Looking at his elite subordinates quickly forming up and appearing before him, Li Bin nodded in satisfaction and said loudly: “This is the General Staff Inspection Team—Director Xu of the Special Operations Division. Today he has come personally to test everyone… Let’s give him a welcome!”
These special soldiers hadn’t witnessed the scene at the shooting range. They only heard the brigade commander introduce this young officer before them as actually being the director of the Special Operations Division, and their eyes went wide.
When the special operations director had come down for inspection last year, everyone had seen him—that was Major General Lin Beijia, famous throughout the special operations world. What background did this Director Xu have, coming down this year?
Seeing the doubt and surprise in everyone’s eyes, Li Bin didn’t explain. There was no use explaining—he couldn’t exactly say the man was only a deputy director, could he? Such a young deputy director—he’d have to let him show his skills and overawe these subordinates first, and then everything would naturally settle down.
After the applause from the special soldiers in front died down, Xu Ze scanned the several rows of special soldiers lined up before him and said calmly: “I’ve just watched your training. Relative to the national standard, it’s very good… I’m quite pleased.”
Hearing this, everyone felt a touch of pride. After all, within the country, aside from the renowned Wolf Fang, the Northwest Special Forces Brigade truly hadn’t yielded to anyone.
Just as everyone was listening to what else this young director had to say, Xu Ze’s voice suddenly turned cold: “But you must absolutely not become complacent. Don’t be smug just because you can rank near the top nationally…”
“You exist to protect the entire country, to repel foreign enemies. So you must forge ahead bravely and never become complacent—because in this world, ‘special forces’ is not a synonym for ‘invincible.'”
Xu Ze swept his gaze over the crowd, who had a flicker of defiance in their eyes, and said calmly: “Not long ago, in a certain country, I encountered several experts. These experts had bizarre and extraordinary skills, and struck with extreme ruthlessness… If I hadn’t used some tricks to launch a surprise attack at the time, I’m afraid I wouldn’t be standing here today.”
“So today, when I come to inspect, although I’m fairly satisfied with you, I hope you won’t be content, and won’t be careless. You must keep working hard, striving toward higher goals… and temper yourselves into true pillars of the nation!”
At this point, Xu Ze looked at the special soldiers full of defiance and smiled: “I know some of you aren’t convinced, thinking I’m bragging and fooling you—that just because I can’t handle something doesn’t mean you can’t. So today, I’ll give you a chance… As long as you can take me down, then your entire brigade’s inspection results will all be rated ‘excellent’… Of course, if you can’t take me down, then it’ll depend on your performance…”
“Huh?” Everyone was startled hearing Xu Ze’s bold declaration, secretly wondering if the director had lost his head—how could he dare say such a thing?
“All right!” Xu Ze looked at the spreading shock and disbelief, then turned to Li Bin beside him and smiled: “How about this… sometimes numbers are useless. Commander Li, pick ten people… If these ten come at me together and can take me down, your entire brigade gets an overall ‘excellent.'”
Hearing Xu Ze’s words, the inspection team behind him were all startled, then looked in unison toward Major General Li Jun in the middle.
But Li Jun had a thoughtful expression, looking at Xu Ze without objecting.
Li Bin was also stunned. This was allowed? Choosing ten to fight him one? The man was far too confident, wasn’t he?
“Hurry and pick them… I think they can hardly wait,” Xu Ze said with a faint smile.
Urged by Xu Ze, Li Bin couldn’t help but turn to look at Commander Wu behind him. Seeing Wu Lei nod solemnly, he called out loudly: “Lin Guobao, Zhang Jiangyong, Li Xiaobing, Xu Baolei… step forward!”
As Li Bin called out these names, ten men ran out from the ranks, ran up before Li Bin, stood at attention, and saluted.
Xu Ze glanced at the ten men before him. Seeing their tough, formidable look, he knew Li Bin had picked close-combat elites. He chuckled inwardly… He was fairly confident about dealing with these ten. He was now approaching Level 4, and all his body’s functions had been greatly enhanced. Dealing with these people before him wouldn’t be very difficult.
Hearing the brigade commander really wanted ten of them to take on this young director alone, the ten soldiers all wore strange expressions. Normally, each of them could take on ten ordinary people—but now the situation was completely reversed, with the ten of them going after one man.
If they hadn’t seen the brigade commander’s serious face and known this man really was a deputy director from the General Staff, these soldiers would have cursed him as crazy.
At that moment, seeing their brigade commander’s stern gaze, all ten responded. Everyone understood the commander’s meaning: if the ten of them actually lost, they’d better prepare for collective punishment afterward… And if this director couldn’t take a hit? Then they’d better be careful to hold back and absolutely not seriously injure him.
Seeing the ten elite special soldiers surround Xu Ze in the center, someone from the Military Training Department side of the inspection team finally hesitantly leaned over to Zhang Zuo, who also looked solemn, and asked: “Section Chief Zhang… can Director Xu really do it?”
Zhang Zuo shook his head solemnly and sighed softly: “I’m not sure either… But our director isn’t the kind to talk big. Logically speaking… since he dares to do this, he must be capable.”
“Oh…” Seeing that Zhang Zuo didn’t seem to be forcing his words, the lieutenant colonel relaxed slightly and nervously looked toward the field.
Inside, the ten special soldiers had carefully surrounded Xu Ze in the middle. Having received the brigade commander’s instructions, they didn’t dare be careless and prepared to start.
But the onlookers beside them were even more nervous than the ten about to attack. They all stared fixedly at the field—whether the special soldiers won or Director Xu won, someone would be nervous either way.
Xu Ze stood still, only lightly tilting his head to glance at the special soldiers around him.
At this moment, several special soldiers directly in front of Xu Ze exchanged glances. The one in the middle signaled to the two beside him with his eyes.
Seeing the signal, the two special soldiers let out a low shout and lunged at Xu Ze.
Xu Ze smiled slightly. He naturally knew these two were just testing his strength, but he didn’t plan to waste time. If the ten of them dragged this out, his stamina would be drained too much, which wouldn’t be favorable for him.
Seeing the two lunge at him, Xu Ze didn’t want to give them a chance. As the two came close, Xu Ze swung both hands with full force, lightning-fast, grabbing the arms they swung at him and pulling down hard.
The two special soldiers were extremely agile. Seeing the other actually grab their arms, they immediately swung their other hands at Xu Ze’s head, intending to force him to let go first.
But Xu Ze naturally wouldn’t make it that easy. He twisted hard with both hands. The two special soldiers’ arms were wrenched, and they couldn’t help but grunt in pain, weakening downward.
Xu Ze pulled again, and as the two fell toward him, he deftly swung his hands in a chop, striking hard at their carotid arteries… The two let out another muffled groan and collapsed on the spot.
Seeing Xu Ze easily take down two, the remaining eight’s eyes turned sharp. They naturally knew their comrades’ strength, yet they had been easily taken down by this Director Xu—this greatly raised their vigilance. The group exchanged glances, nodded in unison, and lunged at Xu Ze together.
Seeing them all attack together, Xu Ze didn’t dare be negligent. Although he was confident, he naturally couldn’t let them entangle him—otherwise, with this crowd swarming him, shaking them off wouldn’t be easy.
He gave a clear shout and lunged toward one corner, planning to defeat them one by one.
With Xu Ze’s strength, defeating them one by one and avoiding entanglement naturally wasn’t difficult. After charging over, he took down two in just a couple of moves. Although he was struck in a few places by the special soldiers behind him, it wasn’t a problem for him. The remaining six were even easier to deal with…
The onlookers, seeing Xu Ze moving agilely and striking sharply amid the siege, taking down several in just a few moves, all secretly thought things were bad… They knew the remaining few probably had little hope either.
Li Bin’s face was dark, and Wu Lei’s expression was also very ugly. The subordinates they had trained so painstakingly couldn’t even withstand a few moves from the other man—naturally their faces looked bad.
Sure enough, before long, the remaining few were taken down one by one by Xu Ze… This made the watching special soldiers all gasp sharply.
These ten were elite figures among them, yet ten of them besieging one man had still been taken down—this was truly shocking.
Xu Ze stood in the field, looking at the ten soldiers being helped away, then looked at the special soldiers already neatly lined up in front and said calmly: “You must all think I’m very formidable now… But as I said at the start, there are many formidable people in this world—our country has them too. So you must never be complacent. You must keep working hard and strive toward higher goals. Understand?”
The watching special soldiers had long since been overawed by him. Hearing his words, they quickly responded loudly: “Understood!”
Xu Ze nodded in satisfaction, then turned and walked back.
Wu Lei’s expression toward Xu Ze was now greatly different—the earlier probing and slight contempt were swept away, clearly replaced by a measure of respect. Sensing these changes, Xu Ze felt somewhat proud. The military ran on strength—without strength, everything else was empty.
And so, the first day’s inspection passed. The second day’s main item was a twenty-five-kilometer cross-country march carrying thirty kilograms.
The day’s inspection items were simple—Xu Ze and the others just drove along and watched the main force.
But seeing the direction of this march, Xu Ze’s heart stirred, because that was the special place he had sensed two days ago. These past two days he had been extremely curious about that spot where energy particles automatically gathered.
So that day Xu Ze asked Wu Lei for a vehicle and, taking one subordinate from the Special Operations Division and two officers from the military region, went out under the pretext of observing the field march, following behind the special soldiers on their cross-country march.
After following behind the special soldiers for a while, watching them carry their backpacks and weapons and advance quickly at no slow pace, Xu Ze nodded slightly. This kind of training was once a week, plus other daily training—it couldn’t be called light. But it was precisely through such rigorous training that these invincible iron armies were forged…
The special soldiers beside them, seeing Xu Ze in the vehicle, all ran forward with all their might. They recognized him—this was the deputy director of the Operations Division who was extremely skilled in both marksmanship and close combat. None of them wanted to show weakness in front of him.
The vehicle continued forward. Xu Ze closed his eyes slightly and sensed the energy particles around him, feeling that the mysterious place wasn’t far now.
After the vehicle went forward a bit more, it had already overtaken the marching special soldiers. The officer driving stopped and asked Xu Ze: “Director Xu, should we wait here, or turn back?”
Xu Ze shook his head slightly, then pointed toward the direction of the mysterious place ahead: “What’s over there?”
The officer stood up and looked in the direction Xu Ze pointed, then smiled: “Just go around this small hill, and ahead is Sanga Monastery.”
“Sanga Monastery? What place is that?” Hearing it was actually a temple, Xu Ze raised an eyebrow with interest and asked.
Seeing Xu Ze was interested, the officer quickly explained with a smile: “Oh… Director Xu, you’re from Yanjing, so you’re naturally not too familiar. This is a fairly famous Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Qinghai. There’s a living Buddha and many lamas inside… Many people go there to worship. If you’re interested, you can go take a look—it’s not far from here.”
“Oh? Not far?” Xu Ze smiled slightly, looking quite interested.
Seeing Xu Ze seemed interested, the officer smiled: “Right… just go around the small hill ahead and you’re there. The troops behind won’t be here for a while anyway—I can drive you over to take a look.”
“Well then… as long as it doesn’t delay anything, let’s go take a look,” Xu Ze nodded with a smile in agreement.
Since Xu Ze agreed, the other officer naturally wouldn’t object. The inspection was Xu Ze’s call anyway—just taking a look was more or less like a spring outing. Besides, they’d already watched for a while and there was nothing else to do now. Since the director was interested, they were happy to accompany him.
And so, the jeep drove around the hillside ahead…
Just as they rounded the hill, Xu Ze felt his eyes light up. Not far ahead, a massive, magnificent monastery stood before them…
