Chapter 1678
[ 581 words ]
A rare, faint smile touched Dane’s lips. “She is.”
Having dedicated his entire life to national security, Raymond had never married or had children, completely failing to grasp the romantic entanglements of the youth.
But he knew Dane had always been ruthlessly cold and pragmatic. To see the icy billionaire wrapped around a girl’s finger was utterly shocking.
Then again, that was none of his business.
“Even if she’s your fiancée, I’m not going easy on her!” Raymond warned.
Dane’s absolute faith in Claire remained unshaken. “She doesn’t need your charity.”
Raymond scoffed. Young love was entirely blind, and he wasn’t about to fall for the hype.
True to his word, Raymond unleashed a brutal, multi-layered encryption test-the exact same firewall he used to break his elite apprentices.
To his absolute shock, Claire obliterated the defenses in record time.
Raymond’s attitude instantly did a violent one-eighty.
“Claire, my dear! I hear you’re pre-med. Have you ever considered changing your major?”
“Never,” Claire shut him down flawlessly.
Raymond was stunned.
He desperately wanted to argue, but the mission took precedence.
He handed over the highly secured flash drive and pulled up the log of their failed decryption attempts.
He had attempted to bypass it once and failed. He didn’t dare try again, as three failed attempts would trigger a total wipe.
The drive was laced with a lethal self-destruct virus.
“There are two attempts left. I wanted to run another script, but…”
Raymond’s voice trailed off. He hated admitting it, but his brilliant mind simply couldn’t keep up with the cutting-edge tech of the new generation.
He had wanted his top student to take the second attempt, but command had vetoed it.
They had recruited Claire because she had a proven track record of dismantling this exact type of architecture.
Watching Claire’s elegant coding style had sharply reminded Raymond of ‘S’, an elusive international hacker who had taken the dark web by storm a few years ago.
Ironically, Claire’s surname started with an S too.
But ‘S’ had made their legendary
debut three years ago, when
was just starting high school There was no way it was her, right?”
Raymond suddenly felt a flicker of uncertainty.
“You get exactly one shot. If you fail, we’ll have to bring in the big guns for the final attempt,”
Raymond warned her gravely.
In reality, the agency had already tried reaching out to ‘S’.
But ‘S’ was a total ghost. While they had assisted the government before, their true identity remained an absolute mystery.
The only reason they had a secure line of communication was from their previous black-ops collaborations.
Raymond held ‘S’ in almost religious reverence, a stark contrast to his initial skepticism toward Claire.
Claire stared at him. If she couldn’t crack this code, ‘S’ definitely couldn’t either! “Did you actually get a hold of ‘S’?”
Her question made Raymond assume she was feeling the sting of professional rivalry.
“Not yet, but we will.”
“So don’t put too much pressure on yourself, and absolutely do not force it.”
“You might not be on their level yet,
but if you drop this medical
nonsense and cammit to
cybersecurity, you could
e.ne
surpass them!”
“You have youth on your side. Think about your legacy.”
Claire didn’t feel like explaining herself she simply said, “I’m not medicine, Coding is just a ✨ little hobby of mine.” .net>
“And I have zero interest in competing with ‘S’.”
“After all, ‘S’ is a former world champion.”
Since no one knew ‘S’s true age, Raymond subconsciously assumed they were an experienced veteran.
Which is why he believed Claire had the potential to eventually outshine them.
“Don’t sell yourself short.” Raymond was practically fawning over her now that he knew she was a prodigy.
Claire merely shrugged, entirely unbothered.
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