"Look there…"
When Leon and Sheva Alomar looked towards the back of the village, they saw a huge, modern oil refinery, completely out of place with the primitive village, standing silently in the dark shadow.
Presumably, that was their destination for this trip—the Tela Sail West Africa Branch's oil refinery and chemical plant, built within the Kijuju Autonomous Region!
Leon and Sheva Alomar exchanged glances. Neither spoke, but both knew exactly what to do and what they would face next.
At present, the only way for them to reach that oil refinery was likely to pass through this primitive village.
Therefore, a fierce battle was inevitable.
Fortunately, both of them were already mentally prepared!
Bang—
As the speedboat docked on the shore outside the village, Leon and Sheva Alomar jumped off the boat and cautiously entered the primitive village.
"Ah, that is…"
After only a few steps, they saw a Delta Team member hanging upside down from a gallows not far in front of them.
The person's death was extremely gruesome; their entire abdomen had been cut open with a sharp weapon, and their internal organs spilled out onto the ground…
"These damn bastards!"
Sheva Alomar gritted her teeth at the sight, and her eyes immediately turned red.
"Be careful, the enemy is coming."
Leon raised his hand, pointing to a dozen or so primitive tribe members rushing out of a wooden house opposite them. They held wooden spears or spiked maces, wore skull masks with horns and long tongues, and their bodies were grayish-green. Except for their private parts, which were covered by woven grass skirts, they were almost entirely naked, yet their stature was over two meters tall. He whispered, "These people are probably also infected. Check your ammunition… And, whatever you do, don't let their blood splash on you!"
Sheva Alomar looked in the direction Leon pointed, her heart instantly chilling. She then followed behind Leon, using the surrounding wooden houses for cover to evade the pursuing primitive infected.
Bang, bang, bang—
The two walked and fired, headshotting the primitive infected who suddenly darted out from the surrounding buildings, attempting to block their path with primitive weapons.
However, Leon's worst fear still came true.
After the tall infected died, their blood, like that of the ugly giant monster before, began to evaporate into the air, gradually forming yellowish-green toxic mist.
"Damn it, forget about the pursuers, let's go!"
Leon turned and pulled Sheva Alomar, who was still providing covering fire for him, and charged forward. They narrowly and dangerously reached the back of the village.
However, to truly reach the oil refinery, they still needed to take a makeshift cable car across a deep river valley, and then pass through a mountain hollow.
Fortunately, there was only one makeshift cable car in the entire village.
This way, Leon and Sheva Alomar didn't have to worry about the primitive infected catching up to them from behind.
Creak, creak, creak—
The moment the makeshift cable car started, the connection between the cable car body and the overhead cable made a teeth-grinding sound, and it slowly began to move towards the mountain hollow on the opposite side.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—
The primitive infected who had caught up from behind, seeing Leon and Sheva Alomar gradually moving away, roared and threw their wooden spears towards the cable car.
But fortunately, the cable car was already out of their attack range, so it didn't pose any threat to the two of them.
"Leon, look, there's a man-made tunnel there."
After getting off the makeshift cable car, Sheva Alomar, while Leon was reloading his firearm, discovered a cave more than a person's height at the base of the mountain wall.
The two immediately exchanged glances, turned on their flashlights, and cautiously walked in.
The cave was not long. Leon and Sheva Alomar emerged from it in just a few minutes, appearing in a rugged valley.
"Oh, what are those…"
Sheva Alomar quickly ran a few steps forward, then pointed to the logos on several makeshift tents near the rock wall in the valley and said, "Leon, isn't this the Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals logo? Logically, they shouldn't be here, right?"
"That's right."
Leon stepped forward, took a look, and nodded with a solemn expression, saying, "The oil fields managed by Ricardo Elvin belong to the Natural Resources Development Department under the Trasel Group, which is a different business segment from Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals. Logically, it shouldn't appear here."
The Trasel Group is a multi-industry corporate conglomerate.
Its most important core business components are Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals, Tela Sail Shipping, and the Tela Sail Natural Resources Department.
Although all three companies belong to the Trasel Group, they are completely independent entities in their respective fields.
So, just as Leon had just said, finding the Tela Sail Natural Resources Department logo here would not be surprising at all.
After all, they owned the mining rights to this oil field.
But if it were Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals, that would be another matter entirely…
Because Leon had actually omitted one thing just now: the reason why the BSAA Organization's high-level officials issued the order to capture Ricardo Elvin alive at any cost.
One key reason was that Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals was one of the BSAA Organization's important sponsors.
Leon didn't know if there were any unsavory backroom deals behind this, but one thing was certain: the reason their current operation was so hesitant was likely due to the constraints from Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals.
After all, with billions of dollars in sponsorship annually, if you directly killed their high-level employee without concrete evidence, wouldn't the BSAA Organization's sponsorship be cut off by the angry sugar daddy, drastically reducing the money for the high-level officials' luxurious lives and young mistresses?
Sheva Alomar seemed to have thought of something, and said somewhat uncertainly, "Leon, you mean… Ricardo Elvin's clandestine trafficking of biochemical weapons, could it have been at the instigation of Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals?"
"This…"
Upon hearing such a bold conjecture, even Leon couldn't help but be stunned.
Because if it were truly as Sheva Alomar had just said, it would mean that the BSAA Organization's high-level officials had been played by Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals.
