Indeed, after a round of firing, the sniping fire from the surrounding vessels had almost completely ceased. It seemed they had all been taken down simultaneously.

I couldn't help but marvel at the marksmanship of Jie Yuting's men. Although it was unexpected, and at such close range, taking out all the opposing snipers at once was no ordinary feat.

With the snipers eliminated, the pirates on the surrounding boats clearly lost their composure. They fired wildly in our direction; bullets whizzed everywhere, striking the deck and the three-story cabin behind us, the sound of shattering glass incessant.

I realized that if Jie Yuting hadn't told us to duck just moments before, we would have been riddled with bullets by now.

At this point, the spray of mist rising from the nearby pool began to dissipate. Jie Yuting was the first to scramble up from the ground, lunging toward the tall man in front of us with practiced ease.

However, at that very instant, several of the man’s subordinates simultaneously leveled their guns at Jie Yuting.

Normally, I wouldn't have cared about Jie Yuting’s fate, but at this moment, on some strange impulse, I drew my own weapon.

The gun was wrapped in oilcloth, and in my panic, it took considerable effort to tear the wrapping off.

Fortunately, the opposition was equally caught off guard, or perhaps fearful of accidentally shooting their own leader, so they held their fire.

I seized the opportunity and pulled the trigger toward the foremost pirate.

With a sharp ping, the bullet discharged, striking the man squarely between the eyes.

Perhaps hitting his ballistic helmet, a puff of sparks erupted from his brow, and then his neck snapped back as he slowly collapsed.

The moment I dropped the first opponent, the pirates surrounding him seemed to finally find a target; they all turned their muzzles toward me in unison.

In fact, due to the searchlights on the opposing ships, I hadn't been able to clearly make out their features, but now, I could distinctly see that their movements were somewhat odd.

First, their reactions seemed slower than normal, and the motion of turning their guns was stiff and unnatural.

In that second, a thought flashed through my mind: these people might all be seventy or eighty years old.

This strange notion passed quickly, and I immediately realized that if I didn't act now, I would truly be perforated like a sieve.

But there was nowhere to hide at this moment; I could only fight with all my might. So, I pulled the trigger again, hitting another man in the neck.

Strangely, even though I struck his neck, a shower of sparks still burst out.

But there was no time to ponder it; I thought this must be my final shot, and I would soon be riddled with holes.

Unexpectedly, Da Xiong reacted with incredible speed, throwing the precious umbrella in his hand like a javelin.

The tip of the umbrella struck one of the men in the chest, but it actually bounced off, then swept across several others, making them stumble.

Taking advantage of this opening, we all charged forward, preparing to subdue them.

But just then, a flash of electrical light erupted from somewhere near my vision, and a figure flew backward like a broken kite.

Fortunately, the figure slammed directly into Da Xiong, and the two of them tumbled to the ground.

I looked down and saw it was Jie Yuting.

Recalling how skillfully he had gripped the opponent’s neck moments ago, it shouldn't have been possible for the enemy to retaliate, yet now he had been thrown back.

And what was that flash of electricity just now?

A bad premonition began to creep into my mind.

Jie Yuting and Da Xiong rolled a few times on the ground; perhaps due to the padding, Jie Yuting didn't seem severely injured, only that his shirt over his chest was blackened and smoking faintly.

He slowly got up from the ground, wiped the corner of his mouth, and said, "Retreat! Fall back into the cabin first; something is not right with these people."

Jie Yuting was so skilled; to have suffered such a baffling loss, none of us dared to press the fight. We helped him toward the main deck cabin.

Entering the door, I told them to go ahead while I used my gun to cover the rear.

At that moment, I saw the figures I and Da Xiong had knocked down slowly rising to their feet again, including the two I had shot in the forehead and neck.

While I was astonished, a tongue of flame suddenly shot from the top of the opposing ship, striking the wall next to me. Sand and debris scattered wildly, leaving a deep pit the size of a fist.

I flinched back, terrified enough to nearly pull a muscle in my back, thinking that the sniper on the other side hadn't been killed after all!

As I retreated, moving out of the sniper's range, I began to recall how strange the behavior of these people had been ever since they boarded.

First, their manner of walking. Even if they had us completely surrounded and were certain of victory, they weren't Chow Yun-fat in a gambling film; they couldn't afford to be so brazen. After all, without knowing if we were armed, no one would be so bold.

Our ship was only five or six meters from theirs, yet these men took more than a full minute to cover the distance—their pace was far too slow.

The second notable point was that these individuals hadn't spoken a single word from beginning to end. Pirates, unlike coast guards, often retain a certain sloppiness even under strict training; there are usually a lot of extraneous mutterings. It would have been normal for them to shout at us using a loudspeaker or something. Yet, these men maintained strict discipline after boarding, and not a soul uttered a sound. Their ship, too, was like a ghost vessel; apart from the sound of the engine, there was no extraneous noise whatsoever.

Based on these observations, I suspected that these so-called pirates were not human, or at least not normal humans.

Thinking this, as I backed away, I noticed that the dark figures outside the door were not rushing. Seeing us flee, they merely rose slowly from the floor and began to follow at a measured pace.

I fired a few shots out the doorway and asked Jie Yuting, "Is there a secure compartment? Close the door; hiding in here isn't a permanent solution."

Da Xiong was supporting Jie Yuting, and the two of them appeared quite steady now.

Jie Yuting raised his head slightly; though the injury wasn't severe, his whole body felt like it had been electrocuted, punctuated by intermittent tremors.

"Step back two squares from where you are standing, and stomp hard on the floor tile..." Jie Yuting said, his jaw muscles twitching slightly, with some difficulty.

Knowing there must be a mechanism here, I followed his instructions.

Stepping on that mechanism, I immediately grasped the ingenious nature of the trap. The corridor we were in was paved with black and white checkerboard tiles. I once watched a foreign program suggesting that no matter how old people get, they retain a childish impulse. When confronted with black and white tiles, people generally choose to step only on the black squares, avoiding the white ones, imagining they are crossing a small stream and the black parts are the stones.

This theory makes psychological sense: white represents the void, black represents solidity, and black is more visually prominent, leading people to subconsciously insist on walking on the black squares.

Exploiting this psychological quirk, the ship had installed all its mechanisms on the white tiles, and they required considerable force to trigger. This design avoided accidental activation by ordinary people, allowing those secretly controlling the system to trigger mechanisms unnoticed. The effect created was, "I just walked right past here and nothing happened, but as soon as you step there, a ghost appears." By leveraging people's understanding of natural phenomena, the appearance of such a "ghost" seemed accidental, making it feel more real and instilling genuine terror.

I marveled at the cleverness of the mechanism while telling Da Xiong to put his weight into it as I stomped down on that white tile.

With a loud click, the mechanism engaged.

I watched as a hole opened in the ceiling, and a hanging apparition, its tongue lolling out, dropped down right in front of us, its eyes rolled back white.

We all froze at the sight. After a moment, Da Xiong finally cursed, "Damn it! Jie Yuting, you're messing with us again!"