I started with a portal, then turned around and handed it over to the nation.

"There! On the left!"

Lin Mo suddenly turned the gun and fired a burst at the moving cloud of orange smoke.

"Meow—!"

A heart-wrenching scream rang out.

The orange outline suddenly paused, then exploded into a spray of blood, revealing the true form of a black corpse.

"Beat them! Give them a good beating!"

Captain Tiger stood up abruptly, raised his light machine gun, and opened fire on the orange shadows.

The cat demons couldn't hold on any longer.

They couldn't outspeed them, and their stealth was broken.

This isn't a battle; it's lining up to be shot.

The cat demon corpses in the front row had already formed a low wall, and the cat demons behind, stepping on the corpses of their own kind, had just peeked out when they were blown to pieces.

Finally, fear overwhelmed the craving for food.

"Meow—"

With a shriek, the remaining cat demons turned and fled.

They tucked their tails between their legs and charged madly into the distant forest, not daring to look back.

The gunfire gradually subsided.

Lin Mo released the trigger, his hands still trembling uncontrollably.

The gun barrel was red-hot and emitting blue smoke.

The open ground in front of us was covered with a thick layer of spent shell casings, which crunched as you stepped on them.

Outside that defensive line, the cat demon's corpse lay mangled, its black blood forming a small stream.

"That's... all?"

Renn slumped to the ground, still clutching a half-finished ammunition belt in his arms.

He looked at the figures fleeing desperately in the distance, then glanced at the group of men in black beside him who were changing magazines.

"So, who exactly is the monster?"

On Lin Mo's retina, a line of pale blue system notifications was flashing rapidly.

Mission progress: 213/100 Shadow Cat Demons defeated

Current rating: Grade A (Exceeded expectations)

"Huff...huff...Team Leader Long, mission accomplished!"

"Received!" Long Fei replied simply.

"Was it good?"

Lin Mo unscrewed his canteen, tilted his head back, and took a big gulp. The water flowed down his chin and into his collar, the icy sensation clearing his feverish head slightly.

He nudged Ryan with his elbow.

"what?"

Renn shuddered violently, and the ammunition belt in his hand clattered to the ground.

Ryan turned his head, looked at Lin Mo, then at the heavy machine gun that was still radiating heat, and his Adam's apple bobbed up and down with difficulty.

"This...this is...divine punishment?"

His voice was hoarse.

"What divine punishment? This is the power of industry."

Lin Mo grinned and reached out to pat the QJZ-89's receiver, feeling the metallic texture in his palm.

"If there's enough ammunition, even God will bleed."

"Each group reports on ammunition consumption."

Long Fei's voice broke the brief silence on the channel.

He emerged from behind a broken wall, his tactical mask pushed up to reveal his cold, hard face, as he wiped the blood off the barrel of his gun with a rag.

"Tiger Team One, machine gun ammunition consumption is 40 percent."

"Tiger Team Two, 35% depleted."

"Snow Wolf... We've run out of grenades, but we still have half a bullet left."

Han Feng's voice was somewhat excited: "Boss, these bastards have gotten smarter. The last few waves didn't dare to show their faces at all; they all retreated back into the woods."

"Don't be careless."

Long Fei walked to the edge of the trench, took the water bottle Lin Mo handed him, took a sip, and kept his eyes fixed on the deep forest.

The sun sank below the treetops, and the already dim forest became completely dark.

Something's not right here.

Long Fei tossed the kettle back to Lin Mo and looked up at the sky: "The temperature is dropping too fast."

Indeed, the air, which had been hot and humid just moments before, now carried a chill, and Lin Mo felt the hairs on his arms stand on end.

"Rest in place and take turns eating."

Long Fei glanced at his watch: "The Tigers will hold them off for now. The Snow Wolves will come down to eat. We'll rotate in half an hour."

"We'll spend the night here. If we can hold out until tonight, we'll leave first thing tomorrow morning."

Upon hearing this, several Snow Wolf team members unloaded their tactical backpacks, leaned against the cover, and tore open the packaging bags of their individual self-heating rations.

"Here, have a taste."

Lin Mo tossed Raine a bag of compressed biscuits and a bag of braised beef.

Raine hurriedly caught it, tore open the packaging like Lin Mo did, stuffed it into his mouth and chewed it forcefully twice.

"tasty!"

Raine's eyes lit up, and he wolfed it down: "It's softer than the jerky in the village, and... it even has a nice aroma."

"Hahaha~ That's the taste of additives."

Lin Mo smiled and shook his head, then opened a pack of energy gels and started inhaling them himself.

Although physically exhausted, Lin Mo was mentally exhilarated. The feeling of wielding heavy weapons and trampling fear underfoot was incredibly addictive.

"Sizzle... sizzle..."

Suddenly, an unstable electrical sound came through the headset.

"The Eagle Calls for the Dragon Team."

The observer in charge of monitoring the drones sounded tense, his voice lacking the relaxed tone of the daytime.

"Speak." Long Fei's hand, which was checking the magazine, suddenly stopped.

"The thermal imaging...is a bit messy."

The observer's voice carried a hint of hesitation:

"The temperature in the forest dropped suddenly, the background temperature difference increased, and the noise in the thermal image suddenly increased."

"and……"

"And what?" Long Fei pulled down his tactical mask, his voice instantly turning cold.

"And those red dots are moving faster."

The observer swallowed hard. "It's more than twice as fast as during the day."

Lin Mo's heart skipped a beat. He grabbed the heavy machine gun next to him and pulled the bolt back with a clatter.

He suddenly remembered a remark Professor Sun had made before he set off.

"Judging from its name, this feline has a reflective layer behind its retina, making it highly dependent on nighttime environments."

They sleep during the day, and their daytime assaults are forced into operation.

They only go to work at night.

"All units, cease rest and reorganization!"

Long Fei's roar boomed through the channel: "Level One combat readiness! Turn on night vision goggles and thermal imaging!"

"Splash—"

Almost at the same time, all the chewing sounds in the trenches disappeared.

The Snow Wolf team members threw away their half-eaten rations, grabbed their rifles, and leaped to their firing positions.

"Buzz—"

The faint electrical hum of the low-light night vision goggles rang out intermittently, and everyone's vision instantly turned into a bleak green.

"Eagle, report your location!"

"All...all of them!"

The observer's voice changed: "We've sealed off the east, south, and north gates; they can't get in."

"Now all the red dots in the forest are crowding towards the west gate!"

"How much?" Lin Mo pressed his eyes against the scope, his palms sweating profusely.

"countless!"

The observer roared, "Not just a few, but a whole swarm! A tide!"

"They smelled blood!"

The voice just fell.

Suddenly, a pair of green lights appeared deep within the once desolate forest.

Then came two pairs, ten pairs, hundreds of pairs...

Dense green lights lit up in the darkness, surging towards the west gate in an overwhelming manner.

"Meow--!!!"

A piercing scream tore through the night sky.

The sound was no longer the soft, meek call it made during the day; just listening to it made my eardrums ache.

"Thump! Thump! Thump!"

Through the night vision scope, Lin Mo saw a scene that sent chills down his spine.

In the darkness, countless black figures are running wildly.

They no longer hid or stalked, but instead charged madly over the corpses of their companions.

It moved so fast that it left afterimages in the night vision goggles.

"Three hundred meters away!"

"Two hundred meters!"