Chapter 92: Running Until Spitting Blood

Outside Luolong City, more than two thousand five hundred young and strong refugees were running wildly around the city walls, kicking up dust that filled the sky; the residents inside the city and the refugees outside were all watching this rare spectacle.

One lap around Luolong County is five kilometers, so ten laps is fifty kilometers; this is even further than a marathon race.

Meng Yifan's rules are very simple: the first people to finish ten laps are the winners, and they will be able to become soldiers.

Being able to eat three full meals a day, receiving ten taels of silver in pay every month, and being allowed to bring one's family to live in the city—for these starving and freezing refugees, this has an incomparable attraction.

Therefore, as soon as many refugees started running, they used every ounce of their strength, rushing forward with all their might, afraid of falling behind and having others obtain the qualification to become soldiers first.

Seeing this scene, Meng Yifan shook his head; he knew that in long-distance running, one must absolutely not sprint with full force at the beginning; one must master the rhythm of running, otherwise, one would exhaust their strength before long and be unable to run any further.

"Dad, keep it up, the child and I are counting on you."

"Dad, you are the best, keep going."

"Big brother, hurry up, you've already been passed by others, run faster."

In the originally desperate and deathly silent Refugee Camp, the scene was now filled with the sound of gongs and drums, the atmosphere was enthusiastic, and the refugees were shouting and cheering for their own family members.

The residents inside the city, whose daily lives were also quite dull, viewed this race outside the city as a sporting event, and they were shouting and cheering for the contestants they favored.

"Run, get moving, all of you! Hurry up, are you dawdling because you haven't eaten?" Meng Yifan roared.

"Master, I really haven't eaten. How about you reward me with a bite to eat? Once I have food in my belly, I'll immediately run faster than a rabbit," a thin young man with long legs and bright eyes said with a cheeky grin.

"Go to hell, keep running! If you can finish in the top one thousand, you'll be my soldier, and when the time comes, I'll let you eat your fill," Meng Yifan said with a laugh and a curse.

"Alright! Just you wait and see, Master, I'm definitely going to be a soldier." This young man was named Xu Le; he swung his long legs, each step covering the distance of one and a half of others', and he soon overtook several people in front of him.

These refugees were all quite strong, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to enter the Labor Camp, but the food provided in the Labor Camp was only enough for them to be half-full; if they had family in the Refugee Camp, they would also have to give some food to their relatives, which caused them to be even hungrier.

Yet, even in this state of hunger, not a single person dropped out during the first five laps, twenty-five kilometers; all two thousand five hundred-plus people finished them.

Meng Yifan checked the countdown on the Game Panel; for the ordinary young men running twenty-five kilometers, the slowest took forty minutes, and the fastest took only twenty minutes.

What surprised Meng Yifan was that among these refugee youths, there were also twenty-five First Grade Martial Artists; their speed was a large cut above ordinary people, and fifty kilometers was a piece of cake for them, which they finished quite easily.

"These young men have very good physical fitness, much stronger than the recruits on Earth; with a little training, they will all be good soldiers," Meng Yifan muttered.

People in the Great Martial Heavenly Dynasty World generally have much stronger physical fitness than people on Earth; many young people on Earth are sub-healthy, panting after sprinting two hundred meters, let alone a fifty-kilometer long-distance run—many young people couldn't even persist through five kilometers.

By the sixth lap, some people started to be unable to run, especially that group who had sprinted with all their might from the start; they could no longer lift their feet, and over a hundred people really couldn't run anymore, collapsing to the ground, mouths wide open, gasping violently.

Some people beat the ground in pain, sobbing uncontrollably, and their family members also ran over; the whole family was crying, the scene looking very miserable. They longed to obtain the qualification to become soldiers, but their bodies were severely overdrawn, and they truly could not persist any longer.

"Run! I cannot stop, I must persist; for my parents, for Xiuzhi, for my son, I must run into the top one thousand."

Zhang Shagen was an ordinary refugee with old parents above and young children below; he had learned some farm-style martial arts, and even if three or five strong men came at him together, they were no match for him, but he had no martial arts manuals and no cultivation resources, so he was not a Martial Artist, just an ordinary person.

Zhang Shagen had also sprinted with all his might at the beginning, but by the sixth lap, he felt a burning sensation in his chest, and his legs felt heavier and heavier; he knew he was nearing his limit, but he could not stop.

He was the pillar of his family, and his whole family relied on him to live; as long as he could become a soldier, the whole family could move into the city to live, and they would all be able to survive.

The Refugee Camp outside the city was becoming more and more dangerous; many children had been traded and eaten, and many had been stolen or snatched away.

After the children went missing, they could never be found again, leaving behind only some scattered white bones thrown everywhere.

Meng Yifan recruiting soldiers in the Labor Camp was a path to survival for Zhang Shagen, and he had to seize this opportunity.

"Run, keep running, even if I run myself to death, I cannot stop." Zhang Shagen was drenched in sweat, his gaze firm; regardless of the exhaustion in his body, he still gritted his teeth and persisted in running.

There were many other refugees similar to Zhang Shagen, and Meng Yifan also discovered that these people had long since reached their physical limits, yet they were still running; Meng Yifan nodded in appreciation—these people were the good soldier material he had in mind.

On the seventh lap, another two hundred-plus people collapsed, but Zhang Shagen was still persisting.

On the eighth lap, some people had leg cramps and collapsed directly to the ground, while others had exhausted their physical strength and truly couldn't hold on, also collapsing; another hundred-plus people fell.

Zhang Shagen already felt his vision blurring, seeing double; he had also reached his physical limit, but he still did not stop and continued to run.

Over three hundred people collapsed on the eighth lap.

On the ninth lap, even more people collapsed, as many as four hundred-plus; Zhang Shagen's consciousness was hazy, and he vaguely heard his son calling his name; he turned his head to look, and not far away, it seemed to be his son, shouting for his dad to keep going.

"Run! I cannot stop, I must keep running." Thinking of his adorable son and his elderly parents, Zhang Shagen seemed to have a new burst of strength, moving his already numb legs and continuing to run forward.

On the tenth lap, many people collapsed; halfway through, Zhang Shagen opened his mouth and spat out a mouthful of blood; he felt as if his lungs had been torn, and every breath he took was excruciatingly painful; he could no longer see what was in front of him, feeling the whole world shaking, but for the sake of his family, he was still running forward—no, his movements could no longer be called running, at most it was shuffling forward step by step.

Seeing him run until he spat blood and still persist, Zhang Shagen's family members were already streaming with tears.

"Shagen, forget it, if you really can't run anymore, then don't; if you run yourself to death, how will our whole family live?" Zhang Shagen's father shouted.

"That's right, Shagen, forget it, let's not run anymore," Zhang Shagen's mother also shouted.

Zhang Shagen's wife shouted: "Dear, don't run anymore."

Zhang Shagen's son cried uncontrollably, sobbing: "Dad, you're spitting blood, don't run anymore."

"No! I must run, I must keep running." Zhang Shagen bit the tip of his tongue, the sharp pain making his consciousness clearer; he looked ahead with a firm gaze and continued to run forward.