Chapter 525

St. Thomas, while different from the mainland United States, was still good when it came to law and order.

After the glasses girl called the electric alarm, the police arrived at the pier within 20 minutes.

The police inquired about the situation, viewed the crime scene, gave separate statements to the three people, made a copy of the surveillance on the yacht, and then left.

Luke didn’t hold out much hope that they’d be able to catch the thugs.

One is because there are fewer clues, and the other is because there were no casualties on the yacht, and no valuables were lost, so the nature of the case is not serious.

Because St. Thomas was special and different from the mainland U.S., Luke did not disclose his FBI identity.

Wizard Elsa Marin got the news and also arrived at the pier ahead of time to meet up with the trio.

Five o’clock in the morning.

The four of them simply ate breakfast, and with some fatigue and exuberance, they set off on a treasure hunting trip in their yacht.

Before departing, Luke rechecked his weapons, Luke had brought three guns with him this time, two pistols Glock, Beretta NANo and a modified version of the Burnelli M4 shotgun.

The Beretta NANo was Luke’s backup gun, smaller in size and with an eight round magazine, many agents preferred to use this gun.

Since he had already showered and gone to bed last night, Luke didn’t carry a spare gun on him.

After returning the glasses girl’s pistol, Luke equipped the spare pistol, as for the Glock pistol, it could not be used for the time being because of the damaged barrel.

A shotgun plus a pistol, together with sufficient ammunition, was enough to cope with this treasure hunting trip.

Luke sat on the deck lounge chair and drank coffee while enjoying the beautiful view of the sea.

The view that Luke was looking at was not the endless ocean, but the endless and varied islands that surrounded him.

There were thousands of islands in the surrounding waters, the smallest of which were only the size of a soccer field, and were simply uninhabitable without fresh water resources, but for those who liked to explore, it didn’t stop them from exploring with enthusiasm.

Lilith stood on the foredeck of the yacht, holding the tan-colored map in her hand, a pair of blue eyes sweeping the sea from time to time, Elsa Marin also stood beside her, from time to time pointing her finger to the distance and whispering something.

Luke felt that this way of treasure hunting was also quite good, he was only responsible for security and defense work, and did not use his brain, usually just sitting on the yacht, blowing the sea breeze, drinking beer and sunbathing.

Vacation is just like this.

One hour later.

The yacht slowly stopped.

Luke yawned, got up and walked to the front of the yacht, and asked Lilith, “Why did the yacht stop?”

Lilith pointed to the island not far ahead, “The island in front of us on the right looks a lot like the treasure island depicted on the map, we need to explore it.”

Luke asked, “Is the yacht going to dock?”

Without waiting for Lilith to answer, Elsa Marin stepped out from the cockpit, “We can’t dock, the water around the island is shallow and there might be a reef, once we get close, we might hit the reef and we’ll be in trouble then.”

Glasses Girl walked out with a drone, “Why do we need to board the island, having it is enough.”

Glasses Girl skillfully maneuvered the drone into the air, the drone had a high-definition camera on it, so you could see the scene directly below the drone on the screen.

The drone flew above the island, Luke and Lilith and the others overlooked the panoramic view of the island through the monitor, the island was not large, only the size of an airfield, the drone flew up to a certain altitude, and they could see the shape of the entire island and the distribution of the terrain.

Lilith scrutinized for a while and said, “Retract the drone, it shouldn’t be this sea island.”

Luke asked, “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” Lilith sounded certain.

Luke didn’t answer and went back to sunbathing in his recliner.

Luke had looked at that yellow map in Lilith’s hand, which only roughly labeled the treasure hunting area, and at best could identify it as the U.S. Virgin Islands, but certainly couldn’t pinpoint which sea island it was.

However, Lilith was able to accurately determine whether it was a treasure-hiding island through the overhead image of the island, indicating that there should be other clues in addition to the known treasure map.

Since Lilith was hiding it, never mind if it was out of mistrust or for some other reason, he didn’t feel the need to waste his mind when the information wasn’t equal.

Even if he couldn’t find the treasure, he wouldn’t be at a disadvantage with the four hundred thousand dollars commission.

The one who really suffered was instead Lilith, not only did she have to pay for the three people’s hiring fees, but also the cost of renting the yacht and the traveling expenses.

She was not in a hurry, what was Luke in a hurry for.

The yacht traveled for a whole day, and Lilith found more than ten islands that were suspected to be treasure hiding places, but after some drone reconnaissance, they were all dismissed by her.

At this point, it was already more than a hundred nautical miles away from St. Thomas, and at night, the yacht didn’t return to the dock on St. Thomas, but docked at a natural harbor with deeper water.

