At 2 a.m., calm returned to the presidential mansion after the battle.
Once the residence was secured, half of the mercenaries were stationed along the perimeter walls to reinforce defenses, while the others were tasked with clearing the battleground. Despite the intense fight, the mansion’s power and lighting system remained largely intact, which made the interior cleanup much easier.
“What is that thing next to the official residence?” Semler asked Deng Shiyang.
“I’m not sure, but it looked like an armored vehicle.”
“Why wasn’t that thing in the intel? This operation was almost ruined by that piece of junk!”
Ignoring Semler’s grumbling, Deng Shiyang walked over to the armored vehicle.
It was a 4x4 wheeled armored vehicle, approximately 6.5 meters long, close to 3 meters wide, and painted a dull gray. The vehicle now lay slumped beside the driveway, with three of its tires blown out from the earlier firefight, and the body peppered with bullet holes. On top was an open turret, the commandos commanded by Du Preez were suppressed by this turret when they rushed to the mansion. Now, only fragments of the armored plates and half a shattered FN MAG machine gun remained. The vehicle’s side and rear doors, along with the front, side turret, and engine compartment, bore various blast marks. The whole thing emitted an unpleasant stench—a mix of gunpowder and burnt protein.
“It’s an RG-31 Mk5E wheeled armored personnel carrier. Swaziland acquired seven of these from South Africa in the 1990s. After Mswati III’s ousting, they were decommissioned due to poor maintenance and lack of parts. Ndofa must have cobbled one together with salvaged parts,” Deng Shiyang explained.
Just then, an African soldier reported finding something in the mansion’s west wing.
Deng Shiyang and Semler followed him to a large room in the west wing. It was a spacious study, now in disarray. Expensive mahogany wall panels were riddled with bullet holes, and the floor was littered with debris and spent casings, evidence of the intense combat.
Two long blood trails stretched across the parquet floor, ending at the wall, where two bodies in black suits were crumpled together like discarded trash.
At the center of the office, on a pale yellow carpet, lay two more bodies—one African and one Asian.
The short, stocky African man was barefoot, wearing a dark blue silk robe, with a large bloodstain on his chest. His weary expression was frozen on his face, thick lips pressed together, eyes half-closed, gazing blankly at the ceiling. Semler pointed to the African man’s body, “Is this him?”
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“Yes, that’s Ndofa.”
With the confirmation, Semler barked a command in Portuguese, and two African soldiers immediately grabbed Ndofa’s body and dragged it toward the door.
“What’s this about?” Deng Shiyang asked, frowning.
“We’re civilized people; we don’t go around displaying heads on pikes,” Semler replied. “I’m just having them strip him and hang him from the wall.”
Deng Shiyang didn’t respond further.
“That’s the guy I ran into in the lobby,” Semler said, gesturing at the Asian man’s body.
The man, with his crew cut and square jaw, had met a particularly grisly fate. His abdomen and chest were riddled with bullet holes, and a horrific wound marred his left calf, with jagged bone fragments protruding through mangled flesh.
Though Deng Shiyang had seen similar scenes before, he still felt a wave of nausea and quickly averted his gaze.
“We found these in the study afterward,” Semler said, holding out both hands. In one, he had a black pistol, and in the other, several spent casings.
Deng Shiyang took the pistol, first inspecting the ejection port and extractor to confirm there was no round in the chamber, then examining it closely.
It was a hammer-fired automatic pistol with a manual safety located between the grip and slide. Near the magazine well on the left side of the polymer grip, there was a small, semi-circular ring for attaching a lanyard. The slide and frame were worn, suggesting long-term use.
Deng Shiyang turned it over a few times, but found no inscriptions on the grip or sleeve, so he picked up one of the casings to examine it.
The casing was bottlenecked, with a dull bronze appearance. It was slightly longer than a 9mm Makarov round, but shorter than a 7.62mm Tokarev. Comparing it to a rifle cartridge, Deng Shiyang found that the bullet diameter was similar to a .223 round.
Handing the gun and casing back to Semler, he said, “This is a Chinese military-issue Type 92 pistol. The guy was probably a Chinese military advisor.”
Semler pocketed the pistol and asked, “What should we do with the body?”
“Put it in a body bag,” Deng Shiyang replied after some thought. “If you don’t have one, wrap it in a bed sheet or curtain and store it in the cold room. Let the new government handle negotiations with China.”
“Understood.” Semler relayed the order, and soon the Asian man’s body was taken away.
Deng Shiyang glanced around the study. On the wall opposite the door was a row of floor-to-ceiling windows, covered in bulletproof glass that was chipped but not shattered. In front of the windows was a richly carved brown desk, with a black leather swivel chair overturned behind it.
He moved around the desk and, with Semler and two African soldiers watching, began searching through the drawers. In the middle drawer, he found a stack of documents and a fancy Callant pen, which he pocketed.
“Order them to bring all the bodies outside for a headcount. I want a report on casualties and captured assets by sunrise,” he said without looking up.
Unlike their previous reluctance to handle bodies, the two African soldiers now hurried out of the study, eager to carry out the order before Semler had even finished translating.
Deng Shiyang chuckled, then opened another drawer, pulling out two boxes—one tall, the other flat. The taller one was a four-inch square wrapped in silver-gray ostrich leather, and the other, a flat, tan wooden box no thicker than two inches, roughly the size of two palms.
The taller box was an automatic watch case, containing a diamond-encrusted Rolex “Full Diamond.”
He weighed the heavy gold watch in his hand, then tossed it to Semler. “Right now, Swaziland is in a state of anarchy.”
“Yes, you’re absolutely right,” the German replied, catching the watch and promptly stuffing it into his pocket without hesitation.