Chapter 199: Elite Soldiers (5)

The morning light pierced through the dense leaves, falling mottled on the lush green grass. The light and shadow swayed gently with the blowing wind. This courtyard, lush with grass and trees, didn't have the desolation that should be in autumn at all. Unfortunately, Su Ling didn't have the mood to appreciate the scenery at all. Just when his patience was almost exhausted, the courtyard door finally opened.

Su Ling greeted him and asked urgently: "How is it?"

The doctor wiped the thin sweat from his forehead and replied: "General Su, rest assured, Miss Qing's injuries are not very serious, as long as she rests more and doesn't tear the wounds again, she will be fine." Su Ling nodded, passed him, and was about to go in when the doctor suddenly said with some hesitation: "Miss Qing said to please ask you not to go in yet."

Why? Su Ling glared at him. The doctor shook his head and said: "This official doesn't know either, this official will go and decoct the medicine." After saying this, the doctor didn't wait for Su Ling to speak, saluted, and retreated hurriedly.

Su Ling glared at the tightly closed door, not understanding what Gu Yun was doing. He grabbed the door handle but didn't push the door open for a long time.

Fortunately, Gu Yun didn't make him wait too long. The door opened again. Standing inside was Gu Yun in black tight-fitting clothes with her long hair tied high. Against the backdrop of black clothes, her skin appeared even fairer, and her sharp eyes were full of sharpness. He admitted that this heroic look was very beautiful, but what on earth was she doing dressed like this?

"Where are you going?" Seeing her dressed like this, Su Ling already had a bad premonition in his heart. Sure enough, Gu Yun replied calmly: "To the drill ground."

Su Ling said almost through gritted teeth: "The competition ends here." He once again felt deeply that letting her train the soldiers was an extremely wrong decision. He could now be certain that in the days to come, all her time would definitely be spent on training soldiers.

"No." This time Gu Yun was incomparably insistent: "If we don't compete in the next level, this whole night of training will have been in vain!" He didn't think she let the soldiers run all night just to tease them, did he?

Su Ling took a deep breath and said patiently: "Tell Han Shu what you want to compete in, let him supervise it, and you can select the people you want just the same."

Gu Yun shook her head: "He can't."

"Why?"

Lifting a rather provocative smile, Gu Yun replied: "He doesn't know what kind of soldiers I really want."

Seeing Su Ling's brows furrowing tighter and tighter, Gu Yun smiled and asked: "You also think it's very inexplicable that I let them run all night, right?"

It was indeed very inexplicable. He had once asked her how she wanted to select soldiers, and she had always smiled and didn't answer, making him curious as well. Looking at it last night, except for the feather shooting being a bit interesting, the others really weren't anything special. What on earth did she want to do?

Walking out of the door and standing side-by-side with him, making a gesture of invitation, Gu Yun said in a good mood: "Let's go see together and you'll know."

Her rare playful look was indeed very cute. If it weren't for the request to go to the drill ground, he would be even happier.

Su Ling stared at her with a cold face. Gu Yun laughed low helplessly: "Don't worry, your old man is quite powerful, I feel better now than in the morning." She had never known the so-called internal energy was so powerful. She had always practiced martial arts mainly for practicality and attack, and she really hadn't come into contact with this kind of martial arts that focused on practicing Qi. She would find the white-bearded old man to study it another day.

In the sun, her complexion was still not very good, but the expression between her brows was indeed better than the past few days. Forcing her to rest now, she definitely wouldn't listen well, so it was better to follow her wishes and not let her be too tired. Su Ling sighed and finally compromised: "Fine, don't push yourself, rest immediately if you're uncomfortable."

Gu Yun smiled heartily and replied: "Worry about your soldiers." She really knew how to keep people in suspense. Su Ling shook his head amusingly. Forget it, let her be.

When the two returned to the drill ground again, the sun had completely come out. Under the bright sun, in the huge mud pit, a group of mud people were squeezed inside, but no one climbed up, each one standing there woodenly.

With her hands crossed over her chest, Gu Yun asked with a smile that wasn't quite a smile: "What is this for?"

Han Shu glanced at her and replied with a terrible tone: "According to your instructions, pass the mud pond!" Did she think they were doing what? After running all night, these people were almost numb from the tossing.

Heartbroken? The temper was so bad. Gu Yun's lips lifted slightly, saying: "All come out."

Hearing her voice, the soldiers who had been running to numbness all turned their heads to look at her in unison. The mud all over their faces made Gu Yun almost unable to tell who was who.

Gu Yun looked at them with a smile, but the people in the mud pond didn't have such good cultivation. Pairs of eyes like fierce tigers stared at Gu Yun, wishing they could climb up and bite her a few times. They had crawled in the mud pond all night, but she had slept refreshingly!

The power of resentment was indeed great. The soldiers who had almost been unable to climb up just now climbed up the mud pond quickly. The morning sun shone on them, and one could vaguely see faint white steam, which showed how cold the water in the mud pond was.

