Crack. Crack

Pat! Pat! Boom!

Ra-tat-tat. Ra-tat-tat.

Every now and then, heated exchanges erupted around the small town.

The booms came from either Athena's suicide drones, missiles, or terrorists' RPGs.

The louder blasts usually belonged to suicide bombers, but since Delta 3 had once encountered a war cry, Spirit Fox operatives never hesitated to fire a bullet if a civilian ran in their direction.

Running away from Spirit Fox or hiding in buildings was safer than staying outside, even if they were assaulting within.

After all, no sane civilian would run out into the middle of a firefight unless pushed to the extreme.

In a room somewhere.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The door was broken into pieces as a shadow rolled in and crawled toward safety.

The mud pebbles on the threshold exploded from projectiles.

The figure heaved a sigh of relief. "Phew, lucky me. What's happening now?"

He patted his vest and brushed off the dust.

His question drew no answer.

Although it was dark, he knew his comrades were hiding inside.

"Damn you guys… have some shame and fight back."

"Do you think we don't want to?" another man protested, teeth grinding hard.

"We lost two as soon as we engaged. We dare not show our heads at all."

"F**k… You're lucky they missed you."

"I believe it's my luck—and because I'm not carrying weapons."

"That's likely possible."

"Who's attacking us?"

"We don't know, but the rotary machines above are irritating me," the man complained.

"Where are the locals? They haven't posed the slightest threat to our visitors."

"Dude, when did you ever seriously count on them to resist? A pity we don't know how our brothers guarding the prisoners are doing."

The men stopped chattering and perked their ears to listen for the smallest sounds as the gunfight quieted eerily.

"You hear anything?"

The others shook their heads.

The questioning man grew anxious as his intuition gnawed at him.

"Let's go and regroup. I have a bad feeling."

"Copy that. Let's roll out. I don't like the feeling either. We lost contact with our brothers since the attack began."

Click.

The sudden sound, though soft, alerted everyone, since their senses were heightened.

A pebble rolled from some unseen force.

Not good! They were near!

The trio exchanged glances and cursed inwardly.

How had the enemies managed to hone in on them silently?

Too fast and too stealthy.

Two rifles fired at the doorway and windows.

The remaining man unholstered his pistol and mimicked his brothers' actions.

"Peel out! Retreat!"

Thud. Thud.

"No!" one of them exclaimed, seeing what was thrown in—a flashbang deafened the interior.

The continuous barrage drew attention.

Opposite the chaos, another group peeked out the windows.

Worry and unease spread across their expressions.

A woman strutted around, nonstop, muttering and glancing at her close subordinate, who shook his head.

She was Mossad's handler—Agent Claudia, the one Ling Qingyu had asked to capture alive.

Tonight's events went against all her plans and hopes.

Surrounding her were mercenaries paid to do the dirty work.

Everyone was surprised to witness multiple helicopters unleashing hell and assaulting the terrorists' stronghold.

Mossad assisted subtly for national interests and strategic goals.

Given the wide network, it was impossible for Claudia to ignore the situation.

Not receiving any prior notification was extremely shocking.

She even suspected someone had sold her out on purpose, if not for one of her subordinates' explanation that the enemies' assault was to rescue hostages.

She never expected the three Country C nationals she had captured to warrant such entrapment.

The thought had never crossed her mind.

It was utterly impossible for Country C to send troops where logistics and transport couldn't reach, much less a direct helicopter airborne mission.

As for Western intervention, Claudia sneered at the possibility.

No need for conspiracy theories—the world understood, and so did she.

Claudia couldn't fathom how fate had turned so badly.

Her skillful planning and elite teams stood powerless against the pounding Gatling guns and rocket barrage.

Of course, her team attempted to escape while local terrorists attacked the sudden invaders.

They weren't foolish enough to fight a stronger opponent.

As long as everyone foreign to this land escaped through the nearby tunnel, Claudia would feel at ease.

Nonetheless, they were cut off and isolated in the building.

Two previous skirmishes had already left several of her subordinates dead, and she couldn't communicate with the rest of her teams—not even the bounty hunters—since the chaos started.

Dimensional suppression stretched from electronics to kinetics. Helpless, powerless…Despair.

"You sure Country C spec-ops are killing us?" Claudia raised her doubt.

"Not sure," her subordinate replied.

"Then, you…"

"I cannot confirm from afar, and I don't hear any Country C language communications." The subordinate bit his lip.

Claudia inhaled sharply. She understood her subordinate's meaning. Being able to fight in an organized and methodical way with little or no verbal communication signaled an outrageous level of eliteness.

"In any case, I see them armed with QBZ-95s. Apart from Country C, I can't imagine others using those lousy, unreliable weapons."

"Unreliable or not, we're being pinned down by cheap products," Claudia cursed. "Where's Sheemah?"

"We don't know her location, but the last news I heard was that Sheemah planned to tease the hostages. If our guess is correct, she should be near them."

Claudia lowered her eyelids. Her lips twitched bitterly. Tears seemed to well up. Although she snorted at Sheemah's coquettish approach and behaved as if she looked down on her, the relationship wasn't bad.

In fact, the two surpassed normal camaraderie. After many missions together, nobody's heart remained frozen like an ice cube.

Perhaps, rationally, she thought she was manipulating Sheemah and exploiting her skills, but when the possibility of Sheemah's demise entered her mind, her heart ached.

No, why had she fallen for that slut? That clever fox might have escaped earlier than her, Claudia mocked.

"How long until reinforcements arrive?" Claudia asked.

Reinforcements in this context referred to a nearby terrorists' hideout from the same faction.

"I have no idea. The fastest is forty-five minutes, but based on the enemy's thorough preparedness, there's no hope. Madam, we must reach the tunnel or we're doomed!"

Her subordinate was correct—what was the use of Toyota Technicals QRF except delivering merits to the foes.

"We have no hope," Claudia sighed. "The helis above mean every movement of ours is stripped naked."

The man flashed a glint in his eyes. "But their fire is restricted to the alleys and streets. No building has been pounded by the big gun so far."

Another man snorted. "Then, do you know what those whining sounds are that blew off the locals' heads with uncanny accuracy? If I hadn't heard the machine-like signature, I'd have regarded it as sorcery born of fear."

Obviously, this man had witnessed the horror of mini-drones.

"We have no choice. Either we take the risk and count on our enemies' rules of engagement to our advantage, or we are contained here and eliminated gradually," Claudia snapped.

Everyone exchanged silent glances and nodded imperceptibly at Claudia. They truly had no other alternatives.

"Or we can identify ourselves and surrender. They might let us live," Claudia joked and continued after a pause. "Smoke out and exploit the civilians infrastructure. If we can get inside, we will flow through buildings, Clear?"

"Clear!"

"Don't even think about saving grenades and smokes."