On the top floor of Shanghai Center Tower, the nerve center of XianGuang Capital, which usually hummed with the deep, steady murmur of an abyssal sea, was pierced that morning by a sharp, dense alarm. This was no ordinary, localized technical‑failure alert; it was a continuous, piercing siren from the highest level of the risk‑monitoring system—a warning of systemic threat. On the vast curved main screen, the global capital‑market data flow, once dominated by the blue and green hues symbolizing normalcy and stability, was now being fiercely eroded and overwhelmed by shocking swathes of red and orange, as if a tranquil sea had abruptly churned into a blood‑red storm devouring everything.
Mozi stood before the screen, his silhouette cast into a statue‑like stillness by the violently flickering alarm lights. His face showed no surprise, not even a flicker of emotion—only a near‑absolute calm, as if the digital tsunami sweeping through global financial markets had long been accounted for among the myriad possibilities he had simulated. He had been waiting for this moment for a long time. This was no accidental market fluctuation, no unexpected shock from a black‑swan event; this was a **coordinated, pre‑meditated, and precisely targeted all‑out assault**. The adversary was the alliance of international capital behemoths entrenched at the apex of the global financial food chain—entities whose fundamental interests clashed with him and the "XianGuang" system he represented.
The overture of the attack was a seemingly objective yet razor‑sharp "research report." Just half an hour earlier, a top‑tier Wall Street investment‑bank research division, renowned for its "independence" and "profound insight," together with several other financial institutions wielding enormous market influence, had simultaneously released a hundred‑page‑plus in‑depth analysis report on the prospects of China's technology industry. Its core thesis was profoundly pessimistic and provocative: after an initial phase of rapid expansion, Chinese tech firms were broadly facing fatal problems such as "hollowed‑out core technology," "innovation capability hitting a ceiling," and "geopolitical risks sharply rising, causing severe obstruction of international markets and supply chains." The report particularly "scrutinized" the semiconductor, artificial intelligence, and advanced manufacturing sectors closely linked to the XianGuang ecosystem, deploying carefully selected and one‑sidedly interpreted data to paint a terrifying picture of an "imminent bubble burst."
The report itself was a depth‑charge dropped into the capital markets. Its destructive power lay not in rigorous argumentation (in fact, it was riddled with inductive assumptions and logical leaps), but in the "authoritative" status of its issuers and the precisely chosen timing. After its release, mainstream global financial media, like sharks scenting blood, immediately launched an overwhelming wave of reposting and amplification, flooding screens with sensational headlines: "Has Winter Arrived for Chinese Tech Stocks?", "Is the XianGuang Model Facing Its Ultimate Test?", "Analysts Warn: Avoid Systemic Risk in China's Tech Sector!"
This was the bugle of **information warfare**, aimed at shattering market confidence and breeding panic.
Almost the instant the media storm triggered by the report reached its first peak, the substantive blows of **multidimensional financial warfare** struck like a precisely calculated combination punch—ferocious and coordinated.
First came the **stock markets**. In Hong Kong and A‑share markets, companies associated with XianGuang, as well as the core Chinese tech firms highlighted in the report, were subjected to unprecedented, synchronized, massive concentrated selling. Sell orders gushed forth like a collapsing dam—heedless of cost, indifferent to price—with the sole aim of driving down stock prices and creating a stampede effect. Short‑selling forces that had quietly built positions earlier now poured out in full force, leveraging derivative instruments to amplify the damage. On the screen, the curves representing these companies' stock prices plummeted like out‑of‑control elevators, while the glaring green numbers (indicating decline in some markets) flashed frantically, triggering one circuit‑breaker mechanism after another. Panic spread like plague, quickly infecting the entire Chinese stock market from the tech sector, with major indices plunging off a cliff.
That was only the first wave.
