When Hu Hao stepped into the holding room, a junior officer sitting near the door immediately jumped to his feet and saluted. The rest of the officers in the room quickly followed suit, and the few who had been sleeping were rapidly shaken awake by their neighbors.
“At ease, everyone. Close the door,” Hu Hao instructed his perimeter guards. The guards immediately pulled the heavy wooden doors shut.
The windows of the holding room were already covered with thick blackout curtains. Operating within a combat zone required strict light discipline, but it also required strict communications and internet blackouts.
If they didn’t enforce a total comms blackout, terrified civilians would inevitably leak sensitive troop movements over unencrypted phone lines, or post videos of the military bases to the internet. The Allied coalition actively monitored local networks for exactly that kind of free intelligence.
“Haozi?!”
Wang Yao and the rest of the academy graduates, who had been sitting near the back of the room, pushed through the crowd of officers in absolute shock.
“Haha! Little Yao-yao! Come here and give your big brother a hug!” Hu Hao laughed, genuinely overjoyed to see Wang Yao.
“Holy shit! You really are a Full Colonel! Motherfucker, how did you get promoted so fast?!” Wang Yao tackled Hu Hao in a massive hug, staring at the golden eagles pinned to Hu Hao’s epaulets.
“Mo-shui! Da-peng! Get over here! Damn, so many of you got assigned here?!” Hu Hao cheered as he saw the rest of the group. Almost ten of his closest friends from the academy—the guys he used to skip class and get drunk with—had all been transferred to his Division.
“Fuck me! Haozi, a Full Colonel?! Did you buy those rank insignia off the black market?!” Xu Hui, another classmate, yelled in disbelief.
The other junior officers from different academies stared at the reunion in stunned silence. They couldn’t believe this intimidating Full Colonel, who was roughly the exact same age as them, was actually classmates with the loudmouths in the back of the room.
“Haozi, you aren’t dead! We bought so much spirit money for your funeral! By the way, you owe me a massive refund! I spent hundreds of credits!” Jiang Bin, another friend, joked loudly.
“Exactly! We demand a full refund! Do you know how much we burned for you?! When we heard we were getting deployed to the front lines, we bought massive stacks of the stuff! We figured if we died out here and went broke in the afterlife, we could just come find you and hit you up for cash!” Wang Yao laughed.
“Hahaha! Come on, sit down! Have a smoke!” Hu Hao pulled out his cigarettes and began passing them around, absolutely thrilled to be reunited with his brothers.
“Haozi, I have to admit, you are a complete monster on the battlefield. Our Class President showed us the video footage… holy shit. Standing completely exposed, firing a heavy machine gun from the hip… you’re a goddamn animal!” Mo Qin laughed, throwing an arm around Hu Hao’s shoulder.
“Hey! Brothers, listen up! Hao-ge is a Full Colonel! We finally have a massive backer in the army! Our lives are going to be so much easier from now on! We absolutely have to celebrate this! Let’s go find some beer!” Wang Yao cheered to the rest of the classmates.
“Where the hell are we going to find beer?! This place is a fortified military base! I already went out and looked around; there isn’t a single convenience store anywhere near here!” Dong Qipeng snapped at Wang Yao.
“Haozi, you’re a Regimental Commander now! You can definitely requisition a jeep, right?! Bopa City isn’t that far from here; it’s maybe a twenty-minute drive! Let’s take a jeep into the city and buy a couple of crates of beer!” Wang Yao suggested, shaking Hu Hao’s shoulder eagerly.
“You do realize there is a strict prohibition on alcohol during active combat operations, right?” Hu Hao sighed, giving Wang Yao a deadpan look.
“Piss off! You’ve made it all the way to Regimental Commander, why are you still acting so scared?! Is the Division Commander really going to court-martial a Full Colonel over a few beers?!” Wang Yao scoffed, completely dismissing the risk.
“Motherfucker… I… I…” Hu Hao stuttered, completely unsure of how to explain the situation. He wasn’t a Regimental Commander; he was the Division Commander! If the Division Commander openly flagrantly violated military discipline by smuggling beer onto the base, how could he possibly expect the rest of his troops to obey the law?!
“Wow, you’ve really lost your nerve since you got promoted. Where is the old Haozi?! Remember all the insane shit we pulled back at the academy?! You’re a Regimental Commander now; you’re supposed to cover for your brothers! But you’re too scared of the Division Commander?!” Wang Yao held up his pinky finger, mockingly calling Hu Hao a coward.
“You motherfucker, I am the Division Commander! How the hell am I supposed to set an example if I break my own rules?!” Hu Hao finally snapped, yelling back at him.
“What?”
The entire holding room instantly fell dead silent. Every single officer in the room—classmate or stranger—stared at Hu Hao in absolute shock.
“Hey man, I think the combat stress finally broke your brain. Being a Full Colonel at your age is already incredibly impressive; you don’t need to posture and pretend to be the Division Commander in front of us! Since when does a Colonel command an entire Division?!” Dong Qipeng laughed nervously.
Mo Qin’s heart suddenly skipped a beat. He remembered exactly what the Major General had told him earlier that afternoon.
“Hao-ge is the Commander of the 87th Division!” the perimeter guard standing behind Hu Hao stated proudly, defending his commanding officer.
The classmates stared at the guard, and then slowly turned their heads back to Hu Hao.
“I’m telling the truth,” Hu Hao nodded seriously.
“Fuck me… you actually are the Division Commander?! Oh my god… wait, wait, give me a second, I need to process this…” Wang Yao pressed a hand to his chest, taking deep, shuddering breaths to calm his racing heart.
He looked up at Hu Hao, his eyes wide. “Haozi! Quick! Dishonorably discharge me!”
