Chapter Fifty-Four: The Power of Reloading Bullets

  The red sun rises, the morning breeze is slightly cool, the mountains and forests are quiet, and the vast wilderness is silent.

  The panic and confusion of the previous ambush had gradually subsided. The remaining sixty or seventy Jin soldiers had reorganized their formation, under the command of a banner-bearing officer, forming a loose cavalry array, cautiously searching around in all directions.

  Already disguised, Di Lie, lurking in the grass on the mountain top, nodded slightly: Indeed, they are worthy of being the elite of the Golden Army. In order to become the main force of the Golden Army's battlefield interception, these scout cavalrymen were all veterans who had been through hundreds of battles. Most of them were Jurchen people, and they were also warriors from the strongest Sheng Jurchen tribe. Judging solely by their individual combat skills, one of them could take on two Jurchen golden soldiers, five Khitan people, or ten Song army elite soldiers.

  But let's get back to the point, what are the so-called elite troops of the Song army? They refer to the hundreds of thousands of imperial guards in the capital city of Bianjing. What kind of moral character do these imperial guards have? They are all trembling with fear as soon as they mount their horses and hug the horse's neck; The Jin army just beat the war drums on the north bank of the Yellow River for one night, and the tens of thousands of troops stationed on the south bank of the Yellow River collapsed like a bunch of rabbits on the battlefield.

  Such "crack troops", Jin army scouts could take on a hundred with just over a dozen - this is not an exaggeration, but a true marvel of war that has actually appeared on the battlefield. As for this point, the previous chapter's seven riders PK two thousand have already been mentioned. So these ten Song military elites would be more reliable if they were replaced by the Western Army of the Great Song Dynasty.

  The Jin army scouts usually operate in units of one to five, exceling at exploiting individual advantages and fighting freely. In a typical Jin army formation, there are usually only two squads of scouts, so these sixty or seventy cavalrymen were mostly independent combat units. However, being able to become the leader of a squad in this gathering of strong men requires strength and experience comparable to that of a regular army commander. Therefore, under the command of this squad leader, the most ferocious group among the Jin army did not back down from these powerful lethal weapons, but instead launched a search with rare courage.

  When the vanguard had scouted forward for nearly a mile, they approached a small hill and no longer encountered any unusual situations. The tense nerves of the Jin soldiers began to relax slightly.

  At this time, a Jin soldier with a scarred face and a ferocious expression, carrying a ten-foot-long recognition flag on his back, gazed up at the mountain slope for a while before suddenly urging his horse forward and overtaking the head of the bamboo marker, saying: "Are those southern barbarians hiding behind the mountain slope? I'll take five riders to go and kill them all."

  Pu Tie's head shook his head, and the whip in his hand pointed to the forest: "They are all hiding in the woods, I am sure they have not left, but staring at us."

  "Are they staring at us? Have these southern barbarians eaten bear gall (the Jurchen people thought that bear gall was more potent than leopard gall)? I'll go and kill them all!" The Jin army's squad leader was enraged, he pulled hard on the reins, spurred his horse's belly, and forced it to stand up on its hind legs.

  "Boom!" At this moment, without any warning, a bowl-sized blood hole burst open on the horse's neck. The fine horse let out a mournful whinny and crashed to the ground.

  If it were under normal circumstances, the horse would have fallen and at most would have crushed one of its owner's legs, or broken it at worst. But this Lieutenant Jin was particularly unlucky, he happened to be standing upright. As a result, the warhorse didn't fall sideways, but instead fell straight back with a loud crack. Along with the sound, the lieutenant's neck twisted into an angle that no living person could possibly achieve.

  The Jin army, which had just relaxed its vigilance, suddenly fell into a great chaos with neighing horses and shouting men.

  Di Lie spat out the grass stem from his mouth, pulled the gun bolt, and let the bullet fall into the grass. He picked up the slightly hot shell casing and put it in his pocket.

  A bit regrettable, the previous shot, Di Lie originally aimed at that commander with the bamboo hat - the principle of sniping is to prioritize taking out the commanding officer of an army. Unfortunately, that golden armor captain just happened to be standing in front of the commander with the bamboo hat. Di Lie had no choice but to shift his aim to the captain. As a result, the captain happened to make a sudden move. At the same time, Di Lie pulled the trigger.

  As a result, the human head was replaced by a horse's head. Fortunately, that horse fell down quite levelly and indirectly achieved Di Lie's goal. The first battle to combine sniper rifles with reload bullets got off to a good start.

  Di Lie's hidden small mound was about one and a half li away from the Jin army, which is roughly 700-800 meters. If he used the original standard bullet, not only could he penetrate the horse's head, but also shoot through the heads of the soldiers behind it. However, at such close range, facing these insignificant Jin soldiers, Di Lie didn't want to waste his precious original standard bullets.

  If the troops on the mountain slope were not the Golden Army, but the Song Army, they would have launched a chaotic and aimless arrow attack in the face of a sudden surprise attack, and the entire army would have retreated. However, this Golden Army had an extremely strong will to fight, and after the initial panic, they quickly calmed down. They dispersed their cavalry, either drawing bows and arrows or half-drawing their swords, with a demeanor as if facing a great enemy.

