Handong: Sha Li wants political achievements? I'll shut down the entire province.

Jingzhou International Hotel, Top Floor Presidential Suite.

The heavy blackout curtains were drawn tightly shut, yet the room was as bright as day.

In the spacious living room, the expensive sofas were pushed to the corner and replaced by three rows of curved screens that were pieced together to form a wall.

The computer case's cooling fan was humming loudly, and even the air smelled of the motherboard burning.

Xu Laosan, a well-known speculator in the domestic speculative capital circle, was sitting confidently in the boss's chair.

He had a Cuban cigar dangling from his mouth and his legs crossed and propped up on the marble coffee table.

Beside him, Mr. Qian, the president of the Jiangsu-Zhejiang-Shanghai Chamber of Commerce, wiped the fine sweat from his forehead, his eyes fixed on the flashing K-line chart on the screen.

"Old Xu, this 50 billion is the last bit of our chamber of commerce's savings."

Mr. Qian swallowed hard, his voice strained.

"Handong is a really strange place. They've got our real investments completely shut down. This stock market... can it really work?"

Xu Laosan exhaled a thick white smoke ring and sneered disdainfully.

"Mr. Qian, you're very good at running a real business, but you can't handle the waters of the capital market."

His fingers, holding a cigar, tapped the screen where the Handong Index was flashing red, his eyes filled with a greedy, murderous glint.

"No matter how powerful that guy surnamed Yan is, can he be more powerful than real gold and silver?"

Xu Laosan suddenly sat up straight and snapped his fingers at the dozen or so traders wearing headphones in front of him.

"Brothers, warm-up's over. Place 20 billion in short orders, start with Handong Heavy Industry!"

"Smash their plates down hard!"

The sound of keyboard typing suddenly became like a torrential downpour.

Less than a minute later, the trader suddenly ripped off his headphones, turned around, and shouted.

"Boss, the order's been taken! Handong Heavy Industry's stock price has plummeted, dropping four points!"

"The other side isn't on guard? Has any major player stepped in to support the market?" Xu Laosan's eyes lit up.

"No! Their buying interest is as soft as noodles, it'll crumble at the slightest touch!"

Upon hearing this, Mr. Qian's originally pale face instantly flushed red, and he rubbed his hands together excitedly.

"Old Xu, it really crashed! This money was made way too easily!"

Xu Laosan leaned back in his chair smugly, his mouth practically stretched to his ears in a wide grin.

"Lingxiao Consortium? Bah! I thought they were some powerful force, but they're just a paper tiger."

He flicked his cigarette ash, his tone becoming increasingly arrogant.

"What's the use of a thriving real economy? In the financial world, I can drain them dry with just an internet connection!"

Meanwhile, on the 68th floor of the Lingxiao Financial Building.

Shin was wearing a well-tailored vest with a dark pattern, holding a cup of hand-drip Geisha coffee.

He stood quietly in front of the huge circular holographic projection screen, adjusting the gold-rimmed glasses on his nose.

On the screen, the green line representing the Handong Index is rapidly declining.

"President Su, the funds from the speculative capital alliance have already entered the market on a large scale."

A trader in business attire strode over and handed over a real-time data panel.

"The opponent's offensive is very fierce, and their main force is all betting on short positions in Handong Heavy Industry and several core energy companies."

Su Jianxin took a sip of his rich coffee, a sneer of shrewdness playing on his lips.

"You dare to cause trouble with only 20 billion? Even a beggar shouldn't bring an extra broken bowl."

He casually tossed the tablet onto the table, his gaze as cold and hard as iron.

"If they want to play, we'll play a big game with them."

The trader paused for a moment, then quickly pressed for more information.

"Should we activate the cash pool to prop up the stock price? If it falls any further, our paper losses will exceed one billion."

"Why are you trying to prop up the market? Let them smash it!"

Su Jianxin turned around, his glasses reflecting a cold, white light.

"Remove all the barriers. Leave the gates wide open, let them think that the Handong stock market is an unguarded ATM."

He raised his wrist and glanced at the Patek Philippe.

"Go and connect the 'AI Quantum-Level High-Frequency Trading System' from the main server room."

The trader gasped, his steps faltering.

That machine was a financial nuclear weapon that Master Yan acquired from overseas at a sky-high price.

Supercomputing power, capable of performing tens of millions of calculations per second, makes human reaction speed as slow as a rusty gear.

"Understood! Connect to the system interface immediately!"

Back in the suite at the Jingzhou International Hotel.

The atmosphere inside the room had completely descended into a frenzied revelry.

"It's hit the daily limit down! Boss, Handong Heavy Industry is firmly locked at the daily limit down!"

"Handong Energy has also collapsed! The entire market index has suffered a crushing defeat!"

The traders were so excited their faces turned red, and their voices were hoarse from shouting.

Mr. Qian was so excited that he opened a bottle of Romanée-Conti, and his hands trembled so much that he spilled the wine on the carpet.

