Chapter 8: The Burden of Badges (Part 1)

  "I really didn't expect this kid to progress so rapidly. I originally estimated that he could reach Song Wei's level in nine months, but I didn't think he would achieve it in just six months." Zhao Zilong shoveled a mouthful of rice and said to Yang Bo.

  Yang Bo held a piece of chicken in his right hand and nodded in response: "Song Wei's fighting skills are among the best in our school, plus his rich combat experience, there are really not many people who can defeat him. And according to Song Wei himself, he was completely defeated. I don't know if it's true or false?"

  "Song Wei lost due to physical strength and carelessness. Once Zhang Hang's attack unfolded, he was exhausted from responding, and by then it was too late for regrets." Zhao Zilong analyzed.

  "Zhang Hang is a piece of fine steel that's hard to come by in a hundred years. Let's add more fuel to the fire and forge him into an extraordinary divine sword, letting him conquer the world and spread our country's prestige!"

  "Heroes see things in the same way! I think from tomorrow, we can teach them parachuting, diving and driving." Yang Bo looked at Zhao Zilong with an inquiring gaze.

  "Alright, you may proceed." Zhao Zilong paused for a moment, then continued with a thoughtful tone: "I think it's time to award him the Dragon Badge now. I reckon the instructors' enthusiasm will be boosted afterwards."

  Yang Bo looked at Zhao Zilong in surprise and nodded in agreement with a hint of understanding.

  The Dragon-shaped badge is a symbol of an excellent special warfare expert identity.

  They are not only battle-hardened but also masters in their respective fields.

  Zhang Hang has dominated the shooting and fighting fields in just half a year, he has all the potential to become an excellent professional soldier: quick-witted, with a photographic memory, strong adaptability, explosive power, strong and stable personality, calm and decisive in handling matters.

  What he lacks now is constant hammering and actual combat experience, which will naturally be taught by others later.

  Sure, here is the translation:

  As expected by Zhao Zilong, the instructor behind saw the dragon-shaped badge on Zhang Hang's body and even his eyes turned red.

  "You're just a rookie trash in my eyes, and you think you deserve to wear this? Remember, for the sake of maintaining the dignity of the Dragon Badge, I'll give you special training until you quit on your own." The instructor with another Dragon Badge on his chest yelled at him with his fierce cow-like eyes.

  "Attention, all of you, dive down and stay underwater for two minutes. But you, garbage, you have to stay down for three minutes. No one is allowed to surface halfway through, or the whip in my hand will land on your head. I want to remind you that eight trainees were whipped into concussion by me before, and one was whipped into idiocy." The instructor yelled, his eyes fixed tightly on the water's surface.

  "Don't take my words lightly, you have only three options: give up, persist or drown." The instructor bellowed and swung his whip forcefully.

  With a "crack", one of the female team members had just surfaced when a whip as thick as a thumb came crashing down on her head, hitting its target with precision.

  The crew member who was hit let out a loud "Ah" of pain and sank into the water in a safe area.

  Ten seconds later, the crack of the whip striking the water's surface merged with the cries of agony into a single sound.

  Through the water surface, Zhang Hang not only saw the fierce instructors constantly wielding their whips, striking the exposed heads again and again, but also heard the instructors' triumphant cries after hitting their targets.

  Two minutes have passed and other teammates have landed on shore. Zhang Hang is still persisting with a tight chest and red face.

  I don't know how much time has passed, but Zhang Hang feels like his heart is being tightly grasped by a giant hand, getting tighter and tighter, with golden stars flashing before his eyes.

  The heart is like a lit explosive package, ready to explode at any moment. Consciousness is also becoming increasingly blurred.

  Time passed minute by minute, second by second. Finally, Zhang Hang's instinctive desire to survive made him go "ahh" and open his mouth to take a breath, with a large amount of pool water rushing into his oral cavity all the way to his lungs.

  Stimulated by this, Zhang Hang immediately woke up and shouted "Ah" as he hugged his head and rushed out of the water.

  Strange, why didn't the whip come down. Zhang Hang opened his hand to take a look, and his comrades were staring at him in surprise, while the thick leather whip as big as a thumb was still clenched in the instructor's hand without falling.

  "Trash, you're lucky to pass. ";He glanced at Zhang Hang and said: "But don't be too happy, next time your diving time will be extended to five minutes."

  "Why? I have the right to know why?"

  "This is my territory, and I'm in charge here. Also, here only instructors tell you what to do, there's no qualification for you to make requests to the instructor. What you need to do is obey, obey, and obey again. Got it?"

  "Understood, sir."

  Now Zhang Hang's most wanted thing to do is to return this damn dragon-shaped badge to Zhao Zilong!

  "Now you, run twenty laps around the playground immediately, and the rest of you, run ten laps. Do it now before I change my mind!" The instructor shouted, swinging his whip fiercely.

  "Yes, sir."

  The track is 800 meters per lap, and twenty laps are 16,000 meters.

  It's all Zhao Zilong's fault for awarding himself this dragon-shaped badge as a reward, which provoked the outbreak of his eccentric and violent nature.

  At first thought it was fun, plus his own vanity was at play, happily accepted the badge.

  Zhang Hang is now regretful to death, never thought this was a hot potato, but also a deadly thing.

  "On the battlefield, when you've completed a beautiful crossing, don't relax your vigilance because of that. You must always maintain a combat state. Because it's possible the enemy is waiting for you on the shore with ease, or it's also possible to rush into another urgent march at any time." The instructor was leisurely sitting in the military off-road vehicle, trimming his nails while imparting experience.

