Chapter Sixty-Four: Peril on Every Side

Ark Bevin lay prone on the ground, his heart still pounding as he stared at the small hole in the nearby tree. If his reaction had been even half a second slower, that bullet would have claimed his life! To fire such a shot in the dense forest—just how skilled was the enemy marksman?

“We’ve found another one!” For the first time, a hint of relief flickered in Ark Bevin’s heart. After dispatching a five-man search team to track the sniper’s whereabouts, he switched to the channel of Third Platoon Leader. “Connor, report your status!”

“We’ve spotted a groundhog. One man wounded. Tenth squad is in pursuit! Eleventh squad continues the search as ordered!”

Connor’s reply allowed Ark Bevin to breathe a little easier. After cautioning Connor to remain vigilant, he switched his comm to First Platoon Leader, Morton. As long as the two squads under Morton could locate one or two of the enemy, the situation would become far more manageable. Ark Bevin was certain Morton could accomplish this—after all, that dock was almost certainly the only viable point for the enemy to evacuate a large number of hostages from the island. There was no way they would abandon it.

“Morton, report your status!”

For a long while, the headset was filled only with static—no reply from Morton. An ominous feeling crept over Ark Bevin. He increased the volume and shouted, “Morton!”

Silence.

“Morton, report your status!” Now, a clear note of anxiety and frustration colored Ark Bevin’s voice.

Still, the headset yielded nothing but silence.

“Morfius! Ronnie! Carson! McGray…” He called each in turn, but the only answer was an endless, suffocating silence. Ark Bevin opened the group channel, shouting, “First Platoon, respond! Damn it, answer me!”

This time, there was finally a reply—a voice came through to Ark Bevin: “Private Anderson, First Platoon, sir, all is normal!”

Ark Bevin had just begun to relax when, on the other end, Anderson’s startled cry erupted: “Ah, no—”

A burst of gunfire—rat-tat-tat—cut off his words, his voice twisting into a scream, followed by a barrage of gunshots and the agonized cries of several men. A desperate voice rang out: “Sir, they ambushed us! Saint Emperor, the whole platoon—”

A muffled thud, the sound of a heavy body collapsing, abruptly ended the wailing. Silence fell, profound and absolute.

“Saint Emperor…” Ark Bevin squeezed his eyes shut in agony, then sprang to his feet and roared, “Third Squad Leader, take your men and reinforce the dock—take it back!”

The order given, Ark Bevin quickly assessed the situation. To his dismay, he realized that after this single assault, his force had been whittled down to a perilous edge.

The dock team—twenty men—was annihilated. Of the more than fifty men he’d personally led, seven or eight were dead or wounded. With three squads of five dispatched as search groups, counting himself, he now had only twenty-five combat-ready soldiers left.

But these men would have to suffice! His own numbers were thin, but the enemy’s were thinner still. The hostile squad, less than ten strong, had split into several teams to harry his forces. Their core zone—the airplane—must now be weakly defended. If he could seize control there, hope remained.

Moreover, if he combined his remaining force with Third Platoon’s twenty men, who were still intact and operating in the southwest, and he still failed to take the objective, he would go down as the most incompetent captain in the history of Poseidon Assault Team Six!

Let him and these brave warriors launch a dual-pronged assault—meeting strength with cunning, striking straight for the heart of the enemy! When the time came, he would send every last one of those red devils to hell with his own hands!

He checked his gear and barked, “Sergeant James, take four men to tend the wounded and maintain a defensive watch. The rest, wedge formation—attack with me!”

Twenty commandos swiftly regrouped and, following Ark Bevin, charged toward the spot where the plane had landed.

Amid the distant sound of explosions, Wuyun stood up and gave a thumbs-up to Song Jingang in the distance.

Moments earlier, as he ambushed a member of the Poseidon Assault Team, his target had suddenly received some message and jerked his head up, exposing Wuyun’s position. Though he killed the man on the spot, the enemy’s gun went off before he fell. Worse still, if Song Jingang hadn’t fired in time to snipe another enemy and suppress two more firing positions, Wuyun would have found himself in serious trouble.

“Team B, be advised: a squad of ten enemies is advancing toward your position. Repeat, a squad of ten enemies is heading your way!” Bei Shiliang’s voice crackled through. Wuyun and Song Jingang immediately tensed, and Wuyun replied, “Don’t try to steal my kill—I’m going!”

Song Jingang grinned. “You? You think you’re up to it?”

