Betting with Your Life! Three Seconds Flat!

Oh man, this time things really got out of hand.

Chu Hang felt like his heart was about to leap right out of his throat, only for a cold hand to shove it stubbornly back down, blocking his airway so he could barely breathe.

On the left was Captain America running for his life, followed by a long train of howling Hydra pursuers. Gunshots, explosions, and angry roars blended together like a moving rock concert, except the instruments playing were death.

On the right was that Hound who had popped out of the darkness like a ghost. He stood there quietly, not saying a word, but the deep chill and killing intent radiating from his bones were more terrifying than that entire symphony orchestra on the left combined.

What did you call this? This was wolves in front, tigers behind, and two nearly frozen little white rabbits caught right in the middle.

Chu Hang's brain raced frantically at that moment.

The western ridge was about eight hundred meters away. Captain America was running extremely fast, and considering the snow and complex terrain, it would take him about a minute and a half to charge here. The pursuers behind him were about a hundred meters back and would arrive a dozen seconds later.

As for the downstream Hound, he was less than fifty meters away from them! Although he wasn't walking fast, he was only doing it on purpose. With an elite operative's explosive power, how long would it take to sprint fifty meters at full effort?

Five seconds? Or three?

Damn it, no matter how many seconds, it was faster than Captain America!

It was over. This gamble was lost. Chu Hang's heart skipped a beat and plummeted to the bottom. His meticulously designed plan—to make two floodwaters crash into each other and fish in troubled waters himself—had completely fallen through because of this damn time difference of a few seconds.

The situation now was that before reinforcements arrived, that perverted butcher would reach the kitchen a step early and leisurely process the two of them as main courses.

Gabe, get ready to fight for our lives. Chu Hang's voice was pitched extremely low, squeezed out almost from between his teeth. He tightly gripped the MP40 submachine gun he had stripped from a Hydra soldier, the cold steel touch his only reliance in this moment.

Gabe didn't answer, but Chu Hang could feel the other man's body, which had been close to giving up the fight, tense up again. When people faced certain doom, they either completely broke down or burst into a final madness.

Downstream, the man called the Hound moved.

He didn't charge straight over as Chu Hang had anticipated, but instead walked step by step toward the reed marsh where they had previously hidden, pacing with an elegance as if he were attending a banquet, unhurried and slow. His gaze remained locked on that area all along, and a trace of an elusive, mocking smile even hung on the corners of his mouth.

He was enjoying the process.

He was like a top-tier bomb disposal expert admiring a rookie's riddled-with-loopholes, poorly constructed explosive device.

Close. Closer.

Chu Hang's palms were covered in cold sweat, and his index finger was already resting on the trigger of the MP40. He knew that as long as the opponent took two more steps forward, he would step on the tripwire made from his shoestring.

Though that thing definitely wouldn't kill the man, it could at least blow him into a dusty mess and buy them a split-second chance!

Yet the Hound stopped walking less than half a meter away from that thin tripwire.

He just halted like that, tilting his head slightly as he looked with keen interest at the thin cord that was barely visible in the cold wind. His gaze was filled with utter contempt, just like someone watching a child's naive prank.

He had spotted it!

Chu Hang's heart was clutched once more. This guy's powers of observation were acute to a perverted degree!

The Hound slowly raised his foot, seemingly intending to stomp that crude device to pieces and thoroughly shatter Chu Hang and Gabe's last hope.

Yet at this very instant as he lifted his foot!

Whoosh—!

A sharp, ear-splitting sound of breaking air suddenly rang out from the direction of the western ridge!

Immediately following it, a red, white, and blue circular shield carried an irresistible momentum, spinning and howling like an out-of-the-barrel cannon shell as it fiercely smashed over!

Its target was neither the Hound nor Chu Hang and them, but a bowl-thick birch tree slightly behind and to the side of the Hound!

Clang!

An ear-splitting clash of metal!

The moment the shield struck the tree trunk, it erupted with formidable kinetic energy. Accompanied by wood chips flying all over the sky, it rebounded violently at an incredible angle! And the direction it bounced toward was none other than the Hound's back!

This turn of events came too fast, too suddenly!

Even the Hound had completely failed to anticipate it!

His originally leisurely and calm posture vanished instantly, replaced by a beast-like reflex. He almost instinctively abandoned stepping on the tripwire, violently twisting his body aside at an angle that defied the laws of physics!

