Chapter 13: The Lurker (I)
While the TR-735 ship was doing intense preparation work, in a transport ship numbered JC-492 at the front of the formation, a middle-aged officer with a mustache looked at the black starry sky outside the cabin in a daze.
The officer, who wore the lieutenant's epaulettes, was part of the Charon Star Staff Headquarters and had served as the deputy staff officer of the Forward Operations Department, and this time he left the Charon War Department with the transport formation was his personal application.
Having been captured in mid-September, he submitted a leave of absence to the General Staff Headquarters on the grounds that he was in poor mental condition, and the General Staff Headquarters approved the request, considering that the overall situation of Charon was now decided, and let the transport formation that was about to set sail take him away from Charon.
An officer who had been traumatized by his capture was put on leave of absence, which would have been a very common thing. In the military, almost every day a soldier or officer leaves his post due to varying degrees of mental problems. They may return to the army after a period of leave, or they may retire away from the battlefield of life and death. So not a single crew member on the transport ship ever doubted his origins, and even deeply sympathized with what happened to him.
But in reality, the lieutenant named Bert is not as simple as one might think.
He served in the army for twelve years, and it took him twelve years to climb to the position of lieutenant deputy staff officer. Speaking of which, such a speed of promotion can only be described as step-by-step, and in the first twelve years and four months of his military career, his life was indeed just as dull and tasteless as many people. Every day is just busy dealing with a mountain of copywriting work, dealing with data and graphics all the time.
If it weren't for the self-recommendation two months ago, maybe there would still be no change in his life. It's a pity that everything can't be done again, two months ago, tired of this monotonous life, Bert, who began to dream of promotion, ventured to compete for the post of deputy staff officer of the front operations department, and after successfully getting this position, for the first time in history, he was away from the rear office and came to the dangerous front-line trenches.
Unlucky, he was captured during a surprise attack by the Federation Army a few days later, and thus became a prisoner of the Union Army.
Because he was the first senior combat staff officer captured by the Union Army, he received special treatment from the Union Army interrogators, and after a series of interrogations and inducements, Bert became a traitor and secretly planned a major raid on the Union border.
This was a seamless plan, and Bert, who had received a generous promise from the Union Army, even thought that his life had ushered in the biggest turning point in history, but the actual result was contrary to his imagination, and he even had the illusion that he had been abandoned by fate.
He still can't believe that a small B-57 outpost, a recruit who has been in the army for less than a week, can make what he sees as flawless tactics fall short, and what makes him even more terrified is that the entire Charon battle situation has taken a huge turn as a result, and the failed Federalist army not only failed to defeat the Republican Army, but even defeated the entire line of Charon.
So, while everyone at the army base was cheering, Bert could only shut himself in a dark room and shiver. He was afraid that his affairs would happen, so he couldn't wait to leave Charon and leave the Republic.
However, he was unable to secure the protection of the Federation after the plan failed and led to the defeat of the Federation Army, so he had to devise another plan, at the very least, to get the Federation to recognize his worth and allow him to become a legal citizen of the Raymond Federation.
A small transport formation consisting of ten 'Catfish' type transport ships, such a small gift, became a letter of nomination that he was going to send to the federal army. Therefore, before setting out, he reached an agreement with the officers of the Federation Army through secret channels, and planned to ambush this small fleet on the way back of the defeated army of the Federation Army, so as to make up for their defeat on Charon.
Now, there were only two hours left before the scheduled time he had agreed with the Federal Commander. At the edge of this meteorite belt, the ambushed Federation forces will launch a surprise attack and annihilate the small fleet he is currently in.
Two hours, the two hours that would soon decide his fate, made him live like a year, his body trembling uncontrollably, and his pale, iron-blue face made him look like a zombie. Everyone who tried to greet him was confronted with his hysterical rants, and he stood alone in the hallway, staring out the window at the transport ship at the very end of the fleet.
He knew that the recruit who had dashed his hopes was now on that ship. He wanted to see if the recruit who had brought him defeat could still work miracles in this desperate situation......
At this time, on the TR-735, Robin, who was moving his muscles in the transport ship's training room, did not know that on the other ship, there was such a suspicious lurker staring at him with a hostile gaze.
Compared to Bert's dark psychology that is tangled at the moment, Robin, who has re-established his prestige, is in a good mood. Although he had a hunch that something might happen along the way, as a soldier, he didn't panic because of it. In his opinion, since he chose to become a soldier, he should regard fighting as a part of his life, and even if he would die in battle one day, he would only admire the magnificence and splendor of life.
