124: Kilimanjaro

"Let's go."

Jiang Yuan sat in the driver's seat, and the land rover defender, modified by the system, let out a low, deep roar.

"Where to?" Lin Xia fastened her seatbelt, watching the Acacia Trees receding outside the window.

"I heard Hemingway wrote about a mountain; they say it's the throne of God."

Jiang Yuan held the steering wheel with one hand, his gaze fixed on the towering peak to the northeast, hidden in the clouds with only its snow-white summit visible.

"We're going to Kilimanjaro."

Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest peak on the continent of Africa, stands at 5,895 meters and is known as the "Roof of Africa."

For ordinary climbers, this is a battle that requires meticulous preparation.

It usually takes a 5 to 7-day climbing cycle, requiring hired guides and porters, as well as long periods of altitude acclimatization training, before one can make the final push toward Uhuru Peak in that thin air.

When the land rover defender stopped in the wilderness near the Marangu climbing entrance, Lin Xia looked at the mountain towering into the clouds, her face full of disbelief.

"Are you… serious?"

She glanced at the mountaineering watch on her wrist; it was nine in the morning.

"Jiang Yuan, this is a high mountain nearly six thousand meters above sea level, not some dirt hill behind a residential complex.

We don't have guides, we haven't obtained climbing permits, and we aren't carrying oxygen tanks or cold-weather gear.

And…"

Lin Xia pointed to herself: "Even though I'm often out in the wild and my stamina is decent, climbing up and down Kilimanjaro in a single day is physically impossible for a human.

We'll die up there; altitude sickness and hypothermia will kill us in an instant."

As a professional Photographer, she knew the temperament of this mountain all too well.

Every year, countless overconfident climbers are carried down, or even left forever in the glacier crevasses.

Jiang Yuan listened and just smiled.

He opened the rear door and tossed Lin Xia a set of seemingly thin, silver-gray sportswear from that spatial storage unit, which seemed to hold the entire world.

"Put this on."

"What is this? Yoga clothes?" Lin Xia picked up the garment; the fabric felt as smooth as silk and light as air, showing absolutely no sign of any warmth or protective function.

"This is the [K-2 Individual Powered Exoskeleton (Civilian Lightweight Version)]."

Jiang Yuan changed into a black version of the same suit and explained while adjusting his cuffs:

"Although it looks like a layer of spandex, it's woven with hundreds of millions of nano-muscle fiber bundles inside. It reads your neural electrical signals in real-time; when you lift your leg, it provides ten times the power of your muscles.

When you land, it absorbs 99% of the impact force."

"As for warmth and oxygen…" Jiang Yuan pointed to a barely visible blue ring on the collar, "It forms an invisible force field on your body surface, locking in temperature and automatically enriching oxygen from the thin air.

Even if you were an eighty-year-old lady, wearing this, you could walk up Mount Everest as easily as strolling through a vegetable market."

Lin Xia went to the back of the car, half-doubting, and changed into the gear.

The moment the zipper was pulled up, she felt like a completely different person.

Her body felt so light she could almost float, and every breath was incredibly fresh, as if she were in an oxygen-rich forest.

"Let's go."

Jiang Yuan put his hands in his pockets, tilted his head, and walked toward the climbing entrance just like that.

This climb completely overturned Lin Xia's understanding of the word "climbing."

The vegetation on Mount Kilimanjaro is distributed vertically, from the tropical rainforest at the foot of the mountain to the alpine meadows in the middle, and then to the high-altitude deserts and polar glaciers, as if all the scenery from the equator to the North Pole had been condensed into one place.

If it were an ordinary person, they would already be panting and drenched in sweat while passing through the rainforest zone.

But right now.

Lin Xia felt like an indefatigable superhero.

She gave a light push off the ground and launched herself three or four meters forward.

The muddy, slippery tree roots and loose rocks under her feet felt like flat ground, thanks to the balance provided by the "exoskeleton."

The two did not take the regular tourist route, but instead chose a nearly vertical wild trail.

Two hours later.

They had already passed through the clouds and reached the alpine desert zone at an altitude of 4,000 meters.

The only plants here were low shrubs and strange giant groundsels. The air became thin and cold, and the wind howled.

Ahead, a well-equipped professional European climbing team was struggling to trek forward.

A dozen people, wearing heavy down jackets and windproof goggles, leaning on trekking poles, had to stop and take a dozen deep breaths with every step they took.

The guide shouted "Pole Pole" (Swahili for "slowly, slowly") in the front, fearing someone would faint due to lack of oxygen.

Just then.

The climbing team was surprised to hear light footsteps behind them.

They turned around.

They saw a man and a woman, wearing incredibly thin-looking sportswear, hands empty, not even carrying a backpack, passing them at an unbelievable speed.