Luke and the others were gathering on the deck for dinner, and the table was filled with some fresh seafood and vegetables and fruits that were healthy.

Lilith had her tablet in her hand, flipping through today’s itinerary and aerial video screenshots of the suspected treasure island, a pair of beautifully arched eyebrows slightly furrowed, “What do you guys think about tomorrow’s treasure hunting program?”

Elsa Marin said, “We have traveled for ten hours today, nearly two hundred nautical miles, and have almost covered a large portion of the range marked on the treasure map.

I think our travel today is not slow, just that we were a bit hasty in exploring the islands, except for the two islands where natural docks were found to implement the boarding of the islands, the rest of the islands were not boarded, and we just explored them through the unmanned airplanes at high altitude, so it is very likely that we would have left some clues behind, or even missed the real treasure islands.”

Glasses Girl said, “I don’t think that’s a problem, the sea islands have lush vegetation, even if the islands are boarded, they can only see a limited range, far less efficient than the drone’s high altitude view, moreover, all those videos of filming the sea islands have already been saved, and they can be taken out and studied at any time.”

Elsa Marin said, “Drones are indeed convenient, but they can’t completely replace people, and boarding the island is still the most reliable way to explore.

Our current problem with treasure hunting isn’t that it’s too slow, it’s that it’s too fast.”

Glasses Girl shrugged, “Technology exists to improve human efficiency.

If every island had to be boarded and explored, it would take ten days, if not half a month, to cover the distance we traveled today.

And I just took a week’s vacation from school.”

Elsa Marin said, “The most important thing in treasure hunting is patience, it’s better to be careful than to miss the treasure ……”

Luke wasn’t too interested in the argument between the two, he felt that both of them were missing the point and got up to leave after finishing his meal.

He was a little sleepy after a long night last night, he had to go to bed early today.

“Knock knock ……”

Luke had just returned to his room when the door to his room slammed.

Luke yawned, “Come in.”

“Cluck ……” The door opened.

Lilith walked into the room with a bottle of red wine in her hand, “Would you like a drink before bed?”

Luke took the glass and asked, “Looking for me for something?”

“Wanted to talk to you.” Lilith held her wine glass and clinked it with Luke.

“Cheers!”

Luke took a sip and savored it, “The wine is good.”

Lilith sat down on the chair and said, “You’ve had success with treasure hunting, I’d like to hear your thoughts?”

Luke asked rhetorically, “Do you have other clues about the treasure?”

Lilith hesitated for a moment, “Yes.”

“You’re hiding some key clues to the treasure, and it’s hard for me to give you the right advice in the absence of clues.”

Lilith also sensed the dissatisfaction in Luke’s tone and hurriedly explained, “It’s not that I’m hiding anything, it’s just that I didn’t have to take it out when I was in Los Angeles.

I was going to tell you when I got to the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Who would have thought that there were thugs boarding the yacht again last night, which caused me to panic a bit, and that’s why I put this off.”

Lilith stood up, “Come with me and I’ll show you something.”

Luke, with his glass of red wine in hand, followed Lilith into her bedroom.

Lilith opened the closet and removed two pieces of yellow leather from the closet safe, one of which was a map of the vicinity of the U.S. Virgin Islands that Luke had seen, labeled with the approximate range of the treasure hunting islands.

Lilith handed Luke the other piece of yellow leather.

This was also a topographical map, different yes, this map was more precise, there was only one island drawn on it, the shape of the island was somewhat similar to a turtle, and it was labeled with the various areas of the island, vegetation, fresh water, and so on.

“It was with this map that you judged that those islands explored by the drones were not treasure islands?”

“Yes. These two maps are together, one labeling the area where the sea islands are located, and one labeling the topography of the sea islands.

Now, I told you everything about the treasure.

And only you.” Lilith blinked her big watery blue eyes and asked with a sincere face, “Can you give me some advice?”

Luke didn’t answer immediately, scrutinized the two treasure hunting maps again, and slowly said, “What do you think about yourself?”

“According to my previous plan, the treasure island should be within the range we are traveling today, so it’s reasonable that we should be able to find it with the topographic map of the island.” Lilith sighed softly, “I’m also a bit confused right now, I don’t know where I went wrong.

I need your help.”

Luke took a sip of his red wine, “Actually, Cobalt and Elsa Marin are right.

Having the drones has greatly improved the efficiency of searching for the hidden treasure islands.

Elsa Marin is also right, judging from the maps labeling the treasure islands, we’ve already searched most of the range on today’s trip, and we might even have missed the real treasure hunting islands.”

