of millions of US Dollars. Some say this is the biggest scandal the US Navy has faced in decades.

It is understood that the Sauva scandal has far-reaching implications, involving illegal arms dealers like Kilika, the Volut New York Branch, and PM Arms Company. This interest group is suspected of illegal arms trafficking and modifying medical equipment into weapons for terrorist organizations in various countries.

Among them, Kilika was assassinated by the bombing case’s main culprit, dying in his home;

The Volut Germany Headquarters made a public statement regarding the event: the involved employees were third-party hires, all of whom have been apprehended by the police. The branch manager has profoundly realized the severity of the mistakes and has sincerely apologized to the public and gained their forgiveness, fully cooperating with the FBI and federal prosecutors in submitting evidence;

To date, PM has not made any response. Rumor has it that PM has been embroiled in Ethiopia’s ethnic massacre incident for the past three months, awaiting the federal government to send in audit agencies.

Affected by this combined event, as the European and US stock markets opened, shares of Volut and PM both fell by more than 6 points…

After finishing the entire report, Gu Ji’s mind went blank.

Wow, is this the power of capitalists?

The Volut Headquarters really pushed away any responsibility, acting as if it had nothing to do with them, as if it never happened.

Just thinking about it, the R&D center is the core of Volut Company.

How could high-tech equipment like surgical robots be so easily accessed by third-party personnel, and that armed security team, would they dare to kill with impunity without high-level orders?

And PM Arms Company is even bolder, not even pretending, directly lying low, like a dead pig not afraid of boiling water.

“Are the US prosecutors just eating and doing nothing? The hard-fought criminal clues were so easily cut off…”

Gu Ji cursed a bit under his breath, then searched for more information on “Saflo Baron.” But whether it was an intentional act by the FBI or other reasons, there were no traces of him in either mainstream or underground news, as if he had evaporated from the world.

Everything seemed to return to square one.

As if the September 8th New York series bombings never happened, no real change came before or after, except for that unfortunate colonel getting arrested and a drop in company market value.

But Gu Ji didn’t develop extreme thoughts like a female thug would have.

On the contrary, now that the enemy was visible while he remained hidden, as long as he could endure and continue to build through the Crisis Management Game, overturning these adversaries was just a matter of time.

Another two days passed.

A full 21 days went by, and Gu Ji finally waited out the cooldown for the treasure chest.

He couldn’t even wait to eat dinner; he rushed home eagerly, first playing a song called “Good Luck” on his computer, then facing the moonlight outside the window, rubbing his hands, and taking a deep breath.

[Do you want to spend 4 crisis points to open a blue mark, item treasure chest?]

[Yes!]

With just a thought, the two black spade wood and steel treasure chests began to shake violently, countless hot blue lights seeping out from the cracked wood grain, making Gu Ji’s eyes sting so much that he could barely keep them open.

The next moment, the chest completely shattered.

[Congratulations on obtaining the blue mark: Speed Boost (Medium), blue item: SCⅡ Ghost Network Server!]

Whoa!

Amazing! Double blue!

Gu Ji excitedly slapped his thigh. People said “relying on the mystical won’t save you, gambling won’t change fate, only believe in guaranteed outcomes,” yet today’s mystical operation truly worked.

There were many excellent marks in the bomb stage.

Theoretically speaking, he believed that the strongest on paper should be Disguise, which almost counted as a professional enhancement, transforming him from a tactical SWAT officer into a special agent spy.

But the most applicable, which also best suited Gu Ji’s enhancement route, was the speed mark.

He believed that the so-called marks were actually like talent runes in MOBA competitive games. There was no strongest, only the most suitable.

Gu Ji loaded the mark into the slot, and the strength of his leg muscles, tendons, joints, and nerve state quickly got enhanced.

Now he already possessed two blue marks: Reaction and Speed.

The two could form a perfect synergy, greatly increasing Gu Ji’s quick-reaction combat ability in crisis environments.

Of course.

The main focus this time was on the blue item.

Blue [SCⅡ Ghost Network Server]: The shell is forged with a fusion of three precisely crafted aluminum metal plates; inside, it comprises a computing machine and network machine, with 4 blocks consisting of 32 computing plug-ins as ultra nodes distributed within. Each plug-in is formed by a computing node board equipped with ultra-micro processing chips, with peak performance up to 125,436 TOPS; the SCⅡ Neural Network Server relies on high computing power, using a special network, directly linking and scanning all electronic devices on the level characters possessed by the player, transmitting network information and erasing your IP trace from any network.

Item usage times: Unlimited; can seamlessly connect to the internet, transferring information through building web pages. The target can choose between the game level character and any third party when sending; when sending to a third party, “direct connection” cannot be used and requires an exact address. Building a web page consumes 1 crisis point, and sending one message costs 0.1 crisis point; receiving messages consumes nothing;

Note 1: This item is not affected by signal-blocking devices, but electromagnetic pulse weapons will momentarily affect signal connection;

Note 2: This item can be extracted to reality for upgrades and modifications, or directly used in the game. Once extracted to reality, it cannot be equipped back into the game;

Note 3: During network connection establishment, AI assistance is available, allowing easy operation without computer technical experience;

Note 4: The network connection can be damaged, but we offer paid repairs;

Note 5: More performance and usage techniques of the item await players to discover…

Upon finishing the first half, Gu Ji couldn’t help but admire the power of blue items, but when he read the latter half, he immediately cursed at the game officials for being trash!

Do you think you’re a telecommunication operator, charging for sending but not for receiving?

And the explanations in the notes proved that this blue item should be a modified version of the mysterious computer beside the bomb stage.

It seems the game retrieves items and prioritizes placing them in level-specific treasure chests.

Even so.

“Recovered” items differ vastly from before, like how a special hallucinogen became a poison needle trap mine, or how a high-performance computing, counter-tracking, signal-ignore supercomputer now became a server that only sends and receives messages.

The former could be considered an enhancement.

But the latter, Gu Ji thought, was a downgrade.

However, to someone who doesn’t understand computers, being able to bypass national intelligence agencies and enemy organizations’ tracking to go online and contact game characters already fulfilled its most crucial function.

Once he mastered the relevant technology later on, he could extract and modify this thing.

He quickly opened the inventory.

Besides the cooldown-refreshing poison needle trap, cross medal, and private’s binoculars, there was now an additional silver honeycomb-like electronic device, resembling a computer case.

Gu Ji used his mind to connect to the server, and two status bars appeared before him like game text.

One bar displayed [Third-Party Address], and the other displayed game characters;

Jiang Songyuan (deceased), Jian Na (direct connection available), Wa Xueming (direct connection available), Patrice Herman (deceased), Saflo Baron (direct connection available).

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep