Hunter of the Forbidden Region ch 10.1 - There's Something In the Water

Lin Shuo did not sleep that night.

Unlike the mercenary on guard duty, he had on him the roe deer skin and he sat away from the camp fire in the shadow in the corner of the camp ground.

The starling bird didn’t go looking for fun in the woods that night, but stayed on Lin Shuo’s shoulder like he was supposed to.

And a recurve bow leaned against a boulder next to the man and the bird.

When Anne saw them in the morning after she woke up, she thought she had seen a statue.

But she didn’t say anything. Quickly she got up and brought back a bucket of water from the river. She handed the water and a towel to Lin Shuo, “Mr. Lin, please.”

Lin Shou nodded and accepted the items from her before he turned around and walked into the woods.

“Shuo-ge, have you noticed,” came the voice of the starling bird from the woods, “This woman, she and you have synergy.”

“…..”

“Shuo-ge, the Lin’s only have single child for three generations and now it’s just you. Speaking of, Shuo-ge, you are not young anymore.”

“……”

“Shuo-ge, the birds in this city seem to be easy to get. All you have to do is nod.”

“Xiao Ba, you still want to keep your bird underneath?”

“My bad, Shuo-ge.”

……

Today was another sunny day. As the sun came up, the temperature began to rise.

The group had an early start and headed toward the metal chain bridge.

Lin Shuo did not take the lead today but let Wei Xingshan took three of his mercenaries to lead the way.

Lin Shuo, along with Xiao Ba, fell behind the troop and kept a distance of over 100 meters.

Nobody dare to have any disagreement against Lin Shuo’s arrangement, nor did anyone ask for the reasons behind it all.

After about 3 kilometers as they were approaching the metal chain bridge, Lin Shuo looked to have breathed a sign of relief and slowly caught up with the team.

The unknown strange lifeform that had been staring at the group through the entire night seemingly observing them had finally departed.

This was the narrowest part of the river, but even so, it was about 50 or so meters wide.

The metal chain bridge might have looked alright from a distance, but now that they were standing next to it, one could tell it had rusted a long time ago. And the wooden plank of it had rotted so badly that every step would cause it to break apart.

The bridge hung about 10 meters above the water, the torrent was rapid underneath and also have under current. The visible whirlpools on the surface of the river looked like scary mouths.

Perhaps a fish could survive the fall, but definitely not a human.

Lin Shou walked up to the bridge and saw Wei Xingshan shaking the metal chains of the bridge. He was a strong man, a couple shakes and the entire bridge was rattled and all the rotten wooden planks broken and fell off as the bridge shook from side to side.

Seeing that, Wei Xingshan went ahead and grabbed the chains with both hands and shook it vigorously. After a short while, all the wooden planks had fallen off, leaving only 4 empty metal chains – two on the bottom that used to have wooden planks on top of them; and two on the right and left sides that were the handles previously.

“Okay,” Wei Xingshan slapped his hands together, “These chains are still quite sturdy. All the wooden planks were rotted, better off this way.”

Having said that, Wei Xingshan looked back at He Zihong and said, “Professor He, let me take a few of my men and cross the bridge first. No need to rush. Let us take the lead and cross and bridge and checked out the situation on the other side, then we will hang a zip wire connecting both sides. You, Dr. Yang, and Miss Anne can cross using the zip wire. It will be safer that way.”

“That’s right, Professor He,” smiled the vice captain Liu Qing, “These kind of zip wire is equivalent to three safety ropes, and you slide over using a steel buckle. Don’t worry, we are very skilled in this. Even though you are hanging off the ground, but it’s actually very safe and comfortable.”

“Thank you so much, Captain Wei and Vice Captain Liu,” Professor He smiled and nodded.

Ever since the team had entered the forest, Wei Xingshan and Liu Qing’s performances had slowly earned the trust of the two scholars, He Zihong and Yang Ta. Especially Wei Xingshan, even though he looked like the roughneck leader of the mercenaries, but he was actually very meticulous in everything he did, and always put the team’s safety above everything else.

After saying that, Wei Xingshan put on his back a utility bag holding the zip wire and was about to take off before realizing Lin Shuo standing between him and the metal chain bridge.

Yesterday day time, Lin Shou’s two fingers in front of Wei Xingshan had left an lasting impression with the mercenaries. In Wei Xingshan’s mind, Lin Shou had gone from a pretentious phony to an enigmatic eccentric. Not to mention that he still owed him his life. Which was why he was very polite to him, “Mr. Lin, what seems to be the matter?”

Lin Shuo bent down and put his nose close to the metal chain and sniffed carefully. Slowly he looked up and said, “Something’s not right.”

___

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Hunter of the Forbidden Region ch 9.2 - No Relation

Anne walked over to Lin Shuo carrying with her two packs of MREs in each hand, “Mr. Lin, Ba-ye, take a look and see what strikes your fancy.”

The starling cocked its head and finally spoke, “Woman, we don’t eat stuff like these.”

“It looks like Ba-ye is finally feeling better,” smiled Anne. “But Ba-ye, certainly you must eat something!”

“Xiao Ba was right, we don’t eat stuff like these,” said Lin Shuo as he shook his head. “These are not nutritious enough.”

“Mr. Lin, surely you are kidding,” said Liu Qing as she approached them with a smile. “These are MREs, they are worth 1,000 calories each. I can’t even eat a pack in one meal, else I will gain too much weight.”

Lin Shuo did not rebut her but just stood up, “I am going to go look for something to eat.”

“Mr. Lin, we are deep inside an ancient forest, where are you going to find food from?” asked Liu Qing curiously.

“Let Mr. Lin be,” Anne waved her hand, “He knows what he is doing.”

