Chapter 577 - Chapter 577: 365, Qing Chen's Counterattack
Chapter 577: 365, Qing Chen’s Counterattack
Fierce Wilderness people.
Uneasy Time Travelers.
Qing Chen saw Sun Chu Ci’s hands trembling slightly, a result of adrenaline secretion.
This Wilderness Hunter must have been scared too. A university student who had been in the Inner World for two months would naturally be afraid when faced with real combat, but Qing Chen did not think any less of him for it.
On the contrary, even though Sun Chu Ci was scared, he did not make the wrong choice to run away blindly nor did he behave in a way that caused panic among the others.
At that moment, Sun Chu Ci calmly said to the others, “If a fight starts, everyone should take cover behind the car and shoot, set your guns to burst mode, and don’t use up all your bullets at once.”
It was impressive that a group of Time Travelers, who were even short on ammunition, could still make a living in the wilderness, earning Qing Chen’s respect.
Sun Chu Ci turned back to Qing Chen and asked, “What should we do, strike first?”
Qing Chen calculated the distance to the forest, 200 meters, just within the effective range of an automatic rifle.
He had asked Sun Chu Ci to stop the car to avoid getting within that range, but Sun Chu Ci’s braking was too slow.
He thought for a moment and said, “Get in the car, run! Create distance between them and us!”
After speaking, Qing Chen got into the driver’s seat and started the car, “Quick, get in the car!”
The Time Travelers were stunned. Run?
They were just marveling at how quickly Qing Chen had realized something was off with the weight of the guns, thinking they might have encountered an expert, and then the next moment, Qing Chen chose to flee in the car?
A group of Time Travelers facing a chase by Wilderness people in the wilderness, running was the least wise and most reluctant choice because their pursuers were the ones most familiar with the area.
Sun Chu Ci hesitated for a moment, but ultimately still shouted, “Get in the car! Listen to him!”
This was not a blind decision, but a judgment made based on the information previously shown by Qing Chen!
Since they believed he was a firearms expert, they should also trust his ability to devise tactics.
In the distance, the Wilderness people saw Sun Chu Ci and the others suddenly getting into the car and immediately started running back.
Not only that, but the leading Wilderness person waved towards the forest, and in the blink of an eye, six dilapidated off-road vehicles charged out of the woods!
Sun Chu Ci and the others were stunned when they saw this scene. There were so many people hiding in the forest!
It was impossible not to think they had some other malicious intentions!
Until that moment, everyone finally believed in Qing Chen’s judgment, and they understood that their leader, Sun Chu Ci, had once again made the right choice.
Sitting in the passenger seat of the pickup truck, Tuan Zi silently looked at Qing Chen, telling herself that she had misjudged him.
Sun Chu Ci asked from the back seat, “Are we just running away?”
“No,” Qing Chen said as he glanced at the fuel gauge. “The car can only go fifty more kilometers before needing to refuel. We can’t get very far, hang on.”
Just then, Qing Chen suddenly slammed on the brakes and then opened the car door and jumped out.
Sun Chu Ci was about to get out to help, but saw Qing Chen kick the half-open car door, forcibly kicking him back inside the car.
Qing Chen firmly raised the automatic rifle and calmly said, “Stay in the car.”
At that moment, he had increased the distance between them and the Wilderness people to 400 meters.
This was a very delicate distance; he could hit the Wilderness people, but they would find it difficult to hit him.
For someone proficient with firearms, distance was everything.
The next second, Sun Chu Ci said over the walkie-talkie, “Don’t get out, wait in the car.”
Then, he and Tuan Zi sat in the car, silently watching the young man outside repeatedly pulling the trigger for burst shots.
The rate of shooting was high, as if the youth never needed to aim when shooting.
The rapid gunfire was like the drumbeat in music, with its own unique and dense rhythm.
Sun Chu Ci’s vehicle was facing away from the Wilderness people, so he turned and lay against the back of the seat, looking back through the car window.
He wanted to see how accurate Qing Chen’s shooting was.
Amidst astonishment, he watched as the vehicles of the Wilderness people successively rolled over, with a burst of blood blossoming from their cars with each shot Qing Chen fired.
Some Wilderness people stuck their heads out of their cars to shoot back, but the rough terrain caused their bullet trajectories to drift, making it impossible to properly aim at Qing Chen.
Moreover, these Wilderness people could only fire one shot before being killed by Qing Chen, who gave them no chance to adjust their aim.
In less than ten seconds, the Wilderness people had no chance to catch up; they were all annihilated.
Without saying a word, Qing Chen approached the vehicles, judgmentally recalling his memory that there should be two people who were not dead, hiding in the overturned vehicles, shielded by the car bodies in his shooting dead angle.
Seeing Qing Chen advancing forward, Sun Chu Ci hurriedly called his companions to get out of the car and follow from behind.
The Time Travelers looked at Qing Chen’s back, noticing how his arms holding the rifle were immovably steady, solid as a rock.
“Don’t rush in; there are still two people alive,” Qing Chen calmly said.
The next moment, he changed direction and finally found a new shooting angle and pulled the trigger.
Qing Chen lowered his arms and let out a long breath of white mist, his warm breath in the cold winter like a delicate steam machine in operation.
He turned around and smiled at Tuan Zi and the others, “Go on, see if there are any spoils of war you need. Don’t worry, there’s no danger now.”
Sun Chu Ci didn’t speak. He walked quickly to the Wilderness Hunter’s vehicle, pried open their trunk first, and took out the two cages containing the falcons.
