Mercenaries, I Will Be King Chapter 1693 - 1342: Reversal

Morning has arrived, but the sun is nowhere to be seen, surrounded by a dense, milky white curtain of fog.

In Illiguo, heavy fog is a rare occurrence.

After leaving the city, Masood's convoy plunged into this natural chaos.

Perhaps due to the mist, visibility was reduced to less than a hundred ters, and the ancient olive trees on either side of the road, weathered by frost, appeared exceedingly eerie in the swirling fog.

In the back seat of the car, having just listened to his nephew Barzani's raging, Masood felt a sudden, inexplicable palpitation.

He instinctively reached into the inner pocket of his traditional robe and touched the cellphone that never left his side.

Upon taking it out, the screen's signal icon was empty, only a glaring little cross and the words "No Service" remained.

He furrowed his brow, the deep lines on his forehead stacked like age rings.

No signal?

On the main road connecting Elbil and Kirkuk?

He imdiately took out his encrypted satellite phone and held down the power button.

The screen lit up with a ghostly blue light, the self-check routine ran, but it eventually stalled on the "Searching satellite signal" interface, the progress bar reluctant to advance.

Once, twice, he restarted the device, but the result remained unchanged.

Two devices, two completely different communication modes, simultaneously failing in a place that is not a remote mountainous region?

The heavy rcedes G-Class SUV had light composite armor and bullet-proof glass installed, which could cause so signal attenuation, but certainly not complete isolation.

This seems more like...

A purposeful jamming.

"What's going on?"

Masood raised his head, his sharp gaze fixed on his nephew beside him, his voice normally steady, now weighted with a hint of vigilance.

"Why has there been no signal for so long? Things have been off since we left the city."

Barzani's gaze remained fixed ahead, not even glancing at his uncle beside him, his expression extraordinarily stiff.

"To ensure absolute safety, Uncle, we implented so temporary signal jamming asures."

His tone was like a routine bureaucratic report.

"Especially during such sensitive tis, with the situation toward Kirkuk unclear, I must consider the worst-case scenario—such as soone using the civilian communication network to remotely detonate pre-planted IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices). A brief signal silence is a necessary protective cost."

"Protective cost?"

Masood repeated the term, his eyes never leaving his nephew's face.

The reasoning sounded logical; on the land of Iraq, roadside bombs are an eternal nightmare.

But instinct, honed through decades of political and military career—a near-reflexive sense of danger—warned him sharply.

Too "thorough!"

Thorough to the point it didn't fit the style of his nephew, who was known for his bold decisiveness, even sowhat rough.

Moreover, the range and timing of the signal jamming both carried a deliberate air.

He tried the phone a few more tis, the screen stubbornly displaying a no-service status, like a silent and eerie eye.

Doubts in his heart spread uncontrollably, like ink on paper.

The previous rumors heard in snippets, observed abnormal troop movents, and the almost stagnant oppressive atmosphere inside the car at this mont all connected in his mind, outlining a reality he was unwilling to face.

No.

Perhaps the signs were there earlier, subconsciously ignored by him.

It was the blind trust and protection from an elder to a child raised single-handedly, an emotional veil over rationality.

Only when the scent of danger was so close did he force himself back into reality.

"Stop the car."

Masood's voice was not loud, yet it carried the authority of a chairman.

This was not a request; it was an order.

However, the young soldier responsible for driving seed to instantaneously lose hearing, hands gripping the steering wheel steadily, gaze staring straight ahead into the dense fog, completely unresponsive to the command from the back seat, not even a twitch of neck muscle.

"I said, stop the car!"

Masood raised his voice, the elderly tone echoing inside the vehicle.

He no longer looked at the driver but instead fixed his gaze on Barzani's face.

"Ah..."

An almost inaudible sigh escaped from Barzani's throat.

The sigh contained no panic, no defense, but strangely mixed with a sense of relieved exhaustion and a sort of liberation from finally tearing off the disguise.

"Uncle..."

He began slowly, still without turning his head, voice heavy, "We've reached this point, having co this far, let's not..."

"You want to kill , don't you?"

Masood abruptly interrupted him, his voice with a slight tremor.

It's not the fear of death.

For soone like him, life and death were long seen with apathy.

The most heartbreaking was the betrayal by the closest kin.

He finally uttered it.

The signal jamming wasn't to guard against roadside bombs?

That was rely a pathetic excuse to sever all connections with the outside world, isolating him entirely in this moving iron coffin!

The ridiculous part was realizing it thoroughly only at this mont.

If it had been anyone else, with his political instinct, alarm bells would have rung at the disappearance of the first signal bar.

But it was Barzani, his late brother's orphan, his nephew whom he spent half of his life nurturing, seeing him as if his own, even subtly as a successor!

Such deep-boned familial affection and trust clouded his judgnt, leading him to instinctively find reasonable explanations for all anomalies, until he recognized himself led into this dead-end step by step.