You were supposed to have a fake marriage with the diva, so how did you become her father?

During the week the trading platform went live, the first thing Lu Ran did every day when he arrived at the company was not to look at the heat map, but to look at the trading platform's transaction data.

It wasn't because he was particularly concerned about the economic system, but because those numbers were changing so rapidly.

On the first day, the total transaction amount was still within the normal range, but it doubled on the second day and doubled again on the third day.

On the fourth day, Zhou Mingzhe projected the data onto the big screen during the morning meeting, pointed to the almost vertically upward curve, and said something that silenced the entire room for two seconds: "This thing is growing faster than when League of Legends was at its peak."

Chen Mo, sitting opposite him, added, "The trading house takes a 5% cut; that revenue alone is enough to cover the game server costs."

Lu Ran leaned back in his chair without speaking; he was looking through the distribution of active accounts in the trading platform's backend.

He discovered an interesting trend: after the trading platform went live, a large number of newly registered accounts had their IP addresses concentrated around a few specific cities.

What those cities have in common is that they all have large clusters of internet cafes, and the computers in those internet cafes are generally well-equipped.

The activity of those new accounts is concentrated in the late night to early morning, which is the cheapest time for overnight internet cafe bookings.

He asked the operations department to check the registration time distribution of those accounts, and found that a batch of accounts were registered on the same day, at the same time, and from the same IP range.

The registration process was too streamlined, like an assembly line. The operations team added a note to the report: "Suspected mass registration by studios."

Lu Ran told the operations team not to impose any restrictions and to let them play normally.

The studio wasn't a hassle for him; it was free labor.

Those people would design the optimal resource-farming routes for efficiency, and those routes would just happen to cover all the areas that Lu Ran wanted to cover.

They just need to be wary of location-based cheats. If they start using fake IPs on computers in large numbers, then Lu Ran and his team will be completely useless with their information.

Less than a week after the first batch of studios moved in, the density of location requests in key areas of Japan and the United States increased by 30%.

The people working in the studios are more patient than the average player; they will spend over ten hours grinding in the same spot until they get what they want.

Moreover, they are not picky eaters; they accept creatures of all qualities because they can sell them in large quantities together.

What truly surprised Lu Ran was the studio's operating model.

He discovered that several studios were not only farming resources in the game, but also conducting intelligence business outside of the game.

Someone posted on the forum saying "paid service for farming specific creatures in a specific area", and someone replied asking about the price. Then the two added each other and chatted privately.

Following that clue, Lu Ran discovered that the account that posted the message had regular communication records with several IP ranges, suggesting that it was coordinating orders with buyers in different regions.

Lu Ran noted down the clue, but didn't touch it.

He knew that such gray areas were unavoidable in any popular game, and as long as it didn't affect the collection of core data, he didn't need to try to block it.

What truly changed the situation was a transaction on the fifth day.

Someone listed a creature of exceptional quality on the auction house. The starting price wasn't high, but the bidding was incredibly fierce. Lu Ran glanced at the creature's details and discovered that its capture location was marked at a coordinate point in the North American region that was rarely visited by players before.

That coordinate point was located exactly within the key area of ​​the western United States that he had previously marked, and even deeper than when he first set the refresh point.

He looked up the creature's detailed attributes and saw that its quality level was S and its refresh time was around 2 a.m. that day.

The fact that an S-class creature could be captured in that location at that time indicates that someone specifically went to that area in the dead of night.

Lu Ran followed the transaction records to find the seller's account and discovered that the account had been registered for less than two weeks and its activity history was so simple that it didn't seem like a real player.

However, its trading history is very clear. In the past five days, it has listed several high-quality creatures, and the capture locations are all concentrated around the same area.

He was staring blankly at the account's activity tracker when the office door was pushed open. Zhao Yiming walked in with a cup of coffee, his face saying, "You definitely haven't checked the forum yet."

He turned his phone screen towards Lu Ran. It showed a post from a North American gaming forum with a title written in English that roughly translated as "Does anyone dare to go inside the restricted area to catch creatures?"

Lu Ran took it and flipped through a few pages.

The post was about a location in the western United States. The post didn't specify the exact location, but only said, "Go along a certain highway in a certain direction, climb over the barbed wire fence, and walk a little further and you'll find something good."

The poster said they had tried it once and successfully captured a high-rarity creature, but almost failed because the connection dropped midway due to unstable signal.

Someone in the comments section asked, "Aren't you afraid of getting caught?" The poster replied, "Who cares about you in the middle of nowhere?"

Zhao Yiming chimed in, "I checked the backend; after that post was published, location requests for that area increased by almost half. Some people in the comments section are even suggesting forming teams, saying that more people means more courage."

Lu Ran handed the phone back to him: "Among those who went, were any arrested or stopped?"

"Not at the moment. Backend data shows their trajectories were all smooth; they went inside, stayed for a while, and then came out, showing no signs of interference."

"That means nobody's in charge over there."

After Zhao Yiming left, Lu Ran sat back down at the computer and reviewed the backend data for that key region in the United States.

