Article 17 Chapter 1 Clause 4

  "Xiao Lie, then why did you join the army?" Liu Ye asked.

  "Me?" Xiao Lie thought for a moment before saying, "My older brother used to be a soldier, so I came to be one too." Xiao Lie replied perfunctorily, knowing that some things were inexplicable.

  As for Xiao Lie's reason, everyone couldn't help but feel a little disappointed. Since he said so, others didn't dare to ask anything else. The soldiers who had just learned the confidentiality order knew what to ask and what not to ask.

  "Comrades, you have been here for a month now. In this month, you not only learned how to face the climate here, but also learned what a soldier should do. As soldiers, learning martial arts is our responsibility. The saying goes, 'Literature has no first, martial arts have no second.' Today is the day of our new recruit camp's first big competition. Do you have confidence in getting the first place?" Zhao Zhuangjie asked loudly to the new recruits in front of him.

  "Yes!" the new recruits shouted.

  At the same time, new recruits from other squads were also being driven by their squad leaders until they shouted out loud.

  "As a soldier, as a man, without confidence and competitiveness, can you still be called a man? Can you still be called a soldier? We not only want to be the first, but also dare to be the first. Not just in the new recruit regiment, but also wherever we go afterwards, because we are men, we are soldiers. Is being number one what you want?" Zhao Zhuangjie asked again.

  "Yes!"

  Zhao Zhuangjie looked at his troops with satisfaction.

  The first competition for new recruits mainly includes two events: 5km full-armed cross-country and 400m obstacle race.

  In Wu Minghui's telescope, all the new recruits have been packed and are waiting in the waiting area. Along the way, some old soldiers are on duty. Except for the bad weather with snowflakes floating around, everything is fine.

  "Alright, let's get started." Wu Minghui said.

  When the starting gun rang, the new recruits who had been waiting on one side began to rush out. Some of the new recruits ran very fast and took the lead from the start. In the crowd, Wu Minghui found Xiao Lie, who was doing warm-up exercises at a steady pace.

  "Just now, Coach Chang deliberately made us wait for half an hour, it was to make our bodies tense and consume our patience. When we are impatient, then when we do intense exercise, we get tired easily. So, at the beginning, we can't be too anxious, when the blood in our body starts moving, we will speed up." Xiao Lie said to Liu Ye and Li Yifan.

  A normal adult can walk one kilometer in about twelve minutes, and five kilometers would take an hour. However, if running bare-handed, a person with good physical strength can cover five kilometers in around eighteen minutes at a steady pace.

  In the military, running five kilometers in full gear is not only to enhance endurance and physical strength but also to train soldiers to react well in emergency situations. Generally, new recruits do not run five kilometers in full gear during their initial training period; instead, they run three or five kilometers bare-handed. After completing basic training, they are required to carry personal equipment such as a rifle, water bottle (full), ammunition pouches, four tear gas grenades, two magazines, cup, toothpaste, toothbrush, towel, pen, notebook, chopsticks, and raincoat, weighing around fifteen kilograms.

  Individual performance is graded as follows: excellent if completed within 20 minutes, good if between 20-21 minutes, pass if between 21-22 minutes, and fail if over 22 minutes. Collective performance is graded as follows: excellent if completed within 21 minutes, good if between 21-22 minutes, pass if between 22-23 minutes, and fail if over 23 minutes.

  The new recruits felt what it was like to be fully armed for the first time, about two kilometers later, the team began to disperse a bit, having run on foot for a month, and suddenly coming fully armed, some of the new recruits couldn't take it at that time.

  "Keep your own pace, don't slow down or speed up. Follow me." Xiao Lie said while running.

  Before long, some of his new recruits slowed down, while Li Yifan had already fallen to the second echelon and seemed to be about to fall into the third echelon.

  "You two run, don't mind me." Li Yifan said when he saw Xiao Lie wanting to come back and find himself.

  "Fatty, did you know? This is what Lian Zhang has been doing to us. He knows we're not physically fit, but still makes us run. Tell me, are you worse than others?" Xiao Lie asked.

  "I won't, but everyone has their own strengths. If you don't hurry up, the first place will be taken by Yang Xian from Class 3. That kid is always competing with you, right? You can't let him get the first place, can you? Didn't you say your brother is also in the army? You can't possibly let your brother look down on you, can you?" Li Yifan suddenly mentioned Xiao Lie.

  "Besides, I'm really tired. Don't tell me you're too much, every time the protagonist inside must bring his own brother to exhaustion. It's not worth it now, if we were on the battlefield and I was injured, you could carry me, I wouldn't say anything, but there's no need for that now. You don't have to say anything either, just run your own way." Li Yifan said.

  At four kilometers from the front of the troops, Yang Xian was still leading alone, and at this time, Sanban Zhang became somewhat complacent.

