Chapter Ninety-One: Fatal Strike

“Enemy attack!”

Cabo roared and threw himself flat, then rolled hard, instantly tearing away from where he had been.

The gunfire did not slacken in the slightest because of his swift reaction.

They had truly been far too careless.

They had fixated on the threat from the golden medicine insects and forgotten the threat posed by He Tian.

To put it bluntly, it was contempt for He Tian.

And contempt of that kind was bound to be punished.

There had been only a fleeting opening.

Yet of the twelve men in all, including Sten, five were struck between the brows and died on the spot.

He Tian had raised the art of sniping to its pinnacle.

For a heartbeat, the entire jungle seemed to fall utterly silent.

The seven who remained, including Cabo, were hidden in different places and did not dare move an inch.

In the distance, He Tian seemed wholly fused with his rifle, his gaze locked on that area.

He was supremely confident that if Cabo and the others made even the slightest move, he could shoot them down at once.

Now it was a contest of patience.

He Tian was certain they had no masters at the fourth level of inner strength. The strongest among them should be no more than the third level.

All of them were within the range of a sniper rifle.

Even a fourth-level master, under these circumstances, if He Tian gave him his full attention, would still be shot dead.

That was the power of firearms.

The reason the Dragon Soul was so transcendent was not merely because its members were all masters of inner strength, but because each and every one of them was a true king among soldiers.

Any one of them could wield modern weapons with uncanny mastery. That was the most fearsome thing about Dragon Soul.

Just like now, when He Tian, with only one sniper rifle, could keep so many masters of inner strength from moving rashly.

As the world advanced, the combat power of modern weapons was by no means inferior to that of inner strength.

As for which was superior, no absolute verdict could ever truly be given.

He Tian had a blade of grass in his mouth, his expression relaxed.

This scene made him feel as though he had returned to Africa, where he had grown so quickly.

In the jungles of Africa, ambushes like this were all too common.

He Tian's finger twitched slightly, and one inner-strength expert, apparently intending to check the situation, had his skull blown open in an instant... blood spraying everywhere, cries of agony ringing out...

It was even more brutal than a shot through the head, because with his skull torn open, he could not die at once.

The searing pain and the fact that death was imminent drove the man into madness.

He flailed blindly at everything around him...

Shrieking and howling...

Only in this way did it seem he could express the lingering attachment to life in his heart.

He Tian's finger moved again, lightly.

Just then, another inner-strength expert, unable to bear watching his comrade suffer any longer, had slightly exposed himself.

And he was clever about it too, trying to slip through the chaos created by his comrade's screams and fish in troubled waters.

But unfortunately, he did not escape He Tian's eyes.

Another shot.

This inner-strength expert, moved by pity, would not have to endure the same torment as his comrade.

He was killed instantly.

The remaining five under Cabo now did not dare move at all.

He Tian's ghostlike sniping truly made them feel as if they were standing on the very edge of death.

The inner-strength expert whose skull had been torn open finally lost his strength and collapsed to the ground.

Blood flowed and life ebbed away.

Yet there was still so much unwillingness in his eyes, so much attachment to this world.

He Tian continued to hold his shooting posture, not moving an inch.

That was the rule of sniping.

After firing one shot, one should change position.

But who told Cabo and the others that they had no weapon capable of threatening He Tian at all?

Under such circumstances, He Tian could afford to be outrageously arrogant and expose his position so brazenly.

That kind of arrogance was itself a tremendous deterrent.

Wherever they were, a group of inner-strength experts, whether at the second or third level, were a valuable asset.

And He Tian also believed that in the eyes of General Baran, Cabo and the others must also have held considerable weight.

The one He Tian truly wanted to make war against, in the final analysis, was General Baran himself.

So then, by eliminating the group of inner-strength experts that General Baran valued so highly, He Tian would undoubtedly make that man feel the pain.

And that would let He Tian vent his fury.

What? Shenfeng stole someone else's things?

He Tian would not consider the matter from that angle.

Sometimes one does need to think for the other side. But sometimes, one absolutely does not.

Cabo lay prone on the ground.

He could not even be sure where the others were now, nor could he establish contact with them.

In truth, the five of them had all fallen into a state of fighting on their own.

Cabo knew that the one targeting them was absolutely a supreme expert. Those two shots from before had already made his level abundantly clear.

Cabo had no confidence that he could evade a bullet's killing blow.

