Chapter 433 - 352: What Kind of Trashy Training Is This?

Chongqing.

As evening fell, the red light from the massage parlor beneath Wild Trench spilled into the stairwell, sharply contrasting with the "First Class Meritorious Service" plaque forcibly hung on the rusty iron door plastered with locksmith’s numbers.

The old man had made a special trip back a couple of days ago just to hang this plaque, and indeed, he managed to get it up there.

He must have bragged about it quite a bit to the neighbors.

But Fang Huai had never dreamed that he would face the same embarrassment as Ye Jiahong.

"Hey, old man, where did you hide the house key under the doormat?"

"You’re home? Why didn’t you tell me and your mom?"

"...I’m in Chongqing for training! I’m staying just one night, cut the crap and hurry up, I need to pee."

Fang Huai paced impatiently.

For some reason, the urge to pee struck him the moment he thought of home, as if by some physiological habit, held in all the way from the airport.

"...Your mother and I are out, why would we leave a key? There’s a locksmith’s number on the door, call one."

Fang Huai: ...

"Farewell, I can feel that you and mom have stopped considering me, stopped loving me, goodbye."

Fang Huai hung up and dashed outside, looking for the nearest restaurant to relieve himself.

In the end, he didn’t manage to set foot in the long-anticipated home and settled for a hotel to spend the night.

It’s just as well he didn’t go back. The domestic troubles of a past life were gradually fading from memory, but having seen too much, the longing to see his parents sprung anew.

What’s the point, no time for that.

...

The following day, July 1st.

Early in the morning.

A certain fire brigade.

The walls were old, the iron gates were locked, the original squadron had moved, and the signs were gone. A new sign, "Military Area, No Trespassing" had been erected, next to the "Southwest Area Fire Training Center."

Any firefighter would die laughing.

Oh my god, the Chongqing Fire Training Center, a regular Regiment-level Unit, equipped with a teaching building, sports field, training tower, simulation training field, guest house, and more, designed to meet the training requirements for more than 500 people at once.

The entire Southwest region’s training center, however, was just a pissant little yard, a discarded fire station, two old buildings linked at a corner, with even the new-looking steel structure training tower cornered within a yard wall, seemingly too big to fit, as if forcefully crammed in there.

On the second floor, a dark-skinned non-commissioned officer from the fourth period was watching Zhao Benshan on the computer, cracking sunflower seeds and cackling like a halfwit, without any of the gravitas of an old soldier.

"Hey! Anybody there?"

A stern shout came from the entrance.

The computer volume was too high, the non-commissioned officer barely heard a noise, shifted his body, turned on the surveillance computer next to him, took a glance, and, seeing Captain Hu and four or five military officers and non-commissioned officers at the door carrying bags big and small, he immediately lit up with joy and stood up shouting.

"They’re here!"

Downstairs, he went to open the door.

The black officer, all smiles, took the camouflage bag from Captain Hu’s hand: "Boss, did you bring it?"

"Brought it, it’s in the bag, find it yourself," said Captain Hu, stretching and yawning:

"Ah... back here again, finished Period One and got a vacation, but minus the travel time, only got about a week, hardly enough for a good sleep! Leading a Period One training is too exhausting, why not let them take a break this period and call it!"

Someone behind him laughed.

"Well, that’s good, I don’t want to lead them anyway, there’s always some freak in every batch, couldn’t handle them."

"Can’t handle it, let our Li Kui, the squad leader, take care of it!"

At this moment, the Black officer roared, "Damn it! Why did I end up with an orange?"

Captain Hu pointed at the group of people behind and said, "There’s some mixed vegetables too. The food at the service area on the road was too expensive. The duck I brought for you was eaten by these guys."

The Black officer was furious, "Damn it! Who ate it? Spit it out for me!"

One of them laughed and said, "Class Leader Kui, it’s just some duck you lost. Look how worked up you are—I’ll buy you some later."