Lin Shuo took Xiao Ba with him into the forest. Twenty minutes later and before it was entirely dark outside, they returned. Contrasting to him leaving empty-handed, Lin Shuo carried with him a roe deer on his shoulder.

This wasn’t a small roe deer, it was bigger than a normal goat, roughly about 30 kilograms.

Using the light from the camp fire, Lin Shuo carried the deer to the river side and skinned and prepped it with his dagger from his waist.

His actions were swift and efficient. It only took him about 2-3 minutes to clean the entire deer.

Lin Shuo then collected a couple tree branches from the river side and cleaned it with his dagger. He skewed the deer and carried it back.

“Excuse me,” he said. And the ones surrounding the fire moved over and provided him with a spot.

He set the deer up above the fire before he fished out a home-made can of spice from the fabric bag he had with him. Pouring spices on his hands, he sprinkled them all over the deer meat generously.

The grease from the heated up deer meat along with Lin Shou’s spice gave an exotic aroma that invaded everyone’s nostril.

GULP!

Everybody sitting around the fire swallowed uncontrollably and simultaneously up down the MREs in their hands.

Everybody started staring at the deer being roasted on the open fire.

For about half an hour, Lin Shuo continued to adjust the angle of the deer to make sure each side of heated up evenly.

The aroma became more and more strong. With the delicacy in front of them, the happy anticipation made the mercenaries chatty:

“What is this? It smells so good!”

“No need to show off your ignorance, this is a roe deer!”

“I’ve always heard that roe deer smells amazing, this is the first time I have experienced it in person!”

“This roe deer is fat!”

“I know, it looks to be about 30 kilograms. Don’t worry, there’s enough to go around.”

“All we have to do is to take a detour for roe deer meat? Mr. Liu could have told us that, and Wang Xong wouldn’t have been beaten up!”

“Shut… shut up… Oh my face, Captain Wei didn’t hold back at all.”

“Nonsense, you know what you’ve done? If Captain Wei didn’t beat you up, you want Mr. Lin to?”

“Exactly. This is Mr. Lin we are talking about. If it was him, you’d at least be half dead. Captain Wei was doing you a favor, dummy!”

“Mr. Lin, I apologize for my ignorance earlier. Please forgive me. You saved Captain Wei’s life, that’s the same as saving my life! Trust me, from now on if you say to go east, I will never go west!”

“This is such a surprise! Someone as strong as Mr. Lin, I thought he would never cook. I never expected him to be so good at barbequing!”

“Aiya, stop talking about it. I am starving!”

“Okay, okay. It’s almost ready!”

Lin Shuo said not one word while the team of surrounding soldiers chatted away as though he couldn’t hear a word they were saying.

When he felt that the roe deer was almost done, he picked the roe deer up from the barbeque stick and walked straight back to the rock he was sitting on in the corner.

He tore a leg off and tossed it over to Xiao Ba. Then, lifting up the barbeque stick with both hands, Lin Shuo took a big bite of the juicy belly meat. With the swift swing of his head, tore off a large piece of the roe deer meat and started chewing.

All the mercenaries still sitting around the camp fire just stare at Lin Shuo, who was keeping all the meat to himself, stunned.

An air of embarrassment filled the surrounding of the camp fire and everybody quietly picked back up the MREs that were entirely code by their feet and started eating them one spoonful at a time.

Nobody dare utter a word, but everything felt that the MREs had never tasted so horrible before.

What was even more annoying was that not only was Lin Shuo eating lusciously; he was also eating very quickly. Almost half of the deer was gone in no time, as though someone would try to fight him over it.

Liu Qing was also observing Lin Shuo but kept her surprise inside. By the way it looked, Lin Shuo could easily finish the 30 or so kilograms of roe deer.

That was truly an astonishing appetite. No wonder he said the MREs weren’t going to be enough.

FLUTTER!

While Liu Qing was still looking at them incredulously, the starling fluttered its wings and flew over to where she and Anne were. He has in his peak a piece of meat around half a kilogram or so. The bird tossed its head and the meat flew from his peak into Anne’s hand.

Bluntly, the bird said, “Woman, Ba-ye kinda likes you. Here’s a piece of meat as a reward for you.”

Anne wasn’t sure how to react to that. The beauty took a look at Liu Qing sitting next to her, then at the other mercenaries. Even the one who was always very articulate in any situations was wordless.

“What about me?” smiled Liu Qing and winked at the starling.

“Ba-ye has no relationship with you.”

After throwing out those words, the starling fluttered it’s wings again and flew back to Lin Shuo.

___

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Hunter of the Forbidden Region ch 9.1 - No Relation

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 Wang Yong so hard that it sent him flying 4-5 meters.

Ever since the crossbow discharged, Wang 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 Wang Yong, “Wang Yong! What the f*!”

Wang 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 Wang Yong continued to wail.

Nobody 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 Wang Yong. Shaking his fists, he walked in front of Lin Shuo again.

Lin Shuo looked up at his indifferently.

“Please be assured 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 assigned 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 nobody 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.

___

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Hunter of the Forbidden Region ch 8.2 - Improper Discharge

The bear, on the other hand, stopped standing on two feet. It bent over and starting running away madly on all fours and disappeared quickly.

“Did they notice us?” asked Wei Xingshan gently.

“Perhaps,” replied Yang Ta sadly and put down the camcorder in his hand.

“Humans are the scariest animals of all,” said He Zihong as he shook his head. “Let’s keep moving forward.”

“Let’s take a different path,” said Lin Shuo, pointing to the east. “We will go this way and take a detour.”

“You mean the big guy we just saw? The bear?” frowned Wei Xingshan. “Didn’t it run away already? We can just keep going as normal. We have to cover 20 km of mountain road. With our current speed, we will get to our destination right before it gets dark. If we take a detour, we will have to camp out in the wilderness. It’s not safe.”

