This Bet Was Yours to Win

During the days Xu Shi had kept him imprisoned, Luo Zhikang felt as though the torment was driving him insane.

There were many reasons for it: the terrible conditions, the virtually nonexistent lighting, the crude meals... but the most important reason was only one.

He could not crack it.

Not long after he first got his hands on it, he had noticed that this "Sea Crane" Xu Shi had brought was different from the one Shen He had previously sent someone to deliver to him.

It had clearly undergone further modifications and upgrades... though he had not paid much attention to that at first.

As the former chief engineer of a top financial conglomerate, Luo Zhikang possessed deep-rooted pride and confidence in himself.

If he could crack the previous one, this one should not have been difficult either.

He had spent his entire life dealing with machinery, and the knowledge stored in his mind was immense.

Yet with this small drone before him, no matter how hard he racked his brains over countless details, he could not find a corresponding way to crack it!

Leaving aside the locks and keys within its core, which left him utterly helpless, even the external dismantling he was best at proved difficult to handle.

The slightest lapse in attention made it hard to reassemble the dismantled parts as they had originally been.

And this was by no means Xu Shi deliberately making things hard for him—the various tools Serpent Coil had provided were millions of times better than those Spark had.

If not for the heavily armed guards stationed outside the door around the clock, those tools would have been enough for him to take apart the confinement room's door and escape.

He was simply inferior. His approach and understanding had been utterly defeated by the machine's creator.

Though he was unwilling to admit it from the bottom of his heart, the mounting sense of frustration had already pushed him to the brink of collapse.

"It should... it should still be possible to crack it like this... No, no!"

"Then I'll use this formula to reverse-calculate it... Still wrong!"

"Ha ha ha, I get it now... Fuck, theoretically this should be right! Why isn't it working?! Why?!"

Roars like these rang out without pause, to the point that even the guards at the door had grown sick of hearing them.

"I give up. Did Chairman Xu lock up a lunatic? Wouldn't it be better to send him to a psychiatric hospital?"

"For real. These days, even when I dream at night, I feel like that old man is howling in my ear. My wife thinks I found someone on the side."

But the next second, they shut their mouths, because they saw Xu Shi walking toward them.

"Restore power to the confinement room."

Xu Shi ignored their idle chatter. After quietly giving the order, he opened the tightly locked door.

The room's lights suddenly came on. Struck by the long-lost brightness, Luo Zhikang instinctively shut his eyes and shrank back.

"It seems Old Mr. Luo has run into a bit of trouble?"

Xu Shi looked down at the disheveled Luo Zhikang kneeling before him and asked with a smile.

"Xu Shi..."

Luo Zhikang froze for a moment, then stared at him and snorted coldly.

It was as though he were protesting: weren't all these troubles caused by you?

Xu Shi found that attitude rather speechless.

Seriously, why could these people not realize that they were the aggressors, while he was the weak, pitiful, helpless victim?

You were the ones who came after me first, yet even after being captured, you could still act so self-righteous.

But he did not pay much attention to it. Instead, he turned serious. "The progress of cracking the drone has probably not been going well, has it? Do you have a lot of questions you want to ask?"

"For example... this part?"

He casually pointed at a messy section on the floor.

"..."

Luo Zhikang did not answer. Troubled as he was, he still had no intention of bowing his head to the man before him.

But before he could react, Xu Shi began explaining on his own the specific structure and details of that component.

He deliberately spoke slowly so the other man could hear every word clearly.

"...That is roughly how it works. Does Old Mr. Luo understand now?"

"..."

Luo Zhikang remained silent, but the defiance on his face had turned into shock.

Xu Shi's explanation had thoroughly resolved his doubts. His muddled mind suddenly became clear in that instant.

The designs and fine manipulations that shattered conventional thinking made him want to praise them—if the creator had not been a genius engineer, they could never have conceived of such methods.

By comparison, Luo Zhikang felt even more ashamed of his own inadequacy.

"Then that will be all for now. I'll come see Old Mr. Luo again after a while."

Xu Shi seemed to have come solely for this. Once he finished explaining, he rose to leave. "I wish you good health."

"...Wait!"

Seeing him about to leave, Luo Zhikang finally could not hold back and called out to stop him.

"Oh? Is there something else?"

Xu Shi turned around, feigning confusion.

"...What about here? The air pressure issue at this three-way junction... how was it resolved?"

Luo Zhikang shakily raised a hand and pointed to another part of the drone.

"This?"

Xu Shi examined it, then shook his head. "I'm not telling you."

"Old Mr. Luo, don't forget that this is our bet."

His tone carried a hint of regret. "Telling you one part was an act of kindness, but you cannot ask me about everything, can you?"

"Of course, if you can admit your defeat... then that would be another matter."

As he spoke, the corners of his lips unconsciously curled upward.

To be fair, compared to Gu Yi or Xia Wuyou, Luo Zhikang had no obvious weakness.

He was alone, without family or attachments, and his loyalty to Tianhe—or rather, to Shen He—meant he did not fear threats of death.

But that did not mean he had no weaknesses—arrogance and obsession.

His arrogance came from his former identity as the conglomerate's chief engineer. In truth, the only person he had ever been loyal to was Shen He. He had never given anyone else in the organization a second glance, always treating them like crude peasants.

His obsession showed itself in his research into mechanical engineering... though that word was not quite accurate. To put it more precisely, he was simply obsessed.

That was why this bet had been designed this way—his inability to crack the drone would reduce Luo Zhikang's pride to nothing. Chief engineer? You were nothing but a joke.

Yet Jiang Chengcheng's exquisite design inevitably piqued his interest, making him desperately want to know the answers.

Of course, Xu Shi had also made arrangements with external factors. Taking away the clock to disrupt his sense of time, the cramped windowless room without light, the poor food... these common interrogation tactics all helped greatly in breaking a person's will.

The increasingly messy handwriting on the calculation papers was proof enough. There were even countless chaotic marks on the walls.

It was clear that the old man was already close to breaking down.

So now was the time for him to make a choice.

"I..."

As expected, Luo Zhikang showed hesitation the moment those words were spoken.

To be fair, his inner dignity would not allow him to yield to Xu Shi. He had never lowered his head to anyone.

Especially since this had been Xu Shi's deliberate scheme from the start, meant to make him voluntarily admit defeat.

But the drone's design truly had him hooked. As long as the questions in his heart remained unanswered, he felt as though ants were crawling all over him.

And he knew that relying on himself, even if he were given another eight or ten years, he might not be able to unravel it all.

So.

"I... admit defeat."

After a moment of struggle, he covered his face and let out a long sigh. "This bet was yours to win."

"Old Mr. Luo, your honesty is truly gratifying."

Xu Shi chuckled, not at all surprised by this.

"Then now... can you tell me?"

Luo Zhikang seemed to have aged several years in an instant, but he still urged him eagerly.

"Of course."

Xu Shi nodded. "However... Old Mr. Luo will need to trade something for it."

"Hm? What do you want?"

Luo Zhikang gritted his teeth. "If you want my life, at least let me... die knowing the answer."

"Don't be ridiculous. Would it be difficult for me to kill you?"

Xu Shi smiled and waved a hand. "And frankly, your life is worthless to me."

"Then..."

"If I remember correctly, before Tianhe was destroyed, it was preparing to launch a project called 'Beyond Limits.'"

"And as its chief designer, you should possess the relevant research materials, correct?"