When Esteban Zaragosa’s pickled fish was ready, the audience praised its good taste.
“Chief, this fish and sauerkraut you’re making is too good!”
“I suddenly remembered the sweet and sour fish my mother used to make me, I miss eating at home.”
“I’m homesick, too.”
The eyes of many mercenaries, holding the bowl of pickled fish, were flooded with hot tears.
Tom Paul squeezed Esteban Zaragosa over his shoulder as he gobbled his pickled fish. “See, you’re making them cry, we’re here to fight, not to stir up emotions, okay?”.
Claudius Belles hummed lightly and scoffed, “I didn’t think the hands that killed a man with a gun could do something so delicious.”
Claudius Belles looked at him suspiciously and frowned, “I didn’t know you were such a good cook.”
Esteban Zaragosa came back on a cloud: “Since I didn’t want to make it for you, I simply hid my craft”.
Claudio Belles’s mouth twitched: “…. Esteban Zaragosa, is it necessary, has Dulcina Calvo eaten your sauerkraut?”
Esteban Zaragosa replied dryly: “Of course, I have done it to him many times”.
Tom Paul said a couple of times, “White Wolf, who is so determined, is a good family man at home.”
Claudio Belles: “You seem to have been taught how to cook well by a woman, Esteban Zaragosa, are you still a man? A man who cooks three times a day for a girl?”
Esteban Zaragosa is unconcerned: “I’m delighted.
Claudio Belles looked crossly at Esteban Zaragosa, “You know the saying: show your love and die young?”
“Someday you will meet that person who deserves to show you love too. I hope you find her sooner rather than later.”
With these words, Esteban Zaragosa got up and entered the store.
Claudio Belles and Tom Paul looked at the man’s back and sighed, “Claudio, have you noticed that the men in this relationship have black chicken soup for their outlet?”
“That’s not black chicken soup, that’s poisonous chicken soup. You can believe anything in this life, but not the mouths of you men.”
Claudio Belles also got up and returned to his tent.
Tom Paul shouted from behind, “Hey, you can’t kill everyone in one shot, there are still good men out there! For example, the most beautiful man in the world, me.”
…
Claudio Belles entered the store and found Esteban Zaragosa studying the map.
“Tomorrow we will leave for the Polar Kingdom, do you think we will really find the location of the treasure? I’ve heard that the Polar Kingdom has avalanches all year round and many treasure hunters have left with no return.”
Esteban Zaragosa still had his head buried in the study of the map. Claudio Belles bit his red lip and could not help but add: “Esteban, don’t you think that the actions of the Ming Organization in the last two years have deviated from the original intention when we founded this organization? We used to kill to defend the peaceful coexistence of whites and blacks, but in the last two years, the most we have done in all our wars is to seize resources. What is the difference between our actions like this and the underworld organization we despise?”
Esteban Zaragosa put the map away and looked at her, “I believe in all the decisions made by my righteous father.”
“But what the Master has done over the past two years has made me see more and more that the difference between us and the Underworld now is simply that we eat a little more elegantly.”
“Claudio, the Master is the one who educated us as children, and after all these years, we all know very well what kind of man he is. You shouldn’t question him.”
Claudio Belles took a deep breath and said, “It’s true that I shouldn’t question it, but there are times when I wonder if what we are doing is really in defense of justice…. It’s as if tomorrow we were to take a group of mercenaries to the Polar Regions and maybe not only fail to find the location of the treasure, but have them killed in the snowy mountains.”
He lowered his eyes slightly and laughed derisively, “In the past two years, I was always under the illusion that what we were doing was not to stand for so-called justice and peace, but for our own selfish desires. I thought that when we had the power and resources, we would do something more meaningful, but now, what we are doing instead is using those powers and resources to fight for greater resources. What’s the point of this?”
A somber look crept into Esteban Zaragosa’s dark eyes, and after narrowing his gaze, he asked in a deep voice, “If one day we were on the opposite side of the Master and he tried to kill us, would you bring him back to life?”
Claudius Belles was slightly taken aback: “Why do you ask that?”.
Esteban Zaragosa just smiled slightly and shook his head, “I guessed as much.”
