Chapter 19.2 – Slaughter
A few muscles on the captain’s face swelled, and his originally fierce-looking face became even more sinister looking. He fiercely kicked each of the two individuals on the ground three times before revealing his snow white teeth, smiling towards the two cadets that were still standing.
The strikes and kicks sounded like thunder next to the two cadets’ ears. They, who only suffered a few times truly couldn’t imagine what receiving three kicks after being beaten by the rod felt like. With each kick Curtis released, they couldn’t help but shudder, as if the kick had landed on their own bodies. When Curtis finished beating them up, not even a minute had passed. In that short period of time, the two cadets’ cold sweat had completely soaked through their combat clothes that were made from rather good materials.
The captain’s metal like forehead seemed to seep out bits of sweat, as if kicking a few times was also rather tiring. The rubber rod in his hands pointed at the two cadets, scaring them so much that they immediately inadvertently dodged to the side. Shortly after, they knew doing this was disrespectful, and they immediately returned to their original spots with pale faces.
“Carry this fellow away. Also, don’t forget that there is a corpse over there as well. Bring it with you.” The captain instructed.
“Should the corpse be tossed to feed the dogs?” A cadet that seemed a bit smarter asked, because this was how Cook’s corpse was dealt with.
“Shit! Don’t you know how to honor the dead? Give the corpse back to his family.” The captain said.
How could the two cadets dare to doubt the captain’s completely opposite behavior? They dejectedly carried the individual and the corpse back, as well as swept the ground and wiped away the blood with extremely efficient movements. After all, they were all individuals with strength, agility, and defense strengthened, and they were candidates for becoming dragonriders as well. As long as they were serious enough, they wouldn’t be any slower than a janitor at doing this dirty work. As long as the captain was here, there was no need to doubt the cadet’s attitude towards the order.
Ten minutes later, Su carried his body that was practically in pieces back to his own barracks and lied down on the bed. He was struck five times at once, and then another four times after. The amount of suffering he endured was almost equivalent to the six strikes he suffered continuously. The excessive pain seemed to make every single nerve in his body become like scorching steel wires that burned within his body and roasted his flesh, bringing about even more pain.
Su’s movements were stiff and slow. In fact, he had already calculated that he had lost control of 81% of his flesh. Being able to crawl onto his bed was already quite difficult. His body’s current circumstances were so terrible that moving any further was no longer just a matter of endurance.
The Magnum was quietly placed by his leg, and the muzzle seemed to continue to release the faint smell of smoke.
The instant the captain’s searchlight appeared, Su hesitated and ultimately decided not to pull the trigger. If he killed the cadet in front of him, then that would have been an undisguised provocation towards the captain. This kind of stuff could be done behind his back, but it couldn’t be brought above the table. If he did something like that, there would be no way to get out of the situation.
Su silently returned control to his body, bringing strand after strand of muscle back under his control. He thought about what had just happened, and in that short period of time, it truly was an intense battle. Inside his mind, those three cadet’s faces already had a glaring red X running through their faces.
All provocation would be returned with blood and cruelty.
This was the number one creed of the Black Dragonriders that revered power, and also the principle that Persephone has stressed again and again before they reached the great coastal city. Only fear would keep trouble far away, and slaughter was an excellent way of instilling fear.
Time passed by bit by bit, and Su’s control over his body was nearly perfect. As expected, being beaten up gave Su another evolutionary point, only, he wasn’t really willing to strengthen himself through this type of method.
His stomach began to burn like a fire; he was hungry again. He sat up, his green eye extremely similar to the eyes of arctic lone wolves.
Right at that moment, the barracks’ metal door was kicked open by someone. No light seeped in from the darkness outside, and the door of the room was practically filled up by the captain’s square shaped body.
“Boy! Your rations are nearing that of a pig’s!” The captain tossed three containers of nutrient-filled food to Su.
Within another barracks, Mad Dog was lying on the military bed, his mouth chewing on a piece of grass as he silently stared at the ceiling. At the end of his line of sight was a black and white photo. There was only a bit of deep green color that greatly resembled that of a wolf scavenging for food.