"Old Xu, you're amazing! You're a true stock market genius!"

Mr. Qian handed over the wine glass, smiling like a chubby kid weighing 200 pounds.

"At this rate, we'll win Ling Xiao's underwear before the market closes today!"

Xu Laosan took the wine glass, but didn't drink it. Instead, he licked his dry, chapped lips.

The gambler's blood boiled completely at that moment.

"Not enough, this is too slow to make money!"

Xu Laosan smashed the wine glass on the coffee table, shattering it into pieces all over the floor.

"The current decline has created a stampede; retail investors are all following our lead and selling!"

He suddenly grabbed the head trader by the collar, his eyes bulging like cowbells.

"Go! Find an off-exchange margin trading company and give me ten times the leverage!"

Mr. Qian was startled and quickly grabbed his arm.

"Old Xu, tenfold leverage? If there's even a slight rebound, our cash flow will be cut off instantly!"

"Rebound my ass! Ling Xiao is nothing but a dead dog now!"

Xu Laosan flung Qian Zong's hand away, his face full of hostility.

"Strike while the iron is hot! Put all the remaining 30 billion on the line, leverage it tenfold, and short sell!"

Once the order was given, a massive amount of funds, carrying ten times the weight, pressed down heavily on Handong's financial market.

Inside the Lingxiao Financial Building, the alarm lights suddenly flashed a dark blue.

"Mr. Su! The other party has increased leverage! Ten times the off-exchange margin, and the entire position is locked up!"

The trader stared at the screen, his voice brimming with barely suppressed excitement.

Su Jianxin put down his coffee cup, took out a clean white handkerchief from his pocket, and slowly wiped his hands.

His gaze instantly turned as cold as if he were looking at a dead person.

"The fish has taken the bait."

Su Jianxin walked to the main control panel, his slender fingers hovering over the Enter key, which represented the highest system privileges.

"Tell them what a dimensional reduction attack is."

"Snapped!"

The button was pressed down heavily.

The long-dormant AI quantum-level high-frequency trading system has been instantly revived.

In the presidential suite, Xu Laosan was preparing to light his second cigar.

Suddenly, a piercing system beep broke the noise in the room.

"Beep—beep beep—"

The main trader jumped up from his chair as if he had been electrocuted, his face turning deathly pale.

"Boss! Something's wrong! There are unusual buy orders entering the market!"

Xu Laosan's hand trembled, and the flame from the lighter almost burned his eyebrows.

"What's the panic! It's just a few retail investors buying the dip. Give me the money and throw it back at them!"

"These aren't retail investors! They're massive orders!"

The trader's voice was tinged with despair as he frantically pounded his fists on the keyboard.

"They don't even look at the order book! Whether it's the upper or lower limit price, as long as there are orders on the market, they'll sweep them all up in a second!"

Xu Laosan suddenly pushed the trader aside and rushed to the screen himself.

He stared intently at the zigzag line, his pupils suddenly shrinking to the size of pinpoints.

On the big screen, the green candlestick chart that had been cascading down like a waterfall suddenly stopped.

Immediately afterwards, an incredibly thick red pillar rose from the ground, defying all common financial sense!

That's not a normal curve fluctuation at all.

That was a vertical red line shooting straight into the sky!

"This is impossible... It's impossible for a human to place tens of thousands of trading orders in a single second!"

Xu Laosan trembled violently as if he had been electrocuted, and the fingers holding the cigar shuddered suddenly.

A scalding hot cigarette butt fell onto the crotch of an expensive suit trousers, instantly burning a large hole through it.

He couldn't even feel the pain anymore.

Because a screen full of bright red warning boxes had popped up on the computer screen.

[Insufficient margin in account, triggering forced liquidation mechanism!]

A mechanical, synthesized female voice echoed coldly in the suite.

A principal of 50 billion, plus ten times the leverage.

With the AI ​​computing power surging like a tsunami, not even a ripple was made.

The stock price was violently driven up, instantly breaking through the margin call level.

Dead silence.

The suite was deathly silent, with only the hum of the computer case fan spinning.

Mr. Qian's legs went weak, and he slid down onto the broken glass like a rag doll, a wet patch seeping from his crotch.

"It's over... The Chamber of Commerce's 100 billion, it's all gone..."

He stared blankly at the ceiling, muttering to himself.

The head trader turned his head with trembling hands, looked at Xu Laosan slumped in the boss's chair, and swallowed hard.

"Boss, we've lost everything... We even borrowed from black market loan sharks."

Xu Laosan turned his stiff neck like a puppet.

"How much did you borrow again?"

"Five billion yuan in off-exchange margin financing..."

The trader wiped the cold sweat from his face, his voice trembling like a leaf in the wind.

"Boss, forget about this 5 billion hole... Go check out the balcony right now. Those unlicensed bread trucks downstairs, are they some black market bosses coming to kill us?"