I, a cultivator, have ended up in the wizarding world

Chapter 568 Network Virus

The atmosphere in the command center's conference room was heavy.

Jemin sat on the edge of the conference table, his gaze sweeping over everyone present.

In the entire conference room, apart from him, a level 5 wizard, everyone else was a level 6 or higher high-level wizard—more than a dozen level 7 wizards, hundreds of level 6 wizards, and Martin, the level 8 wizard, who sat at the head of the table.

The level of this meeting was ridiculously high.

But Jemin knew that he was summoned not because of his strength, but because of the Entropy Brain.

He was the one who first discovered that thing, or rather, the reason the Entropy Brain was discovered was because of him, which is why he was able to attend this meeting. "Everyone is here."

Martin's voice rang out, and the conference room fell silent instantly.

He glanced at everyone and cut to the chase: "You all know the situation. We've trapped the information beings inside, but we can't get in either. The problem now is how to break through their defenses and get in to harvest the entropy brains."

As soon as he finished speaking, someone immediately spoke up.

"Let's launch a direct assault." A level seven wizard stood up and said in a deep voice, "If we could suppress them once before, we can suppress them a second time. Let's concentrate the power of all the high-level wizards, forcefully tear open a gap, and then send in elite squads to reap the rewards."

Some nodded, while others frowned.

A level six wizard in a dark blue robe shook his head and said, "It's not that simple. Last time we were able to suppress them because they took the initiative to rush out and fight us inside the ship's plane. Now they've learned their lesson and are guarding behind the dimensional barrier. That's their home turf; if we go in, our advantage will be gone."

"Then let's use the same methods as in previous wars, with powerful sorcery," another wizard interjected. "Let's blast open the dimensional barriers and destroy their core nodes. Once we take down the command system, all that's left are scattered soldiers."

A murmur of discussion arose in the conference room.

Jemin didn't speak, he just listened quietly.

Soon, someone stood up to refute this.

He was a level seven wizard who looked quite old, with white hair and beard, but sharp eyes.

He raised his hand and pointed in the air, projecting a 3D image of an entropy brain.

"Can't you combat specialists use your brains...? Has any of you actually researched this stuff?"

Everyone looked at him.

The old wizard pointed to the patterns of light inside the entropy brain and slowly said, "I've studied it for three days. The structure of this thing reveals the social organization of those information beings—they have no command system at all."

"What do you mean?" someone asked.

The old wizard explained, "The patterns inside the entropy brain show that each informational organism is a complete server node. They are connected through quantum entanglement, forming an information network covering the entire plane. This network is perfectly flat—there is no center, no hierarchy, and no so-called 'command center' or 'leader.'"

He paused, then emphasized, "All decisions are automatically generated by the information network consensus algorithm. In other words, every information being is both a soldier and a commander. If you eliminate one, the rest will automatically take its place; if you eliminate ten thousand, the rest will still function normally." The conference room was silent for a few seconds.

The wizard who suggested bombarding the command system looked rather grim.

"Then... let's increase the destructive power." He gritted his teeth and said, "Anyway, we only need the Entropy Brain, as long as the plane isn't destroyed, it'll be fine." The old wizard glanced at him and slowly shook his head.

"First, those information beings won't just stand there and let you bombard them. As soon as the dimensional barrier fluctuates, they will disperse, hide, or even actively relocate. What you bombard may only be a small part. More importantly, even if you do destroy the information beings in this area, they can resurrect from other areas."

"Second..." He paused, looking at Martin at the head of the table, "This plane is too unique; the extent of its destruction cannot be guaranteed. Our mission is to ensure that the plane is not destroyed. This plane is extremely valuable; we want a complete plane, not a pile of ruins." Silence fell over the conference room.

Everyone was thinking, but they couldn't come up with a good solution.

After a long silence, a female seventh-level wizard who had remained silent suddenly spoke up.

"Since attacking individuals is ineffective, let's try a different approach."

Everyone looked at her.

She said slowly, "We'll attack their connections."

"connect?"

"Yes." She nodded. "The reason those information beings are so troublesome is not because they are individually strong, but because they form an information network. If we can sever their network and turn them into isolated individuals, it will be much easier to harvest them."

Everyone's eyes lit up.

That's definitely a good idea.

"Indeed, the reason why Wizard Jemin was able to kill the information creatures so accurately was because he severed all their information connections..." one wizard agreed.

But soon, problems arose.

"How do we sever it?" someone frowned. "Their connection is in a quantum entangled state, theoretically ignoring distance and obstacles. Our current information-based witchcraft can only interfere temporarily; it's impossible to permanently sever it."

"And their information connections have self-healing capabilities," another person added. "They will rebuild immediately after being severed."

"Moreover, the reason we were able to isolate them before was because of plane manipulation and the magic array provided by Wizard Jemin. Now that they're holed up in the information plane, we can't move the magic array inside. Without the array's amplification, we simply can't isolate them," someone else said. The discussion once again reached a stalemate.

As Jemin sat in the corner, listening to the argument, a thought flashed through his mind.

Disconnection...

Direct attack on the connection...

He recalled his knowledge about computer viruses from his previous life.

Those viruses don't need to damage hardware or destroy servers; they only need to exploit vulnerabilities in the system itself to paralyze the entire network. Although the wizarding civilization also has something like a magic network, because the wizards had the technology to create artificial souls very early on, they directly used high-level artificial souls to help manage the magic network after its creation, so they haven't experienced anything like viruses.

So if this line of thinking could be applied to witchcraft...

A sudden inspiration struck Jemin.

He suddenly stood up.

Everyone was taken aback and turned to look at him.

"Jamin?" Martin raised an eyebrow. "You have an idea?"

Jemin took a deep breath and organized his thoughts.

"I'm thinking... could we design a special type of information data packet?"

"Data packet?"

“Yes.” Jemin nodded. “It’s like the information turbulence those information creatures use to attack us, but it’s more complex and targeted.” He said as he thought, “The core of this data packet is to ensure that any information creature that reads it will collapse—either its computing power will be heavily consumed, its core information will be contaminated, or it will simply self-destruct.”

"But a one-off attack is meaningless," Jamin continued. "The key is that this data packet must be able to replicate itself. So we must find a way to make an information being read it, and then automatically create multiple copies, which are then spread to other individuals through that information being's network connections."

"In this way, theoretically, sending just one data packet can infect the entire network."

Everyone stared at Jemin, their expressions complex.

After a long silence, the old wizard murmured, "Self-replication...spreading along the network...this..."

He looked at Jemin, his eyes gleaming: "What do you call this thing?"

Jemin's lips twitched slightly.

We can't exactly call it a "cyber virus," can we?

He coughed lightly: "I haven't thought of a name yet. But the principle is the same."

Everyone looked at each other.

Someone frowned: "It sounds wonderful, but is it even possible? For such an information attack to self-replicate... that would require the inherent characteristics of the information organism itself."

"Yes, we haven't fully analyzed the structure of information-based organisms yet. If we design something rashly, won't they be able to counter us?"

"Furthermore, the delivery method is also a problem. How do you send the data packets in? And once they're in, how do you ensure that the first target it infects is weak enough not to send out alerts before the system crashes?"

The discussion heated up again.

But this time, the atmosphere was clearly different.

Although there are still various problems, at least we have a direction.