Wei Xingshan looked desperately at his own chest. There was only one thought in his mind, “It"s all over!”
He was done for!
Then he saw the arrow as he looked down.
He saw the shiny, black arrowhead, and the shaft of the arrow vibrating at a high frequency and making a buzzing noise from being stopped abruptly.
What stopped the arrow from impaling him were two fingers.
A middle and an index finger, clammed down on the arrow like a plier.
He followed the fingers and looked to his side and saw that Lin Shuo, with the giant bow on his back, was somehow standing next to him.
Lin Shuo slowly retrieved his fingers and tossed the arrow onto the ground. He then balled up his hand into a fist and shook his hand. There were black burn marks in the inner side of his two fingers.
It was dead silence in the woods, everything seemed to have stopped.
Everybody was looking right at Lin Shuo"s fingers…
Wei Xingshan was the first to react. He let out a loud, angry cry and charged ahead. He kicked w.a.n.g Yong so hard that it sent him flying 4-5 meters.
Ever since the crossbow discharged, w.a.n.g Yong had be in a daze. The kick woke him up. Happily he said “Oh, Captain Wei, you are alright!”
“I almost peed my pants!” Wei Xingshan was still pale. He lunged forward and rained down his pot-sized fist on w.a.n.g Yong, “w.a.n.g Yong! What the f*!”
w.a.n.g Yong was a 1.8 meter muscular man, but he was like a child in front of Wei Xingshan. With his arms over his head, he cried, “Captain Wei! It was an accident! I swear! I would never done such a thing!”
“I know it was! But you still pointed a weapon at one of our own!” Wei Xingshan did not stop striking him as he talked and w.a.n.g Yong continued to wail.
n.o.body tried to stopped him. Most everyone was still thinking about Lin Shuo and his two fingers. They knew that Lin Shuo was no ordinary people, but stopping an arrow from a crossbow with just two fingers? That was outside of everything they could possibly imagine!
Is he even human?
Everybody was still in shock. Even Anne, who has always had utmost confident in Lin Shuo, looked surprised by what had transpired.
When everybody came to, Wei Xingshan had finished beating up w.a.n.g Yong. Shaking his fists, he walked in front of Lin Shuo again.
Lin Shuo looked up at his indifferently.
“Please be a.s.sured that I had thoroughly beat him up,” nodded Wei Xingshan to Lin Shuo. Then, with a slight twitch in the corners of his mouth, he looked to be struggling with his words, and said softly, “Mr. Lin, please pardon his insolence.”
“You owe me your life,” said Lin Shuo.
“I will keep that in mind,” said Wei Xingshan quietly.
“Have your men control their weapons.”
“I will.”
“We are going east.”
“Whatever you say.”
___
The crew of 19 continued to trudge through the mountainous path. Lin Shuo was still the one leading the way, with the very quiet starling standing on his shoulder. Those behind him had been keeping an even larger distance from him. It was as though everybody was consciously or subconsciously trying to keep a distance from him.
Lin Shuo didn"t mind the current situation too much. He knew that what he had done earlier had truly startled these people. But he also knew that had he not, they wouldn"t be so compliant.
The reason he insisted on the detour was because he picked up a scent from the northwestern side, and also noticed how strong it was.
Even in a deep, ancient forest like this, these fantastical creatures are still rare, and usually don"t like to be disturbed by humans.
It wasn"t their target his trip so Lin Shou decided to leave it alone. And also avoid unnecessary casualties among the crew.
A wide river appeared in front of them, most like a tributary of Heilongjiang on the Russian side. In the twilight of dusk, one could somewhat make out a metal chain bridge connecting both side of the river some 3 km from them.
Anne the beauty took a few quick steps forward and caught up to Lin Shuo. She inquired with him whether they could set up camp nearby. After Lin Shuo"s approval, Anne returned and relayed the message. The team stopped and started getting busy.
It was always better to have a lot of warm bodies. Using their standard a.s.signed machetes, the mercenaries were able to quickly clear out a wide area by the river and collected a bunch of firewood to start a fire.
The mercenaries had also inspected their weapons again per Wei Xingshan"s order to prevent another accident. Wei Xingshan even inspected the 12 cross bows personally, all the while mumbling to himself, “Even these German made products weren"t all the hype.”
End of summer and beginning of fall in the far east, the temperature drops drastically in the night time.
After finishing inspecting the weapons, everybody sat around in a circle. The warmth from the crackling camp fire brought a smile to everyone"s face.
Camping outdoor wasn"t in the original plan so n.o.body have tents with them, but they did have an sufficient amount of food. Inside everybody"s pack was self-heating military MREs (Meals Ready-to-Eat).
These kind of military meals don"t need fire to heat up, just need water added into the bag and they will self-heat and heat up the inner package where the main food is stored. On top of that, they also had with them canned lunch meat, crackers, and other snacks. There were quite a variety of them, and their taste are right so long as one doesn"t eat them daily.
Lin Shuo sat on a rock on one side of the camp and looked at the other heat up their military meals quietly.
The other one who didn"t have to lift a finger was He Zihong. His student, Yang Ta, was busying himself taking care of the old man.
After a whole day, the old man seemed to be exhausted. He sat collapsed by the camp fire breathing hard.