Almost simultaneously, the **futures markets** came under synchronized assault. The primary target was one of the foundational pillars of Mozi's capital empire—**gold**. On the London and New York markets, international gold prices abruptly faced enormous selling volumes for no apparent reason; the price was hammered down, instantly breaking through several critical technical support levels. This was clearly an attempt at a surgical strike against Mozi's massive gold positions. The adversary knew well gold's crucial role in Mozi's "anti‑fragile" system—as both a safe‑haven asset and a key medium for liquidity management and strategy execution. Attacking gold aimed to shake the foundation of his capital fortress, forcing him to liquidate other positions under liquidity pressure and triggering a chain reaction.
Yet even that was not enough. A third‑dimensional attack quietly unfolded in the **foreign‑exchange market**. Offshore RMB exchange rates came under heavy selling pressure, while the US dollar index was mysteriously boosted by strong capital inflows. This coordinated move aimed to spark panic over capital flight, further tightening liquidity within China and amplifying the pressure on the stock and futures markets, creating a vicious, self‑reinforcing death spiral: stocks fall → panic → capital outflow → currency depreciation → further panic → stocks fall further…
Stocks, futures, foreign exchange—three critical markets set ablaze at once, the attack waves meshing seamlessly, the firepower concentrated and ferocious. This was in no way a spontaneous, disorderly market behavior, but a textbook example of **coordinated multi‑market sniping**. Behind it lay a coalition of capital behemoths possessing near‑limitless ammunition, top‑tier information advantages, and coordinated operational capabilities. Like deep‑sea predators lurking in the abyss, they had finally chosen the moment when their prey seemed strongest (XianGuang had just announced its EUV‑source breakthrough and the formation of a new capital alliance)—and perhaps also when its strategic attention might be dispersed—to launch a determined, lethal strike.
The goal was clear: exploit the resonance effect across multiple markets to engineer a localized financial storm targeting XianGuang and its associated ecosystem, crush Mozi's financial defense system at one blow, destroy his capital foundation, and thereby undermine the resource supply on which Xiuxiu's technological breakthrough efforts and Yue'er's theoretical exploration relied. This was a capital‑level "decapitation operation."
Inside the control room, young analysts were pale‑faced, fingers flying across keyboards as they tried to untangle capital flows and trace attack origins, but traditional analytical tools proved inadequate in the face of such complex and deliberate market manipulation. The tense atmosphere had almost solidified into a tangible entity, pressing down on everyone's breath.
Mozi remained calm. He did not even look at the wildly jumping, heart‑pounding numbers; instead, he pulled up the core monitoring interface of the "anti‑fragile" model. The moment the attack began, the model had automatically switched to the highest‑level "survival‑defense mode." On the screen, modules representing different strategy units and asset portfolios were undergoing rapid, complex adaptive adjustments based on predefined extreme‑stress‑scenario contingency plans, as well as the model's own real‑time assessment of market conditions.
Some high‑risk positions were decisively liquidated once stop‑loss lines were triggered, containing losses.
Some highly liquid assets were rapidly cashed out, replenishing margin and cash reserves to cope with potential redemption pressure and more extreme market scenarios.
"Noise‑trading" strategies originally designed to generate alpha had their parameters dynamically tuned, with some shifting to execute covert, small‑scale counter‑operations, attempting to find tiny pricing anomalies and liquidity opportunities amid the market's irrational panic—like seeking momentary calm vortices within a storm.
The model also continuously tried to identify and track capital flows bearing clear attack signatures hidden behind countless normal transactions, though the adversary evidently employed extremely sophisticated camouflage and split‑account techniques.
Mozi's gaze was profound. He knew this would be the most severe stress test the "anti‑fragile" model had faced since its birth—not merely a trial of market risk, but a direct game with a living opponent endowed with top‑tier intelligence and resources. His model, his capital fortress, the offshore structures and shareholder alliances he had meticulously built—all would be tempered in this storm.
He stood in silence for about ten minutes, like a reef enduring fierce winds and towering waves yet remaining unmoving, absorbing all information and pressure. Then he made a decision.
He did not convene an emergency meeting, nor did he issue specific tactical orders (he trusted the model's autonomous response capability, as well as his team's professionalism). Instead, he walked toward his private lounge. He needed to make two calls.
