Babel's Ledger: Zero Point

Chapter 19 — Blueprint of Oasis: A Needle in a Haystack

1. Vows of Vengeance Etched on Ashes

The Parisian subterranean bunker, hidden deep beneath the city outskirts by the Kingdom Builder Foundation, was enveloped in a perfect, heavy silence once the steel doors sealed shut. Yet, within that silence, the bloody gunshots of Nairobi, the inferno that had consumed everything, and young Asha's desperate, heart-wrenching screams seemed to echo, an indelible stigma branded upon their souls.

Lilith, having ensured Asha was under the care of secret operatives in a secure safe house, entered the main control room to find Kai. His eyes, bloodshot as if he hadn't slept for nights, were fixated on the encrypted reports flooding the holographic screen. The screen relentlessly displayed horrific images from the Nairobi field, recovered at great risk by the 'Echo-7' team, alongside an ceaseless stream of updated analytical data on the scale of the 'Babel Foundation's' mercenary forces, the cutting-edge weaponry they had deployed, and the brutal efficiency of their operational tactics. Though his bloodshot eyes betrayed his exhaustion, his mind was sharper, more alert than ever.

How much time had passed, neither could tell. Lilith finally broke the silence. Her voice was severely suppressed, yet the grief and fury contained within it seethed like molten lava.

Lilith: "They… they took everything from Asha, Kai. Her grandmother, her home… and perhaps, memories so horrifying they will never fade for a lifetime. If only we had been a little faster… No, if we hadn't set foot in that hellish place in the first place… Asha…"

Kai slowly turned his head to look at Lilith. No emotion flickered across his face, yet that very stillness seemed to herald an even more terrifying rage.

Kai: "Regret is the most extravagant of emotions, Lilith. And right now, we don't even have the luxury of time for it. Wherever we went, in whatever way, they would have tried to sever our lifelines. Nairobi was merely the first hunting ground they chose. Even if it hadn't been us, Asha and the people there would have eventually become just another set of victims in their endless 'disaster scenarios'."

He rose from his chair and approached the hologram wall. At his gesture, the screen transformed, displaying the complex flows of global financial markets, intertwined with the 'Babel Foundation's' spiderweb-like funding streams, and a list, like a river of blood, of the countless 'disaster-linked financial products' they had invested in across every zone of conflict and calamity on Earth.

Kai: "What they hold most sacred, the most potent weapon with which they dominate the world, is ultimately these 'numbers'." His voice was as cold as glacial ice. He sharply pointed to a specific section of the screen: the 'Babel Foundation's' core asset management graph, and next to it, the 'Nairobi Conflict Zone Reconstruction Fund,' which had recently yielded them their greatest profits.

Kai: "They would have proudly recorded the price of Asha's grandmother's life, the bloody tears of the Kibera slum dwellers, as yet another avaricious rate of return on their balance sheets. Just as young Rael's death in Safran was, to them, merely one variable 'written off' as a loss. In that case… shouldn't we return the favor in kind, in the way that will inflict the most excruciating pain upon them?" His final words were laced with a fury that transcended cold anger, resonating with an almost divine sense of retribution.

Lilith's eyes, too, glinted with an icy light. She deeply empathized with Kai's words.

Lilith: "You're right, Kai. What they fear most isn't physical destruction or a defeat or two in battle. It's the 'Empire of Numbers' they've spent a lifetime building, their seemingly impregnable fortress of wealth and power, collapsing like a sandcastle in an instant. And the moment they realize, before the entire world, that it was all due to their own endless arrogance and greed." She swiftly manipulated the holographic interface, bringing up new data. It was their core investment portfolio for the next fiscal quarter, extracted by her AI, Cassandra, by hacking into the 'Babel Foundation's' internal network.

Lilith: "Cassandra has found it. This is the 'Climate Disaster-Linked Securities' portfolio where the 'Babel Foundation' is concentrating astronomical sums, expecting massive returns next quarter. Target regions… Metropolis in North America, New Frankfurt in Western Europe, and Neo-Tokyo in East Asia. All three cities are commonly betting on a summer of unprecedented, record-breaking heatwaves, subsequent large-scale blackouts, and a chain reaction of drinking water shortages. It's… exactly the same method they used to exploit the Metropolis sinkhole catastrophe."

