Chapter 12: Jie's Story (Part 2)

  Jie woke up 10 hours after being captured and the first person he saw when he opened his eyes was Zhaire.

  At that time, Zha'er stared at Jie with a cold gaze and told Jie that they had used cutting-edge instruments to scan his body and analyze the data, greatly appreciating his excellent physical condition and mastery of single-soldier combat skills, and warmly welcoming him to become a member of the "Gurital" organization.

  "Kuri Tāru" was in the second year after his retirement when he officially launched the "Holy War", and for the organization and its founders who carried out a series of terrorist activities and anti-human atrocities, Kuri felt deeply disgusted and resentful. He often regretted not being able to participate in the battle against them due to his retirement. Now, this organization's small leader actually intended to let himself join the organization, Kuri felt both angry and absurd. Kuri resolutely told Zayir: "That's impossible, don't even think about it!" In response to Kuri's reaction, Zayir seemed to have anticipated it, he coldly said to Kuri: "Originally you should be a dead man, but I have a loving heart for excellent soldiers, so I let you live for a few more hours. Now that I've let you live for a few more hours, I don't mind letting you live for a few more hours. Think about my suggestion again, tomorrow at this time I'll come to hear your answer. If by then you still insist on not joining, then this will be your outcome..." As he spoke, Zayir pressed a small remote control in his hand, and one side of the wall suddenly became transparent like glass. Through the glass wall, a complete human skin was seen hanging on the inner side of the wall, with all five senses intact, limbs undamaged... The dry shape and empty eye sockets told of cruelty and suffering.

  At night, Jie Si was unable to fall asleep, thinking that he would definitely not be able to escape this calamity. He began to consider how to make his death more painful. Near midnight, Jie vaguely felt a rhythmic vibration coming from the pocket of his underwear. It was then that he suddenly remembered that when he parted ways with Sang Yan, Sang Yan had given him a miniature sensor transmitter, which he had hastily put in his underwear pocket. The transmitter continuously sent out the same message - "Jie, are you still alive?" Jie took out the transmitter and quickly tapped out a response to the other party - "Battalion Commander, I'm still alive..."

  Shang Yan's contact with Jie was very brief. Shang Yan told Jie that his current situation was not good and it was uncertain whether he could survive... He told Jie to survive no matter what, and not to give up easily... Later, the telegraph device stopped transmitting information. Jie knew that Shang Yan's injuries were severe and he must have fainted at this moment. Jie told himself: "Continue fighting like a true warrior..."

  The next morning, Zair arrived at the cell on time, accompanied by a short doctor-like man in a white coat. Zair asked Jie: "What's your decision, young man?" Jie said: "I used to serve in the field army, but I retired because I wanted to seek greater development and came to the border to open up a gold mine, so I don't want to have anything to do with any political or military groups."

  Zahil asked, "Is this your answer? It seems you're not very interested in joining the Gurital?" Jie said, "Yes!" Zahil said, "I know that the military personnel of your country are all very shrewd and won't easily switch allegiance to another master!" "This is really a stupid statement!" Jie cursed silently in his heart. Zahil continued, "Just now I heard you mention wanting to seek greater development, what do you think this greater development is?" Towards Zahil's ambiguous conversation, Jie felt very disgusted, and with a tone of disgust said, "I'm not a follower waiting for enlightenment, if there's something to say then just say it directly." Zahil smiled, then suddenly punched Jie in the face. "Fine, since you've already made your decision, I'll give you some directness! Doctor, flay his skin!"

  "Wait... Colonel!" Just as Zha Yi was about to get angry, Jie hastily stopped him. "What's there to say? Are you afraid?" Zha Yi asked disdainfully. Jie sneered and said: "Afraid? Of course not, just unwilling to let you skin us alive like this." Zha Yi said: "It's easy not to be skinned, join us, work for me!" Jie asked: "I used to be a Liberation Army soldier, aren't you afraid that I'll turn against your organization after joining?" Zha Yi burst out laughing... and said: "Of course not, if I dare to let a warrior like you join, I have my own ways to control you."

