Chapter 28 Searching for the Taliban
Zhao Ziyang, who was rescued by the little wild cat, woke up slowly and opened his eyes to find himself in the forest. There were branches under him and a blanket covering him. There was nothing around him except trees and rocks.
Sitting up slowly, Zhao Ziyang felt a tingling sensation in the wound and could not help but touch it. As soon as he touched it, his bloodstained face was stunned for a moment: he touched the wound, but it was almost healed.
"Hello." The voice of the little wild cat came from above, calling Zhao Ziyang.
Hearing the sound, Zhao Ziyang looked up and saw a little wild cat lying on a tree fork and eating an apple.
"Does this tree grow apples?" Zhao Ziyang blurts out.
"Guess, hehe..." The little wild cat smiled and turned over and jumped down from the tree.
Do you still need to guess? Apples definitely don't grow on such a tree. Zhao Ziyang, who had just woken up, was dizzy. When he saw the little wild cat chewing an apple, this thought popped into his mind. But this is also very normal. When people are weak, they always have illogical thoughts, and then express their thoughts through words and deeds.
"Where are we?" Zhao Ziyang asked the little wild cat.
The little wild cat didn't say anything. He put his hands behind his back, pouted his lips, and stared at Zhao Ziyang with his eyes open, as if he wanted something.
"Oh, thank you for saving me." Zhao Ziyang realized that he had not thanked the other person yet, so he quickly expressed his sincere gratitude.
"That's better." The little wild cat muttered, took out an apple and handed it to Zhao Ziyang, saying, "Here you go."
Zhao Ziyang shook his head, rejecting the little wildcat's kindness. Now he was worried about Angel, wondering if Angel could escape successfully.
"If you don't want to eat it, forget it. Apples don't grow on this tree, hum!" The little wild cat glared at Zhao Ziyang, took a big bite of the apple and said incoherently: "This is..."
"Where?" Zhao Ziyang stretched his neck.
“I don’t know where this is either.”
Zhao Ziyang stretched his neck and stood up from the ground in silence. But as soon as he stood up, he felt a sharp pain in his chest, mixed with the numbness and itchiness of the wound, which was extremely uncomfortable.
As soon as this feeling came over him, he immediately realized that the bullet that had shot into his body had not been removed.
"You, you didn't help me remove the bullet?" Zhao Ziyang covered his wound and asked the little wild cat again as he stretched his neck.
"Why should I remove the bullet for you?" The little wild cat said in surprise, "Besides, I don't know how to remove the bullet."
"But aren't you amazing?"
"Who said that if you are good at martial arts, you have to be able to remove bullets?"
“…”
After a moment of staring at each other, Zhao Ziyang chose to admit defeat. He pulled out his saber, cut open the clothes that were standing on his skin on his chest, and found the wound.
"Little wild cat, go to the trunk of the car and get me some medical alcohol. I want to take out the bullet." Zhao Ziyang said to the little wild cat while observing the wound.
It should have been only twelve hours since last night, but the wound looked as if it had been recuperating . The torn flesh had grown together, revealing bright red tender flesh, and it was tingling.
The wound has healed, but the bullet and gunpowder residue have not been removed. If they remain in the body, they will gradually fester and eventually fester from the inside out.
"The car is thrown away." The little wild cat said nonchalantly.
"Then help me find some clean water. I need to clean the wound."
"No, only an apple." The little wild cat threw away the apple core and took out another apple.
"Forget it." Zhao Ziyang shook his head. He didn't expect this girl to help him more. He had to rely on himself.
Zhao Ziyang took out a small military wine flask, shook it in his hand, and nodded. There was still half a flask of white wine in it, which was barely enough.
The gunshot site was in the left chest, and judging from the wound and the location of the pain, the bullet should have hit the edge of the heart. It can be said that it was a blessing in disguise, escaping death while having to face the situation of removing the bullet by himself.
The tip of the knife gently placed on the wound, Zhao Ziyang gritted his teeth and stabbed it with the tip of the knife.
A trickle of blood flowed out from the wound, and the saber broke through the muscle fibers that had grown together and went straight into the deep of the wound.
"Ugh!..." Zhao Ziyang clenched his teeth tightly, making a painful sound from his throat, with beads of sweat oozing from his forehead.
Seeing the blood flowing on Zhao Ziyang’s chest and his painful expression, the little wild cat felt a little bit reluctant, but he remained extremely calm.
The saber was half inserted, and Zhao Ziyang gave up the idea of going any further. The unbearable pain made his right hand begin to tremble. He was not sure if he would accidentally pierce a small hole in his heart.
The wound healed too quickly, which was a good thing, but now it became a bad thing. The muscle growth from the wound where the bullet passed through made it impossible for him to complete the task of removing the bullet.
