Kingdom of Corrosion
Chapter 719 - 338: On the Eve of Battle

Chapter 719: Chapter 338: On the Eve of Battle

At 8 o’clock in the evening, Maya and Stone arrived at the camp on foot, leaving the armored vehicle parked ten kilometers away. Stone had considered siphoning some fuel from the pickup for the vehicle, but Maya vetoed the idea outright; they needed to save whatever fuel was left for tomorrow’s siege.

Upon their arrival, Su Shi announced that dinner was ready. He had cooked today, preparing some dishes with their own regional flavors through the system kitchen. The meal was a feast for the senses, but Maya was not in the mood and instead went outside the tent to the campfire with Shana to discuss work matters. Compared to the previous information they had on the mountaintop church and the sawmill, their intel on the commercial street was lacking—it felt more like a gamble.

Lin Wu had great admiration for Maya, for Dawn robots didn’t need any rest. From meeting Shana in the morning to pushing the cart back in the evening, she dove straight back into work without taking a breather. When looking for a nanny or hiring workers, one should find individuals like her.

After dinner, Maya called out, "Lin Wu, let’s go."

"Coming."

One could sneak into Leimeng Town from any point of the U-shaped highway on foot, but only the northern and southern ramps allowed entry for horses and vehicles. This time, Lin Ma took the southern ramp close to the tent base.

Walking carefully along the side of the ramp into the town, they were stopped by an automatic barrier system. Maya said, "We’ll need to swipe a couple of license plates later." There was not much space left at the side. People might pass, but not vehicles, not even horses.

"Swapping plates is illegal."

Maya ignored the comment and pointed to the side, the two of them bypassed the automatic Sentry Card and continued on. Once they were past the Sentry Card, zombies started to appear. Leimeng Town also had streetlights, but unlike the bright lights of big cities, the local lights were dim. Crouched at the roadside peering into the villa area, no lights were visible. According to the rule that one must open the large iron gate when someone is at home, Maya estimated the occupancy rate of the villa cluster to be around 20% by visually assessing the proportions.

Continuing down the southern road of the inner U for about ten meters, they took down two zombies, and then stopped in their tracks—there was a surveillance camera ahead. Watching the camera, Maya kept an eye on the surroundings, remaining vigilant and said, "Silencer."

Lin Wu raised the Silencer and fired at the camera, hitting it dead-on. A soft snap was heard as the bullet was deflected by the bulletproof glass protecting the camera.

Maya said, "Stealth."

Lin Wu replied, "You fall back first." Don’t get in the way. The second sentence was said in his mind to the worms in his stomach.

Maya retreated the way they came, while Lin Wu moved forward in stealth. As the flash of the camera lit up, Lin Wu broke into a run, and they both headed back to the ramp to wait. Soon after, a drone arrived to scan the area above the surveillance site.

Maya said, "The red light on the drone indicates infrared thermal sensing. The principle behind the camera taking photos must be to capture moving objects. Why aren’t the zombies being photographed then?"

Lin Wu said, "I moved even slower than the zombies."

Maya said, "But your movements are different from those of a zombie."

Lin Wu asked, "Shall we try again?"

"Mhm."

Five minutes later, the drone flew away, and Lin Wu and Maya returned to the original spot. Lin Wu stood up to deactivate Stealth, opened his mouth to reveal his teeth, his eyes went blank, and his arms stiffened as he stumbled forward step by step. His act wasn’t very convincing, but upon entering the camera’s field of view, the camera’s flash did not trigger. Lin Wu glanced back at Maya to signal that it worked. Then the flash suddenly lit up. They immediately fled again.

Zombies don’t just turn their heads; they either rotate their bodies or twist their upper bodies. Since Lin Wu’s movements didn’t match zombie behavior, he was identified as human.

When they returned once more, an NPC resident of the monitored villa came out to take out the trash, and the flash of the camera went off. The NPC faced the camera, raised his left hand to his ear, and the camera took another picture. Then the NPC went back home as if nothing unusual had happened. This time no drone came searching for suspicious individuals.

Maya explained, "Raising the left hand to the ear is a recognition gesture. After the camera takes another picture, it will cross-reference the identity with the database. The database should have car license plates—if we manage to steal a couple and mount them on our vehicle, we can pass the town’s surveillance system undetected." She was nearly sure the surveillance was a standard video monitoring system.

Lin Wu asked, "Is this based on deduction or speculation?"

Maya replied, "Speculation." She couldn’t help but curl the corner of her mouth, feeling smug about her answer.

Childish! Lin Wu said, "Let’s take a detour."

The two of them snuck through between two villas to the back, taking care of a few zombies along the way. After leaving the area covered by the cameras, they stepped back onto the road. A jeep was parked five meters ahead. Maya gestured with her hand.

Lin Wu moved stealthily forward and checked the door lock, only to find it wasn’t a Mechanical Lock. So he connected his personal computer to the system, but before long, Lin Wu came back and whispered to Maya, "It’s a biometric lock. We’ll have to go to the server to download the biometric records."

"Fully networked." Early electronic car locks used stand-alone systems with data stored locally, and the car could be unlocked once a key, code, or fingerprint match was made. Later on, cars became fully networked, and some data stopped being stored locally. This system was very convenient; if your car ran over a pebble, you could contact customer service for a remote vehicle check.

However, being fully networked was a matter of much controversy. Car manufacturers and service providers could control your car and know everything about your vehicle. And if malefactors successfully hacked the system, they could take over your car and effectively hold your family’s life and property in their hands. Some vehicles purchased on loans could be disabled remotely if payments were missed, and there were isolated extreme cases where vehicles locked up while being driven.

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