After hearing this, the Black officer looked at Captain Hu with a speechless expression and said, "With such a large training class and so much training funds every year! Captain Hu, you won’t even reimburse for a meal and you let them eat my duck?!"

"That’s not meant for everyone to eat!" Captain Hu turned around, "Alright, alright, let’s go upstairs for a brief meeting."

The Black officer peeled an orange and started eating it, muttering:

"Chen Qingzhao and Zhang Nian didn’t come, the deputy captain isn’t here either, what’s the meeting for?"

Captain Hu waved his hand, "It takes time for them to come from the team. They might not arrive today; we can’t wait any longer."

...

Second floor, office.

Flip, flip, flip.

The sound of flipping through pages.

Each page was a resume.

Someone exclaimed, "Damn... This one, got second place at the National Grand Martial Arts Competition, crap, another freak."

Captain Hu leaned over to take a look and then shook his head.

"The first competition... that year many didn’t participate, and our preparations were not complete. There was no iron man event, only some traditional military events. Not enough items. I think they even brought over the four hundred meter obstacle to test, and many hadn’t even practiced it. Second place doesn’t count for much."

"Tsk, that’s even more impressive then. Back then, there were a lot of pure physical events, right? Do we need to add some extra weight for this guy?"

Captain Hu pondered, "Hmm... we’ll see. We are training all-around talents here. There are plenty of strong ones who make it into this training class, but I’m worried about those who can’t meet the physical requirements and were blindly sent here. We can only send them back.

If someone can handle extra weight, that’s great. Of course, intelligence is also a key factor."

"Right, I think Zhou Huai made a lot of progress in the last batch. When he first joined the class..."

As one of them was speaking, he was interrupted again.

"Damn, a soldier? Captain Hu, don’t we not take conscripts here?"

"Heh, Fang Huai, right?" Captain Hu said with a smile, "You’ve met him, from Beichuan, the deputy leader of the assault team!"

"Him? He’s a soldier? Damn, he is fierce, took first place in the Guizhou Corps Martial Arts Competition."

"Heh, Guizhou Corps? They have two competitions each year. High chance of inflation there. He Zhijun from the first period was also first and the third at the national level, just forcefully climbing up."

Hearing the relaxed laughter of the team, Captain Hu shook his head, "Don’t underestimate him. Kui Qing, keep an eye on this one."

The Black officer, popping another tiny orange into his mouth, said, "That guy, someone called our office a few days ago to express concern about his recent foot injury... I couldn’t tell if they were hinting at us to go easy on him. Good thing it wasn’t Chen Qingzhao who answered, or he would have surely cursed."

Saying this, he seemed to mimic someone as he theatrically gestured to thin air and spoke in a gossipy high-pitched voice, "Why bother coming here if his foot is injured? The most important thing here is walking! It’s not about experiencing life! Person with connections, person with connections! Good troops are brought down by people with connections!"

"Hahaha..."

Everyone was laughing uncontrollably.

"Damn, has Chen Qingzhao ever talked like that? He hardly ever speaks, alright!"

Kui Li chuckled and began peeling another orange, "I spoke his mind! You watch, if he hears about this, he’s bound to have no pleasant face!"

Captain Hu stroked his chin and pondered for a moment before saying,

"Injured foot? How did that happen?"

Kui Li shook his head, "Didn’t say, just a call from the Chongqing Team. We’re using their turf, so we ought to agree politely, right?"

Captain Hu frowned.

Someone from the Guizhou Brigade, and a call from the Chongqing Team, there must be some connections back home.

Who knows if the Fang Huai he "saw" was the Fang Huai someone had "portrayed".

"Let’s just wait and see. You keep an eye on him."

Kui Li spoke bluntly, "How do I keep an eye on him? Pamper him to a sauna? His foot’s injured, should I get him foot-soaking water when he arrives?"

Everyone laughed again.

Captain Hu gave him a stern look, "Show him some authority!"

While everyone was having a good time, the sound of the iron gate shaking came from the entrance.

"Anyone there?"

Kui Li walked to the surveillance computer again and took a look.