As Claudio Belles was leaving the tent, Esteban Zaragosa suddenly took the floor and said, “I will protect you all, regardless of the responsibilities that will fall on our shoulders in the future.”
Claudius Belles looked back at him and smiled at him in a rare moment, “Of course I know, I trust you.”
…
It was a deep and exhausting sleep for Esteban Zaragosa.
In his dream, he returns to the scene where, as a child, he was introduced to the Ming organization by his upright father, Orlondo Marta.
Orlondo Marta has adopted many well-qualified children, most of them fatherless and many orphans.
Orlondo Marta smiled benevolently and patted him on the shoulder, “Esteban, from now on you will train with these brothers and sisters, remember the words of your righteous father and grow to be a man of honor and responsibility.”
“Father Justo, I remember.”
He trained hard every day, bruised and battered, but he gritted his teeth and never cried. I remember once, in a training camp, he was hit by a bullet in the shoulder, which left a lot of blood for the first time, he was very scared and sweating from the pain, but he gritted his teeth so hard that he never shed a single tear.
Many years later, he became the feared assassin White Wolf, a man who had won numerous battles and defeated countless enemies, and who was grateful to his lawful father for training him.
The scene shifts to the village of Orlondo Marta.
Orlondo Marta stood in the courtyard of his house, dressed in a mid-morning suit, admiring the pink evening sun as he returned from his mission.
“Righteous Father, I have returned.”
Orlondo Marta turned around, holding a pistol with the muzzle directly against her forehead.
“Just Father?”
“Stephen, don’t blame Righteous Father, you have threatened my position. Father Justus … had to kill you.”
BOOM–
A violent shot rang out.
Esteban Zaragosa woke up with a start.
It is a dream.
He half sits down and calms his breathing.
The tent was erected by Claudio Belles, “It’s time to go!”
Claudius Belles saw his sweaty head and frowned slightly, “What’s wrong with you, nightmares?”
“No, it’s just a little hot, why don’t you come out and meet me in a minute?”
Claudio Belles didn’t think much of it: “Okay, hurry up”.
…
Helicopters cross turquoise skies and scorching sun, cold rivers and snow to reach the polar regions after a day and a night.
Here there are constant thunderstorms, snowstorms and unusually low temperatures.
The group donned equipment and oxygen cylinders before disembarking from the helicopter.
Tom Paul looked around at the white expanse of snow-capped mountains and couldn’t help but blurt out, “Shit, is there really treasure here? If I don’t find any treasure, I’ll blow this place up!”.
Esteban Zaragosa looked at the topographic map and said, “We have to go down the subway river here, the treasure must be hidden underneath.”
Claudius Belles scanned the surrounding terrain and frowned, “This is white, no landmarks of any kind, surrounded by snow-capped mountains, each looking pretty much the same, how are we going to find the subway river?”
Esteban Zaragosa pointed to a path on the map: “Looking at the topo map, it probably goes from here. Follow this red route and you should be able to find the subway river without any problems.”
A group of people, weaving through the snow.
After a long day of walking with no sign of the subway river, and with the sky changing in the snowy mountains and the wind and snow beginning to blow, Esteban Zaragosa found a suitable place to camp and ordered, “Let’s camp here, rest a bit and then continue our search for the subway river.”
Tom Paul unloaded the flask from his belt, took a sip of brandy to warm himself, then looked around, “I’m going to take a piss and have a look at the grounds.”
Claudio Belles gave him a blank stare and snapped, “Trying to get lazy again, it’s killing you to set up store, isn’t it?”
Soon after, Tom Paul’s excited shout came from a short distance away, “Stephen! It looks like there’s a river here! Come and see!”
Esteban Zaragosa and Claudio Belles looked at each other and together they went forward to find Tom Paul lying on his back in the snow, looking into a hole.
“I hear water! There must be a river at the bottom.”
Esteban Zaragosa also got out and took a look: “It must be a subway river, let’s go down and have a look.
Once down below, Tom Paul was amazed, “I didn’t know it was so big down here and warmer than up here.”
Esteban Zaragosa reached out and tested the water temperature, it was not cold. “It looks like this subway river is pretty deep, Claudio, go get your gear and we’ll go down and check it out.”
“Good.”