Lin Shuo lifted his eyes and glanced at Wei Xingshan, “You thought that bear was a big guy?”

“Oh?” Wei Xingshan was a bit confused, “What do you mean? A 4-meter bear is not considered as big?”

Lin Shuo didn’t bother explaining. He just took a look at the northwestern direction and said, “There’s a bigger one in that direction.”

Yang Ta adjusted his spectacles and said, “That’s not possible, the giant brown bears are the largest land-dwelling animals in the Outer Khingan region.”

The scholar seemed to have recalled something as he was saying that and added, “Granted, the target of this current operation notwithstanding.”

After saying that, Yang Ta paused for a second, looked over at the northwestern direction nervously and muttered to himself, “Can it be?”

“No, not him,” said Lin Shuo, shaking his head. “It would save us a lot of time if it is.”

“Liu Qing,” Wei Xingshan turned his head and looked at the vice captain of the mobile unit. “Take a look at the northwestern direction with the drone.”

“Yes, Sir!” Liu Qing placed her large backpack onto the ground and retrieved from it a square box.

Inside the box was the latest Russian military drone. It quickly lifted up into the air and slowly flew in the northwestern direction.

Images taken by the drone displayed on the portable monitor in Liu Qing’s hands.

Wei Xingshan arranged a few of them to stand alert and the remaining rested at their current locations. Everybody surrounded Liu Qing trying to take a peek at the monitor.

Displaying on the monitor, one could see all the lush vegetation of Outer Khingan. The verdant tree crowns formed a sea of dark green.

The green waves swayed with the gentle breeze sending beeping sounds through the monitor’s built-in speaker.

After 10 or so minutes, images on the monitor looks like they were from a nature documentary. There were no signs of this “big guy” that Lin Shuo was talking about.

After the drone had flew over wide river, Wei Xingshan couldn’t contain himself anymore. He turned and looked at Lin Shuo disgruntledly, “Mr. Lin, care to explain?”

Wei Xingshan wasn’t the only one, all the other mercenaries turned and looked at Lin Shuo as well.

Lin Shuo was unphased. He lifted his foot and started walking, “Believe it or not, I am going east. You can follow if you like, or just go your own way.”

“Lin Shuo! You wait right there!” Wei Xingshan quickly moved in front of Lin Shuo, blocking his way.

The giant took a step forward and stood immediately in front of Lin Shuo, “Lin Shuo. I have had enough of you! I am the mobile leader of this mission, I decide on which path we take. You must follow the team’s arrangement. This is no time for individualism!”

“Are you confused?” asked Lin Shuo nonchalantly.

“What do you mean?” shouted Wei Xingshan angrily.

“We’ve only just witnessed a tiger some 400 meters away and your crew couldn’t control their firearms,” said Lin Shuo as he looked around at the mercenaries. “If we ran into something they have never seen before, do you think they would be able to control themselves?

“We are surrounding by boulders and tree trunks, once they start shooting  uncontrollably, you think we could control where the ricochets go?

“Your people are not ready at all. If we run into something like that, how many do you think will survive?

“I am not responsible for their lives, but aren’t you?”

Lin Shuo’s words made Wei Xingshan paused in his way.

Lin Shuo didn’t want to waste more time with him. He walked around the giant and continued walking forward by himself.

“Who do you think you are talking about?” A mercenary under Wei Xingshan jumped out before he could respond and blocked Lin Shuo’s way.

This mercenary pulled out a crossbow from behind him, pointed it at Lin Shuo’s head, and said fiercely, “You are right, I can’t control my own hand, you want to see?”

“Wang Yong!” Wei Xingshan looked very concerned at the unfolding event and shouted loudly, “Are you seriously pointing a weapon at one of our own? Have you lost your mind?”

“Captain Wei, you stay out of this one. This guy is way too arrogant. You are the captain so you couldn’t do anything to him. I don’t want to enable him more.” After saying that to Wei Xingshan, the mercenary by the name of Wang Xong turned and look at Lin Shuo in a provocative manner, “Sure, you are quite capable, I will give you that.

“Back in China we didn’t have our weapons, I put up with your arrogance. But now we are armed! I suggest you watch your own when you talk to us. You say I can’t control my own firearm? Let me tell you, if I can’t control my firearm, you will be the first one I shoot!

“So you think you are all that? But can you stop a bullet?”

“Wang Yong! Put down the crossbow!” shouted Wei Xingshan.

Wang Yong smiled lightly, “Don’t worry, Captain Wei. I know what I am doing.”

“No you don’t!” Shouted Wei Xingshan as he sidestepped in front of Lin Shuo, “How long have you been a solider? You don’t fool around like this!”

While they were talking, all of a sudden Wang Yong turned pale, “Oh my god! Watch out, Captain Wei!”

Way before he said that, an arrow had shot out from the crossbow.

Nobody knew whether it was from mechanical error, or that Wang Yong’s hand shook from nervousness of yelled at by Wei Xingshan but the German crossbow discharged!

An arrow from this crossbow is much stronger than a bullet from a handgun and ranges up to 200 meters. At this distance, once it’s discharged, it will kill for certain!

Wei Xingshan turned completely pale. Slowly he looked down at his own chest.

___

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Hunter of the Forbidden Region ch 8.1 - Improper Discharge

Commercial fishing is prohibited in the Heilongjiang region between June and July in the summer time.

There weren’t a lot of boats in the river around noon time, so the three speed boats splitting the waves as they approached Dzhalinda drew a lot of attentions from the locals.

 The speedboats parked at the commercial fishing port of Dzhalinda and 20 or so muscular, armed men disembarked the boats.

The leader of them was a 1.8 meter tall muscular man. Asian, with a scar stretching from his left brow all the way to the corner of his mouth, making him looked savage and sinister. The humongous Qin crossbow looked like wings on his back.

