The piercing alarm suddenly shattered the tranquility of the base!
Having just escaped death from the energy tower and not even having had a sip of water, Lin Yi and the others felt a sudden tightness in their hearts.
Su Qing's usually languid and charming face was now so solemn it could drip water.
Her long, slender, fair fingers blurred across the control panel of the quantum computer, as lines of complex data streamed across the screen like a waterfall.
"What's going on?" Lin Yi stepped behind Su Qing, his deep gaze fixed on the flickering data.
"The core database of the Energy Tower... I intercepted a data packet that was encrypted layer by layer and disguised as redundant information!" Su Qing's voice trembled slightly, indicating that what was inside was extraordinary. "It's decrypted, this is... a consciousness template!"
"Consciousness template?" Chu Yao frowned slightly; she didn't know much about this.
Aizen's perpetually melancholic eyes also turned to the screen. He seemed to have realized something, his expression changing drastically: "Could it be..."
Su Qing suddenly raised her head, her eyes filled with horror and disbelief, staring straight at Lin Yi: "This template... contains your complete consciousness waveform! Precise down to the pulse frequency of every neuron! Night Owl... they are trying to create a clone of you!"
Upon hearing this, the air in the command room seemed to be instantly sucked out, and everyone felt a sense of suffocation.
A clone with all of Lin Yi's memories, combat skills, and even thought patterns?
That was a nightmare!
If successful, Night Owl will possess a terrifying weapon that understands Lin Yi best and is most effective against him!
"How could they possibly obtain such complete data on my consciousness?" Lin Yi frowned, his mind racing as he recalled every encounter with Night Owl, trying to find a flaw.
Could it be that they scanned it using special methods during a previous battle?
"Now is not the time to dwell on this!" Chu Yao was the first to calm down, her bright eyes flashing with determination. "Although we have obtained the data from the energy tower, Night Owl's plan is a much greater threat! We must stop them!"
"Stop them? How can we stop them?" Aizen gave a bitter smile. "We don't even know where they are replicating, or how many clones are being cultivated."
For a moment, the heavy atmosphere made everyone feel suffocated.
Just then, a glint flashed in Chu Yao's eyes, and a bold, almost insane idea formed in her mind: "Wait! Since they have our consciousness template, then... can we use it against them?"
She looked at Lin Yi and said, word by word, "What if we take the initiative, activate one of these templates, inject our preset instructions, create a 'fake' Lin Yi, and infiltrate Night Owl's ranks?"
"What?!" Su Qing and Lan Ran exclaimed at the same time.
That's too risky!
If they are found out, the consequences will be unimaginable.
Lin Yi's pupils suddenly contracted as he stared at Chu Yao, as if trying to see through all her thoughts.
After a moment, he took a deep breath and said in a deep voice, "This idea... is feasible!"
Everyone was taken aback.
Lin Yi continued, “Since Night Owl dared to launch this plan, he must have made thorough preparations. It’s incredibly difficult for us to sabotage it from the outside. But if we have one of our own to undermine it from within, the chances of success will be much greater.” He paused, his eyes sharp as knives, “However, the guidance of this ‘fake Lin Yi’s’ consciousness must be personally led by me! Only I know myself best, and only I can ensure that he won’t slip up at crucial moments, and… can plant the ‘seeds’ we need.”
His words were filled with undeniable confidence and control.
"I understand!" Aizen's eyes lit up, and he immediately understood Lin Yi's intention. "You want to tamper with the consciousness level? We can adjust the template parameters and implant a specific 'cognitive virus'! This virus usually lies dormant, but once it receives a specific instruction or is forcibly read from the core memory, it will instantly erupt, disrupting the target's memory and cognition, causing a systemic mental breakdown!"
“That’s right!” Chu Yao exclaimed excitedly. “We can disguise this virus as a tiny redundant segment in the template data, or even a fragment of information from a… key. Even if the Night Owls check it, they’ll only think it’s normal data loss or encryption residue from the transmission!”
Let's do it!
Su Qing immediately retrieved Lin Yi's consciousness template data, while Aizen and Chu Yao began to nervously adjust parameters and program the virus.
Time ticked by, and the atmosphere in the command room grew extremely tense.
Lin Yi closed his eyes and concentrated, adjusting his mental state in preparation for the most crucial conscious guidance.
Finally, Aizen let out a long sigh of relief: "It's done! We have successfully implanted a 'cognitive virus' that has been specially encoded and disguised as a fragment of an ancient key into one of the most stable consciousness templates, which is also the most likely to be activated by Night Owl first."
The "key fragment" lay quietly in the depths of the ocean of consciousness composed of virtual data, shimmering with an almost imperceptible eerie light, like a venomous snake waiting for its prey.
Inside the base, everyone held their breath, waiting for the most crucial step in the plan—how to deliver this meticulously crafted "gift" to Night Owl without anyone noticing.
However, they were unaware that outside the base, an invisible hand had quietly turned the wheel of fate, pushing a special "piece" into the unfathomable center of the game.
The night was as dark as ink, and the starlight was dim, as if it were obscured by an invisible giant hand.
Xuanmingzi's fingertips flew across the virtual keyboard, and lines of unpredictable data cascaded into the Night Owl organization's supposedly impregnable central network.
In his eyes, the firewall was nothing more than layers of thin paper, which would crumble at the slightest touch.
"Done!" Xuan Mingzi pushed up his glasses, which weren't actually on his nose, and a knowing smile appeared on his lips.
The "fake Lin Yi" bio-template, into which he had poured countless efforts, had been quietly implanted into Night Owl's core database like a most insidious virus.
Even more ingeniously, he also meticulously crafted a "New Alliance Weapon Development Plan," so detailed that any intelligence analyst would believe it to be true, and sent it out simultaneously as a tempting lure.