Lilith said, “We did check out a lot of islands today, but many of them didn’t meet the conditions for treasure islands, so I just ruled them out.

A dozen or so of the more similar islands were drone scouted.

But again, they don’t match the terrain of the treasure-hiding islands.

Is there anything wrong with my operation?”

Luke shook his head, “No.”

Lilith pressed, “Did I miss anything?”

Luke was silent for a moment and said, “Yes, you did leave something out.”

Lilith was curious, “What things?”

“Time.

Time can change many things.

The map is static, but the sea water is not, the climate is not, and coupled with the human factor, which can lead to an ecological imbalance, the topography of the island may have changed.”

Lilith’s eyes lit up with realization, “You’re right, that’s something that does need to be taken into account.” Lilith’s arched eyebrows stretched, and a smirk grew on her delicate face, “Since you see the problem, you should have thought of a solution.”

“I do have a solution, but I don’t want to tell you.”

“Come on, don’t be so petty.

It’s my lack of consideration for hiding the treasure clues, and I apologize to you.

I promise to God that in the future, as long as it’s something related to the treasure, I definitely won’t hide the slightest bit of it from you again.” Lilith revealed a pitiful look, “Please.”

Luke knew very well that only by working together could he find the treasure, so he wasn’t trying to hide it, but he wanted an attitude from the other party and said, “There are two ways.

The first way, to find the ancient charts with long ages and detailed drawings, the terrain of the island where the treasure is hidden should not have changed at that time, and the treasure island can be found by comparing the geographic location.

The second way, if the topography of the island has changed, it is most likely because the vegetation has been destroyed, resulting in soil loss, and some of the low places have been submerged by seawater.

However, the center area of the sea island tends to have higher terrain and won’t be affected by the waves, so we can compare the higher terrain of the hidden treasure sea island.”

Previously, Lilith had been comparing the overall topography of the sea island, if it didn’t feel like the topography of the sea island, she would rule out the possibility of it being a treasure hiding sea island, when she thought about it carefully, there was some truth in what Luke had said, and it was very likely that she had really missed the treasure hiding sea island.

Lilith picked up the yellow leather treasure map and said: “It may take some time to find the ancient nautical charts that are old and drawn in detail.

I think it’s better to use the second method, it’s faster and more accurate to find the treasure island by comparing the topography and features of the high points of the island’s terrain.”

Luke nodded noncommittally, today was the first day of the official treasure hunt, it was not too late to change the exploration program.

Lilith pursed her red lips and asked, “Should we tell Cobalt and Elsa Marin about the second treasure map.”

Luke smiled somewhat playfully, “Didn’t you already tell me?”

“You’re different, I’ve always thought of you as a partner, I just haven’t found the right time to tell you yet.

They’re more like an employment relationship.”

Luke laughed, I’ll believe the hell out of you.

Not only is this chick pretty, she’s sweet-talking, and she’s pretty good at coaxing people, even though she knows she may not mean her words.

Luke took a sip of the red wine in his glass, “I suggest telling them.

We are a team and want to find the treasure island as soon as possible and need their assistance.”

Lilith raised her right hand in salute and playfully said, “YES, Sir.

I hear you.”

Soon, Lilith brought Glasses Girl and Elsa Marin to the table and the four of them worked on the second treasure map.

The second map had the detailed topography of the treasure hidden island, the east side of the island was a steep cliff and the highest point of the entire island.

High above the cliff was a small stream that meandered down, forming a small lake on the south side of the sea island.

On the north side of the island is a tall tropical rainforest.

On the west side is a mangrove forest, which is also on the lower ground of the island.

Mangroves do not refer to a specific type of plant alone, but rather to a plant community composed mainly of mangrove plants. Mangrove forests are very protective of the environment, purifying the water, and are also a habitat for some seabirds, shrimps, crabs, and shellfish.

Mangrove forests can also weaken the power of tsunamis, withstand rough waves and mitigate marine disasters.

At the same time, mangroves can act as a sand fixer, preventing sediment loss and consolidating soil and water near the coastline.

Without the existence of mangroves, the sea waves kept eroding the soil and the area of the island would gradually shrink.

This was also one of the reasons Luke speculated that it might cause the shape of the island to change.

Subsequently, the group carefully studied the treasure map and speculated on the possible changes of the sea island after five hundred years, identifying several unchanging features, such as the cliffs on the east side, the tall tropical trees, and the small lake that might exist on the south side.

Then, once again, they looked at the overhead view of the island taken with the drone today, and after some comparisons, they found an island that was very similar to the treasure map.