Cyber Era Witch
Chapter 487 - 434: Hacker Conference

Chapter 487: Chapter 434: Hacker Conference

After returning, Farosa had conducted several controlled deductions in the secret chamber. When she entered the deep meditative state of the Witch Goddess, she was able to fully mobilize her extensive divine power and wisdom to explore various future scenarios.

The outcome of the corporate wars was brutal, not only in the current megacorporate battle taking place in the Eastern Hemisphere but also the bloody struggle for supremacy over the Northern Archipelago between Nestor Corporation and New Xisheng Group.

Currently, they were powerless to prevent nuclear weapons from destroying cities, so regardless, the Northern Archipelago would be left in ruins after the war, and it would take an entire generation to rebuild everything that was lost.

The New Xisheng Group had inherited the nuclear arsenal left by Honma Noriko, including an all-weather strategic missile system with numerous ballistic missiles hidden in silos at secret military bases.

The Northern Archipelago was so narrow that the mountainous areas and uninhabited islands suitable for hiding nuclear bases could be traced, but this was top secret and never to be disclosed.

They also had nuclear submarines, the most robust and viable part of the nuclear strike force. Of course, Farosa could use the Ocean Descendant to search the nearby seas, but as a company, they could hide the nuclear submarines within another enterprise’s jurisdiction at will, leaving no trace, only to cast nuclear weapons on Anjiu City when the time was right.

In addition, there were those large strategic bombers and stealth bombers, always ready to sortie in batches, causing irreversible damage to cities.

The Law of Recovery? After nuclear weapons destroyed a city, Farosa could indeed use complex rituals to harness divine power and recover the entire city to its pre-bombing state.

But this would be a resurrection of millions of dead people, who would retain their memories after revival. They would never forget the terrifying fact that they had died and returned to life. Once things got to that point, the citizens would not be able to turn a deaf ear and act as if nothing had happened, there would surely be troublesome reactions.

If humans became skeptical troublemakers, the cost of controlling them would greatly increase.

So, it was essential to dismantle the nuclear weapons system first, then strike the corporate dogs with thunderous force, seizing their industries, annexing their territories, killing their members, and taking their funds. Farosa thought darkly.

This matter needed to be considered over the long term.

The opponent was an entire corporate group, which might lead to unexpected incidents. Xu Yang was supposed to be the one to handle the nuclear bombs, but it was called away by its massive siblings. This made Farosa adopt an even more cautious strategy.

She suspected that the New Xisheng Group’s chances of winning were less than 1%, but she dared not gamble her fate on it, so she had to first sever their last means of resistance, ensuring their strategic and tactical downfall.

She went upstairs to find Xu Yang, who seemed to be conducting negotiations, chatting happily.

"Who are you talking to?" Farosa frowned.

"Nanase Kizuna." Xu Yang leaned back, "I sent her the creative proposals written by Kirino Reisei, and she’s both happy and excited. Of course, she doesn’t know Kirino Reisei is here. I just said it was from an enthusiastic fan."

"The big fox is more amiable as a manga artist." Farosa sneered coldly, "Or I should say, as a pet, quite suitable."

"I need to leave for a while." Xu Yang put on his coat, leaving his terminal.

"Doing what?" Farosa felt even more peculiar, "You better explain clearly to me."

"Global Hacker Convention." Xu Yang adjusted his attire, "It’s online, but I want to dress up properly before I go."

"You seem particularly happy."

"Yes." Xu Yang was eager to try, "It’s filled with tech experts, the strongest hackers, and fighters from around the world who aspire to fight against the corporations. Hackers are creative, curious, and loners. They can be said to be the coolest bunch, and this convention brings together all the elite."

"You will scare them to death." Farosa said arrogantly, "Prove your strength to them."

"No," Xu Yang said, "I’m going in as an apprentice. Compared to those real legendary hackers, what I can do is still very limited. I must learn from them as much as I can to make my skills reach the top level."

"As if you’re trying to get an actual license?"

"Exactly." Xu Yang faced the mirror to adjust his appearance, "I don’t have the ability to break into the core databases of giant corporations yet. They are protected by multiple layers of control, and top-level network engineers personally guard them, protected by world-renowned cybersecurity firms. Only by reaching higher levels and perfecting my art will I stand a chance to peek inside."

"Found the military base," Farosa snapped back to reality, "As long as you infiltrate New Xisheng Group’s data center, you can reveal the location of their strategic weapons storage."

"Not just that, by then, I can tamper with everything," Xu Yang made thorough preparations, "Alright, leave the office to me."

"Hmph," Farosa kissed Xu Yang, "You’d better be able to."

