Fierce Battle on Pirate Island

With a shriek and a roar, the rocket traced a long, fiery tail before slamming into a pirate’s chest. The ensuing explosion turned everything within forty-five meters into a massive fireball, incinerating three men into charred remains in an instant.

Gunfire, explosions, and screams wove together a chaotic symphony. Ding Ye crouched low, his Model 18 braced against his shoulder. His gaze moved with the barrel, sometimes fast, sometimes slow. Whenever a figure appeared in his sights, Ding Ye squeezed the trigger without a second thought.

Another burst—three precise shots tore into a pirate over a hundred meters away. As he watched blood spray from the man’s chest, a sudden sense of danger prickled at Ding Ye. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of two pirates darting from a shack some five hundred sixty meters away. One of them aimed his weapon straight at him.

No hesitation—Ding Ye instinctively rolled aside, diving behind a sturdy wooden barrel. Bullets hammered the barrel, sending splinters flying everywhere.

The pirates kept firing, and Ding Ye could feel the barrel behind him shudder with each impact. On this chaotic, dark battlefield, none of the other trainees paid any attention to this little corner.

It was clear that relying on anyone else for help was a fantasy. Calmly pressing his back against the barrel, Ding Ye even allowed himself to narrow his eyes. But all the while, he was silently counting, calculating how many rounds remained in the pirates’ magazines. At the first telltale click of an empty chamber, Ding Ye shot from behind the barrel like lightning, unleashing a ferocious barrage from his Model 18. The pirate who had closed to within thirty meters was riddled with bullets and dropped.

Not far from the fallen man, the other pirate spotted Ding Ye. In panic, he fired wildly, but his bullets went wide. Ding Ye, crouched low, remained unflinching—his Model 18 shifted, and a single shot blasted through the pirate’s skull.

“Regroup on me! There are more enemies than expected. Concentrate fire and force them back! Sura, clear us a path!” After a quick assessment of the battle, Ding Ye adjusted the operation plan over the radio.

Within minutes, fifty-six trainees had converged on his position. Rocket after rocket turned every enemy firing point along their advance into blazing wreckage and debris.

The tide of battle was turning in their favor. But suddenly, from a sturdy house two hundred meters ahead, more than a dozen heavily armed pirates charged out. Even more alarming, two .50 caliber heavy machine guns appeared in the windows on the second floor, their devastating lines of tracer fire sweeping the battlefield.

A trainee beside Ding Ye was unlucky—a ricochet from the heavy machine gun struck his leg. It was as if the world’s fastest amputation had just occurred; he fell, but his leg remained grotesquely in place.

Even amid the thunderous rattle of the heavy machine guns, the trainee’s scream was piercing. But the others had already taken cover—at the brink of life and death, everyone looked out for themselves; no one would risk rescuing a man doomed to bleed out.

The pirates’ counterattack was fierce. More than a dozen assault rifles unleashed a storm of lead, overwhelming any trainee who dared poke his head out in a hail of bullets. Ding Ye’s group was forced to stay down. But even behind cover, they weren’t safe—a .50 caliber could punch through not just wooden barrels, but even thin brick walls. One by one, trainees were found and cut down.

“Sura, take out those machine guns!” The mounting casualties finally infuriated Ding Ye, and he shouted into the radio.

But Ding Ye had clearly underestimated the pirates who had entrenched themselves here for years. Just as Sura, positioned at the rear, hefted his RPG-7 to target the machine gun, two or three flares shot into the sky, illuminating the battlefield as bright as day. Sura, exposed and crouching in the open, suddenly became a glaring target.

The .50 calibers, rocket launchers, and every weapon the pirates had opened fire on Sura. Their aim was crude, and the rocket shot wide, but sheer volume mattered. Though the rocket missed, the hail of bullets made Sura’s whole body jerk and convulse as if dancing, his arm dropping as the RPG fell to the ground.

The explosion not only tore another trainee apart but also detonated spare rockets, turning the area into a hellish display of fireworks.

