Chapter 3 Ambush

  Before dawn, Li Ang was woken up by a gunman named Lei De. It was his first time participating in such an operation and he was very excited. After gathering his equipment and going downstairs to the hall, he found that everyone was already eating breakfast.

  Li Ang didn't say another word and casually found a spot to start eating, who knows when the next meal would be. The food was simple, high-calorie and small in volume, consisting of pan-fried double-headed beef and an unknown beverage similar to coffee.

  Several people who came with He Bulan all changed into desert camouflage, not only were they fully armed, but they also looked so relaxed and calm, which was clearly not the same level as Li Ang, this tense and excited rookie.

  Just as Li Ang was struggling to finish his third piece of fried beef, Jin, fully armed, arrived. As expected, he's a local tyrant, Li Ang cursed in his heart. This guy actually wore power armor over, no wonder he had an air of confidence yesterday. However, the power armor didn't seem to be a military model, and after careful observation for half a day, it was clear that it was a fire-fighting power armor. No wonder it was painted red and equipped with a high-pressure deoxygen gun on its shoulder, which Li Ang couldn't figure out what it was at first glance. Jin's weapon was even more revealing of his old rivers and lakes background - it was a flame spray projector. With the assistance of the mecha, Jin could have been equipped with many other heavy weapons, but he chose the super equipment flame spray projector used in urban warfare instead. Using fire-fighting armor to fight fires, what an evil taste this uncle has.

  After eating, Blank pulled out a tactical map to start assigning tasks. They were divided into three small groups. Blank's six-man group was responsible for the diversion, drawing fire from the front. The eight-man group led by Lamei and Mutant Luo was the firepower group, bursting through the wall from the side and entering the Sand Bandit camp where the target was being held, and blocking the enemy's retreat route. As for his own group, there were only three people, he was responsible for opening the door, a man named Red was a sniper responsible for covering them, and a middle-aged man with a lewd appearance named Mackey was an explosive expert responsible for destroying the Sand Bandit's barricades.

  It turned out that he had also become a technical soldier and didn't have to do dirty work. Li Ang's originally tense heart relaxed slightly, but if he couldn't open the door at the critical moment, he wondered how these people would treat him. After thinking carefully, it was actually possible that he could open the door. Thinking of this, Li Ang felt a chill in his heart again. In the worst case, they would assign him back to the combat unit; after all, yesterday they had already said that there was no guarantee that he could definitely open it.

  When leaving Shacheng, the sky had already lit up. Looking at the three well-maintained military Hummer jeeps behind Blanke, kicking up dust, Li Ang became even more curious about the forces behind him. Having been to Shacheng for three months now, he had seen many merchant teams and travelers coming and going. But never had he seen a team as fully equipped as this one.

  Why do they have to spend money to hire these people? At least hiring themselves is a mistake by Blanc, they didn't even prepare for the opening. Can't they see that? It's just to reduce trouble, after all, having more people makes it more secure. Or perhaps the bottle caps they paid out are worthless to them. Thinking of this, Li Ang felt a wave of sadness, never thinking he would sink to the point of risking his life for a pile of soda caps.

  Arriving at the Sand Thief's campsite, it was already noon. Even without their main force present, there were still over a hundred people around, and this organization didn't have any non-combat personnel to begin with. According to Lamei's intelligence, they also had two 20-man patrol teams active.

  Blank directed everyone to carefully drive the vehicle to a distant sand pit and wait for nightfall. The group of seventeen people was divided into four groups, taking turns resting and preparing for nighttime action. Except for being sleepy during his shift, Leon couldn't sleep, first learning from others to carefully check his equipment, then starting to daydream. Why did he end up in this place, and what would he do in the future? His mind was filled with wave after wave of anxiety, looking at the crippled Jin who could still snore loudly in his powered armor, Leon suddenly felt that this person must not have any worries, and being able to think about nothing might actually be a kind of happiness.

  At last they made it until 3 am. Redd, wearing a wide-brimmed cowboy hat, woke up Liang who was still half asleep and started to take action.

  The Sand Thieves' camp appears to be a dilapidated old-world city, the only difference being that they have built a wall around the camp using various scrap materials. Abandoned cars, old concrete walls, and numerous steel plates surround the camp very tightly, with a watchtower every now and then, on top of which there are not only people patrolling but also searchlights. Even though there is no force nearby that can threaten them, they still haven't let their guard down, it seems that the Sand Thieves are not a disorganized mob.

  Li Ang and the other two stopped about 200 meters away from the barricade. The man, Mackey, took down the backpack behind him and started to set up the explosives with detonators and triggers. Watching him take out blocks of solid material from a bucket filled with coal oil and attach what seemed to be an ignition device on top, Li Ang's heart was racing with fear. Wanting to walk away but having nowhere to hide, he realized that he had been walking alongside a super-explosive barrel the whole time. What were they thinking, using this unstable old-fashioned C-family volatile explosive? Unknowingly, he must have brushed shoulders with Emperor Ge several times along the way.

  It seems that this cripple Jin is indeed unreliable, the demolition expert he found can settle himself at any time without harming anyone. Li Ang surprisingly had no awareness in his heart that he was the real waste among these people, and he kept muttering to himself about the cripple.

  At 4 am, the originally bustling Sand Bandit camp gradually quieted down. This was also the moment when people's sleep was at its deepest. I believe that if it weren't for the presence of someone who could blow himself up to the sky beside him, he would have liked to take a short nap too.

