War of Intelligent Machines

Chapter 25: The Climb

Chapter 25: The Climb

Jiang Yu opened the video at the internet café as instructed and saw two masked men pointing guns at her son. Her heart felt as if it were being sliced by a knife, and she was so overwhelmed with anger and anxiety that she nearly fainted. Suppressing her anguish, she returned to her office and immediately reported the situation to Wu Peiyuan.

Given that the kidnappers had set a three-day deadline, Wu Peiyuan wasted no time and escalated the matter to his superiors. The higher-ups decided to send the kidnappers a preliminary, rough framework of the Forbidden Fruit Project to buy some time. Following instructions, Jiang Yu located an old version of the design framework and sent it to the specified address.

...

Jiang Yuesheng was taken back to his residence. He realized that he and his grandmother had once again fallen into a den of thieves. The soldiers who had pretended to rescue them were likely part of the scheme to keep him calm, and their true intention was probably to extort his mother.

"I must find a way to escape as soon as possible!" he thought.

One day, he noticed a cleaner carrying a keyring with many keys. He wondered if one of those keys might unlock the mysterious room he had seen. An idea began to form in his mind.

Back in his room, he closed the bathroom door and used his prosthetic left hand to forcefully twist the faucet. After several attempts, he managed to c***k the base of the faucet, causing water to spray out from the fracture. He returned to his room and waited for the water to flood the area.

Two hours later, half of his room was submerged. He picked up the phone and pressed the service button to call the front desk.

"My room is flooded! There's water everywhere!"

Soon, he heard someone unlocking the door. It was the cleaner with the keyring. The cleaner was visibly shocked by the sight of the flooded room and immediately began to deal with the water. In the process, she placed the keyring on Jiang Yuesheng's desk. Seizing the opportunity, Jiang Yuesheng quickly grabbed the keyring and ran to the mysterious room. He tried the keys one by one and, on the fifth attempt, the door opened.

He slipped inside and left the door slightly ajar. The room turned out to be a ventilation chamber for the basement. The machine noise he had heard in the hallway came from the fans. If this was a ventilation room, there must be an air intake leading outside.

He quickly searched the room and found the air vent behind the fan. The vent resembled a chimney, with a square metal duct fixed to the inner wall by steel beams. He assessed the situation and felt confident that he could climb up using the steel beams, but he wasn't sure about his grandmother, who was in her sixties.

To make it easier to return, Jiang Yuesheng picked up a piece of bark that had fallen from the chimney and wedged it into the door latch. This way, he could simply push the door open next time.

When he returned to his room with the keyring, the cleaner was still working in the bathroom. She suddenly turned around and noticed the keyring in Jiang Yuesheng's hand. Her expression changed immediately.

"I accidentally dropped it, and the keys got wet. I was just looking for a cloth to dry them," Jiang Yuesheng explained.

"Don't bother!" the cleaner snapped, snatching the keyring from him.

After dinner, two soldiers arrived at Jiang Yuesheng's door and escorted him to another room. They pushed him inside and locked the door.

"Grandma?"

He saw his grandmother, Jiang Hui, inside. The room was bare except for a toilet, clearly designed for confinement. Jiang Hui hugged her grandson and began to cry.

...

Jiang Yu received another email: "What you sent is fake. You have three days to send the latest version!" Attached was a photo of Jiang Yuesheng and Jiang Hui in the confinement room.

Jiang Yuesheng realized that the kidnappers were escalating their threats against his mother. They had to escape soon, or not only would his mother be in danger, but he and his grandmother might also be killed.

He described the ventilation room to his grandmother and asked if she could climb up. She nodded, saying she could. Jiang Yuesheng believed in her abilities—after all, she had been a pilot, with exceptional physical fitness, and she still maintained her health through regular exercise.

He looked at his prosthetic left hand, then at his grandmother. "Tonight, it's all up to you," he said.

His prosthetic hand, made by his mother with the best carbon fiber and titanium alloy, was not only incredibly strong but also powerful, with a grip strength three to four times that of an average person. It was more than capable of breaking the door lock.

To avoid alerting the kidnappers, he decided to use his prosthetic fingers to slowly tear open the steel plate next to the door lock. After some observation, he identified the door frame as the weak point. Through the lock's latch, he could see that the steel plate was only about 1.5 millimeters thick. He could tear it open with his prosthetic hand, but it would take time and the right approach.

