It seems that the mastermind behind this doesn't want to confront Zhang Lei directly, otherwise they wouldn't have resorted to using pirates and hiding in the background.
Of course, there are other possibilities, such as them having no other forces on the sea.
It's unlikely that Zhang Lei can be eliminated directly, and even if he succeeds, the price to pay would be too high. Eliminating Zhang Lei at sea is obviously the most convenient way. On the vast ocean, without nautical charts, ships, or drinking water, even the most powerful person would kick the bucket.
According to Zhang Lei, "I don't want to interrogate him now. I'm afraid that if I find out who instigated this, I won't be able to resist seeking revenge!"
Hatred is only a part of life. Zhang Lei has already driven himself away from home because of hatred. He is now unsure whether he should let hatred drive him to the point where he has no place to stand.
Moreover, this thing is also related to mood. After killing Li Yang, Zhang Lei still felt a sense of loss or emptiness, and it was not as exciting as he had expected.
However, Zhang Lei's current reluctance to interrogate Tie Liu does not mean that he wants to let him go. When Zhang Lei has free time, or when he is in the mood, he will naturally find a way to get something out of him.
Once they were out of the pirates' encirclement, catching up with Zhang Lei wouldn't be so easy. The pirates weren't as crazy as Zhang Lei, putting so many engines on a small yacht that could only carry a dozen or so people.
So Zhang Lei was already quite relieved. As long as they didn't have a second layer of encirclement, these pirates could only follow behind and get splashed by the waves.
If it weren't for Tie Liu, Zhang Lei might have really suffered a great loss.
"Spare me! If you promise not to kill me, I'll tell you everything I know!" Tie Liu was originally very tough, but after discovering that Zhang Lei had hung him on the bow of the ship as a figurehead, he had no interest in paying attention to him at all, and his toughness gradually dissipated with the sea breeze.
"We adults don't have time for you right now!" Wu Chen walked over and gave him a hard knock on the head.
Zhang Lei disliked the title "Big Brother," even though it was used by gang leaders, small-time thugs also used it, and even the lowest-ranking thugs could get a few elementary school kids to call them that. Therefore, Zhang Lei had Wu Chen change it to "Sir," which sounded much better.
"We can't wait any longer! If we wait any longer, we might be dead!" Tie Liu said anxiously.
"Don't talk nonsense!" Wu Chen was startled. Judging from Tie Liu's appearance, he didn't seem to be lying on purpose, and lying wouldn't do him any good now.
"I'm not making this up. Those pirates also have a helicopter, and there might be missiles on it."
Wu Chen didn't notice that Tie Liu was already trying to get on his good side; he had already put himself in the same group as Zhang Lei and the others. Upon hearing this, Wu Chen only remembered rushing towards the bridge.
Zhang Lei was experiencing the feeling of speed, like racing a car. Sometimes it felt better to drive himself, especially after killing someone, as it helped calm him down.
"Sir, something terrible has happened! That pirate captain said his accomplices have a helicopter, and there might be missiles on it!" Wu Chen shouted from below the bridge. He didn't dare go up there casually; there were three people up there, and who knew what Zhang Lei was doing up there besides steering the ship.
"What?" Zhang Lei was also taken aback. It was indeed possible. A small helicopter wouldn't take up much space on a boat, and with some modifications, a small boat could also take off and land a helicopter. He quickly activated his internal air defense system, and thankfully, he didn't find any suspicious objects within its range.
The ship's radar wasn't military-grade, so its ability to search for aircraft in the air was practically zero. Whether the ship's radar could detect an aircraft flying by depended on fate. Zhang Lei felt that he didn't usually worship any gods, so he figured that no matter what kind of god it was, they probably wouldn't take care of him.
“Say what you said again!” Zhang Lei jumped directly from the bridge to Tie Liu’s side. “Wu Chen, you go up, you’re in charge of the ship!”
"Why did you tell me?" Zhang Lei asked, somewhat curious after hearing his description.
“We discussed this in our meeting. Although capturing you alive would be more profitable, if you can really break through the encirclement, we might as well use the missiles from the helicopter to blow up your ship!” Tie Liu spoke with extreme caution, afraid of angering Zhang Lei. “I’m on the ship now, and they won’t stop firing missiles just because of me! I don’t want to die, so I can only tell you the truth. Don’t worry, whatever you want to know, as long as I know it, I will tell you the truth!”
"Hmm, I'll ask you about the things I need to know later. Right now, we really need to deal with that damn thing first!"
