Chapter 20: Hello, Do You Top Up Q-Coins?
Lin Xuan set up the interference framework on his side and looked nervously toward Jiang Zhaosheng.
Jiang Zhaosheng was placing the ring on a high-end card reader, and the microchip inside was quickly being read.
A string of complex encrypted characters jumped onto the screen. A well-written script quickly deciphered them, and the final result was not an identity introduction for Shang Yan, but rather looked more like a… temporarily generated anonymous account.
Interestingly, the account balance was clearly displayed as: 0.
Lin Xuan and Jiang Zhaosheng saw that zero at the same time.
Jiang Zhaosheng gave a light smileâShang Yan really hadn’t been kind. He gave the entrance ticket but didn’t give any money. He wanted to see him in a pickle, probably hoping that he would have to humbly ask for help when the time came.
He took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“Teacher Jiang, what kind of currency is this? If itâs money, I can…”
Before Lin Xuan could finish, Jiang Zhaosheng pressed down on his shoulder. The Betaâs strength was greater than imagined, stopping his movement to stand up instantly.
“No need. Iâve already thought of a way.”
He turned the screen in front of him and pointed it toward Lin Xuanâ
Having barely kept up with the code running in front of him, Lin Xuan turned pale with fright:
“This… isn’t very good, is it?!”
It was more than just “not very good.” To put it in popular terms, it was like finding a loophole in a gaming companyâs firewall to give oneâs account infinite virtual currency.
This practice was practically shitting on the hostâs head.
“Who told them not to be a legitimate auction?” Jiang Zhaosheng leaned his head back, his index finger pressed to his lips, smiling somewhat like a fox.
“Shh.”
Lin Xuan felt a bit of a chill down his back. If the opponent were a legitimate group, he might face a lawsuit and sky-high debt. If it were the other kind… he might vanish from the face of the earth.
While he was falling into a panic, Jiang Zhaosheng had already neatly finished up, erasing the traces of his intrusion. Just as he was about to comfort this “little heart,” a video call request from Jiang Wan suddenly appeared on the desktop.
The ringtone made Lin Xuan instinctively look in that direction, but his vision suddenly went blackâJiang Zhaoshengâs cool fingers rested over his eyes, and a gentle voice came from beside his ear:
“Good boys don’t peek at other peopleâs phones, mhm?”
Jiang Zhaosheng covered his eyes and pulled him up from the seat.
Lin Xuan didn’t have the heart to resist because the Beta led him by the hand all the way to the door, unlocked it, and impatiently propped his back, saying softly:
“Iâm really grateful to you today. Go back and rest well, don’t be nervous. Goodnight.”
The door slammed shut behind him. Lin Xuan was blown by the cold wind and only then realizedâ
Was he just used as a tool?
Finally back home and in the shower, Lin Xuan let the image of the home-style, hair-tied Jiang Zhaosheng fill his mind.
A person at this age couldn’t help it when being looked at by the person they liked, let alone the fact that Jiang Zhaosheng had touched his shoulder, his hand, and his eyes today.
In the rising steam above his head, Lin Xuanâs thoughts went from sweet to resentfulâwho called to make him so nervous? To use him and throw him away like this, wasn’t he afraid of him turning back at the last minute?
Then he thought of the top-rated reply under his post. Tonightâs encounter allowed him, in a certain sense, to better step into the role of the pitied son.
The shower took almost an hour. Lin Xuan haphazardly wiped his hands and walked out of the bathroom to receive a text message from Jiang Zhaosheng:
Bad Mother: ăIf you need help with anything next time, you can come to me too ;pă
Lin Xuan replied with an “okay.” He thought to himself, you already helped me just now, if weâre talking about soothing my desires.
…
VIP ward of the City Central Hospital.
Shang Yan leaned halfway against the headboard, looking at the uninvited Jiang Zhaosheng. A flash of expected triumph crossed his eyes. He closed the laptop in front of him and naturally handed the computer to his subordinates. After they left and sensibly closed the door, he finally spoke to Jiang Zhaosheng:
“Zhaozhao figured it out so soon? Are you here to see me, or do you regret it?”
Jiang Zhaosheng stood by the bed. As always, he ignored Shang Yanâs barking and went straight to the point:
“The account in the ring is empty.”
“Oh? Is it?” Shang Yan feigned surprise. “What is our relationship that you come to me as soon as youâre short of money?”
He drew out his words, his gaze sweeping over Jiang Zhaoshengâs pink lips and the neck exposed because his hair was tied up, speaking with implication:
“I know you don’t want to beg for mercy. It just so happens that itâs inconvenient for me. Come and please me, Zhaozhao. You can have as much as you want.”
Jiang Zhaosheng looked at him quietly, his blue eyes like an all-encompassing sea, devoid of any emotion.
His brow slightly pressed over his eyes, looking a bit cold when he gazed down at people.
Under Shang Yanâs gradually uncertain gaze, Jiang Zhaosheng unhurriedly took two cards from his coat pocket. They weren’t his own, but two exclusive black cards with very different designs that one could tell at a glance had high limits.
His movements were casual as he lightly tossed the two cards onto the nightstand next to Shang Yan, like playing cards.