Gu Yun seemed to enjoy their eyes full of hatred, and smiled as usual: "Take off the sandbags, line up over there." Even if they stared their eyes blind, Gu Yun wouldn't be moved.

No matter how dissatisfied they were in their hearts, the soldiers could only obey. Although they could take off the sandbags, there was no sense of relief at all. Their clothes, hair, and bodies were all dripping with mud water. Their clothes were wet and then dry, dry and then wet, and their bodies were also cold and hot. The mud slurry and the fabric stuck to their bodies, sticky and cold, but they didn't even have the strength to lift their hands to wipe it off. Now supporting them was perhaps only willpower.

The crowd jogged to the other side of the drill ground and lined up. Gu Yun said straightforwardly: "One hundred people were eliminated last night. You can persist, which shows your physical strength is good. Now you can rest on the spot for a stick of incense time. There is one last test, I hope you can also pass it."

After being tortured all night, they had long expected that Gu Yun wouldn't let them off so easily, so when she said there was another test, the soldiers didn't feel surprised. They just wanted to rest now. Almost as soon as Gu Yun finished speaking, many soldiers sat on the ground, and some even lay flat, their hands and feet simply not feeling like their own.

Gu Yun smiled and didn't say anything, letting them sit or lie down.

"Yu Shijun."

Yu Shijun replied loudly: "Yes."

"Is the stuff ready?"

"Ready."

"Give it to them."

"Yes."

Before long, there was a hand crossbow by everyone's feet. Many people sat up straight with difficulty and began to study this weapon they had just received. More people were too tired to move, not even wanting to move.

Gu Yun watched the group of paralyzed soldiers silently, watching Yu Shijun direct everyone to move the targets to the middle of the drill ground one by one.

Su Ling asked curiously: "What is this for?"

Gu Yun smiled mysteriously: "You'll know in a moment."

There was a small table at intervals in the middle of the field. With the table as the center, eight targets were placed. Eighty targets were placed on the entire drill ground with ten tables.

When everything was ready, Gu Yun shouted loudly: "Line up."

Even though their whole body's bones were so tired they were about to fall apart, even though they wanted to sleep for a long time, as soldiers, there was absolutely no reason to disobey orders. Using a speed half slower than usual, this group of elites barely finished lining up. Gu Yun didn't blame them, and said coldly: "Put all the crossbows in your hands by your feet. Without my order, you are not allowed to touch them."

Most people's crossbows were already by their feet, and only a few soldiers holding them put them down. Gu Yun waited for them to stand up, and then continued: "The next test is to test your proficiency with the crossbow, your ability to distinguish directions, and your limb coordination. Every table you see now has ten crossbow arrows, with numbers one to ten on the arrow tails. When you shoot later, you must shoot in order. Eight targets surround each table, which are the eight directions: due east, due south, due west, due north, southeast, northeast, southwest, and northwest. Later, I will call out ten directions at random, and you must shoot arrows according to the directions I say. When I finish speaking, the arrows must also be shot."

"Do you understand?"

"Yes."

Regardless of whether they really understood, Gu Yun didn't intend to say it a second time: "Ten people in a group, who comes first?"

"Me."

Just as Gu Yun finished speaking, Ge Jingyun walked out first.

"Me." Luo Yan was the next.

"Me."

"Me."

Soon there were enough ten people. There was never a lack of brave warriors in the Su army, which she had always known. Her eyes swept over Leng Xiao and Liu Xing, but neither of them made a move. Leng Xiao was a cautious and scheming person, while Liu Xing was a boy with small cleverness. She guessed Leng Xiao would come out in the second group, while Liu Xing would wait until the last group to participate in the competition.

The ten people picked up the crossbows by their feet and jogged to the table with the short arrows. Gu Yun squinted and looked at the rising sun, saying: "All face due east." The ten people turned toward the direction of the rising sun immediately.

"Prepare." At Gu Yun's order, the ten people picked up the first short arrow and loaded it onto the crossbow at the same time.

"Due west." As soon as the words fell, ten short arrows shot straight toward the due west direction. No one shot wrong this time.

"Northwest." Gu Yun said the second direction almost consecutively. This time the arrows shot out were no longer so unified, some fast and some slow, and the directions also began to deviate.

"Due south, southeast, northeast, southwest, due west, due south, northwest, northeast."

Gu Yun shouted very fast, and the pause time was only enough to load the crossbow arrows. If the direction was shot wrong, before there was time to react, the next direction had already come out. Su Ling seemed to understand a bit of the intention of Gu Yun letting them run all night. This moment was their most exhausted moment. At such a time, being able to distinguish directions in a very short time not only required strong willpower, but the brain also had to be absolutely flexible. And what was even more hateful was that she chose a crossbow instead of an arrow as the competition tool. The strength required to load the short arrows onto the crossbow was much more than that of an arrow into a bow!

(End of Chapter) ===== CHAPTER 200 =====