Unexpectedly, those two cages were empty, with nothing inside.
Seeing this, Qing Chen guessed, “These Wilderness Hunters intended to trade the falcons for antibiotics with you, right?”
Sun Chu Ci glanced at him and no longer hid the truth, “Yes.”
“Among these people, some had severe influenza. It’s possible many in their camp were infected as well, so they urgently needed antibiotics to save lives,” Qing Chen said. “But, they couldn’t find the falcons you needed and couldn’t complete the trade.”
Capturing falcons wasn’t as easy as imagined. The Qin Family People had come to the wilderness to catch Kite Falcons and ended up not even seeing a shadow of them in two months.
So, the Wilderness Hunters decided to take the risk and forcefully rob the antibiotics.
Qing Chen looked at Sun Chu Ci, “During your trades previously, did you directly take the medicine from the car and give it to them?”
Sun Chu Ci nodded.
Qing Chen laughed and said, “Next time, be smarter and bury the medicine somewhere first. After the trade is completed, then tell them where it’s buried. Otherwise, killing you and searching the car for the medicine is too tempting. Of course, the safest bet is to have more formidable firepower.”
In the wilderness, killing didn’t require many reasons – only that I’m hungry and you have a piece of bread, or I’m sick and you have medicine in your hands.
The logic is just that simple, brutal, and straightforward.
At this moment, Sun Chu Ci checked all the vehicles, gathered the Wilderness Hunters’ firearms onto the car, and took photos as evidence.
He said to Qing Chen, “City 10 has issued a bounty on Wilderness Hunters, five thousand dollars for each one killed. There are seventeen Wilderness Hunters here, which will net eighty-five thousand dollars… We can transfer eighty thousand dollars to you after we claim the bounty.”
Qing Chen was startled. He had known that Wilderness Hunters were also targeted by Hunters, much like how corporations hunted wild beasts.
But he did not yet know that the lives of Wilderness Hunters could actually be exchanged for money in the Federation!
And that they were so cheap.
Qing Chen looked at Sun Chu Ci and laughed, “After all this hard work, are you guys just keeping five thousand dollars for yourselves, and giving me the rest?”
Sun Chu Ci earnestly replied, “You killed them, and we were essentially saved by you, so even taking five thousand dollars is like getting a bargain for us.”
It was mainly because they were quite strapped for cash; otherwise, they might not even take those five thousand.
Qing Chen smiled, “But you’ve saved me before as well.”
Sun Chu Ci said, “Given the capabilities you’ve shown, even if we hadn’t given you a ride, you wouldn’t have had any problems.”
At this moment, Sun Chu Ci had thought it through very clearly. How could someone like Qing Chen be left halfway to fend for himself, rushing to City 10 to ‘start anew’?
So the excuses Qing Chen had mentioned before were merely stories concocted on the spot by the other party.
But every time Sun Chu Ci thought about the young man laying on the road pretending to be pitiful, it seemed utterly absurd…
What kind of behavior was that? Just for fun?
Qing Chen looked at Sun Chu Ci, smiled, and shook his head, “It’s okay, after you collect the money from the Federation just keep it yourselves, consider it my fare for the ride. It also saves you from plotting to kill me for money halfway through, which is how things are in the wilderness, right?”
Sun Chu Ci paused for a moment, “We wouldn’t do that.”
Qing Chen continued, “Lately, the Border Control Agency has been very strict about managing antibiotics, and it’s very difficult for the average Wilderness Hunter to bring so many antibiotics out from the city. So you are Time Travelers, right? The antibiotics also came from the Outer World?”
Upon hearing this, Tuan Zi and the others became extremely defensive, as if their biggest secret had been revealed.
Qing Chen laughed, “Relax, I won’t report you. Although I am an Inner World Native as you call it, I have no ill will towards Time Travelers.”
Sun Chu Ci breathed a sigh of relief. Currently, Time Travelers were worth much more than a Wilderness Hunter’s life.
Qing Chen got into the car first to warm up, “Don’t forget to thoroughly search their vehicles. After all, firearms and ammunition are quite useful to you.”
Sun Chu Ci and Tuan Zi blushed upon hearing this, knowing that Qing Chen had guessed their desperate situation.
After Qing Chen got into the car, Tuan Zi whispered to Sun Chu Ci, “Senior, I counted just now; this young man fired a total of thirteen shots, but seventeen Wilderness Hunters died. I now feel his identity must be extraordinary, and he’s very likely a major figure in the Federation…”
Sun Chu Ci bowed his head in thought; they were using automatic rifles with a 7.62 mm caliber.
Even if such a caliber could create through-and-through wounds in a body, it’s hard to imagine those bullets penetrating both a body and vehicle seats to inflict fatal injuries on people behind.
He checked the Wilderness Hunters’ wounds and found that four of them had died from bullet grazes to their large carotid arteries in their necks.
The bullets, like knives, had sliced through the carotid arteries and, without losing much kinetic energy, hit the people sitting in the back rows.
If one Wilderness Hunter died this way, it might be a coincidence, but with four, it couldn’t be just coincidence!
What kind of shooting skills would that be?!
Tuan Zi added, “Senior, his surname is Qing.”
Qing was a very rare surname.
As she spoke, she turned back to look at the young man who had already gotten into the car, who was now looking back and smiling at her, his smile still flawless and pristine.
Source: Webnovel.com, updated on N𝘰vgo.co