Twelve Hours Early

[Haicheng FreshRoute Cold Chain, Warehouse Three, will suffer a controller failure in twenty-three minutes. Due to a communications outage, the contracted maintenance crew will arrive in eleven hours. Pharmaceuticals will exceed safe temperature in forty-seven minutes.] [Recommended action: emergency repair.] [Estimated lawful compensation: ¥8,000–¥12,000.] [Success reward: permanent base-bandwidth upgrade; Level-One opportunity filters.] [Failure penalty: opportunity alerts suspended for seventy-two hours.] Lin's first thought was scam. FreshRoute was the city's largest pharmaceutical distributor. Its maintenance qualification threshold exceeded his annual income.