Bang!

The shield flew past barely brushing his back, slamming viciously into the frozen earth behind him and kicking up a large clump of cold mud.

Though he avoided the vital spot, the violent force carried by the shield still sent him stumbling, his body pitching forward out of control.

And the direction he was diving toward was none other than the tripped-wire device Chu Hang had set up!

The Hound's pupils violently shrank to the size of needle points at this moment! He wanted to catch himself, but it was already too late!

His military boot stepped heavily onto the thin shoestring.

Snap!

The shoestring broke right on cue.

The pull-ring connected to the fuse was jerked out instantly.

Chu Hang roared frantically in his mind: Right now!

Boom—!!!

An earth-shattering explosion!

The formidable power of the C4 explosive was completely unleashed in this single instant! Orange-red flames, mixed with thick black smoke and ice, snow, and earth blasted to pieces, formed a terrifying shockwave that swept wildly in all directions!

The entire riverbank seemed to shudder violently.

That arrogant and domineering Hound didn't even have time to let out a muffled groan before he was blasted entirely airborne by this sudden explosion, tumbling twice in the air like a broken sack before plunging heavily into the nearby icy river with a splash.

All of this, from the shield flying in to the explosion sounding, took a long time to describe, but in truth happened within just one or two seconds!

So fast that nobody had time to react!

Chu Hang and Gabe stared dumbfounded at the dramatic scene before them, their minds completely blank.

Did they... succeed?

No, they didn't succeed.

It was that man who had arrived!

Chu Hang snapped his head around, gazing toward the west.

A tall, burly figure was charging out of that chaotic patch of woods. He wore a blue, white, and red tight-fitting combat uniform, a white five-pointed star on his chest gleaming brilliantly in the firelight. His face was stained with gunpowder smoke and mud, his breathing ragged, and his gaze filled with exhaustion, yet that ramrod-straight spine looked like an unbending javelin!

Captain America, Steve Rogers!

He had finally arrived!

He was three seconds later than the Hound, but his shield had been three seconds faster!

It was precisely these three seconds of speed that had saved the lives of Chu Hang and Gabe!

"Get down!"

Just as Chu Hang stood there in a daze, Captain America's loud and urgent roar reached them.

Immediately after, dense gunfire swept toward their hiding place like a hailstorm, beating down mercilessly! It was the Hydra soldiers who had caught up from behind!

Chu Hang snapped to his senses, hurriedly pulling Gabe and pressing their bodies firmly behind a rock.

Bullets struck the rock, sparking tiny points of fire while stone fragments splattered everywhere, stinging their faces fiercely.

Chaos!

Utter and complete chaos!

Captain America ran ahead while searching for cover, the Hydra soldiers pursued and fired wildly behind, and the Hound, blasted into the river, was of unknown life or death.

This small riverbank instantly turned into a meat grinder!

Opportunity!

Chu Hang's eyes shone terrifyingly bright at this moment!

What he wanted was precisely this kind of chaos!

He didn't continue hiding, instead abruptly sticking half his body out from behind the rock and raising the MP40 submachine gun in his hands.

His target was neither Captain America nor the pursuing Hydra soldiers.

It was the flank!

He had spotted immediately that in the flanking woods, three more Hydra soldiers were attempting to flank Captain America's rear!

"Captain! To your right! Three of them!"

Chu Hang used all his strength to roar in English!

Almost at the exact same time his roar sounded, the MP40 in his hands spat out angry tongues of fire!

Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat!

A magazine of bullets accurately sprayed across!

He wasn't counting on hitting anyone; what he wanted was simply to use the gunfire and bullet trails to mark the enemy's positions for Captain America!

Captain America, who was seeking cover in a shell crater, clearly heard the shout. Without any hesitation, he rolled on the ground, picked up the shield that had just smashed into the dirt, and flung it backward without a second thought toward the direction Chu Hang had indicated!

Clang! Clang! Argh!

The shield carved a graceful arc through the woods, accompanied by two muffled sounds of metallic impact and one shrill scream, before flying back into Captain America's hand.

Those three Hydra soldiers attempting a flanking maneuver were silenced instantly.

Captain America held the shield in one hand, half-crouching in the shell crater with a gaze sharp as lightning, and for the first time formally cast a complex look mixed with surprise, vigilance, and a trace of gratitude toward Chu Hang's direction.

The battle had only just begun!