Chapter Fifteen Bliss and Woe

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  Two months passed quickly, and Jiang City was already in summer. The weather had turned hot, making people feel like they were steaming in a pot, with sweat dripping all over their bodies. Zhang Peng sat under the big tree in front of the kitchen door, his task being to clean up the vegetables for lunch today. He listened to the intermittent gunfire from the shooting range and listlessly dealt with the pile of cucumbers and tomatoes in front of him, muttering to himself as if scolding someone.

  A month ago, the new recruits basically completed their physical strength enhancement training and started infantry basic training. However, they encountered a problem from the very beginning. The new recruits in the new recruit company only conducted hand grenade throwing training with mock grenades, but did not organize live grenade throwing exercises. The scouts had never thrown real hand grenades before, wasn't that a joke? So the regiment decided to make up for this lesson.

  The grenade was thrown on a small hill outside the camp, with sentries deployed around it. The company commander first demonstrated, twisting open the rear cover of the hand grenade, using his fingers to break through the waterproof paper, pulling out the fuse line, and putting the fuse ring on his right little finger, throwing it forward, using the momentum of the hand grenade to ignite the fuse, hearing a "bang" sound, that's it.

  After the demonstration was completed, they stayed in front to protect and guide. The instructor was about ten meters away, throwing hand grenades. Following the order of old soldiers first, new soldiers second, and lastly recruits, the ones who threw first did so smoothly. When it was the recruits' turn, even the older recruits had thrown without any issues. Only Zhang Peng and Sun Li were left when Sun Li rushed to take a hand grenade. Nowadays, romantic TV dramas teach elementary school kids about love, but back then war movies taught kids about heroism. Sun Li might have wanted to add some flair, twisting open the grenade cap, pulling out the fuse line, not putting it on his little finger, but instead biting it with his mouth. The hot sparks from the fuse fell onto Sun Li's face, and the burning temperature was so high that it burned Sun Li, who let out a "Ah yo!" and wanted to cover his face with his hands. The instructor saw this and shouted loudly: "Throw it quickly!"

  The instructor's shout really reminded Sun Li, who was still holding the "sizzling" and smoking hand grenade. Without thinking, he handed it back to the instructor. The instructor's reaction was not slow either, thinking: you give it to me, how do I deal with it? He threw it forward to the company commander. The company commander's skill was indeed impressive, thinking: you give it to me, I can't keep it! He shouted loudly: "Take cover!" and threw the hand grenade into a nearby foxhole that had been dug in advance. The effect of their daily training immediately became apparent, as the soldiers behind him fell to the ground, and Zhang Peng was also pressed down by Liu Dayong.

  A loud "Boom!" shook the air, sending dust flying everywhere. After a while, the smoke gradually cleared, and the entire battlefield fell silent.

  "Sun Li, if you hurt someone, I'll kill you!" The instructor grabbed the stunned Sun Li and gave him a loud slap in the face.

  The soldiers all stood up at this time, looking at each other to see if anyone was injured. Several squad leaders rushed towards the company commander and helped him up, carefully checking him over. The company commander's hat had been blown off by the air flow, and he had fallen into a muddy puddle, but he hadn't been hurt anywhere.

  After checking again and again, except for Sun Li's face being burned by a firework, no one else was injured.

  The aftermath of the incident was: Zhang Peng became the only soldier in the entire company who had never fired live ammunition, and as a result, the training team made up for the loss by prohibiting new recruits from participating in similar 'dangerous' training.

  In later training, Zhang Peng only learned one or two exercises in apparatus training apart from physical training. In combat training, he only mastered a set of capture fist, and wanted to find someone to practice with, but there was no door. The assassination training could only hold a wooden gun next to the team and follow the command "Defend left - stab", "Defend right - stab", "Defend down - stab", "Defend left - side strike", "Defend left - buttstock strike" ... Learned some movements, watching others wear protective gear, with wooden guns flying up and down in a stabbing motion, feeling uncomfortable in his heart.

  The demolition training was even more exaggerated, and no one was allowed to get close. The instructor's original words were 'afraid you will blow up the whole barracks'. Later, Liu Daxiong took pity on Zhang Peng and secretly gave him a finger-length fuse, letting him "have some fun", but not even a single sound was heard.