Meanwhile, hundreds of kilometers away, outside the owl's nest, shouts of battle and explosions rose and fell, and the firelight illuminated half the sky, making it appear and disappear intermittently.
"Boom! Boom!"
Long Wu's burly body resembled a blood-soaked war god. Every swing of his specially crafted high-frequency battle blade brought forth a chorus of shrill screams and severed limbs.
His "Dragon Fang" special operations team is currently launching a "suicide" attack on one of Night Owl's key outposts.
"Captain, the firepower is too intense! We can't hold on much longer!" A team member was covered in blood, with his shoulder blades even revealing white bone, but he still fought to the death.
Long Wu kicked a Night Owl cyborg who pounced on him away, then slashed through another enemy's energy shield with a backhand stroke. He said in a deep voice, "Hold on for another five minutes! Make sure to create as much of a commotion as possible! Make them believe that the Alliance's main force is tearing through their defenses at all costs!"
His eyes were as sharp as an eagle's, yet his mind was as clear as a mirror.
This "fierce" battle was nothing more than a meticulously orchestrated drama.
The location of every bomb crater, every pool of blood from a "comrade-in-arms," and even every desperate cry was precisely calculated to maximize the attention of the Night Owl's leadership, making them believe that the Alliance's main force was launching a fierce attack on the periphery, thus creating an excellent window of opportunity for the "fake Lin Yi" to infiltrate.
Deep within the Night Owl's Nest, in a heavily guarded, massive council chamber filled with a metallic and gloomy atmosphere.
Dozens of Night Owl high-ranking officers, exuding powerful auras and radiating a chilling killing intent, sat upright.
They come in all shapes and sizes. Some retain the basic outline of a human, but their bodies are grafted with grotesque mechanical parts; others are almost completely alienated, like monsters that have emerged from a nightmare.
On the throne, a figure shrouded in a black cloak spoke in a hoarse yet strangely magnetic voice: "Gentlemen, we have just received a report from the front lines. The Alliance's mad dogs are frantically attacking our outer defenses. Hmph, just a death throes."
A commander with a snake's head and a human body below chuckled sinisterly, "Your Excellency is wise. However, they do seem to be somewhat reliant on something. Our intelligence department intercepted a secret report about the Alliance's 'new weapon development program,' which is said to be incredibly powerful and capable of turning the tide of the war."
These words immediately sparked a low murmur of discussion in the hall.
Just then, an "officer" dressed in Alliance standard military uniform, with a face identical to Lin Yi's, entered the council hall under the "escort" of two Night Owl guards.
His expression was "panicked," and his eyes held both "unyielding" and "despair," as if he were an important figure who had just been captured.
The cloaked figure's gaze was sharp as he swept over the "fake Lin Yi": "This is one of the key figures in that so-called new weapon project, Lin Yi? He doesn't seem like much."
“Yes, sir.” A Night Owl leader in charge of the interrogation bowed and said, “Although he is stubborn, we have confirmed the authenticity of this new weapon program from some fragments of his memory, and this person seems to have more Alliance secrets.”
The fake Lin Yi perfectly displayed the shock and anger of being exposed, his body trembling slightly, yet he managed to stay upright.
Every subtle expression he made, every flicker in his eyes, perfectly replicated Lin Yi's stress response under extreme pressure in the Xuanmingzi database.
Meanwhile, at the Alliance headquarters, Lin Yi, through a miniature consciousness link device implanted in the body of the "fake Lin Yi," clearly "saw" and "heard" everything at the Night Owl high-level meeting.
When Lin Yi heard the cloaked man's next words, his pupils suddenly contracted.
“Excellent. Now that the Alliance’s main force is tied down and the new weapons program has been exposed, this is the perfect opportunity for us to deliver a fatal blow!” The cloaked figure’s voice suddenly rose, filled with cruelty and fanaticism. “Pass on my order: mobilize all available forces within the organization, including the ‘Shadow Legion’ and the ‘Abyss Titans,’ with the target being—the Alliance headquarters! I will utterly annihilate them in their self-righteous revelry!”
"Yes, sir!" the Night Owls' high-ranking members responded in unison, their eyes gleaming with bloodlust.
Inside the command center of the Alliance headquarters, Lin Yi slowly removed his consciousness linker, a cold and sharp smile appearing on his face, like a peerless divine weapon drawn from its sheath in the dark night.
“Very good, we finally know what they’re going to do next.” He muttered to himself, a chilling anticipation in his voice.
He raised his head, his gaze seemingly piercing through the alloy walls of the command room, looking towards the direction of the Night Owl's nest.
That "fake Lin Yi" was standing in the center of the council hall, surrounded by wolves, seemingly isolated and helpless, but like a time bomb buried deep in the ground.
Now, all that's missing is the perfect moment to detonate it.
Inside the Night Owl's hive council chamber, the atmosphere grew increasingly frenzied due to the devastating order to launch a general offensive.
The cloaked figure at the head of the table seemed to have lost interest in the "fake Lin Yi" and waved his hand: "Take him away, keep a close watch on him, and squeeze every last drop of value out of him."
The fake Lin Yi was roughly shoved by the guards, staggered, and his eyes showed even more despair.
However, beneath his lowered eyelids, a barely perceptible glint of light flashed and disappeared.
Beneath his cerebral cortex, a special program module pre-programmed by Xuanmingzi was quietly activating.
He is not just a pawn, but also a player.
For him, this meeting was not just about stealing information, but also... the opening act of a grand performance.
He waited, waiting for the cloaked figure to glance at him again, waiting for a certain emotional fluctuation, waiting for the perfect moment to implant the deepest suggestion.
Deep within his consciousness, invisible threads began to quietly weave, preparing to entangle these self-righteous hunters.
This council chamber will soon become his stage.
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