Chapter 198: Crisis & Desperation
The Type-81 ARs automatic firing slowly came to a complete stop, and only the Garand Rifles were left firing.
Countless healthy and active rats jumped into the compound within the walls amidst the gun fires. Seeing the rats scampering about on the ground, Zhang Xiao Qiang was prepared to remove his Beast Horn Spear and stop his attempts to enter the ammunition dump.
Who cares about it, I’ll just kill as many as they come…..one….two….three of them…..
Three lucky rats scampered and increased their speed upon seeing Zhang Xiao Qiang. Just as their speed was increasing, a cold and straight blade swept past their bodies. Following the upswing of the blade, two of the rats were instantly crippled. Another one managed to slip past and pounced over. “Shua….” The blade hacked downwards, this remaining rat was instantly split into two. The hands wielding the blade pulled back, and the blade was instantly retracted from the ground.
Guo Fei had rushed over. He stood at the foot of the wall where the number of dead rats was sufficient to form a meter tall wall, where some of the half-dead rats around twitched their legs. Guo Fei stood guard steadily, regardless of how many rats came down, they would all be killed by him. But as time passed and following the increasing number of times Guo Fei had to cut down, physical exhaustion took over him. More and more rats fell, but as the Garand Rifles could only hold 8 bullets per time and the riflemen were all busy reloading, the sudden increase of rats made Guo Fei helpless. He could only increase the speed at which he was cutting them down, but with the increase in speed, the remaining amount of strength left in him became negligible.
Ultimately, three rats past him and headed towards Zhang Xiao Qiang who was at the steel door. “Pa Pa Pa….” Three fires were heard. Shangguan Qiao Yun used her M1911A1 and slowly walked over to Zhang Xiao Qiang’s side and guarded his back. Zhang Xiao Qiang did not look at Shangguan Qiao Yun, he was in an anxious state, the combat team members only had a few hundred bullets with them from the beginning and should be close to depletion already. At that time, they would no longer be facing scattered rats but be overwhelmed by the surge of them.
It looked as though Zhang Xiao Qiang was about to destroy the lock when the final gunshot ceased firing, and the scattering dozen of rats above the wall turned into a downpour. Shangguan Qiao Yun used her gun to shoot the rats, “Ka….” Her M1911A1 pistol’s 7 bullets were emptied.
The holster on Zhang Xiao Qiang’s waist loosened, but it was Shangguan Qiao Yun who took his Desert Eagle, “Bang…” a leaping rat instantly exploded and turned into blood splatters. Even with both her hands on the Desert Eagle, Shangguan Qiao Yun was forced a few steps backward due to the large recoil and knocked into Zhang Xiao Qiang who was working hard on the door.
It might have been the final and critical lock to open the steel doors as the steel doors suddenly opened up with a loud “BOOM…”. Zhang Xiao Qiang and Shangguan Qiao Yun immediately rolled at the moment they saw an opening.
Behind the doors was a slope similar to the arsenal, Zhang Xiao Qiang moved blindly with his hands waving wildly in front of him, wanting to grab onto something, but the cement floor was too slippery. He managed to grab onto a soft body, but it turned out to be Shangguan Qiao Yun. Due to the shock, he and her rolled down in the embrace until his head knocked onto a large crate.
They were in total darkness. In a daze, Zhang Xiao Qiang supported Shangguan Qiao Yun up. He looked at the only light source that came from the doors above him, making it look as though the doors were suspended in midair. Touching the large wooden crates behind him, Zhang Xiao Qiang immediately released Shangguan Qiao Yun from his embrace and reached out for the torch in his bag.
The bright beam of light tore the darkness away, countless of wooden crates laid quietly in front of him. Zhang Xiao Qiang ignored the large crate by his side as he looked at the corner at the slope of the entrance.
When the torchlight in his hand shone on rows of wooden racks revealing green ammunition crates, a low resounding noise was heard from the outside. Zhang Xiao Qiang had no idea of what had happened outside and unconsciously grabbed onto Shangguan Qiao Yun’s delicate hands and ran towards the ammunition crate. Right when they reached the crates, they felt that the light from the doors had dimmed.
A figure with the light behind his back ran towards Zhang Xiao Qiang, it was Wang Chong in perspiration. Zhang Xiao Qiang had to use the torch to identify him.
“What exploded?” Zhang Xiao Qiang was unaware of the situation outside and asked, he knew that when Shangguan Qiao Yun and he stumbled into the ammunition dump, the situation outside was already at its critical point where the tide of rats was surging in.
Covered in perspiration, Wang Chong took two deep breaths before replying: “Oh….it was the hand grenade that Brother Cockroach gave me, seeing that the situation was dire, I just threw it out. Somehow, those things are temporarily blocked. Captain Three have brought his men to cleanse the remaining few, and I came in to check if I could help.”
Zhang Xiao Qiang recalled the incident. He fake threw a hand grenade in the cave to scare the occupants out, to which Wang Chong actually picked it up. Wang Chong had wanted to return it to him, to which Zhang Xiao Qiang never wanted to give to anyone else. But who would have known that at the most crucial juncture, this forgotten grenade would be used to its largest potential? It could also be said that without this grenade, Zhang Xiao Qiang and the rest were bound to die.
Zhang Xiao Qiang, Wang Chong, and Shangguan Qiao Yun carried two crates of ammunition up the watchtower. Magazines fully loaded were handed to every member, while all the Garand Rifles were swapped for the Type-81 ARs. With the firepower of 40 ARs locked onto the wall, not one rat was able to enter anymore. Seeing that the situation had been stabilized, Zhang Xiao Qiang prepared himself to enter the ammunition dump again.
Guo Fei sat at the foot of the stairs of the watchtower, holding onto a rat pelt that he carved off from a corpse and cleaned his blade. He cleaned the blade meticulously with extreme focus, to the point that he ignored the bleeding wound on his face.
The wound, a scratch made by a rat, stretched from the corner of his right eye to the bridge of his nose, the skin that was flipped up had blood flowing down his face. Drops of blood dripped onto his blade, producing bloodflowers on the gleaming surface of the blade, which would be wiped away with the rat pelt.
He saw Zhang Xiao Qiang’s feet by his side, raised his head to take a look then lowered his head again and continued wiping his blade, as though he no longer sense Zhang Xiao Qiang’s existence. To him, only his blade existed.
Zhang Xiao Qiang walked back to the pile of wooden crates inside the ammunition dump, to which Wang Chong, who was behind him, would move the crates of Type-81 AR ammunition outside. Zhang Xiao Qiang placed the rat infestation to the back of his mind, as long as they had sufficient bullets, they were not in any danger.
Zhang Xiao Qiang opened up crates after crates, all the ammunition that was wrapped tightly in oil papers placed neatly in the crates were all revealed. Zhang Xiao Qiang removed the oil paper, revealing the glossy bronze bullets that shone under the torchlight. He kept on unsealing the bullets, revealing the pointy ammunition that reflected when the beam of light passed them.
Zhang Xiao Qiang discovered that majority of the standardized bullets were placed neatly together, they were all 7.62mm bullets with the same diameter, the sole difference was their lengths. The longest bullets were heavy machine gun bullets, the mid-length were light machine gun bullets or rifle bullets and the shortest were pistol bullets. As for the remaining bullets….