Mr. Qian raised his gun and realized that He hadn't even taken his rifle off his back—the shot hadn't come from He at all.
Both men were taken aback.
"What lousy shooting!" Suming muttered from behind the waterfall.
It must be stressed that Suming was legitimately skilled with a handgun! His old man worked in wildlife conservation outdoors, and Suming had been exposed to the '54 pistol from a young age. As he grew up, he even experienced live ammunition shooting during military training, so the captured replica '54 wasn't at all unfamiliar to him.
However, being able to shoot a handgun doesn't necessarily equate to shooting accurately.
Mr. Qian was only about twenty meters from the waterfall. Suming, holding the gun behind the waterfall, aimed for a long time but still missed. The bullet flew at least twenty or thirty centimeters from Mr. Qian into the trees.
Shooting a handgun is challenging—it's not just about firing, but hitting the target accurately. At a distance of more than twenty meters, even trained police officers can't guarantee a hundred percent accuracy; a sixty percent hit rate would already be considered good. Being able to hit any target within twenty meters is the level of a sharpshooter.
For a gun enthusiast like Suming, missing the target at a distance of twenty meters wasn't really a disgrace.
Outside the waterfall, after a momentary stun, He and Mr. Qian both shifted their gaze behind the waterfall. Guns without silencers make distinguishable noises, and anyone but a deaf person could accurately pinpoint the location of the gunshot.
Both men immediately performed standard tactical movements, lying down on the sandy beach, aiming their rifles towards the waterfall's mouth.
"Damn it! Who's there, come out!"
Before Mr. Qian's words fell, another bang came from behind the waterfall, and a bullet hit the ground less than twenty centimeters from him, kicking up chipped pebbles that left a bloody mark on his face.
The wild man, filled with sorrow and anger, still a bit dizzy, saw Mr. Qian practically deliver himself to the doorstep. Not one to be polite, he seized Mr. Qian's neck with one hand, and without waiting for Mr. Qian to raise his gun, the other hand, clenched into a fist the size of a sand pot, rained down three heavy punches onto Mr. Qian's head.
If this were ancient times, the wild man's fists might have been even more fierce than Lu Zhishen's who had killed Zheng the butcher with a flurry of punches. But this man simply needed three. After the three punches, half of Mr. Qian's head was buried in the ground, and the half that remained outside resembled an overturned sauce jar, red and white blood messy and mixed.
Well now, of the six poachers, only He remained, plagued by intense frustration.
What was this mess?! His group of six, all armed to the teeth, each one an experienced hand, could have held their ground against a squad of armed police, yet they hadn't even seen their opponent's face when five were finished off with brutal efficiency!
If it weren't for He's military experience offering him a robust mental fortitude, he might have broken down without needing Suming or the wild man to lay a finger on him.
Especially the two men outside the cave who died so mysteriously: one lying on a tree, body turned black as if poisoned; the other with the back of his skull shattered, his face swollen like a pig's head. If it weren't for their clothes, He would hardly recognize them.
His two subordinates were no slouches and pretty sharp, too, or he wouldn't have entrusted them with the watch. Yet, they were effortlessly taken down by the enemy, without even a chance to sound the alarm. This suggested that the enemy didn't have numbers, but were indisputably masters among masters, proficient in close combat, adept with poisons, proficient with... rocks?
Who on earth could this be? Several groups flashed through He's mind at once: the hunting squads from the Middle East, the Black Death mercenaries from South Africa, the Fallen Angels from North America, Blackwater security...
His mind was in disarray; these factions were not ones they could afford to provoke—in fact, they weren't even qualified to provoke them.
Was it the employer silencing them? He was shocked, took a deep breath, and hid behind a metal cage. With one hand holding a gun and the other clutching a backpack filled with dry food, he slipped stealthily toward the woods.
Even though He wore glasses, suggesting a scholarly look, they were actually plain glass for disguise—his natural vision in both eyes was 1.2. He came from a line of hunters and grew up to fight jungle warfare in the military. He was confident that once he retreated into the woods, it would become his domain. Using the deep mountains and forests as cover, he could slowly ascertain the enemy's situation and even unexpectedly turn the tide of battle.
"I'll say it one last time, drop the weapons and surrender to save your life,"
a voice resounded faintly, genuine and sincere, from behind the waterfall.