A dangerous glint sparked in Kai's eyes. In his mind, hundreds, thousands of counter-attack scenarios were already being drawn at the speed of light.

Kai: "And if their scenarios don't unfold as planned, or if the damage ends up being far milder than anticipated… what happens to their 'perfect predictions' then?"

A cold smile touched Lilith's lips.

Lilith: "Their 'Climate Disaster-Linked Securities' become worthless scraps of paper, and they incur astronomical losses. Especially since most of these products are derivative instruments employing immense leverage (leverage: a financial technique of using borrowed capital for an investment, which can magnify both profits and losses; of course, if the prediction is wrong, the losses also increase exponentially). If their predictions are off by even a single day, the losses will spiral uncontrollably. And, of course, the largest share of those losses will have to be borne by the 'Babel Foundation' itself."

She paused for a moment, looking at Kai.

Lilith: "The problem is, Kai, how do we stop their 'predicted disasters'? We can't prevent a heatwave itself with human power."

Kai: "We cannot stop the heatwave,"

A uniquely cruel, yet more confident than ever, smile appeared on Kai's lips.

Kai: "but we can neutralize the criteria they define as a 'disaster,' namely, the 'insurance payout trigger conditions'. For example, if they've bet on a 'three-day-plus widespread blackout, 50% paralysis of major hospitals, and implementation of water rationing' in Metropolis due to a heatwave, then we mobilize all our resources, our networks, and the 'ammunition' secured from our secret satellite, to prevent their scenario from becoming reality."

His eyes were already mapping out the detailed operational plan.

Kai: "Before the predicted blackout, we activate emergency power support systems to prevent overloads at the most vulnerable substations, and preemptively supply all our emergency generators and mobile solar energy systems to major hospitals and evacuation shelters. Simultaneously, using the secure emergency drinking water supply locations identified by Cassandra and Micah, we disseminate this information in real-time through all channels, to fundamentally block the water crisis and spread of panic they intend to cause. We inject a decisive variable that their sophisticated 'Big Data' and 'Kairos Engine' could never predict: our 'human intervention' and 'network of hope'! We will strike at the most fatal flaw in the 'algorithms' they trust most."

Lilith's eyes widened with astonishment and excitement. This was precisely the kind of brilliant, asymmetric counterattack she had dreamed of!

Lilith: "Exactly, Kai! Their systems can never account for human will, unpredictable benevolence, or the creative solidarity born from desperation!"

She rose from her seat and stood beside Kai. Her voice no longer held any trace of the sorrow or helplessness from Nairobi. Only a steel-like resolve and a cold fury directed at the heart of the 'Babel Empire' remained.

Lilith: "Lucian Drake and his 'Inner Circle'… they reign like gods upon the vile game board of 'disaster capitalism' they've designed over decades. The 'Kaunas Model' we demonstrated in Lithuania was the first small stone that shook the rules of their game. Now, it's time to shatter, most brutally and beautifully, the very place they feel most pain: their 'profit model' itself, their avaricious heart."

The cold smile that had played on Kai's lips deepened further. His gaze seemed to be calculating not just the next move, but the final victory of the entire war.

Kai: "Agreed, Lilith. Now that we've pinpointed their Achilles' heel, cunningly hidden in the smallest print, precisely where they believe they are safest, it is time to execute. For those who delight in converting human suffering into numbers and revel in despair, there can be no revenge more gratifying, more absolute, than carving an eternal, indelible red stain of bloody tears directly onto their Balance Sheet (Balance Sheet: a financial report showing a company's assets, liabilities, and equity at a specific point in time)."

Their gazes met, intense and unyielding, in the void. No more words were needed. In the suffocating silence, the second prelude to an invisible war began to play, faster and more furiously than ever before. Lilith was the first to place her hands on the holographic keyboard.

