"Yeah right, he fed those two henchmen up front a bomb each, then went on to consecutively blast out four more—has no idea if this guy even has a brain."
Hiding behind layers of greenery, Agent Zero rolled her eyes.
The bandit lackeys also realized there was no more commotion above, so they climbed the tree trunk shoulder to shoulder. In no time, the tree trunk was swarming with people. The branches trembled along.
Yijie, with his hand cannon propped against the tree trunk, finally realized a problem at such a critical moment. He had bought his hand cannon from Dark Night Market, which came with six bombs. The price wasn’t high, but that was all the bombs he got. Once used, they were gone, and it wasn’t a conventional weapon; even if he visited a weapon shop, he couldn’t buy compatible ammunition.
"What a damn mess," cursed Yijie as he quickly pulled his head back into the treetop. That Dark Night Market should be called "Rip-off Market."
"Cover me with fire, and I’ll head down," Yijie yelled toward the lush green tree opposite.
(Fire cover,) Little Eight expressed doubt, wondering where the fire support was. Agent Zero, in total, only had a toy gun and a slingshot on her.
A slender hand extended from the tree branches, making an OK sign.
Yijie tossed the hand cannon into his military bag, eyeing a few footholds. He was just waiting for Agent Zero to shoot and would then promptly leap down to deal with those little henchmen scurrying around the tree like grasshoppers.
’Swish, swish,’ the sound of bullets flying by; Yijie felt a few bullet breezes brush past his face.
"Where are you charging to?" As soon as Yijie’s words fell, a noise from below made his head boom. His next move was to curse as he climbed desperately toward the higher, denser part of the tree.
During this short span, the henchmen clinging to the trunk rolled and tumbled down like they were escaping a flood or a ferocious beast.
The two remaining bandit leaders continued to throw their curved blades, listening to the strange yells of their henchmen below, they were dumbfounded. The curved blades circled in mid-air.
First came one, then two, dozens, hundreds, and then thousands of bees burst out all at once. It looked like Agent Zero loved chaos; the bullets earlier had all hit the beehive dangling from the branches.
The startled bees swarmed into the crevices of tree trunks and bark, stinging anything and biting any piece of meat they saw.
The bees, lacking sight and brains, focused on a single target. They buzzed around the tree where Yijie hid.
Yijie dodged quickly, but still got stung a few times; he finally realized what was happening.
Completely and utterly, he—and those bandits—had fallen into Agent Zero’s trap.
Agent Zero climbing the tree right next to his was no accident. She had targeted that beehive, intending to cleverly use the beehive to repel the enemy. The problem was, why didn’t she give a heads up first? Why was there no sense of teamwork at all? At the end of the day, they were supposed to be on the same side. He ended up in a messy situation, while she just breezed through it.
Thinking all this, Yijie almost ground his teeth to powder. Looking over at Agent Zero, she was yet at ease, breathing steadily.
Yijie’s vision blurred for a moment as Agent Zero suddenly flipped, bent her knees, hung upside down in a golden hook position, and her mid-length hair dangled straight down.
She had switched to a needle shooting gun in her hand, aiming at the bandits who were trying to fend off the bees with their bare hands.
Her finger lightly tapped the trigger, her eyes squinted slightly. Her movements were not as swift and powerful as Yijie’s, but everything she did seemed natural in his eyes.
Done in one go without hesitation. If Yijie’s method of killing was like the domineering force of Shaolin Fist, then Agent Zero’s approach was like the gentle, lingering Emei Stab.
With each needle shot, her finger paused slightly before she readjusted the gun to target the next one. The subtle movements and more importantly, her unusually high hit rate compared to the usual 20%, as she only missed twice.
At first, if Yijie and Agent Zero paired up just for the sake of group healing skills, by now, he had started to value her abilities. When he thought of female soldiers, Yijie’s mind wandered to another person that made his teeth ache more.
"Not interested."
That rejection on Longzhi Mountain Road. That damn female trainee named Xia You.
"There will never be another woman in the Armed Department," Lu Xun had firmly told himself after that day. If it weren’t for those whiny bastards under him always harping about wanting more green amongst the green, he wouldn’t have even thought of recruiting a female soldier. Lu Xun had never been turned down by a woman before.