“Of course you will have a lot of grievances. You will be grinding your teeth trying to get compensation for your losses. The White Death is nothing compared to Black Mamba. He was a human, but Black Mamba is Azrael. He is dangerously scary for those who had betrayed us. In his hometown, he broke the arms and legs of a friend who betrayed him, removed his heart, and fed it to the pigs.”
“Oh, that’s how you escaped from Legion Etranger.”
“His eyes did look scary. He must be a psychopath.”
“Crazy punk, who would have known that his personality would be so crass!”
Colonel Philip, the tactical lieutenant, and the aide’s faces turned white at Paul’s scare tactic. The staff who were standing outside the office looked at each other. Black Mamba had suddenly turned into a psychopath.
Black Mamba, forgive me for making you a villain.
Paul pleaded for forgiveness from the bottom of his heart.
“Damn, if your motive was to threaten us, then you have succeeded. Please try to calm your friend. I would like to avoid a confrontation with a man as scary as him.”
Philip wanted to get away from the menacing conversation as soon as possible. He had a lot more to discuss with the oldies before Black Mamba charged into the office. Paul, who was having fun with the situation, had no plans to stop.
“Well. It won’t be easy to persuade him. When he was torturing the guerrilla troops, he broke their fingers one by one. After he was done with their fingers, he went on to their toes. White bones poked out of their palms, and their muscles could be seen.”
Paul ended his sentence then looked around at the faces surrounding him. Their faces were full of anxiety.
“He pulled out the muscles. He plucked each muscle, buried in blood, with precision. It was hard for me to continue watching.”
“Ugh, how cruel. He was that kind of person!”
Commander Louis folded his hands as if his muscles were being plucked.
Paul continued, “Breaking fingers and toes are considered child play in his torture technique.”
“Torture technique? What is that?”
“It is a Korean torture technique that requires hitting with a club to fold the bones.”
Paul stopped talking and glanced at Philip. He looked anxious.
“Yes, you aren’t human if you aren’t afraid of this.”
“You hit them with a club specifically to target 206 bones before it increases to 400. You don’t touch the skull, but you target the pelvis to fulfill the number. To put it simply, it turns you into an octopus. I can still hear the desperate screams of Mike and Poro. Even the guy, who got all his fingers and toes broken, easily gave up. Amazingly, even as all the bones in his body broke, his mind seemed clear. According to Black Mamba, you time the infliction of pain to keep the mind clear,” Paul explained the torture technique which Black Mamba had described to him in detail.
There was silence.
Anyone who heard that would be at a loss for words. It sounded as if every bone in the body would be broken. He had never heard of such a skill that could keep a person’s mind clear while every bone in the body broke apart.
“Haha, this is why the mafia is always threatening people.”
Paul continued describing and enjoyed seeing the color drain from their faces. Philip was slowly losing his mind.
“Was it your team who destroyed Habib’s residence and kidnapped him?”
Colonel Philip didn’t know the specific movements of the Ratel team after losing communication with them. It was because the DGSE had intentionally broken the communication.
“To be exact, it was Black Mamba. The other comrades and I were always just a tribute.”
“I see.”
“After we lost contact, we got a report from the DGSE, which said that Habib’s residence had been destroyed and that he had gone missing. I finally understood what was going on then.”
Philip gritted his teeth.
Damned punks, now that they are fighting against Black Mamba, they release me.
The DGSE and the government organization had not only taken advantage of the Ratel team but him as well.
“Habib must be dead then.”
“Black Mamba is one persistent man. After finding out all the information, he chopped off Habib’s p*nis then buried him in the desert with just his head sticking out of the sand. We found the remains of his skull in the morning after the hyenas were done with him. The animal ended up in the stomach of another animal, so he seemed to have found his rightful place. Whoever angers Black Mamba will not be forgiven.”
“I would have never thought that he would be one to enjoy such cruelties…” colonel Philip stuttered.
Crazy punk. He swallowed his thoughts.