He discovered that the density of location requests within that area had increased significantly in the last two days, and the distribution of these requests had begun to spread from the periphery inwards.

Those tracks are no longer following the boundary line; someone is moving deeper into the area. The movement is not large, but it is definitely going inward.

On the afternoon of the seventh day, an alarm suddenly popped up in the backend.

The alarm is triggered when the boundary threshold he set is crossed. When the number of new location points in a region exceeds the normal fluctuation range within a certain period of time, the system will automatically mark it.

Lu Ran clicked on the alert and saw that the marked area was the key area in the western United States, and the trigger time was between 3 pm and 4 pm that day.

He retrieved the location records from that period and found that more than a dozen accounts had appeared in that area at the same time.

The accounts' activity patterns were highly overlapping; they almost all entered through the same portal, followed similar paths to a location, and then returned along the same route.

The neat and orderly trajectory pattern clearly indicates that these are not individual players, but rather a group of people acting together.

Lu Ran went through the environmental photos collected during that period again.

Several of the photos were taken from a location that was noticeably further inside than before. One of them showed the ground inside the wall, where clear tire tracks and the side of a section of pipe could be seen.

Another photo shows the corner of a building with a gray-white paint finish. There is a row of neat ventilation louvers in the corner, and a faint light shines through the gaps in the louvers.

Lu Ran took a screenshot of the photo, zoomed in on it, and then sent all the relevant data to Wang Anguo.

This time, he didn't even bother writing the email body; he just attached a file, a compressed file named "Western United States Region II: New Batch of Terrestrial Imagery".

Wang Anguo still hadn't replied to the email, but Lu Ran knew they must have seen it.

Over the next two days, player activity in that area did not decrease; on the contrary, it became even more active after someone posted photos of the interior on the forum.

Although the photos were blurred and the details were not clear, it was clear that there was something inside the wall. Once players knew that there was something inside, they would try every means to go inside and see.

According to the data from the backstage, some players have already begun to carry out planned division of labor within that area. Some are responsible for scouting, some for keeping watch, and some for recording coordinates.

This team collaboration model has significantly improved efficiency.

On the tenth day, Lu Ran received a message from Wang Anguo. The message was shorter than any before, containing only one line: "You're right, they are indeed researching things they shouldn't be researching."

Lu Ran stared at the message for a few seconds, then put his phone aside and reopened the heat map in the background for a look.

The density of location points in that area on the map continues to increase, new trajectories are constantly emerging, and more and more trajectories are extending into the deepest part of that area.

Lu Ran received a call from Wang Anguo the next morning.

The call was made to Lu Ran's personal cell phone. The number displayed was Wang Anguo's encrypted line. When Lu Ran answered, he first heard a long silence, as if the line was being checked for security.

Then Wang Anguo's voice rang out, a tone lower than usual: "President Lu, we've done a more detailed analysis of the pictures you sent last time. The conclusion is that the internal structure of the facilities in that area differs significantly from conventional military facilities. Several ventilation duct layouts and cooling system designs do not meet military standards. We consulted several experts in related fields for cross-referencing, and their conclusions were highly consistent—the design parameters of that system are closer to the ventilation requirements of a biological laboratory."

Wang Anguo paused, as if giving Lu Ran time to process his words, before continuing, "Biological laboratories typically have three independent ventilation systems. One is responsible for intake, one for exhaust, and the third is a backup. The most crucial is the exhaust system; it needs to pass through multiple stages of filtration before being released into the external environment to prevent the leakage of harmful substances. The pipe paths shown in the pictures you sent perfectly match that multi-stage filtration layout. In ordinary laboratories or factories, the exhaust pipes wouldn't be designed with such a convoluted structure."

"Furthermore, regarding the pipe connection at the bottom of the wall that those players photographed, we had structural engineers analyze it. The design of that connection differs from conventional water or electricity supply lines; it's more akin to the specifications of a laboratory wastewater treatment system. Wastewater from biological laboratories needs to undergo high-temperature inactivation before discharge, requiring a structural design within the piping system capable of withstanding high temperatures and pressures. The wall thickness and material type of the pipe in the picture you sent don't match those of typical industrial pipes."

After listening to all this on his phone, Lu Ran was quickly processing the information in his mind.

He had only pieced together some scattered fragments of images, and he knew something was wrong, but he couldn't quite put his finger on what it was.

Wang Anguo's words essentially connected those fragments and provided a judgment.

"So your current assessment is that there is indeed a biological laboratory in that area of ​​the western United States?" Lu Ran asked.

"To be precise, there exists a facility that meets the structural characteristics of a biological laboratory. The current evidence is insufficient to make a final judgment regarding its specific research activities. However, the very definition of a 'biological laboratory' is subject to restrictive international treaties. Furthermore, the fact that the facility is located near a civilian area already constitutes a violation."

When Wang Anguo said the word "violation," his tone was very flat, as if he were simply stating a fact. But Lu Ran sensed the weight behind those words, because it meant that this matter had gone beyond what he had previously thought was "secret weapons research."

"So what should I do now?" Lu Ran asked.

"Could you have the players provide clearer evidence? A higher image resolution would be even better."

...