So he could only remain flat on the ground like this.

But staying that way forever was not a solution. They had to resolve the current predicament.

Yet how?

How on earth were they supposed to resolve it?

“Ahhh!”

Just as Cabo was thinking about that very problem, he suddenly saw one of his comrades bouncing out from the jungle.

And on his backside...

There was actually a long, slender snake.

Cabo, no stranger to the jungle, saw it clearly. The snake was venomous. It was called the Death Snake.

In other words, once it bit you, its poison would spread, and no one would survive.

“Help me! Help me!”

Facing death, the inner-strength expert forgot the threat He Tian posed.

Then his instinctive will to survive drove him to lunge toward another comrade.

“Get lost, don’t come here!”

Who could still care about him now?

The man he had扑 toward was furious and flustered, hastily striking out to shove his comrade away.

Unfortunately...

Their performance ended there.

That commotion had already given He Tian an opening.

He simply shifted his angle, raising it slightly, and fired two shots in succession.

Then all the clamor vanished in an instant.

Cabo clenched his fists. In his heart he cursed the man bitten by the snake for being utterly stupid.

Was this not clearly dragging someone else down to die with him? Despicable. Truly despicable.

At the same time, Cabo secretly felt relieved.

Relieved that he, thankfully, had not been the one the snake-bitten man had lunged at.

If it had been Cabo...

Cabo had no confidence whatsoever that he could have escaped the other man's shot.

“Modern weapons!” Cabo howled inwardly.

He had never imagined that one day he would be forced to such a degree by modern firearms.

He had fought against the most elite special forces under Sten, against the best snipers, and it was not as though he had no experience with them.

But in accuracy, firing speed, and every other respect, they could not compare with the hidden enemy now before them.

In such contests before, Cabo had always been the victor.

And now, he could not see the slightest hope of victory.

This made Cabo extremely anxious, and deeply regretful as well.

If he had known modern weapons possessed such overwhelming deterrent power against inner-strength masters, he should have studied them and practiced them long ago.

And now...

Whether he could even stay alive was still uncertain. As for the chance to practice, it was probably gone forever.

Three were left.

But Cabo still could not think of any way to solve the problem at hand.

He Tian silently set down his sniper rifle.

Then, with his entire body concealed, he crept forward.

There were only three left now. Even without the sniper rifle, He Tian was confident that dealing with the three of them would be effortless.

Still, he was fully armed.

If there was an advantage to be had, He Tian would never willingly give it up.

Trading the smallest cost for the greatest victory—that was the principle He Tian lived by.

As He Tian shifted soundlessly into position, he finally saw an inner-strength expert lying flat on the ground, too afraid to move.

He could not help but laugh.

Were they timid? Or were they timid?

In any case, to He Tian, they were far too cowardly.

Did they not know that fate could only ever be seized actively, and that only then might it be placed in one's own hands?

To wait so passively was no different from walking slowly, step by step, toward death.

If it were He Tian, he would absolutely not accept such a method.

A handgun appeared in He Tian's hand.

In this jungle, under full combat gear, He Tian did not think of himself as some inner-strength expert; he thought of himself as a true king of soldiers.

Modern weapons were his first choice now.

And He Tian's marksmanship was beyond question.

Still from behind that inner-strength expert, he had ample time to aim, and then...

Fire.

The man's head burst open.

He Tian deliberately removed the suppressor, letting the gunshot echo through the jungle.

Cabo was startled.

From the sound of the shot, Cabo could tell at once that the enemy had already drawn near to this area.

At once, Cabo grew secretly furious.

The other side had abandoned the sniper rifle.

What an opportunity that had been, and he had not dared move an inch. Cabo was filled with all manner of regret.

But now he knew: the chance had arrived.

That had been the sound of a pistol.

A pistol could not compare with a sniper rifle.

If they did not seize this chance to flee, they would truly leave their lives here.

So Cabo leapt up without any hesitation.

Then he rushed swiftly into the depths of the jungle. Even though the direction he chose was the same one as the golden medicine insects, he could no longer care about that much.

Another inner-strength expert clearly had the same thought as Cabo.

He, too, wanted to seize the chance and run.

Only, his position was different from Cabo's.

He Tian's lips curved in a smile.

This was exactly the chance he had been waiting for.

Two gunshots rang out, and two figures fell swiftly to the ground.

But He Tian merely frowned slightly, then moved quickly toward Cabo's direction...