This leg of the journey was by passenger bus without any tarpaulins. Word was it would take about ten hours; departing at noon, they would arrive around midnight.
In the first row on the left, Zhang Dao'an sat back down after shouting that parting cry. His back was straight as a ramrod, his eyes fixed forward, and he didn't say a word.
The bus was dead silent.
This batch of recruits was unlike previous ones. Because certain matters had come to light, by now nearly everyone knew that 34473—the name belonging to the yellow dog at the mess hall—was actually Chief Drill Instructor Zhang's official service number in the Eraser Ninth Army... The backstory and implications ran deep.
So if Chief Instructor Zhang felt like shouting it himself, that was his own business... None of the others dared utter a peep.
Until...
In the last row on the same left side, a burly fellow suddenly leaned across his window-seat comrade, craning his neck with difficulty, and poked his upper body out of the window as well. Grinning warmly, he waved toward the back and shouted, "Goodbye... 34473! Goodbye, Big Yellow!"
He Tangtang pulled back inside and sat down, rubbing his hands like an eager youth who had just left home to seek his fortune in the world. Facing the shocked and pitying stares of everyone on the bus, he chuckled, "Heh heh, I'm really gonna miss him."
"..."
"To be honest, back at the beginning, I even had designs on him. Wanted to secretly snare him to eat dog meat," he rambled on when no one responded, directing his words at the two people on the right side of the back row—Wen Jifei and Han Qingyu. "Luckily I never made a move. Now I've grown attached to him."
Han Qingyu and Wen Jifei: "..."
The bus was dead silent.
After a while, He Tangtang crossed his arms and began to snore.
On the bus, where the only sounds were the engine and the rattling windows, quite a few people fell asleep despite the bumpy ride. Han Qingyu quietly pondered the matter of Grave Robber for a while. He felt the injustice was one factor, and having nothing left to care about was another, but what ultimately led him into Pure Purgatory was probably the guidance and brainwashing by that "good person" he had spoken of.
So perhaps this outcome was for the best... He had already chosen to leave that path of senseless destruction against innocent people, and indeed, no one had the right to force him to fight for a world that had treated him so coldly.
As for Han Qingyu and the vast majority on this bus... they, to varying degrees, had reasons to fight. As for the question of why it had to be him out of all the people in the world... since he had already had the bad luck of being chosen, there was no point in asking.
Then he began to think about the problem of "urine theft."
The volume had to be large, so drink plenty of water.
Under certain circumstances, it might also need distance. No problem there, I'm still young.
It also had to be a continuous stream over a certain period of time.
And then, the source energy would be conducted over, through... Never mind.
Right at the moment Han Qingyu gave up and looked up, he caught Captain Milla hurriedly averting her gaze from the front row on the right.
That certainly wasn't affection.
The blame lay entirely on how scorching Han Qingyu's gaze had been when he dove into the water to loot the corpse... Milla naturally didn't think he was excited over salvaging a dead body. Therefore—good God, this guy was actually excited imagining the reservoir was her bathwater!
*Yes, he was peeking at me just now. In his eyes, I must still be wearing that bikini... Well, although it probably, really, did look very good.*
*So, was this the final hope of becoming the captain of a regional squad with a Grade A squad member?*
*What a dilemma.*
In the evening, when they set up field stoves to eat their marching rations.
Wen Jifei saw He Tangtang wandering aimlessly by the edge of the woods, so he said to Han Qingyu, "When we get back on the bus in a bit, let's make sure to check... He might not be around anymore."
Yet He Tangtang still boarded the bus. After a while, he pulled a snake he had pinched unconscious from his jacket and said, "We'll roast it when we arrive later. You guys want some?"
Han Qingyu reached out, took it, looked it over, and said, "This kind of snake doesn't taste good. Smells too earthy."
"Really?" He Tangtang examined the snake's head and asked.
Han Qingyu: "Yeah."
"Then forget it." Fearing the long creature might bounce off the window frame or hit someone, He Tangtang coiled the snake into a ball and hurled it out the window.
The bus drove through the night for over an hour before Zhang Dao'an finally stood up to speak.
