Starting Cultivation in Wasteland

Little Lake cleverly exploited the opponent’s cognitive bias and discreetly swallowed a few data packets, analyzing the related mechanisms.

What made it most proud was that it did not expose itself in the process.

Big Head Butterfly explained it quite professionally, and fortunately, Qu Jianlei completely understood.

With a somber face, he spoke, "So, someone or some force from another planet wants to create a backdoor?"

"Boss, you’re spot on," Big Head Butterfly turned slowly, "apart from your slightly weaker hardware, you’re almost catching up to me."

Qu Jianlei’s mouth twitched slightly, "Catching up to you isn’t very hard, is it?"

"Although I can’t quickly upgrade my hardware, I can reduce your hardware equipment."

"Boss, don’t joke," Big Head Butterfly froze momentarily.

"My wellbeing means everyone’s wellbeing... Wrong, my wellbeing ensures everyone’s wellbeing, and then becoming better means everyone can be better."

"Stop with the nonsense," Qu Jianlei remarked calmly, "curiosity is a good thing, but the loan pressure is heavy."

Big Head Butterfly chuckled, "Indeed, I also think it’s good news; the two billion large-scale computing unit group is quite..."

"Shut up!" Qu Jianlei’s face turned dark instantly, "One loan is enough, there won’t be another!"

Their bickering set aside, they quickly devised a plan: do not alert the other party for now.

Little Lake vowed confidently that it would not let the opponent steal any useful information.

"If you can’t win on home ground, you might as well publish my core code directly."

After three days of vendor training, Ping’an personnel began operations on the computing unit group.

The vendor’s technicians originally planned to observe for a few days, but the trading group treated them well for two days and sent them off directly.

At this point, few aware that this large-scale computer group was procured for others.

Besides key communicators like Duoduo, only those involved in loan-related matters knew the secret.

Ping’an personnel became familiar with the equipment for two days, thinking they would flourish in the future.

During this, intruders secretly established a backdoor, unnoticed by Ping’an personnel.

On the third day after the vendor’s technician left, a Taiping Trading Group A-level Awakened suddenly died mysteriously.

This person, over 120 years old, was rehired as a consultant, but their combat effectiveness had significantly declined.

However, this person held a high status in Taiping Trading Group and usually guided some work, earning respect from peers.

Taiping investigators thoroughly examined for two days and concluded suicide.

Soon they discovered that the elder had recently incited actions against Ping’an.

His actions were understandable as his comrade was killed by Ping’an years ago.

Now, attempting to stir tension between the two groups went unfulfilled, or encountering other matters led to despair and suicide.

Hence, Taiping explained through someone to Ping’an, affirming it wasn’t a group act, but an individual’s.

Ping’an Trading Group laughed off the explanation, refusing to discuss compensation with Taiping.

In their perspective, retaliation against Taiping once this stabilized was inevitable.

Now they’ve presented a ready-made excuse; why discuss compensation?

However, Taiping’s proactive approach left Ping’an Trading Group puzzled: What purpose would the opponent serve?

After all, both were sharp minds sensing something amiss, yet unable to analyze the specific cause.

Yet, with strong support twice before, the Trading Group secured immense survival space.

Having such confidence, the unclear matters need not be resolved immediately. Being observant is sufficient in future days.

At this moment, Ping’an internally announced the shutdown of the newly installed large-scale computer group.

The activation time wasn’t mentioned from above.

Employees below buzzed with speculation, especially the trained ones, utilizing connections to inquire about the reasons.

— How could such expensive equipment be idle? We’ve learned in vain, and aren’t stockholder investments wasted?

Yet, no answer came, with higher-ups stating not to question what shouldn’t be asked!

Finally, one day, they saw the leader of a mysterious force entering the computer room.

In this instance, everyone realized: The equipment wasn’t for the trading group’s own use, but for others!

This news remained sealed, forbidding discussion among those aware.

Qu Jianlei arrived with Flower Scorpion to inspect the equipment after entering the computer room.

Large-scale computing devices feature positioning devices, imperially mandated for controlling these materials’ usage.

The device can be removed, but would lead to equipment auto-lock.

However, this didn’t pose a challenge to Qu Jianlei and Little Lake—after all, it was a matter of permissions.

After they removed the locator, they cracked the locking program, tested it, and confirmed it was running without issues.

Next up was testing the backdoor program, and they tinkered for two days, confirming it can only steal data and not send a location.

