Chapter 17.1 - Increasingly Lonely
A gunshot tore through the tundra’s peacefulness.
This gunshots weren’t especially loud, nor did it possess the imposing manner of a sniper rifle as the bullet left the chamber. It clearly possessed the meticulous and refined characteristics of a new era firearm, as if a precise electronic instrument was being adjusted. However, its power definitely wasn’t weak. The miserable cry that rang through the tundra was the perfect commentary on the power of this weapon.
A pretty youngster dragged his own left leg that only had a smaller portion remaining, tumbling about on the ground as he screamed with everything he had. Several meters out, most of his left leg was peacefully lying on the ground, occasionally even twitching a few times. The youngster crawled on the ground and reached out his hand to grab it back, but this action only brought about even more intense pain. The youngster once again grabbed his broken leg and miserably howled. Only when his lungs ran out of air did the screaming temporarily stop.
Warm blood scattered down on the tundra, immediately being absorbed by the ice-cold rocks. The youngster’s anguished wailing and screaming mixed together with the howling cold winds as it travelled far into the distance, as if it was describing the cruelty and harshness of the tundra.
Maria calmly stood there as she watched this young man roll on the ground. Her eyes were full of anger, and her scarlet lips were so thin they were like a blade.
This young man was quite pretty, making him one of her favorite subordinates. His abilities weren’t the greatest, but he was the man that Maria received the most pleasure from playing with. Maria decided to bring him along as well, not because she expected him to be of any use in this hunt, but rather out of habit in case she needed him.
In that instant just now when Maria became vigilant and hurriedly turned around, a whistling bullet shot over. She seemed to have seen the bullet draw out a faintly discernible trajectory and then land in the middle of that young man’s thigh. The bullet only exploded after completely sinking into his leg’s flesh, and as such, the young man’s right leg began to split apart in a rigid manner before spinning and flying outwards.
Maria knew that the reason this shot didn’t land in a crucial area was not because the sniper made a mistake, but because his goal was purposely to break this young man’s left leg. There wasn’t much decision behind this conclusion and it was completely based on her intuition, and her intuition told her that she was correct.
The bullet landed from 2000 meters away. The skills of this sniper were definitely not inferior to Lynch’s. The wilderness at nighttime greatly restricted one’s vision, so even though Maria didn’t fear a sniper shot, she didn’t excel at Perception Domain abilities, so in this type of wilderness environment and this short period of time, there was no way for her to track down the sniper that was 2000 meters away.
The youngster continued to howl with pain, his miserable screams like intangible slaps that repeatedly struck against Maria’s face. Her face was so scorching hot it was as if she was on fire. Maria suddenly walked out with large steps, and then she stepped down with force. Only a bang sound could be heard, and then it was as if the broken leg was rigged with explosives. It exploded, sending flesh flying several meters outwards, dyeing this tundra region a scarlet red. When the howling young man saw his own leg explode under that trample, all wishes of restoring it disappeared. His spirit and mental state finally reached their limit, and under this final strike, he completely collapsed. After a weeping cry of sorrow, he finally went unconscious.
Maria silently walked in front of a subordinate and fetched a high-powered pistol from her waist. She then aimed at the unconscious male and unloaded the magazine’s twenty rounds. The young male seemed to have woken up from his unconsciousness, but after releasing a few short shrieks, he became completely quiet. There were only movements from being struck by the bullets, and the drops of blood even landed on the face of Maria who was several meters away!
After this magazine was emptied, Maria fetched a new magazine from the subordinate’s side, inserted it into the pistol, and then she shot them out at the constant target before her at a constant speed. The power of the pistol was extremely great, and every shot would open up a terrifying hole in that young man’s corpse. After firing these forty shots, one could no longer see what kind of creature the pile of mangled flesh belonged to.
The face of the subordinate besides Maria was pale. Even though she was quite pretty and delicate, she didn’t fit Maria’s esthetic conception that well. She stood in her original spot with her back perfectly straight and didn’t dare to make any movements, fearing that Maria’s rage would be transferred onto her own body.
Maria’s breathing became well distributed and tranquil. This was the result after she purposely controlled her mood. She knew that this sniper, Su, was most likely hiding in the distance and watching this place to see her reaction. It could also be said that he was watching her make a fool out of herself. To blast apart the leg of a subordinate from 2000 meters away, this truly wasn’t bad marksmanship, roughly equivalent to fifth level sniping expertise. This didn’t deal too great of a psychological blow to her. Losing a subordinate didn’t damage her fighting strength that much, but the clumsy performance of this subordinate before death made it impossible for her not to erupt with fury! Every single miserable scream was like a layer of skin that was being flayed from her face. In addition, he had already completely entered a panicked state, so there was no way for him to even seen Maria’s murderous gaze. When Maria fired to vent out her fury, she also knew that she had already lost this first battle.
She began to hate Su even more. Why didn’t he find Kafen or Lynch, and instead looked for her first? Could it be that Su thought that because she was female, she would definitely be the weakest of the three? Maria’s lips were so red it looked as if she had just applied blood to them. Her decisiveness informed Su that she was going to show him how great his mistake of provoking her first was.
Maria didn’t give the flesh that was gradually freezing on the ground another look and instead headed into the depths of the tundra. She believed Su should have quietly left, because a sniper was only a king from a distance. If he stayed even a bit longer and exposed his location to Maria, it was clear what the end result of Su who was equipped with Perception Domain abilities would be. The current path of advance Maria took was preplanned with Kafen and Lynch, so they could display the effects of cooperation. The route was mainly selected by Lynch, because this was something that the carrion crawler, who excelled in sniping, should be an expert in during a pursuit and encirclement as well.
Right now, Maria even wished for Su to take another shot. Under her complete attention, this shot should expose Su’s whereabouts and maybe even leave behind a few traces.
When she thought about Su’s appearance, as well as the things she could do to him before handing him over to the higher ups, Maria couldn’t help but feel excitement from deep within her, to the extent where she even began to tremble.
Bang!
Then, an ill-timed gunshot cut her train of thought. Suddenly, another miserable shout tore through the tundra. Maria spun her body around, just in time to see half a broken leg fly past her face before landing on the ground that had long frozen solid.
The broken leg was quite long, slender and powerful, a leg Maria was quite fond of. Its original owner also reached the standard of beauty most people perceived, which also satisfied Maria’s tastes. However now, she was just like the young man before her, hugging the broken leg while rolling on the ground with everything she had. After seeing the conclusion of the young man before her, she still maintained a minimum level of clear-headedness, trying her hardest not to scream out. However, the unbearable pain still caused one or two stifled cries of anguish to sound.
Maria only felt her face become heated, as if she had been slapped in the face again. In addition, it was direct, ferocious, and without any mercy, just like the one she received from Persephone back then.