The oriental man even had his hands in his pockets, his demeanor as leisurely as if he were taking a stroll in his own backyard, and he was introducing the scenery to the woman beside him:

"Look over there, that's Mawenzi Peak; the volcanic rock structure is quite interesting…"

And the woman, although holding a heavy SLR camera, moved with effortless ease, constantly clicking the shutter as she walked, without even catching her breath.

"My God…"

The climbing team leader took off his goggles and rubbed his eyes, thinking he was having hallucinations caused by altitude sickness.

"Are those humans? We're at an altitude of four thousand meters! It's minus five degrees! Aren't they cold wearing so little?"

"Are they… taking a walk?"

Before the climbers could recover from their shock, the two figures had already disappeared at the end of the scree slope above, leaving this group of fully armed "professionals" standing in the cold wind, disheveled and beginning to question their existence.

...

11:30 AM.

5,895 meters above sea level, the summit of Uhuru Peak.

This is the highest point on the entire continent of Africa.

Beneath their feet were thick, ancient glaciers, and overhead was a deep, almost black blue sky.

Looking into the distance, the entire East African savanna was in full view, with a sea of clouds churning beneath their feet, as if they were standing at the end of the world.

The temperature here stays around minus fifteen degrees all year round, and the wind cuts like a knife.

But Lin Xia stood in front of the wooden sign that said "Congratulations," feeling not a hint of cold.

That invisible nano-force field perfectly blocked out the wind and snow.

She put down her camera, looking at the breathtaking scene before her: snow on the equator.

The massive glaciers refracted diamond-like light under the sun, creating the ultimate contrast with the steaming hot African continent in the distance.

"It's so beautiful…"

Lin Xia murmured to herself.

She never dreamed that in this life, she would be able to stand on the summit of Africa in such a relaxed and elegant manner.

"It's indeed not bad."

Jiang Yuan stood at the edge of the cliff, glancing at the sea of clouds beneath his feet.

"However, something is missing right now."

He snapped his fingers.

Spatial folding technology activated.

Under Lin Xia's stunned gaze, a set of exquisite folding tables and chairs appeared out of thin air on the ice-and-snow-covered summit.

Following that, a set of vintage pour-over coffee equipment appeared, along with a small copper pot still steaming with heat.

"Sit."

Jiang Yuan pulled out a chair and even thoughtfully laid down a wool seat cushion.

At the freezing summit 5,895 meters above sea level, surrounded by ancient glaciers.

Jiang Yuan ground the coffee beans unhurriedly.

Crunch, crunch.

As the hot water was poured in, the coffee grounds expanded, and a rich, mellow, roasted aroma instantly permeated the thin air, overpowering the scent of the wind and snow.

"This is Geisha; it should go with the snow scenery here."

Jiang Yuan pushed a cup of amber-colored coffee toward Lin Xia.

Lin Xia picked up the cup, the warmth in her palms assuring her that all of this was real.

She took a sip, the heat flowing down her throat, dispelling the psychological chill.

She turned to look to the side.

Jiang Yuan was sitting with his legs crossed, holding that "mobile phone" which only existed in legends, taking a photo of the sea of clouds and snowy mountains in front of him, then lowering his head to edit a caption.

Lin Xia couldn't help but lean over to take a look.

She saw him post a new update on that account with 120 million followers:

[Image: A cup of coffee, with the Kilimanjaro boundary marker and glacier in the background] Caption: "Came to the high ground to catch some wind, and have a cup of coffee while I'm at it."

Lin Xia looked at the man's profile, and that feeling of absurdity surged in her heart again.

Others treat this place as the end of a pilgrimage, a battlefield to challenge life and death.

But he.

Really just treated it as a slightly elevated terrace cafe.

"Jiang Yuan." Lin Xia suddenly spoke.

"Hmm?" Jiang Yuan looked up.

"Are you really a human from Earth?" Lin Xia asked, half-jokingly and half-seriously.

Jiang Yuan smiled, raised his coffee, and toasted the sun above the sea of clouds in the distance.

"The genuine article."

"It's just that I live a bit more freely than others."

The wind and snow blew by, ruffling the bangs on his forehead.

In this place closest to the sun, his smile was more dazzling than the sunlight.

"Alright, coffee's finished."

Jiang Yuan put down his cup and checked the time.

"Let's head down; if we're late, we'll miss the sunset on the savanna."

He stood up, and the table, chairs, and coffee set vanished instantly.

The two of them, like two urban white-collar workers who had just finished afternoon tea, put their hands in their pockets, turned around, and walked down the mountain along the path they had come, leaving behind only those two rows of shallow footprints.