  "Third shift refuel! Third shift refuel! Third shift is number one!"

  The voice was not loud, but it clearly reached the ears of every new recruit. The young recruits remembered that they had promised themselves to be the first in their class, but now they were really tired and wanted to run, but their feet could no longer keep up.

  "I am the first, I am the first." Xiao Lie said to himself. He knew that what made him different from others was not only that he always got first place, but also that he needed to be first, because with being first, he could stand out and achieve his hopes, and his hope was Xiao Yang.

  It is said that when a person's body receives a stimulus, it will trigger a potential, just like when a person is suddenly frightened, the body will involuntarily make movements that one cannot think of.

  Xiao Lie took out a relatively thick needle from the package, its silver-white tip gleaming with an unusual sharpness. He gritted his teeth and then fiercely jabbed it into his own buttocks.

  "Wooh!" Xiao Lie suddenly shouted and rushed forward in big strides like a stimulant-fed beast.

  "A stimulus that is received will produce a potential within the body, this is when he needs to pay attention the most. For someone who has not undergone training, that potential will disappear in just a few seconds, and at this time, one must hypnotize oneself. Generally speaking, the most painful and the most beautiful things can make that potential last.

  In Xiao Lie's mind, Xiao Yang's words echoed, a sorrowful mood slowly spreading throughout his brain, and that power once again entered his limbs. Suddenly, he felt that he was not so tired after all. In front of him, it seemed as if Xiao Yang was waiting for him."

  Xiao Lie shouted, and many people were startled, then the soldiers saw Xiao Lie quicken his pace.

  "This kid is ruthless." Wu Minghui watched his movements clearly through the telescope.

  Yang Xian saw Xiao Lie rush forward like a cow, his feet moving quickly, but soon discovered that his physical strength had been almost exhausted and he couldn't run at all.

  Four hundred meters...

  300 meters...

  Two hundred meters...

  As the finish line drew near, Yang Xian's anxiety grew, but he found that Xiao Lie had no intention of slowing down. Instead, upon seeing the finish line, he ran even faster, as if his lover was waiting for him up ahead. Meanwhile, Yang Xian felt like his lungs were going to burst out of his chest.

  After running to the finish line, Xiao Lie continued to run for a while before slowly stopping. Some new recruits who rushed to the finish line were led by their squad leaders to continue running for a bit before stopping.

  "What were you just doing?" Zhao Zhuangjie asked Xiao Lie with a serious face.

  Xiao Lie showed Zhao Zhuangjie the needle in his hand.

  "Do you use this method? Who taught you?"

  "No one taught me, I had a classmate who studied medicine, he said so." Xiao Lie didn't want to tell Zhao Zhuangjie that this method was taught by Xiao Yang.

  "Do you know that what you're doing is very threatening? It's good to stimulate your body's potential, but what if you can't catch your breath? Have you thought about the consequences?" Zhao Zhuangjie asked somewhat indignantly.

  "I've thought about it. Class President, every time is very important to me." Xiao Lie looked at Zhao Zhuangjie steadily.

  Zhao Zhuangjie originally wanted to say something, but seeing Xiao Lie's eyes, he couldn't say it, and then patted his shoulder and said: "Good job."

  At this time, Li Yifan and Liu Ye also crossed the finish line, and Xiao Lie hurried over.

  Yang Xian looked at Xiao Lie from afar, feeling very uncomfortable in his heart. From the first day he entered the new recruit battalion, he found himself unknowingly competing with a person named Xiao Lie. Since childhood, whether at home or in school, no matter what aspect, he was always the best, so it made him develop a kind of personality, thinking that there were some people born to be superior. But he didn't expect that in this new recruit camp, he would encounter someone as excellent as himself, and Xiao Lie's excellence wasn't just shown in military quality, but also more mature in thought. If Yang Xian was a natural-born superior person, then Xiao Lie was like an immovable mountain, yet swift as a rabbit when he moved.

  "There's always one thing I'm better at than you." Yang Xian said, looking at Xiao Lie's figure.

  After the loss in the 5-kilometer cross-country run in the morning, Yang Xian had some expectations for the 400-meter hurdles in the afternoon. Among the hundreds of new recruits, there were only a few who could be considered his opponents in this event, except for Xiao Lie. Since he was young, he had been practicing martial arts, so he was much better than ordinary people in terms of physical balance. It was clear that Xiao Lie had not received systematic training since childhood, but what he didn't know was that when Xiao Lie was young, he often followed Xiao Yang to climb mountains and rivers to dig bird eggs, and in the village, he was good at climbing trees. Although he was not used to the 400-meter hurdles at first, after eating a few losses, he was no longer so inexperienced, and as he became familiar with all aspects, his performance gradually improved.