"Are they from Arasaka?"
Tiger Woman leaned on the back of the chair, looking down at Shoko, who had already connected to the equipment.
But connecting to the equipment and entering the cyber world didn't mean Shoko lost her senses to the outside world.
On the contrary, after entering cyberspace, Shoko actually had a feeling of "cyber godhood."
Shoko's ethereal voice echoed in the room, and she directly used the broadcast to tell Tiger Woman:
"Doesn't look like it. She's using a flagship microcomputer released five years ago. That thing is pretty good, I have one in my room too.
But that has nothing to do with Arasaka. Arasaka agents wouldn't bother with something like that because it can't connect to the corporate network." "Her equipment is pretty average, common stuff, but her skills are quite good. She's not far from us now; I've already found her exact location.
She's probably a few kilometers away from us. She cut off our signal jammer. Crap, wait, Tiger Woman, I was wrong.
This person's skills aren't just good, they're excellent!"
Tiger Woman blinked, seeing the cyber avatar on the big screen had already broken through the wooden gate and officially entered the pixel castle. The scene looked like a mini-game released in the early centuries, with a cute cyber avatar in the castle dodging black iron balls, pixel arrows, and pixel monsters with skull heads.
Shoko's voice carried a hint of amusement: "This guy must be a hacker who's good at adapting on the fly. I deliberately showed her some flaws and let her know I'd discovered her. As a result, she immediately changed her intrusion method and is now launching a full-scale assault."
"Full-scale assault? Just what I wanted. Let me see what you're made of."
Tiger Woman blinked at the side. Well, she didn't understand it at all.
As a soldier, she really couldn't comprehend the world of hackers.
But Tiger Woman knew that a hacker's battle was no less exciting and intense than a street shootout. After all, one careless mistake could easily fry your brain.
After all, in a shootout, if you're lucky, you might still survive, but what about a war between hackers?
When one side loses, the outcome is often virtual death.
In an era where everyone has brain-computer interfaces, hackers' BCIs are far more complex than ordinary people's, with various small plug-ins and implants connected to the brain, half of the head becoming mechanical.
In such a situation, if a problem occurs in one part of the brain, and it's not disconnected in time, the entire brain will follow suit.
But precisely because of this, hackers can employ an endless array of astonishing attack methods.
These guys are hailed as the most dangerous and complex profession of this century, and there's a good reason for it. After all, they're truly risking their lives online...
Just as she was thinking, the door suddenly opened.
Tiger Woman turned her head and saw Jax and Maine's crew standing at the doorway.
Ah... Shoko opened the door. That's right, after connecting to the equipment, she was the master of this fortress. All cameras were her eyes, and all speakers were her mouth.
"What happened?" Jax came forward, glanced at Shoko lying in the hacker chair with her eyes closed, then asked Tiger Woman.
"A hacker intrusion, but it's nothing serious, you don't need to worry," Tiger Woman said casually.
She had great confidence in Shoko. With Shoko's skills and the best equipment her boss bought for her, a hacker... unless it was a chief technical officer from a major company, Shoko would never lose.
"Did Arasaka's agents find us?" Maine asked instinctively from behind Jax.
"No, it has nothing to do with Arasaka. Only one person came." This wasn't said by Tiger Woman, but by Shoko.
Jax was stunned, because Shoko, lying in the hacker chair, hadn't moved at all. Then, Shoko's voice rang out again:
"It's a very pretty girl. At first glance, I thought I was mistaken; this girl's attire is so similar to ours."
"Wait… is she a black-haired girl with that hairstyle, and a naturally upturned mouth?" Jax was startled by Shoko's words, then immediately stretched out his hand and began to gesture to himself.
But after gesturing, Jax immediately wanted to hit himself.
Damn it, Shoko had her eyes closed. It would be strange if she could see!
But the result was that after listening to Jax's description, Shoko actually said softly: "Heh, it's exactly as you described.
So, you guys know this person, right?"
As she spoke, Shoko, lying in the chair, suddenly raised her hand, her fingers moving slightly, and then the image on the big screen changed.
The screen showed a yellow desert, where a girl was now lying on the sand, her eyes closed and head buried, a data cable from her wrist connected to a micro-laptop beside her.
Jax stared at the figure on the screen, his eyes a bit dazed.
It really is Sasha...
"Holy crap, it's Sasha!"
"How did she find us? Damn, how did she just come straight here? Why didn't she communicate with us beforehand?"
"Communicate? You forgot, didn't you? A few days ago, Michiko said we were forbidden to communicate with the outside world for a month. Weren't our communication plug-ins forcibly shut down?"
"Tiger Woman, that person is our teammate, she came to find us."
Maine and Dorio immediately explained to Tiger Woman.
Shoko even whispered, "Optical camouflage combined with drones really works… She didn't even notice her being so close."
Noisy sounds filled her ears, but Jax's gaze remained fixed on the figure lying on the sand.
"I'll go get her." Jax looked at Tiger Woman and said. Tiger Woman hesitated for a moment, then nodded and shrugged, saying, "Alright, then it'll just be you and me. The rest of you wait here."
Anyway... they had already taken in so many people in the fortress, one more wouldn't make a difference now.
Maine and the others nodded, understanding Tiger Woman's meaning.
She was treating them as hostages, right?
"Don't rush, go slowly. Let me play with her a bit longer. She's really good. Like Kiwi, she's a self-taught hacker, but with a big heart.
Even though I've completely suppressed her, she's still stubbornly looking for a breakthrough. A hacker like this… I can't help but tease her. There are very few people like her left now." Shoko said with a smile in her voice.
"Take it easy, don't bully the kids," Tiger Woman sighed upon hearing this.
The first generation of Panthers were all forty to fifty years old; Dr. Naomi, the oldest, was already over sixty. So, calling Maine's crew