  Jie suddenly changed his tone and said, "Actually, one of the main reasons I chose to leave the army back then was that I couldn't stand the internal **and political darkness." Zha Yil was taken aback by Jie's sudden change and immediately gave him a strange look. "Your political stance is quite resonant with me," Zha Yil said after a pause. "My father was a US soldier stationed in Afghanistan, but he died in a war. I grew up and enlisted just like my father, joining the Tree Frog Special Forces. In battle, I feared no death and fought bravely, but what did I get in return? Some incompetent fools who were good at bribery and manipulation climbed to positions above me, while I became a clown whose life was manipulated by others for their entertainment. Later, Guli Tal made me understand that people are not equal, but this inequality is based on ability, not background."

  Zahir leaned in close, his eyes wide with excitement. "Young man, your abilities should be put to good use, not wasted among the common folk. Join Guritar and become my trusted subordinate, and your life will be vastly different." Jie stared back at Zahir, his voice cold as he said: "Colonel sir, what you say seems reasonable. If possible, I'm willing to join!"

  Zahir nodded in satisfaction: "Young man, this is absolutely the most correct choice you've made in your life."

  The initiation ceremony was held five days later, and during those five days before the formal initiation, Zha'er had a chip implantation surgery done on Jie. The chip, which could only be seen under a high-powered microscope, was implanted in Jie's central nervous system. Due to the effect of the chip, all of Jie's words and actions were controlled by a secret satellite monitoring station.

  The ritual of joining the Gureital religious organization was not complicated. On that day, there were more than a dozen people who were about to join the religious organization like Jie, but the initiation ceremony was held in a relatively dimly lit mountain fortification, and everyone wore masks, so they couldn't see each other's appearance. The fortification had some kind of technical means, making people feel as if they were in outer space, with strange stars scattered all around. A person revered as the "Master" stood at the center of the altar, his hands raised high, gazing up at the starry sky, muttering to himself.

  A moment later, the high priest ordered that all those about to be initiated be locked in an iron cage. At this point Zair stood up and addressed everyone: "In each cage there is a four-year-old python, whoever can kill it with their own dagger, then dig out its eyes and swallow them into their belly, will become a formal member of the Gurtalar organization."

  Inside the snake cage, a python with scales reflecting green light was spitting out long threads of saliva, its large mouth drooling with a mesh-like texture, and it was clear that the python was extremely hungry. The Protestants engaged in a bloody battle with the python, during which two of them were swallowed by the snake due to exhaustion. However, most of them successfully hunted down the snake and gouged out its eyes, swallowing them whole in front of the bishop. In this human-snake battle, Jie successfully hunted down the python but, in his haste, used a dagger to stab the snake's eyes to pulp. The bishop saw that Jie had failed to complete the task and was furious, scolding Jie as an idiot.

  Jie stood in front of the bishop, hearing the bishop say with a loud laugh. "It's not that I don't have the ability to get the snake eye, but rather I am unwilling to swallow such a lowly beast's organ." As he spoke, Jie made a fierce gesture - he grasped his dagger and dug out his own left eye, then threw it in front of the bishop.

  He swallowed the eyeball that was still dripping with blood. The bishop, Zayil and everyone present were shocked by Jie's action. However, the bishop seemed to be a person who had long been numb to fresh blood, he quickly regained his composure and said calmly: "You have a lot of bloodlust, from today on, you are a member of the Gurital religious organization." Jie looked at the bishop in front of him, didn't say anything, just nodded lightly.

  After returning to the base, Zayil highly praised Jie. Zayil told Jie that the Gilita organization had more than 200,000 people, but only less than 20,000 could truly join the church, and these people were the true human elite. The vast majority of others have not been truly allowed to join the church, but are just used as inferior species tools. Zayil said: "The Y organization belongs to a higher level of Gilita, entering such a level can be reused by the organization, with powers that ordinary organizational members cannot reach, you can become a member of the Y organization proves that I am not wrong."

  Jie remained extremely calm, telling Zayil that power was nothing but a form of self-expression. Zayil asked Jie, "Don't you feel sorry for blinding your own eyes?" Jie thought to himself, "Anyway, they're already blind, and this way they can be used to their fullest potential." Although he thought this, Jie's words were ambiguous as he said to Zayil and also to himself, "It doesn't matter, I've lost my left eye, but my right eye is still here. Even with one eye, I'm still an excellent warrior!"

  In the following days, Jie did many things that went against his conscience in order to gain more trust from the organization and steal more intelligence to help Zayir. Every day, he was tormented by self-reproach, and the only hope that kept him going was the possibility of reconnecting with Sangyan again.