He leaned in closer and took another look.

He laughed, "Captain Hu, speak of the devil, and the devil shall appear."

...

Fang Huai stood at the entrance, somewhat bewildered.

What the hell kind of place is this?

A place that looked even shabbier than his own home. It was one thing for the exterior to be rundown, but next to the gate pillar, the inscription of ’Nanchuan XX Street Fire Brigade’ wasn’t even scraped clean. It was barely visible. If not for the ’Southwest Area Training Center’ sign next to it, one might really think they’d been demoted to some suburban brigade.

He was supposed to report this afternoon.

After waking up and making a nauseating call to Yang Shaoqing, Fang Huai felt truly bored, so he pulled out his new laptop and checked all the training fields nearby, the terrain, the jurisdiction brigades, and so on.

After all, this training sounded quite mysterious, better to be prepared.

But when it came to firefighting, there wasn’t much information on the Internet these days. One reason was that information technology wasn’t advanced enough on the Internet, and also because it was the troops, most information would be on the intranet.

Searching here and there, feeling that not much of it was useful, he decided to report early.

It was dull staying at the hotel, better to go early and get to know the place.

But now, seeing this dilapidated training location, Fang Huai had some regrets.

This damn iron gate is rusty, shake it a couple times and it leaves a red mark on the hand!

If he knew beforehand, he might as well have rested more in the hotel!

"Anyone there?"

Fang Huai shook the gate again.

"Coming!" A muscular, black man came over with an impatient expression and opened the door.

This time, the door wasn’t locked; he simply left it wide open.

"Report at five o’clock, why are you here so early?"

Fang Huai stood at attention and saluted, "Squad leader, good! I’m Fang Huai from the Guizhou Brigade! I happened to be near here on official duties, so I came to report after finishing!"

He couldn’t mention the vacation since it was against regulations; as a conscript, he normally wouldn’t have any leave.

But Fang Huai’s carefully worded phrase didn’t elicit a smile from the black officer.

"You, a soldier, on official duties? What kind of duties?"

Fang Huai was watertight, "Report! It’s about the refurbishment of my squadron, I can’t disclose more!"

Having heard that, the black officer didn’t ask further, just turned around and walked inside.

"Come in, follow me."

The black officer led Fang Huai to a room on the first floor with a crudely handwritten sign on it.

Squad One.

Inside, it was like a makeshift hut, cramped space, with six bunk beds, one on top of the other.

Fang Huai was bewildered once more.

Oh my god, I want to go back to the hotel.

But the black officer said sternly, "Now that you’ve reported, stay here, don’t go anywhere. Put your bag on the floor, find a place to keep it; there will be bento boxes coming in at noon, I’ll call you."

"...Squad leader, what if I need to use the toilet?"

"Next door."

Fang Huai said helplessly, "Can I get some training done? I haven’t trained in several days; I feel like warming up. I see there’s a horizontal bar over there."

The black officer became impatient again, "You talk too much. Just stay put if I tell you to stay put."

With that, he walked away.

Fang Huai watched his retreating back and his face involuntarily twitched; the hand he’d just pocketed came out again.

Is this training? Bro, you lock me up in a temporary unit like I’m in jail; is that cool?

I even bought a pack of good cigarettes, planning to chat while offering smokes!

The surroundings...

There are no surroundings, just iron beds. Upon entering, he noticed a table in the corner of the wall.

The training tower was almost within sight, showing no signs of use, not even a rope dangling from it.

The room itself reeked of age, and when he touched the bed frame, ash fell off.

There was even a dead mouse under the crappy table in the corner!

Fang was numb.

The sunlight wasn’t strong that day, and the overhang from the second floor cast a shadow inside, making the room a bit dark.

Turn on the light, turn on the light.

"Click."

"Click."

"Click."

No light.

"Oh my god... No electricity?!"

Fang Huai felt his complaints building up, really wanting to curse out loud.

What kind of rubbish training is this?

Where is the promised high-end experience?!