  At 4:01, the sound of various weapons fired at the front gate of the camp. Blanke's assault team began to act. The two teams on this side also started acting simultaneously. Lede, who had been well-prepared early, shot and killed the sentry on the distant watchtower with one shot, but the second shot did not take out the searchlight as planned.

  "Locke, take it out." Kim yelled at the mutant as he saw that rifle bullets were apparently no threat to the military searchlight.

  Locke sprang into action, grabbing the machine gun and sweeping the watchtower with a hail of bullets. The heavy weapon's projectiles emitted white streaks, tracing parabolic arcs in the night sky, and the ill-fated tower was instantly reduced to rubble.

  It's over like this, what's the point of having a sniper. Li Ang was secretly scolding, while Reed had already taken down another lookout tower guard further away.

  At least five hundred meters, several months of hunting career made Li Ang know how difficult it was. It turned out that there was a god of guns around him, and after the action was completed, he had to get a rifle with a scope, and then he could easily deal with the golden lizard. That's a big pile of lids.

  Everyone except Li Ang, who was staring blankly and thinking about how to get his hands on the M14 and make a fortune, had already moved towards the wall. The lewd man, McGyver, took the lead and rushed to the bottom of the wall, using the plastic explosive in his hand to set up an explosion. After a loud bang, a hole large enough for an elephant to pass through was exposed before everyone's eyes.

  The firepower group immediately pressed on from the breakthrough point according to the position of the hostages. Apparently, this raid caught the sand thieves off guard, and most people were not fully dressed or equipped. And those who were vigilant mostly rushed towards the front where Blanke's group was making a loud noise, while only a few people on this side could pick up their weapons to resist.

  Li Ang was surrounded by heavily armed personnel, especially the crippled Jin and the mutant Luo Ke. These two humanoid beasts were immune to ordinary weapons and charged forward with fierce attacks. The heavy machine gun fire made many sand thieves either cut in half or blown open with a big hole, almost instantly killing them. Of course, this situation should be considered fortunate, as the sand thieves who were set on fire by Jin's flame gun occasionally let out miserable cries and ran out of the buildings and shelters they had been hiding in, struggling to end their suffering.

  Li Ang's group followed closely behind, except for himself having no awareness of the battle, Lede occasionally put down enemies who had escaped from a distance, and Mackey, who was following behind him, was setting up explosives everywhere, east and west, it seemed that this person was born with a destructive desire, a demolition maniac, many buildings without any destruction value were also equipped with explosives.

  What struck Li Ang as strange was that he didn't feel nauseous from the bloody scene, as described in books. Although the air was filled with a vomit-inducing smell of blood and burnt tissue, all he felt was his heart racing due to tension.

  "Right ahead is where they're holding the prisoners, Red get to high ground and cover everyone else, others secure this area." Kim ordered after spotting a solid building up front.

  "Kak, Lander, follow me! Everyone else take cover!" Jin yelled as he kicked open the iron door of the building and turned to shout behind him.

  Lee Ang remained at the back of the team, and to this day he still hadn't fired a single shot. Safety first, safety first. He kept repeating this mantra in his mind as he moved through the darkness. Slowly but surely, he made his way towards the building where Jin had entered, while Mackey behind him was recklessly setting up explosives as if danger didn't exist. Suddenly, Lee Ang felt that he himself was actually in the greatest danger, and hastily quickened his pace to catch up with Jin and the others ahead.

  The bandits apparently began to notice that something was wrong inside the camp, and the firepower team members were no longer as relaxed as they had been at first. Fortunately, Lock attracted a lot of firepower on the front line and used his machine gun to suppress the rushing sand thieves at the intersection, unable to lift their heads.

  "Li Ang! Come in quickly. The person we're looking for should be here." It seems that Jin has already cleared out the enemies inside the house, and is shouting from somewhere through a loudspeaker.

  What's coming will always come, and this situation is something that Li Ang can't avoid. Helplessly, he gritted his teeth and rushed into the building quickly.

  As soon as he entered, a strong stench made Li Ang dizzy. It wasn't just the smell of blood, but also the pungent odor of human waste mixed together. Two dead bandits were twisted and lying at the entrance, clearly the result of being flung by the crippled man's powered armor. One person's head was twisted to an unbelievable angle, while another person holding a large knife was torn in half, with their abdominal contents spilling all over the ground. Undigested food sprayed everywhere from the torn intestines. Fortunately, Li Ang's stomach was empty at the moment, but a wave of acidic gastric juice still rose up. The killing that had just occurred was far away, but the gruesome scene before him made Li Ang realize that he wasn't on a tour, but fighting for his life.

  The good times didn't last long, and by the time he reached the second room, he could no longer bear the intense nausea. It turned out that the smell from earlier wasn't just from the two bandits losing control of their bowels when they died, or at least not as strong as this room was in general.

  Li Ang had never seen a slaughterhouse before, but in his impression, a slaughterhouse was just like this. However, he had never imagined that the things hanging here were human corpses, and even the hell he imagined was not as cruel as this. Obviously, it was still working not long ago. A grown man was fixed on the operating frame with an iron hook, just like a big pig. The huge incision in the middle made the entire thoracic cavity and abdominal cavity open. The contents inside were all scooped out and placed on the table, and the meat on one leg had been stripped clean. On the ground was a large bucket containing this person's excrement, it seemed that when this person was handled by the sand thieves, he was still alive. In the corner of the house, there were several people with bound bodies, both men and women. If not for the commotion just now, perhaps these people would have ended up like this too.

  "Li Ang! Don't dawdle on me! Come over quickly!" Jin's roar came from inside.

  Li Ang, who had just come back to his senses, hastily ran inside, and more clearly realized that this world would never accept the weak.