“Piss off! I want to leave too! But the military has completely suspended all discharges and retirements! Don’t you know that?! Did you honestly think your brain was more flexible than mine? If running away was an option, I would have used it a long time ago!” Hu Hao cursed at Wang Yao’s immediate cowardice.
“Wait, Haozi… you are seriously the Division Commander?! This isn’t an elaborate prank?!” Mo Qin asked, still struggling to accept reality.
“Why the hell would I joke about this?! We are literally standing inside my Command Headquarters!” Hu Hao rolled his eyes.
“Holy shit… you actually climbed that high?! Then… what about that Major General?! The one who told me you were the Commander?!” Mo Qin asked, the pieces finally falling into place.
“Oh, he’s the Chief of Staff. He used to be the Commander of the 87th Division. But after I took over, he said he wanted to learn how to wage war from me, so he demoted himself to Chief of Staff. Honestly, I didn’t even want him here, but he shamelessly refused to leave!” Hu Hao explained casually.
“FUCK YES! Brothers, our backer isn’t just massive, he’s virtually untouchable! We can literally walk sideways through this camp from now on! If anyone dares to look at us funny, we’ll have them executed!” Wang Yao cheered, jumping up and down.
“Shut your damn mouth! Walk sideways?! Every single soldier in this camp is heavily armed! If you act like an arrogant prick, my veterans will shoot you dead, and they won’t even blink! They don’t even respect Zone Commanders; you think they care about a snot-nosed Lieutenant?! Keep your head down! I do not want to be the one sweeping your corpse into a bag and burning spirit money for you!” Hu Hao warned Wang Yao sternly.
“Ah? Wait, if you’re the Division Commander, doesn’t that mean we get special privileges?! Come on, we spent five years together at the academy! We’re closer than blood brothers! You have to give us something!” Wang Yao demanded, completely ignoring the warning.
“What exactly do you want?” Hu Hao sighed, exasperated.
“Assign me to a safe logistics unit! I don’t want to go anywhere near the front lines!” Wang Yao immediately requested.
“Keep dreaming! In this war, even the mess hall cooks are expected to grab a rifle and hold the trenches! I am the Division Commander, and I personally charge the absolute front lines; what makes you think you get to hide in the rear?!
Listen to me, brothers. Let me be perfectly clear: it’s not that I don’t want to help you, or that I don’t want to give you safe assignments. I’m telling you the brutal truth: in the war that is coming, there is nowhere left to hide. Every single soldier, including the staff officers in the command center, will eventually be forced to fight on the front lines!
Furthermore, I want you on the front lines! It’s the only way you’ll earn enough merit to survive the purges, and more importantly, it’s the only place you’ll actually learn how to stay alive in combat! Yes, the risk is astronomical. But brothers… this is the front line. Death is everywhere. It doesn’t matter if you’re charging the enemy trenches or hiding in a bunker; you can die at any second!” Hu Hao explained the grim reality to his friends.
The classmates fell silent, the gravity of Hu Hao’s words finally sinking in.
“I just returned from the front. We fought a massive engagement all through last night, and we fought another massive engagement this evening. I literally just crossed the pontoon bridges to get back here. I am a Division Commander, and I lead my troops from the front.
You are all commissioned officers. According to High Command’s deployment orders, you must be integrated into active combat units. There is no escaping this. If you had seen the horrific slaughter inside the occupied cities today… you wouldn’t even want to escape,” Hu Hao said softly, looking at the faces of his closest friends.
“Alright, Haozi, relax! We were just joking around! You know exactly what kind of man I am! When the time comes, I’ll be the first one over the trench! Heh heh… honestly, if I had been assigned here instead of you, that Colonel’s rank would definitely be mine by now!” Wang Yao laughed, trying to break the tension.
“Absolutely!” Hu Hao smiled back.
“See that?! I’ll be a Full Colonel before you know it!” Wang Yao bragged to the rest of the class. The other students burst out laughing, the heavy atmosphere finally lifting.
“Division Commander! Call from the Corps Commander!” a radioman suddenly interrupted, sprinting into the room and handing Hu Hao the satellite phone.
Hu Hao immediately raised a hand, signaling for absolute silence. The room went dead quiet. He pressed the receiver to his ear.
“Greetings, Commander Li.”
“Hu Hao, I just received an urgent strategic briefing from Zone Command. Our aerial reconnaissance wings have confirmed that a massive Allied coalition force is currently maneuvering toward the Southwest Combat Zone!
According to the latest intelligence, our 27th Corps is currently facing Limaguo’s 11th Corps, while your specific sector is facing their 7th Corps. Furthermore, our western flank is currently being threatened by the Mara Empire’s 11th Corps!
This means our localized defensive line is preparing to absorb the impact of two—potentially three—entire Allied Corps! We need to formulate a cohesive defensive strategy immediately. Do you have time tomorrow afternoon to travel to Corps Headquarters for a strategic summit?” Corps Commander Li Tianyuan requested over the phone.
“How many Allied Corps have been positively identified across the entire theater?” Hu Hao asked sharply, his mind racing.
“Currently, Zone Command has confirmed the deployment of eight full Allied Corps. We don’t know if there are more reinforcements trailing behind them. I pray there aren’t. If the offensive is larger than eight Corps, our entire Combat Zone might collapse,” Li Tianyuan admitted grimly.
“Understood. I will arrive at Corps Headquarters tomorrow afternoon. I need the morning to finalize some critical logistical deployments here,” Hu Hao agreed after a moment’s thought.
Eight full Allied Corps. In Hu Hao’s estimation, that force represented the main body of the coalition’s offensive attack. There might be smaller reserve elements trailing behind, but the vanguard of the apocalypse had finally arrived.