"Ugh..." A groan came out of Zhao Ziyang's mouth. He pulled out his saber and removed the muscle stained with gunpowder.
This series of work was completed with the little wild cat's round eyes open. The little wild cat was stunned, looking at Zhao Ziyang's painful expression.
"Ah!..." Zhao Ziyang screamed in pain as he poured white wine on the wound. The strong white wine prepared by Omo for him instantly burned the nerves in his body through the wound, and his whole body twitched slightly.
"Huff, huff..." After doing all this, Zhao Ziyang fell heavily to the ground and breathed heavily, letting the blood from the wound seep out bit by bit.
He had no intention of bandaging it. His physical condition was very strange, and the wounds were healing at an astonishing speed. The fox spirit had been studying this, but had never figured out what was going on. It could only be attributed to the leaf he had eaten.
The blood from the wound flowed slowly for a while and then coagulated on its own. The wound began to heal quickly again, forming a scar in a short time.
If the warhead cannot be removed, there is no other way. Now the first problem is to find Angel and his teammates . If the estimate is correct, Angel must have fled to the Taliban base, which is the safest place.
"Little wild cat." Zhao Ziyang called the little wild cat and cut off a piece of camouflage cloth with a military knife to wrap the wound.
"Ah?" The little wild cat responded with its mouth wide open.
"Where did you throw the car?" Zhao Ziyang asked the little wild cat while holding his soldier card.
The Humvee has a radio, and he will try to use it to contact Seth at the base, and then locate all members. Everyone's soldier card has a positioning system, so no matter what kind of mission they are carrying out or what kind of danger they encounter, they can quickly find people through satellites for support and rescue.
"Throw it to..." The little wildcat pointed in four directions with a confused look on his face and said, "Probably, probably that direction..."
Zhao Ziyang showed a helpless expression on his face towards the confusion shown by the little wild cat, but he was alert in his heart.
How could a person who knew that the US military would attack them, a person who possessed superb traditional Chinese martial arts, and a girl who was probably only in her twenties be so confused? Moreover, she was in Afghanistan, which was enough to show that the other party was not simple.
But I still don't know who this girl is. Is she sent by the country to keep an eye on me? Impossible. I am not so charming that the country would send an agent to keep an eye on me.
If this possibility is ruled out, the appearance of this girl is a mystery. But no matter what, the other party saved him. Since she saved him, it means that she had no malicious intentions. But at the same time, I am afraid that she also had no good intentions.
Zhao Ziyang would not show these things on his face. After a major turn of events, his emotions were hidden deeper than before.
"Don't worry about the car." Zhao Ziyang straightened his back, gently turned his arms, and made sure that the bullet in his body was not having a big impact. Then he raised his head to determine the direction.
When you are in a mountainous area, with the sun hanging overhead, it is easy to determine the north-south direction by the treetops.
This is a mountainous and forested terrain, and there is only one place near Grishk where this kind of terrain can be found: the Helmand River basin.
The Helmand River is located to the west of Grichek. The entire river flows from northeast to southwest, originating from the Sersel Kubaba Mountains in Afghanistan and extending into Iran.
From Grishk southwards, the river flows along the southern desert, with abundant water sources, creating Afghanistan's impenetrable mountainous and forested areas.
"Little Wildcat, are you driving south or north?" Zhao Ziyang asked Little Wildcat, but immediately changed the question: "Did you see any desert or river?"
"I saw the big river, but I didn't see the desert." The little wild cat knew this very well, so he answered very happily.
Zhao Ziyang nodded. He roughly knew where he was. If the deviation was not too big, the little wild cat would drive him to the north of Grishk. The formed road here had disappeared and was in the area where Taliban militants were active.
The Taliban controls most of the mountains and forests in Afghanistan, and controlling the mountains and forests means controlling most of Afghanistan. The Afghan war launched by Russia failed because it could not conquer the mountains and forests here. The United States will still follow this old path.
The U.S. military did not have enough troops to complete the occupation because of the deep ravines. The most important point was that the mountainous terrain here was unfamiliar to them, just as terrible as the jungle in Vietnam.
"Let's go." Zhao Ziyang waved to the little wild cat, put away his saber, and strode towards .
"Hey, where are you going?" the little wild cat shouted loudly at Zhao Ziyang.
"Look for the Taliban." Zhao Ziyang strode forward without looking back.
The best way at this time is to find the Taliban, then find Angel through the Taliban, get in touch with the base, and try to gather the lost team members together.
Zhao Ziyang knew that his idea was good, but the actual situation might be very, very bad.
The base may have been razed to the ground, and there may never be any survivors of the Lurkers. But he still firmly believed that the Lurkers would not die so easily. These guys had stronger battlefield survival ability than any special forces soldier because they had experienced too many life-and-death tests and each had their own survival skills.
