When Xiaoyun came to the training field early the next day, Yezi and Yiming were on the stage waiting for him.
All the 'new' recruits and full-time soldiers were below, standing underneath the sun that had just risen on the horizon.
"Took you long enough. We thought you weren't going to show up in time." Yezi murmured, noticing Xiaoyun's leg shaking a little.
"Just a little delay last night. There's no way for me to miss something so important." Xiaoyun answered as he ran up the stage.
"Sure, bud... How about you do the honor of announcing what rank they are?" Yezi suggested as he moved to the side.
"Sure."
As Xiaoyun moved up to the podium, there was already a sheet of paper on it. He began to read every single one of their names.
Then he began to read out their assigned units and rank alongside their standard salary and the looting policy, which was instantly welcomed by loud applause.
After announcing the listed military reforms, Xiaoyun took a step back and gave Yiming room to take over.
Yiming's turn was filled with reaction from the soldiers. Some were happy, while some were upset.
The majority of the happy ones were the new recruits, who were happy to learn they wouldn't need to go into the cities.
Meanwhile, the older soldiers were a little upset to learn of a new training schedule that's even more rigorous than before.
With the announcement out of the way, the soldiers were split into groups and sent to the running track as Gantian and Jixi took charge, overseeing the new formation.
A few minutes later...
"You guys don't mind me going to join them, right?"
Xiaoyun suddenly asked as his eyes stared towards the soldiers. His body was itching to join in with everyone else down in the field.
"Nope." Both Yiming and Yezi answered at the same time.
The moment Xiaoyun hopped down the stage and joined alongside the soldiers, everyone was a little shocked.
Especially the new and the older soldiers, who thought Xiaoyun was just going to watch the whole time.
As the training progressed from running to wheel hops to monkey bars to loops after loops of strength and endurance tests, they were all shocked by Xiaoyun.
He managed to place first in both tests. The only flaw Xiaoyun had was the shooting test next, which was only slightly above average.
Still, all of the soldiers on the field were extremely impressed. In their mind, Xiaoyun had almost always skipped training with them.
With the first three standard trainings done, it was time for close-range combat training. The new one that had just been added.
All of the soldiers quickly split up on their own into pairs. Unfortunately for Xiaoyun, nobody wanted to be his partner after seeing the test score earlier.
At least that's what Xiaoyun thought... Until somebody within the older group of soldiers took their chances to step up.
It was Wuli, the female soldier who hadn't joined for that long. She managed to knock him out in less than a minute.
Everyone was shocked. Both the new and the old soldiers didn't expect her to beat Xiaoyun so easily.
Even Yiming and Yezi were surprised by the result as Xiaoyun fell onto the grassy field, with Wuli's fist resting right above his head.
"You did well. You just need better form and technique. You're going to beat me in no time."
As Wuli changed her fist into a helping hand, he accepted it before putting his fists up once again in fighting position.
"Thanks. Let's go for another round..."
---
After getting beaten over and over again, Xiaoyun had drastically improved, from falling in one minute to falling in five minutes.
"Everyone, lunch time." Jixi and Gantian announced.
Immediately, all the soldiers ran towards the cafeteria, except for Yezi and Yiming, who had left early before them.
After Xiaoyun got in line to get food alongside the soldiers, he sat down next to Yiming and Yezi near one of the isolated tables.
"How was it?" Yezi curiously asked, noticing the hints of bruises all over his face and shoulder.
"The training was pretty nice. The two of you should consider joining the soldiers," Xiaoyun suggested.
"Hell no. I'd rather die than do that stupid endurance run for that long. It looks like my worst nightmare." Yezi instantly answered.
"It's not that hard... Come on, it's good for your health. Look at that belly of yours." Xiaoyun murmured.
"Not in a million years. I'd rather go be a farmer than join that."
Seeing Yezi firm on his choice, Xiaoyun turned his attention over to Yiming, who had been mostly silent the whole time.
"How about you, Yiming? You want to join?" Xiaoyun asked.
"Nah, I'm too old. I'm already over fifty."
As soon as Yiming said it, Xiaoyun gave up convincing the two completely. The three of them ate the food in silence until Yezi suddenly brought up something.
"You think we should wait this out, or should we pre-emptively attack the zombie horde?"
"I think we should wait it out... This one doesn't seem to be controlled, and we can't be sure if the military is going to step in and attack it." Xiaoyun answered first.
"We don't have enough firepower to deal with it ourselves either," Yiming added as he sided with Xiaoyun.
"Well then we wait, I guess."
With the decision made, the three of them once again fell into silence as they continued eating the food until the lunch break was over.
---
A week later...
After a long and grueling training, the new recruits had gotten along enough to be with the rest of their fellow soldiers.
Unfortunately, Xiaoyun was still unable to beat Wuli. However, he could at least hold her back without getting knocked out.
