From the carriage, a youth jumped down. He looked at the house number before he knocked on the door.
The Jura couple and Dudian were having breakfast together. They saw the carriage from the window and suddenly understood the reason a guest had arrived. Jura immediately opened the door and warmly invited, "come in."
The soft-haired youth took notice that Jura seemed to know the purpose of his visit. Instead of entering, however, he showed the identity card which was a medal that had a double-crossed sword, representing the "Guard" identity. He did not enter the room, but replied: "No. I'm sorry but my schedule is tight. I must take your child here to the commercial district for military training. You must have received the notice prior so please make it fast as I'm in a hurry."
Jura did not think that he was so anxious and busy, "Dear officer, how long would the child be away for military training?
"The training period takes up three years" he said. "During the three years, he will be able to come back to home only on holidays. However, I suggest that he should avoid doing so and study if he wants to complete his studies in three-year period."
Jura's face changed, "So difficult? What if he can't complete it?"
"You can be rest assured. Even in case that if he is eliminated he will be referred to minor position." The youth responded in an indifferent tone.
Gray overheard their conversation and his heart felt relieved. He turned around and saw Dudian over there slowly dining. He could not help but croak, "Are you going to prepare?! Do not let the officer wait for you for so long. Come on!"
Dudian sighed. He hated immensely to be interrupted while dining. Staring straight into Gray's eyes, he could only lay down his rolls, pat his hands, and return to his room. He already folded two sets of changing clothes and received the linen backpacks. Of course, the most important item was his uniform which he received beforehand.
Dudian carried his backpack to the door. He looked up at the youth and said: "Let's go."
Jura worriedly asked, "Have you taken everything? The clothes, the shoes... "
"Everything is in the backpack." Dudian waved and responded by saying "do not worry."
"Be careful when you go there. Do not fight with other children." Jura added.
Dudian's heart warmed. Previously, the last time when they tried to marry him into Avril house, it made his feelings grew cold towards them. However, seeing Jura seemed to be so sincere and caring for him as if for her own son changed these previous cold feelings he had for them. After all, he was adopted. He was grateful for everything that they did for him.
"I will." He answered back. "You have to take good care of yourself too, 'Black Death Season' is coming up and the temperature will go sky-rocket. Ventilate the house a lot or you will catch diseases!"
Jura was a perceptive as well as a sentimental person. She did not know how long would it take to see Dudian again. Tears flowed down her eyes. "Let's go." The youth turned towards the carriage. He helped Dudian to put his backpack onto the carriage.
Dudian climbed unto the carriage, and looked at Jura and Gray. He waved his hand, for there was a hint of dismay in his heart. Soon, this strand of feeling was suppressed into the far bottom corner of his heart. His palm gripped the backpack, and cold looking eyes he 'stared' towards the future. His soft heart became cold and strong.
...
...
The carriage sped into the business district. It drove along dozens of streets before gradually entering a small secluded street. The carriage continued to move forward before it came to full halt in front of a huge wall. The huge iron gate was swung open and carriage went inside after that. There was a monstrous sword carving on each sides of the door. On top of the swords there were two words that were engraved.
"Loyalty" and "Guardian"!
"Get off!" The youth ordered Dudian.
Dudian disembarked from of the carriage, silently observing the surrounding environment.
"Come with me." The youth glanced at him, before he released the reins of the horses, not afraid if the horse-drawn carriage ran away on its own. They walked towards a small door.
After passing through, a huge school field appeared in front of their vision. There was a school building around the field. They passed the field and proceeded into a remote building. As they were passing through the hall they heard a low cry.
The youth, accompanying Dudian, frowned. He opened the wooden door. There were seven or eight children around the same age as Dudian. Now one of the little girls was holding her knees, crying as she squatted on the floor. Next to her stood a few boys with embarrassed facial expressions and did not know what to do.
The youth asked with a cold tone: "What happened here?"
One of the boys was shocked to see the youth, "Mi,Mi, Minnie said she is homesick."
The youth frowned, "is she?" He came up to the little girl in front, and ordered: "I'm going to give you two seconds. Stop crying and stand up!"
The little girl heard his cold words, timidly stood up as if she feared him. She was trembling and tears were still flowing down her face.
Chapter 14: Orientation
"Although I am not your instructor, but I loath to see someone crying in front of me." The youth spoke in a cold tone: "Return to your room in the dorms. You can enjoy crying with no effort."
The children turned pale, afraid to say anything more. Minnie clenched her fists and clutched tightly at her clothes. She bowed her head low to fight back her tears.
The youth took another glance at the children. He was too lazy to rebuke anything. He walked right up to the counter, opened a drawer and grabbed a string of keys from inside the drawer. "Come with me", as he said and left the hall.
Dudian immediately went after him to keep up with the youth. The other children picked up their backpacks from the ground and walked following behind after the youth and Dudian.