“Bah! What man would say he isn’t!” Wuyun cursed, waved his hand, and bounded into the tall grass like a rabbit. Song Jingang shifted his position and continued to watch the sea, his mission to hold this vantage point at all costs, secure the dock and research vessel, and cover the final group of hostages arriving there.

Among the four combat groups, only Lei Dong operated alone. Huang Xiwen, too, was solo—tasked not only with monitoring the core battle zone around the plane’s landing site and ambushing the enemy, but also with coordinating and overseeing the entire battlefield.

Two hours after Lei Dong led the hostage group out, Huang Xiwen, concealed in the forest south of Area One, finally spotted the assault team that had landed from the south.

It was a platoon of about thirty men, advancing rapidly in a classic dual-arrow formation typical of commandos. Unlike most units in the world, the Poseidon Assault Team was small—usually organized in eight-man squads. This group, however, was made up of four squads, divided into two teams. At the front of each team, two scouts advanced fifty meters apart laterally and twenty meters apart front to back, alternating positions to cover each other as they moved.

Behind the scouts, two riflemen with Model 32 rifles followed, while the heart of the formation consisted of two heavily armed fire support teams—each with four men, two machine guns, a grenadier, and even a shotgun for close-quarters devastation.

The two fire support teams faced opposite directions: the first at the rear formed a rightward attack arrow; the second, a leftward one.

At the very rear were the commander and a communications officer, orchestrating the squad’s movements.

The greatest advantage of this formation was its balanced firepower and manpower, tight structure, smooth command, and rapid reaction—it could flexibly respond to almost any battlefield situation. Against a large-scale assault, it could swiftly concentrate its fire for defense and retreat; against small-scale harassment, one element could fix the enemy in place while the other outflanked and annihilated them. When facing an evenly matched opponent, the formation could quickly break into several triangle or inverted-triangle configurations, adaptable for offense or defense, advancing or withdrawing as needed.

The interlocking dual-arrow formation, with its complementing firepower and manpower, was almost seamless.

The thirty-odd commandos, moving in this composite dual-arrow formation, swept across the island’s terrain with swift, coordinated motion. The spacing between individuals, groups, and teams shifted continually, but the overall formation remained tight and unified, flowing through the grass like water with a peculiar rhythm.

Clearly, these men were all hardened veterans, and their commander operated at a level of mastery rarely seen.

Generally, whether dual-arrow or composite dual-arrow, such formations worked best in open terrain with good visibility. It was still nighttime; visibility was poor. Though the commandos’ night-vision gear compensated significantly, no equipment could truly neutralize the limits of sight. In this terrain—between mountainous and flat jungle—their movement and reconnaissance would be severely constrained, exposing numerous weaknesses.

Yet this very team had chosen such a formation. It was clear that every single member, officers and men alike, possessed a profound confidence that they could devastate any opponent under any circumstances. Such adversaries were always the hardest to deal with.

“They really are something,” Huang Xiwen thought, “but there’s no formation in the world without a weakness. For example…” He pressed his eye to the night vision scope mounted on his assault rifle.

The commandos advanced rapidly, knowing there weren’t many enemies on this desolate island—and that the enemy’s force included a large but utterly untrained group of hostages. Under the direction of Platoon Leader Connor, the two teams of four scouts slung their Model 32 rifles across their chests, drew their machetes, and began hacking a path through the tall grass.

Suddenly, the lead scout on the right wing raised his left hand sharply, forearm vertical, signaling a halt. Connor bent his left elbow to head height, clenched his fist, extended his index and middle fingers in a hook, and waved them rapidly—instantly, the two following groups moved up to fifty meters behind the scouts, ready to cover them.

Connor then signaled with a clenched fist, prompting the fire support teams to fan out to both flanks, each seeking cover and forming an assault formation, ready for contact. At the rear, the communications man swiftly deployed the infrared camera, scanning the surrounding terrain.

The entire squad moved with flawless coordination and speed. From the scout’s signal to the final formation, it took just three seconds—smooth as running water.

ps: You see? You asked me to cut the prison break section, and now I have to rewrite all the special operations hand signals. But this will be the only time. From now on, all hand signals will be summarized as “he made a gesture, indicating such and such” or “he made a gesture with a certain meaning.” I suspect the people who like this novel know as much about hand signals as I do…

A bit of flattery to everyone—use your bookmarks, recommendations, and clicks to shower me with support! The heavier, the better—I’ve got a thick hide, I can take it!