Marvel: A Lazy-Ass Superman Chapter 797: The Enemy at the Airport

The twelve weeks of Marine Corps training had indeed been effective. The moment everyone in the truck heard the explosion, they didn’t panic like ordinary civilians.

Blair Aoxing, the squad leader, immediately slapped the driver’s-side window and ordered the driver to stop. Everyone jumped out at once and sought cover along the roadside, hiding behind vehicles that might already have been destroyed—or simply crawling beneath the trucks.

Henry struggled to hold the light machine gun in both hands as he crouched beside a tire, peeking toward the distant explosions.

That area was already within the airport grounds, perhaps even near the runway. Had someone accidentally blown up a refueling truck, or were they really under attack?

But with the explosions becoming more and more frequent, there was no way this could still be considered an accident.

The confused soldiers didn’t know whether they should continue forward or retreat.

Before long, Lieutenant Frank Castle, their platoon leader, came running over in his helmet, bringing the other two squads under his command with him.

"Form up!"

There was no time for a proper formation during wartime. Gathering together was good enough.

The young second lieutenant quickly explained, "We’ve encountered a powerful enemy at the airport. A group of heavily armed militants with excellent equipment. Their leader is suspected to be the internationally wanted criminal known as the Mandarin—a genuinely dangerous individual.

"Some of our men are surrounded near the control tower. Nobody lets their guard down. Follow me and attack from the eastern side of the airport. Henry, get your light machine gun ready. You’ll be one of our primary attackers. Everyone, check your equipment one last time."

The soldiers quickly felt over their weapons, confirming that their rifles were loaded and the safeties engaged.

Then they immediately followed the young second lieutenant, Frank Castle, crouching low as they hurried toward the eastern side of the airport.

Under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Ray Schoonover, the battalion commander, the weapons company had already set up its mortars.

Unfortunately, the fighting on the front lines was too tangled, with friend and foe mixed together. Otherwise, they would have simply bombarded the entire area.

In truth, Henry had been stunned the moment he heard the name "Mandarin."

Wasn’t this supposed to be a modern war in which victory was practically guaranteed?

When had the difficulty suddenly increased to the level of a superpowered battle?

Despite being a member of the mutant battalion, the combat strength of this unit would probably be inferior even to Magneto’s Brotherhood of Mutants if they were deprived of their rifles.

At least the Brotherhood had Magneto’s strength backing them up. No matter what, they couldn’t be considered weak.

But there wasn’t a single person in this battalion whose combat power could rival Magneto.

Naturally, that included neither Henry—this crippled Kryptonian—nor anyone else.

Their target was an international airport, and the chain-link fence surrounding it was the first obstacle.

For an army, however, it was nothing more than a matter of bringing along some cutting tools and a few pairs of shears.

Once they had opened a gap, the platoon leader crawled through first. He then had everyone else pass through and gather inside the airport.

After taking a quick look at the terrain on either side and assessing the ongoing battle, he immediately called over the three squad leaders.

"First Squad, attack the building on the left. Take the roof and set up a machine gun. Second Squad, your target is the building on the right. Same mission. Third Squad, follow me. Go!"

Henry belonged to the third squad, the one Frank had specifically ordered to follow him.

The two buildings the platoon leader had designated were not actually occupied by enemy defenders. "Taking" them simply meant advancing toward them with caution in case there were ambushes.

As a result, the soldiers who reached the rooftops quickly found suitable positions and set up their light machine guns.

The two buildings formed a pincer around one corner of the enemy encirclement.

Frank Castle’s goal was to break through that point and rescue the friendly troops trapped inside.

When the muzzles of two light machine guns and countless rifles appeared over the edges of the rooftops, the platoon leader led the charge himself!

Seeing this, Henry hurried after him.

He desperately wanted to grab Frank and stop him, asking why the platoon leader had just designated him as one of the main attackers, only to rush headlong into the fight himself the moment the battle began.

Frank’s platoon had a rule: whenever the platoon launched an attack, the platoon leader always fired the first shot.

The purpose of this rule wasn’t to highlight how heroic the platoon leader was.

It was to prevent a group of inexperienced soldiers with poor psychological resilience from blindly firing their rifles the moment they spotted the enemy.

They had to hear a comrade fire first before they were allowed to shoot.

And the first person permitted to fire could only be the platoon leader.

Frank Castle’s criterion wasn’t distance. It was whether the enemy had noticed him.

If the enemy hadn’t seen him, why run a few extra steps just to announce that an attack was coming?

But if the enemy had spotted him, then regardless of how far away the target was or whether the shot would hit, the sound of gunfire would still put psychological pressure on the enemy.

As expected, Frank chose a rather cunning direction of attack.

He didn’t immediately draw the enemy’s attention, allowing the platoon to quickly approach the encirclement from behind an aircraft passenger stair truck.

Henry also noticed that a destroyed aircraft was burning on the runway.

Its position was right in the middle of the strip. That meant that whether someone wanted to take off or land, it would be impossible without first clearing away the wreckage.

Since it was a daytime attack, nobody shouted a battle cry.

But the countless footsteps mixed with the sounds of gunfire still attracted the enemy’s attention.

One of the militants happened to turn his head and saw the American troops closing in from both sides.

He immediately began screaming hysterically at his comrades.

Frank Castle fired the first shot!

Once the platoon leader had opened fire, the entire platoon’s firepower began to show its strength.

The two light machine guns on the rooftops swept back and forth like sewing machines, posing a far greater threat than the controlled bursts of the rifles.

But the most terrifying sight was still the man charging forward with a light machine gun, spraying bullets as he went and not even bothering to look for cover.

Several people tried to take him down.

But whether he was bulletproof or everyone had simply missed, nobody could say.

All they knew was that the light machine gun never stopped firing.

After several men were knocked down, the remaining survivors hiding behind the aircraft stair truck fled.

Their position offered no protection against an attack from behind. If they didn’t run, they would simply die there.

Once those men fled, a gap opened in the encirclement.

Frank slapped Henry on the shoulder and pointed toward a direction where the enemy’s fire was particularly dense.

Henry understood immediately. He unfolded the bipod of his light machine gun and began sweeping the designated area with suppressive fire.

The others fired toward the opposite direction, driving away the nearby enemies and widening the gap.

Opening the gap was, of course, not the end of the operation.

They still had to get the trapped soldiers out.

Frank charged ahead alone, rifle in hand, sprinting through the storm of bullets like a legend.

He soon reached the position of the surrounded troops.

Before long, soldiers began emerging from the piles of cover beneath the control tower, intending to escape through the gap Frank’s platoon had opened.

The enemy naturally refused to let them go.

Their attacks became even more ferocious.

Unfortunately for them, the breach had created blind spots that their fire couldn’t cover. Even when they pushed forward and applied pressure, they couldn’t achieve any greater results.

In the end, the surrounded American troops successfully escaped.

Now all they had to do was withdraw from the airport.

After that would come a combination of artillery bombardment and aerial strikes.

Even if the runway had to be repaired before it could be used again, that was still better than sacrificing more lives to defend it.

The wealthy and well-resourced American military had the capital to squander resources on that scale.

The rescued troops withdrew first, while Frank’s platoon stayed behind to cover their retreat.

Everything went according to plan.

That is, until a formidable man descended from the sky, cut off the squad’s escape route, and looked down upon everyone with utter disdain.

Seeing him, Henry thought:

Thank God. It’s the Ten Rings, not the Ten Commandments.

Even better, he’s not some discriminatory caricature with a Manchu rat-tail braid or slanted eyes.

He’s Xu Wenwu, not Fu Manchu.

There was only one problem.

He was the enemy...

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