Rebirth of a Mercenary: The Ace Mercenary Forced to Be the Beloved of the Group

The drainage ditch outlet is on the east side of the mine, less than 300 meters from the edge of the rainforest. According to the original evacuation route, Group A should have crawled out from here, crossed a thicket, and then run south along the valley to wait for the helicopter at the rendezvous point.

Shen Zhuo was the first to rush to the exit. His hand had already touched the iron railing when he suddenly stopped.

Through the gaps in the iron fence, he saw the scene outside—three armored vehicles were parked in a fan shape less than fifty meters from the outlet of the drainage ditch, and the searchlights on the roofs illuminated the entire open space as if it were daytime.

At least twenty mercenaries had set up firing positions using armored vehicles as cover, all aiming their guns at the drainage ditch outlet. Two PKM general-purpose machine guns were arranged in a crisscross pattern, creating a fire coverage area with no blind spots.

"Retreat!" Shen Zhuo whispered, his body jerking back. "The exit is blocked! Three armored vehicles, two machine guns, twenty men—they're waiting for us to come out and be sitting ducks!"

Without hesitation, Li Mo said, "Change course. Go uphill and break through to the surface. Exit through the old boiler room behind the mine's office building."

"Boiler room?" Lu Xiao quickly went through the 3D map in his mind. "The boiler room is less than fifty meters away from the office building. Stepping out, you'll be right in front of their headquarters."

"Nobody thought of the front. They assumed we were in the drainage ditch, so they concentrated all their firepower on the east side. The boiler room is in the northwest corner, which is now the weakest point for the defenders."

"walk."

The five people turned around in the narrow alley and ran up a sloping maintenance passage.

Just as they were about to reach the exit, they bumped into a group of mercenaries who were heading underground.

Shen Zhuo reacted a full beat faster than his opponent. Before the opponent could raise his gun, he pulled the trigger, a long burst taking down the two people in front of him. Their bodies rolled down the stairs, and two people behind him were tripped up.

Xie Ran squeezed past him from behind, smashed the third mercenary who tried to raise his gun with the butt of his rifle, and then kicked him down the stairs.

Lu Xiao fired two more shots, and the stairwell fell silent.

"Ammunition." Shen Zhuo glanced down at his magazine well. "The pistol is empty, but the submachine gun has only one magazine left."

"My machine gun jammed." Xie Ran threw the machine gun to the ground, the metallic clanging echoing in the stairwell. He drew a pistol from his waist and a machete from his back, grinning, "No problem, it's enough."

"Your machine gun jammed, and you didn't say 'it's over' but 'it's enough'?" Shen Zhuo looked back at him as he ran uphill.

"My machete works better than a machine gun. At least it doesn't jam."

Xie Ran kicked open the iron door to the boiler room. The door flew out and crashed into the opposite wall with a loud bang. Then they saw the whole scene on the ground.

In the open space in front of the mine's office building, forty or fifty mercenaries were gathering. Armored vehicle engines roared, and searchlight beams swept back and forth between the rainforest and the mine. A heavy machine gun was mounted on the roof of the office building, its muzzle slowly turning towards the boiler room. Even more deadly was the person standing on the second-floor balcony of the office building.

He was a white male, nearly 1.9 meters tall, with a buzz cut and an old scar running from his brow bone to his chin. The megaphone in his hand emitted a piercing feedback shriek, and then his voice echoed throughout the entire mine.

"Bonsoir, sales intruder." (Good evening, intruder.)

Li Mo raised his binoculars from behind the bunker on the outer wall of the boiler room and saw the rank and name strips embroidered on the enemy's tactical vest.

"A retired sergeant major from the French Foreign Legion, possibly a senior commander in the PMC." He lowered his binoculars. "There's no such person in the intelligence."

"As expected. The intelligence didn't say this was a fully manned fortress." Lu Xiao squatted down next to him, quickly drawing a map of the mine on the ground with his dagger. "Forty or fifty men, armored vehicles, heavy machine guns, and a veteran who looks like he's been fighting for thirty years—we only have five of us, light weapons, and we're almost out of ammunition. Objectively speaking, the best option now is to retreat underground and find a place to hide until the support helicopter arrives."

The people on the balcony continued to shout through a megaphone.

His English, thick with a French accent, sounded like every syllable squeezed from his nose, arrogant and contemptuous: "I know you're mercenaries. I also know you planted explosives underground. Do you think I'm stupid enough to let you blow them up and run? My armored vehicles have completely sealed off this area. Your only option is to lay down your weapons, come out, and kneel before me, and maybe I'll consider sparing one of you alive."

"His English pronunciation is really awful," Shen Zhu commented.

"That's how French people speak English," Lu Xiao said without looking up.

"So," Shen Zhuo leaned against the cover, slammed the last submachine gun magazine into the magazine well, pulled the bolt, and his voice carried a mocking laugh, "we're not only going to bomb the factory, but also have to fight a French sergeant major and forty or fifty men head-on?"

Li Mo drew the gun from his waist, checked the magazine, and reloaded it: "Yes."

Shen Zhuo paused for a second, then said, "Damn it."

Li Mo glanced down at the countdown timer on his tactical watch. The C4 detonation time was eight minutes. In eight minutes, the entire underground factory would be reduced to ruins in a chain reaction collapse, along with their escape route.

He raised his head and, in an extremely calm tone, announced the decision that everyone thought was crazy.

"Eight minutes. Take out the sergeant, eliminate the pursuers, and take the prisoners. Withdraw in the last few seconds of the countdown."

The air was still for a moment, then Lu Xiao burst out laughing.

"Alright." He stood up from behind cover, drew his pistol and checked the magazine, his movements as light as if he were going to a shooting range rather than engaging in a head-on firefight with forty or fifty men. "Since we're here, the old rule applies—whoever kills the fewest has to clean the toilets for a month."

Xie Ran bent down and picked up a machine gun from beside a downed mercenary on the ground. He weighed it in his hand and found it was fully loaded. He hoisted the machine gun onto his shoulder, stabilizing it with one hand while gripping his machete in the other: "You said it."

Wen Yan pulled out a third scalpel from her medical kit and inserted it into the scabbard at her waist.

"You're a doctor." Lu Xiao glanced at him.

"Doctors can also have side jobs."

Li Mo did not join in their laughter.

"A direct firefight isn't the goal. The goal is to hold them off, let the explosives detonate, and then retreat amidst the chaos. Lu Xiao, take charge of identifying their commander and machine gunners, prioritizing eliminating the command chain. Xie Ran, suppress the heavy machine gun positions. Shen Zhuo, clear obstacles at close range, don't let anyone get close to our cover. Wen Yan, assist with shooting and first aid; no one is allowed to fall until I say they fall. I'll take the sergeant's rank."

Lu Xiao closed his eyes, took a breath, and then opened them. He began to laugh—the kind of laugh a mad dog smells blood, completely different from his previous smirking.

"That's fucking insane."