Chapter 210: the bald eagle and the new region

Just in a flash, their comrade that was evicted a moment ago was dead. Shock alone could not describe the soldier’s emotions, as they watched with terrified expressions.

Seeing the blood remains and small pieces of flesh that were left of their comrade, they did not know what to think. Their hate for this region was increasing by the hour.

Already learning their lesson from back in the tunnel, despite how shocked they were, none of them dared to fall into a daze as they all watched alertly for any threat.

“Activate the energy signatures masking device immediately, and converge closer to each other”. Clark slowly whispered into the comm, as his soldiers acknowledged the order immediately.

Just like the others, he was also shocked by this unexpected outcome. He evicted the soldier because he was really angry and he wanted to use him as a lesson, but he never intended for him to die. That’s why he gave him such a gadget.

Though his intentions were pure, the execution completely differed entirely from the way that he expected it. Despite this, he did not let himself carried away as he thought of their current scenario.

“Where was this exactly? Which part of the mountain was this?” He had a lot of unanswered queries.

[Ding!! Master, the wind speed in this area has suddenly received a huge spike. There is a high probability of the same unknown bird appearing again, it’s probably coming back.]

“Be fast. Take this, connect this stealth device to the masking device. Work it faster, we don’t have time”. Clark acted swiftly after listening to his implant.

The slightly technical soldiers in the squad went to work, as they hastily set up the masking device while also connecting it to the stealth device that their Major just brought out.

5 seconds later, they finally set it up as a transparent energy film suddenly covered them in a semi-circle. The stealth device also activated, as the energy film suddenly flickered before making them invisible to the outside world.

After this, they finally relaxed their tense nerves as they cautiously glanced outside for any sudden movements.

Whoosh!!

The wind stirred fiercely, as a big bird of prey suddenly dived down from the air at an astonishing speed before perching at a tree that was close to the squad’s position.

“A bald eagle?”

Clark felt frustrated at seeing this, he had not recovered yet from his injuries, but he was already seeing more dangerous things. His implant suddenly flashed a display before him at this point to give more details.

[Ding!! Master, this is an exobeast bald eagle. The bald eagle is a bird of prey found in North America. It has 2 known subspecies, and forms a species pair with the white-tailed eagle.]

[After a lot of analysis for the past few hours since you arrived at this region, my processing core has discovered a surprising conjecture.]

[The bald eagle is a sea eagle. Its habitat is not the Himalayan ranges, and definitely not the Mariana territory either.]

[Also, about the cats you just escaped from. It is baffling that such dangerous cats are living in the Himalayan ranges and it’s not recorded anywhere. Due to all these, I came to a surprising conclusion.]

“What is it? Lily be fast, this predator does not look friendly at all. I don’t have much trust in the effectiveness of our stealth camouflage systems”.

[Master, my conjecture is that your squad either just came to an undiscovered part of the Himalayan peaks, a newly formed region of the peaks, or a dangerous region that the big 5 don’t deem necessary to make known to the world.]

[All the happenings and animals living in this region are strange, and this area is not included in the map that you bought. I advise that master takes time to explore the area to know more.]

Hearing this detailed analysis from his implant’s A.I, Clark went silent as he entered a contemplative mood. Like the implant, he was also seeing this region a little strange.

“Sir…, Major, it looked at us”.

Hearing one of the soldier’s quivering tone, Clark finally snapped out of his daze as he turned his head upwards to look again. His heart stopped for a moment, as his eyes clashed with the eagle’s.

Though he knew that the eagle could not see him, he still felt his heart palpitate at a faster rate from this sight alone.

When his implant was showing him all that, the eagle was originally looking in another direction. Why did it suddenly look this way, and in their direction?

“Are we discovered?” He was alarmed immediately.

After analyzing closely, he found from the eagle’s perching posture and curiosity-filled expression that it was not sure if they were there. Maybe its senses were telling it that they were there, but its sight was saying otherwise.

Seeing this, Clark immediately knew that staying in one place was not good at all.

“Soldiers, retreat backward a little. We are moving 5 meters from here; our current location is not safe”. He whispered again to his soldiers.

“Watch your steps, don’t step on anything that will reveal your position. Don’t go against the wind, let yourself flow with it and ride with it. No abrupt movements, take it slow and steady”.