The reason the other party was willing to provide hundreds of millions or billions in sponsorship each year was not truly to contribute to the BSAA Organization's cause of resisting biochemical terrorism, but rather to openly play the trick of 'the thief crying stop thief' with the BSAA Organization!
In other words, the thief was shouting "stop thief."
This way, Tela Sail Pharmaceuticals not only gained a reputation for humanitarianism on the surface but also secretly made huge profits from dirty money through biochemical weapons, truly having it both ways.
At this thought, Leon's expression immediately became much grimmer, but he still maintained his composure and looked at the tents, saying, "Before we have substantial evidence, we cannot make such an assumption yet. Let's first check these abandoned tents for any useful information left behind…"
With that, the two entered the abandoned tents one by one to carefully search, but to their frustration, there was nothing valuable inside except for some dusty makeshift furniture.
Subsequently, Leon and Sheva Alomar followed the valley forward. After walking about a hundred meters, they saw the towering, huge oil refinery and chemical plant outside the valley.
The factory area was brightly lit, as if it were broad daylight.
"Looks like we've finally reached the target oil field. This place was really hard to find," Sheva Alomar's eyes lit up, and she immediately began checking her ammunition reserves.
The two had fought their way through to this point, and although they had replenished a few times along the way, their ammunition was clearly running low.
"That's right, this time we absolutely won't let Ricardo Elvin escape again."
Leon cautiously approached the gate, carefully examining it, and found no guards. He then waved to Sheva Alomar behind him, and the two proceeded into the factory area.
"Leon, look, it's Irving!" Sheva Alomar suddenly pointed to a tall tower in the distance.
Leon quickly looked over. Illuminated by the lights, he saw Ricardo Elvin casually walking up the external staircase and into a factory building on the platform above.
"Excellent, he's really here…"
The melancholy on Leon's face finally faded a bit, and he immediately rushed towards the tall tower with Sheva Alomar.
However, their progress was not smooth. They encountered dozens of infected workers with normal physiques.
But what relieved Leon was that after these infected were shot dead, the blood flowing from their bodies did not evaporate into yellowish-green toxic mist.
About fifteen minutes later, the two successfully and uneventfully arrived at the factory where Ricardo Elvin was located, and then, like him, quickly ascended the external staircase to the topmost area.
However, when Leon and Sheva Alomar cautiously entered the factory, they hadn't gone far before they were stopped by a burly man holding a pistol.
"Josh?"
Sheva Alomar could hardly believe her eyes, exclaiming in disbelief, "That's great! I knew you had to be alive!"
Then, she saw that he was covered in blood and looked disheveled, so she asked with some concern, "Are you alright now? And… how did you get here alone?"
After Josh Stone clearly saw the two in front of him, his extremely taut nerves instantly relaxed. He lowered his gun, breathing heavily, and said vaguely, "We were attacked at the swamp dock earlier, and then I and a few team members followed Ricardo Elvin all the way here."
Suddenly, as if he sensed something, he glanced at Leon and Sheva Alomar behind them. "How are the others?"
Leon and Sheva Alomar exchanged glances. Neither spoke, but anyone could tell the outcome from the slightly sorrowful expressions on their faces.
"Damn it!"
Josh Stone's burly figure swayed, seemingly having suffered a considerable blow, as the deceased team members were all his brothers with whom he had faced life and death.
Sheva Alomar's face showed a hint of unbearable pity at the sight, and she gently advised, "Josh, now only we are left of the entire team…"
But before she could finish speaking, she was interrupted by Josh Stone, "Wait, since everyone else is dead, why haven't you two retreated yet?"
Perhaps fearing his words might be misinterpreted, he quickly explained, "What I mean is, the current situation has clearly exceeded our limits. We are no match for that guy… Moreover, before you two arrived here, headquarters had already issued an order to abandon the mission."
"That's because…" Just as Sheva Alomar was about to say something, Leon stepped forward before her to explain, "This has nothing to do with Sheva. I still have some personal matters that I need to get answers for from Ricardo Elvin."
To prevent unnecessary disagreements, Sheva Alomar quickly said to Josh Stone, "In the intel you shared with us at the train station, there was a part about the bio-weapon lab facilities, and those photos included two of Leon's friends…"
"Wait, two friends?"
Josh Stone said with a strange expression, "Although I don't know what's going on, according to past situations, almost no one who has been used as an experimental subject by those guys has survived intact."
Leon ignored his persuasion and said in a very firm tone, "I don't want to implicate others because of my personal matters, but until I capture Ricardo Elvin and find out what exactly happened here in the Kijuju Autonomous Region, I will absolutely not leave."
Josh Stone looked deeply at Leon and shook his head helplessly, "If that's the case, then you probably need to speed up your actions."
"What do you mean?" Leon looked at him, somewhat puzzled.
Josh Stone tilted his neck and said, "I overheard Ricardo Elvin making a phone call here earlier. He seems to be planning to blow up this oil refinery to completely erase all remaining evidence, and then escape from Africa…"
"So, if you want to catch him, you'd better hurry to the secret dock at the back of the factory area right now. He's probably heading there now."
"Damn it, that lunatic." Sheva Alomar cursed, both angry and furious, upon hearing this.