0110 The Little Camel and Its Mother (Part Two)

The clown-faced leader shouted loudly right next to the boy’s ear, while the boy could only weep, shaking his head violently and struggling in vain to escape the leader’s iron grip.

After a stalemate of about ten seconds, the clown-faced leader grew impatient. He forced his own finger into the trigger guard, pressing down on the boy’s finger to squeeze the trigger.

"Bang!" A gunshot rang out, and the boy’s father collapsed on cue, a look of despair and sorrow frozen on his face even in death. The mother and the boy threw themselves onto the father’s corpse, wailing uncontrollably. Seeing this, the clown-faced leader gestured to his subordinates. The Alliance soldiers immediately closed in and opened fire, gunning down the mother and son right on top of the father’s body, leaving the entire family piled together.

Witnessing this horrific scene, the remaining villagers erupted into a panic. Families who had been dragged out struggled to flee, but their efforts were met only with ruthless volleys of gunfire.

"Rat-tat-tat!" In the blink of an eye, thirty-four more corpses littered the open ground. Several adult men were gunned down from behind by the Alliance soldiers, who then proceeded to fire point-blank into the fallen bodies, acting like merciless killing machines.

Terror and slaughter were indeed the most efficient and effective ways to subdue people. This massacre by the Alliance soldiers immediately silenced the remaining villagers. Most of them bowed their heads, men and women huddling together and shivering, helplessly watching through their fingers as their neighbors were dragged away by the soldiers.

The tragedy continued, family after family. Some of the children forced by the clown-faced leader pulled the trigger in their terror, killing their own parents. Others refused to comply, and the result was simply being executed alongside their families. In less than half an hour, it was the turn of Little Camel and his mother.

When the clown-faced leader shoved a .38 revolver into Little Camel’s hand, Hou Rui, who had been watching from the tree, felt an overwhelming urge to jump down. Forcing family members to kill one another was a beastly act; having been raised with traditional, upright values, Hou Rui found it absolutely impossible to accept.

But just as his blood boiled and he was about to act, thoughts of the organization’s biochip, Jin Shanshan’s unknown state of distress back in Egypt, and his own instinct for survival flooded his mind. These thoughts hindered his actions. In his hesitation, Hou Rui lost the impulse and courage to jump down and intervene. He could only watch in vain as the clown-faced leader continued his work, helplessly guessing what choice the child, Little Camel, would ultimately make.

"!" The clown-faced leader roared into Little Camel’s ear, then released his grip on the hand he had been using to steady the revolver. He stepped back and drew a 9mm pistol from his waist, pressing the barrel against the back of Little Camel’s head.

"My child, don't cry. I am fine, really fine. Pull the trigger. You must survive." Unexpectedly, the woman in the headscarf knelt there and spoke to Little Camel in English, presumably so the brutal Alliance soldiers would not understand their final conversation.

"No, Mother, I want to stay with you," Little Camel replied, also in English. By this point, Hou Rui, perched in the tree, was likely the only one who understood what they were saying.

"No, these devils will kill you. You must live. I am fine; your survival is my only wish." The woman continued to plead with him. Though her face was streaked with tears, Hou Rui witnessed a display of the purest, most magnificent maternal love.

"I can't do it!" Little Camel struggled, but the leader behind him grew impatient and disengaged the safety on his 9mm pistol.

"Shoot, quickly, my sweet child, hurry!" Seeing the leader’s move, the woman panicked. She crawled on her knees across the blood-stained ground, arms outstretched, calling out as she moved toward Little Camel, voluntarily meeting the bullet—voluntarily meeting death.

"Mother, I love you. I won't kill you." Little Camel’s face was ruined by tears, and the .38 in his hand drooped, pointing almost at the ground.

"No, sweet child, you must listen to Mother. Live bravely until you grow up. Come, pull the trigger." The woman hoisted the revolver up, pressing the muzzle directly against her own forehead, smiling at her son as if saying goodbye.

"" The clown-faced leader let out a sudden roar. Even from the tree, though he couldn't understand the words, Hou Rui could tell the man had decided to take action. Yet, just before the leader could pull his own trigger—

"Bang!" The .38 in Little Camel’s hand fired, a bullet instantly piercing his mother’s forehead.

As his mother’s body slumped to the ground, Little Camel, filled with grief, regret, sorrow, and despair, let out a scream, rolled his eyes back, and fainted dead away.

Another happy family destroyed.

An Alliance soldier standing nearby stepped forward, preparing to put a bullet into the unconscious "useless" child, but the clown-faced leader unexpectedly stopped him. He ordered the soldier to pick up the fainted boy and place him on a pickup truck with the other children who had been forced to kill their parents.

The tragedy continued, but since Hou Rui hadn't intervened for the others, he had no reason to help now. He clung to the tree, watching helplessly as only seven children out of more than a dozen families survived to be loaded onto the trucks.

Just when Hou Rui thought the bloody ordeal was over, the screech of tires echoed from afar. A large jeep and a pickup truck mounted with a heavy machine gun roared into the village. Seeing the flag on the jeep—two clenched fists crossed—Hou Rui knew these were also members of the Liberator Alliance.

Upon seeing these vehicles, the clown-faced leader, who had been so arrogant while killing, suddenly became obsequious. He ripped off his sunglasses and trotted over to open the door for the passenger in the back of the jeep.

Amidst celebratory gunfire from the soldiers, a middle-aged local man climbed out of the jeep. Hou Rui, watching intently, was struck by the strange sight of the man wearing a knee-length skirt made of black fabric—an absurd sight.

Unlike the confused Hou Rui, the villagers went mad the moment they saw the man, or rather, the moment they saw that skirt. The men among them scrambled toward the woods without a second thought, not caring if the soldiers would shoot them; their only thought was to flee from this devil.

"Rat-tat-tat!" The scene spiraled out of control. Some soldiers opened fire, gunning the men down from behind, while others chased them down, beating them mercilessly before dragging them back and throwing them into the crowd.

In the chaos filled with gunfire, screams, and pleas, one man ran blindly toward the very tree where Hou Rui was hiding.

*Go back! Go back! Don't come any closer.*

Hou Rui, tense and clinging tightly to the tree, repeated this silently. Unfortunately, his mental prayers had no effect. Just as the man reached the base of the tree, an Alliance soldier nearby fired, hitting him in the shoulder.

In the next second, the man, stumbling from the impact, lost his balance and slammed hard into the tree. The violent shaking of the trunk caused the incredibly unlucky Hou Rui to lose his grip and fall from the canopy.

"Thud!" Hou Rui landed hard on the ground. A man suddenly dropping from the tree stunned not only the wounded man below but also the pursuing soldiers. For a moment, a bizarre silence descended.

However, as Hou Rui scrambled to pull his weapon while ignoring the searing pain in his backside, the pursuing soldier had already leveled his AK-47 at Hou Rui’s head. Meanwhile, the heavy Browning M1917 machine gun on the pickup truck also swung toward the uninvited guest.

The situation was dire. Surrounded by dozens of soldiers with weapons trained on him, a helpless Hou Rui had no choice but to raise his hands. He was then dragged back to the center of the village square.

As the Alliance soldiers crowded around, Hou Rui quietly observed the two commanders, especially the man in the skirt who had arrived later.

The man was about 170 or 175 centimeters tall, his torso covered in bulging, well-developed muscles. More striking, however, were the jagged, ghastly scars across his chest and arms—the clear sign of someone who had weathered countless battles. He was obviously not a man to be trifled with.

Then, as Hou Rui’s gaze moved downward to examine the strange black skirt, his blood ran cold, and his mind ground to a complete halt.