Thirty kiloters west of Hulmatu, C1 area.
Ti: 3 a.m.
The scorching heat that can scorch people during the day has long faded, replaced by the piercing cold of the desert night.
All is silent, only the endless cold wind, like a vengeful spirit, shuttles and whimpers through the gorges and canyons, whipping up fine sand, which hits the rocks with a rustling sound.
Under this curtain of extre cold and dead silence, the killing intent, like a lurking scorpion, quietly reveals its sting.
Jiang Feng curled up in an observation post expanded from a natural rock crevice, his body tightly wrapped in a thick infrared isolation blanket, covered with a desert-colored camouflage net blending seamlessly with the environnt.
He pressed his eyes close to the eyepiece of the high-power night vision binoculars.
In his field of vision, suddenly appeared a ghostly green world, the distant dried-up valley—a route for vehicles to one of the few paths leading to Hulmatu—clearly visible under the night vision, emitting a slightly different cold light compared to other places.
Near him lies the sharpest blade of the entire "Musician" defense—rcenary Battalion One, comprising three hundred and twenty seasoned veterans.
They were not clustered, but precisely scattered like seeds by combat groups on the shaded sides of the sand dunes along the valley with varying heights, in the shadows of rocks, and in fully or partially concealed positions perfectly camouflaged by night excavation.
Each soldier strictly adhered to the highest standards of stealth discipline—wearing expensive all-terrain ghillie suits and infrared cloaks with special insulation layers built-in, even their weapons were carefully wrapped with infrared-blocking fabric.
They were like stones, like dead grass, completely integrated with the cold desert.
Those several "killer trump cards" of this ambush—PP87 82mm mortars and their ammunition—were placed in carefully chosen naturally sheltered positions.
The cannon body and surrounding areas were covered with thick double-layer insulation camouflage nets, carefully spread with local sand and gravel, making them difficult to distinguish in the night even from close range.
All tal components were pre-treated with materials to reduce thermal conductivity, minimizing the temperature difference with the cold environnt.
For this mont, Jiang Feng and his battalion had been lurking in this icy desert for over six hours.
They infiltrated silently on foot during the early night's darkness, moving in batches into predetermined positions.
Once inside, they imdiately completed final camouflage and strictly implented radio silence and heat source control.
Drinking water and food were cold individual rations, waste sealed in specially designed bags, everything was resolved beneath the camouflage net.
Jiang Feng knew his opponent too well—the elite mixed unit of the US Army's Delta and Iligo ISOF would surely be equipped with the most advanced starlight and thermal imaging reconnaissance devices, with drones certainly patrolling the skies above.
Any negligence, even a slight tremor from a soldier due to cold causing heat leakage or an unnatural optical reflection, could ruin the entire ambush plan.
"Report, low-frequency drone signal detected northwest..."
From the earphones ca the whispered voice of the forward reconnaissance team.
Jiang Feng perked up, adjusted the direction of the binoculars, carefully scanning the ghostly green field.
Soon, he caught sight of a tiny speck of light nearly rging with the night, quietly gliding along the valley in a standard reconnaissance trajectory.
That was the enemy's "eye," with extrely low noise and excellent endurance.
"Attention all, 'Hawkeye' overhead. Repeat, maintain absolute silence, freeze!"
Jiang Feng's command, transmitted clearly through bone conduction headphones to every soldier, carried an irrefutable iciness.
The entire ambush position seed as if a pause button had been pressed.
Even the occasional mild coughs due to the cold disappeared completely, with soldiers holding their breath, keeping their bodies as low as possible against the cold sand, relying on camouflage and insulation material to beco part of the environnt.
The reconnaissance drone circled twice above the valley, its high-performance infrared thermal imager and starlight cara scanning the seemingly uneventful ground below.
On the drone operator's screen, the area below appeared "normal."
In the cold environnt, the ground and rocks emitted faint natural cold radiation, occasionally interrupted by weak heat sources belonging to nocturnal small animals roaming, but otherwise dead silent.
Those ticulously camouflaged elite rcenaries, whose body heat was tightly locked by efficient insulation materials, and mortars deployed in the rear, harmonized almost to thermal balance with the surroundings, left no suspicious traces on the advanced infrared detectors.
Only the natural shadows and outlines appeared in the starlight cara.
"Hawkeye reports, within a three-kiloter range of the valley and its surroundings, no abnormal heat sources or suspicious mobile targets found. Optical scan shows no anomalies."
The drone operator's calm voice transmitted through encrypted channels to the squad secretly approaching.
