Inside the computer server room of a scientific research institution in Jingdu City, Chén Zhāoyáng was squatting in front of a server rack, fine beads of sweat, like glistening pearls, oozing onto his forehead. His brow was tightly furrowed into a deep crease, and his eyes were fixed on the cascading streams of data scrolling across the screen, as if he intended to pierce through those lines of code to find the root of the problem.
"Older Brother Zhāoyáng, the third node is still down," Xiaolin, his assistant, said, his voice carrying a trace of anxiety and helplessness as it reached Chén Zhāoyáng's ear. He hurried over to Chén Zhāoyáng's side, handed him a bottle of iced soda, and looked deeply worried. "The client just called to rush us again, saying they need it up and running first thing tomorrow morning. What are we going to do?"
Chén Zhāoyáng took the soda but did not drink it right away. Pouring a little bit of the soda into his palm to feel the chill, he quickly wiped his face to wake himself up a bit. He took a deep breath, steadied his nerves, and said, "Don't panic. Let's check the logs first. Starting from three in the morning, data packets have been dropping for thirty seconds on the hour, every hour. This definitely isn't a hardware issue."
Chapter 162