Actually, it’s quite understandable, as sending location information is easily intercepted, requiring neither sophisticated equipment nor personnel.

If you want to spy stealthily, the quieter the better, naturally.

In that case, Little Lake in Ping’an’s system can serve as a stepping stone, without worrying about the other party discovering Shanshui Small Building.

Qu Jianlei spent two days dismantling the unit and moved the equipment back to the building that night.

On that note, although he prepared a large number of Storage Talismans, he still had to move twice to completely transport everything.

In other words, the restructuring of the entire computer unit is an urgent matter.

Otherwise, when needed to escape later, not all items could be transported.

During the next half month, Qu Jianlei was busy with this task; Little Lake was responsible for drawing plans, while he was finding materials and processing.

At the same time, Little Lake also had to manage data isolation backdoors and prepare a large amount of deceptive content.

The other party can probe but won’t come in contact with genuinely useful information.

However, the person controlling the backdoor was very cautious, mostly lying dormant quietly, with occasional fluctuations being quite minor.

After half a month, Qu Jianlei finally completed the transformation, reducing the space occupied by the entire computer unit by one-third.

Yet even so, moving two Storage Talismans was still necessary—as after all, everyone had to load other supplies.

However, this one-third modification greatly increased the cooling needs, requiring the addition of a substantial amount of cooling equipment.

Awakened with water and ice attribute can manually use techniques to cool down, but this operation can’t be normalized; reliance on equipment is necessary.

Fortunately, making cooling equipment is much easier, with temporary manufacturing possible after transportation.

To move smoothly, modularization had been fully considered during reconstruction; in short, it wasn’t easy.

Once everything was prepared, the formal modification was carried out for use 21 days after the equipment was moved to Shanshui Small Building.

Once the equipment started, it immediately entered Gold-devouring Beast mode, consuming tens of thousands of Energy Blocks daily.

Then Little Lake faced another problem: this large computing device still had considerable room for improvement in the underlying logic.

But if the underlying logic is altered, the reaction would be too great; the violent fluctuations of data tides can’t be concealed from backdoor surveillance.

After much consideration, Little Lake suggested, "How about we identify the opponent and eliminate them?"

However, Qu Jianlei thought for a moment and still refused, "Let’s observe first, at present, it’s enemy clear, us hidden; they are still unaware."

He quite liked such underhanded tactics.

Big Head Butterfly spun around twice, "I also like such sneaky operations...but isn’t it a waste of such strong computing power?"

It still couldn’t bear to lose the computing power, but it’s understandable; which old gourmet can resist the allure of a meal?

Qu Jianlei could only resort to circuitous tactics, "As you mentioned, the opponent might have even stronger computing power, why not follow the trail?"

Big Head Butterfly spun wildly for ten minutes before reluctantly stating, "Then... temporarily don’t change."

Qu Jianlei suggested again, "You can use the underlying logic of 80 million computational units to operate the new computer unit."

This can only be considered a compromise proposal; it’s certainly more effective than simply using the latter, but it’s not easy to operate.

If not for Little Lake’s high intelligence, otherwise, letting Qu Jianlei improve it himself might result in exhaustion without reaching the goal.

Big Head Butterfly spun around twice, then sighed, "Ah, there’s no choice...typical small horse pulling a big cart!"

"Stop while you’re ahead," Qu Jianlei replied irritably.

"It’s said that photography makes one poor for three generations, DSLR ruins a lifetime... I met you and have even worse luck, at least three to five hundred years of poverty!"

Despite the complaints, Little Lake was really straight while speaking and soon got involved in new tasks.

Experiencing proves, although the large computer unit has a high use threshold, it indeed operates well.

In just two short months, Super Qi Gathering Array’s decryption showed certain progress.

Qu Jianlei originally thought this array would take at least ten years to decrypt and occupy a lot of his time.

But now it seems, two to three years is about enough, of course, provided the calculation time is guaranteed.

Theoretically, large units should shorten the duration compared to hundreds of times improved computational power units.

However, as a matter of fact, it’s not the case.

Although computational power increased, brute-force cracking of certain assumptions also rose; exhaustive search method is very power-consuming.

Yet comparatively speaking, Qu Jianlei’s own work reduced significantly.

He no longer needed to frequently judge manually, eliminating options less likely—sometimes even retracing steps.

Most option elimination was also delegated to the machine.

So this large computer unit, besides being a bit expensive, is really fragrant.