Chapter 53 - Episode 5: The Missing Mole
A hand rose up from the floor of the watchtower.
The guard who had been leaning on the wall suddenly got his neck twisted.
“Ack!”
With immense strength, his throat was ripped out. The guard’s life ended without a chance to even let out a scream. It was a gruesome death, worthy of the angel of death.
The guard who had been operating the searchlight retreated backward and let out a suppressed scream.
“Ka kanma! (Ghost)!”
Swoop! In that instant, the kukri flashed. This guard too could not scream as his neck was cut off.
“I’m sorry! I have no personal feelings against you. What can I do? You’ll just have to understand.”
He wiped his kukri using the clothes of the dead guard and muttered to himself in Korean. It was not something he should be saying to the dead. Because of the language barrier, he knew he couldn’t interrogate them, so it was better to cleanly get rid of them.
The watchtower was about 1.5 square meters in area and well built with palm trees. From above the watchtower, he could see the entirety of the barracks.
“It’s a perfect time to give them a present.”
Black Mamba stepped down from the watchtower, placed the box of grenades over his shoulder, then climbed back up to the watchtower.
The grenade used by France’s army was the E07.
The hand grenade weighed 850 grams, and the smoke grenade and flash grenade weighed 510 grams. A box containing 24 grenades in total weighed about 20kg.
After Black Mamba opened the grenade box, he began to give a speech.
As the war continued, Black Mamba began to grow more relaxed.
“Now, Frolinat soldiers, it’s showtime. It’s been a long time since you had the ball. This may not be a clean shot, but don’t boo me for it.”
A grenade flew to the right with the speed of a bullet. After flying a distance of 150m, it fell exactly into the watchtower. He threw another one into the left watchtower.
Boom! Both the watchtowers on the right and left burst into flames and crumbled.
He could clearly see the guards flying out of the watchtower due to the explosion. If a grenade explodes from a close range, even if one is not harmed by the heat of the explosion, the pressure change causes the insides to rip apart.
The other three watchtowers all got the same grenade deliveries. The furthest watchtower was 400m away.
‘Will this be possible?’
He had never thrown a grenade 400 meters before. With the four-second delay of the grenade and a speed of 100m per second, it would explode at exactly the time of its landing.
Black Mamba took in a deep breath.
Woong! The resonance shook his arteries and pulse.
Schwing! The grenade flew to the other side like a point-blank shot. Boom! It exploded the moment it made contact with the watchtower. He could hear the screams of the guards with their bodies on fire. The time it took to destroy six watchtowers was exactly 10 seconds.
The barracks started to bubble like cooked porridge.
“Del la ddun! (It’s the enemy!)”
“Hari-Keu! (Fire!)”
“Eep tied bisur! (Hurry, get out of here!)”
There was a lot of yelling in Arabic he couldn’t understand.
“This is why you shouldn’t have overdone it. Why did you have to kill kids, you miserable punks,” Black Mamba muttered as he continued to deliver the hand grenades to each barrack. It was delivered two at a time.
Even the barracks located 300m away were not safe from his attack.
Inside the building, it made whirring noises as if running a generator. When he inhaled deeply and tightened his muscles, a cold sensation flowed out to the tips of his fingers. The grenade sped out like a bullet and reached 300 m with room to spare.
Lastly, he threw two of the hand grenades into the building that looked to be the main headquarters. The main barracks were encased in flames. The fire spread to the barracks next to it. The entirety of Frolinat’s 3rd brigade barracks was aflame.
Those inside the barracks were in a panic.
Pungpung! The oil storage room exploded.
“Hari-Keu! (Fire!)”
“Eep tied bisur! (Hurry get out of here)”
The soldiers running out of the barracks yelled in a panic. There were over ten soldiers flailing around due to their bodies being on fire.
“My mother said that I would wet my bed if I played with fire, but I wonder if this is too much. But where is everyone?”
Although the barracks encompassed an area of ten thousand square meters, there were not many soldiers within it.