The bustling night quickly passed, and the training came to an end. From here on out was Curtis’ last and most miserable segment of the training camp: combat.
The winds were great.
This was Su’s first feeling, and it continued from beginning to end.
So this is what it feels like inside of the radiation-filled clouds.
This was Su’s second feeling.
Through a small side window, Su calmly watched the thick and murky clouds quickly move past. From time to time, he could also see magnificent lights flashing through the clouds.
Su sat in the central cabin. From time to time, the plane shook extremely fiercely, rapidly rising or plummeting over a hundred meters, yet he still stood steadily. Su did not connect the safety belt, and none of the others in the plane had their safety belts on, yet no one left their seats regardless of how much this plane resembled a small boat passing through a tempest.
Not including the captain and the pilot, there were 15 people remaining. From the thirty three people that this training camp started with, only this number remained. From those that were eliminated, a few died, most were crippled, and the others went insane. None of the individuals that persisted until now were willing to back out. Among the 15 individuals still here, 4 were female.
All of the cadets were sitting back to back, silently observing the world outside the side window. Only a few individuals here had rode in a plane, and for a wilderness survivor like Su, he had never even seen a usable plane before. He had however seen quite a few plane remains.
This was an incredibly ragged plane. As it arduously made its way through the clouds, it struggled against countless unforeseeable streams of air and occasionally encountered streaks of lightning. The inside of the plane’s cabin was full of rust, and almost every item was rocking about and groaning as if they would fly off the cabin walls at any moment. The cadets’ luggage and equipment were all properly packaged and bound with nylon ropes in the rear cabin. Su only had two guns and a few dozen rounds of bullets, while the cadets with more equipment brought an entire three bags of items.
Su began to doubt whether this plane could hold on for much longer. If someone told him that this plane would fall apart in under a minute, Su wouldn’t find that strange. The only thing he was a bit confused on was how this thing was able to hold on for so long.
The captain made his way out from the piloting cabin. After scanning the cadets with his eyes, he moved towards the cabin door and then directly opened it!
Bone-chilling winds immediately screamed over, throwing the cadets that could not prepare themselves at all into a complete mess. A few individuals were able to grab onto the handle straps that were hanging from the ceiling and as as such weren’t blow down. Su grabbed onto the cabin’s ceiling, and his body floated up with the wind, directly sticking to the roof.
The captain leaned against the side of the door with half of his body outside of the plane. He took a look outside the plane cabin, and from who knows where, he retrieved a metal piece. He then forcefully brought it down on the wall outside the cabin. In that instant, the ear-splitting grinding sound seemed to even suppress the roaring sound of the airplane’s engine!
After only a few seconds, the metal piece in the captain’s hands began to glow bright red. He then fetched out a wrinkled cigar and raised the metal piece to its end, actually igniting it like so!
The captain took a deep drag of the cigarette smoke and then slowly breathed it out. He seemed extremely carefree.
Suddenly, the direction of the wind outside the cabin changed, changing from a wind that was blowing inwardly to one that sucked air out. A cadet didn’t prepare adequately enough and was sucked into the air, flying straight towards the cabin door! He was immediately so frightened that his face distorted, and a loud scream was released!
If one didn’t die after falling from this thousand meter height, then that was truly a miracle. After all, no matter how much you strengthened the flesh, it was still just flesh.
The captain released a curse and raised his iron pillar like leg, trampling that cadet onto the cabin floor. When they all saw the cadet’s body suddenly go rigid, many of them revealed disturbed expressions. It was quite clear that even though this stomp saved his life, the feeling should be similar to being struck by the rod.
Inside the cabin, an old-fashioned electrical bell alarm went off, releasing a sound that was no different from static to the entire cabin, once again suppressing the noise of the engine.
When this noise sounded, the cadets knew that this was the signal that they had arrived at their destination. A few individuals that were more nervous rushed towards their equipment to prepare themselves. However, none of them expected that the plane would abruptly drop downwards without a single sign. In the blink of an eye, they pierced through the clouds and directly rushed towards a mountain peak that was covered in thick white snow!
When one of the female cadets saw this scene through the window, she finally couldn’t help but scream!