The other muscular men behind him were of all different races, but they all looked vicious.

This town combined both commercial logging and commercial fishing businesses so smuggling was quite rampant and residents were usually brute looking.

So when these men boarded the shore, the fishermen drying their news on the dock barely took a second look at them but just keep their heads down and carried on with their work. Partly because they were already used to it and partly because they didn’t want to attract any trouble.

These brutes didn’t stay on the dock for long before the entered the small town.

Before leaving the dock, the man with the scar turned at looked at the vast mountains in a distance. With an evil grin, he said, “Wei Xingshan, this is the cemetery that I have picked for you!”

___

“Ah choo!”

Wei Xingshan, at the deep Outer Khingan region, sneezed. Rubbing his nose, he turned to look at Lin Shuo, “A something big? Where?”

Just when he had finished his words, they heard a loud roar coming from the northwestern direction.

It was the low and rumbling kind of roar. Everybody immediately got goosebumps and became frightened uncontrollably.

“This is the roar of a tiger,” said Yang Ta as he adjusted his spectacles, appearing to be usually calm. He started looking around in search of the origin of the roar.

Except that the group were stuck in the midway up the mountain inside a forest. It was either trees or boulders next to them. They couldn’t see anything.

“Let’s head to the top of the mountain immediately, so we can surveil from up above,” said He Zihong as he pointed toward the apex of the mountain with his alpenstock.

“But professor….” Said Yang Ta, concerned.

“I am fine. I have recovered already,” said He Zihong as he led the way toward the top of the mountain. He looked as though he had past his threshold and felt refreshed all over again.

“He’s so fit for his age,” said Anne as she followed him quickly.

Lin Shuo casted a glance at Anne. He noticed that she had been trekking for two or so hours, not only was she not out of breath at all, she wasn’t even sweating.

On the other hand, Wei Xingshan, the head of the mercenaries, even though he looked to be at ease, but he was already starting to sweat.

Her fitness seemed to be above that of mercenaries. That, of course, was not a result of any judo or Taekwondo training.

Not to mention that there was a tiger roaring nearby. On this trip there were either biologists or mercenaries who had seen their fair shares of lives and deaths, so it’d make sense that they did not show too much reaction to what was going on.

But Anne, a beautiful woman,  not only was she still looking just like normal, she even has the capacity to care about others around her. Lin Shuo was starting to be intrigued by her.

But he was in no rush, no matter how good she was at hiding her true self, he would be able to see it before the end of this trip at Outer Khingan. Otherwise, she wouldn’t make it out alive.

In the midst of thinking about all these, Lin Shuo had arrived at the top of the mountain with the rest of the crew.

The view opened up entirely in front of them.

“Quick! Look over there!” Shouted Yang Ta as he pointed toward northwestern direction.

“Hot damn! What is that?”

“Look at the tree next to it! It’s almost 4 meters tall!”

“Damn! That thing was huge even looking at it from so far away!”

Across from the mountain top that they were standing, on top of a cliff, stood a giant creature. Its entire body was covered in dark, brown hair; it’s body round and strong. It was standing with it’s back to everyone.

“That is a gigantic brown bear,” explained Yang Ta. “Once a male brown bear grew to this size, it has no more natural predator in nature.”

As he was saying it, he reached into his pack and pulled out a portable camcorder.

Right after he finished his words, the big brown bear on the cliff across from them was struck by something, causing it to stagger backward.

It was then when everybody saw the animal that was blocked from everybody’s site previously by the brown bear.

It was a Siberian tiger. It one size smaller than the brown bear but still reached a good 3 meter with upturned eyes and a white forehead. It looked savage and ferocious.

ROOARRR!

Another roar from the tiger. It’s volume loud, short but full of strength, much more aggressive than it’s previous roar.

All the mercenaries turned pale and subconsciously raised their rifles in their hands. This fear for this ferocious animal was deeply-rooted fear in the human DNA.

“Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!” shouted old man He Zihong to remind everyone. “This is their territory. We are the visitors. Don’t shoot!”

“You bunch of weaklings. Lower your weapons!” ordered Wei Xingshan with a cold look. This was when the mercenaries came to and lower their rifles.

Across from them, an epic deadly fight between two ferocious beasts had begun. Obviously, the Siberian tiger was the instigator in this fight. Whether it was merely hunting for food, or to avenge the tiger cub, nobody knew.

They could see that it leaped high up on the air and descended onto the shoulder of the bear. It’s two paws, size of hand fans, struck the brown bear forcefully on its head.

THUG! THUG!

The sounds arrived everybody’s ears with a half second delay due to the distance.

The brown bear was clumsier than the tiger, but it was stronger in strength. Under pain, it waved it’s giant paw and sent the 3-meter long, sturdy tiger out over 10 meters.

The tiger flipped and got back up immediately after it landed on the ground and charged at the brown bear again.

“This was not a wasted trip,” lamented Yang Ta as he filmed the fight. “A fight between a Siberian tiger and a giant brown bear is a rarity. In the past, biologists were only able to speculate from trails left behind from the fights. I never imaged that I’d not only be able to witness this with my own eyes during this trip, but also capture it all on tape.”

While he was saying that, the two giant beats on the cliff stopped in their actions abruptly.

Almost simultaneously, they both turned and looked in the northwestern direction.

Then the tiger turned around and with a big leap, disappeared into the thick woods.

___

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Hunter of the Forbidden Region ch 7.2 - Invitation for Zhui-ye

To my dear readers:

If you enjoy Hunter of the Forbidden Region, please do rate it on NovelUpdates. If you don't, I'd also like to hear about what is it that you don't like about it. Any feedback on the story will be appreciated.

