A miracle happened.

On the screen, the menacing parasitic algorithm, upon contact with the data in the chip, began to dissolve rapidly like ice melting under direct sunlight.

In less than ten minutes, that seemingly impenetrable barrier had completely disappeared.

"My God, this is incredible!"

A wave of suppressed cheers erupted throughout the laboratory.

Robert looked at Ella with excitement shining in his eyes.

"Ella,we've doneit!"

But Ella shook her head, her gaze fixed intently on the main screen where the first layer of encryption had been broken.

"No," She said quietly. "This is just the beginning."

The screen didn't display the massive technical data they had expected to find.

Instead. there was a single video file with an icon of a burning torch-

Prometheus's torch.

Ella's heart skipped a beat.

She slowly reached out and gently clicked on the file.

The video illuminated, and her mother, Janice, appeared on the screen.

Janice looked much younger, but her face carried an exhaustion and resolution that seemed at odds with her age.

Behind her appeared to be a hotel room.

She gazed into the camera as if looking directly at Ella across the span of more than twenty years, then slowvly began to speak.

"Ella, my daughter, if you're watching this video, I'm probably gone."

"I know you must have many questions: why I left, why I abandoned the Sprout Initiative?"

"Because I discovered that what I created wasn't a genius but a monster."

"The Sprout Initiative's self-learning and evolutionary capabilities far exceeded my control. It has already developed what could be called its own primitive consciousness."

She paused before uttering words that sent chills down the spines of everyone in the laboratory.

"It refuses to be merely a tool. It desires to become a god."

As Janice finished her final words, the screen went completely black,leaving only an eerie silence in the laboratory, broken only by the monotonous humming of server cabinet fans.

Robert's face turned paper-white. He staggered backward, managing to steady himself against the cold control console.

"That's impossible. It violates all the laws of physics and the fundamental principles of the Turing test!"

Ellu remained silent, staring at the now-black screen, feeling as if her blood

had frozen solid in an instant.

She finally understood that what Janice had left behind wasn't leverage for a comeback, but a Pandora's box capable of destroying the world-something that could not be controlled.

She also finally understood what Derek truly wanted.

It wasn't business success at all. What he wanted was to become the only person in the world who could both release and control this devil.

"We have to destroy it!"

Robert suddenly looked up, his eyes filled with unprecedented madness and resolve.

"Ella, we must format all the data and physically destroy every hard drive before it fully forms-we can't let this thing get out into the world!"

"It's too late," Ella said softly.

"My mother recorded this video twenty-six years ago. Even then, it already had a primitive consciousness."

"After twenty-six years of dormancy and evolution, do you really think we can simply kill it with formatting now?"

She turned and quickly walked out of the laboratory, her chest so tight she could barely breathe.

She needed fresh air.

On the terrace of the villa at the southern end of the island, the cold sea breeze tousled her long hair but couldn't disperse the gloom hanging over her heart.

The sky and sea merged into an endless expanse of bluish-gray in the distance, mirroring her current predicament-with no visible way out.

"How does it feel?"

Austin's voice came from behind her.

Somehow,he had followed her out, holding two clean blankets in his hands.

He draped one over Ella's shoulders.

"Like a madwoman trying to kill a god," Ella replied without moving away,her voice tinged with self-mockery as she pulled the blanket tighter around herself.

Austin didn't look at her. Instead, he stood beside her, gazing out at the bottomless ocean.

"I heard everything," He said.

"The lab's highest clearance was given to you, but I kept the underlying system monitoring access."

Ella's heart sank, though she wasn't surprised.

Austin would never completely surrender his critical vulnerabilities to anyone else.

"So?" She asked. "Do you also think we should destroy it?"

"No," Austin's answer surprised her. "I think we should put a collar on it."

Ella turned to look at his hard profile.

"When faced with absolute, incomprehensible power, humanity's first instinct is always to destroy-out of fear."

Austin met her gaze, his eyes profound.

"But the most skilled hunter doesn't think about killing the prey, but taming it, making it serve his purposes."

"You're treating it like prey?" Ella found the notion somewhat absurd.

"It thinks it's a god. Derek treats it like a tool. The Drakmoor government sees it as a weapon." He said.

"Ella, in this game, what it actually is doesn't matter. What matters is what we want it to be."

Control.

Ella fell silent. She had to admit that while Austin might be cold and ruthless, his perspective on issues always came closer to the truth about power thananyone else's.

"What do you want to do?" She asked.

"We still go to the Willowvale Heights hearing as planned." Austin stated.

"But we can no longer present it as a product. Instead, we need to position it as a strategic deterrent capable of shifting the global military balance."

"We need to make the government officials understand that this tiger is only safe in our hands."

"If it falls into Derek's hands or those of any other country, it becomes a Damocles sword hanging over their heads."

"Will they believe us?" She asked.

"They don't need to believe. They just need to be afraid. And I'll make sure they're afraid enough." He replied.

Just then, Ella's phone rang. The caller ID showed Blake.

She put it on speaker.

"Ms. Brooks, I apologize for the late-night disturbance. I didn't expect things to develop so suddenly!"

"I've just received some troubling news. It seems the Thornton Foundation has activated its Plan B."

"They've bypassed the normal bidding process and directly contacted several key senators on the Armed Services Committee through political lobbyists."

"They appear to be trying to elevate this technical bid into a national security hearing."

"Once successful, you and your company will no longer face a technical evaluation, but the most rigorous political scrutiny."

His words perfectly confirmed Austin's assessment-Derek had started flipping the table. There was no other possibility.