She spun around and left.

"Xu Cheng?" Xu Yang looked for Little Fool’s position.

Little Fool’s eyes widened as she looked at Xu Yang, who was exceptionally handsome and spirited. She saluted him, nodded, ran to close all the curtains, then made herself some milk, sat on the cabinet with the milk cup firmly in her hands, and gazed blankly at Xu Yang.

"I’ll be back in six to ten hours," Xu Yang reassured himself as he sat down in the chair, checked the wiring, ensured emergency backup strategies, took a deep breath, pulled out the data connection from his wrist, plugged it into the terminal, keyed in the communication key sent by the relay machine on the screen in front of him, and then took another deep breath.

—His mind turned into photonic information, entering the vast and infinite network space, and then followed a predefined channel into the main venue.

This was a network conference space. High-end business meetings also unfolded in a similar fashion, where participants encountered digitalized light and sound. Everything could be built, shaped, and deleted by the administrator, with attendees moving as codes on a virtual platform on the server.

The place he was in resembled a virtual sand dune, with ripples of sand made up of tiny hexagonal grains. The digital strings and numbers that made up the land around him reflected the server’s underlying source code.

Xu Yang stared at the soil imprinted with high-level technical information, feeling enlightened by the familiar encoding and terminology. He suddenly realized where he was.

This was the deep web server for anonymous networks.

This is it! Xu Yang felt a surge of excitement. He had finally seen it—it was famously known for providing countless net surfers with an anonymous venue for conducting a series of unregulated and untraceable secret actions. The global hacker convention was held here.

He looked up and immediately saw the dark purple "starry sky," a dome of the digital space representing a concrete network firewall, intricate as if made up of hundreds of millions of grids, separating the deep web of anonymous networks from the public networks operated by corporations.

By unspoken agreement, corporations domesticated billions of people on one side of the network firewall, contenting them with superficial information from the surface web, while all the vicious, maniac behaviors, and radical dissent hid within the deep web, flickering like sparks, appearing and disappearing on these oblivious sand dunes, each revealing their true faces.

So-called public networks appeared like stars. Many stars above Xu Yang’s head showed dying, withering states, gradually turning into cold rocks. This was because the corporations that operated them had gone bankrupt, leaving behind servers to be recycled and tens of thousands of unarchived websites, becoming dead celestial bodies in the network space.

Neon shadows crisscrossed everywhere. With just a thought, Xu Yang could instantly move to any corner of the server. Other hackers drifted on the virtual sand dunes, true beings of light and electricity, unbounded by their physical bodies.

A string of code whizzed by Xu Yang, morphing into a young girl with pink hair and flashy tattoos all over. With a lollipop in her mouth and wearing a black vest and leather pants, she was adorned with so many metal accessories that she almost resembled a sculpture.

"Where are you from!" she shouted with enthusiasm.

"I can’t say!" Xu Yang felt an atmosphere of madness spreading out. The hackers invited here were all experts in information technology, eager to declare war on authority, but he had to stay rational. It’s known that Xia doesn’t have many hackers, many have been defeated by communications services, or lured out by cybersecurity knowledge contests.

"Alright, you neurotic fellow, I come from New Taixi State!"

"Strange," Xu Yang said curiously, "I thought people from New Taixi State were all snobs living unimaginably luxurious automated lives, nestled in the highest standards of welfare."

"Those dog-bred Lighthouse Cores practice an isolation strategy, treating us like animals confined within the lands of New Taixi State," she said viciously. "You don’t know, people from New Taixi State have been nurtured to idiocy, so dumb that they can’t tell the difference between Xia, Silla and Northern Archipelago residents, can’t point out where Lundinium is on the map, and even think that a kangaroo company is established on Peaceland. You’d become another idiot quickly by hanging out with them, that’s why I want to break through the network barrier and embrace freedom!"

"I remember that Todd Compton, the founder of the Formless System, also came from New Taixi State," Xu Yang looked toward the interior of the network dunes. The initiator and lead speaker of the convention was about to give a speech, transmitting crucial files, revealing the core information of the Helis Sea.

"Right, his whole family was killed by the Lighthouse Core’s risk control forces," the girl said passionately. "There are always those in the world who refuse to be cowards; we have a deep hatred against the corporations."

More and more hackers ceased streaming and stayed in place. Xu Yang looked out to see network phantoms everywhere, each a cyber ghost with unique skills, totaling in the thousands.

The moment was almost upon them. The ultra-high-resolution avatar of Todd Compton, the founder of the Formless System, rose from the bottom of the sand dunes. It was a happy, chubby, and pale face, rising up high, overlooking everything.