His heart hammered against his ribs. He grabbed the mouse, but the cursor fought him, dragging itself toward his browser. It opened his email. Then his bank portal.

He had tried every free tool. Finally, he landed on a professional-grade software: FoneLab Android Data Recovery . It promised a miracle, but after the scan finished, a paywall appeared. It wanted $50. Elias looked at his bank balance: $4.12. Desperation is the primary fuel for bad decisions.

He disabled the firewall. He ran the .exe inside the RAR archive.

He tried to adjust the volume, but the slider moved on its own, sliding back to 100%. Then his webcam light flickered on. A steady, unblinking green eye.