Something flew into Zhang Lei's inner energy circle. Judging by its size, it should be the helicopter he mentioned. These days, pirates are high-tech pirates. If a pirate hadn't graduated from university, he'd be embarrassed to even greet people. Having a helicopter is nothing.
It's possible that the helicopter's fire control system was modified before it was sold to them, which is why the helicopter didn't launch an attack from a very far distance.
However, given the height and distance at which they were positioned, it would still be problematic for machine guns to hit them.
"Whoosh!" A missile trailing white smoke flew towards the speedboat. It seems these pirates paid a hefty price for these items, as they didn't launch two missiles at once.
If Zhang Lei were caught off guard by their surprise attack, it would indeed be difficult for him to dodge the missile. But now? Even if Wu Chen couldn't dodge the missile while piloting the speedboat, Zhang Lei wouldn't let it land on his boat.
Episode 4: An Eye for an Eye, a Blade for a Teeth - Chapter 88: The Unnecessary Pursuit (Part 2)
There's not much to say about the battle itself. Even if Zhang Lei jumped up to meet their missiles head-on, it's questionable how much damage these small missiles could inflict on him. Moreover, missiles without signal guidance have limited fine-tuning capabilities; Wu Chen easily steered the boat around with a couple of turns to shake them off.
Zhang Lei couldn't understand why they would consider this a last resort. Didn't they know that this tactic only works when the opponent is completely unaware? Zhang Lei forgot that he almost became that completely unaware opponent himself.
Although Zhang Lei's ship already had machine guns, they were not fixed in a fixed location, so the machine guns could not fire accurately at all.
For safety reasons, they didn't even enter the range of the machine gun, probably thinking they were safe.
Zhang Lei did not actually use the machine gun, but he did not say he would not use the machine gun shells. Zhang Lei used the small shells he removed from the ammunition belt as darts, and hit the target in just two uses.
The first shot corrected for the deviation through the inner air ring, and the second shot hit the front window of the helicopter directly. Although it didn't knock out the enemy in one hit, it was enough to terrify the people inside.
The pilot was clearly a coward; he no longer had the courage to fight back and hastily turned the plane around to run away.
How could Zhang Lei let it get away? One of the important characteristics of self-examination is controlling one's shot. Back then, Linghu Zaichong could make every three-pointer without using his special ability. After using self-examination, it goes without saying that he could control his power and angle with precision down to the second and his strength with precision down to the milligram.
With the inner air circle corrected, Zhang Lei gave them no chance at all. Before the plane had even turned around completely, at least a dozen machine gun shells, still with spent cartridge cases, had already hit the helicopter in a swarm, covering almost every part from start to finish.
It's unclear whether the pirates bought substandard shells or if the seal was restricted while the shells were still attached to their casings, but only about half of the shells exploded successfully.
However, those shells that did not explode actually exerted greater power, some of them like armor-piercing shells, especially after the casing was stuck at the back and pulled off.
"Isn't it spectacular?" Zhang Lei turned to ask Tie Liu. This kid was good. Zhang Lei wanted to keep him, so it would be best to give him a certain degree of shock, to make him realize that he was not to be trifled with.
Whether it was sweat or seawater splashed on his forehead, Tie Liu replied in a fawning voice, "Spectacular, absolutely spectacular!"
"Alright, don't be so nervous. Before we take you off, let's talk about the other things you know. I'm quite interested in how much my bounty is!"
Zhang Lei ran over and sat at the bow of the boat, looking like Tie Liu's good friend. The two were enjoying the scenery and chatting happily about their friendship, but one was sitting while the other was tied to the bow as a mascot.
"Five hundred million? In euros!" Zhang Lei was so shocked he almost jumped off the ship. Although the RMB had been appreciating, its exchange rate with the euro was still close to one to ten. Moreover, the euro was a stronger currency than the US dollar in the international market.
Zhang Lei knew he had offended many people, but he never expected that he would be so hated. No wonder these pirates were so eager to come and hunt him down.
The people who offered the bounty did not come forward directly; instead, they used the most convenient economic leverage. Zhang Lei estimated that the price was about the same as bribing the US Pacific Fleet to carry out a single mission.
"Oh, that high? I'm almost tempted to sell myself!" Not to mention them, Zhang Lei was tempted too. And according to his speculation, the investors this time were probably just a few of his haters. The real big shots wouldn't bother to find someone else; they'd rather crush Zhang Lei themselves, and the process would definitely not be any simpler than Zhang Lei crushing Li Yang.