He remembered the battle at Dien Bien Phu he had fought 30 years ago while holding a Lee–Enfield rifle in his hands. He had gone from hand to hand combat to stabbing the enemy with his gun knife. One of the guys, who had become scared, put up his hands in surrender. Philip had been drunk on blood and stabbed him in the chest soon after.
He could still see the eyes of the scared young soldier in front of him. Murder was something you couldn’t avoid as a soldier. However, even when one killed another human being, there was a dignity to maintain.
Gruesome torture for the sake of investigation was one thing, but to get rid of an enemy that way made him inhumane. It made sure that he could not move his body as a drooling predator approached him. The fear and desperation that Habib felt would have been unimaginable. The curiosity they had for Black Mamba changed to that of disgust and fear.
The Angel of Death had returned. Black Mamba had vowed revenge on him and survived through hell. Philip rubbed his forehead. His hand was full of cold sweat.
He was seriously scared. Tomorrow, he would be the general he had always wished to become. It looked like he would be encroached by a nightmare before he could receive his reward. The fabricated DGSE report sent warning bells off in his head.
[…Of the 612 men killed, 145 men had died from blunt force trauma. The weapon was either a club, a rock, or something unknown. The unknown weapon was probably a part of Black Mamba’s body. The remaining 19 men were assumed to have been killed by a vine of some sort. Those who died had been killed almost instantaneously. There were no survivors found at FROLINAT’s headquarters…]
That sort of action would make him a catastrophe. A catastrophe was not something that could be controlled by man. It was called a catastrophe for that reason. He could have never imagined that Black Mamba was this dangerous. If they had known, there would have been no reason to start the backdoor tactic. Just thinking about it gave him chills.
“I will send a report in three days. There is just so much to write. Even if I condense it, it will be at least 100 pages long. Black Mamba is an emotional being, so if you give him a lot of gifts and let him hit you a couple of times, it might appease his anger. Otherwise, you can live in fear for the rest of your life.”
Philip’s face became stiff. Paul looked from Louis to Armang and smiled.
“It will be the same for you too. The nightmare of war will come and find you. Don’t forget that Habib’s p*nis had been cut off.”
Black, I’m sorry.
Paul even dumped Ombuti’s crimes onto Black Mamba. The more afraid the oldies got, the bigger their reward.
The faces of the three people flushed white. After sending in the tactical team, they had done what they could, even if it hadn’t been the best effort. The problem was whether Black Mamba would accept it. In Black Mamba’s shoes, their actions didn’t help but instead were a string of continuous betrayals. He wouldn’t be content with merely punishing them.
A disaster was not called a disaster for no reason. If they couldn’t change Black Mamba’s mind, they would be the victims of something gruesome. That fact shook their brains.
A fist that could explode a man’s skull, a kick that could break a spine—it was gruesome just thinking about it. He was a man who had broken a boulder with his bare hands at Mt. Chinto. Even that had only been a portion of his full skills.
“Why don’t you hit me 10 times instead?”
“I can’t. Those in pain are ravaged by anger and sadness, which digs deep into their soul. It’s a way to remember the attacker. I assure you that Boniface will soon become a transgender.”
At Paul’s threat, Philip’s mouth dropped.
“Ever since this guy has been hanging around Black Mamba, he’s changed.”
Paul had been a strict soldier who obeyed all chains of rank. Right now, he was acting more like a middle mafia boss.
“You know how Boniface is.”
Boniface was the director of the foreign tactical department of the DGSE. Currently, he was the commander in chief. The fact that he could lightly mention such matters regarding Boniface was blasphemous. The person talking could say whatever he wanted, but the person listening was on the verge of wetting his pants.
“As I’ve already told you, I will meet with the leaders of the government and the DGSE to get the proper compensation for you. Please calm him down for us,” Philip pleaded sincerely.
He felt pathetic for pleading to a lower-ranking official, but his opponent was Black Mamba. If the angered predator charged out of the hospital, he was done for.
“We’ll see. He grinds his teeth and feels the urge to cut the traitors’ necks. What can I do to change his mind? Truthfully, there is something I promised Black Mamba. It’s a bit difficult to say.”