Along the trail through the woods, the crowd arrived in front of a dilapidated wooden shed. The youth opened the door and said, "This is the place. Pick any empty bed and get ready because by tomorrow morning the special training will begin.". After finishing his words, the youth threw the keys towards Dudian and then directly left.
Dudian caught three keys in his palm. He stared at wooden shed and then frowned slightly. The wooden shed was most probably intentionally built for them. It could not be compared with the gorgeous and unique buildings in the surrounding areas. Even by the living standards of slum areas, this building was a relatively poor house to live in.
"Is this how they are going to treat us?" Dudian knew that special training was not going to start by tomorrow. It had already begun right now they first arrived at the wooden shed.
There were three rooms inside the wooden barracks. All three rooms were completely identical to each another. There were four beds in each room. Each bed had mats and some dark stains on the boards. He quickly checked all the beds and picked a relatively clean wooden bed. He laid his backpack on the bed and waited for the others to choose their beds so that he could then exit to find whisk leaves or large weeds to wipe the bed.?During this time, the other children had also entered the wooden shed. They were stunned at the sight. Even for the boys it was unbearable to live inside the barracks. Minnie slumped down and cried.?The kids grew up in residential areas and have not experienced such a harsh environment before.?Instead of wasting his time, Dudian gave the other two keys to the other children. He went outside to find and gather dried whisk leaves. Later, he returned to the barracks to wipe the bed. If he had known earlier that this was going to be happen, he believed that he should have brought a mattress along to cover the bed.
The other children watched as Dudian busied himself with the entire cleaning process. After they stopped wallowing in self-pity, they each began to choose their own beds. One of the children bit his teeth and talked out to rest of them," Bear with it temporarily, things will certainly get better in the future!" In desperate moments, people always relied on hope
to encourage themselves.
As time passed by they began to compromise with the situation at hand and began to adapt to the current condition.
One of the bigger boys went into Dudian 's room. He seemed a bit curious about Dudian, "My name is Mason, what' s your name?"
"Dudian."
"You seem to not be afraid of dirt." The child was direct.
"In fact, there are moss-like things over the top of the bed." Dudian replied.
"What is it?", Mason asked.
"......It's nothing."
Mason scratched his head, for he did not know what else to say. He noticed spots of mildew on the bed board. He recalled how Dudian dealt with the situation. Immediately, he exited the room to the outside to pull out some green grass to wipe the bed, yet there were too many spots of mildew on the bed. No matter how hard he tried to rub it off, the spots remained dark.
Dudian looked at him, and then said: "We have to dry them under the sun."
Mason was surprised for a moment and then agreed: "We can put the bed boards outside under the sun to let it dry, so that the pieces do not rot." He called out to the other children.
They mobilized immediately.
Mason looked at Dudian, "Don't you want to dry your bed as well?"
"I cannot move it alone."
"I'll help you then," Mason replied at once.
Dudian, because of his temperament, would not ask for help directly. Nevertheless, he replied: "Thank you." With Mason's assistance, they took the beds outside of the wooden shed.?Not long after, another youth in officer uniform led a group of children over.
The officer looked at the beds in the open space before frowning slightly, but he did not say anything. Just like the previous officer that came before, he too casually opened a few rooms, let the group of children to pick their own rooms, before leaving the key and then left.
The children looked curiously at Dudian, Mason, and others and then, one by one considered their own bedrooms.
...
...
"Are these dwellings for the children ready?" Dasha arrived to the window. She wore a white thin silk gloves and held a metal tube. If Dudian was here, he would without a doubt recognize at first sight that it was an old-fashioned telescope. She raised it up to her eye level and began to observe the situation outside the wooden sheds.
"Everything is in accordance with your instructions. The housing environment has not changed. We will stop supplying hot water soon." Tobu respectfully added on, "I believe they will soon adapt to the pains and hardships. This time, I am confident that we will 'produce' more than hundred "Scavengers"!"
Dasha nodded slightly. Suddenly she saw group of children carrying the beds from inside the wooden sheds out into the wide-open space. She was momentarily stunned as she did not expect the children to act in such a manner. After a while, she placed away the old-fashioned telescope and said. "You must discipline these children greatly. The number of passing children declined year after year. We must improve the teaching methods and tactics to maintain stable number of Scavengers. Additionally, do not forget to eliminate them instantly in case their mental state is not up to par."
Tobu bowed his head: "Yes!"
...
...
In the evening, the children worked together to help each other to move the beds back to their respective rooms.
Mason pulled out a bedding from his backpack and laid it on the mattress. Some of the other children looked at him in envy. He laughed back at them and then comfortably lied down, proudly for his 'foresight'.
Dudian changed his clothes and lied down. He closed his eyelids to revise the knowledge he got from super chip.?Unknowingly, he fell asleep. He woke up at 5 am the next morning because of harsh strange sounds coming from outside. Dudian and other children got up and came together to look at the source of the strange noises. They saw a meter-tall birdlike creature with a crooked neck. It emitted a very sharp sound that almost ruptured their eardrums.
