"Mr. Carlot, here are your stolen belongings. Please check if anything is missing!" a police officer placed over a dozen devices in front of Carlot for inspection.
"Okay," Carlot began to check his devices immediately, particularly observing the locations of storage cards. He had intentionally marked their positions, so if anyone had touched them, he would know now.
To his surprise, Carlot found that all the devices showed no signs of tampering. The police had not touched his secrets at all, which moved him. If this had happened in the United States, these items would have likely been examined by countless people numerous times.
"Mr. Carlot, if you have no further questions, you are free to leave. However, if there are follow-up developments in this case, we hope you will cooperate with our investigation in a timely manner!" the officer said.
"Okay, I understand!" Carlot nodded, walking out of the police station in a daze. As he entered, several officers greeted him with nods, warming Carlot's heart.
But soon, an overwhelming chill spread across him again.
After this incident, he had completely fallen out with The New York Times. Not only would he be fired as a special correspondent, but he would also be unable to secure any other special correspondent positions with media outlets, as these were all owned by the same boss.
If it were just losing his job, it would be manageable. However, he had offended the consortium behind The New York Times, and now he had no reason to stay in China. If he returned to his home country, he would likely face terrifying retaliation.
He wasn't afraid of retaliation from the US government; in fact, it might even bring him fame through lawsuits, as the US government often used such cases to demonstrate its freedoms.
But retaliation from a consortium meant that he wouldn't even have the chance to file a lawsuit. He might find himself shot dozens of times in the chest the very next day, with the coroner ruling it a suicide.
The thought sent a shiver down Carlot's spine. Even though the midday sun was shining on him, he still felt as if he were in an ice cellar.
Carlot no longer had the strength to walk. He slumped onto the roadside, was discovered by patrolling police officers, and was inexplicably brought back to the police station.
The officers at the station didn't know what was wrong with Carlot. Thinking he might have low blood sugar from not eating, they kindly brought him food. At this moment, Carlot truly felt the midday sun descend from the heavens, as if something within him had found salvation.
"There's a video in my equipment!" Carlot said directly, facing the police again. "I'm a journalist, and I previously attended the test run of China's first ultra-high-speed vacuum maglev railway.
"I filmed this video, from leaving the airport, boarding the maglev train, arriving in Guangzhou, leaving the airport... I even recorded the entire return journey. There were no interruptions, and the total duration was 9 hours!" Carlot looked at the surprised expressions of the officers around him and felt a surge of satisfaction. He continued, "I am willing to hand over all these videos to you. This can prove the authenticity of China's ultra-high-speed vacuum maglev railway!"
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Carlot handed over all his materials. Although he didn't receive any money, Carlot still felt very fortunate.
This wasn't to say Carlot had been directly converted, or that he was a man of such deep emotions.
While Carlot's personality was indeed somewhat emotional, and he was genuinely touched by the police, the more crucial factor was that Carlot understood he could never return home. Returning home meant certain death. The only place he could live safely until old age was China.
In China, even if he offended all the US consortiums, he could still live safely in this city without the fear of someone suddenly pulling out a gun in broad daylight and shooting him.
The only issue was his residency permit. Once his journalist visa expired, if China deported him, it would be disastrous.
Therefore, Carlot needed to earn some merit. He unhesitatingly chose to hand over the video as his pledge of allegiance.
Later, when someone approached him expressing a desire for him to release the video in his personal capacity, Carlot readily agreed, directly publishing the entire 9-hour unedited video on all his social media accounts.
It was rather miraculous. Logically, most of these social media platforms only allowed videos within a certain duration and did not permit long videos, as bandwidth and server storage weren't free.
Carlot knew this, so he was somewhat worried, pondering what to do when he suddenly found that a large portion of his social media accounts had received an internal message.
It stated that he had become a special test user for the website and could upload videos of any length without restriction.
Carlot felt a chill run down his spine again. For the first time, he realized that perhaps the Chinese were not inferior to the Americans in controlling global public opinion; in fact, they might even surpass them, as virtually all new online media were controlled by the Chinese.
However, the Chinese remained discreet. All the complaints about China on the internet were never deleted, causing even an experienced media professional like Carlot to overlook this issue.
It was only now that Carlot felt the existence of these hidden fangs.
It was like nuclear weapons; their greatest deterrent power always lay in being held and not used.
As it turned out, Carlot had finally made a wise decision this time. Although the Chinese authorities never explicitly stated they would reward him, just a few days later, a European media outlet approached Carlot, inviting him to become their special correspondent. They offered him a very generous salary and guaranteed to help him apply for a visa to stay in China long-term.
Simultaneously, Carlot surprisingly discovered that his status in China had increased significantly.
Although Carlot had lived in China for seven or eight years, the highest-ranking individuals he had interviewed were only at the city level. He had never interviewed truly important figures individually.
But now, he received one or two interview invitations almost every month, and the invitations were from undeniable influential figures; there was no need to elaborate further, as their status was extremely high.
Carlot didn't understand why at first. Later, during a meal with his Chinese friends, after hearing his confusion, his Chinese friend smiled and told Carlot that in the eyes of the Chinese, he was now one of them.
Carlot finally had a moment of enlightenment. He then dedicated himself to continuously improving his professional skills. His standing grew higher and higher, even leading him to appear on the Spring Festival Gala, becoming a figure like the second Da Shan – a foreigner, but not an outsider.
These were matters for later. After Carlot had confessed everything, he returned home with peace of mind but was still in pain thinking about the hundreds of thousands of dollars he had lost.
He was even more distressed thinking about the inevitable plunge his purchased stocks would take.
"Wait, since I've confirmed they're about to plummet, why don't I short them?" A flash of inspiration struck Carlot, and he immediately got to work with excitement.
Because China had voluntarily granted Carlot the right to release the video, Carlot could sell all the stocks he held in the US United Super Vacuum Pipeline Company before releasing the video.
He would then use the withdrawn cash to short the US United Super Vacuum Pipeline Company's stocks through professional financial institutions, even purchasing a 100x leverage, allowing his $1 million to be used as $100 million.
Of course, if the stock price of the US United Super Vacuum Pipeline Company rose by more than 1%, his $1 million would be wiped out instantly, leaving nothing.
But Carlot knew clearly that this time, he would not lose.
Indeed, as Carlot released the video online, everything began to plummet as planned.
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"Thud."
Accompanied by a loud noise and the piercing wail of a car alarm, a cafe employee on Wall Street shook their head and muttered, "Another one."
"How many is that today?" another employee asked.
"That's the third one today, the seventh this week."
"Sigh, thankfully we don't have money to buy stocks, otherwise, we'd be the ones jumping," the employee sighed.
Indeed, these seven consecutive figures falling from the sky were none other than living souls, and these unfortunate individuals were, without exception, all stockholders of the US United Super Vacuum Pipeline Company.
So, this round of sharp decline only affected the US United Super Vacuum Pipeline Company. However, the company's market value was so high, currently standing at over $2 trillion, with the vast majority of it being the savings of individual retail investors.
Unlike most listed companies whose main investors are financial institutions, the primary investors of the US United Super Vacuum Pipeline Company were retail investors. This led to a high number of people jumping to their deaths due to the company's stock price. Seven people jumped in a single week.
This was just within the vicinity of this coffee shop. The exact number of people across the entire United States was unknown. In any case, there was no institution that would specifically track this number and release it. In fact, related news was completely ignored by the domestic media, and most ordinary citizens were unaware of this matter.