Therefore, under the current pressure, Robin is the most relaxed of all the fighters on the ship. Having done his homework while the other soldiers were chatting, he had plenty of time to spend his time, and the training room was undoubtedly a great place to be.
Compared with the well-equipped training rooms of the army base, this training room in the transport ship is relatively simple. But to Robin's satisfaction, the training room is free, although under Lee's education, his concept of consumption has changed slightly, but the stinginess brand cultivated over the years is not so easy to eliminate. And although the training room is simple, there is no shortage of necessary things, including gravity regulators and strength equipment, these basic facilities are still available.
Robin, who has always hoped to make a breakthrough in strength, has been training himself every minute and every second in the past two days. Using what he calls 'subtle' body control, Robin initially focused on the small muscle groups in the joints.
Unlike large muscle groups, small muscle groups have a relatively small number of muscle fibers, so they can show results in a short period of time, and small muscle groups are even more important than large muscle groups in some ways, if you can strengthen the small muscle groups in all parts of the body, Robin is confident that in a short period of time, he can break through the bottleneck of strength, open the genetic lock, and thus obtain second-order strength.
When he tested his grip strength in the training room, the results proved his point.
Over the course of two days, Robin focused all of his energy on the ten fingers of both hands and the muscles of the palms. The result is that his grip strength has increased by nearly one-third compared to before, so it can be calculated that if the strength of the forearm can also keep up with the strength of the palm muscles, then the strength of his hands will be doubled in an instant, and this level of strength has definitely broken through the bottleneck of the first order.
"If you look at it this way, my limit in strength should be the appearance of the third order."
After calming down from the joy of the breakthrough, Robin calculated and worked out the limits of his potential in strength.
The limit of the strength of the third order, which confirmed the bad evaluation of him by the instructors in the training camp. This means that no matter how hard Robin tries, the limit of his strength can only reach the level of the third order, which is not very high, and if Robin has not developed this unique 'subtlety', maybe by the time he retires, his strength will not be trained to the third order.
But now that he has 'Subtlety', his progress will be greatly accelerated. He is confident that he will be able to reach the limit of his strength within one to two years, and at that time, he will be qualified to enter the special battalion and become a 'knight' who can be equipped with heavy infantry armor.
Thinking back to Yarman's invincible battle scenes, Robin has an indescribable envy, and he hopes that one day he can become a warrior as powerful as Yarman, and this day no longer seems so far away.
"That kind of soldier can be considered a real soldier, and I don't want to be a servant for the rest of my life." Robin lay flat on the strength machine, gritting his teeth and doing an overweight bench press.
While using 'subtlety' to strengthen locally, he still uses the common means of strength equipment to strengthen his large muscle groups, although the results are small, but he believes that with perseverance, the cumulative results will burst into unimaginable power one day in the future.
And Yarman became a yardstick in Robin's heart, when the heroic back of the god of war on the battlefield stimulated Robin like a stimulant, so that he would always stay motivated in this boring and tedious practice.
It wasn't until the last bit of strength in his body was drained that Robin, who was almost about to collapse, put the heavy barbell on the shelf, picked up a can of high-energy sports drink next to him, and poured it into his throat.
This high-energy sports drink is quite expensive, and you need to pay a lot of contribution points to buy it, and it is a luxury item exclusively provided by the military department. In the past, even if he was killed, he would not buy such a luxury. But now, after accepting part of Lee's concept of consumption, Robin's stinginess has subsided, at least for himself, he won't be so stingy anymore.
After pouring the last drop of the drink into his mouth, Robin reluctantly threw the can into the trash and began to focus on the high-energy drinks that entered his digestive organs, and stimulated his body organs with 'subtlety' to make them absorb the energy contained in these drinks as much as possible.
This is another function of Robin's newly discovered 'subtle', which stimulates the body's organs to absorb as much energy as possible from the food, which is also a means of strengthening, although he currently does not understand what kind of benefits these absorbed excess energy will bring to himself, but in his stingy surname, he will definitely not waste the energy he paid for.
"It seems that we need to study human biology more ...... in the future"
Robin scratched his head, and the thought came to his mind. But remembering that Leona was the only one on the ship who could provide him with such a consultation, he was a little frightened, and after thinking about it, he still planned to give up this idea for the time being, and wait for the opportunity to take a professional certification in medicine in the future, so that he could consult this information at any time.