Outside of the training, the scouting unit that Yezi sent was able to find that the zombie horde had left the outskirts.
Although nobody knew where the zombie horde went exactly, the rescue mission was still able to resume once again.
But this time, there was a new commander leading the charge. There was no more hidden soldier, as Xiaoyun was officially leading a bus full of soldiers.
"Jixi, you're still in the lead. I'm just here to learn some experience." Xiaoyun pointed out as the two of them sat next to each other.
"No problem... You can direct two of the platoon if you want." Jixi suggested as he looked out the bus window.
"I'll just watch first." Xiaoyun murmured, not wanting to risk the soldiers' lives just for the sake of training his 'commanding' skill.
"Very well then."
As the two finished talking, they finally arrived at their intended destination.
Everyone immediately got out of the bus and started searching their assigned area, while Jixi and one platoon unit stayed behind as a temporary military HQ.
Xiaoyun watched in silence as Jixi managed the units and kept track of the general direction of where each individual platoon was.
It gave the much-needed freedom to the new platoon leaders to direct the ground operation, instead of requiring Jixi to micromanage every single unit.
After studying Jixi for three hours nonstop, Xiaoyun finally decided to take charge of two platoons.
Everything started relatively easy, as all he had to do was look at a map and help guide two platoons towards their destination.
There were only a few occasional decisions, like whether they should clear one of the buildings or leave it for later.
Jixi could clearly tell Xiaoyun was getting better and better at it. Eventually, he decided to let Xiaoyun take over the captain post to have the full experience.
It was chaotic at first, but Xiaoyun was eventually able to sort out the chaos of multiple walkie-talkies speaking at once.
As the day was about to close, Xiaoyun returned the commanding position to Jixi and Gantian to deal with.
"Man, this is tiring."
Xiaoyun murmured as he sat down on a foldable chair, his head full of sweat underneath the hot sun.
"Yeah, normally this isn't supposed to be done by one person. But since we don't have real officers, Gantian and I have to do this.
Anyway, this will be less and less work as the new lieutenant and corporal ranks officer will get enough experience to command themselves rather than asking me.
You and I will only need to give the general direction later on... At least that's what Major Yezi told me." Jixi added.
"I see..."
---
Another week quickly flew by.
Xiaoyun had stopped going to the city outskirts to be a part of the rescue mission as Jixi had nothing else to teach.
He was back working in the office for the morning, with the afternoon being spent on learning from Yiming about actual military tactics.
Although Yezi was a little annoyed at first to be dragged along, he soon dropped it when he started to learn things that had practical uses in field combat.
Soon, January was almost over as it reached the final day of the month.
---
"Hey Xiaoyun, it's almost Chinese New Year. Should we set up an event for it?" Yuqi asked as the two of them sat in the office.
"Probably... I think this time, we should let the civilians themselves do it, though. People don't really celebrate New Year with other people.
They would rather celebrate it at home with their friends and family. Besides, the commercial sector will make events of their own."
Xiaoyun's suggestion made Yuqi fall into silence for a second before Yueyue spoke up and nodded her head in agreement.
"I think Xiaoyun is right, we probably can just give employees a week's holiday off. People can decide what to do with it themselves."
"Okay then, I will set it as a town holiday then..."
As Yuqi started writing a public announcement to put on the billboard, Xiaoyun suddenly had a thought in his head.
"By the way, anything important I miss while I was gone for the week?"
"Nope, everything is going smoothly... Store expansion is under construction, and the school seems really happy that they got extra funding."
After answering Xiaoyun, Yuqi paused for a second before looking back over to him.
"Oh, actually, yesterday a doctor Li came in to give you a report. Yueyue, do you remember where we put it?"
"I think it's over here... There."
Xiaoyun quickly accepted the paper that Yueyue handed over, only to see a name that he was more than familiar with.
"Doctor Li's medical report on Songming... classified for the mayor only," Xiaoyun mumbled as he read the cover.
As he read the line after line, it simply left him more confused than anything, with all the medical data, until he saw the summary at the end.
"In summary, Songming's blood has a full degree of resistance to the H1 virus that everyone has developed resistance to.
However, this is useless as everyone who hasn't turned into a zombie only needs partial immunity to the airborne version to stop it.
Further testing of the blood is required, especially on a live zombie, to see if the blood can imitate a drug resistance to the C1 virus that zombies carry in their body."
The more Xiaoyun read the paper, the more he feared the possibility. It was starting to get a little too aggressive in the method requested.
"Hm. Doctor Li wants to bring a live zombie to test his experiment? That is too risky. But what if he is actually able to develop a cure...
No, I can't risk a virus outbreak in the town. There are too many things at stake. Just too much room for human error."
With the rejection decision made, Xiaoyun began to write a letter to pause the experimentation until further notice.