Chapter 341: Demon Shadow in Rain

Those figures wavered unsteadily, sometimes appearing and sometimes vanishing behind the curtain of rain. It was obvious they meant no good, as if they were carefully observing us, waiting for an opportunity to strike. The sight of these specter-like shadows peeping from behind the rain made one shudder.

What's going on? Why are so many people suddenly showing up here?

The first thought that came to my mind was my earlier guess: someone in the village was secretly hindering us, and now they'd finally made their move. These people might be here to ambush and kill us.

This was a total mess—goddammit, a rabid horse on one side, a large ambush squad on the other, what a damn situation. This time we were dead for sure.

I took a rough count; there were about seven people here. Damn it, I had no idea what they wanted, but it looked like they'd set up an ambush here.

I wiped my face to clear the rain, but the downpour was so heavy that rain instantly filled my eyelids again. Those figures were still blurry and hard to make out. I couldn't tell what weapons they carried.

I also couldn't see the expression on Pan Ma's face. I kept my distance from him. He paused for a moment, then suddenly dashed straight toward one of the shadows.

I jumped at first, but then I quickly understood his reasoning: Holy shit, he thought these figures were those people.

In this kind of environment, no one could calmly set up an ambush or intercept others. So rather than waiting for the other side to get a clear picture, it was better to charge right in. With so many people in such chaotic conditions, once confusion set in, they might mistake me for one of their own, giving him a chance to exploit the situation.

I didn't know if this was good or bad for me, but I couldn't afford to think about that now. I immediately followed after Pan Ma. If they surrounded me, as soon as he clashed with them, there was bound to be an opening, and I could use it to escape.

I couldn't go back to the rain shelter either. If these people had been here all along, I didn't know how Agui, Poker-face, and the others were doing. After all, no matter how skilled Poker-face and Fatty were, one bullet each would take them down, especially with Agui and the others holding them back.

Running on that slippery, uneven rock beach was like performing acrobatics. After a few meters, my knees were completely scraped raw. I followed Pan Ma from a distance as he charged toward one of the shadows. Once the distance shifted, all the shadows around became hard to distinguish, and I couldn't tell what moves they were making. Pan Ma rushed straight at that shadow, the Yao knife in his hand cutting through the rain curtain with a momentum that didn't look like it belonged to an eighty-year-old man.

Strangely, that shadow stood motionless, as if completely unimpressed by Pan Ma's fierce charge. In less than ten seconds, we reached the shadow's front. Old Man Pan Ma turned his blade at the last second instead of striking, then suddenly let out a blood-curdling scream and dropped his knife. He stumbled backward wildly, then tripped over a rock and fell to the ground.

I circled around to take a look and saw the shadow's true form: it was a standing skeleton. What made it even more hair-raising was that the skeleton still wore a military uniform and webbing gear, rotted into black shreds, and carried a rusted gun on its back.

I shrank back a step, my scalp tingling. Holy crap, what the hell was this?! Had those dead bodies really crawled up out of the water?

But my mental endurance was much better than Pan Ma's. A gust of rain hit, and I saw the skull swaying in the wind like a lantern, as if it were hanging from something. Looking closer, I realized the skeleton was propped up on a wooden frame—there was a branch framework behind it.

Damn, how did a dead body get here? Had they found the corpses at the bottom of the lake? I sucked in a cold breath and examined the bones closely. Sure enough, those water-eaten clothes and military webbing meant it was definitely a soldier. Looked like my guess was right.

Still, seeing the skeleton standing there like this felt extremely eerie. I cursed under my breath—what was this, just trying to scare people? Old Man Pan Ma had gotten a real fright. When I looked back, I couldn't see where he was anymore. I wondered if it was Fatty's prank. I immediately ran back to the mules, but still didn't see Pan Ma. My head was pounding. I walked over to the other shadows and found they were all the same dead bodies. I counted seven skeletons in total, and couldn't say if there were more elsewhere. That madman was nowhere in sight, as if he'd gone into hiding.

With such heavy rain, I couldn't go searching for Pan Ma. I decided to first meet up with Agui and tell them there were others around. The mules seemed scared of the dead bodies and wouldn't move no matter how I drove them. I tied them to a rock, then went around the dead man and back into the rain shelter. The shelter had obviously been reinforced; it stood firm against the downpour. I rushed inside, and the surroundings immediately grew quiet. I looked around and found that they weren't there.

I cursed again. With rain this heavy, had they gone back into the water? Or had something else happened? I saw a big pile of stuff inside the shelter—everything they'd salvaged from underwater. In the two weeks I'd been away, Fatty and Poker-face had been pretty productive.

All the metal items were badly rusted. I saw canteens, rifles and pistols, binoculars, some daggers and machetes—all standard military gear from that time. You could imagine the wartime atmosphere here. There were also plenty of everyday items, even biscuit tins, meticulous in variety, likely picked out from larger salvage pieces.

Thinking I had nothing for self-defense, I picked up one of their Type 56 triangular bayonets—a famous kind. These bayonets weren't actually used much back then, since it was close to the 1980s and individual weapons had strong firepower. Bayonets were mostly used in special missions; the Vietnamese in jungle warfare didn't bother with bayonet charges.

Because of the material it was made of, the bayonet wasn't badly corroded. I'd heard that these bayonets were often treated with poison, so I was especially careful, holding it in a reverse grip. I was trying to figure out what to do. Damn it, with rain this heavy, you couldn't hear a thing, and you couldn't see clearly either.

Thinking that I was too exposed in the rain shelter, and that Pan Ma might barge in, I dashed out into the rain again and ran to the lakeside to see if Agui and the others were there. I circled around a few times and suddenly saw someone dragging a raft toward the shore on the lake beach.

I rushed over and saw it was Agui. His thin back was alone, hauling the raft ashore. When I appeared in front of him, he saw me and froze, his face pale as a sheet. "Why are you alone? Where are the others?" I asked.

Agui stood dumbly in the lake water, his expression vacant. He just stared at me. I asked a second time, and he still didn't respond.

Looking at the rafts, I thought Agui had just come back from the lake. Holy crap, I thought, these people really are insane—dredging in such heavy rain? Then I suddenly felt something was wrong. Why had Agui dragged the raft back? He should have been waiting on the lake surface for them, otherwise swimming back in this downpour would be very dangerous, especially since the water level had risen so much. And Agui's expression was really off.

I walked closer to Agui to ask more clearly. The closer I got, the more I sensed something wrong. Agui's face was incredibly dazed, as if he'd experienced something extremely shocking. He seemed to be in a dissociative state. I stepped up and slapped him across the face, shouting, "What happened?!" He finally snapped out of it, then suddenly burst into tears, wailing, "They… they're all dead!"