1969 Black Water Gang

　　“Taking down three top-tier gunners in seven minutes and twenty-nine seconds, your performance is more or less acceptable.”

　　Li Yao picked up the gunner’s hands with his mechanical hands and examined them carefully, especially the callus on the fingers. He then called the two little fellows and asked them to check.

　　“Look. The man’s fingerprints have been almost entirely erased, which can only be the result of using guns all the time. Also, look at the muscles around his eye sockets. His left eye is loose, and his right eye is tight, which is the result of aiming through a scope all day. Therefore, this is a very skilled gunner. It is understandable that he escaped from you.”

　　Han Te and Liu Li observed carefully and discovered that what Li Yao had said was very true. They could not help but admire ‘Grandpa Yao’ even more.

　　After pondering for a moment, Li Yao said, “At first, the Village of Peace had sixteen super searchlights in total, which were deployed in the street that was four kilometers long. There were only four enemies, but they blew up sixteen searchlights in different directions at the same time, which means every shooter opened fire four times on average in one second.

　　“Also, based on my perception of the ballistic trajectories, the locations of the shooters at the beginning was at least two to three kilometers from the red line. Over such a long distance, they shot four times in different directions in one second and did not miss a single target. Their teamwork was neat and flawless, too. All signs indicate that they were a well-trained team of snipers. But I’m quite curious about one thing. It is obvious that the villages other than the Village of Peace are abjectly poor and barren, and all their villagers seem to be starving. Do they have the wealth and resources to build such an elite squad of gunners?”

　　Even common gunners had to gain their expertise by using countless bullets in training. Super gunners were even more difficult to come by. The drugs to nurture their eyes and improve their eyesight alone were too valuable to be bought anywhere. Li Yao did not think that any small village in such a remote region could have supported the four experts.

　　Han Te and Liu Li shook their heads suspiciously. “We don’t know. Logically, such extraordinary shooters should be very famous, but we’ve never heard of them in any villages nearby.”

　　Thinking for a moment, Han Te took off the vest on the super gunner first. But he only found bullets and tobacco that could suppress the soul inside the pockets, nothing that could prove the guy’s identity.

　　He then drew a dagger and cut the enemy’s undervest, only to discover a very strange tattoo on the body’s chest. It was a pattern where a drop of black water was dripping to a pool.

　　“Black Water Gang!” Han Te and Liu Li exclaimed at the same time.

　　Seeing the shock and fright on the two little guys’ faces, Li Yao could not help but feel curious. “What is the Black Water Gang? Is it very strong?”

　　“It—it really is,” Liu Li said, her voice shivering. “About three hundred kilometers to the west of the Village of Peace, there is a valley named Double Dragons. At the end of the valley is a ruined city. But the city is not too seriously damaged. I’m told that the radiation and pollution there is quite feeble, and aid falls from the sky all the time, too. Therefore, some ten ferocious gangs have taken the place as their nest. It is a murky, lawless Bloody World.

　　“The Black Water Gang is a gang that rose there in recent years. It is said that the gang has done all kinds of unpardonable things. Although we have never seen it with our own eyes, it is not very difficult to infer. If they were not tough, ruthless bandits, how could they have risen in Double Dragons Valley, where there were already almost ten gangs?”

　　Li Yao thought quickly and asked, “Have the bandits come to mess with the Village of Peace before?”

　　“Of course they have,” Liu Li said. “When I was little, gangs came to the Village of Peace to cause trouble every other day, but they were all beaten back by my father. Also, the Village of Peace enjoys the terrain advantage. Our village is at the center of a boundless lake that has no barricades at all. Whoever dares to attack us will be seen when they are dozens of kilometers away. Even if the tough bandits could swim over, they would not be able to carry their heavy magical equipment.

　　“Besides, we are merely a tiny village in a Desolate World. This bone is very hard to bite and does not have much meat left. Therefore, after my dad and… Uncle Zhao Lie defeated quite a few bandit groups and reached a pact with the few largest gangs in Double Dragons Valley, agreeing to offer them a certain number of assets every year. Thus, the safety of the Village of Peace was secured. At the very least, in the last five years, barely any tough bandits have ever attacked our village.”

　　“However, the Black Water Gang is a gang that rose recently,” Han Te said. “They do not know the toughness of my master yet. It is not entirely impossible that they want to demonstrate their power by demolishing the Village of Peace.”

　　Li Yao gave no comment to the little fellows’ analysis. He simply spread out his telepathic thoughts, only to discover that a lot of feeble spiritual waves were lurking deep inside the city ruins. He sneered in his heart and asked, “Then, have the gangs ever attacked during the ‘Bliss Ceremonies’?”

　　Slightly dazed, Han Te shook his head and said, “No, I don’t think so. The angels project aid almost everywhere at the same time. Right now, the assets floating above Double Dragons Valley are certainly a hundred times more abundant than those here. Those ferocious bandits are no idiots. Why would they abandon the fat meat that is right next to their mouth and fight over bones with us?