Thanks and enjoy the story below:

***

Lin Shuo and his small hunter team started trudging through the deep, old forest. At the beginning everybody still has very solemn look on them. But not long into the journey, the beautiful sceneries and their state-of-the-art weaponries made them relaxed and let down their guard gradually.

The sceneries at Outer Khingan in the summer are, indeed, very delightful. Especially in the day time, before the temperature rises.

Lin Shuo walked in the front; Wei Xingshan was okay with that.

In fact, he’d very much like to see him stumble.

Wei Xingshan carried with him the map provided by the Russians, along with a compass. It was quite obvious to him the path that they needed to take, but Lin Shuo didn’t have any of these with him.

Wei Xingshan was familiar with trudging through old forests. Surely the sceneries were refreshing at the beginning, but an hour or so in one’d notice that everything looks the same, with no landmarks of any sort.

Up above were canopies of trees, beneath one’s feet were a thick layer of leaf humus. Everywhere you look were just more trees that looked the same. One would grow numb in no time. Then all there was left was nonstop trekking uphill and downhill and endless command of more energy.

One would have to have lived here for a good eight to ten years before he’d be able to recognize the paths.

After about two hours, Wei Xingshan looked at Lin Shuo’s silhouette and was confused all over again. The path that Lin Shuo was leading them was exactly the same as the best path that he had analyzed using both the compass and the map! During their morning meeting, all Lin Shuo did was taken a quick glance at the map!

Wasn’t he living at Guangxi before? That was almost half a world away! How was he able to not get lost in this entire unfamiliar forest?

“Wait a minute!” shouted Yang Ta when Wei Xingshan was getting more and more confused by the minute.

“My professor is tired,” said Yang Ta nonchalantly while everyone was looking at him.

Everybody then turned and looked at He Zihong and, sure enough, he was turning pale and out of breathe.

“Oh, I have trained for a while prior to this. But still doesn’t measure up to you younglings,” smiled He Zihong bitterly with his alpenstock and slowly leaned against a tree while holding his back. “I’m sorry, I need to take a break.”

“I should be the one apologizing. This was oversight on my part,” apologized Anne then turned and said to Lin Shuo, “Mr. Lin, can we take a short break?”

Without looking back, Lin Shuo stopped in his track and said, “Not here.”

“Why not?” asked Yang Ta as he adjusted his spectacles, his voice displeased.

Lin Shuo turned around and gave him a look, then, pointing at a pine tree about five meters away and said, “You are an expert in this field, go look for yourself.”

Yang Ta looked toward the direction that Lin Shuo pointed at and his look turned solemn as he started walking toward the pine tree.

Wei Xingshan waived his hand immediately and two mercenaries flanked him on both side.

After some observation, Yang Ta returned and, casting a glance at Lin Shuo, said to He Zihong, “Professor, this is the habitat of Siberian tigers. I found two footprints under the tree, there were more than two of them.

“They are just tigers,” said Wei Xingshan full of contempt, “With us here, the tigers will just turn into extra meat for dinner!”

“Let’s go,” said Zihong who had changed his mind, “Let’s cover some more ground, I will be fine.”

Hearing that, everybody continued on another uphill path.

When they were crossing a mountain stream, Lin Shuo suddenly lifted his arm to stop everybody in their tracks.

Lin Shuo then reached out, broke off a tree branch, fished something out with it before throwing it on the ground for everyone to see.

Once they got a better look at the object, everybody backed away from fear.

The object was half a tiger’s head. The wound was uneven and has obviously been chewed on. It was fresh, there were still blood drifting from it.

In these deep and remote forest, what could possibly kill a tiger? Not to mentioned chewed it until only half a head was left?

A few of the mercenaries started turning pale.

If any monsters really appeared in front of this team of mercenaries, these men for certain wouldn’t even give it another thought and just start shooting.

But the unknown generates fear. Sometimes one can’t overthink things; the more you think about it, the scarier it gets.

Yang Ta, the fragile scholar, was the one who looked like it was just another day in the office. Instead of taking a few steps back, he took a few steps forward.

From his traveling bag he took out a pair of latex gloves and donned them before lifting up the half of a tiger’s head and examined it carefully.

“This is an yearling,” said Yang Ta. Then, seemingly concerned that others might not understand what that meant, he added, “This tiger might look huge, but from it’s teeth, you could tell it’s not an adult yet.”

“But even if it’s not an adult tiger, judging by it’s size, it must still be pretty powerful in a fight. It should still be unrivaled in this forest.” Said one of the mercenaries, “Could this… could this be done by it?”

“That impossible,” said Yang Ta as he shook his head, “According to our research….”

“That’s enough, Xiao Yang,” He Zihong chimed in, “No need to say more. They will think what they want to think. If one of these is already dead, let’s hurry up and get out of this area.”

“Yes, professor,” nodded Yang Ta as he placed the half of the tiger’s head into a plastic bad and placed it inside of his own backpack before he stood up.

Just as everybody was about to start marching again, Lin Shuo raised his arm one more time, “Everybody hold still!”

Lin Shuo sniffed a few times and looked at the northwestern direction.

“There’s something big, and it’s close by.”

___

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Hunter of the Forbidden Region ch 7.1 - Invitation for Zhui-ye

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***

Chapter 7.1 - Invitation for Zhui-ye


An hour later, the team was ready to go.

The mercenaries were all armed and loaded. Even the researchers He Zihong and Yang Ta, who now possessed basic knowledge of gun-handling, were armed with hand guns after a crash curse from Liu Qing. Each of them was armed with a handgun on their waist

Ten or so people stood in the courtyard waiting for Lin Shuo to come down.

Just a few minutes ago, Lin Shuo confirmed the full names of each team member with Anne before he returned to his own room.

