Beyond the Zenith

Lying in a ditch was a one-person enterprise. Two people made it cramped. Three people turned it into something resembling a hot pot.

After roughly two minutes of silence in the grassy ditch, He Tangtang finally couldn’t take it anymore. He reached over and nudged Han Qingyu upward, like chopsticks pushing a meatball around in a pot.

Then he let out a quiet “hey” and waited for the other two to look at him. Pointing at himself, he said to Xin Yaoqiao with earnest emphasis, “Um... I’m seventeen. I won’t even be eighteen for a few more days.”

“Huh?” Xin Yaoqiao couldn’t help the involuntary sound that left her lips.

He’s actually a little younger than me?

Then, taking another careful look at He Tangtang, she said apologetically, “Sorry, Uncle.”

He Tangtang was speechless.

“I...” Xin Yaoqiao looked away and stared at the ground in a fluster, trying very hard to rein herself in. “Sorry, Little Uncle—no, young comrade.”

Despite her best efforts, she couldn’t help laughing.

Thankfully, He Tangtang was gracious enough to accept, and the ditch fell quiet again for a little while.

“Um, my name is Xin Yaoqiao,” she tried again.

In truth, she had absolutely no idea why the three of them were lying flat in a ditch. Are we setting up an ambush for a Sharpie?

She wasn’t afraid either way.

After a moment, the girl turned her head again and said shyly to Han Qingyu’s profile, “You can call me Qiaoqiao, or Yaoyao, or even Huanghuang. Any of those works.”

She knew that Han Qingyu didn’t know her at all. He hadn’t even been told yet that he was in the prospective tier.

Others in the tier only knew about their own placement and had no idea who else was in it. Xin Yaoqiao was the sole exception. As a liaison officer of the prospective tier, she had access to the files and information of all the other members.

Han Qingyu kept his head down and said nothing, refusing to engage. He was considering whether to strangle her.

He Tangtang turned his head again, nudged Han Qingyu once more, then nodded politely at Xin Yaoqiao. “Sure... Wobbles.”[1]

Should I just strangle him too? Han Qingyu thought.

Xin Yaoqiao gave a short hum in response.

So Number 10 doesn’t like to talk? If Han Qingyu hadn’t called her over earlier, she would have assumed he was mute. After a moment’s thought, she decided to try starting another conversation.

“I almost thought you were dead just now,” she began. “Just for a second—”

“If you two make another sound, we really will be dead,” Han Qingyu said sharply, trying to keep his irritation down.

Xin Yaoqiao didn’t dare make another peep. Lowering her head, she buried herself deep in the ditch.

At last, blissful silence.

Han Qingyu listened intently as he lay there, but after about two minutes, he had an unsettling urge to check for a pulse.

It took him a moment to understand what was off, but once he did, he said with resignation, “You can breathe, or I’m going to think you’re actually dead.”

Xin Yaoqiao let out a long exhale, wriggling her shoulders and neck while still lying flat. After a pause, she fidgeted again.

Han Qingyu glared at her.

“A little bug crawled into my collar,” Xin Yaoqiao explained innocently. She tried rubbing her cheek against her shoulder carefully, not daring to reach up and grab it.

It didn’t seem to help. She was wearing her maneuvering device with all the metal straps, and the combat fatigues had hook-and-loop fasteners running up to the collar. There was no getting it open without a good deal of tugging.

Han Qingyu stared at her. “Where?”

Xin Yaoqiao tensed up, eyes darting to him with a blank expression. “Around my shoulder.”

Without a second thought, Han Qingyu reached over and carefully pressed his palm against her shoulder a few times. He finally felt the bug under his fingertip, but the little beetle was small and slippery. It escaped on the first try, so he had to chase after it. At last, he pressed down with enough force to catch it, pinning it in the hollow of Xin Yaoqiao’s left collarbone.

As for Xin Yaoqiao, she hadn’t expected him to reach over as he had. She hadn’t even had time to think or refuse, and became genuinely flustered for a moment. Is Number 10... a pervert?

Then she noticed his completely blank expression. He seemed entirely focused on the task.

Her attention was then pulled entirely toward the hand on her shoulder. Gradually, she realized she was feeling something peculiar, very peculiar indeed.

Is this what the books mean by hormones?I wonder if he feels it too...

Han Qingyu crushed the beetle in the hollow of her collarbone, then pulled his hand back and lay flat again.

“You... I—”

“Shhh.”

Xin Yaoqiao shut her mouth.

Trying very hard not to imagine the burst remains of the beetle in the hollow of her collarbone, she bravely endured it and lay back down.

