Nicholas must have been coming to visit Grandpa, but something urgent came up, so he left!
Yes! That has to be it!
Isabella repeated this to herself over and over, finally managing to calm her emotions.
She urgently grabbed Alfred's arm and instructed, "Alfred, remember this. From now on, if you see Nicholas's car anywhere near the Lancaster estate, you must inform me immediately! Do you understand?"
She had been in love with Nicholas for many, many years.
And now...
Serena's return had made her own position in the family incredibly awkward.
It was as if Serena had cast a spell on her grandfather and parents; they all favored her now.
She had to win over Nicholas. It would be best if she could successfully marry into the Blackwood family. Only then... only then could she solidify her position within the Lancaster family and never lose the place that was supposed to be hers alone!
Alfred glanced at the hand gripping his arm tighter and tighter. He frowned slightly and discreetly pulled his arm away before nodding respectfully. "Of course, Miss Isabella."
***
Upstairs, Serena walked into her fantastical room, a space filled with lace and an explosion of girly pink, without a change in her expression.
She placed the gift from her brother on the desk, then pulled a specially modified laptop from her canvas bag.
She opened it.
Her slender, fair fingers flew across the keyboard.
The screen lit up, and she immediately logged into an encrypted channel, where a complex authentication screen appeared.
If anyone else had been there to see that authentication screen, they would have gasped in shock.
It was the access portal for a national core research facility!
Serena's fingers danced across the keyboard, a blur of motion as she entered a string of extremely complex commands. The screen instantly switched to another terminal window, where streams of code cascaded down like a waterfall.
Without the slightest hesitation, her fingers moved at an astonishing speed.
The screen instantly split into countless complex code windows, with dense lines of code constantly scrolling by.
Serena's expression was calm and
focused. She rapidly entered
commalid after command,
partitioning and caffing up one template after another...
She never paused, yet she was able to precisely isolate the source of the interference.
Only then did Serena stop, her clear, bright eyes narrowing slightly.
This interference source...
It was disguised within a core service process template, and the attack vector was incredibly sophisticated.
Without calculations more precise than a supercomputer's, it would have been nearly impossible to detect.
To be able to tamper with the core service process template in such a way...
It had to be one of the core members of this project!
Serena's cool gaze sharpened, her eyes locked on that template.
Then, her ten fingers returned to the keyboard.
A set of targeted anti-tracking code was rapidly constructed.
*Knock, knock...*
A very light knock came from the door. "Serena, it's me."
Hearing her brother's voice, Serena didn't look up, her fingers still tapping away at the keyboard. "Come in."
The door opened, and Julian walked in carrying a glass of warm milk and a plate of delicate pastries.
He saw Serena sitting at her computer and didn't want to disturb her. He walked over with light.
footsteps and placed the tele
milk and
pastries on the desk. Content,
His gaze fell on his still-unopened gift, and he paused for a moment.
It seemed his little sister was truly busy.
Julian decided not to bother her any longer. Just as he was about to leave his eyes landed on the screen in front of her Comment