First, he dialed Xiuxiu's encrypted line. The video connected; Xiuxiu appeared to be in the rest area outside the ultra‑clean lab, her face still bearing the weariness that followed intense research. When she saw Mozi's unusually calm yet deeper, more solemn gaze than ever before, she immediately sensed something momentous had happened.
"Xiuxiu," Mozi's voice was steady, without the slightest ripple, as if stating an established fact, "they've started. Stocks, futures, foreign exchange—full‑scale assault. The target is our capital system."
Xiuxiu paused, then instantly, the fatigue on her face was replaced by a soldier‑like sharpness. She did not grasp the intricate details of financial warfare, but she understood the weight of the words "full‑scale assault" and "target is us." This meant the R&D funding she relied on, the efforts of her team, could all come to naught if the rear fell.
"How serious?" Xiuxiu's voice also lowered, asking tersely.
"This is a decisive battle." Mozi did not conceal the truth. "The scale and coordination are unprecedented. We'll hold, but it will take time and entail heavy losses. On your side, proceed as usual, don't lose composure. Trust me."
Xiuxiu looked into Mozi's eyes on the screen—eyes bottomless yet containing absolute resolve—and nodded firmly. "Understood! The lab here won't collapse! You focus on dealing with them!"
Ending the call with Xiuxiu, Mozi took a deep breath, then dialed Yue'er's number.
Yue'er answered quickly; she seemed to be in her study organizing the latest notes on the geometrization of P vs. NP, her expression serene and focused. When she saw Mozi, she too keenly detected the unusual, intensely restrained tension about him.
"Yue'er," Mozi's tone remained calm, yet carried a trace of explanation, almost imperceptibly more than when facing Xiuxiu, "the financial markets are undergoing a coordinated sniping operation against us. The situation is quite severe."
Yue'er frowned slightly. Her understanding of capital markets was more abstract than Xiuxiu's, but she could grasp "coordinated sniping" and "quite severe." She saw in Mozi's eyes not panic, but a commander's calm and determination on the eve of a final battlefield.
"Is it… because our progress has been too fast?" Yue'er asked softly, with a hint of concern.
"It is an inevitable conflict," Mozi replied. "We are shaking their foundation. This is only the beginning. Over the coming period, I may be completely immersed in this defensive battle; external contact will be minimal."
He paused, looking into Yue'er's clear, wisdom‑filled eyes, his voice low yet distinct: "You and Xiuxiu, protect yourselves, continue your work. That is the greatest support for the frontline."
Yue'er gazed at Mozi. She could sense the roaring turbulence beneath the calm words, imagine the immense pressure he must be bearing. She did not utter empty phrases like "be careful" or "stay safe." She simply looked deeply at him, as if trying to transmit her belief and strength through her gaze.
"We'll be waiting for your return." In the end, Yue'er spoke only these five words, her voice soft yet carrying undeniable trust and strength.
Mozi nodded, said no more, and ended the call.
Setting down the communicator, Mozi stood alone in the silent lounge. Outside the window, Shanghai remained its bustling, noisy self, yet his world was enveloped in an invisible financial nuclear blast. He had informed Yue'er and Xiuxiu—not to seek solace, nor to share the burden, but out of a sense of responsibility, an inevitable duty to the most important people before the storm broke.
The three of them were like kin about to step onto different battlefields. Xiuxiubreakthrough efforts in the micro‑world of technology, Yue'er exploring in the abstract kingdom of theory, and he—facing the fiercest, most direct artillery fire on the global battlefield of capital. Emotion, under this oppressive, life‑or‑death tension, was not diluted; instead, it grew deeper, more restrained, transforming into a tacit, absolute trust and support that needed no words. He knew that, no matter what blood‑and‑rain tempest lay ahead, behind him were two world‑class minds and hearts fighting alongside him.
He straightened his suit and tie, his face regaining its usual stern impassivity. He pushed open the lounge door and walked back into the control center bathed in red‑alert light.
The decisive moment had arrived.
He stepped up to the main console, his eyes sweeping over the financial storm still raging wildly on the screens. His voice, not loud, carried clearly throughout the room:
"Activate 'Great Wall' protocol, highest level. All personnel, man your posts. Let us… welcome our guests."