Resurrection Empire

Ren Zhong's assets in his pocket reached the insane figure of 4.47 million once more.

While he rubbed his cheeks, he kept recalculating tonight's stock market moves in his mind.

Ren Zhong planned to fully invest in the market tonight.

But this still wasn't the peak operation of Ren Gushen; the true pinnacle only existed in the world of citizens.

At 9:05 PM, Ren Zhong drove the Thunderbolt Car into a villa adjacent to the Town Government Tower.

Five minutes later, the wailing began.

Even though the villa had excellent soundproofing, it couldn't block out Ma Xiaoling's wild and unrestrained roars.

The faint "piercing scream" continued for over an hour, finally quieting down at 10:15.

...

After "finishing," Ma Xiaoling lay idly on the sofa, crossing her legs, chewing on throat lozenges, complaining, "This was even harder than I thought. Mr. Ren, you should see how much I've sacrificed for you."

Ren Zhong was speechless, "I told you to use synthesized voice, but you wouldn't listen. Blame me?"

"What do you know? Synthesized voices don't capture the essence."

Ren Zhong: "You seem well-studied?"

"Of course! I've been studying materials these past few days! But I think it's unfair, tomorrow you have to scream too."

Ren Zhong shook his head, "That's impossible! My acting isn't as good as yours, I'd be too deliberate."

Ma Xiaoling raised her fist, "Not necessarily."

"What do you mean?"

"If you're in pain, you'd scream with real emotion, wouldn't you? Anyway, I'm going to hit you later, why not practice to get used to it first?"

Ren Zhong's expression turned dark.

He suddenly wondered if Ma Xiaoling in the previous timeline had any grievances from not beating him, now seeking revenge across time!

Ma Xiaoling stretched lazily, "Alright, I won't force you. You didn't make a sound when I beat you so badly during sparring before; I know you're not up to it. Just watch me perform. It's 10:30, are you staying the night?"

Ren Zhong shook his head, "No need, please arrange a Night Watchman's uniform for me. I have something to do later."

"Aren't you going to train in Virtual Reality?"

"Mm, not tonight."

"Great, then I can finally focus on trading... oh no, on national war!"

...

At 12:15 AM, 7th Alley, South District of the slums.

The double moons hung high, the world was silent, and not a sound was heard.

Ren Zhong, dressed in a Night Watchman uniform, stood in front of the crooked, dilapidated door of Room 144, and took a deep breath, gently reaching for the ancient mechanical lock.

This was the lair of Sima Wan, the master of disguise.

Ren Zhong gently applied force with his fingers, and the door opened.

This mechanical lock had long been broken.

Ren Zhong stepped inside, and the spotlight above turned on.

The room was in complete disarray, empty and covered in dust.

Passing through the main hall into the inner room, it was the same.

Clearly, no one lived here; this drafty house with holes in the roof had been visited by thieves countless times.

Ren Zhong pulled out dismantling parts for a Fourth Level exoskeleton, a Metal Micro Scanner, embedded a battery, activated them, and began searching along the living room floor.

Five minutes later, he switched to a Hot Melt Cutting Device and cut a square hole in the eight-inch-thick cement floor.

He saw a sophisticated encryption lock and put on a pair of Second Level Demolition Master gloves, slowly reaching his hand forward.

As his hand approached, the gloves emitted a regular, faint energy beam.

A minute later, the encryption lock clicked open.

Unlocking successful.

Ren Zhong exhaled a long breath.

A slight clattering sound came from the inner room, indicating that the entrance to the basement had appeared.

There was an even more complex lock there, but it wouldn't pose a problem for him.

Last night, under Ren Zhong's orders, Zheng Tian and others moved valuables into Lin Wang's manor throughout the night, each taking residence there.

Ren Zhong asked Chen Hanyu to carefully inspect the relics of Sima Wan in the room.

In the previous timeline, Ren Zhong had already confiscated Sima Wan's relics, which included notes from Chen Hanyu's parents, as well as a notebook with encrypted phrases recorded by herself.

It was laughable that the encryption phrases mastered by Sima Wan were actually the proprietary phrase list method created by Chen Hanyu's mother.

It wasn't an advanced encryption technique, just a sequence of passwords.

By following the sequence, performing basic calculations, deriving new numbers, and then using these numbers to look up words in the Source dictionary, the corresponding text could be found.

It was unexpected that after all these years, Sima Wan was still using this method.

She probably thought that since Chen Hanyu's parents were dead, and Chen Hanyu, a little girl, had either disappeared or couldn't survive in this town's environment, her unique encryption method would remain her exclusive skill, used boldly and confidently.

Who would have thought Chen Hanyu would return from the underworld, driven by her parents' blood feud?

At that time, Chen Hanyu had translated the notebook's contents, revealing very complex security unlocking schemes for unique encryption locks of two Demolition Masters.

One unlocking step involved over sixty procedures, with any error resulting in a failed unlocking attempt.

The other had over one hundred and twenty procedures.

Unfortunately, at that time, Ren Zhong didn't know about the existence of Room 144, even though he knew there was valuable information behind it. In the end, it was left unexplored.

Unexpectedly, details and intelligence that spanned two timelines connected here.

As for why Sima Wan wrote such important information as physical documents instead of storing it in her wrist watch, it was likely because Yang Bingzhong also had access to her wrist watch.

Fearing her life-saving method might be confiscated by Yang Bingzhong, she opted to write it on paper and store it where no one knew the lock's location.

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