Becoming A Tech Tycoon Begins With Regression-Chapter 228: The Vigilants are back

Exactly a week.

That was all it took for Helix Aegis to crumble, just as Athena had predicted.

At first, it was subtle enough to be dismissed, isolated failures, "edge-case anomalies," systems that stalled for a fraction of a second too long.

Helix Global released statements blaming configuration errors, promising swift patches and full transparency.

Then the failures stopped being isolated.

Corporate networks protected by Helix Aegis began reporting simultaneous breaches.

Not catastrophic ones, not at first, but they were humiliating intrusions, whoever was doing this seemed to only be doing it as a way to mess with Helix.

They renamed encrypted files, rearranged internal memos, and rewrote access logs in ways that made no sense.

And the worse part was, the person wasn't even brute forcing their way into the systems, instead they calmly trutted in.

Inside Helix Tech's main operations floor, the air was thick with sweat and panic.

Engineers hadn't slept properly in days. Whiteboards were filled, erased, and filled again with theories that went nowhere.

Servers hummed under unsustainable loads as emergency patches were pushed, rolled back, and pushed again.

"It doesn't follow a pattern," one engineer shouted over the noise, "every time we lock it down, the attack vector changes."

"That's not possible," another snapped. "Unless they're predicting our responses."

The room fell silent.

That implication was a knife twist.

Helix Aegis was supposed to be the one predicting.

And yet, someone else was always one step ahead.

By day four, the media had caught the scent of blood.

"HELIX AEGIS SECURITY PROMISES UNDER FIRE."

"CUSTOMERS REPORT BREACHES DESPITE 'PREDICTIVE' DEFENSE."

"IS HELIX AEGIS ALL HYPE?"

Helix Global's stock began to slide, slow at first, then faster.

And looming over all of it was a single, recurring signature.

An unknown hacker group.

No, it wasn't exactly an unknown hacker group, after all, as far as the world knew, they were supposed to have died in a fire.

The Vigilants.

But their symbols had suddenly been appearing every single time Helix failed, so that led the public to speculate.

Either they didn't actually die in that fire or a new group of hackers were impersonating them.

Either way, everyone knew this was bad for Helix Global.

By the end of the week, emergency meetings were called. Contracts were frozen.

Governments quietly reverted to Sentinel-based systems under the table, unwilling to wait for Helix Global to "figure it out."

In a private boardroom, voices were raised.

"We need to shut it down," one executive hissed. "Pull the product before this gets worse."

"And admit failure?" another shot back. "That would destroy us."

From the corner of the room, the Collector finally spoke.

"No," he said calmly. "You don't shut it down."

They turned to him.

"You let it fail."

Silence followed.

"Publicly," he continued. "Spectacularly. Then you blame the hackers and you blame OmniTech. You blame anyone but yourselves."

He smiled thinly.

"Panic is still useful. Even failure can be weaponized."

"Are you crazy?" Vladimir slammed his hand on the table and stood up, "we have been pouring money into a black hole all this while and when it explodes, you expect us to just attract more fails?"

The collector had no change in his expression as he continued, "you see, Vladimir, OmniTech's retaliation revealed a fatal mistake."

"And that is?" Vladimir asked with a frown on his face.

With a smile, the collector pointed to the monitor before them, "the Vigilants."

Shown on the screen was a news headline focused on the return of the Vigilants.

"All we have to do now," the Collector paused, "is paint them as the villains and I've got just the thing to do so."

***

Ethan watched everything play out before him just as expected, according to Reid's latest report, the CEO had been having meetings with the higher ups quite frequently for the past few days.

He knew that the collector would soon make a move in retaliation, but what?

But that wasn't what bothered him right now, what did was how soon he would release the nanobots.

According to his simulations, he needed to create a need for it first, and how would he do that?

Quite simple actually.

All he had to do was force the people to need it, but first he needed a lab ra—um, test subject.

A willing one of course....even if they're unwilling it's still fine.

And there were a couple of options that came to mind, one was Olivia, but that idea was immediately scrapped since her use to him was basically none.

Another and the most likely option, the collector.

The collector had reach, even in different countries, so controlling a man like that meant control over his connections, and those connections were exactly what he needed to complete his current ongoing quests.

Ethan got off his couch, and walked towards the window, watching the people go about their day.

For the past few days, he had been working on the problem and although he had completed it, he was hesitant.

Was this really right?

Was he selfish enough to use all these people just to achieve his goals?

But those questions were immediately answered by the system's screen reminding of what was at risk.

[Project Aegis]

Objective: Develop a global defense network capable of withstanding extraterrestrial or quantum-scale invasions.

Time Limit: 1 Earth Years.

Failure Penalty: [Extinction Event]]

"That's right," he muttered to himself, "it's either this or we lose the entire Earth, and I'm willing to choose the lesser of two evils.

With that, he walked back into his lab, finishing his planning both for the collector and the release of his nanobots.

"Let's quickly end this game shall we?"

***

[Location: Edge of the Milky Way, Sector 315, 300 light-years away from Earth.]

A relatively small Metallic spaceship slowly floated through the sea of bright burning stars.

The Captain's cockpit was filled with holographic screens each either displaying the status of the ship, a floating cube or a very familiar planet.

Earth.

The pilot had on a black combat suit, filled with blue glowing lines that covered its entire body, save for its head.

Its features seemed mostly similar to a human's, save for the fact that there were no whites in his pupils, only black and filled with dot like shines for stars.

Two antenna were protruding out of its forehead and through its black hair.

Its ears were also doubled and pointy, similar to an elf's and finally, it's face was blue, completely.

It turned to the hologram of earth, looking at it for a while before muttering.

"W@$# *@" it paused and added, "earthlings."