Jiang Feng watched through the binoculars as the drone completed its reconnaissance, continued flying forward, and finally disappeared into the dark horizon.
He slowly released a breath he'd been holding, white vapor condensing into fine droplets inside the multi-functional battle scarf.
The prey's eyes had moved on, but the real hunt had just begun.
He knew, the mont testing patience was about to arrive.
About forty minutes later, when the clock hands pointed to around 3:40 AM, the moonlight slanted westward, marking the ti when the body was at its most fatigued.
The target finally appeared at this mont.
The first to enter Jiang Feng's night vision scope were several faintly visible, slowly moving shadows set against a ghostly green background.
Their movent was highly professional, swift and silent. They made full use of every rock and shallow pit for shadow cover and paused for observation, advancing in a rhythm that was both smooth and deadly.
This was the mixed twelve-man squad previously detected by our side, composed of six "Delta" mbers and six Iligo ISOF (Iligo's Special Operations Forces) mbers.
These guys were equally well-ard to the teeth.
In addition to HK416 assault rifles with various tactical attachnts, precision shooter rifles, silencers, night vision goggles, and tactical headsets, one particularly noticeable figure in the team carried extra communication antenna equipnt and a laser pointer—
The Joint Terminal Attack Controller (JTAC), the key person responsible for summoning and guiding the descending Grim Reaper at the critical mont.
Even though drone reconnaissance indicated "safety," this squad maintained extrely high tactical vigilance.
The team leader, codenad "Tombstone," a veteran from Delta, raised his clenched right fist. The entire squad instantly halted, lting into the nearby rocky shadows for another brief routine of covert observation.
The cold wind masked the sound of their breathing and the possible slight friction of their gear.
"Tombstone, this is 'Hawkeye' (drone call sign), final scan confirmation, no valid heat signal or suspicious activity detected from the front valley to the target area. Environntal paraters are normal."
The drone operator's voice confird once more.
"Understood. 'Hawkeye', expand the monitoring range, focus on the direction of Hulmatu."
"Tombstone" responded in a low voice, which sounded sowhat muffled through his mask.
Years of living on the edge had given him a beast-like intuition, and the "cleanliness" of this area made him vaguely uneasy, like the stillness before a storm.
Yet all technical asures told him there was no threat here.
"Maybe it's the fatigue from continuous marching?"
He shook his head secretly, suppressing the thought, and made a few concise tactical hand signals to those behind him.
The squad once again beca ghostly figures in the night, silently slipping into the bottom of the dried-up valley.
They didn't know they were stepping into a cold and deadly trap, laid wide open.
anwhile, beneath Hulmatu, inside the electromagnetically shielded A-node mobile command vehicle.
Song Heping, wrapped in a military coat, sat at a row of screens flickering with various colors.
The main screen was divided into multiple windows, respectively showing live footage recorded by helt caras of several Vanguards at the front.
The image quality wasn't perfect, but it was clear enough to see the twelve-man squad slowly entering the core area of the ambush like worms in the dark.
The air inside the vehicle was heavy, with only the low hum of equipnt fans and Song's steady, slight breathing.
"Old squad leader, the targets have all entered the bottom of the 'pocket'. Repeat, all twelve targets have entered the optimal kill zone."
Jiang Feng's voice was so calm it was almost devoid of emotional fluctuation, transmitted through a high-security encrypted channel.
Song Heping leaned slightly forward, his gaze sweeping over another auxiliary screen displaying three key intelligence briefs lined up:
1. US Army advisory group abnormal evacuation tiline and route analysis report (marked in red: tactical evasive posture).
2. Recent communication record text analysis with Colonel Kote (keywords "B-52", "routine training" highlighted).
3. Activity trajectory assessnt of this Delta squad over the past few days (arrows pointing straight to Hulmatu).
His brows furrowed tightly, his fingers gently taping the edge of the table.
Reconnaissance squad, JTAC, a standby strategic bomber...
All these elents linked together pointed to a chillingly clear conclusion:
The assassination plot against him is likely already approved, and the Aricans' action ti is expected to be soon, probably within a day or two.
"It's not just about dividing the soup, they want to smash the whole pot?"
A sharp flash of cold light passed through Song Heping's eyes, as if seeing those decision-makers in the Pentagon's high command center thousands of miles away, thinking they controlled everything.
"Then no one gets to eat!"
He took a deep breath, speaking into the microphone, he uttered just four words, yet they carried a heavy weight:
"Execute the plan."
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