Chapter Two: Before the Trap Closes

Subscriptions stood at 9.98 billion yuan, twenty million below the threshold. Zhou laughed. “Without ten billion, the master key will never exist.” Lin opened his own account. Balance: 42.60 yuan. “Zero, you promised to make me rich.” “Yes.” “Then lend me twenty million.” “I cannot create money that does not exist.” “I did not ask you to. Lucent uses hundreds of puppet accounts to fabricate subscriptions. One demonstration fund must still be unused today. Locate it and file a temporary, police-supervised frozen subscription. The money never moves. It only triggers the counter.” Zero paused for seven-tenths of a second. “The procedure falls within a defensible legal boundary. Demonstration account located. Balance: twenty-three million.”