Xu Yuxian was sitting at his workstation, casually browsing the company's internal security dashboards.
He was on website maintenance duty today—easy shift. For weeks now, there hadn't been any serious cyberattacks against the company, just a few low-effort pings from script kiddies that bounced harmlessly off their firewall.
Refresh page. Check server logs. Sip coffee. Rinse. Repeat.
Until—
Ping!
An alert message blinked on screen:
⚠️ Alert: Unknown servers attempting to breach the company firewall.
Xu Yuxian's pupils shrank.
"Hey—code red!" he shouted, already switching interfaces to begin defensive operations.
The alert caused a ripple of tension to sweep through the entire cybersecurity team.
"Notify the supervisor—this is a live breach!" he barked, fingers flying over the keyboard.
A minute later, chaos erupted.
Across the building, every screen went still.
The entire office fell into stunned silence as hundreds of monitors froze simultaneously. Xu Yuxian yanked his mouse cord out and plugged it back in—nothing. Dead. He glanced sideways and saw his teammates frantically doing the same. All systems locked.
Then the screens flickered.
A smiley face appeared.
A calm, mocking grin.
Someone had taken control of their entire network.
"Shut down all gateways connected to sensitive servers—now!" someone yelled.
The cybersecurity team's faces turned pale. In under two minutes, their defenses had crumbled. They'd been absolutely flattened.
It was humiliating. Their team had never been taken down this fast. Not even by last year's ransomware surge. And now? They'd been outclassed, violated, and left with a smile.
Moments later, Zhao Min arrived at the security floor, her face grim.
"What's the situation?"
"There's been a full system compromise," someone reported, voice tight. "We're working on tracing the intrusion, but… we've never seen this type of attack before. It's possibly a new generation of trojan. We've lost control of all workstations."
The entire team was sweating.
No matter what they tried, they couldn't even identify the signature of the breach, let alone fight back.
Zhao Min stared at the sea of frozen smiley faces with a clenched jaw.
"Send an internal notice," she said. "Acknowledge the breach. Everyone remain calm. Continue working on recovery."
She turned, motioning for Xiao Yu to follow her. "Let's go."
Meanwhile, Chen Mo was sitting quietly in his lab, sipping tea, his face serene.
There wasn't a trace of panic on him.
"Ink Girl," he said, "turn the official website homepage into a smiley face. Then update our Weibo with the same smiley. Caption it with just one word: Smile."
"Yes, Brother~" chirped Ink Girl, cheerfully executing the command.
Within seconds, the marching ant official website had been replaced by a huge grin. Their Weibo updated too, the same grin staring back at their five million followers.
The internet lost its mind.
"They got hacked, didn't they?"
"That smile… that's a cry for help disguised as a meme."
"Marching Ant Company posting smile emojis while their servers are on fire?? Bold strategy."
"Let's all smile while Rome burns, I guess."
As Zhao Min and Xiao Yu exited the elevator en route to Chen Mo's lab, her phone buzzed.
"Zhao Zong," Li Lingfeng's voice came through. "The Weibo account password was compromised. Someone else posted the smile."
Zhao Min frowned.
"I know," she replied calmly. "Ignore it for now."
No need to panic the staff further. With the company's computers under full control, a hacked social account was the least of their worries.
Back in the lab, Chen Mo took another sip of tea.
"Ink Girl," he said casually, "copy the call recording I had with Zhao Min yesterday. Also the product briefings for Butterfly Eye, and a few of our advertising strategy documents."
"Already done, Brother~ Xiao Yu and Zhao Min just entered the security zone."
"Good. End the simulation. Return all systems to normal."
"Yes, sir!"
Back on the security floor, the team was in full-on despair.
They'd thrown everything they had at the breach, and still—nothing. Their systems remained completely locked. No clues. No trail. Just an eerie silence and that damned smile.
Then—just as suddenly as it began—the smile vanished.
One by one, every screen flickered back to life.
Systems returned to normal.
The room fell silent.
Everyone just stared at their computers, stunned.
It hadn't even been fifteen minutes, and yet the hacker had come, flexed, and left like it was child's play.
What had they even taken?
After passing security checks, Zhao Min and Xiao Yu arrived at Chen Mo's office.
"Chairman, the company's under attack," Zhao Min reported without preamble.
"I know," Chen Mo said smoothly. "Crisis has been resolved. We'll issue a statement saying the servers were breached, but no core data was compromised."
"So fast?" Zhao Min raised an eyebrow and walked over to check his monitor. Just a normal desktop.
"You're sure?"
"More or less," Chen Mo replied with a faint smile.
He obviously couldn't tell her he was behind the breach—or she might chase him around the lab with a chair.
Zhao Min exhaled, relieved. "Alright. I'll draft the announcement."
She turned and left with Xiao Yu.
Chen Mo swiveled back to his monitor.
"Ink Girl, package the files I mentioned—the copied call, product ads, and internal memos. Upload them to Western social platforms using a spoofed IP. Sign it under the username Smile, claiming they were taken from Marching Ant's servers."
"Roger~"
Minutes later, Marching Ant's Weibo post was deleted and replaced with a new official announcement:
"Earlier today, Marching Ant Company experienced a targeted cyberattack.
While some non-critical internal recordings were accessed, our core systems remain secure.
The incident has been reported to relevant authorities. Thank you for your continued support."
The announcement sent another wave through the internet.
Marching Ant—hacked?
Again?
What kind of disaster week was this?
Meanwhile, across the ocean, on one of the West's most popular tech forums, a new thread appeared, posted by a user named Smile.
Title: "Leaked internal materials from hacked Marching Ant Company"
Attached were several files: audio snippets, conference call recordings, product outlines, and most damning of all—a recorded call between Zhao Min and Chen Mo.
"Chairman, did I disturb you?"
"What's up?"
"(Apple) Cook wants to talk with us tonight."
"Talk at night? Is his jet lag that bad? Tell him if he wants to cooperate, he should come here."
Within minutes, the forum exploded.
"Wait—Cook? Tim Cook?"
"Is that really him?"
"Did they just casually tell Apple to come crawling to them??"
"Who the hell are these people?"
Internationally, it was funny. Quirky even.
But back in China, the recording sparked a firestorm.
The truth was out.
It hadn't been Marching Ant who invited Apple. Apple had approached them.
Suddenly, Cook's carefully crafted PR spin—his little "I was invited" soundbite—fell apart.
Reporters who had been suspicious were now buzzing with energy.
One of them posted simply:
"Someone's lying.
And it's not the ants."