After so many experiences and deadly examples, the idea of disobeying or ignoring his orders again was already taboo to the soldiers.

They followed his orders to the paper as they came. They all retreated in tandem, with no sound and change in the airflow being detected. Their bodies moved like a well-oiled machine.

Whoosh!!

As they moved, their eyes widened in shock as the bald eagle exobeast who seemed to have become impatient suddenly leaped from its perched position and dived down at their previous location.

“Stop, hold your breath, and slow your heartbeat rate”.

Though they hardly moved from their previous location, the soldiers did not disobey their Major as they all stopped their movements and stood rigidly in place.

The soldier who stood at the forefront felt his bladders tighten before loosening, as the wind-wave of the bald eagle’s passage hit his face fiercely. He freely wet his pants without any care for those around him.

After flying across the location but not coming into contact with any human, the now confused eagle flew back to its perch spot in the tall tree.

It looked down to scrutinize the spot again for some time, but its patience was limited. With another loud eagle cry, it finally soared into the air before riding the wind away.

Despite not seeing it again, the soldiers stood still like that for another 30 minutes to confirm before Clark finally said that they could relax their tense nerves.

They all plopped down tiredly, but they still did not open the stealth-covered energy signature masking device. They let it be, as they derived more security from knowing that it was activated.

As the soldiers slowly regained their nerves after resting for a few minutes, Clark finally stood up again before looking around himself to see where they were exactly.

Since they escaped from the tunnel, they never had a second to check out their surroundings. From evicting the disobedient soldier, to him flying off, to the bald eagle eating him off, everything looked like an action movie.

As he finally started taking in this new region that they found themselves in, his expression underwent huge changes.

The first impression that he had on seeing this completely strange landscape, was that this did not seem to be a place in the great Himalayan peaks. This place was actually a cold region forest, inside these Mountainous great peaks.

None of the sight before him showed that this was a mountain that needed to be climbed higher, to get to other locations. The landscape looked completely normal, like regular cold forest regions.

He could hardly see any rock nearby, only snow and few sights of rocky regions filled his sight with a proportional number of trees rambling across the whole region. He felt like he was suddenly in an adventure movie.

“Is this the legendary transmigration in web novels? What else can explain suddenly appearing from a cold mountain to a cold forest region? This is not an illusion, right?” He was sincerely shocked.

Thinking of all these, he could not help but attribute it to the trapped corpse that they saw in the orange glowing egg back in the tunnel.

“Who were those people that died there? Who was that trapped corpse? How was that grey alpha cat so intelligent that it could command its subordinates to attack cohesively?”

The questions in his mind were too numerous, there was no way that he could go through everything in his limited time. This only made this region seem more mysterious and fantastical to him.

“Did I really transmigrate? Damn, that will be amazing and dreadful in itself. That’s the stuff of myths and legends”.

As he observed, his subordinates already recovered as they stood beside him, observing also. They all had varied expressions on their faces, from curious to shocked, to bamboozled, then to excited.

From the historical knowledge that they got from their implants, the knowledge that was disseminated on the internet, and the map that the locals here gave them, there was no such region like this in the whole Everest region.

“The stealth device is running low on energy. We have to find shelter now before its energy is depleted”. Clark suddenly spoke out again, after receiving an alert from his implant.

“Let’s go to the forest. There, we would have more cover to hide and to think more carefully about our situation. We need rest, and our equipment also needs recharging”.

None of the soldiers had any contrary opinion, as the decision of their Major was the best in unknown situations like this.

Though the forest would be more infested with danger, it was still better than staying without any coverage here in the open. Here, predators can easily spot them.

Instead of staying here and relying on luck, they would rather go to the forest and forge their safety themselves.

After making sure that everyone was on the same wavelength as he was, Clark nodded in satisfaction before turning to lead his soldiers into the forest. By this point, most of his injuries were healed, reducing his discomfort.

Like that, in this completely unknown region, the soldiers of Squad 6 finally followed their leader into the forest through stealth coverage.

Perhaps, if they were lucky, the loot and discoveries of a new region were awaiting them. If it was the other way round, then the dangers of an unknown region were stalking them.

It was only a matter of time before one of these 2 scenarios would come to pass, they could only pray for better luck.

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