Chapter 20
“If you say it like that, is there some big problem? From what I saw they just seemed like mediocre recruits — are they that awful? Or did one of them mess up with you?”
“It’s not like that.”
When I fired off questions one after another, Aquila stayed silent for a moment, then said something I hadn’t expected.
“There’s a recruit with gray hair.”
“Oh, I remember! What was his name again….”
“Gray.”
“Ah, that’s a very literal name.”
“Anyway, Gray — what about him?”
Aquila answered while Karon and I took turns speaking.
“His eyes are arrogant.”
“Huh?”
“Of course soldiers have shitty looks because the army is like that — you get rotten gazes, I get it. But his gaze is off-putting.”
“Like he’s going to pick a fight with you?”
“Are you crazy? He wouldn’t dare go at me.”
I looked at Aquila’s fierce eyes and his orange irises and nodded. Right — and he uses a fire aura, too; if he were sane someone wouldn’t be bold enough to pick a fight with him.
Aquila rolled his eyes to the right without saying anything.
‘Ah.’
I looked at Karon standing there and slowly nodded.
‘He must’ve thought Karon was an easy target.’
Karon always smiled and they’re only one class-year apart, so if someone was cocky they might imagine stepping on that seniority. But even a one-class difference still makes senior a senior; no matter how stupid someone looked, seniority is seniority. In the army, Gray’s attitude could easily be a problem.
“Alright. If I see that bastard’s arrogant look again I won’t leave it alone.”
“What are you going to do?”
Aquila said incredulously as he looked at me.
“My baby brother is always the baby! I told you I’d look after him. Of course it’d be best if nothing happened….”
Just as I said exactly that, Blair rushed out of the building and wildly gestured at us. I couldn’t be sure what his hand motions meant, but they made it clear something urgent had happened.
After a few months of army life we’d learned to read the signs, so we hurried to Blair.
Blair’s face was pale — already the kind of sickly color that made everything feel ominous.
When I heard what he said I cursed this world again that it wasn’t a romance-fantasy novel, because Blair announced:
“Emergency! April has ordered all the recruits to assemble under her!”
XX — whatever that meant, I knew something huge had happened. Just kill me now.
‘XX, please, send me to a romance-fantasy world. Even obsessive male leads are okay — just get me out of this world. I’ll change my tastes, I swear I’ll learn to like obsession….’
Walking behind Blaim into the building, I wondered what the hell the structure of this damn world even was. I mean, the name Sarubia, coral-colored hair, golden eyes — who wouldn’t call that a romance-fantasy-style name and appearance? The presence of the Arcon people and monsters made the setting feel like typical fantasy. And look at Aquila and Winter — their faces, abilities, bodies — they’re obviously male-lead material.
‘Then why did they apply a real-world military system to this world?!’
And not even a modern army — this was some retro, brutal, fear-and-violence-filled army straight out of the eighties.
‘XX, assemble?’
An assembly — that was, hands down, the worst part of this fucked-up military culture. It’s the starting point of every humiliation. The worst of it is:
‘Assemble — everyone from your seniors above you to your juniors below you.’
That wasn’t something that would end with the recruits who made a mistake; it was a declaration to strip people from the highest seniors down the chain. It would make the person involved want to desert.
‘What mistake could a recruit have made?’
Even April — an expert at driving people insane — had called an assembly, and I already wanted to desert. This damn army: whether senior or junior is at fault, there’s never a day when it won’t affect me, XX.
When we entered the space where the seniors were lined up, I instinctively took a step back at the atmosphere, but grudgingly stepped forward to join the line.
‘The air itself is different…!’
My breath caught in that icy air. Even if Winter laid down an ice aura it wouldn’t feel this cold!
‘Somebody please save me….’
I silently prayed as I stood in line between the seniors. Their faces all clearly showed they were wondering why they were even there.
‘Which recruit among the four messed up?’
