131: Chapter 130 Instant Kill Hidden Force

The soldiers in the armored personnel carriers disembarked, following behind the line of Warrior assault vehicles in a skirmish formation. Upon hearing Cao Xiao's attack order over the walkie-talkie, twenty-four Warrior assault vehicles shot forward like arrows. The Vulcan Cannons on their roofs opened fire frantically, while twelve assault rifles fired simultaneously from the designated firing ports on the sides of the vehicles.

The opposing side clearly hadn't expected an immediate attack and was caught off guard by the sudden rain of bullets. However, they were well-trained soldiers after all; within a few seconds, numerous tongues of fire erupted from their defensive line.

In the command center of the Black Scorpion Mercenary Group, the Commander of Black Scorpion and two vice-commanders stared at the large monitoring screen in silence. Seeing the Iron Fist Mercenary Group brazenly deploying their attack formation, their faces turned so dark they looked ready to drip water. Just as the commander was about to order a counterattack, the screen suddenly went black. Simultaneously, all the lights in the command hall went out, plunging the room into total darkness where nothing could be seen.

"What happened? Why is the power out? Didn't the independent generator start? Why aren't even the emergency lights on? Quick! Someone go out and see what's happening!" The usually composed Commander of Black Scorpion's expression changed drastically at this sudden turn of events. Many thoughts flashed through his mind in an instant, and he began to feel a sense of panic.

"Commander, all communication and power equipment have failed! Including cell phones! We can't contact any other combat units. This isn't electronic interference; the enemy has used an advanced electromagnetic weapon we don't know about!"

"Commander, this is bad! All our vehicles have stalled, the helicopters can't take off, and the fighter jets likely couldn't get airborne either!"

"Commander, the radar is unusable, and our artillery units can't aim effectively! The enemy is already locked in close combat with us; firing forcibly would result in friendly fire. What should we do now?"

"Commander, the enemy is attacking with hundreds of rocket launchers and dozens of Vulcan Cannons at once. They've already broken through our first line of defense, and the second line won't last long. Our command system is paralyzed, and the soldiers have begun to flee. We don't have time to organize a third line. It won't be long before they storm the command center. We need to retreat immediately!"

"Yes! Let's retreat first. We'll go west and have Saber-toothed Tiger avenge us and retake the base. If we don't leave now, it'll be too late!"

At the entrance of the command center, a group of officers surrounded the Commander of Black Scorpion, reporting with panic and urgency, urging him to evacuate.

The Commander of Black Scorpion was overwhelmed by the news, his eyes filled with blank confusion. He couldn't understand how the enemy possessed such means to instantly disable their entire electronic and power systems, nor how their firepower could be so overwhelming that they broke through carefully prepared defenses effortlessly before they could even react. Though he was the leader of the Black Scorpion Mercenary Group, he wasn't a professional commander. Only he knew that he was merely a proxy; without the heavy support of the forces behind him, a man as physically weak as he was could never have commanded such lawless desperadoes.

"Scimitar, Bao, escort me to Saber-toothed Tiger's base immediately." Snapping out of it, the Commander of Black Scorpion disregarded his loss of composure for the sake of his own life and immediately spoke to the middle-aged man surnamed Bao and the wicked-looking young man.

...

On the small hill, Cao Xiao lowered his binoculars and turned to Duan Hong and the others. "The situation is settled! Let's head down! The big fish are about to escape!"

At the same time, a humanoid figure in the distance suddenly vanished into thin air. This was the 'senior expert' Cao Xiao had conjured up to make an appearance; in reality, it was just a humanoid mannequin shrouded in a black robe. It was only meant to be seen from a distance by Yan Qingcheng to dispel her suspicions and provide a plausible explanation for the mysterious events occurring here.

When they were ten kilometers from the Black Scorpion Mercenary Group base, Cao Xiao used the industrial mother machine to devour all light and electromagnetic signals a thousand meters above. If any satellites were focused on this area, they would find it completely blurred and unable to capture anything. Radar and optical wave detection would yield no response whatsoever.

This allowed him to act freely. He intercepted bullets fired by enemy soldiers that would have hit his own men, knocked out enemies in bunkers, and destroyed all the enemy's heavy fire—including rocket launchers and grenades—by slicing them all in half. This was why his assault vehicles were able to break the enemy's defensive lines so quickly.

"Sister Yan, the enemy leaders are fleeing toward the three o'clock position. Take a team to intercept them. Be careful, there are martial artists among them. Just attack from a distance; do not approach rashly, it is very dangerous." Seeing that the Black Scorpion mercenaries had stopped resisting and most had surrendered, Cao Xiao restored communications.

