Daily Intelligence: Forced to Save the Beautiful President at the Beginning

”The orange gear I spent half a month grinding for, gone just like that?”

”Blue Whale, you damn scammers! Refund my money!”

Hot search terms climbed at a visible speed: #FirmamentDataLoss, #BlueWhaleGamesScam, #CollectiveRightsProtection, followed by the bright red ”Hot” tag.

In the Technology Department, programmers hammered away at keyboards like crazy, cold sweat soaking their shirts. ”The database is locked!” a technician wearing glasses roared. ”There’s a virus! We can’t clear it!”

”Where’s the backup? Use the backup!” Wei Xiang grabbed his shoulder, his nails nearly sinking into the flesh.

”The backup... all the backups have been formatted!”

These words were like a thunderclap, freezing everyone in place. Chang Yuan’s face turned pale, and he stumbled back.

When he was ”optimizing” the code last night, he seemed to have accidentally deleted some file. He hadn’t cared at the time, but could it be...

”Impossible!” He lunged at his computer, his fingers clicking randomly. ”There must be a way... there must be...”

A line of gibberish popped up on the screen, like a mocking grimace.

At 2:00 PM, Blue Whale Games’ stock price plummeted, falling from the opening price of 87 yuan to 32 yuan, hitting the limit down hard.

The three major partner streaming platforms urgently issued termination statements, and the licensor of the Sok Engine also sent a lawyer’s letter, demanding termination of cooperation and compensation for losses.

Kudo Shinichi flew into a rage in the conference room, slamming his folding fan in half: ”Useless! A bunch of useless fools! 50 million in marketing! 20 million online! And now you’re telling me the data is gone?!”

Allen lowered his head, the shirt on his back soaked through as if he had just been pulled from water. He knew it was all over—without data, there would be no revenue; without revenue, the company’s cash flow would break immediately; combined with player claims and partner penalties, Blue Whale wouldn’t survive the month.

”Call the police!” Chang Yuan suddenly roared. ”Call the police and arrest Zhang Fan! It must be him! He’s the one behind this!”

Allen shuddered, then acted as if he had caught a lifeline: ”Right! It’s him! He left a backdoor!”

At 3:00 PM, two police cars stopped at the entrance of the University Town Incubation Park. When the police walked into Singularity Technology’s studio, they were stunned.

In the small room, besides Zhang Fan and Gu Jingshen, there were actually five men in suits sitting there, each carrying a briefcase, with laptops and stacks of documents laid out before them.

”What are you...” The lead police officer was a bit dazed. ”A game studio? Or a law firm?”

Lawyer Wang stood up and showed his ID: ”Officers, we are from the Legal Department of the Gu Group. We are currently providing legal consultation for Singularity Technology.”

Zhang Fan sat behind the desk, twirling a pen in his hand, and looked up at the police: ”Are you looking for me for something?”

”Are you Zhang Fan?” The police officer took out a summons. ”Blue Whale Games has reported a case, saying you are suspected of damaging a computer information system. Come with us.”

”Damaging the system?” Zhang Fan smiled. ”Do they have evidence?”

Lawyer Wang stepped forward and handed over a document: ”Officers, this is the chain of evidence we have compiled. First, Blue Whale owes my client 2.5 million in labor compensation, with audio and video recordings as proof. Second, according to Article 286 of the Criminal Law, damaging a computer information system requires proof of ’subjective intent,’ but my client left Blue Whale after fixing the bugs, and he has an alibi. Finally, we suspect that Blue Whale’s data loss was caused by internal operational errors, and now they want to frame my client.”

He spoke at a steady pace with clear logic, turning a summons into an indictment against Blue Whale.

The police looked at the thick stack of evidence in their hands, then at the five serious-looking lawyers, and felt a bit conflicted. They had heard of the Gu Group’s reputation; someone who could have the Gu Group’s legal team personally oversee them was clearly no ordinary programmer.

”This...” The lead officer took out his phone. ”We need to report to our superiors.”

Zhang Fan leaned back in his chair, looking at the sunlight outside the window, a faint smile playing on his lips.