On the open ground next to Qianlong Residence, a temporary, all-white building, resembling a giant box, sprang up overnight. Dense fiber optic cables extended from it, like countless black blood vessels, eventually converging on the futuristic-looking CT scanner in the east wing.

Despite having two huge dark circles under his eyes, Director Zhang's face was filled with a fanatical excitement. He rubbed his hands together, following Lin Jianguo, constantly gazing at the white building.

"Mr. Lin, look, this is the speed of national development! It was all built overnight! It's filled with the country's most advanced optical computer servers!"

Holding his grandson, Lin Jianguo looked at the spectacle and felt a little uneasy. This commotion was more exaggerated than any military parade preparation he had ever witnessed in the past.

Chu Chen leaned on his grandfather's shoulder, yawned, and asked in a childish voice, "Uncle Zhang, did you build a public toilet over there? Why is it so white?"

Director Zhang stumbled, nearly losing his balance. "Advisor Chu, this...this is the temporary data center for the 'Dragon Vein Project'!"

He led Lin Jianguo and Chu Chen inside. As soon as they entered, a wave of heat mixed with a deafening roar hit them. Hundreds of server racks were neatly arranged, countless indicator lights were flashing wildly, and the huge cooling fans sounded like hundreds of tractors starting up at the same time, making their heads ache.

"The equipment is running at full speed, converting the digital information of all the dragon-patterned artifacts in the museum into the purest energy data stream and transmitting it to your mother's hibernation pod," Director Zhang shouted, as if afraid they wouldn't hear him.

He pointed to the red-hot warning light on a mainframe, his face full of worry. "It's just... the heat dissipation problem is a bit troublesome. The core temperature is almost at the critical point. The technician said that if this continues, it will only last for half an hour at most before it crashes."

Chu Chen wrinkled his little nose and wriggled out of Lin Jianguo's arms with a look of disgust. He walked around the pile of rumbling metal lumps with his hands behind his back.

"Uncle, your internet cafe's specs are terrible." He stopped in front of a core server, shook his head, and said, "The fan is so loud, and it keeps disconnecting. How am I supposed to play games with my grandpa in the future?"

Director Zhang and the group of technicians who had gathered around were completely bewildered. An internet cafe? Playing games?

An engineer with thinning hair and thick-rimmed glasses approached, wiping his sweat as he explained, "Advisor Chu... this isn't an internet cafe, it's a branch of the National Supercomputing Center. The computational load is enormous; even the liquid nitrogen cooling system can barely keep up..."

Chu Chen ignored him. He stood on tiptoe, stretched out his chubby little finger, and slowly drew a symbol that no one could understand on the scorching hot casing of the main unit.

After he finished drawing the last stroke, he gently touched the symbol with his little hand.

"Buzz—"

After a soft, ancient-sounding hum, the noise in the entire server room disappeared.

Hundreds of tractors instantly transformed into hundreds of quiet cats.

The scorching heat subsided, replaced by a refreshing coolness.

"hiss……"

Everyone gasped.

The server casing, which had been glowing red, was now visibly covered in a layer of frost. The frantically flashing red warning light had turned green, indicating stable operation.

"Temperature...the temperature has plummeted to minus five degrees!" A technician stared at the monitor screen, his voice trembling.

"This...this doesn't conform to the second law of thermodynamics!" The balding engineer rushed to the server, touched the layer of frost, shivered from the cold, and was completely dumbfounded. "Energy...where did the energy go? Did it just vanish into thin air?"

Chu Chen pulled a crisp cucumber out of his pocket and took a bite. He walked up to the engineer and stuffed the remaining half of the cucumber into the engineer's mouth, which was wide open enough to swallow an egg.

"Uncle, stop studying it. Have a cucumber to cool down."

The engineer, with a cucumber dangling from his mouth and his eyes wide open, was completely consumed by self-doubt.

Seeing this, Lin Jianguo quickly went over and picked up his grandson. "Alright, alright, Chen'er, don't worry about these adult things. Come on, Grandpa will take you to try on your new clothes."

He didn't want his grandson to drive another scientist crazy.

Back in the courtyard, Lin Jianguo proudly presented a bright red silk Tang suit, embroidered with plump carp in gold thread.

"Chen'er, look! Grandpa specially commissioned a master craftsman to make this for you. Wear it on your birthday tomorrow, and you'll look just like the doll in the New Year's picture!"

Chu Chen stared at the bright red outfit, his face contorted in frustration. Although he was mentally mature enough, his aesthetic sense was still that of a child; he preferred Winnie the Pooh.

Just as he was about to protest, Zhou Tian rushed in from outside like a gust of wind, his face filled with inexplicable excitement.

"Grandpa Chen! Grandpa Lin! Something's happened!"

Chu Chen glanced at him impatiently. "It's not even my birthday yet, and you're already trying to bring me bad luck?"

"No, Master Chen!" Zhou Tian ran up to him and lowered his voice, "The news from Falcon says that a group of 'people' has arrived in the capital!"

"Who is it?" Lin Jianguo's heart tightened.

Zhou Tian thought for a long time before finally managing to come up with a word: "A person with... an aura of righteousness!"

"They seem to be after Director Zhang and that 'Dragon Vein Project.' They look like they're someone important; they all walk with a swagger, and their eyes are more intimidating than Captain Li's gun."

Chu Chen licked the sugar stain from the corner of his mouth, not caring at all. "I understand."

He pointed to the red Tang suit and said to Lin Jianguo, "Grandpa, I don't want this one. I want the blue one with Ultraman on it."

For him, nothing is more important than receiving gifts and deciding what new clothes to wear on his birthday tomorrow. Even if the King of Heaven himself came, he'd have to wait until he made his wish and blew out the candles before anything else.

Just as Lin Jianguo was about to discuss the merits of Ultraman versus traditional Chinese culture with his grandson, the makeshift phone in the yard suddenly rang shrilly.

A security guard responsible for liaison answered the phone, listened for a couple of sentences, and his expression instantly changed. Holding the phone, he jogged towards Director Zhang, who was studying the rune on the server.

"Director Zhang! It's your phone! It's...it's Team Leader Yan!"

"Yan Zhengqing?"

Upon hearing this name, Director Zhang's face drained of all color. His face, which had been flushed with joy just moments before due to resolving the server issue, was now paler than the frost on the computer case.

He took the phone with trembling hands and held it respectfully to his ear.

"Hey, Old Yan..."

After hearing something said on the other end of the phone, Director Zhang unconsciously bent over, large beads of sweat rolling down his forehead and soaking his collar.

A few minutes later, as if his soul had been ripped out, he hung up the phone. The mobile phone slipped from his hand and fell to the ground with a thud.

"Director Zhang, what's wrong?" Lin Jianguo felt a sense of foreboding when he saw Zhang's appearance.

Director Zhang's lips trembled, and he couldn't utter a single word for a long time.

"He...he's here..."

"Who's here?"

"The head of the Cultural Relics Inspection Team is Yan Zhengqing!" Director Zhang seemed to have used all his strength to say the name completely.

"He... he also brought with him the highest-level 'Cultural Relics Inspection Order,' that thing is like the imperial sword of ancient times!"

Director Zhang leaned against the stone table beside him, his legs trembling so much he could barely stand.

"Old Yan is a notoriously old-fashioned man, intolerant of any injustice. He believes the 'Dragon Vein Project' is feudal superstition, nonsense, and a waste of national resources!"

He looked at Chu Chen in despair, his voice trembling with tears.

"He...he's already at the entrance of Qianlong Residence."

"He's here to shut down our 'absurd' project!"

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