Half of Habib’s army was trying to catch Makumbo. The ones that had fought and lost to the Lattell team amounted to over 400. Excluding the soldiers who had gone out to do surveillance or were garrison, the only ones left were the guards and losing army survivors. Of course, there was no way Black Mamba could know their exact situation.
Ahmud, who was taking a nap inside the barracks, woke up with a start.
“Aide, aide!”
He yelled out before realizing he no longer had an aide.
“Shit!”
His aide had been shot down at Guradi, and his second aide, Muhammed, had his head exploded off during the night attack.
He ran out of the barracks on full alert.
His sight was filled with his men falling like dominoes.
“Kanma, it’s him.”
The one who used a sniper like a machine gun, it was him.
The headquarter barracks and the watchtowers were already on fire. There were only 100 men left in these barracks. It was a battle they could not win.
His fear suppressed his anger. His heart became cold and Ahmud immediately ran down to the underground shelter. Ahmud hid BTR152 under the driver’s seat that was stored in the underground shelter.
Only two smoke grenades remained in the grenade box. Black Mamba stared forlornly at the smoke grenades then threw them to the ground like a rock without removing its pins. The RPG shooter who came out running with a rifle in his hand had his head exploded.
Black Mamba placed Dragonov against the watchtower wall and started shooting in a relaxed manner.
Kung kung kung! Each shot equaled a kill.
It didn’t matter if they were soldiers trying to quell the flames or the search team looking for intruders. They all collapsed. The soldiers who had figured out the direction from where the attack was coming from were targeted quickly. The guerrilla troops who had run out of the barracks dispersed trying to find cover.
The large barracks soon became empty.
The burning barracks and the splayed out corpses on the ground caused an eery silence. There were 40 corpses dispersed here and there. It had not taken 49 seconds to create this travesty. The pouring blood slowly dyed the ground red.
The silence was soon broken.
The survivors started to shoot in the direction of the watchtower. Kkang Kkang Kkang! The dry echoes of the AK rang through the air.
“Have you all finally come to your senses?!”
Black Mamba jumped down from the watchtower.
He landed lightly onto the ground, placed the Dragonov back into his backpack, and put the AK in his hand.
If you are weak, you will die. It was something he had learned when he had fought against Choi Do Shik’s men at Mt. Bang Tae. Get rid of the source of the problem. He wanted to erase the entire anthill from the get-go.
Black Mamba jumped into the burning barracks without any hesitation.
From the back, something flew at him past his face. It was a perfectly executed roundhouse kick. Black Mamba’s head turned 90 degrees.
Puck! The AK rifle penetrated the man’s chest with a powerful force.
“Ka kanma! The Almighty Allah will not forgive you.”
The middle-aged guerrilla, who had the end of a rifle shoved through his chest, sputtered his last words.
“You idiot, Allah won’t forgive you all first.”
Black Mamba let go of the neck of the rifle he was holding in his hand. He no longer wanted to use the AK that was soaked in blood. Black Mamba’s eyes, which looked down at the guerrilla troop who had become a gun holster, were cold. He felt no guilt over ending a life but instead thought it a waste to abandon a gun he had become accustomed to.
‘Two of them?’
Black Mamba flew up in the air as if he was slingshotted upwards. Kkang Kkang Kkang! Gunshots rained over where Black Mamba had stood moments ago.
Swish! Boom! Black Mamba threw his body and swung down with his kukri into the bunker.
“Damn!”
Crack! Underneath the bunker, the hidden guerrilla troop’s chest was completely collapsed. Sensitive to the sensation, he felt the bone and skin break. It obviously put him in a sour mood. Luckily, however, he didn’t fall into a blood-driven mania like last time.
The kukri penetrated the bunker past 18mm until the handle itself plowed through it.
From under the bunker, blood poured out. Black Mamba didn’t even check underneath the bunker and pulled out the kukri.
Black Mamba entered each of the barracks and finished off any survivors. There was not a single person to escape Black Mamba’s wrath. Even the guerrilla troops hidden inside the ground could avoid death.