Paul shrugged his shoulders, a gesture that suggested he was embarrassed to speak of the details. Philip frowned and insisted otherwise.
“I promised him that I would let him hit you at an amount that corresponded with the number of our dead comrades. Only after I made the promise did I send him on his way. I was able to make this compromise with him since you had at least sent out the rescue team. There are 100s of guerrilla soldiers who had gotten their heads chopped off by his Kukri. In Tanga, he had chopped off the necks of 60 Tubu clan men.”
Paul enjoyed scaring the government officials. The things he was telling him weren’t exaggerations but the truth. Black Mamba could sneak into the president’s room and chop his neck off if he had wanted to. Anyone who became aware of his skill would be filled with fear even if they were a god.
“Don’t try to scare me too much. I’m old, and my bones are frail. You said that we would become octopuses once he performed his torture tactics? If I get hit by him once, I will probably die.”
Philip’s face turned so yellow, he looked pathetic. The color of the staff’s faces didn’t look too great either. If their leader was going to get beaten, there was no way they would be safe from it either. As much as they tried to think of it as a joke, it was not something to joke about. Just thinking about the killer, who cut the necks off of 60 men in one location, made their skin crawl.
“Paul, if he hit me, I will die.”
“Commander, even if Black Mamba is reckless, do you really think he will kill you? The only people he killed were enemies.”
“Would Black Mamba think we’re on the same side?”
The colonel’s worry-filled question made Paul laugh.
“That is the problem isn’t it? The crazed Black Mamba would even eat a cobra. Regardless, just get beaten. It will be easier to get hit and admitted into a hospital. Isn’t that better than being murdered in your sleep or having to live your entire life looking over your shoulder?”
Paul pleaded for forgiveness once again.
Black Mamba, forgive me. The more you act like a villain, the more we will gain from the oldies.
“Yes, but his beating scares me”
The serious meeting turned comical all of a sudden. Paul knew there was nothing more he could do. He was a French citizen who had graduated from a French military school and was now a government soldier.
“Even if you whine about being betrayed, you will only end up getting a dishonorable discharge. If you move based on emotion, you may end up marked as a traitor.”
Paul continued, “Even if you were to release the scandal to the media, it would only become sensational for a while before dying out. France’s media outlet is free. However, if it is related to the country, it will be strict. The situation will have a few lines written in Le Monde then be shoved back inside a desk.”
The best solution was to come to a compromise with Black Mamba. His power was lesser than colonel Philip who would soon be promoted. He scared him enough, so he should be flying around doing what he must.
The reason he told colonel Philip about the DGSE’s double contract was so that he could pressure the government with the information. Black Mamba’s entity was an immense threat to the DGSE and the government. They wanted to bury him, but they were unable to. If they tried to shut him up, their necks would suffer under Black Mamba’s hands.
“Thanks to Black Mamba, Bellman, Emil, Jang Shin, and I were able to come back alive. We have handed over our lives and the lives of the other six comrades to Black Mamba. The oldies will have to make some compromises with Black Mamba.”
“Hm, all of you have made the right decision, but they will have the worst person as an enemy.”
Philip’s face looked troubled.
“Hm, do your best to fight against the wild cat.”
Paul decided that he had pressured Philip enough. Fear was an emotion that had a quick effect on a human’s psyche. If the scared Philip relayed this fear, their reward would become bigger.
In Paris, there was a hospital that took care of government officials named BM, meant for VVIP patients. The VVIP hospital room had a separate bed meant for high ranking generals. The living room was taken over by Ombuti and Sun WooHyun, and Edel occupied the bedroom.
While Paul was scaring colonel Philip, Black Mamba was casually examining the ward. The hospital room was like a five-star hotel suite room. It had a phenomenal medical team, food similar to that of a hotel room service, the cheerful and smart Edel nursing him, and the loyal Ombuti and Sun WooHyun by his side. Heaven could not be better than this. He recovered quickly by devouring five servings of food, satisfying his ravaging hunger.