He was outscored after scoring 520 points, but his status as a prodigy can't be hidden.

"Given sufficient computing power and funding, they can forcibly remove the Trojan module, although the cost is a 50% decrease in the overall algorithm's efficiency and a huge amount of memory consumption."

Xia Zijin explained from the side.

"That's right."

Lin Yu took a sip of water. "This is exactly what I wanted. Go and connect the peripheral interfaces for version 2.0. Once Tencent has set up the stage, we'll go and close the net."

Wang Lei looked at the USB drive on the table, his eyes slightly reddening.

He knew that this was the first time Lin Yu had truly granted him access to the most core technical knowledge.

This represents complete trust.

Ten million in stock options bought him the ultimate ticket to a new era. Wang Lei clutched the USB drive tightly in his hand and turned to frantically write code.

One month later. Shenzhen, Tencent Group's Binhai Headquarters Building, top-floor studio.

The Tencent Star Stream Engine launch event, broadcast live across the entire internet, is underway. The hall is packed, with hundreds of media outlets aiming their cameras and microphones at Ma Huayun on stage.

The large screen displays stunning data charts and highly technological UI animations.

"Over the past month, two hundred top engineers in Tencent's technology department have been working day and night."

Wearing his signature black turtleneck sweater, Ma Huayun paced back and forth on stage, microphone in hand, announcing, "We've completely restructured the existing underlying logic of video transmission. Today, the Penguin Starstream Compression Engine is officially launched!"

The applause of the audience was thunderous.

"This engine can reduce bandwidth consumption in streaming media by 40%!"

Ma Huayun raised his voice, "Starting today, all Penguin Video products will be seamlessly integrated with the Starstream Engine. We will also open our API to all partners, empowering the entire ecosystem!"

A reporter from the media in the front row immediately raised his hand and asked, "Mr. Ma, a month ago at the Challenge Cup, the Singularity Algorithm team claimed to be able to reduce bandwidth by 90%. Is there any connection between Tencent's Star Stream Engine and them?"

The entire room fell silent. Everyone knew that Ma Huayun had gone to Beijing to look for Lin Yu.

Ma Huayun smiled, his eyes revealing a condescending disdain.

"Penguin has always supported the innovative spirit of university students."

Ma Huayun said calmly, "A month ago, we did have initial contact with the Qidian team. But after a rigorous evaluation by our technical department, their theory was too idealistic and could not be implemented in a complex business environment. There was even serious suspicion of data fabrication."

This statement caused an uproar across the internet.

Ma Huayun added fuel to the fire: "Technology cannot remain confined to PowerPoint presentations and the black boxes of labs. The Penguin Starflow Engine is a core technology for which we own completely independent intellectual property rights. Hereby, I also unilaterally announce the termination of all forms of contact with the Singularity team."

The chat room exploded with comments.

"Tencent has spoken out: the Singularity Algorithm is a scam!"

"I knew it! How could a freshman possibly outperform tens of thousands of engineers at Tencent?"

"Mr. Ma is magnanimous; not only did he not pursue the fraudsters, he even produced genuine products himself!"

Public opinion is overwhelmingly in favor of the Chinese. The Gu family's media resources are subtly fueling the fire, with press releases about Lin Yu's academic fraud and malicious extortion of Tencent spreading rapidly across various platforms.

In an abandoned warehouse next to Peking University.

Wang Lei stared at the live stream on his computer screen, trembling with rage: "Bullshit! They call that independent research and development? That's clearly a knock-off product made by forcibly modifying the underlying logic of the crippled version you gave them!"

Lin Yu sat at his desk, holding a box of freshly made braised beef noodles.

He slurped up a mouthful of instant noodles, his gaze indifferent as he looked at the spirited Ma Huayun on the screen.

"Brutely dismantling the underlying logic will inevitably damage the stability of the data structure."

Lin Yu put down his fork, pulled out a tissue to wipe his mouth, and said, "They forcibly isolated Xia Zijing's rocking horse, thinking that everything was fine."

Xia Zijin sat on the other side, her fingers flying across the keyboard.

The screen displays real-time traffic monitoring data for the entire Penguin Video network.

"The press conference was extremely effective at attracting visitors."

Xia Zijing looked at the data panel. "Penguin Video's concurrent access volume has exceeded three times the usual amount, and it is still rising exponentially. Their servers are running the Star Stream Engine at full capacity."

"Lin Shen, are we just going to watch them dump all their dirty water on us and make money off our technology?"

Wang Lei's eyes were bloodshot.

Lin Yu stood up and walked to the control panel.

"Wang Lei, do you remember what else was left in that stripped-down version of the interface I asked you to provide to Tencent, besides the Trojan horse?"

Lin Yu put one hand in his pocket, his tone calm.

Wang Lei was stunned for a moment.

He recalled the details of writing the code a month ago.

"A system timestamp detection function?"

Wang Lei remembered, "But that function has no logical connection; it's just a piece of dead code that's been hibernating in the background, reading the system time."

"It's not dead code."

Lin Yu looked at the live broadcast on the big screen, a cold smile curving his lips.

"That's a trigger."

Lin Yu turned to Xia Zijing: "How much time is left until the timestamp triggers?"

Xia Zijing glanced at the numbers in the lower right corner of the computer screen.

"Forty-five seconds."

Lin Yu pulled out a folding chair and sat down, placing his hands on the keyboard.

"Wang Lei, prepare to cut off the live stream from Tencent Video. Connect to our backend."

Lin Yu issued the order.

"clear!"

Wang Lei immediately took action.

The air in the warehouse instantly plummeted to freezing point, and a machine poised to crush a financial behemoth began to operate.

The scene of the Penguin press conference.

Ma Huayun is demonstrating the smoothness of Tencent Video after it was connected to the Star Stream Engine on stage.

"Please look at the big screen, everyone. Currently, ten million users are watching this 4K movie online simultaneously. The server CPU load is extremely low, and the picture is completely smooth without any lag..."

The high-definition image on the big screen suddenly and eerily froze.

It wasn't the kind of buffering caused by network lag; rather, the entire screen felt like it was frozen into an ice cube.

Ma Huayun frowned slightly and glanced at the technical director in the back office. The technical director was frantically typing on the keyboard, his face ashen.

"There might be a slight network fluctuation at the venue, please wait a moment."

Ma Huayun remained calm and tried to smooth things over.

The moment he finished speaking.

The image on the big screen suddenly shattered, turning into a blinding speck of static. Immediately afterward, a huge line of red error code filled the entire screen.

The entire studio fell silent instantly.

"What's going on?!"

Ma Huayun roared into the microphone, forgetting to turn off the amplifier, and his voice echoed throughout the venue.

The technical lead stumbled onto the stage, his voice trembling: "Mr. Ma! It's crashed! The entire system has crashed! Our two thousand edge computing node servers all had their CPU utilization locked at 100% within three seconds! The memory pool exploded!"

"Reboot the server! Switch back to the old engine!"

Ma Huayun roared.