“Here’s something good I can use. Hahaha”
Black Mamba broke into a smile as he found the bikes that were left behind.
Crack! He broke the gas tank with his kukri. He lit the flowing gasoline on fire. He lifted the bike that was aflame like a fireball and threw it towards the barracks.
Bang! The gas tank exploded and the barracks, which was the only thing that not burning, was now set aflame.
historical
Puckpuckpuck! Three guerrilla troops who had run out of the barracks fell to the ground at the same time. Black Mamba’s double-tap was able to become a triple tap during the actual battle.
Pung! Pung! Explosions continued to happen here and there. It was probably due to the fire meeting gasoline and weapons. He circled around the place to survey the area. He did not find any survivors. Even though he tried to use his tracking skills, the unstable environment made it difficult. The smell of burning flesh only made his head spin.
Black Mamba stepped into the last of the burning barracks.
Inside the empty barracks, all that was felt was a large hanging flag. It was a flamboyant flag with a Shamshir and AK crossed together.
“Their flag is sure nice looking.”
Black Mamba pulled out the flag to take as a souvenir, then turned his footsteps around.
He registered a couple of survivors, but he ignored them. Once his burning killer instinct had calmed, the face of his teacher once again came to mind.
“Ksitigarbha, Ksitigarbha!”
Black Mamba put his hands together and bowed deeply. It was but tears of an alligator but within one night, he had ended the lives of many. His heart felt heavy.
At 1:30 AM, the hand of the angel of death was merciless.
Within just 30 minutes, Frolinat 3rd brigade was not destroyed merely as a military target but was destroyed of all life.
After coming out of Frolinat’s 3rd brigade headquarters, Black Mamba turned to stare blankly at the burning barracks. About a hundred people had been erased off of Azrael’s list.
He thought it lucky that there were few civilian casualties. When he had chosen to become a mercenary, he had already come to accept the lust for blood, so what could he do about it now?
Each person has a purpose.
Even with the brain of a genius, if one lived like a farmer, they became useless. If one sits in an office crunching numbers, what use is it one’s ability to think outside the box? His core purpose may be to be the devil of war.
Black Mamba turned from the fire engulfed barracks.
Captain and his comrades would be hopping mad, but if it ended well, it would be good for everyone.
Thirty minutes after the angel of death had left, Ahmud crawled out of the underground shelter. He stared blankly at the burning barrack from the shelter entrance. His men were covered in shrapnel and burnt to a crisp like dried squid over a fire, but he had survived like a cockroach.
The moment Black Mamba returned, the Lattell team ran to him. Captain didn’t even think to reprimand Black Mamba as he ran with all his might down Trident Rock. In the special forces, departing the war scene is was the first step to surviving. After collecting the supplies, they had departed Toko Doum as if their tails were on fire.
Lattell team had arrived to a valley 15km south of Ekiya by nightfall.
Only then did Captain and Black Mamba come face to face.
“Ugh, you stink.”
Captain covered his nose upon smelling Black Mamba. The smell of blood, sweat, and gunpowder mixed to create an unbelievably disgusting scent.
“Let’s first hear your report.”
“Yes, sir! The 3rd brigade command center was at Koromonga oasis. There were 12 individual barracks within their main headquarters. I cleared it out and left it in ashes.”
“Ack! What do you mean?”
Captain’s mouth dropped open. This guy always seemed to do something beyond what was logical.
“He’s saying he mowed them all down. Simple for Black, as expected,” Burimer said smiling.
“How many did you kill?”
“I don’t know the exact number. I put in 22 grenades into their barracks. I would assume I directly killed about 60 of them.”
“Oh my!”
“Wow!”
Captain and Burimer exclaimed in surprise.
“Black, you disobeyed orders and broke away from the operation. Do you admit it?”
Acting out on your own during an operation is punishable by immediate death. Of course, this didn’t apply to Black Mamba. Captain only intended to make his point.
“Toong chi ja.”
Black Mamba threw the flag that he stole from Frolinat’s headquarters to Captain.
Captain and Burimer, obviously, didn’t understand his Korean.