　　“Therefore, it is possible for some lone, desperate bandits to show up, but it does not seem likely that a whole gang would come to loot the trophies.”

　　“Understood.” A great question mark popped up in Li Yao’s mind. He gave instructions casually. “Cut off the fingers of the four bodies and the tattoos on their chests. Collect them and their sniper rifles. Then, deform the bodies, throw them into a random building, and blow it up. Once you return, you will tell other people that you accidentally saw a few bodies on the road and felt that something was not right when you noticed their guns and gear. Therefore, you checked the bodies, only to find that they belonged to the Black Water Gang. Remember, do not reveal your current capability to anybody, especially not ‘Blood Eagle’ Zhao Lie!”

　　“Understood, Grandpa Yao!”

　　Having just killed three experts from the Black Water Gang, the two little fellows had only just begun to understand how remarkable the methods of spiritual energy utilization that Li Yao had taught them and the magical equipment that Li Yao had specially crafted for them were. They were more confident than ever. But upon hearing the solemnity in Li Yao’s words, they realized that Grandpa Yao must have sensed something wrong and that the situation would probably have more subtle changes.

　　However, as long as Grandpa Yao was here, they had nothing to fear.

　　Was the super gunner of the Black Water Gang not easily killed by Grandpa Yao as if he were a chicken?

　　Li Yao went deeper into the city ruins with the two little fellows. This time, they did not alarm anyone but simply investigated the environment.

　　Li Yao naturally discovered some traces, but he had not connected the glittering puzzle yet. Therefore, there was no need for him to explain everything to the two little fellows right now.

　　After they took another turn and finally returned to the camp of the Village of Peace, Manjusaka had already disappeared behind the dark clouds.

　　In the east, however, the first bleeding morning glow was vaguely showing up.

　　A new day had come.

　　But the slaughter and destruction in the Land of Sins would never stop.

　　The fierce battle on the red line had ended.

　　In terms of capability, the sinners of the other villages were absolutely no match for the many experts of the Village of Peace. They were simply launching suicidal attacks with their courage and their madness to die with the enemy.

　　However, skulls were not as hard as sticks after all. Their momentum could not last long. The several hundred sinners at the front were all knocked to the ground, moaning in pain.

　　‘Sky Breaking Hammer’ Gu Zhengyang and ‘Blood Eagle’ Zhao Lie marched forward unstoppably, one from the left and the other from the right. The mobs that were temporarily gathered were finally crushed. Leaving the wounded soldiers who were screaming with their broken bones, they retreated again.

　　But the Village of Peace had suffered grave casualties, too.

　　After the fierce fight of no more than two hours, more than a hundred warriors had died, and approximately five hundred were heavily wounded. In the Land of Sins that had no doctors or medicine, after their internal organs were churned up by rusted weapons, they would most likely be crippled even if they were lucky enough to have not been killed on the spot.

　　More importantly, most of the victims were brawny men in their prime. They were the strongest hunters, warriors, and explorers of the village.

　　There were only several thousand people in the entire village, and almost five hundred men had been lost after a single battle. Such a loss was truly devastating.

　　The chasm between the village leader and the captain of the exploration team finally collapsed, and fervent fury erupted out of it.

　　Hardly had Li Yao brought the two little fellows back to the camp when a conflict ten times more intense than the previous night broke out between Gu Zhengyang and Zhao Lie.

　　“Revenge! Revenge! Those scumbags must pay for what they did!”

　　After a night of fighting, ‘Blood Eagle’ Zhao Lie’s armor had been dyed red, with suspicious mangled flesh dangling from it. But he could not have looked more excited and showed absolutely no sign of exhaustion. His bloodshot eyes were almost jumping out of his head while he waved a dented saber and shouted, “For every victim of the Village of Peace they killed, I will kill ten of them as retaliation. Kill them all and leave no one behind! Slay all of the scumbags!”

　　Quite a few young and passionate warriors were on Zhao Lie’s side. Their fathers, brothers, and friends had been heavily wounded if not killed in the battle of the red line. They were in the most infuriated and crazy state. Led by Zhao Chong’s Iron Blood Youths, the young warriors were reorganizing the tanks and moving the ammunition, truly preparing to march to the other side of the red line.

　　“Enough!”

　　As they installed the crystal cannons and storm bolters to the rails of the tanks and refilled fuel for the vehicles, Gu Zhengyang strode forward and stood before Zhao Lie like a door. His face had also been blackened because of the fire and smoke, but his eyes were still clear and filled with fury that felt like magma.

　　“Captain Zhao, your recklessness last night has already caused the deaths of so many of our brothers here. This is something that has never happened in the past twenty years. Are you now going even further and determined to destroy the future of the entire Village of Peace?”