"Since you all already know about the existence of Pure Purgatory," he said, "I'll say a few words... That organization merely relies on hatred and despair to reshape people. It isn't truly terrifying... What is truly terrifying is using so-called ideals and philosophy to convince people to choose destruction, like Snow Lotus."
"I once hunted down a woman from the Snow Lotus organization. She was a young, beautiful lady from a wealthy family who had never suffered misfortune. She looked as though she had more reason to appreciate and enjoy this world than anyone among us..."
"I asked her why. She said she felt that witnessing the annihilation of the dominant species with her own eyes was a very romantic thing. And if one day in the future, her skeleton were unearthed and put on display like a dinosaur fossil, that would also be very romantic."
"I hacked her down... Fuck romance."
A few people chuckled softly, while most remained silent. Hearing a rough, bald iron man standing over one meter ninety utter the word "romance" was enough to give anyone goosebumps.
"Three-dimensional apparatuses and dead iron straight swords—that is romance."
"Source energy slamming into the heart to bring you back from the brink of death, and the violent surge coursing through your limbs—that is romance."
"Nearly dying, yet hacking a Great Spike to death—that is romance."
Zhang Dao'an finished speaking.
"He's definitely reciting from a script, don't you think? Otherwise, why do you think he waited until it was pitch black to say it?" Wen Jifei whispered, yet in the silent bus, his voice still carried with startling clarity.
*Ah, I suddenly really want to see Instructor Zhang go crazy, pounce over, and bite to death... no, throttle the guys on either side of me.*
***
Eraser Ninth Army combat training base.
The next morning's first training class began with collecting the "source energy three-dimensional maneuver gear" before class. The recruits' three-dimensional apparatuses were managed under a unified system; checked out every morning, and returned after training.
Therefore, each regiment had an equipment manager... also referred to as an equipment officer.
This was the official post Wen Jifei had pulled strings to secure.
Every morning, register and distribute; every evening, collect and register again; then inspect the condition of the gear and submit maintenance requests for those needing repair.
For the rest of the time, he would attend a gear repair course and devote most of his hours to shooting practice.
"What are you looking at? You dumb grunt, do you want your gear or not?" Looking at Han Qingyu standing in front of him, Wen Jifei grinned smugly and said, "Didn't see this coming, did you?"
Han Qingyu took the apparatus and smiled as well.
"The gradual phase-in officially begins on October 15," Wen Jifei said. "To spare the recruits from having to readjust later, they're issuing the new ones straightaway..."
Hence, the Generation 9 source energy three-dimensional maneuver gear.
The Generation 9 apparatus looked far simpler and cleaner than the Generation 8 worn by Lao Jian and the others. Metal straps were linked together, two horizontal and two vertical, forming a grid shaped like the character "井" without the horizontal ends protruding.
When putting it on, one slipped one's head through the central opening. The four ends, front and back, all locked into four ports on the waist belt, and finally, fastening the connectors over the heart and shoulders completed the assembly.
Apart from having an extra horizontal bar across both the chest and back, and being somewhat thicker, it looked almost like the suspenders worn over clothing by wealthy young masters in period dramas.
The metal source energy war box was still a separate component. Looking at its dimensions, it appeared slightly smaller; based on its construction, it was meant to be clipped vertically onto the metal strap on the left side of the back—directly behind the heart.
Then the sword: still slung diagonally across the back, hilt extending past the right shoulder...
"No swords issued today." Wen Jifei pointed toward the cabinets on the other side, where a long row of dead iron black straight swords were racked in parallel, slanting diagonally.
"Once you receive your gear, don't mess with it! Wait until we get to the drill grounds and put it on under instruction!" he shouted toward the crowd.
"Doesn't that feel a bit pathetic?" Han Qingyu asked.
"Pfft, no way!" Wen Jifei gave a dismissive smirk, turned, and gestured across the enormous equipment hall. "Just you wait. Starting tomorrow—no, tonight—I will rule this place."
Aside from him, nearly every other regiment had female soldiers serving as equipment officers...
Chapter 48