Chapter 426: 426

Chapter 426 Zero

The 01 Guerillas were still in shock . Although Black Nest had dispatched snipers at the ski resort last time, they weren’t under fire at that time, and so, the fear was simply surreal to them . When the sniper killed Iron Fist, his blood splattered all over Zhang Heng’s shirt . It made them realize that they had just crossed paths with death himself .

Everyone, including Leah, crouched under their seats, fearing that the flying bullets would claim their lives from nowhere . Two minutes later, Zhang Heng told them, “Okay, you can come out from the hiding . We are safe for now . ”

“Uhh… are you sure? I heard that he could snipe the farthest . How far did he shoot when he was being deployed at the ski resort?”

“We are in a city now, not an open environment like a ski resort,” Zhang Heng explained patiently, “The route I chose has a building as cover . The snipers can’t shoot us from here . ”

“That’s a relief . . ” Waldo finally relaxed and returned to his seat .

Although out of danger, Ponytail wasn’t looking too good . “Those people are not targeting us . Their target is Edward . Black Nest’s patience is finally running out, and they do not intend to use peaceful means to resolve this matter . ”

“Edward is in a dangerous situation now . We must find him before they do . ” Semiprime said in a rare occurrence that he spoke up .

“But the only person who knew his whereabouts has just died in front of us . ”

As soon as Little Boy said these words, everyone fell silent again . Although still less than forty, Ponytail was the oldest among the team, and he’d never faced a life and death situation before . Ever since he got himself involved in Black Nest’s and Edward’s matter, he had witnessed death twice .

When Ponytail jumped down from the bridge, he survived miraculously somehow . However, Iron Fist was really dead this time . There was no way that he could survive that fatal shot .

“I’ve been thinking about a question along the way: how did Black Nest find us here?” Philip, who had not spoken in a while, asked .

“Eh?”

“No one knows Edward’s abilities better than us, but the guy who died just a few minutes ago said that Black Nest raided their residence two weeks ago . Judging from Edward’s character, he would only become more cautious . At the same time, he must have found out the reason behind it and took precautionary measures . But even so, Black Nest still managed to locate him two weeks later . ”

“Are you trying to say that someone betrayed Edward?” Little Boy raised her eyebrows, “At a time like this, there are not many Edward can trust . Iron Fist is definitely not the one that betrayed him . After all, he is already, uhh… that way . So only Mr . Gilm is left, but considering what happened to his son’s family before, it is unlikely he’s on Black Nest’s side . ”

“I’m not saying that there is a traitor among us, but that there must be something that allowed Black Nest to locate Edward,” Philip sighed, “unfortunately, we don’t know what that thing is . ” “It’s CTOS,” Zhang Heng, who was driving, interrupted suddenly .

“Eh?”

“Black nest has connected CTOS to this city . ”

01 looked at each other when they heard that, “…it’s impossible, isn’t it? CTOS isn’t even complete yet . And generally speaking, such a project needs to be approved by the House first . ”

“Certain parts of CTOS have yet to be completed, and the algorithms haven’t been calibrated to their optimal level as well . However, the part of the system that collects personal data from the public was completed half a year ago . In theory, this toned-down version of CTOS is now online . As for its legal jargon, Black Nest didn’t get authorization from the parliament, but they are very powerful in Toulouse, and the city council is theirs . They’ve obtained a signed document from the mayor, allowing them to carry out some ‘preliminary experimental work’ in Toulouse . ”

“What preliminary experimental work?”

“That’s where the problem lies . The definition of the phrase isn’t stated clearly in the document . That would mean Black Nest can do whatever they want at this point . ”

“Including silently launching CTOS without the public knowing it?” Leah’s eyes widened .

“It seems like it . ”

Before leaving the parallel quest, Zhang Heng wanted to figure out what exactly the number zero meant in the main mission . He did not get the answer from 01, and Edward’s murder didn’t yield too much useful information either . Zhang Heng spent half a month visiting people involved in the matter at that time, and he did not get anything useful from them . After that, he sneaked into Black Nest’s headquarters on the last day and found a copy of CTOS’s development records during its early days . According to the research and development records, Black Nest apparently launched an unfinished version of the CTOS system in secret to capture Edward .

The name of this system-Zero .

However, according to information Zhang Heng collected, Zero was only supposed to be launched two weeks later . Zhang Heng still had plenty of time to do the necessary preparations . Zero must have gone online earlier than scheduled because of the players’ behavioral changes .

Two weeks ago, Black Nest people raided Edward’s room, proving that Zero must have been online at least one month earlier .

“Okay… we now face a city under close surveillance of Black Nest,” Philip took a deep breath, “let me think about what we can do at this time?”

“Can you hack into the CTOS system?” Ponytail asked Waldo .

“I don’t know . Edward once talked about CTOS with me . He and several other talented guys developed their advanced AI security, a system which continuously improves itself through machine learning . He boasted that even he couldn’t hack into it . But you know me, I never thought that there are places in this world I could never go . It will take time, maybe weeks, maybe months, but they will eventually track me down . No… I should say, with the help of CTOS, they will track us down inevitably . ”

“I can hack into CTOS,” Zhang Heng said, “but of course, my skills are only good enough to hack into the incomplete CTOS . ”

In the parallel quest, a group of hackers led by 01 fought a long war with Black Nest . During this period, the hackers had managed to achieve some small gains . However, every time they found a loophole, Black Nest would upgrade CTOS’ security . In the end, the hackers had inadvertently made CTOS more perfect than before . It was nearly perfect, in fact, which was the group of hackers was in such a rut in the end .

But this wasn’t the future . Zero was the early version of CTOS, and it surely had loopholes . Two months before they entered the small town, Zhang Heng was already more prepared than everyone in the 01 Guerillas .

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