Lilith: "Cassandra, execute a final scan of the 'Babel Foundation's' entire Northern Hemisphere summer heatwave-linked financial product portfolio. All trigger conditions, linked derivative structures, fund flows, and… every conceivable hidden variable they might have overlooked. Analyze and simulate faster than light!"

Cassandra's processing core pulsed with a red light as it began to absorb and reconstruct a vast ocean of data. In an instant, hundreds of encrypted files, data streams, and complex financial network diagrams poured onto the screen like a living, breathing waterfall. It was the most secret, most vital part of the blueprint for the Tower of Greed that the 'Babel Empire' had built over decades.

Simultaneously, Kai's 'Revelation Computation Unit' transformed into another kind of battlefield. His fingers moved with almost invisible speed, awakening his 'eyes and ears' scattered across the globe – anonymous whistleblowers, scientists of conscience, and hacker groups searching for a last hope amidst despair.

Kai: "Metropolis Substation No. 3… Average body temperature of smartwatch users within a two-kilometer radius has risen by 0.8 degrees Celsius in the last three hours. Simultaneously, local online forums and anonymous communities show a 1200% spike, compared to normal, in keyword searches for 'blackout anxiety' and 'substation obsolescence.' Confirmed acquisition of a decisive internal whistleblower file from the power company, stating that 'warnings of severe overload risk due to budget cuts have been repeatedly ignored'."

After several hours of intense, breathtaking analysis and verification, Kai had precisely pinpointed Metropolis's most vulnerable link, and the decisive variable overlooked by Babel's predictive models.

The next target was New Frankfurt.

Kai: "Central coolant control system… Official reports claim 'state-of-the-art AI-based perfect defense system.' However, Cassandra's decryption of internal communications from an unofficial maintenance team last week confirms 'indefinite postponement of core sensor replacement and AI algorithm update due to budget overruns.' Local dark web discussions on 'black market prices for emergency supplies during city paralysis' have surged by 78% in the last 24 hours. This is no mere coincidence. It's clear evidence that someone is intentionally fomenting chaos."

Finally, Neo-Tokyo.

Kai: "Undersea power transmission cable… its location precisely matches that of a recent minor swarm earthquake cluster. However, Babel's risk model is processing the scale and frequency of these quakes as 'statistically insignificant error margins.' Highly probable that repair histories have been deliberately omitted or falsified to avoid insurance payouts. To them, it's merely an 'efficiently manageable risk' that could, in fact, generate even greater chaos and thus additional derivative profits."

Upon the vast, intricate skeleton of 'Babel's' sophisticated financial data analyzed by Cassandra, Kai was now swiftly and precisely layering the living flesh of on-the-ground intelligence and deep insight into human psychology. It was like a master surgeon, using decades of experience and intuition to locate an invisible lesion, undetectable even by advanced MRI scans, and applying the scalpel with unerring precision.

Lilith watched in breathless awe as Kai's analysis and Cassandra's data merged into one, completing a colossal picture of their counterattack.

Lilith: "Their seemingly perfect algorithms and big data… in the end, they only deal with past data and calculated variables. They cannot hear the small cries of anguish from the field, nor can they read the desperate will of humans yearning to change the future."

Kai finally nodded. His eyes, though deeply fatigued, shone with a light of absolute conviction.

Kai: "We will amplify those 'cries of anguish' into a deafening roar, Lilith, and shatter their perfect calculations. Not with the 'disaster' they have designed, but with the unpredictable 'hope' that we, right now, in this very moment, are designing."

All the information coalesced into one grand, audacious attack scenario.

Operation Codename: 'Plan Oasis.'

It was no mere relief plan or systemic improvement proposal. It was a precisely engineered asymmetric financial attack scenario, designed to directly disrupt Babel Foundation's avaricious predictive algorithms and, in a mere three days, turn their disaster-linked financial products, painstakingly constructed over decades, into worthless scraps of paper.

Kai made his final declaration. His voice was low and resolute, heralding a great storm to come.

Kai: "D-DAY for the operation… will be the very day the Northern Hemisphere summer blazes hottest. Exactly 72 hours from now."