N.O

Chapter 6

I jumped at the sound of metal banging against the train walls as it brought back the loud ringing. I then realized sleep took over me during the ride.

"Everyone listen," said the Section Leader quite loudly. "My name is General Kim Geonho, and I'll be your Leader for the military branch during the whole year. Your first four months are your physical training. We'll teach you the basics of fighting, how to handle a gun, and help you make your own techniques as a person. We like to call this the First Phase. The next four months is your mentality. How you respond to your fears and how you respond to your strengths, which is called the Second Phase. The last four months are what we call your Testing Weeks. During these last four months we help strengthen everything about you for your finals, then repeat everything for the next fours years after that. Of course during this time, we'll teach you your basics in math, science, and technology, but your most important thing is your strength. Understood?"

In unison, everyone said, "Yes."

"Very good." He took a deep breath then continued. "Now, for your first test." He opened the train doors, backed up, then said, "Good luck," as he ran and jumped.

Me and Saejun dropped our jaws and looked out the doors.

"Jump?" Saejun said in shock. "Is he trying to kill us?"

While people opened the other doors, I watched them jump out and saw some sliding down metal poles while others found rusted ladders that were nearly broken.

"No," I said to Sae-jun. "He's trying to crack us open. We jump on the count of three."

He shook his head as a response, his answer goes unnoticed as he is pulled beside me. "You have to jump. You want to see your family again, right?"

He looked me dead in the eyes, nodding as an answer.

"Then we have to jump." I let go of his shoulders and looked before me. "One..."

I saw the people on the ladders persuading us.

"Two..."

I noticed the general on the ground look at us in disappointment and saw the last ladder available.

"Three!"

We ran and jumped towards the ladder, but it was barely out of reach from me and I kept flying forward. Seeing that there was a silver pole across from the ladder that Saejun was able to grab onto, I gripped it and held onto it for dear life.

We looked up at each other and let out sighs of relief before making our way down. I reached the ground before Saejun did and waited patiently for him. Once he made it, he turned around and slid to the ground.

In worry of where everyone was, I turned my head and saw them waiting for us while the Section Leader brought his hand to his wrist and tapped it.

Getting the message, I tapped Saejun's shoulder and said, "Come on."

He took a deep breath and started standing up, but stumbled with a petrified face while his hand was over his heart. I chuckled at him and helped him the rest of the way up. Once he fully stood up, I noticed a few people who jumped with us, but they laid still, bent in weird angles with open eyes and cracked bones sticking out. Not wanting Saejun to have a panic attack, I kept leading him to where the Section Leader was.

We caught up with everyone else, following the Section Leader to the gates of Section Four. The gates had two towers on each side. On the top of those towers were machine guns and two soldiers guarding them. Across the top of them read Section Four in our traditional Hangeul letters with little red lights that I assumed were cameras.