Strongest Soldier King

After the meeting, representatives from all sides returned to their respective stations. Tang Tian glanced at the newly piled mound on Dangyang's hillside, where her closest friend, the White Wolf King, was buried. With a cold gaze filled with resentment, she gathered her close confidants and quietly recounted the situation, finally adding, "Brothers, I have a premonition that the joint military action will end in a disastrous defeat. Should we stay or leave? What's your opinion?"

"As mercenaries, if we just leave like this, we lose all honor. Who will trust us in the future? Secondly, although we came here partly because of Sam Country, we're also here for a sizable commission. If we leave like this, we gain nothing, which is not in our best interest," a deep-voiced man said quietly.

"What you say makes sense, and I have considered it. But the instability within the alliance means that if the enemy finds a chance to launch a major counterattack, we'll be in a very passive position. Moving forward, we should focus on preserving our strength. As long as we hold out until the end, even if the alliance fails, it's not our problem. Our strength remains, and so does our honor; at that point, we can take the money and go. What do you think?" Tang Tian said softly.

"That's fine." Everyone nodded in agreement, understanding the importance of preserving their strength until the end. According to the agreement, as long as they hold out till the end, even in defeat, they still get paid, albeit half. For the Wild Wolf Mercenary Group's current situation, this is undoubtedly the best choice.

"Wolf King, the brothers' wounds are very strange, they aren't healing, the wounds are starting to fester, and the bleeding won't stop," a sturdy man said with a gloomy face, running up to speak quietly.

"What?" Tang Tian was shocked, immediately standing up as a sense of unease flooded her mind. She said with a cold face, "Let's go, take a look." With that, she jogged toward the resting area for the wounded.

Everyone followed closely behind Tang Tian, arriving at the injured. Tang Tian crouched down to check her subordinate's wound, which was caused by trap spikes piercing the arm. Normally, this wasn't a significant injury; applying some antiseptic spray and bandaging it should lead to scabbing quickly. Mercenaries always at death's door had their methods of treatment.

However, everyone found that the wound wasn't scabbing, instead becoming inflamed, festering, and continuously seeping black bloody pus with a foul odor. This gained everyone's attention, and they quickly reported the situation to Tang Tian. Tang Tian examined the wound, smelled the stench, and her face became increasingly grim. After a few words of comfort, she slowly stood up, signaled for her confidants to step aside, and whispered, "It's poisoning; I didn't expect they used poison."

"Hiss? Then what should we do? Can it be treated?" someone asked in a surprised whisper.

"It can be treated but requires immediate hospital treatment. We lack medicine here, and if untreated within a week, it will probably be too late," Tang Tian said with a grim face.

"We can't let the brothers be in trouble; they must be treated," an efficient man immediately remarked. Although mercenaries focus on profit, they are very united internally.

"I know," Tang Tian replied, a bit annoyed. Her gaze passed over the crowd, looking towards the mountain top with a serious expression, as if a fierce beast could jump out at any moment. Everyone anxiously awaited Tang Tian's final decision but didn't disturb her thoughts. They had deep trust in Tang Tian's character and intelligence. After a while, Tang Tian continued, "Arrange for a few people to escort the wounded away immediately. A few of us will stay. Our people being injured like this, the coalition won't be much better off. This battle won't be easy."

"That's fine, even if half of us leave, we'll still have over a dozen people left. Sam Country can't say anything about it," a man immediately agreed. This way, they could save their brothers while preserving their honor and continue the mercenary mission, achieving the best of both worlds.

No one else disagreed; they nodded and began making arrangements. Shortly, several wounded were carried away, and Tang Tian watched everyone disappear into the dense forest. With a gloomy face, she glanced at the dozen or so elite subordinates who stayed behind, her unease growing more pronounced. She said in a low voice, "I have to go find Piero; you all be careful."

Tang Tian gave a few instructions, then hurried to the camp, finding Piero, who was changing his bandages. Seeing that the new wound under Piero's arm was also festering, her face darkened, and her cold eyes showed a tint of worry. She hurried forward and asked, looking at Piero's wound, "Does it have a foul smell?"

"Hmm, I didn't notice before, but I found something wrong when I changed the bandage earlier," Piero replied with a serious face. Thinking of something, he hesitantly asked, "You came to see me; is something wrong?"

"My men's wounds are the same as yours; it's poisoning, the enemy used poison," Tang Tian said in a hushed voice.

"Poison?" Piero looked at the thumb-sized abrasion under his arm, noticing signs of decay in the muscular tissue, which was indeed unusual. A feeling of unease inexplicably emerged, causing his brow to furrow and his face to darken as he quietly commented, "Last night's battle, the coalition sacrificed nearly sixty people, with over thirty injured. Does that mean all the wounded could be poisoned? No, we must clarify this immediately."

Without waiting for Tang Tian to speak, Piero immediately summoned his people and used the walkie-talkie to contact other teams, asking them to check the status of the wounds and to meet up quickly. Tang Tian, with a heavy expression, found a place to sit and ponder. Few knew of last night's battle results, and Piero's unintentional revelation allowed Tang Tian to estimate that they lost nearly half of their forces in the battle. With the wounded needing escorts, based on one escort per wounded, that would require thirty, conservatively estimated. If two escorted one wounded, that would be sixty, meaning fewer than fifty could remain.

Fifty men against nearly a thousand armed forces, among them over a dozen well-trained snipers—how could this battle be fought? With this thought, Tang Tian's face turned pale, caught in a dilemma. Piero apparently thought of this issue too, pondering with his head lowered. Soon, representatives from all sides arrived one after another, sitting together, each with a grim expression.

Piero, seeing this scene, immediately understood. Everyone's wounds were unusual. His face transformed, his brows tightly knit as he looked at the others and said, "It seems everyone's wounds aren't simple. Miss Tang just mentioned there's a sign of poisoning, and this is very likely. Miss Tang, since you can see it, tell us, how long can I last with this kind of injury?"

"At most, five days before the wound rots and causes death by bleeding. In severe cases, the toxin will attack the heart, with three days being the limit," Tang Tian said coldly. "I've studied in Huaxia Country and know of a poison, accurately a virus, prepared from feces and smeared on weapons. This virus eats away cells, causing muscle rot and unstoppable bleeding. It was commonly used in ancient cold weapon battlefields."

"Hiss." Everyone took a sharp breath, each calculating internally. The wounded were brothers who shared life and death, and no one was willing to see their brothers fall like that.