Chapter 111: Signal Hijacking

Crossing the highway, the distance between the skyscrapers became much smaller. Many buildings extended their footprint into the air with floating sections, which provided the trio with convenient platforms for their high-altitude maneuvers. Unlike V, Jackie quickly adapted to the unique way of moving using both arms, resembling a gorilla in action. Leo was controlling the signal jammer strapped to his chest—this device could disrupt radar signals within a certain range. Combined with the complex terrain of the city's skyscrapers, the radar trucks and drones couldn't detect any anomalies. Soon, the three of them reached the Biotechnica Tower in City Center, where most of the building lights were still on. They steadily climbed the tower, even catching glimpses through the glass of office workers fiercely debating the current situation. As they ascended, they finally reached the top of the 400-meter-high building. In front of them was the enormous aerial structure built by Biotechnica to showcase their power, looking like a massive bridge. Gazing at the seemingly endless structure, V remarked: "Damn... from below, this thing looked impressive, but standing here, it feels like it shouldn't even exist in reality." A bridge spanning a river, although similarly suspended between two banks, always has visible structures around it to stabilize the bridge. But the aerial structure of Biotechnica Tower looked like someone had simply laid a skyscraper horizontally and connected it between two other buildings. Leo figured that the designer had likely hidden some of the load-bearing structures beneath the outer walls. However, considering its length and appearance, it was still an impressive feat. "It's definitely an architectural marvel, but we're not in position yet—stay alert, there are Hornet drones between the buildings." "Tch, they actually anticipated someone might climb up?" Along the sides of the long aerial structure were openings for drone patrols. The small Hornet drones would occasionally fly out from these openings, scanning the building's structure for any abnormalities. Although Biotechnica didn't intend to use Hornets as surveillance devices, if they saw three people running on the building, they'd definitely respond. "Maybe it's not to prevent people from climbing up. Think about it, drones and helicopters land on the top floor's helipad every day. Deploying these cheap drones at high altitudes to observe the helipad or direct personnel is quite reasonable. And besides, if this structure had an issue, that would be a huge problem. The Hornets are probably part of the building's maintenance." Leo was scanning and analyzing the Hornet drones' behavior patterns. There were twelve openings in total, with each one dispatching a Hornet every ten minutes to scan its designated section, taking about 30 minutes per scan. After scanning, the drone would return through the opening to recharge and upload data—it was clearly an automated system. Automated systems were great; hackers loved automated systems. "What's the plan?" Jackie asked the important question. "The scans aren't very thorough; this isn't a high-security area, after all. Take a look at the route." The planned route spiraled around the aerial structure, timing their movements to avoid each Hornet drone and their optical scanners. Overall, the route was fairly straightforward, with a high margin for error— But the key was getting past the last Hornet drone. The final step in the route wasn't just about avoiding the drone but also hijacking it. Seeing the last point on the route change to a combat icon, Jackie and V raised concerns: "I thought we were going in quietly." "That's exactly why we're doing this quietly." Leo then marked his guess of the subnet topology on their visual systems. First, they had to understand that they were currently outside the building, and Biotechnica Tower only looked less sophisticated than other corporate towers. In reality, its exterior glass was still high-strength, tempered glass. Breaking through this glass would cause a huge commotion and trigger the building's emergency systems. The reason the company didn't defend the upper floors was exactly this—if you wanted to get in from the outside, you'd have to force your way in, which would trigger alarms. Besides, there weren't many weapons capable of breaking such tempered glass. And every time a Hornet drone completed its scan and returned, Leo could try to hack the drone and use this logic to transmit information into Biotechnica Tower's internal system. Once there was an exchange of information, he could attempt a hack. This was the only security flaw. However, while the Hornet drone itself was easy to hack, the data it transmitted would go through military-grade ICE protection. Bypassing that wasn't easy—one mistake, and he'd be fried to a crisp. Leo couldn't rely on outdated computer-assisted calculations from another world to break through Biotechnica Tower's ICE firewall; after all, Biotechnica's ICE maintenance resources far outstripped his. But Leo still had access to several Biotechnica employee accounts, which provided a means to bypass the ICE. "Got it, it's a technical job. So we need to hijack the drone—let's get started?" "Follow my lead—starting in 10 seconds, countdown initiated." "10." As Leo began the countdown, a timer appeared in Jackie and V's visual systems. The two prepared themselves like athletes awaiting the starting gun— "1." Zoom. Jackie and V sprinted along the route Leo had marked. With so much experience working together, the two had developed a habit of trusting Leo completely, focusing solely on following the path without distractions. The real pressure was on Leo, who had to ensure their positions remained within the margin of error. Jackie and V didn't disappoint him, sticking almost perfectly to the optimal path, running, climbing, even flying along the way. To keep up the pace, V would use her reinforced tendons to leap when on the sides of buildings, then grab onto the walls. Meanwhile, Jackie used his strong arms to swing when he was under the building, suspended in the air. A kilometer wasn't far, but considering they were hundreds of meters up, on one of the world's top megacorp towers, it felt like a long way— But they were top-tier, too. The final checkpoint— The Hornet drone flew out from the opening below, spiraling up around the building's structure— And was caught by Jackie! "Activate the jammer!" Jackie grabbed the drone just as its blue indicator light quickly turned yellow, then red. Leo swiftly plugged in his personal link! The jammer prevented the drone from triggering the alarm signal, but Leo still had to get the drone back to its opening within this 30-minute patrol period to upload its data! Subtracting the seven minutes needed to ascend and the time to return, Leo had less than 20 minutes to hack! Leo's brain was on fire as Jackie quickly moved along the drone's original path, with V ahead. The moment Leo accessed the software, he grasped the system's connection method. The Hornet's security level wasn't very high—clearly, Biotechnica preferred to allocate its security resources to the building itself, showing their confidence in their ICE. This made hacking the Hornet relatively easy, far from military-grade difficulty. The red indicator light blinked rapidly, turning yellow, then back to blue as the thruster power stabilized. Jackie tossed the drone to V, who caught it, activated her Sandevistan, and placed the drone back where it belonged. The jammer was deactivated, the drone resumed its normal operations, and connected to the data return port as usual. Everything proceeded as normal—the only difference was that Leo had forged the exterior scan information, establishing a data transmission link. Leo quickly located the drone's privileges, identified the security port it used, and cross-referenced it with the employee information and privilege list Morton had provided. Then, he input the account, reverse-hacked into Biotechnica Tower's internal operating system through the security port, and gained access. Successfully bypassing Biotechnica Tower's ICE. [Found employee code #10039, work location: Biotechnica Tower, 56th floor, Sector E, position: Architectural Design and Security Maintenance Engineer.] [Class-A Access Levels: Public areas of the tower, Physical Asset Maintenance Department.] [Class-B Access Levels: Administrative Offices, Technology and Development Department.] The remaining four access levels weren't worth checking—those levels didn't have window access. Joanne Koch's office was on the 77th floor, with the closest Technology and Development Department floor on the 70th. "Move to the 70th floor; I'll have a bot open the window."