Han Qingyu himself saw nothing wrong with any of this. Of course, if Wen Jifei were present, he would have repeated what he always said whenever he wanted to lecture or needle Han Qingyu, “Little Qing, you’re hopeless. Just wait for your mom to set you up with someone and muddle your way into a marriage. You don’t understand a damn thing about love.”

They lay there for another three minutes.

“Aren’t we going to find the instructors?” Xin Yaoqiao asked cautiously, unable to hold herself back any longer.

“I’m afraid we’ll run into the Sharpie,” Han Qingyu said.

“Oh, that’s fine though.” Xin Yaoqiao lifted her head slightly and added with casual confidence, “If we run into it, I’ll just chop its fucking head off.”

The sudden vulgarity from the girl caught both Han Qingyu and He Tangtang off guard. “What did you say?”

“Chop the Sharpie’s... fucking head off.”

Xin Yaoqiao cringed. She couldn’t control it. Whenever she said “Sharpie,” the word “chop” automatically attached itself to the front, and “fucking head off” latched onto the end.

“Of course, I probably can’t do it alone,” she said, hastily steering the conversation back on track. “But if you two help, it should be manageable. If we had the instructors too, it’d be easy.”

Han Qingyu and He Tangtang exchanged a questioning glance. Did the 491st have a girl soldier this fierce?

Neither of them had heard of one.

As they were about to press further, a group of footsteps approached.

Zhang Dao’an and sixteen others came charging past with their maneuvering devices fully active, making almost no effort to conceal themselves. They swept by not far from the ditch where the three of them lay.

“You two stay here. Don’t move,” Han Qingyu instructed once the group passed.

Then, activating his own device, he took off after them.

***

Zhang Dao’an had just received a transmission. One of the retreating groups of recruits had spotted the Sharpie on a mountainside not far away.

The few recruits who saw it had panicked. They activated their devices and fled, even shouting for the others to run. Under those circumstances, there was no way the Sharpie hadn’t noticed them.

Zhang Dao’an bolted out like a madman when he heard this.

He sprinted with everything he had, his heart aching fiercely the whole time.

A single mistake he had made years ago had caused him to carry a lifetime’s worth of debt and hatred on his back. That mistake had resulted in him watching helplessly as a pillar sword pierced through his platoon leader’s chest, and as many of his comrades died.

Recently, things had changed. After all these years as head instructor, Regiment 425’s latest batch of recruits had finally produced a promising kid. He had thought that this could bring some small comfort to Wang Liuzheng in the afterlife.

He had started to live a little more easily because of that.

Then, he chose to send the recruits to what he believed was a safe distance before turning back to rescue Platoon 1123. That decision itself wasn’t inherently wrong, but the consequences were devastating. At least sixty recruits from Regiment 425 were now dead.

They had evacuated the recruits while they waited in ambush, prepared to fight to the death, but then the recruits had found and encountered that Sharpie again.

If a god truly existed, it seemed intent on punishing him endlessly with the lives of others, piling on guilt to slowly destroy him.

You won’t have your way this time. I’m betting my life one last time.

With that thought in mind, Zhang Dao’an accelerated.

***

A mixed group of recruits from the 425th and 491st scattered in panicked flight.

Those terrible footsteps followed through the forest, matching their pace, never striking, as if playing a hunting game.

The terror built endlessly. Some recruits even had a breakdown.

“Instructor Zhang...” someone wailed.

One after another, the recruits called out the names of their instructors.

Zhang Dao’an and ten other instructors, along with the six members of Platoon 1123 who had received basic first aid, had arrived in time.

The moment they reached the scene, they turned, formed a line, and stood ready with blades drawn.

A wave of relief swept over the recruits. Some even stopped running. Their classroom training had taught them that a properly led formation of sixteen to twenty-four soldiers, guided by veterans and skilled fighters, was usually enough to kill a Sharpie.

This lineup of soldiers met both conditions. Besides the two head instructors, there was also a second lieutenant, Platoon 1123’s deputy platoon leader. The rest were all seasoned veterans.

Zhang Dao’an, however, shouted, “Run... Run!”

At the same time, the ominous snapping of branches rang out from the dense forest ahead of them. The Glowing Blue Sharpie in its black armor emerged from the trees, dragging its heavy pillar sword behind it in a walking gait.

Then it simply stood there.

It bore no facial expression, but it didn’t seem to be in any hurry at all.

Seventeen against one. A rare standoff between humans and a Sharpie, where neither side immediately attacked.

1. The raws use 摇摇晃晃 (yáo yáo huàng huàng), which is an extension of her Yaoyao and Huanghuang nicknames. It’s quite long so we decided to shorten it to Wobbles instead. ☜