Wei Xingshan stared at the door leading inside the hotel and looking more and more impatient.

Just when he was about to explode, Lin Shuo slowly walked out of the hotel door with the ebony box lugged across his shoulder.

“Give me a minute,” said Lin Shuo to the beautiful Anne then, with a swift motion, placed the humongous ebony box behind himself.

He rested his forehead against the box and closed his eyes for a minute.

Then he fished in his shirt pocket and pulled out a wrinkled pack of cigarettes and lit up all three remaining ones. With the cigarette butt facing upward, he planted them in the soil in front of the ebony box.

Afterward, he took half a step back and said in a low voice, “I am asking Zhui-ye for help during this trip into the mountain. Your disciple Lin Shuo are offering you incense here.”

While saying that, Lin Shuo fished up a neatly folded letter from the pocket of his zhongshan suit and slowly unfolded it. The letter was written by hand.

Anne had sharp eyes and noticed that the letter contained all the names that she had just given to Lin Shuo.

“Zhui-ye, these are everyone going on this trip. Bless us with your power so we can have 19 in and 19 out, not one is missing. When it was all over, your disciple will repay your greatly.”

As he was muttering, he lit another match to light the letter on fire. He drew a few circles in front of his chest with the burning letter and finally let it go when it was almost fully consumed.

Yang Ta, the PhD in biology, had a slight look of contempt while watching Lin Shuo’s actions and was about to make a comment.

He Zihong quickly tugged at the corner of his student’s shirt before he closed his mouth in embarrassment. He turned his head away slightly.

“This is all for show,” said Wei Xingshan lightly.

Lin Shuo saw and heard everything that had taken place but didn’t bother being riled up by them. He merely took a step forward and placed the box down slowly.

“Pardon me, Zhui-ye!” Lin Shuo looked at the ebony box that was now being placed horizontally. He let out a light cry and with a smack of his hand, the cover of the box slid silently to one side, exposing the content inside.

“What is this?”

Everybody stretched their necks to look at the content inside the box, feeling surprised and bewildered.

The item was crescent moon shaped, it’s body was entirely black, approximately 2 meters in length, and difficult to tell what material it was made out of. From the middle of its body, both sides recurve beautifully. There were a nock on each end, stretched from them was a semi-transparent elastic string with thickness that of a finger.

“Judging from the shape, it’s a recurve bow?” asked one of the mercenaries, his voice filled with uncertainty.

“Are you crazy? When have you seen a recurve bow this size?” said another mercenary, “Forget that it’s 2 meters long, it’s body is the size of your calf. Who does one draw a bow like that?”

“What if he’s the one drawing it?”

Everybody fell silent from that comment. Everybody had barely came across his strength.

“Still impossible? We are not talking about one’s strength anymore. Look at the body of the bow, you will need to warp both hands around it. If you can’t even hold it in one hand, how do you draw it?”

“But there must be a reason why he solicited it’s help!”

“Who knows?”

Through all the discussions, Lin Shuo kneeled on one knee and took out the recurve bow with both hands. With the bow’s body facing the back he lugged the bow behind his back. He then took out a quiver the size of a backpack from the box. Inside was only 3 arrows size of an arm.

Seeing that Lin Shuo had finally invited Zhui-ye, Anne the beauty looked around at everyone discussion nearby and said, “Exactly, this is a recurve bow and it is one of the Lin’s family heirloom. Everybody in the hunter’s circle refer to it as ‘Zhui-ye’. Zhui-ye is ill-tempered, so I suggest you don’t gossip too much about it.”

Everybody piped down after Anne’s words, but Lin Shuo squinted at her, his look not too friendly.

Anne quickly covered her own mouth with her hand and apologize to Lin Shuo with her eyes, admitting that she has spoken too much.

Lin Shuo ignored Anne but placed his fingers in his mouth and made a loud whistle. The starling flew back with fluttering wings and landed on his shoulder.

The bird ate so much his stomach was rounded, but he didn’t look like his in good spirit. His head hanged slightly.

“Let’s go.” Said Lin Shou calmly and walked toward the forest.

___

Xing’an Mountains, is the largest primeval forest. It’s made up of Greater Khingan Range, Lesser Khingan Range, and Outer Khingan.  Among them, Greater and Lesser Khingan lie within the Chinese border, while Outer Khingan, also known as the Stanovoy Range (also known as Sukebayatur and Sukhbaatar) by the Russians lie north of Heilongjiang.

This area is scarcely population and is one of the areas barely touched by humans.

The destination of Lin Shuo and the team was small town located deep inside the Outer Khingan, approximately 20 km from their point of departure.

That town, was where 182 individuals disappeared. They would learn more details once they have arrived on site.

The Russian police department has very limited resources in the far east region. The only local police there was a 50-something drunkard, who expressed that he would not be providing any assistance. That was actually more beneficial for Lin Shuo and the group, allowing them more freedom to roam around.

___

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Hunter of the Forbidden Region ch 6.2 - It Will Have To Do

“Shuo-ge! Shuo-ge! If you castrate me now, I won’t recover right away. Then I will definitely mess up!” The starling was so scared that his voice was hoarse and he shat himself.

“No more next time?” Lin Shuo stopped and asked, starting at the starling.

“Never again!” The starling shook his head violently from side to side.

“I’ll give you one hour, you get back into the woods and replenish all the energies you have spent last night!” said Lin Shuo as he flung the bird high into the air.

“Gua Gau~~” The starling stretched his wings in the air, fluttered them and flew away.

That was the first time Anne heard bird-like noises from the starling.

A lot of times, she had forgotten that he’s just a bird.

Before Xiao Ba had gone too far, a large trust with canvas over it’s truck bed entered the backside of the hotel.

The main business in this area is lumbar, these kind of trucks can seen everywhere within a hundred kilometers between the local roads and the train tracks.

