Oh no! I've only been a freshman and I've already been targeted by a mean upperclassman.

Wang Qiang took a deep breath.

"Okay, whatever you say."

The host walked onto the stage.

The competition rules are now being read aloud.

"This competition will use the CTF (Capture the Flag) format."

Each team will receive an independent server.

"Your mission is to breach the other teams' servers and steal their flags."

"At the same time, protect your servers from being compromised."

"The match will last three hours."

"The final score is based on a combination of the number of Flags captured and the server's survival time."

"Now, all teams, please log in to the system."

Li Chen sat down in front of the computer.

My fingers flew across the keyboard.

The login screen pops up.

He entered the team's account and password.

A virtual network topology diagram appeared on the screen.

The dozen or so nodes represent the servers of a dozen or so teams.

"The match begins!"

With the host's command.

The entire venue fell silent instantly.

Only the sound of keyboard typing remained.

Li Chen did not rush to attack.

He first opened the automation tool he had written.

Start scanning the servers of all teams in the game.

Less than a minute.

A barrage of vulnerability reports popped up on the screen.

"interesting."

Li Chen curled the corners of his lips into a smile.

"It seems our opponent today is nothing special."

He turned to look at Chen Mo.

"Change the firewall rules on our server."

"Use the configuration I gave you before."

"receive."

Chen Mo immediately began the operation.

"Wang Qiang, go and keep an eye on the movements of those strong teams."

"Report it immediately if you discover any signs that they are going to attack us."

"clear!"

"Zhao Zixuan, prepare the log analysis tools."

"We monitor the traffic on our servers continuously."

"no problem!"

Each of the three had their own duties.

Li Chen then began his performance.

He selected his first target.

A team from a prestigious 985 university in southern China.

Their server has an SQL injection vulnerability.

Li Chen's fingers flew across the keyboard.

A string of code flashed across the screen.

Less than three minutes.

He then obtained the other party's database.

Congratulations to team "Linjiang Storm" for taking the first flag!

A system notification sounded.

All eyes in the room instantly turned to Li Chen.

"So fast?"

"You took one down in just three minutes?"

"Which school's team is this?"

Whispers rose and fell.

Li Chen ignored all of this.

He has already locked onto his second target.

The team in black from the university of science and technology.

Their server protection is quite good.

But in the face of Li Chen's AI tools.

It is still riddled with flaws.

Five more minutes passed.

Congratulations to team "Linjiang Storm" for securing their second Flag!

This time.

Even the host couldn't help but glance at Li Chen again.

"This team's speed is astonishing."

In the audience seats below the stage.

A middle-aged man in a suit put down his coffee cup.

"interesting."

His assistant asked.

"Mr. Li, should we look into the background of this team?"

"Need not."

Mr. Li waved his hand.

"Keep watching."

"To be able to win two games in such a short time."

"Either you're lucky."

"Or...?"

He paused.

"They really have the ability."

Inside the venue.

Li Chen has begun attacking the third target.

This time.

He chose the Tsinghua University team.

The opposing team's captain seemed to have noticed Li Chen's actions as well.

He adjusted his glasses.

A cold smile curled at the corner of his lips.

"Trying to take me down?"

"Then let's give it a try."

His fingers flew across the keyboard.

Begin setting up the traps.

But what he didn't know was...

Li Chen's tools had already recorded all his movements.

"That's interesting."

Li Chen looked at the honeypot trap set up by the other party on the screen.

"Unfortunately, it's too shallow."

He bypassed the trap.

Enter directly from another entrance.

Ten minutes later.

Congratulations to team "Linjiang·Storm" for capturing the third Flag!

The Tsinghua team captain's expression changed instantly.

"How is that possible?"

He clearly set up so many protective measures.

How did they manage to get around it?

At this time.

Li Chen had already stood up.

I moved my wrists around a bit.

"That's about it."

He turned to look at his three roommates.

"Now, it's time to close the net."

The match has reached the 40th minute.

The leaderboard on the big screen was completely messed up.

The name "Linjiang Storm" dominates the top spot with overwhelming force.

Five Flags.

The Tsinghua team, which ranked second, has only just secured their second spot.

The whispers in the audience grew louder and louder.

"When did Linjiang University produce such a strong team?"

"They didn't even make it to the finals last year, did they?"

"The difference is just too exaggerated."

The host's voice was tinged with excitement.

Congratulations to Linjiang Storm Team on another victory!

"They're now leading second place by a full three flags!"

"This speed is simply..."

He paused, unable to find a suitable adjective.

In the end, he could only manage to utter one sentence.

"That's terrifying!"

Li Chen leaned back in his chair.

He was holding a cup of instant coffee that Wang Qiang had just brewed.

He did not continue the attack.

Instead, they were observing the movements of other teams.

"Old Li, are we stopping?"

Wang Qiang leaned over and asked.

"No rush."

Li Chen took a sip of coffee.

"Everyone's attention is on us now."

"If we continue the attack, we will become the target of everyone's criticism."

"What should we do then?"

"wait."

Li Chen put down his cup.

"Let them create chaos first."

really.

With the strong rise of Linjiang·Fengbao.

The other teams started to get restless.

The group of people dressed in black from the university of science and technology were the first to launch an attack.

They gave up trying to capture the flag.

They then began a full-scale attack on the Linjiang Storm server.

"Old Li!"

Zhao Zixuan kept an eye on the traffic monitoring.

"We're being attacked!"

"The surge in traffic is likely a DDoS attack!"

"I saw it."

Li Chen switched to the defense interface.

A dense stream of data packets is flooding the screen.

This is a typical distributed denial-of-service attack.

An attempt to crash the server by sending a large number of invalid requests.

"Chen Mo, start traffic scrubbing."

"Wang Qiang, trace the source of the attack in reverse."

"Zhao Zixuan, prepare the counterattack script."

The three of them immediately sprang into action.

Li Chen's fingers flew across the keyboard.

He did not choose passive defense.

Instead, it directly follows the attack traffic.

They reverse-engineered and compromised the other party's botnet servers.

Less than two minutes.

The attack on the university of science and technology stopped.

Because of their servers.

Li Chen countered and defeated him.

Congratulations to team "Linjiang·Storm" for capturing the sixth Flag!

The black-clad captain's face turned ashen.

"That's impossible!"

He clearly took so many precautions.

How could we have been so easily defeated?

in the audience.

Mr. Li finally sat up straight.

"interesting."

He watched the replay of Li Chen's actions on the big screen.

His eyes grew brighter and brighter.

"This person is not simple."

"Mr. Li, would you like to...?"

The assistant asked tentatively.

"Wait until the game is over."

Mr. Li interrupted him.

"I want to meet this person in person."