Book 3 Chapter 4.2 (1/2)
- Swamp
Su carefully ascended a small peak. After carefully observing his surroundings, he then gave a signal to the people behind him. Nine soldiers climbed up one after another and set up a simple camp to get some food and rest. Several minutes later, Li Gaolei who was holding up the rear walked up the hill as well and sat down by Su’s side.
Li Gaolei lit a cigarette. Even though it was still daytime, he still carefully blocked the light from the end of the cigarette. During this continuous week of fighting, he hadn’t slept for more than ten hours, which covered Li Gaolei’s face with signs of fatigue. They had already swapped out their soldiers, but it was clear that their stamina was nearly exhausted as well. After wolfing down the military nutrient-filled food, they immediately fell onto the ground and knocked out.
Su was the only one that quietly sat there, silently drinking, eating, and continuously watching the surrounding region for movement, not showing the slightest sign of fatigue. Li Gaolei looked at Su like he was examining a monster, truly not understanding how this individual with a delicate porcelain like appearance could have such strange and abnormal levels of stamina. During these seven days, Su would go out ahead of them to scout, carry out sudden and violent assaults, and protect the rear. The tasks he shouldered were at least several times that of the others.
Due to Su’s valiant performance, after undergoing a complete exchange of members, there was only one dead and one injured. Their losses were far less than that of other dragonriders.
In front of the hill laid wide and spacious terrain with ruins of varying sizes scattered about. Most of the ruins were surrounded by mist, making it hard to see them too clearly. There was a chance of Scorpions of Disaster soldiers or war machinery being hidden within every single one of those ruin sites. They were all in small units, seemingly unable to take a single blow. However, if one looked at it from an overall perspective, these little units of Scorpions of Disaster might not pose any threat right now, but once they started moving and continuously exchanged attacks, it would be a completely different matter. Su who was always at the very forefront of the battlefield understood this type of pressure the best. Attacks came wave after wave, giving him almost no time to catch his breath. The Scorpions of Disaster were like olden era army ants that never stopped attacking. No matter how large their prey was, they still couldn’t escape their jaws.
If Su already felt like this, Li Gaolei naturally felt an even greater pressure. After each battle, Li Gaolei would often find the sweat and blood all over his body mix together and completely soak through his combat suit. Long-range heavy firepower, especially heavy artillery of varying caliber and range were the Scorpions of Disaster’s unique characteristic. There was no rhythm to the artillery bombardment, but they were extremely deadly. Up to five rounds of artillery shells would often descend together, and even with Li Gaolei or Su’s abilities, they still had to do everything they could to intercept the heavy artillery. Those ordinary soldiers instead didn’t give off too much pressure.
“Leader, don’t you feel like we’ve gone a bit deep? What do you think?” Li Gaolei spoke while carefully burying his cigarette into the ground.
Su narrowed his eyes. He gazed into the rugged and uneven land beneath him where ruins were scattered throughout before slowly saying, “I want to return to the base too, but from the battles that happened these past few days, I can feel that the Scorpions of Disaster are currently gathering military strength towards their base. If we want to return, we would have to either continuously fight them head on a few more times, or we need to take a detour. It seems like both paths are blocked.”
The soldiers’ stamina were already reaching their limit, and most of their ammunition had been exhausted as well. This troop, including Li Gaolei, needed rest and reorganization urgently. It was hard to say how many more fights they would last through. Only Su seemed to never tire. However, his scattered light blonde hair would occasionally be contaminated by smoke and earth, and only through careful cleaning would those traces be erased.
In nearly any environment, Su would always remain clean. This was a riddle that didn’t have any explanation. Dust and filth didn’t stick to Su’s skin at all. After the few times they made contact, Li Gaolei found that Su’s skin was even more fine, soft, and flexible than that of any of the women he had touched before. However, this skin that looked like blood would be drawn from the slightest touch possessed a completely unmatching sturdiness. After seeing Su’s performance on the battlefield, Li Gaolei began to develop suspicions that if an ordinary soldier tried to cut Su’s body, even if Su didn’t do anything to resist, he might not necessarily be able to cut through.
On the battlefield, when Su’s body started to be contaminated with dust, that also meant that his stamina was starting to reach its limit. This wasn’t a true verdict, but rather an intuition Li Gaolei felt.
Li Gaolei narrowed his eyes and gazed towards Pendulum City, but he didn’t sense a thing. There was over 100 kilometers from this place to Pendulum City, with countless abandoned homes, factories, bridges, and hills in between. The vast and complex terrain could easily hide numerous soldiers. The number of soldiers from both the Black Dragonriders and Scorpions of Disaster here numbered over a thousand. They were like fish inside of a large lake; once they went back down, there would no longer be any signs of them.