Chapter Eight: The Ancient Virus

Jiangxi Wen’s shout once again drew many gazes his way, as everyone saw his screen resting just beneath the standard interface.

Before he could answer Gong Xiang, someone exclaimed in admiration, “This kid really knows his stuff, impressive...”

The guy playing Romance of the Three Kingdoms snapped back to attention. He couldn’t afford to lose face in front of a kid. “Impressive? Come on, he just knows a few commands. Ever heard of turbonet—”

“Not bad, man. Where did you learn this? You’ve been full of surprises since you started teasing the text parser. You must be hiding some real skills.” Gong Xiang commented with a hint of envy, finally noticing that Jiangxi Wen’s screen wasn’t entirely black—there were several lines of characters and a blinking cursor.

Jiangxi Wen was momentarily taken aback, but quickly brushed it off. “I told you, save up and buy royal jelly, or malted milk powder if you’re short on cash. Even if you don’t catch up to me, you’ll at least learn half as much.” Not waiting for further questions, he called out again, “Boss, do you have what I asked for or not?”

“Oh?” The owner finally snapped out of his daze and replied, “This is my game room, so I don’t have what you’re looking for. But the computer classroom at the school next door does. If you’re entering high school, you can sign up for classes there.”

Good grief, what kind of world is this, where even a public computer school only accepts high schoolers? Jiangxi Wen sighed inwardly, then was interrupted again by Gong Xiang, “Where did you really learn all this? Teach me.”

Everyone in the room, except the chubby guy, looked over at Jiangxi Wen, their curiosity piqued by Gong Xiang’s question. The owner and the Romance of the Three Kingdoms youth were especially hopeful. After all, in 1993, in a small city like Yangjiang, it was hard to believe a teenager could skillfully enter DOS commands and demand a C programming environment.

Who would have thought grown men could be so nosy? With no other choice, Jiangxi Wen once again trotted out the story of his uncle at the fabled Modo University, smiling humbly. “Well, it was my uncle, really. Last summer I stayed with him for a while, he taught me a lot, but this is all I remember. Now that I finally found a public computer room, of course I wanted to try it out.”

“I knew it, just a lucky relative! Learned a few things and now he’s showing off,” the Romance of the Three Kingdoms youth chuckled. Since Jiangxi Wen said so, everyone was willing to believe it. As university students or teachers themselves, they couldn’t lose face to a child, so they chose to believe Jiangxi Wen was just an ordinary kid—especially since some of their own knowledge didn’t go much further.

As everyone turned back to their games, Jiangxi Wen finally breathed a sigh of relief. Gong Xiang had lost interest in his game and, clearly envious, begged Jiangxi Wen to teach him.

Jiangxi Wen was more than willing to share. He still hoped to go into business with Gong Xiang one day—brothers united are as strong as steel.

An hour passed quickly, and Gong Xiang, being sharp, managed to learn the basics of DOS operations through their lesson.

Just then, the Romance of the Three Kingdoms youth shouted, “Boss, what’s wrong with my computer?” Everyone turned to see his screen as bursts of funny music blared: “Two tigers, two tigers...”

Interesting, such an old virus. Jiangxi Wen shook his head. The legendary DOS virus “Two Tigers”—in a place without any network, he must have inserted a floppy disk.

“What the hell did you do?!” The owner’s face turned deathly pale as he yanked the disk from the machine, furious. “You’ve got a virus! Where did you get that disk?”

“Oh no!” cried the guy next to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms youth. Immediately, his computer began to play the melodious strains of “Two Tigers” as well.

At that moment, four “tigers” sang in chaotic harmony.

“What are you guys doing? Did you use his disk too? I don’t have any antivirus software here—you’re responsible for fixing this!” The owner’s face went from white to livid, his bottle-thick glasses blinking furiously.

“Old Gao, you’re loaded—just buy two more computers!” The chubby guy, who had been silent, looked in satisfaction at the completed Xuan Yuan Sword game and spoke up loudly.

This Old Gao was, of course, the owner. Hearing the chubby guy’s words, his anger changed to a fawning smile. “Xiao Qi, if I had money, I’d just get that management system from Qingruan Company. One machine could manage them all—even if there’s a virus, it’d be easy to handle. But money’s tight.”

“Come on, that Qingruan system costs at least thirty grand. All your computers together aren’t worth half that.”

“Xiao Qi, you’re an insider, don’t be so harsh! Each of these computers cost at least ten grand. Maybe you can talk to your classmates at Tianxing School and get a system for me. I’ll just copy it over.” Gao grinned, eyes full of greedy anticipation.

“A whole ten grand?” The Romance of the Three Kingdoms youth and his friend gawked, eyes darting toward the door, wishing they could melt through the wall.

“This 386 for ten grand? Who are you kidding?” The chubby guy scoffed, turning away. “Letting you lease these fifteen computers is already a favor from my classmates. Now you’re scheming for more. Besides, that system will definitely have anti-piracy protection—you think you’ll get to copy it?”

Gao, undeterred, kept up his ingratiating smile. “With you here, Xiao Qi, cracking an anti-piracy code should be nothing...”

“Nonsense. I’m an upstanding person, not some pirate. But tell you what—two hundred bucks and I’ll fix these two machines for you.”

“Might as well buy antivirus software then.”

“Go ahead, get a computer company to fix it—it’ll cost you at least five hundred. As for antivirus, if you can find it in Yangjiang, I’ll take your surname. There’s a pirated KV100, but the virus database is out of date—it can’t handle this new virus.” The chubby guy spoke with an easy confidence, clearly in his element.

Gao hesitated for a moment, then gritted his teeth. “Fine, two hundred it is.” He turned and snarled at the Romance of the Three Kingdoms youth and his friend, “You two, one hundred each. Pay up.”

“But, a hundred...” the friend stammered, finding the sum a bit steep.

“Two hundred, no problem!” the Romance of the Three Kingdoms youth quickly agreed. Clearly, he’d been covering his friend’s time at the computers. In those days, anyone who could come here to play games had some money at home—except for people like Jiangxi Wen, who could happily skip meals just to be near a computer.

Seeing the bill drop from ten grand to two hundred, the Romance of the Three Kingdoms youth felt a huge weight lift from his heart. He quickly handed over the money and hustled his friend out the door.

“We should go too,” Gong Xiang said, sticking out his tongue. “If these computers really break, we can’t afford to pay.”

Jiangxi Wen nodded, leaving the computer room with Gong Xiang. The scene just now had sparked a new idea in his mind—if he could pull it off, it might just earn him a tidy sum, maybe even a fortune.