Chapter 245
Hera looked around with a flashlight Their car was parked in the middle of the dirt road, which had no cement paving. No streetlights or surveillance cameras were around.
The forest was on both sides of the road. As there were many oak trees planted, it was dubbed an oak forest.
The oak forest covered a large area. They weren’t sure if the fourth tree Isabella mentioned was from the left or right. If they didn’t have a plan and looked for it aimlessly, they might not be able to find the box until dawn.
“Let’s start from the right and check them one by one. Our current direction is the main road toward the village. Logically speaking, the fourth tree is probably on the right side.
Stephen used his flashlight to scan the forest on the right. As a local, he was familiar with this area.
Nathan spread out a map and showed it to Hera. He had asked Stephen to circle the location of the oak forest and mark several major roads on the map before boarding the plane.
Hera glanced at the markings. Even so, they were in the countryside, and this was just a map. The actual location and number of trees weren’t specified.
“Is there another road at the end of the forest on both sides?” she asked.
“Yes, but they’re all small roads. Most people won’t take them unless they re villagers.”
Stephen took the pen, held the flashlight with his mouth, and marked the locations of the small roads on the map.
Based on the marked roads, Nathan calculated the spots they would have to search and discovered roughly 20 of them.
There were only three of them. Even if they searched separately, they would need to cover around six or seven positions each, which would exhaust them.
“We have no other way. Let’s just do it!” Stephen took the flashlight and pointed at the map. “You two go together and search the area to the left. I’m familiar with the area, so I’ll go to the right side alone”
As he spoke, he pulled out two walkie–talkies from the car and handed them to Nathan. “You two can take the car. Let’s stay in contact at all times.”
Hera, who was pondering, suddenly stated, “I have an idea, but I don’t know if it’s feasible.”
“What’s it?” the two men asked simultaneously.
Seeing her point to the sky, Nathan and Stephen both looked up. On such a cloudy day, they couldn’t see the moon and only spotted a few stars.
“What are we looking at?” Stephen turned back and looked at Hera in confusion.
Hera explained, “I was referring to satellite monitoring
“Wow, pretty girl! Your ideals quite bold!” Stephen gave her a thumbs-
s–up.
Nachan felt amused. “I’ll be too slow if we go through the approval process with the corresponding departments. We might even finish digging this forest while we wait.” Moreover, even if satellite monitoring was available, it was difficult to find the video records from more than a month ago. It could only capture real–time footage. Hera felt embarrassed to tell them her actual idea. She actually didn’t need to go through the official process and could try to back into the system right away.
Nathan and Stephen were both upright police, so it never occurred to her that she would use illegal ways. They assumed she was joking and didn’t take it seriously “You stay in the car first We’ll go check out the nearby spots,” Nathan said.
Hera didn’t refuse. While they were gone, she returned to the back seat, took out the laptop from her bag, and turned it on. Then, she connected to the mobile hotspot, plugged in the USB flash drive, and started typing quickly, Codes soon flashed across the screen
Due to the time difference, it was daytime in Maidan. The staff on duty at a military air base spotted one of the satellites sending out a data anomaly alert.
He immediatly activated the alarm. “Attention, someone has invaded UTA–224. Enter a defensive state!”
All staff in the office immediately went on guard.