  "At that time, if you have the slightest relaxation and mistake, you will lose your life. Moreover, you will also drag your comrades into a desperate situation."

  The warriors who are running understand that these brutal instructors indeed have the capital to be proud of, they are all veterans of a hundred battles, and killing is just a trivial matter for these special warfare experts.

  What is being taught here today was bought with the blood and lives of our predecessors. The demands on them are strict, also in order to maximize their survival rate on the battlefield.

  "Hurry up, you trash." As soon as he finished speaking, he raised his whip and lashed it at Zhang Hang's body.

  At night, Zhang Hang walked into the dormitory with his head hung low and dejected. The two brothers, Situ Jian, took one look at his expression and knew he must not have succeeded. This lifelike, vivid dragon-shaped badge was definitely still in his hands.

  At that time, Zhao Zilong only said one sentence to Zhang Hang: If you are afraid of the training volume it brings to you, then you are a coward! I was wrong about you!

  Zhang Hang didn't say another word and turned around to leave.

  The next day, when the instructor wanted to use a whip on someone in the car, he found that the car couldn't start.

  Ten minutes later, he crawled out from under the car with a puzzled face and shouted into the earpiece: "Old Cao, come over quickly, my car won't move."

  "What's wrong that even you can't handle it? I really want to see what happens. But first, let me declare: a pack of cigarettes and a bottle of wine. Are you in or not?"

  "What else can you do besides taking advantage of the situation? Shut up, if you can't fix it within ten minutes, you owe me a pack of cigarettes and a bottle of wine."

  Eight minutes later, the car started normally. After losing cigarettes and wine, Instructor Tie asked with a gloomy face: "Old Cao, what did you tell this car was wrong with it? I couldn't lose without knowing why."

  Someone had tampered with it, but left no evidence behind, very clever. This technique seems to be from... He said this and turned his head to glance at Zhang Hang.

  "Hey coach, what are you looking at me for?!" Was it the driving instructor being overly cautious or had he been discovered? Despite feeling guilty to death, Zhang Hang still puffed out his chest and asked nonchalantly.

  What can you do to me without evidence?

  "Ah, so that's what this rubbish is capable of! Not bad, quite bold, and the result is pretty good." The instructor stared at Zhang Hang, speaking word by word.

  "First, you are our instructor and I respect you so much, how could you do such a thing? Second, even if you suspect me, shouldn't there be evidence? Can't you just convict me based on suspicion?"

  "What evidence?"

  "As the saying goes, 'catching an adulterer requires catching both parties', and 'apprehending a thief requires apprehending the stolen goods'. On a clear day with no evidence, you can't wrongfully accuse good people. Of course, relying on your instructor identity, you can force me to confess, but I won't be convinced in my heart. Although I will accept any punishment, I'm afraid that you won't be able to convince others, and it will damage your instructor's dignity and glorious image!" Zhang Hang's heart was a bit nervous, but his mouth didn't give an inch.

  "You think I don't have evidence? You're so sure about that? If you want to keep it a secret, just pretend you didn't do it. Now I'll go find the evidence for you."

  The instructor has returned to normal tone of speech, Zhang Hang felt a sense of unease.

  "Zhou Peng, were you on duty in the garage last night? Has anyone entered after the gate was closed? Did the key ever leave your sight?" The instructor took off his headset and turned up the volume to its maximum so that everyone could hear the conversation.

  Reportedly, there shouldn't be any.

  According to regulations, garage keys are kept by the security personnel for convenient use at any time.

  "What's there is there, what isn't isn't, what's this 'shouldn't be'?"

  "Last night before my shift, I, Zhang Hang and Chu Nian were drinking together. After that, I and Chu Nian felt a bit dizzy and took a nap for a while. Zhang Hang covered my shift for a short time." Zhou Peng replied honestly.

  After a battle with Chu Li, Zhang Hang easily became brothers with Chu Li, who loved wine as his life.

  As soon as Zhou Peng's voice fell, everyone's eyes turned to Zhang Hang, and his suspicion was rising.

  "Not bad, it was I who took his shift and said that I did a good deed. However, I didn't touch the key because I had no idea where the key was."

  Zhang Hang really didn't know where the key was, Zhang Hang at that time just whispered in Zhou Peng's ear: "Take the car, I need the key to open the door." Zhou Peng then took out the key himself.

  "Wow, they're really something else. They can even get things done while asleep." Zhang Hang took the keys and sighed: "It seems like they really have a system in place, able to train people to this extent. If they were given a pile of corpses, who knows, maybe they could even train a group of zombies."

  "Oh, is that so? In that case, I was wrong to blame you."

  Perhaps it's guilty conscience, but Zhang Hang couldn't help feeling a chill in his heart when he heard the instructor's words.

  However, to thoroughly clear your suspicion and prove that you are indeed a helpful and worthy comrade for us all to learn from, I think you won't mind if we take a look at the surveillance footage from last night's garage, right? The instructor said in an unusually warm and elegant tone.

  "Monitoring? You mean there's monitoring in the garage?" Zhang Hang asked hastily, cold sweat dripping from his forehead.

  The storm is coming. The day before yesterday was always calm, anyone can see that the instructor now looks like a barrel of explosives, and as long as there is a spark, it will explode.

  I really don't know if Zhang Hang can survive this big explosion.

  "Wang Jun, immediately check the surveillance video in the garage for me, what was the situation during the first hour of Zhou Peng's shift last night?"

  The report said that Zhang Hang took over the post, during which he entered the garage for 15 minutes and crawled under the car, wearing gloves as if doing some maintenance.

  "Got it, thank you!"

  The truth is out!