Mercenary I am the king

Chapter 968 Rift Valley Purgatory
Midnight in the African Rift Valley is no time for rest.

The scorching sun that baked the earth during the day has long since set, replaced by an endless, suffocating darkness.

Lumar hid in the brigade command vehicle, his body covered in sweat as if he had just been pulled out of a cesspool.

Tonight is the crucial moment for his confrontation with Song Heping, a moment that will determine who is superior and who will live or die!
"Report... Report! Sir! Right wing! Right wing, over there at the limestone! A large group of government infantry has appeared!"

One of the staff officers took off his headset, his voice cracking with fear: "They're fucking charging at that soft spot on our left lower back! They're... they're at least a brigade! They're charging... charging like mad dogs! It's a night attack! These bastards are courting death! It's a suicide charge!"

Lumar, who had been under a lot of tension, suddenly jumped up from his chair as if he had been hit on the butt with a high voltage and rushed to the monitoring screen on the side.

On the screen, the infrared/low-light images transmitted by the high-altitude "Reaper" drones controlled by the SAS crew were broadcasting a hellish scene with the detached calmness of someone watching the dead.

The limestone slopes appear eerily gray-green under night vision lenses.

That steep slope was now completely covered by a writhing, rolling tide of human flesh!
The densely packed government soldiers looked like demons squeezed out of the cracks of hell, braving the deadly bullets that were poured down from above and left long trails of light in the night vision goggles, as they climbed up using both hands and feet!

The bullets grazed the bare rocks, sending up streaks of dazzling sparks, like will-o'-the-wisps.

Images of people being struck by unseen sledgehammers, tumbling and falling off the cliff, their piercing screams swallowed by even louder explosions.

At the foot of the hill, the outlines of several government BMP-1 infantry fighting vehicles and modified pickup trucks were clearly visible. Their 73mm cannons and heavy machine guns were desperately spewing tongues of fire, pouring a rain of steel and flames onto the defenders' positions, making it impossible for them to lift their heads.

That reckless madness, that ruthless willingness to risk everything, was more terrifying than any of the previous tests!

"Fuck them! These vile maggots! How did they become so fierce?!"

Lumar uttered vicious curses through clenched teeth, his eyes filled not only with anger at being offended, but also with a deep sense of panic gripped by the sudden and reckless night raid.

Right wing limestone.

That was his weak spot on the defensive line, and under the cover of darkness, it was going to be a killer!
If these bastards were to wedge in at the junction of his left and rear waist, it would be tantamount to cutting his own troops in half. At that point, his entire brigade would be surrounded and shredded!
Lumar was a commander who had attended a military academy; he was not stupid, and he could see through the intentions behind such tactics.

"SAS! SAS team! Ascertain the situation on the right flank immediately! Top priority! Use everything at your disposal to bombard the right flank! Flares! Illuminate the eastern slope of the limestone hill like daytime! Use artillery fire to send those bastards who climbed up back to their homes!"

He roared into the communicator, spitting almost onto the screen, as he called for help from the special forces sent by his British father.

"Air defense team! All air defense teams, listen up! Night vision equipment on full blast! Keep a close watch on the right flank at low altitude! Prevent those damn MiG planes from sneaking in during the chaos! Don't let a single mosquito in!"

The order was like ice water, instantly waking up the SAS guidance team, who had been responsible for long-range battlefield intelligence support and air defense interception, in the rear concealed position.

The relaxed expressions on the faces of these elites from Chongqing instantly transformed into professional coldness. The green light from their night-vision goggles illuminated their expressionless faces.

"Caesar received. Advance to the right flank and perform surveillance and fire guidance. Repeat, advance to the right flank and maintain continuous surveillance."

The communication channel crackled with rapid, clear English, delivered with the stiff, calm tone of a standard London accent.

"All Javelin shooters in position, switch to night vision mode. Authorize firing if MiG-23 heat signature detected. Over."

The SAS team leader's voice was cold and hard, and every word was clear during the nighttime communications.

The invisible mobilization was completed in an instant in the darkness.

The air defense positions deployed around the command vehicle and on high ground had their eerie green laser beams, like the gaze of death, forcibly turned mostly towards the boiling meat grinder on the right flank.

The man-portable air defense missile gunner vigilantly scanned the sky in the direction of the limestone through the night vision sight, which was flickering between light and shadow caused by tracer rounds, explosive flashes, and flares.

at the same time.

The right-wing limestone highlands have now become a complete meat grinder in the dark.

Under the brief, pale light of flares or the eerie green of night vision goggles, the soldiers of the 11th Brigade of the Seine government forces, braving the relentless fire from the high ground of the Lumar defenders, desperately pushed their way up, stepping over the still-cold corpses and severed limbs of their comrades, which appeared even paler in the cold night.

The whistling of bullets tearing through the air, the muffled thunder of exploding shells, the heart-wrenching screams of wounded soldiers, and the hysterical shouts of officers, mixed with the explosive sounds of stones being shattered, created a chilling symphony of death that was particularly eerie under the deathly silence of the night.

"Charge! Charge! For Senna! God bless!"

A government army captain, his face covered in blood and looking like a demon in the flare light, was swinging his pistol, his voice hoarse from shouting.