“Goddamn it!” Ding Ye was nearly thrown off his feet by the blast wave. Seeing their heavy weapons gone, he cursed furiously. “Dis, move—draw their fire, split their attention! We’re pinned down!” Even as he spoke, a bullet struck the iron frame in front of him, showering his face with sparks.

There was no reply from Dis over the radio—just static.

“I’ll kill you myself one day!” Ding Ye wiped his face, then shouted to the others, “Grenades! Create a barrage! Move on both flanks to draw the machine guns!”

Immediately, fifty-six grenades were hurled forward. The violent explosions generated thick smoke. Seizing the moment, Ding Ye sprinted ten meters to a burning wooden hut on the left. Simultaneously, another trainee dashed in the opposite direction. Risk was their only chance to divert the .50 caliber’s deadly focus.

One machine gun took the bait, its barrel tracking the fleeing trainee. With a muzzle velocity of 930 meters per second, no human could hope to outrun those rounds. Under the flaring light, everyone saw a bullet pass through the trainee’s waist, spraying blood even without a direct hit.

Another round struck his shoulder, tearing through body armor as if it were paper and ripping his arm clean off. Before the body could fall, a third bullet obliterated his head—above the neck, there was nothing left: flesh, bone, and helmet all vanished.

In less than a second, half a man was gone. The shock of such carnage left the other trainees momentarily frozen. Only Ding Ye kept running, yelling into his radio, “What are you waiting for? Suppression fire! Take out that gun!”

The trainees snapped out of their stupor, leapt up, and unleashed a storm of bullets at the house’s windows, riddling the concrete with craters. Amid this hail, the machine gunner was shot in the head, silencing one of the .50s for good.

The pirates were momentarily cowed by Ding Ye’s ferocity but quickly rallied, yelling back and forcing the emboldened trainees to duck once more.

Behind the burning hut, Ding Ye was safe for now. He skirted the flank, dashing between cover, making twenty meters before two dark muzzles emerged from behind a pile of fishing nets. A burst of gunfire came straight at him.

Ding Ye didn’t dodge. He kept moving, eyes fixed on the heap for an opening. Two rounds struck his abdomen, but the body armor stopped them, leaving him with the sensation of being hammered twice in the gut and blood trickling from his lips. Unflinching, he pressed forward. When one pirate finally exposed his torso, Ding Ye emptied half a magazine into him.

Ignoring his fallen foe, he advanced steadily. The remaining pirate, panicked, fired blindly without exposing himself. Rather than running, which would be more dangerous against such erratic fire, Ding Ye pressed forward, determined to find an angle to shoot.

But surprises are inevitable. Just as Ding Ye neared the pile, another pirate circled out from the side, gun raised and firing. At the same instant, Ding Ye stopped, pivoted his upper body ninety degrees, and fired his Model 18.

Both men were hit—Ding Ye took a bullet in the shoulder; the pirate clutched his stomach and dropped.

Ding Ye’s magazine was empty. Without bothering to reload, he discarded his Model 18 and drew the pistol from his thigh holster. As he did, another pirate popped up, hoping to catch him unprepared. But Ding Ye’s reaction was flawless—a single shot at point-blank range, straight through the pirate’s eye.

Ding Ye’s havoc on the flank finally drew the machine gunner’s attention from the house. As the barrel swung toward Ding Ye, Dis—who had been missing since their landing—appeared at last. Her first act was to lob a 30mm rifle grenade into the midst of several pirates, clearing a firing point.

Dis and three trainees surged forward. Once she took cover behind the point she’d just cleared, the machine gunner tried to swing his weapon back—but too late. With the others providing covering fire from multiple angles, Dis calmly and accurately fired a second rifle grenade through the house window, destroying the remaining .50 caliber.

“Advance!” Ding Ye shouted, exhilarated, into the radio. But fate was unkind—just as the swiftest trainee poked his head up, the last machine gun in the house roared back to life, forcing him to duck back down.

“Bastard!” Ding Ye cursed, slamming a fist into the ground.