  But... where is the enemy?

  Pu Dian flipped over the horse's head, carefully examining the wounds on the horse's corpse. On the left side was a thumb-sized blood hole, which appeared to be the entry point of an unknown weapon, while the exit wound on the right side was as large as a washbasin, sending chills down one's spine. However, upon closer inspection of the wound surface, no signs of any weapon could be found, even after cutting off the horse's head from the wound and re-examining it repeatedly, nothing was discovered.

  Such a terrifying and mysterious wound...

  Pu Dian's face suddenly broke out in a cold sweat, and as a seasoned soldier, he had just qualified to view the bodies of the nine Jin soldiers who were mysteriously killed at Bulu Village. And now, the wound on the horse's head was extremely similar to the mysterious wounds he had seen before.

  That's the evil spirit!

  Pu's eyes widened in shock, his nerves of steel, tempered by a hundred battles, were shaken for the first time.

  Due to repeated attacks by mysterious forces, even destroying several thousand-strong army camps, personnel and material losses were heavy. The main commander of the Jin army's eastern route, Right Vice Marshal Wanyan Zongwang, after listening to the ominous prophecy of the shamanic great wizard, in order to control the spread of rumors while not making his subordinates completely unaware of this mysterious and terrifying enemy, ordered that the nine Jin soldiers' corpses killed by unknown forces at Bulu Camp be transported separately to each route's northern return army camp, allowing the heads above Pu Wei to inspect them, so as to have a rough idea in mind. When truly facing these nameless evil spirits, they would not panic and flee without fighting like those ordinary Jin soldiers who had never seen anything before.

  But even if this Puyi guessed that it was a vengeful spirit that killed him, what could he do?

  Di Lie didn't give the other party much time to be surprised, and while the person with the Pu Yi brand on his head was looking around in fear, Di Lie pulled the trigger again.

  In the lens, Pu Jie's hard iron helmet suddenly appeared a small hole, and red and white things kept coming out. His eyes, filled with pre-mortem fear, stared fixedly at Di Lie's position, but unfortunately, he could no longer speak...

  First, a captain was killed, and then the temporary leader of this cavalry unit, Pu Dajie, was also mysteriously killed. The Jin soldiers could no longer remain calm, no matter how elite and brave they were, after all, they were still spiritually backward and barbaric. Witchcraft, mysterious powers, and unexplainable forces could completely crush them mentally, which had nothing to do with physical strength or weakness.

  Finally, someone couldn't hold back and shot the arrow in his hand, followed by more people shooting randomly - when facing ignorant forces and invisible enemies, such behavior is not a bad way to relieve pressure and adjust high mental tension.

  Di Lie quietly watched, without any intention of taking action. Until the Jin soldiers were exhausted from shooting, their hands and feet numb, their arms cramped from holding the knife handles, and they had barely calmed down a bit. Only then did Di Lie leisurely select another Jin soldier who was probably a Wu Chang, and called out his name again.

  The third inexplicable collapse of the Jin army finally made the already tense nerves of the Jin military scouts snap like a broken string. Just as throwing a stone into a beehive, this elite cavalry of the Great Jin Empire instantly erupted.

  The invisible enemy is the most terrifying enemy. Even the strongest army can't withstand the constant deaths, yet they can't find their opponent, and no matter how much they hide, they will still be beaten, leading to a desperate situation.

  Even modern elite troops can be stymied by a skilled sniper, unless they have a similarly skilled sniper to counter-snipe and break the stalemate.

  Suppress! That's right, the most important role of a sniper is to suppress!

  A skilled sniper doesn't need many bullets to achieve what even a heavy machine gun firing several thousand rounds per minute can't do. Visible death, with enough courage and conviction, can be bravely faced; but invisible death is fear, and overcoming this fear that originates from the depths of one's soul is just as difficult as overcoming oneself.

  If the previous intense explosion could still be considered as the result of the Song people burying a large number of "thunderbolt fireballs" (after all, their ingredients are similar, and the smell of gunpowder after the explosion is almost the same, only the purified black powder has N times more power), then this silent and stealthy killing technique can only be attributed to witchcraft.

  "Evil spirit! Evil spirit! It's here! Only a shaman can deal with it! Retreat quickly! Retreat quickly!"

  The mysterious and inexplicable death finally made the Jin army scouts see the light. These great Jin warriors, who came from between the White Mountain and the Black Water, and in just a few short years would overthrow two old empires that had stood for centuries, were defeated in front of this magical scene created by the high-tech weapons from later generations. Of course, there was also Di Lie's notorious intimidating power.

  "Can a shaman really deal with me?" Di Lie muttered to himself, putting away his gun, "Is it by reciting incantations or bathing in dog blood?!"

  "Master." A'tu crawled over with a shrinking head and body, saying uncertainly, "Could it be that reciting incantations or splashing dog blood can break the master's magical artifact?"

  Dilie didn't bother to explain, and instead sneered: "That would require him to read it out loud or splash it on me - and before that, I'll have enough time to turn him into a corpse."

  After watching that group of fleeing riders disappear into the distance, he leapt to his feet: "Let's go and see what kind of gods our friends are."