He descended the small hill, started the assault vehicle, and sped toward the direction the Commander of Black Scorpion and his group were fleeing. Not far behind the base was a vast primeval forest. The Commander of Black Scorpion and a group of over sixty people were fleeing on foot toward the forest. Those following the commander were the group's leaders and elite mercenaries, and two of them appeared to be martial artists. He couldn't tell their exact realm, but they were at least at the level of Obvious Power. Once they successfully reached the forest, it would be difficult to pursue them, which was why he had Yan Qingcheng lead a team to intercept. He hadn't expected there to be martial artists in the Black Scorpion Mercenary Group, let alone two. He wouldn't easily pass up such a rare opportunity to collect data on martial artists, who were usually hard to come by. He didn't move to kill them directly, nor did he probe their combat attributes, fearing he might alert them.

Shortly after the dense gunfire stopped, intense firing broke out again behind the base. Cao Xiao and the others arrived at the scene in less than three minutes, passing over a dozen corpses of Black Scorpion mercenaries along the way. Three assault vehicles were circling a patch of jagged rocks, the Vulcan Cannons on their roofs firing non-stop into the central rock pile. Even though the people inside the rocks were surrounded with no hope of escape, they were still putting up a desperate resistance and returning fire. However, the assault vehicles' armor was thick, the glass was reinforced bulletproof glass, and the Vulcan Cannon positions on the roofs had armored plates. Consequently, after several minutes of crossfire, the enemy had left over a dozen bodies while Cao Xiao's side had no casualties. Yet, due to the obstruction of the rocks, even the powerful Vulcan Cannons couldn't take them down immediately.

Cao Xiao had Duan Hong stop the vehicle a hundred meters from the rock pile. He put on the bulletproof helmet handed to him by Niu Zhen and skillfully assembled a sniper rifle. The bodyguards didn't stop him; with the armored plates on the roof and Cao Xiao covered in bulletproof gear from head to toe, including his eyes, there was no danger, so they let him indulge himself.

"Sister Yan, stop the attack and shout for them to surrender unconditionally within one minute!" Cao Xiao said to Yan Qingcheng while lying on the roof of the vehicle, having set up his sniper rifle.

"Listen up, Black Scorpions inside! Stop resisting immediately! You have one minute to surrender unconditionally! Otherwise, no quarter will be given!" In less than three seconds, the three Warriors stopped their attack, and Yan Qingcheng's forceful voice echoed across the scene.

Hearing Yan Qingcheng shout in a local Huaxia dialect, Cao Xiao didn't know whether to laugh or cry. If you want people to surrender, you have to make sure they understand you! Let alone the people opposite, even Cao Xiao had to rely on guesswork to understand her. He could empathize with Yan Qingcheng; if the Black Scorpion Mercenary Group hadn't been in the way, she would have had her revenge long ago. Over the years, she had lost countless subordinates, and the hatred between the two sides had long since reached a point of 'only one can live.' Now that the enemy was surrounded and her revenge was at hand, she couldn't give them any hope; otherwise, if they all truly surrendered, she wouldn't be able to finish the job completely. So, Cao Xiao let her be. He didn't care about the lives of these people, but things shouldn't be done too heartlessly. After all, there were dozens of lives involved. He had to give them a sliver of hope, if only for his own peace of mind. But now, it all depended on their luck. If they understood and laid down their weapons, Cao Xiao would only execute the ringleaders and not wipe them all out. If they didn't understand, he couldn't be blamed—who told them not to learn the Huaxia language?

Once the attack stopped on this side, the firing from the rock pile also ceased. After a few seconds of silence, Cao Xiao thought the enemy had decided to give up resistance. To his surprise, two dark objects were suddenly thrown out, accurately hitting the sides of two assault vehicles and rolling underneath.

—Boom! Boom!—

Almost simultaneously, the two assault vehicles were lifted over two meters high. One lost its center of gravity and flipped over, crashing onto the ground with its wheels in the air. The other was luckier, landing steadily back on the ground due to its own weight.

Those were cluster grenades. Fortunately, these were armored vehicles with chassis that weren't as fragile as ordinary cars; otherwise, the bodies would have definitely disintegrated under such explosive force, and no one inside would have survived. Even so, the soldiers in those two vehicles were in bad shape.

Cao Xiao had been momentarily distracted and hadn't expected the enemy to use the ceasefire to lull them into a false sense of security before launching a bold attack. It was those two martial artists who had acted, catching them completely off guard. Two assault vehicles had lost their combat effectiveness, including the one Yan Qingcheng was in. And the enemy wasn't finished; in Cao Xiao's line of sight, the middle-aged Huaxia man and the wicked-looking white youth were holding more clusters of grenades, ready to throw them. Their targets were clearly the remaining assault vehicle and his own side.

