WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 449: Stuffed Paradise (11)

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During refresher training, the officers of the Independent Battalion often made use of a nearby golf course. It occupied a broad stretch of land between the U.S. Army War College and the Army Heritage Center, and because it was run by Army MWR, the cost was not much of a burden.

The same went for its heightened security.

The officers did not turn down the quiet hours that came every weekend. They were under no small amount of stress from competition, and walking the well-kept greens and fairways with Gyeoul felt like a reward in itself. A thread kept taut forever would eventually snap.

Gyeoul was not very good at golf, but he understood that much, so he deliberately joined them.

‘The mood in society lately must be bothering them too.’

His subordinate officers had eyes and ears. Every one of them knew the times were far from normal. Their lifeline was Gyeoul, so as their commander and leader, he had a responsibility to reassure them. A commander had to look calm even with an unexploded shell buried in the ground right in front of them, smoking.

“Just having you hear us out in person is a huge comfort, Sir. It motivates us too.”

That was what Ensign Song Jeong-hun of Alpha Company said.

“In some ways, it’s a privilege. You wouldn’t believe how many people envy us... After getting looks like that so often, I worry I might lose myself.”

“Lose yourself?”

“You know, Sir. Riding on someone else’s authority? ...Or maybe I should call it arrogance?”

“Ah.”

“Even in casual conversation, there are moments when I think, ‘Oh no. Did I just sound like a jerk?’ It’s worse because people keep hyping us up as war heroes... If I were the only one who came off as an unlikeable bastard, that would be one thing, but smearing your name, Commander... Whew. Just imagining it makes me want to beat myself up.”

“If you always keep that mindset, I don’t think there’s much to worry about.”

When Gyeoul smiled, Song Jeong-hun scratched the back of his head awkwardly.

“No, Sir. If it weren’t for Lieutenant Lee Yura, I would have made several more mistakes by now.”

“Really?”

“Yes. She’s always been that way, but she manages people well, in a way that keeps subordinates from feeling intimidated. She stays close with people regardless of background, but as a superior officer, she still says what needs saying. When I see that, I think she really is something else. I guess she’s exactly the kind of person you would choose yourself...”

“Somehow, that sounds like I’m praising myself.”

“Pardon? What do you mean...?”

“It does, doesn’t it? In the end, you’re someone I appointed too, Ensign Song.”

At Gyeoul’s half-teasing words, Song Jeong-hun fumbled.

“No, I was, well... originally I only started acting as an officer as a stand-in for Lieutenant Lee Yura...”

Song Jeong-hun had received his commission because of Lee Yura’s injury. During the defense of the Aidlin Geothermal Plant, Lee Yura suffered a concussion and was evacuated to the maritime field hospital, and Song Jeong-hun, one of the experienced soldiers, took charge of a platoon as an Ensign through temporary position-based promotion. He had worn the same rank insignia ever since.

Gyeoul smiled again.

“Whatever the reason was, if you had been incompetent, I wouldn’t have left you in charge of an entire platoon this long. Why is someone with a Bronze Star so lacking in confidence?”

“Most officers who participated in Operation Roaring Storm received one, Sir.”

“They gave it to you because you deserved it. Too much humility doesn’t look good either.”

“Urgh... I’m trying not to get carried away, so it’s hard when you praise me like that.”

While Song Jeong-hun looked troubled, the sound of a helicopter engine drew closer from far away. Gyeoul did not think much of it. Military facilities were nearby, so helicopters often passed through. The golf course even had a helipad. Sometimes they flew directly overhead, just like this.

“Ah, the wind!”

At the edge of the green, Tatarra of Charlie Company frowned just as they were taking their stance. Nearby stood Ensign Hironobu, watching as if on guard with a rifle in hand.

To an extent, it was a measure taken with the terrorist threat in mind. But even before that, this was an age when civilians brought weapons along to buy groceries. After open carry became common, excessive police crackdowns had increased, but the overall crime rate had actually fallen slightly. It was the same principle as California, which had once had strict gun regulations yet recorded higher crime rates than states that did not.

Even after the wind died down, Song Jeong-hun kept praising Lee Yura, entirely unrelated to the flow of conversation.

Gyeoul listened quietly, then suddenly called out to Yura.

“Lieutenant Lee!”

“Yes?”

“Ensign Song here is praising you like crazy. He says he can’t say enough about how happy he is that you’re the next company commander!”

Song Jeong-hun panicked.

“Uwaah... No, Sir, why all of a sudden...”

As he said it, he glanced toward Yura, who stood a little distance away.

“Hm-m.”

Yura stood at an angle with one hand on her waist, rested a golf club on her shoulder, and narrowed her eyes.

“I don’t really like flattery.”

“It wasn’t flattery!”

Since he had said it to Gyeoul, not Yura herself, there was no way it could be flattery. He might have worried it would be passed along secondhand, but Song Jeong-hun was not that calculating. And there was no way Yura did not know that. Right now, she was only playing along with Gyeoul, teasing Song Jeong-hun until sweat ran down his neck on a cool spring morning. The other officers giggled as if they found it amusing too.

That had become the everyday mood among the officers of the Independent Battalion lately.

Yura had once said this to Gyeoul about it.

“I like that you’ve become brighter than before, Commander.”

Then she added.

“I felt relieved. I thought, at least your heart is a little more at ease than before...”

When Gyeoul asked if he looked that way, Yura smiled and mentioned Anne.

