'Study in scarlet' in Leshan: Deliveryman aids police save trapped woman

For Zhang Kun, it was hardly an everyday sight: a pillow tumbling seemingly out of the sky and landing right before his feet.

It was the afternoon of August 12 in Leshan, southwest China's Sichuan Province, and the 19-year-old college student, who was working as a food deliveryman during summer break, had just stepped out of a Soho building after dropping off an order.

The white pillow stopped him in his tracks. Curious, he picked it up only to make a startling discovery.

"I found the numbers 110 and 625 scrawled on it," Zhang recalled later in an interview with the China Media Group.

"In blood."

In China, 110 is the national emergency number for the police. Realizing the message might be a desperate cry for help, Zhang immediately reported it. That decision would turn out to be lifesaving.

Police officers quickly arrived. The pillow appeared identical to those used in hotels and short-term rentals. A nearby hotel staff member confirmed that an Airbnb unit in the neighboring residential block used the same kind of bedding.

It was in the "Building No.6, 25^th Floor."

Studying the trajectory of how the bloodstained pillow might have fallen, officers soon identified the likely apartment. As they approached, a pounding noise came from inside.

Fearing the worst, the officers forced open the door only to find the living room empty. The pounding continued from behind the bedroom door. They kicked it open. A pale, exhausted woman emerged. Her finger was bleeding.

The woman, Zhou, owned the Airbnb unit. On August 11, she had come to clean the apartment after a guest checked out. According to Zhou, while she was inside the bedroom, a gust of wind slammed the door shut, locking her inside. Her phone was left outside in the living room. There was no food, no water.

Trapped, Zhou tried first to break the door but to no avail. She began shouting and hanging objects out the window to signal for help, but no one noticed from 25 floors down. After nearly 30 hours without sustenance, weak and desperate, she bit her finger and scrawled "110" and "625" on a pillow with her own blood, then hurled it out of the window in a last attempt to save herself.

By sheer chance, the pillow landed right in front of Zhang Kun, who recognized the plea and acted.

In recognition of his actions, the delivery platform Zhang works for awarded him a 2,000-yuan bonus.