"Watch out for bombs!" Cao Xiao shouted into the walkie-talkie to warn the soldiers in the last assault vehicle, unable to check on the injured in the other two cars.

—Boom!—

Fortunately, that assault vehicle was still running and sped away from its position just before Cao Xiao's warning. The Vulcan Cannon on its roof opened fire at the same time. The bomb exploded less than two meters behind the vehicle, the shockwave pushing the moving car forward a short distance.

After shouting, Cao Xiao quickly adjusted his aim. First, he pulled the cluster of grenades into his space to deplete its kinetic energy before releasing it. This process took less than a tenth of a second—indistinguishable to the naked eye. Then, with a crack of his rifle, the bomb exploded in mid-air fifty meters away.

Cao Xiao was now truly enraged. Since the enemy was so fierce, there was no need to hold back. He quickly swapped the bullets in his sniper rifle for special explosive armor-piercing rounds. These rounds were modified; the outer metal was a superalloy, and the interior was packed with high-power propellant and concentrated explosives. Their penetration and explosive power were more than three times stronger than the original special rounds. Since he was here, he wasn't worried about losing the shell casings. He was somewhat humiliated and furious that Yan Qingcheng and the soldiers had been injured—and one had even died—due to his negligence.

The rock pile could not block his vision; the situation inside was as clear as if it were right in front of him. Even though the armor-piercing rounds had formidable penetration, they couldn't pierce through many rocks clustered together. However, they could blow away the rocks blocking his path. Once he cleared the rocks in one direction, the enemy would be completely exposed to his muzzle.

Cao Xiao picked a rock and fired without hesitation. A long, thick bullet bored into the lower middle of a rock. After a muffled explosion, the rock shattered into pieces. This was followed by a continuous series of dull rifle cracks and explosions. During this time, bullets were constantly fired toward Cao Xiao's position, but they all mysteriously vanished in mid-air before getting close.

After loading his third round of ammunition, Cao Xiao continued to fire with a grim smile. Very few rocks were left obstructing his line of sight. Now, parts of the mercenaries' bodies were exposed. He stopped aiming at the rocks and, finding the right angles, began firing directly at the mercenaries themselves.

He didn't use the explosive armor-piercing rounds this time; those bullets were too bloody when they hit a human body, and he wasn't some bloodthirsty maniac.

The entire process took less than thirty seconds. The soldiers who could still fight crawled out of the overturned assault vehicle and used its body as cover to return fire. The other vehicle was surprisingly still functional, so the two vehicles moved around together, maintaining the blockade. Under the suppression of the Vulcan Cannons, the enemy was unable to throw any more grenades.

Screams of agony echoed from the rock pile. No matter how the Black Scorpion mercenaries adjusted their positions or hid their bodies, they couldn't escape their fate. Many weren't killed by direct hits, but by the rocks around them being shattered by bullets, sending fragments flying at immense speeds from all angles. Every shot was accompanied by a scream. Cao Xiao wasn't attacking blindly; otherwise, he would have smashed all the rocks first before killing them directly.

In less than five minutes, despite their attempts to hide and fight back, only four people remained in the rock pile: the Commander of Black Scorpion, the wicked-looking youth, and the two middle-aged Huaxia men. However, they had stopped fighting back. Even the wicked youth and the middle-aged man, despite being martial artists, couldn't help but look despairing. Martial artists were still flesh and blood; facing a sharpshooter while trapped in a cramped rock pile without the chance for close-quarters combat, they were only slightly better off than ordinary people.

This was the result of Cao Xiao intentionally showing mercy; otherwise, even an Anjin Martial Artist wouldn't have escaped the sudden strike of high-powered bullets. But now it seemed his plan to collect data on the two martial artists had failed. If they had surrendered earlier, he might have forced them to demonstrate their techniques. But given the current situation, leaving them alive was far too dangerous; they could lash out and kill at any moment. He didn't dare take risks with such dangerous enemies.

The wicked youth was clearly an extremely dangerous person, and perhaps mentally unstable—otherwise, why would his smile be so hideous? The remaining middle-aged martial artist was likely the vice-Commander of Black Scorpion and the cousin of Yan Qingcheng's enemy. Neither of them had any reason to stay alive.

Having made up his mind, Cao Xiao issued the command to probe the wicked youth's combat attributes. Instantly, the youth fell into a daze. After waiting two seconds, Cao Xiao pulled the trigger. A bullet struck a rock beside the youth, and the rock exploded, sending several fragments into the youth's head at high speed. Before he could even snap out of his daze, an Anjin Martial Artist had died there in such a bizarre fashion.