“Please tell her this. On behalf of everyone in the Independent Battalion and the alliance, thank you. And I hope she lives happily with you for the rest of your lives...”

Gyeoul said he was grateful. It was not politeness. He truly appreciated her thoughtfulness.

Thwack.

A crisp impact woke Gyeoul from his recollection. The ball cut diagonally across the sky. It was going to drop in a good spot. Wang Kechai clenched a fist, and the platoon leaders from Bravo Company, who were on the same team, cheered. The platoon leaders from Alpha, Charlie, and Delta shook their heads.

The officers of Bravo Company, most of whom were Chinese, loved golf.

‘It must have been something they admired.’

According to Min Wan-ki, golf in China had been considered taboo as a bourgeois pastime. The government had even officially used the expression “green opium.”

Even so, golf was a pastime Chinese people admired. In a murky society, breaking taboos was treated like a privilege. Public officials and tycoons led the way, and many people dreaming of a life higher up the ladder followed behind them.

Even if the Chinese officers of the Independent Battalion had reached the point of hating their own cultural background, the influence of the past could not disappear completely.

‘Still, they’ve changed a lot in a good way. Truly... I was planning to cut them loose if things went wrong.’

When Gyeoul first accepted them, he had been wary over whether officers with criminal records could really abandon their bad habits.

Even so, he had given them a chance because he believed that in a world flowing in a muddy current, someone’s wrongs were rarely that person’s responsibility alone, and because the U.S. military itself had a history of using criminals as manpower.

As he had once thought before, this country even appointed criminals who had paid for their crimes as police officers. The logic was that since they had been criminals themselves, they would understand how criminals thought.

Of course, accidents happened because of it too, but the rate of those accidents was lower than the concerns raised beforehand. It was just that the accidents within that low rate were extremely serious.

Put another way, the positions given to them had reformed them.

Gyeoul thought the reason was this.

‘Because they’re respected, they act in ways worthy of respect.’

People were their relationships. As long as everyone had a desire to be recognized by others, once they felt pride they had never experienced before, anyone would want to become someone worthy of it. Whether they succeeded was a separate matter. The important thing was that they came to want it themselves.

The respect Americans gave soldiers was enough to make that possible.

All the more so if they belonged to Gyeoul’s Independent Battalion.

“Sir! It’s your turn!”

The one calling Gyeoul was Li Ailing. It was striking to see her enjoying this time with her colleagues without calculation. The venom she sometimes showed had also dulled compared to the past.

She now got along well even with Sun Xian, Liu Jianchao, and others she had once been on bad terms with because of their original organizations. It was proof that her sense of kinship with the Independent Battalion had grown stronger than her attachment to her original background.

Just as Gyeoul pulled out his club, a helicopter flew in from the direction of the War College. This time too, he thought it would pass overhead, but it slowed down and landed in the middle of the golf course.

At the same time, a faint siren could be heard from the northwest, where the college was.

“What is that?”

The platoon leaders set down their golf clubs and naturally took positions suited to responding to an attack. Even if they were in civilian clothes, they had not left their combat experience behind.

Soon, a group of police officers approached from the direction of the clubhouse where the helicopter had landed. They wore combat uniforms and carried automatic weapons, and perhaps because they realized they were being watched by the battalion officers, they slung their guns behind their backs and walked over slowly. The leader at the front saluted Gyeoul.

“First time meeting you, Sir. Stephen Maynard, State Police.”

Then he showed his badge. Gyeoul returned the salute.

“Good to meet you, Captain Maynard. But what brings you here?”

Gyeoul wondered after seeing his rank. American police used military-style ranks, but a state police captain did not correspond exactly to an Army Captain.

The highest official of the Pennsylvania State Police held the rank of Colonel. Even so, that person could not be treated as an ordinary colonel. In practical terms, they were an official equivalent to a deputy secretary in the state government.

‘If someone around captain level in the State Police is out in the field... does that mean enough police forces to cover several counties are moving all at once?’

As a key figure in the emergency response system, Gyeoul had memorized such matters in detail.

Captain Maynard looked around once, then answered.

“At around 1030 hours, an email arrived at the official State Police account claiming that a bomb had been planted somewhere at the U.S. Army War College.”

Tension rose among the subordinate officers. Gyeoul asked back without surprise.

“A bomb?”

“Yes. They even attached a photograph of an improvised explosive device. They didn’t state who the target was, but if this isn’t a prank, we judged that there was a high chance Lieutenant Colonel Han was the target. So we mobilized to protect you. We first went to your quarters, but only learned afterward that you were here.”

“...That’s strange.”

“What do you mean, Sir?”

In front of the questioning captain, Gyeoul took out his Net Warrior terminal.

“I haven’t received any news through my emergency contact network.”

The contact network prepared against the plague should normally have worked even in a situation like this.

The officers of the Independent Battalion, starting with Yura, raised their muzzles slightly. That alone was enough to fluster the captain.

“Uh, wait... I don’t know much about the contact network. Since it was an emergency, it seems information sharing between agencies wasn’t smooth.”

“You’re sure contact wasn’t intentionally delayed?”

“...Mm.”

After hearing Gyeoul’s question, Maynard thought for a moment, then gave an ambiguous nod with a sour look.

“That may... have happened.”

It would have been stranger for field personnel not to have experience with that problem. What Gyeoul had pointed out was the possibility of a jurisdictional dispute that occurred when multiple departments handled the same area.

Footnotes:

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