Obviously, this was no ordinary truck. As the truck as entered into the backside of the hotel, Wei Xingshan walked out of the hotel with his dozen mercenaries. The mercenaries pulled back the canvas over the truck bed and opened the door. Trip after trip they are unloading boxes of various sizes painted in green.

After all the boxes have been unloaded from the truck, Wei Xingshan waved and the emptied out truck rocked it way out of the hotel lot.

“Open the boxes!”

One order from Wei Xingshan and the dozen of mercenaries started using crow bars to break the metal strips around the boxes, ripped out the packaging material, and take out the weapons one by one.

“There are tight controls inside the Chinese border, so we had no choice but to have these shipped here instead,” Anne whispered Lin Shuo’s ear at this time to explain.

While they were still in China, Lin Shuo only felt that all the mercenaries were very well-behaved. They all followed Wei Xingshan’s orders like puppets. He only felt that they were obedient, not so much professional.

But now, he could start seeing their strengths.

All the different and complex weapon parts of various sizes, all came to live in their hands. Picking them up, placing them, assembling, greasing, cleaning, adjusting, all the steps were done cleanly and efficiently.

Between the dozen or so individuals who worked like dozen or so machines, along with all the metallic sounds of metal pieces falling into place, each and single piece of equipment appeared in front on Lin Shuo in their original ferocious state in less than 10 minutes.

Wei Xingshan seemed very pleased with his comrades performance. He walked in front of Lin Shuo, cleared his throat, and said, “Mr. Lin, I know you are a capable person, but I am going to guess that you haven’t had a lot of experiences with these types of modern machinery?”

And before Lin Shuo could respond, Wei Xingshan continued, “Look here, this is ten set of  assault rifles. Indeed, they are cold weapons, but they are more powerful than handguns and more expensive than rifles.

“We were going to go with the US Army’s assault rifles as our main weapons, but considering our target this time, 5.56 mm bullets won’t be enough, so we swapped to these instead:

“OC14, also known as Groza, made in Russia. Nicknamed Thunderstorm. 7.62 caliber with 40 mm launcher, crazy firepower.

“And look at that big guy, this is a anti-material rifles, Barrett M95. In combat, these are used to take down military grade helicopters.

“I am going to skip introducing each and every single one of these small items. All of them are something handy.

“And our boxes of ammunition. If we put the amount of ammunitions that we have prepared in Europe  or Middle East, we have enough to take down a small country.”

When Wei Xingshan was introducing then weaponries, he look like a general inspecting his soldiers.

Ever since the rural village in southwest China when Lin Shuo casually placed the ebony box into the SUV and displayed his abnormal strength, Wei Xingshan had been avoiding any interactions with him somewhat intentionally or somewhat unintentionally. He didn’t dine at the same table as him; he didn’t ride in the same car as him; he didn’t even stay on the same floor as him when they stay at hotels. But right now, with the weaponries in hand, somehow Wei Xingshan had regained the confidence for a rematch with Lin Shuo.

There was finally a smile on his cool face, “Well, Mr. Lin. You think these will be good enough?”

Lin Shuo looked at the blurry mountains on the border of the small town, his look betrayed no emotions. The corner of his mouth twisted and he said indifferently, “They’ll do.”

___

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Hunters of the Forbidden Region ch 6.1 - It Will Have To Do

After they have deboarded the plane, there were more travelling to do.

Three days later, Lin Shuo and the group finally arrived at Dzhalinda – a small town in the far east of Russian.

This border town sits on the north side of Heilongjiang, and borders Meho, China by just that. The residents mostly have black hair and darker color skin like that of Asians. Most of the residents are fishermen or lumberjacks.

Naturally the living condition here was nowhere close to that in Chun Ning. The guest rooms were dimly lit and the bed as hard as steel.

Lin Shuo slept soundly nonetheless. A total of 19 individuals plus the bird, Lin Shuo was the only one that has his own room.

Whether he was sitting down, lying down, or standing up, Lin Shuo had been sleeping majority of the time through the entire trip, with the large ebony box upright next to him, and the chatty bird on his shoulder.

Everybody has gotten used to that.

The next morning after they have arrived at Dzhalinda, Lin Shuo rose exceptionally early for a change. Leaving through the decrepit door of the hotel, Lin Shuo stood in the outdoors squinting his eyes from the bright light of the sun.

Even at 3,000 kilometers from the north tropic of Cancer, but summer at the far east can still reach 30 degrees Celsius. The time now was end of summer and beginning of fall, the temperatures vary greatly between day and night times.

Granted, this was not comparable to heading into the mountains during the worst season of the far east, but thinking about their target this trip, Lin Shuo’s mood was heavy.

When his eyes finally adjust to the sun, the first thing he saw as Anne the beauty.

Out here, Anne dressed very differently from her usual white collar outfit. She had on full outdoor outfit. Not only did she appeared to be efficient and ready for business, her outfit further accentuated the curvature of her body.

At the edge of the forest just outside the hotel, she was stretching  against a white birch tree with one foot high up on the tree branch while standing on the other.

Noticing that Lin Shuo was approaching her, the beauty put her leg down and walked in front of Lin Shuo, “Good morning, Mr. Lin. Please get ready, we will be leaving in an hour.”

“Looking at your stance here, how many years have you trained?” asked Lin Shuo.

“Oh, I have trained in both judo and Taekwondo,” Anne smiled lightly, “Don’t worry, Mr. Lin, I won’t become a burden.”

“What you have practiced won’t be useful on this trip,” Lin Shuo shook his head and walked into the white birch forest.

---

Anne didn’t see Lin Shuo again till ten minutes later.

“I won’t do it again, Shuo-ge!” The starling was being held in Lin Shuo’s hand, struggling violently.