The four recruits all looked tense, so it was hard to single out a culprit. But following the direction of April’s gaze (who had called the assembly) made the cause obvious instantly. April — keeping her pretty smile — had fixed her eyes on Gray, the recruit Aquila had said had an arrogant look.
XX — I really can read faces!
While I was frozen in that breathless air, April finally opened her mouth. She narrowed her spring-like pale green eyes and smiled that so-called “devilish smile.”
“Say again what you said earlier, recruit.”
“…No, ma’am.”
Gray answered in a somehow cocky tone. As soon as he spoke, every senior shivered and started to hedge their behavior around April to gauge her mood.
“Hey, what do you mean ‘no’? I told you to say it — do you want to die?”
“Did I order you to speak? Did I suddenly rename you ‘recruit’ without knowing?”
Leon spoke harshly to Gray, but April’s rebuke silenced him. Gray, refusing to lower his pride, kept his mouth shut — but he seemed to realize things were getting serious; his expression was darkening.
“Alright, recruit. Tell us again what you said earlier.”
‘…Was it Winter just now?’
Even though lots of people were gathered, the temperature dropping was palpable — it was uncanny.
“I- I’m sorry…! Please forgive me just once.”
Gray, who’d bravely kept his pride up until now, finally begged in a terrified voice. He couldn’t stand the situation any longer.
“Why. Say with your own mouth what you said.”
“Sorry…! I must have lost my mind.”
I had a pretty good idea. Gray must have seen April’s face and spoken to her insolently. XX.
‘If you judge people by appearance here you’ll get your ass handed to you.’
“Phew, well, we can’t help it. Until you say exactly what you said with your own mouth, your seniors will run laps around the training ground.”
April said that and slammed her hand onto the shoulder of her junior, Louise. Even calm Louise made a sour face toward Gray, and Gray had no choice but to speak in a choked voice.
“I, I… asked if April’s classmates were all weaker than April and thus all dead….”
A cold silence filled the room at once.
‘Is he insane?’
First, it was a problem that Gray, a mere recruit who had just enlisted, dared to ask April — the senior-most sergeant among the top-ranking sergeants — such a question.
‘Back when I joined, I wouldn’t have dared make eye contact with April; I can’t believe such an inconsiderate guy exists.’
Second, it was mocking April’s ability. Saying that April’s classmates were weaker than April and so were dead was an insult: if they were weaker than someone who looked like April, how weak were April’s peers?
Third….
‘They weren’t dead because they were weak.’
Most of us present had lost at least one comrade, and even if not, there were seniors or juniors who had died. Everyone carried the memory of dead comrades in their hearts and lived determined to survive and be discharged for their sake. Gray’s words were enough to stir feelings more than anger in every soldier there.
“This is insane….”
Plato, rare for him, ground out those words in a voice that carried anger.
‘Plato said all six of his classmates died.’
“…Does he have a screw loose?”
“I’ll see you later.”
Leon and Brave, both rough by nature, also spoke with anger.
“…We should probably start the training from scratch.”
Usually taciturn Louise also looked resolute this time.
“Phew, well. What wrongdoing could a recruit have? They haven’t adapted to the unit yet.”
No matter how angry the others were, April put on a shamelessly pitying face and said that. The more April spoke, the colder the room felt.
“This is all your fault for not helping them adapt properly to the unit….”
‘XX.’
It was getting ominous. Already ominous!
“There’s nothing to be done, kids. You can do it!”
I’ll say it again. April is a madwoman.
When April sees the mistakes of her juniors, I actually wish she would beat them up — but she never hits them. Instead that crazy woman torments people in every bizarre way imaginable.
“Come on, everyone, try harder! You can do it!”
And so we were scraping the ground under the moonlight on pebbles that shone. Yes. This was one of her favorite torture methods: “throw metal marbles onto pebbles and make them search for them.”
‘Why on earth did the gods give creativity to that madwoman?’
Her insane personality plus creativity meant she did all kinds of wildly creative cruel things. A junior cleverly spiteful to seniors, a senior creatively tormented juniors — which was better? Either way, I wanted to desert.
