"Gesang, you and your brother stay here for now. Don't make a sound or run around. We'll be right back," she instructed in Tibetan.
"Sister, you must be careful!" Gesang nodded sensibly, her big eyes full of worry.
After settling the children in, Su Tang and Qin Ye quietly took advantage of the cover of night and the blizzard to sneak behind a broken wall near the granary.
Su Tang took out a thermal imaging device from her backpack.
The scene inside the granary was instantly presented to her in clear blocks of red, yellow, blue, and green.
"How's the situation?" Qin Ye asked in a low voice.
"It's not good." Su Tang's voice was deep. "There are about forty or fifty villagers, all locked up in a large compartment on the west side, guarded by five people. Two of them are mobile heat sources, their body temperature is higher than the others, and they are probably patrolling with guns. In the large communal room on the east side, about ten people are sleeping, and another ten or so are gathered together, seemingly playing cards and drinking. The granary is outside the courtyard, far from the crowd, but it is guarded by five people, two of whom are armed."
A precise internal personnel distribution map instantly took shape in her mind.
"Move the granary first," Qin Ye immediately decided.
“That’s what I think too.” Su Tang put down the thermal imaging device.
After all, food is the primary resource for the villagers' survival; otherwise, even if the villagers were rescued, they would still have to deal with the food issue.
The two went around to the back of the granary, where the courtyard wall was not high.
Qin Ye leaped in silently and then pulled Su Tang up as well.
The windows of the granary were not high, and one of them had a hole in it, which was plugged with rags.
Su Tang cautiously leaned closer and lifted the tattered cloth a crack, revealing the scene and sounds inside.
A bonfire was burning in the granary, and the pungent smell of smoke mixed with the stench of sweat and cheap liquor wafted over.
Five strong men were gathered around a fire.
Two men were armed; one was leaning against a grain sack, wiping his old-fashioned hunting rifle while muttering curses.
"This damn gun, if we don't take good care of it, it might explode one day without us even knowing. When Brother Shan Kui leads us on a big heist, we'll definitely need to get a new weapon!"
The other man with the gun paced back and forth, appearing somewhat impatient.
"What's the point of guarding this pile of rotten grain? Those young women in the temple... tsk tsk, Shan Kui and his gang are really unfair, they get all the good stuff."
"Alright, stop thinking about it," a man with a pockmarked face said, grabbing a handful of roasted barley from a sack and stuffing it greedily into his mouth.
"Brother Shan Kui said that grain is our life! Anyone who dares to covet our grain is just as deadly as someone who covets his boss! If we guard it well, we'll be the local tyrants when spring comes!"
The remaining two were in even worse shape. One was already drunk, lying on a haystack snoring loudly. The other was holding a dagger, listlessly peeling a frozen potato.
This is just a mob.
Su Tang understood.
She gestured to Qin Ye, signaling him to be on guard, and then silently took out a specially made anesthetic syringe launcher from her spatial storage.
This thing looks like a small flashlight. It is silent and emits needles that are as fine as cow hair, and it works very quickly.
However, the key to using this thing is accuracy; if you're even slightly off-target, you'll alert the enemy.
She decided to tackle the two moving targets first.
"This damn weather is freezing!" The burly bandit with the gun rubbed his hands together and walked towards the door, seemingly wanting to urinate.
Chance!
Su Tang's pupils contracted sharply as she steadily raised the launcher, the cold metal pressed against her fingers.
Just as the ruthless bandit turned his back to the fire, exposing the back of his neck completely to her view—
"call out!"
A soft sound, like a snowflake falling to the ground.
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