It was in the middle of the night, right before dawn, when the night was at its darkest.

John, Lenny, and Peri were each on their tents, presumably asleep.

It was at this moment that Peri's eyes flared open and glinted with a dangerous, and malicious light.

She slowly left the tent, her footsteps didn't make any sound, but...

"Leaving, so soon?"

Peri heard a voice coming from behind her. She turned around and saw the yellow beacon known as Lenny, resting by a tree that was behind her tent.

She squinted her eyes and stared at Lenny. "It's none of your business, Novakid."

"Yes, it is." Lenny took a revolver from his holster and aimed at Peri. He was calm and his expression was unreadable. "Why don't you just say the truth right away?" Lenny glanced at her.

"I don't want to involve him, and you in my problems..." She sadly sighed.

"Even though I appreciate your sentiments... It's too late now..." Lenny glanced behind him. "We have company." He took his other revolver.

It was at this moment that Peri also sensed the presence of 6 people coming from the direction behind Lenny. She looked at Lenny with eyes filled with surprise.

Florans have been trained in the forest since they were young, so they are the best hunters in this type of environment. Because of their living style, after centuries of evolution, they also evolved enough to have night vision.

That's why she was surprised. She wondered, how was Lenny, who didn't have night vision and neither spent almost his entire life in the forest, able to sense the approaching enemy before her?

"Enemies?" John emerged from his tent while carrying his two pistols.

"There is 6 of them." Lenny said while throwing a glance at Peri.

"Indeed..." She confirmed with her high instincts.

John looked at Lenny and then at Peri. He noticed that there was a tense atmosphere around them the moment he emerged from his tent.

"What we do then? Engage in direct confrontation or ambush?"

"I prefer direct confrontation," Peri said unhesitatingly.

"What a crazy woman..." Lenny sneered at her. "We're in a disadvantage of number, of course, we have to go with an ambush."

"This isn't the Warrior's Way. Ambush is for the cowards and weak." She looked down at Lenny.

"Hey!" John interrupted their quarrel. "They are almost here, we go with the ambush, alright?" John switched his sight between Lenny and Peri.

"Alright..." Lenny shrugged his shoulders.

"..." Peri just nodded her head.

"Okay... Lenny, climb a tree and give support while I and Peri will go there and meet them face to face. We start when I fire."

Lenny was about to left the place when he glanced one last time at Peri. After a few moments, he took his sight away from her and swiftly climbed a tree.

Peri, of course, sensed that glance from Lenny, but she just ignored it. She stayed with John and both of them went silently toward the group of 6 enemies that were in their front.

When they were almost close to the enemies, John made a signal for Peri to go toward the left side while John went to the right side. They were going to pinch the enemy from both sides while Lenny would take care of the front.

John crouched by the bush and waited.

"They were around here..." John heard one of the enemies say.

"Hmph! They couldn't have gone too far, keep looking." Said another of the soldiers.

John lifted his head and a.n.a.lyzed them.

All of the enemies were wearing a forest camo Armor with a conspicuous black star on their chest. John was unable to see which Tier the armor was, but he was able to identify the weapons they were using.

[USCM Spit Fire...] John's face became grim. [The advanced a.s.sault Rifle used by the USCM forces. Tier 3 weapon with high fire rate and high penetration... They are well equipped.]

John was also able to identify some of their grenades and equipment, including the Teleport Signal Jammer.

John glanced at his PIPS and saw that he was indeed unable to beam back to the ship.

He deeply inhaled and then stopped breathing. His full concentration was on the enemy that was the closest of him.

Bullet Time.

The time around him slowed down by 10 times. He lifted his HEP02 and aimed at the unprotected joint between the Chestguard and the Helmet, right at the neck.

He calmly pressed the trigger...

*Bang*

The energy bullet left the muzzle of the pistol and traveled at a speed faster than sound.

"Argh!" The bullet pierced the neck of the enemy from one side and left at the other. There was no blood splattered because of the high temperature of the bullet that was able to cauterize the wound as it went through.

The guy fell dead on the ground.

"Contact!" The other enemies realized they were being ambushed so they started to fire in the direction from which the energy bullet came.

*Bang, bang, bang...*

They pressed the trigger with determination and the a.s.sault Rifles shot a barrage of fire.

John rolled around to dodge the bullets, but a few of them hit his armor.

"What is th-" Another enemy fell when a grayish light flashed right before his eyes. He didn't even have time to finish speaking when a gray spear pierced his helmet and head.

Blood splattered everywhere.

The 4 remainder enemies fell in panic and started firing everywhere.

Peri jumped from her hiding spot and launched toward the closest enemy.

She waved her hand and the spear that was lodged in one of the soldier's head disappeared and appeared in her hand.

John looked with a surprised expression when he saw what Peri had done. It was just like magic, but he didn't see any trick involved in that, it really disappeared in one place and appeared in another.

Peri moved like a snake between the enemies, they had no chance of fighting back in such a close range against Peri.

"Argh!" The sound of another enemy falling entered the ears of John.

Peri's spear was very sharp, sharp enough to pierce through the armor of the soldiers with no problem.

After the spear penetrated the enemy's heart, she rotated the spear and completely destroyed the heart, giving no chance of recovery to the soldier.

Her entire body was covered in blood and her eyes glinted with hatred and bloodl.u.s.t.

There were only 3 soldiers left, but they stared blankly at Peri.

They haven't realized the carefully approaching John from behind them and neither Lenny that was taking aim at one of them.

The soldiers were locked at a triangular formation of Peri, John, and Lenny.