After hearing what Horse-Face said, I looked at him in disbelief: "Is the story you're telling true or false? What era are we living in? How can such a thing still happen?"
"The world is vast, and what you see is only a small part of it. You think the world is peaceful because we live in a country with a superior security environment, but not all places in the world are like that! You can't imagine what war-torn areas in Africa are like."
Horse-faced paused for a moment: "Back then, those people made us fight lions not to test our physical abilities, but to mentally break us and make us indifferent to death. After a few of us survived, we began to undergo even more rigorous training."
After a period of rigorous training, I thought I could become a mercenary, but those guys treated me like an assassin, specifically tasked with assassinating political figures. If I wasn't careful, I would lose my life.
As the saying goes, "If you walk by the river long enough, you're bound to get your shoes wet." Once, we received a mission to assassinate a envoy sent by a country that supported a certain African nation, and we set up an ambush on his likely route.
In the past, our targets were officials from small African countries, but the person we were to assassinate this time was a general from a major country, surrounded by people from special forces, who were far beyond the reach of a self-taught assassin like us.
We suffered a crushing defeat that time. The enemy had only a six-man squad, which held off our attack of fifty or sixty men for three hours in just one courtyard, until reinforcements arrived!
To that mercenary organization, we were all like smelly socks that could be worn and then thrown away. If we failed the mission, we would surely die. So the other surviving assassins decided to flee the country.
I told them at the time that the mercenary company controlling us was extremely powerful, and if we rashly tried to escape, we would only face certain death and would be caught sooner or later! If we really wanted to escape, the best plan was to retreat strategically, go back and kill our superiors first, and then make our escape while no one was around to arrest us.
After listening to Horse-Face's story, I nodded: "I'm afraid even the people who captured you didn't expect that the skills they taught you would become a knife falling on their own heads!"
"Who told you we succeeded?"
Horse-face chuckled: "Don't you think that mercenary company, which can train a group of emotionless assassins like us, would lack the means to subdue us? So when I made this suggestion, I knew it was a choice that would lead to certain death."
I frowned: "Then how did you escape?"
“I tricked the remaining dozen or so people into attacking the base. In reality, I didn’t choose to participate. Instead, I took advantage of their attack and ran away with Minotaur! Given the situation at the time, only if the riot attracted the mercenary company’s attention could the two of us escape capture. So we survived because we took advantage of the trust others placed in us.”
I was taken aback.
"Do you know why I'm telling you this story? I made you fight the wolf so you would know what it feels like to be dying, and so you would know how precious life is! And I'm telling you this story to tell you that everyone has a will to live, and in a life-or-death situation, don't trust anyone."
As Horse-Face spoke, he tore off a leg of lamb and handed it to me: "You've already died once, so in the training to come, you must remember that everything you experience from today onward is to prevent yourself from being forced into that life-or-death situation again."
I took the food from the horse-faced man and took a bite. A sense of satisfaction I had never felt before welled up inside me. Then I asked him, "Can I know your story after that? What did you do after you ran away from Africa?"
“We went to the embassy and claimed that we had been kidnapped and had been working illegally abroad for many years. With their help, we returned to China. In the blink of an eye, we have been abroad for five years, but we have not earned a penny. All we have left is our ability to kill.”
Horseface smiled bitterly: "So, the two of us went back to our old ways in the country and became professional assassins. The security environment in the country is so good, you can hardly even see guns on the market. We two mercenaries who came back from war zones naturally thrived and quickly made a name for ourselves in the industry."
In those years, we made countless amounts of money, gained immense fame, and our ambition grew incredibly powerful! It was around that time that we received a mission: to infiltrate Fengmen Village and assassinate the "Snake Beauty"!
Upon hearing this, my eyes widened suddenly: "The conditions for entering Fengmen Village are so strict, how did you pass the test?"
“The challenges in Fengmen Village are different every year. When we first came here, Fengmen Village was just a rudimentary village, so the challenges here back then were all about killing skills!”
Horse-face knew that the beautiful snake had taken me in as her adopted son, and he didn't hide anything from me about it: "What kind of tests does Fengmen Village hold every year? It mainly tests what kind of talents are lacking here, and then tests the new villagers to see if they can be recruited."
Unfortunately, we were far too overconfident back then, thinking we could easily kill the Serpent Beauty and get that astronomical reward, just like we did outside. But the Serpent Beauty had too many powerful people around her; Black Impermanence alone almost took our lives!
Looking back now, we were actually quite lucky, because Fengmen Village was in dire need of manpower back then, so we were spared and became one of the Ten Ghost Messengers. If it were now, we'd probably be rotten to the bone by now.
I was gnawing on the lamb leg in my hand, about to ask Ma Mian something, when I suddenly felt an unbearable pain in my stomach and said in a deep voice, "There's something wrong with what we're eating!"
Horse-faced man sliced off a piece of meat, put it in his mouth and chewed it gently: "These things are fine. The problem is in the wine you just drank. This is your third lesson. If you want to survive, you must first learn to pay attention to your surroundings at all times. Carelessness will come at a price."
I was writhing on the ground in pain, gritting my teeth and cursing, "Damn it, I knew I shouldn't have trusted you, you bastard!"
"Don't say that. What I gave you to eat isn't entirely poison. It's a marrow cleansing pill that the wasp gave me. It can expel some of the toxins that have accumulated in your body, which will be very beneficial for your upcoming training. I just mixed some special things into it."
Horse-faced sipped his beer and replied casually, "The poison I used won't harm your health, but there's no antidote. You'll probably feel terrible tonight. Once you get through it, our next training session will begin."
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