"Identify yourself," Machete asked in English.
The Asian man did not answer. He just stared at them with a deathly blank face.
Nick reached out and stopped the Gatling Nikolai, the Russian, was carrying, reassuring him again. "Don't be so tense." Then he looked the Asian man up and down and uttered a strange word. "Yakuza?"
The Asian man nodded expressionlessly and said in heavily accented English, "I'll go with you."
"What does that mean?" Machete was rather confused.
"Yamaguchi-gumi." This time, everyone understood what Nick said.
Although he did not know whether the man actually belonged to the Yamaguchi-gumi, the name was like "Mafia" for the Italian mob. Say it, and everyone knew you meant Japanese gangsters.
"Then let's go. I'll take point." Dahlia volunteered to lead the way. Behind her, the men exchanged looks.
"There's something very wrong with this place." Nikolai followed behind Nick, muttering as he walked.
The five of them traveled through the dense forest for about twenty minutes, and everyone sensed that something was wrong. Not all of them had been to a tropical rainforest, but they knew how treacherous such places could be.
Yet along the way, they had encountered no mosquitoes, snakes, or ants, nor had they seen a single bird or lizard. There were only strange mushrooms covering the ground, giving off a faint fluorescent green glow.
Strange insect calls sounded from time to time, but there was not even an ant on the tree trunks, let alone any other insects. The creatures making those calls all around them were nowhere to be seen either.
"Shh!" Dahlia, who had kept about ten paces ahead of the others, suddenly crouched and signaled behind her. The others immediately went on alert and carefully moved up beside her.
"Bastard!"
"You son of a bitch!"