After a few attempts, he realized it wasn't as easy as he had thought. He decided to try chipping away at the cement around the door frame. Using the titanium alloy fingertips, he managed to chip off a small piece. This gave him hope, and he continued to work at it, eventually creating a small hole in the door frame.

He inserted his fingers into the hole and began to tear at the steel plate. Slowly but surely, he bent the plate and tore it open. The steel, likely corroded over time, gave way under the force of his titanium alloy fingers. Soon, the latch was exposed.

He tried to push the latch with his fingertips, but it didn't budge—the door was bolted from the outside. He would need to tear open the latch's housing completely. Feeling tired, he sat down to rest for a moment.

His grandmother came over to comfort him. "Don't rush. We still have to climb later."

After a while, Jiang Yuesheng finally managed to tear open the steel plate blocking the latch. With a push of his right hand, the door opened.

He peeked out into the hallway—it was empty. They had to move quickly to the ventilation room, avoiding the surveillance cameras as much as possible.

"Grandma, I'll go first. Watch which door I enter, then follow me."

With that, Jiang Yuesheng slipped out of the room and ran to the ventilation room. He pushed the door open, slipped inside, and left it slightly ajar. Jiang Hui followed shortly after.

"Grandma, you go first. I'll stay below in case you need help."

"Alright."

Jiang Hui reached up to grab the steel beams, but she wasn't tall enough. Jiang Yuesheng crouched down, lifted her by the thighs, and helped her grab the beam. With a pull, she managed to get one hand on the next beam and used Jiang Yuesheng's shoulder as a step to climb up.

The beams above were evenly spaced, like a ladder. The two began to climb, one after the other. After a while, Jiang Hui's strength began to fail her. Her legs trembled, and she couldn't climb any further.

"Yuesheng... let's rest... I can't go on."

"Alright."

They stopped to rest. After a short break, Jiang Hui felt a bit better and continued climbing, but she quickly ran out of energy again.

"Yuesheng... I can't do it..."

"Grandma, rest a bit longer. Don't rush."

"Okay..."

This time, Jiang Hui rested for a full minute, but she still couldn't climb much further. It was clear that her strength was failing her.

Jiang Yuesheng realized that his grandmother's stamina was spent. He decided to carry her on his back.

"Grandma, I'll carry you."

"No, you can't carry me!"

"Grandma, trust me. I can do it."

With that, Jiang Yuesheng climbed up a few steps to reach his grandmother.

"Grandma, hold onto me."

Jiang Hui tried to wrap her arms around Jiang Yuesheng's shoulders, but she knew she couldn't hold on for long.

"Yuesheng, I can't hold on. My arms are too weak."

Jiang Yuesheng thought for a moment and decided to try pushing his grandmother from below to lighten her load.

"Here's what we'll do, Grandma. I'll stay a bit lower and use my hands to push you up. Let's see if that helps."

He positioned himself so that his shoulders were level with his grandmother's hips, allowing him to use the strength of his arms to push her upward.

"Grandma, push with your legs."

Surprisingly, this method worked well. The two of them managed to climb another ten steps before Jiang Hui needed to rest again.

"Let's rest, Yuesheng."

They continued this way, resting nearly thirty times, until they finally reached the top of the chimney. There, they saw the moon for the first time in what felt like forever.

However, a new challenge awaited them.

At the top of the chimney was a ring of barbed wire, its sharp spikes glinting ominously in the moonlight. Jiang Yuesheng looked around and realized that the chimney was over ten meters above the surrounding terrain. Even if they managed to break through the barbed wire, they couldn't simply jump down. Moreover, there was another ring of barbed wire surrounding the base of the chimney.

After some thought, Jiang Yuesheng came up with a plan. He decided to dismantle part of the barbed wire and use it to lower his grandmother to the ground. His titanium alloy prosthetic hand was impervious to the sharp spikes, so he used it to grab and break the wire. He began to unravel the barbed wire, snapping off the spikes as he went.

Soon, he had removed over twenty meters of wire. He tied one end around his grandmother's waist and legs and secured the other end to the steel beams supporting the barbed wire. Slowly, he lowered her through the hole he had created. Once she was safely on the ground, he used the wire to rappel down himself.

..

"Human grip strength can be easily tested by hanging from a door frame or a pull-up bar. If you can lift your body with one hand, your grip strength is quite good. For middle-aged people, especially those who have gained weight, it's rare to find someone who can lift their entire body with one hand. For example, I weigh 85 kilograms, and I can't lift myself with one hand—meaning my grip strength is less than 85 kilograms."