  Practicing shooting, others use handguns, submachine guns, semi-automatic rifles, and let him practice with a wooden gun for stabbing, not even a sight, what's the point of practicing! Zhang Peng was so angry that he almost smashed it, and only when maintaining firearms as usual, his comrades in the class allowed him to touch the 'real' gun.

  Zhang Peng became a free man in the class, after morning exercises, new recruits were eager to help old soldiers with their chores, sweeping and washing. As soon as the old soldiers changed their clothes, the new recruits immediately took them away to wash and dry, and when the old soldiers went to the toilet, the new recruits were eager to take over, except for training and official business, they didn't need to worry about anything else. During training, Zhang Peng had no choice but to chat with Wu Quan, Li Weiguo and a few other idle recruits under the shade of a tree, deepening their feelings. Liu Ban Zhang saw that he was idle and uncomfortable, so he assigned the task of teaching Batu Gerel to "speak" to Zhang Peng. After two months of patient instruction, Batu Gerel can now communicate with everyone in Shandong dialect, and it's also a good thing to do.

  The recruits who were practicing live firing could hear the sound, that day they had a 25-meter fixed target shooting training with handguns. Usually there are many sparrows on the shooting range, Zhang Peng specially brought a slingshot to shoot a few to improve their lives. As a result, not even a bird's feather was seen - the gunfire scared the birds away, so he went to have a meeting with several comrades and gave some comments to the new recruits.

  "He's really terrible at this, such a big target and he still can't hit it! I don't know how he was trained." Wu Quan expressed his opinion about a soldier from the third squad who had just gotten a 'zero' score.

  "You guys are so capable, go and try a full circle!" Unfortunately, it was overheard by the third squad leader, who said indignantly.

  "Give it a try then, hand over the gun." Zhang Peng said in succession.

  "You think holding a gun is something to brag about? Not having a gun is the real deal!" The squad leader didn't dare give him a gun, losing the battle but not losing face.

  "Then you spit a ten-ring saliva, let me see." Li Weiguo continued.

  "...The squad leader didn't know what to say anymore, he was no match for these students in a war of words."

  "I'll show you something without a gun!" Zhang Peng picked up a few stones, took advantage of the shift change, and pulled Sanban to the shooting range. He took out his slingshot and shot five stone bullets in no time. The target rods shook left and right five times, full ring!!! The recruits behind him shouted "Wow, wow..." and started cheering. Sanban was so embarrassed that he ran away, which made Lianzhang scold again, but it's unclear who he was scolding. Only the target staff in the ditch was puzzled and wondered: Didn't they say we're not shooting silent guns today?

  Because of this episode, Liu Dayong was afraid that Zhang Peng would cause trouble again, so he didn't let him participate in the rifle shooting practice today and instead sent him to help with cooking in the kitchen.

  Zhang Peng finally gathered up a pile of vegetables and carried them to the operating room, where he saw the head of the cooking class, Gao Changsuo, looking worried and unhappy as he stared at a pile of chicken, duck, fish, sea cucumber, and squid on the operating table. The quartermaster was staring at two turtles in a basin.

  "Head of the class, so many good things, let's have a feast?" Zhang Peng excitedly asked.

  "What the hell, tomorrow leaders are coming to our camp for inspection, we're specifically asked to wait, and the logistics department just sent over this pile of stuff." said Gao Changsuo.

  "Lao Gao, think of a way quickly, what to do now." The housekeeper said.

  "What's the method, chicken, duck, fish and meat are easy to say, but what about those messy ones?" Gao Ban Zhang pointed at the squid and the two turtles who responded with a bad attitude.

  "Hey monitor, are you going to steam or stir-fry this turtle?" Zhang Peng asked while teasing the turtle with chopsticks.

  "Zhang Peng, have you eaten this thing?" The quartermaster's eyes lit up.

  "It's quite delicious after having it several times."

  "Have you done it?" The steward asked without much hope.

  "It's easy, I've done it twice!" Zhang Peng was competing with Wang Ba, who was biting the chopstick head, without lifting his head.

  "Heavenly father, we've found our savior!" said Classmate Gao, his excited expression rivaling that of comrades finding their organization in the movies.