My friend arrived at two o'clock that afternoon. I told him that my uncle needed his help to check the computer and the cost would be 100,000 yuan. This guy was short of money, so he got up at five and arrive on the first plane. I told him that I wouldn't meet him if I was busy with something else, and he could earn the money on his own.

This man was a cla.s.smate of mine who had some skills on the computer. When I checked that website the last time, he also helped me. As soon as I told him my request, he immediately understood and didn't ask why, just immediately set the whole thing up.

He moved the whole computer, looked at it, and then gave an "ah”.

When I asked what was wrong, he said, “Your computer isn't connected to the internet.”

“Not connected?”

“You see, there's no network cable.”

I got down to have a look, and was also surprised. Sure enough, the back of this computer was bare, and even people like me who didn't know much about computers could be sure that it had absolutely no internet connection, because it only had one power cord connected to the socket.

“Wireless?”

“Impossible, there was no wireless network drive system installed on the computer.”

“Then what's going on?” I asked surprised.

s.h.i.+t, this was GHOSTNET. I had seen a TV drama before where the computer in it could be connected to another computer in another world through some psychic force. The people in it called this kind of thing “ghost network”.

I didn't know what the principle behind it was, but it was definitely not a ghost net and I suddenly realized that this matter was very crucial.

I sat back in front of the computer and calmed down. He said, “I have to take it apart to see what's going on. Otherwise, you've been talking to yourself.”

“I don't understand, you have to be more specific.”

“It can be done in theory. Two accounts can be set up on one computer and communicate with each other on the same computer."

“No need for network?”

“No, but was there any actual content in your email?”

I nodded, “Of course there was.”

“That can't be the case. I think there must be something wrong in the computer's cha.s.sis.” He said.

When I asked him if he would damage the machine, he shook his head and said absolutely not.

He was very fast, obviously used to installing computers in the city, and soon removed the sh.e.l.l of the host computer, which was full of circuit boards I couldn't understand. He knocked around inside with tweezers and after looking at it, he turned pale and said to me, “Uncle, this is really weird. There's no network card in it.”

I didn't understand how serious this was, showing a puzzled expression. He said: “At the computer level, this goes against the laws of physics. If you don't have a network card, it's absolutely impossible to receive any email from outside the network. No, this email you received can only come from your computer itself."

“What do you mean?”

“Either you're emailing yourself, or your computer is emailing you.”

I shook my head, this was absolutely impossible. “Absolutely not, take a closer look.” I said, before suddenly remembering yesterday's last email. s.h.i.+t, was this computer intelligent? It saw me go out to smoke from the room and wasn't somewhere else monitoring my balcony like I originally thought?

I felt a chill come over me. If so, was what we just did considered rape? No, we were dissecting it.

I quickly dismissed this ridiculous idea. There must be something fishy about this. My cla.s.smate continued to study the inside of the frame and suddenly cried out “aha!" He used a flashlight to illuminate a very thin white wire and said, “I see.”

“What?” I asked eagerly. “I don't know yet, but there's a strange wire here,” he said. He fiddled with the thin wire, following its path to the source, which was the power supply of the computer.

He immediately began to remove the power supply, and after that was done, he picked out the white wire with a screwdriver and found that it was connected to a small electronic component.

I couldn't understand it at all as I watched my cla.s.smate touch his chin in thought for a long time. Then he said, “I can't believe what I'm seeing. I actually got to see this kind of thing in this era. You may not understand but this is a very primitive network card, which uses ground wire to transmit signals. This is a point-to-point network. The other computer is only connected to your computer. In fact, it's a Morse code pa.r.s.er."

“Then where is he?” I didn't want to know how it worked.

“I don't know, he was using a ground wire in the power supply. This is a special line. Do you have a circuit diagram of this house? If so, I can help you find out."

I shook my head. Needless to say, I didn't know where it was and even if there was such a thing, Uncle Three must've destroyed it. With his cautious nature, he couldn't allow the possibility of exposing this route to exist.

He said: “The only way is to pull out this line. One end of the line is here, so the other end can be found as long as you follow the line." When he said this, he pointed to the socket embedded in the floor, “This is the source. We have to pry the floor up and find the direction of this line. Another computer must be connected to it."

I thought about it and told him not to do anything for now. I knew that if there was too much noise, we would be discovered, so it had to be handled carefully. He said: “This kind of private network has a very short transmission distance and is impossible to be too far away from the house; otherwise it would involve street transformers by the roads. Therefore, his position will definitely not be too far away from here. It will definitely be within a few hundred meters and you can find out soon."

“At most, how long do you think it will take?”

“Three hours.”

I patted him and said, “Well, you take a rest first and we'll do it after dark tonight. First, install the computer for me."

The situation continued to change, and we needed to wait until midnight.

I emailed again, telling the man to wait. In this way, he'd eagerly be waiting beside the computer and if I found him, I could break into his house and catch him.

The other party didn't reply. I waited until it was completely dark and asked my cla.s.smate to start work with a flashlight wrapped in cloth.

In fact, Uncle Three's house was a renovated old farmer's house and all the lines were exposed. But he had added a layer on the ground for safety. My friend carefully pried open the floor, cracked the protective sh.e.l.l outside the protective wire, and pulled it out.

I ran to the second floor to see which of the external wires on the roof was pulled.

Then I looked all the way down and found that this wire was directly connected to the outside of the house. I pulled out all the rivets that affixed it to the house and made my cla.s.smate continue to pull it.

On the first floor, we followed the wire all the way to the yard and saw it went straight down to the ground.

It was strange that Uncle Three's yard wasn't big, only six or seven square meters. There were four or five wires in that bundle, all of which went under the eaves of the wall. Only this wire went underground.

The ground was full of more than a dozen messy, potted plants. My friend and I moved carefully from pot to pot and I was surprised to find a manhole cover.

The wire went all the way down it.

I never knew that there was such a thing at Uncle Three's house. There was a handle on the manhole cover, and when I went to lift it, I found that I could. It was dark inside and my heart was lifted.

There was a door.

I took a deep breath and said to my cla.s.smate, “All right, here is good.” After I showed him out, I immediately went to the house and grabbed a flashlight, went back to the manhole cover, took a deep breath, pulled it up, and looked inside.

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