Approaching the Mother Ship

In weather where the sun cannot be seen, being in the middle of the jungle, it is easy to lose your sense of direction. Once you lose your sense of direction, the chances of survival directly decrease by half.

Luo Jun never dared to be negligent, even though he was a jungle survivalist with abundant experience.

That night, taking the woman through the jungle was forced by helplessness. If there was a choice, he would absolutely not be willing to cross the jungle at night. Not losing his sense of direction was also largely due to luck.

Luo Jun knew the growing environments of most plants. That night, he inferred the direction he was walking by the various plant environments.

After walking for three hours, Luo Jun found a moss-covered boulder to sit down, partly to rest, and partly to reconfirm whether he was walking in the wrong direction.

When he had climbed to the top of the mountain earlier, he observed the surrounding terrain. This was an extremely advantageous condition for identifying directions.

However, when situated in some indistinct terrain in the woods, that kind of identification condition completely disappeared. Therefore, he had to rely on other methods to identify directions.

Luo Jun observed the surrounding moss, and selected five or six lush, upright trees.

If a tree did not grow crooked or tilted, then the side facing south would grow more lushly, while moss growing on the north side of the tree would be denser.

This was because moss liked a damp growing environment.

Of course, he could not determine the direction based solely on the moss and lushness of one tree.

He had to find several more trees of equal condition as a reference, in order to avoid mistakes.

No matter whether it was night or day, as long as he could carefully observe these details, he would definitely be able to find his bearings.

In addition to these two methods, there were many other methods, such as looking at the growth rings - the dense end was north, and the opposite was south. This was also related to the amount of sunlight received. There was also observing bamboo - the greener side was south, and the blue-yellow side was north. With no wind, the tips of the bamboo would usually point south.

If he could not observe any of those, even on bare cliffs and precipices with sparse vegetation, he could still distinguish north and south sides by their degree of bareness - the barer side was north, and the opposite was south.

For Luo Jun, this knowledge was extremely basic.

He only paused here briefly before setting off again.

After about another two hours, Luo Jun discovered that the surrounding plants and geology were now completely different from before.

The geology here was sandy, and the sand tasted salty. He knew that the seaside was very near.

Luo Jun quickened his pace here, because the road here was much easier to walk. Before long, he smelled the fishy sea breeze piercing through the woods, as well as the rustling sound of waves and distinctive cries of seagulls by the seaside.

Luo Jun was now unsure how far he was from the mothership, but he could confirm that he had directly bypassed the Red Mangrove Swamp Area.

Between the Red Mangrove Swamp Area and the mothership was a large stretch of beach spanning several kilometers.

Luo Jun heaved a sigh of relief - what he feared most was that what he would see when he emerged would not be a beach, but a stretch of red mangrove forest!

Because once he entered the red mangrove forest, even dashing for two days would not get him to his destination, as one could not even walk 900 meters into the Red Mangrove Swamp Area in an hour, while also facing the risks of high tide and bites from aquatic creatures.

Avoiding this disaster was not a matter of luck. It was entirely due to him climbing up the hilltop that day to observe and memorize the surrounding terrain, in addition to his abundant direction identification skills.

Luo Jun replenished his food and water before moving northwest through the sparse woods.

Forty minutes later, Luo Jun carefully climbed up to some high ground and crouched behind some trees. Using binoculars, he observed the mothership!

Luo Jun noticed the load lines on the hull, indicating it was a small boat with a displacement of only 150 tons.

Judging from its exterior, it looked like an ordinary passenger ship. While it could make long voyages, taking a hundred people on board would be somewhat of a stretch. Since they were here on a mission and it was unknown how long they would stay on the island, there would definitely be a lot of food and fresh water supplies on board. Given that, their total number of people should not exceed eighty.

Food and water determined the length of their mission. If there were too many people, food and water supplies would be the first things to run out.

Estimating eighty people was still calculating toward the upper limit, in Luo Jun's opinion.

If he were captain, for safety and smooth progression of the mission, he would bring fifty people at most, or even forty.

While more food supplies could be brought, that was not the case with fresh water, as the water tanks had limited capacity. If they were not modified, a passenger boat this size could support a hundred people's drinking and living needs for five days at most.

Luo Jun did not know if this boat had been modified. Under normal consumption, fifty people would last ten days at best.

And judging from previous experience, the time they took to sail here definitely exceeded ten days.

Therefore, Luo Jun felt that the observer had probably spoken the truth about there being only thirty-three people on the boat!

Of course, if the water tanks had been modified, the number of people could exceed fifty.

In any case, Luo Jun still decided to get closer to understand the situation, and see if they needed to collect water on the island. If they did need to collect water, then he would have to recalculate the length of time they had been on the island, as well as their number of people.

Luo Jun approached them again. After another hour, a light rain started, the icy raindrops striking Luo Jun's face.

Luo Jun crept up a hill only a hundred meters from the river.

He looped a rope around his feet to climb up a tall, straight redwood tree like the Malaysian coconut harvesters.

Luo Jun concealed himself amid the redwood canopy, using binoculars to observe the boat 300 meters away.

With the rain, there was no one active on deck. Both layers of windows emitted a faint light, indicating their generator had not broken down either.

So, what that observer said about something affecting electronic devices was probably not true.

Of course, this was just one of Luo Jun's inferences. To truly understand what was going on, actual investigation was still required.

Through the light rain and gloomy sky, Luo Jun saw a man and a woman moving about near the window.

"There's actually a woman on board?"

Luo Jun knew clearly that mercenaries would not bring women on missions, because women's resource consumption on ships was significant, and also affected the mercenaries' work state.

This was quite strange.

Were they here to carry out a mission, or organize their own treasure hunt?

Subsequently, Luo Jun looked toward the beach and river outlet in front of the boat. What he saw next shocked him even more. Upon seeing those tents, he immediately understood why the people caught by his punji sticks that night seemed nothing like the snipers - they were never together in the first place!

They just had a subordinate relationship!

Those people fought so desperately simply for survival!

Just who were these people?!

They did not seem like military men or mercenaries!