Lin Shuo flicked the starling on his forehand with his fingers from the other hand and said solemnly, “What time do you think it is now? You just can’t control your bird down there? You have been gone all night! Look at yourself! There will not be a next time, I am going to castrate you right now!”

“No! Please don’t, Shuo-ge!” The starling continued struggling violently, “Aren’t we brothers? You can’t do that to me!”

“Sure I can!”

“Shuo-ge! Shuo-ge! There are outsiders here, save me some face!” The starling was close to tears, “Aye! Woman! Quick, speak for Ba-ye here!”

Anne looked a bit uneasy but finally took a couple of steps forward and hesitantly said, “Mr. Lin, is that really necessary? Ba-ye was just having some fun…”

“He’s not an ordinary bird,” said Lin Shuo after casting a glance at Anne.

“Of course Ba-ye wasn’t an ordinary bird,” replied Anne, perplexed.

“The reason he’s not an ordinary wasn’t because of how smart he is, or how human-like he is, but he has a great responsibility within him,” continued Lin Shuo. “He is a very important partner of mine during combat. If he loses his mind during combat, I may not make it out alive. And if I don’t make it out alive, none of your will make it out alive.”

After saying that, Lin Shuo paused for a second before he asked, “You still want to appeal to me for him?”

Anne quickly wave her hands and shook her head. She even took a few steps back.

The starling saw that he has no one else by his side and played hard, “Shuo-ge, give me one more change, huh? If I messed up, you don’t need to castrate me, I will flew into the cliff and kill myself!”

Lin Shuo was unaffected by his words. He pulled up a shiny dagger from his waist and with a flicker of his wrist flipped the staring with his stomach side up.

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Hunters of the Forbidden Region ch 5.2 - Old Rival

"I was once in combat with it six years ago,” Lin Shuo decided to divulge a bit of information. He felt that Anne was too overconfident about his ability.

This was, naturally, not a bad thing for Lin Shuo. But as one of the leaders for the troop, her mentality might not necessarily be a good thing.

“Have you heard of the incident at Mount Kunlun six years ago?” asked Lin Shuo.

“A little bit of it. It was a tragedy among the circle of hunters. Thirty or so of you entered the mountain, and you were the sole survivor,” said Anne. “Truth be told, this was the reason ILRO decided that we must have you as the leader of this mission.”

After saying that, she seemed to recall something else, “Do you mean that the creature we are facing at Heilongjiang right now is the same creature from Mount Kunlun that annihilated almost the entire group of hunters?”

“From the evidence we have so far, I’d say so,” nodded Lin Shuo. Then, casted a look at Anne, “You know who taught me all my skills?”

“Naturally the 86^th head of the Lin’s household and also your father, Mr. Lin Yaoshan,” replied Anne in the most respectful tone. “He is the current leader of the hunter circle.”

“My father died on Mount Kunlun six years ago,” a painful look flashed past him briefly but his tone remained calm.

Anne was obviously shocked. She then lowered her head and said, “I am sorry. We didn’t know.”

“We didn’t expect you to,” said Lin Shuo. “Our battle on Mount Kunlun was the best kept secret among the hunter circle. It was already quite impressive that you have found out about that.”

“If that is the case, does that mean you are the current leader of the hunter circle as Mr. Lin senior had already passed away in the unfortunate event?” Anne look rejuvenated.

Lin Shuo paused for a second and casted a glance at Anne, “There was never a leader within the circle of hunters. The hunters in the group were just being respectful and willing to follow our lead when we work together on missions.”

“Oh,” nodded Anne, like she had learned something new. She then asked again, “I have also heard that, since the very ancient time, in addition to the ebony box that you had on your back, the Lin family has another token of the hunters’ circle called the Dragon Bone Thumb Ring. This token represents the absolute authority that the Lin family among hunters.”

Picture: Dragon Bone Thumb Ring (What I think right now. I might update to a different picture if later on the description suggests otherwise.)

Source: read01.com

Picture: Some other types of thumb rings (agate, emerald, and jade, in order)

Source: ehiding.co

As soon as the dragon bone thumb ring was brought up, Lin Shuo’s attitude turned cold and he stopped talking.

“Woman, you’ve heard too much!” said the starling after swallowing a bite of pastries.

“I’m sorry, so sorry,” said Anne as she bowed and apologized.

“It’s fine,” Lin Shuo waved his hand, “I am only telling you this to let you know that the creature might be stronger than you have imagined. I will do my best. I know you might be trying to establish authority for me that’s why you boast about my abilities to others. But I want you to know that you didn’t hire some sort of superior being and everything will naturally work out the way you have expected.

“I merely accepted the money for my assignment. I don’t need to be responsible for anyone’s lives. But you are not the same. Miss Anne, you are not just anyone. I trust that you know what I am saying.”

“I appreciate what you’ve said, Mr. Lin,” nodded Anne, taking his words seriously.

---

Everybody had a day’s rest at the Four Seasons Hotel.

Lin Shuo returned to his room for a nice, long sleep. He didn’t care what was going on outside.

The next morning, Anne woke him up using the phone inside the hotel and asked him to meet up at the hotel lobby.

When he arrived at the lobby, the entire team heading toward Heilongjiang was assembled.

Anne – the person in charge of ILRO’s Asian branch.

Wei Xingshan – captain of the Asian branch mobile unit along with Liu Qing, his vice captain, and 13 elite mercenaries.

There were also ILRO’s lead researcher, Professor He Zihong, along with his student Yang Ta.

All 18 of them with Lin Shuo being the mission leader mounted the tour bus arranged by Anne one by one and headed toward Chun Ning International Airport.

Destination of their flight: Northeast China. 

 Picture: Northeast China

Source: mikongjian.com