Chapter Two: A Hundred-Million Limit, One Human Life

Lin pulled the network cable. The email remained on-screen. This was no ordinary hacker. He moved his mother into the hospital's restricted-care wing, then called Tang Ye, an old friend working night operations at Wanchuan Securities. Tang's first response was blunt: “Did getting rich fry your brain?” Five minutes later, Lin predicted the prices of three stocks over the next hour. Tang verified each move in a test account. The jokes stopped. “There is no Tomorrow's Settlement field in our system,” Tang said. “But your account received an encrypted packet tonight. It came through the national clearing backbone, not the brokerage. I've only seen that authorization level in training manuals.” “Can you trace the sender?”