Chapter 15: As long as you stay alive!
For starters, it was an unbearable place to live in, so the children did not adapt well to the new environment. They barely slept. So, when they heard an ear-piercing sound such as this one, it felt as if lots of needles were jabbed to their brains. One after another they got out of the room. The sky was still dark, and the temperatures at night were cold. Most of them could not help but shiver because they went outside still in their pyjamas.
That strange bird called out three time more before it ceased.
Some children wanted to go back to sleep, but it was in vain. "I am now going to give you three minutes to be ready to stand in front of me." A brown haired brawny person at the height of two-meters howled out loud.
At first, many children were in confusion, but they soon remembered about the special training.
Dudian's biological clock was disrupted, so he cannot help but to suffer from some headaches. He restrained his emotions, ran back into the room to wear a coat but later he gave up. There was cold water near the door which he used to rinse his face and then later exited the wooden shed and moved towards the brawny man. Only two and half minutes had passed.
The other children gave up on washing themselves but instead hurriedly put on clothes to go out. They wanted to give a good impression to the instructor so they did their best to be as fast as possible. But there were others did not change even after three minutes were up; especially the girls who brought along a lot of luggage full of clothes, as they hesitated on what to wear today to look good.
The instructor did not hurried anyone, but quietly waited.
Time went by, about five minutes later everyone was out standing near the instructor.
"Since today is the first day, I set up a special alarm for you to wake you lot up from sleep. However, from tomorrow onwards, I hope that when I come over here I shall see all of you already ready and set to go!"
"Yes!" Several bold boys answered loudly.
The brown-haired man nodded slightly. "Well, today you are five minutes late. So, everyone will have to run five laps around the school field."
The faces of many children changed. They had witnessed for themselves the huge size of the school field. Let alone five laps, even a full one lap would exhaust them.
"Teacher, why is it everyone that have to run?"
"We arrived well within three minutes!"
"Even if we were late, only some were late for two minutes at most, why is it now five minutes?"
Several boys could not help but spoke their minds loudly.
The instruct replied in an indifferent tone: "First, even if you all were ready in three minutes' time, you would still had to run three laps around the field. Secondly, you are a group! A collective, if one of you is left behind the rest of you must bear the consequences!"
"Teacher, I am not satisfied!"
"There will always be people dragging their feet, I refuse to follow such a ridiculous idea!"
A few boys suddenly spoke out in anger.
The instructor licked his lips and responded in a rhetorical manner, "not satisfied, are you?" Without waiting for a response, instructor kicked the boy who talked first in stomach. The kick was so fierce that the kid was pushed backwards, he hit few other children and fell in pain.
"You do not agree?" Instructor kicked another dissatisfied boy in the same way as he kicked the first one. Unfortunately for other boys he did not stop but continued to kick another three or four boys.
As soon as he was finished kicking them, instructor turned around to speak "Here, you don't ask anything. You only obey the orders! Anyone who refuses to act will be hit by me. I may even kill you. Believe me, nobody will care." there was a trace of indifference in his face as he sneered and continued on, "In the previous session I killed one. Unfortunately, you were not here to witness it. It's better to kill the garbage instead of wasting time and resources to nurture them!"
All the children who heard the vicious words coming out
of instructor's mouth were frightened and turned pale.
Some of the girls had their legs trembling because of the fear. Tears poured out, but none dared to cry.
The instructor gazed at them before saying: "If you fail to finish in ten minutes, then there will be no breakfast!" Then, he suddenly smiled "Those who cannot adhere the collective idea, and those who don't finish running are the ones who won't get to eat. I do not want to let any individual garbage pull down the level of the whole group."
A lot of the sturdy children felt relieved after hearing those words.
Dudian sighed, almost crying in his heart. He knew for a certain, that he would not finish the run within the stipulated time.
Soon, the instructor brought all of them into the school field to begin the run.
However, the school field was too big. Even the children with the best physiques failed to finish in ten minutes. Some were late for a minute, some were late by two minutes and some for four or five minutes. In short everyone lost the opportunity for breakfast.
Some frail girls finished the entire five laps 20 minutes well over the time limit. But Dudian's result stunned everyone else. He lagged thirty whole minutes over the time limit to finish the run.
He won the nickname "undisputable" from other children. Mason and the other two boys who lived in the same room as Dudian distanced away from him as if he was a total stranger to them.
Although Dudian was relatively calm, he could not help but to blush a bit because of shame as he saw all the strange eyes casted at him. He knew for a fact that having slept in a frozen storage capsule for over three hundred years, it had slowly weakened his body. It would take many months to recover from it.
He got tired from walking let alone to run for five laps.?The instructor looked towards Dudian but did not say anything.
"Everyone, gather!" The instructor ordered as soon as Dudian finished. This time the instructor's order was not left deft by anyone. Soon everyone arranged themselves into neat rows.
The Dark King Page 7