  However, ten days, twenty days, fifty days passed, and Jie still did not receive any signal from Sangyan. Every day was like a year for Jie, he often asked himself in his heart, if he couldn't contact Sangyan, couldn't deliver the intelligence to the combat troops, what value would his life have? Finally, one day, Jie's heart turned cold and grey, he was certain that Sangyan had sacrificed herself. Jie told himself, he couldn't live like this against his will anymore. Just as Jie was about to shoot himself with a gun, the telegraph device hidden in his arm skin finally sent out a signal.

  Sang Yan told Jie that after the operation, he had been in a coma for over a month and just woke up today. At this moment, Jie's tears burst out uncontrollably, and he told Sang Yan that he had already joined the cult organization and grasped many internal secrets and intelligence, which could be used to coordinate with special forces in combat. Sang Yan told Jie to take good care of himself and wait until his injuries were a bit better before joining forces to fight against the cult together.

  Reconnecting with Sangyan reignited Jie's passion for battle and courage to survive. In the nearly two years that followed, Jie closely collaborated with Sangyan, helping combat troops defeat cult forces multiple times and successfully eliminating a cult military base within China. However, Guli Taral cleverly exploited ethnic conflicts, manufacturing the shocking "Kunshan Great Riot", resulting in thousands of deaths, tens of thousands injured, and a city destroyed.

  Jie and Sang's tacit cooperation provided timely and accurate intelligence for the troops, but in the end, a person appeared who not only harmed Sang but also made Jie forever lose contact with the troops. And this person is Liu Hui, codenamed Gui Yu.

  Liu Hui enlisted at the age of 20, with average military skills and a selfish personality that made him unpopular among his comrades. However, he somehow managed to get sent to military school and later became the deputy commander of a communications company in the Lanzhou Military Region. Little is known about his background, and few people paid attention to it. As an officer, Liu Hui changed his ways and tried hard to please and befriend his comrades, cultivating good relationships with them. He surprisingly gained a good reputation. What shocked everyone even more was that during a large-scale war, Liu Hui was unexpectedly appointed as the deputy commander of a communications battalion at the front line.

  Regarding Liu Hui's secret harm to Sang Yan, it is necessary to start with the "Kunshan Great Riot". After the "Kunshan Great Riot" was pacified, General Yu Ning, Deputy Director of the Political Department of the Headquarters, went to Kunshan for a visit and condolences to comfort the local people. The itinerary of General Yu Ning's visit belonged to the first-level top secret and should not have had any accidents. However, General Yu Ning was assassinated during this trip.

  After the general was assassinated, the troops immediately launched a thorough investigation. At this time, the defected Liu Hui happened to intercept the telegram code between Jie and Sang during a night shift through an ultra-high frequency radio receiver. Although he could not decipher the content of these telegrams, he learned that the signal was sent by Sang through technical means. Later, Liu Hui informed his contact in the Guri Tala organization about this situation. The contact used the frequency provided by Liu to send a large amount of reactionary information to Sang, while Liu pretended to have intercepted this information and reported it to headquarters.

  Facing seemingly irrefutable evidence, Sang Yan was speechless. During his detention, Liu Hui had attempted to extract from Sang Yan the identity of the mole within the Guli Tower organization. However, Sang Yan vowed to keep the secret until death. Later, after failing to obtain any information through interrogation, Liu Hui went mad and designed a plot to assassinate Sang Yan.

  Later, I asked Jie why he didn't try to contact other members of the unit. Jie told me that at the time, in order not to reveal his identity in a crisis-ridden environment, his connection with Sang Yan was top-secret, so the leadership instructed that no third person could know of his existence. Therefore, except for Sang Yan, no one else knew about Jie's existence or that he was the one who had been in contact with Sang Yan. After Liu Hui appeared, Jie felt even more vulnerable to unknown dangers and thoroughly went into hiding. Deeply hidden, Jie waited every day for an opportunity to deliver a fatal blow to the Guli Tala organization. Finally, one day, I, this slippery loach, appeared. Then, Jie began to carefully set things up and eventually succeeded in contacting me...

  When the sky is turning white, Jie tells me it's time to rest, and when Zaiyin comes back, the battle will start, so in the remaining time, we need to conserve our energy.

  But I had just fallen asleep on the board bed for a while, when the door of the cell was suddenly opened with a clang, and a guy with his head wrapped in gauze rushed in fiercely. "You scum, you sleep quite well, today I'll take your life..." I opened my eyes to look. It wasn't someone else, but that little mustache from two days ago who had been torn off his face...