Samuel then turned to look at Shane, who had joined the meeting due to being a collaboration partner.
Shane had an equally dark expression, as Adrian's return was akin to a resounding slap across his cheek. The "gardener" he had always looked down upon had suddenly become his strongest opponent yet.
"Mr. Johnson, what do you think of this situation?" Samuel's tone was subtly interrogative.

Forcing himself to smile, Shane replied, "Don't worry, Mr. Sander. That guy has been gone from this industry for three years, so he's definitely out of touch with the newest techniques. The Skynet Project is ours for the taking."
Despite his reassuring words, deep down inside, he didn't dare take Adrian lightly. After all, he knew better than anyone just how capable A had been back then.
After the meeting ended, Shane sought out Selena.
"That ex-husband of yours sure knew how to hide himself." An undercurrent of mockery lined Shane's words.
Selena chewed on her lip, her eyes flashing with hatred.
"He's doing this to take revenge on me—on us."

In response to that, Shane scoffed. "He wants to take revenge? Him? As if he's worthy! Don't worry, Selena. I'm going to show him what will happen to a firefly who challenges the moon's illumination."
It didn't take long before the plot to take me down began.
On the eve of Terrone Corporation's project tender, my company was suddenly attacked aggressively. Countless viruses swarmed our server in an attempt to shut it down and steal our key technical proposal.
At the same time, an ocean of posts slandering my name started to appear all over the Internet. Some claimed that I had stolen the technology ATech used from someplace else, while others said I was of poor moral character and was a useless man living off his wife.

There were also many other false accusations dragging my name through the mud.
My team members were panicking as they cried out, "Adrian, this is definitely Shane and the Sander family's doing! How utterly despicable of them!"
"Our firewalls can't hold on much longer!"
I sat down in front of my computer and watched the lines of aggressive code scroll by rapidly. Nonetheless, my gaze was eerily calm.
"No need to panic," I said indifferently. "The fish has taken the bait."
I had been waiting for this moment.
Did Shane seriously think he could defeat me using hacking techniques? It seemed he had forgotten that I was the true king when it came to this field.
My fingers flowed across the keyboard as elegantly as a conductor directing an orchestra, sending out lines of code in return.
"Initiate the Hive Protocol. Let's show them what real skills are."
The next second, the cyberattack on our company's server abruptly stopped.
However, back at Shane's company's server, a real storm was only just beginning.
…
The IT department at Shane's company was in an uproar.
"Mr. Johnson, grave news! Our server has been breached through a reverse hack! All our data has been locked away, and the hacker has left a ransom message!"
Shane came charging into the IT department. The moment he spotted the huge "A" on the screen, formed from coding, he was utterly incensed.
The ransom message was simple. "Want your data back? Then use the Skynet Project in exchange. Otherwise, all your company's business secrets and client information will be making the headlines tomorrow."
It had been signed off with a smirking smiley face.
"Adrian Luther!" Shane bellowed my name through gritted teeth.
He hadn't expected that the hacker team he had been so proud of would be so useless against me. What he had just done was basically shooting himself in the foot.
"Think of a way to crack it now! I don't care how much it costs!" Shane screamed at the IT department director.
Sweat dotted the director's head as he replied, "It's no use, Mr. Johnson… What he used is an encryption algorithm that we've never seen before. Unless he gives us the encryption key himself… Well, even a god wouldn't be able to crack it."
"You!"
Shane lashed out at a nearby chair in frustration, kicking it far away.