His little commotion was nothing compared to the deafening noise of the battlefield.

His response was the muffled thuds of his brothers falling to the ground after being shot, followed by their abruptly stopped screams.

A mortar shell, with its distinctive "whoosh," crashed into the crowd. A sudden flash of pale light illuminated the scattered pieces of flesh, intestines, and scalding mud and stones!
The pungent, nauseating smell of blood and entrails filled the cold air, assaulting the senses.

A young soldier whose leg had been blown off, in the pitch black after the flares went out, futilely clawed at the cold stones with his hands, dragging his protruding intestines, letting out inhuman howls, until he was trampled into the darkness by the crowd surging up behind him.

The lifeline of the Lumar defenders was a ring of machine gun nests made of several large limestone blocks.

Two PKMs and two NSV "Rock" heavy machine guns crisscrossed, forming a deadly net of fire. The machine gunners wore night vision goggles, or simply used tracer rounds to fire, their faces expressionless, devoid of any human features, only numb killing instinct remaining.

The scalding hot cartridge cases, like dark golden urine, gushed out of the ejection port, piling up into small mountains at my feet, steaming in the chilly night.

The gun barrel glowed red-hot, blindingly bright in the night vision goggles.

Bullets swept across the dark hillside like water being poured, and tracer bullets left long, deadly red trails, causing people to fall in droves like wheat being harvested wherever they went.

The surface of the stone was covered with thick, black blood, which looked like ink spilled at night. It flowed down the ditch in a small river.

But the government troops, these reckless fools, kept charging forward.

They couldn't stop, because behind them was a supervisory team composed of Jiang Feng's mercenaries.

Whoever backs down is guaranteed to receive a "gift" made from a 7.62mm caliber warhead.

Just behind this blood and flesh millstone, in a small, sheltered ditch, a dozen or so men dressed in dark combat uniforms stood like stone pillars growing into the night.

They are the "wolf pack's" oversight team.

Jiang Feng, the leader, was holding his thermal imaging sights, coldly staring at the hellish scene ahead.

In the world of thermal imaging, living people are glaringly yellowish-white, dead people are cold, deep blue-black, and explosions are blinding white spots.

There was no anger or pity in his eyes, only a cold calculation of the battlefield situation and the efficiency of "harvesting," like playing a video game.

In the thermal imaging view, on the far right flank, a small group of about twenty government soldiers were being relentlessly attacked by a firing point emitting white light, causing the brightness to plummet.

This indicates that casualties among government forces are increasing rapidly.

Their fighting spirit completely collapsed.

More than a dozen soldiers, unable to withstand the pressure of death hovering overhead, turned tail and ran down the mountain in a panic—they were deserters terrified!

"Target confirmed. Right fourth district of limestone, defeated soldiers, fresh targets, about fifteen."

Jiang Feng's voice came through the throat microphone, cold and flat, devoid of any human warmth, like a machine counting off.

"Received. Heat source locked, can't escape."

In the earphones, the voice of the deputy captain of the supervisory team was just as cold as ice.

Jiang Feng put down the thermal imaging camera, slowly raised his right hand in the darkness, and then, like a guillotine, coldly chopped it down.

"Kill them."

At the command, three PKM rifles mounted behind sandbags and two SVD sniper rifles equipped with thermal imaging scopes simultaneously unleashed their deadly fire from the edge of the pit!
Da da da da da——

The machine gun fire left a dense trail of bright lines in the darkness, instantly burying the area of ​​heat from the deserters.

The dense barrage of high-powered 7.62x54mmR bullets, with a piercing whistle as they tore through the air, slammed into human flesh.

The few bright figures at the very front suddenly stumbled forward, "exploding" at the core of the heat source in the night vision goggles. The brightness plummeted, and hot red dots representing blood and flesh splattered out from the side.

The heat signal of the person in the middle was abruptly cut in half. The upper half was still pushing forward with energy, while the heat of the lower half cooled down and turned blue in the blink of an eye.

Sniper rifles are even more lethal in burst fire, specifically targeting those who try to find a place to hide or who are slow to run.

In thermal imaging, the brightest little dot on the top of the target's head or the pit of the chest suddenly "pops" open, and then the entire shadow quickly darkens and cools down.

The screams sounded short and sharp amidst the gunshots, and were immediately drowned out.

In just a few seconds, the dozen or so bright, living heat sources were completely extinguished in the thermal imaging, turning into a cold, deep blue, the same color as the stone ground behind them.

Hot shell casings clanged against the sandbags, sparking small embers in the night, while smoke mixed with the strong stench of blood drifted in the cold wind.

Jiang Feng, without changing his expression, picked up the thermal imaging camera again, his cold gaze sweeping over the heat signature piles of the attacking troops from other directions.

That silent death stare is more terrifying than any roar in the darkness.

The supervisory team stood there, upholding an ironclad rule built from the bones of the dead—charge forward, and you might die; run back, and you'll definitely die!

Their gun barrels are the most direct enforcers of this rule in the darkness.

This small, earthen mound became the boundary between the living and the dead, exuding a despair even more suffocating than the artillery fire ahead.

(End of this chapter)