Clack, clack.
“Wen Zhengâs secondary card,” he first tapped the one on the left with a dark pattern, “the limit is about eight figures.”
Then he used his fingertip to push the one on the right, which was made of a harder material with gold thread embedded in the edges:
“He Qianyuâs account-linked card. He said thereâs no limit, but his family will probably monitor it at any time.”
Looking at those two cards, the smile on Shang Yanâs face froze, and his gaze instantly darkened, becoming so gloomy it could drip water.
He hadn’t expected Jiang Zhaosheng to be able to get these from those two kids. What did this mean? Had those two become so obsessed with him? Or had Jiang Zhaosheng performed those tricks to deceive young boys again?
“You…”
But Jiang Zhaosheng didn’t give him a chance to lash out. He leaned over slightly, getting close to Shang Yan, close enough to see his own face in Shang Yanâs eyes:
“âLittle Shang, if I wanted to spend money, would I need to specifically come and ‘please’ you?”
He straightened up and looked out the window, intentionally mimicking the tone of an elder scolding a junior:
“Besides, the money you students have… probably isn’t enough to catch my eye.”
These words were arrogant to the extreme, yet coming from his mouth, they carried a strange persuasiveness.
Shang Yan almost pulled the IV needle out.
“What do you mean?”
Jiang Zhaosheng finally revealed his first smile since entering the ward.
“It means, thank you for the entrance ticket. As for the money…” He paused, resting his face in his hand with a look of distress. “I don’t like borrowing money from people, and Iâm not used to the feeling of having a limited balance.”
“So, I slightly modified the backend of the auction’s payment system and made a temporary binding between my ring information and the hostâs account.”
“The limit… is probably about the same as the auction’s capital pool? It should be enough.”
He tilted his head and politely added: “By the way, no need to worry about safety issues. After all, you were the one who got this ring. Don’t report it.”
Before Jiang Zhaosheng left, he glanced at the two black cards he had discarded like old shoes:
“Remember to return the cards to your good brothers.”
The ward door closed softly.
Instead of being angry, Shang Yan actually laughed.
As expected of him… treating the hostâs vault as his own temporary loose-change jar.
…Truly a complete, lawless lunatic.
The Beta had been gone for a long time, yet Shang Yan felt his scent still lingered here. He didn’t want to admit he was attracted to Jiang Zhaoshengâso strongly that he felt his very soul was trembling.
Inside the core server room of the “Pandoraâs Box” auction, the atmosphere dropped to freezing point.
Samuelâthe nominal host of the auction who actually controlled a massive gray industrial chain, an Italian manâhad a face as green as iron.
On the screen in front of him, traces of data intrusion were highlighted, right on the sophisticated system he took pride in.
The opponent was completely capable of hiding, which made this data full of mockery.
What made him even more furious was that the final destination of this intrusion path was actually linked to his account payment authorization. Someone had quietly opened a back door in his vault, took a stroll around with great fanfare, and then used a dagger to carve a signature on the wall.
The technical team was as silent as cicadas in winter, their fingers tapping frantically on the keyboards, trying to trace the source and the identity of the intruder. However, the opponentâs anti-tracking methods were so high they were despair-inducing. All paths hit a dead end after finally pointing to several long-abandoned anonymous nodes.
Just as Samuel’s patience was about to run out, the Chief Technology Officer spoke tremblingly:
“S-Sir… we found a… uh… message.”
“What message?!” Samuel turned his head abruptly, his gaze fierce.
“At the deepest part of the intrusion traces, thereâs an encrypted data packet embedded. It requires top authorization to trigger… It just… popped up automatically.”
In the center of the screen, a very simple window popped up. There was no sender, no title, only a solitary attachment icon. The name of the attachment wasâ”A Gift for My Old Dog :)”.
â”Old Dog.” Samuelâs pupils shook violently. That man, at whose feet he once crawled like a dog, yet whom he could never touch.
Impossible… it could absolutely not be him. Samuel pushed the technicians away, his heart burning with anxiety.
Without giving him time to calm down, a video player automatically popped up and began playing in full screen.
A brisk, retro electronic intro echoed in the silent server room.
On the screen, MV footage with high color saturation began to jump.
Never gonna give you up~
Never gonna let you down~
Never gonna run around and desert you~
…
The famous scam song “Never Gonna Give You Up” was playing cheerfully, with singer Rick Astley singing soulfully on the screen.
The technicians in the entire server room were all dumbfounded, staring with open mouths at this absurd scene. They didn’t dare to laugh, so they could only try their best to hold it in, their shoulders shaking frantically.
As for Samuelâhe looked as if he had been hit by a pause button, standing before the screen and stubbornly watching the entire MV.
It was him!
It was definitely him!
Only he would use such a childish and highly insulting way to express his “greetings.”
He had intruded into his most core system, touched his vault, and then risked being found… just to send him a stupid internet scam MV.
Before all the technicians, Samuel slowly covered his face and laughed.
A pathological excitement and longing lit up the foreign manâs face.
He was still alive. This made him happier than any achievement. Samuel ordered his subordinates to arrange a private jet; he was going to the auction in person.
“Quanto tempo, mio padrone.” (Long time no see, my master.)
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