Chapter 32 - Bootcamp in another world

- The Kingdom of Apolyon's Airspace, Several Km from Himeja Island –

- Yukikaze's internal cabins -

- 0905hrs, local time –

On a calm morning when the crew should've been checking on their post after cleaning the ship, a resounding sound of a crowd could be heard throughout the hallway near the cafeteria. Though, from afar, running steps echoed throughout one of the corridors, slowly getting louder every second. It was Jaeger, who's also with Jeanne who ran quickly to where their problem was currently frolicking.

"For f**k's sake! How in the world she could even get into the ship this easily!? Not even thermal imaging from our security cameras could detect her!" exclaimed Jeanne in frustration as they turned around the corner.

"I don't f**king know! You're the brains in this ship!" retorted her brother who was looking at her who is starting to run out of breath. "That aside, how many times has she teleported into our assets?" 

"it's the 34th time if I counted correctly".

"34 times!? In a span of a week!?"

"don't blame me! She got space-time bending powers! How are we supposed to stop her?! And she kept betting with the crews a lot that it spent most of our food reserves for a week every time she came!" 

Turning around another corner, they can see the cafeteria bustling with people, shouting in excitement as their troublemaker put more flames on the fire of her shenanigans. 

"Aww come on boy~ can't believe you lost to this old lady~" she teasingly said as the guy who challenged her ran away dejectedly. "Alright, who's next?!"

The whole crowd cheered and nearly all of them raised their hands. Jaeger inconspicuously eavesdrops on a conversation in the crowd, from the sound of their conversation, it was the ones who lost to her, from their uniform, they're part of the gunnery crew. "There goes your 50 bucks bro haha!".

"Damnit! How many stomachs does she have?!"

"For real… that aside, is it worth the shot hmm?"

The guy smirked at his friend, "You bet, damn she's quite a mommy. I feel oddly good to be teased by her". right after that comment, Jaeger patted both of their shoulders.

"So you wanted to get humiliated by someone's mom huh? ya' f**king degenerates…" The two had shivers down their spine, scared of what will going to happen next. Yet, Jaeger let it slide after they apologized and ran away. he sighed and glanced back at the centrepiece of the crowd, walking straight towards Christina.

All of their fun was stopped as someone exclaimed "Commander on deck!" and frantically stepped away from Christina. Both Achiles and Jeanne crossed their arms having an irritated look painted all over their face. "Having fun?" he said in a way similar to someone who's about to scold, well… in this case, literally.

"Oh hey Achilles, Jeanne, what uhhh… brings you here?" Christina let out a chuckle, a nervous one. obviously, it's because she knows what's about to happen next. "On second thought… I think I know why…"

Jeanne cleared her throat, "Look here my dearest mother that I just know, this ship has limited supplies and what you're doing is just decreasing our food stockpile. So please, for the last damn time… DO NOT TRY TO ATTEMPT AN EATING COMPETITION ON TODAY'S CAFETERIA SPECIAL! AGAIN!!... Ehem… That's all" 

That left quite an impression on Christina, who sat there dumbfounded. "Ah and additional note, do not even try to make a betting challenge on this ship." Jeanne then glances around towards the crew, "That includes y'all dumbasses too! get back to your posts!!"

"YES MA'AM!" they quickly scrambled and ran towards their assigned position whilst Jeanne dragged Christina out. "Now my dearest mother… you're coming with me~ we have an important "chat" to do~" 

"Eek!! Achilles! Help me out here!" the merc turned a blind eye as she was dragged by the angry commander away, though, before Jeanne left the cafeteria, she looked behind her shoulder towards him. "Lt. Colonel, the marquis is waiting in the hangar bay two, get moving". 

Leaving Jeager behind, he quickly walked away from the room and headed where the hangar was located. His walk there took a while, even with the assistance of rapid-moving walkways since the ship was extremely massive for its class. On the way, he kept thinking about a certain thing that still troubled him to this day. 

"… a lot of things happened again huh… I need to not make more enemies here and… stop doing such…." He shook his head, shrugging these new memories that would haunt him again soon. He got used to those kinds of scenes, having himself betray his comrades as ordered by his higher-ups, committing atrocities that he never wanted to do, and many more. it's part of his job as a no-ordinary mercenary. Still, deep inside he wanted to let go of this sort of life, but to this day, he still can't find a way to do so. 

Soon enough, he saw the Marquis, who was standing near the transport that would fly them back to the capital as it was spooling up. After a small greeting, they both went inside the cargo bay and strapped themselves with the reinforced harness as the craft was being connected to one of the side catapults of the ship. Jaeger, who sat across from his guest/employer, noticed that the marquis closed his eyes and gripped the harness hard. "Sir, are you okay?"

"ah- I… yes. Though, I'm still not accustomed to riding this flying carriage which…"

"Flew from 0 to Mach Jesus under 3 seconds? Yeah, I got used to it after two weeks of training so it's quite relatable". The marquis let out a small chuckle at his remark. "That was quite hilarious of you young Wolfenford. Who would've thought that someone like you could jest- WOAHH-!" 

The transport suddenly catapulted itself without warning from the pilots, startling the passengers. As the rattles stopped when the aircraft flew in a stable flight path, Jaeger opened his harness and headed to the cockpit. Jordan could hear his friend's son blabbering about how they should've warned them about the take-off down in the cargo bay, he let out a small laugh at how young yet intriguing fellow Jaeger was as he never heard a military superior sternly yet jokingly reminded his subordinates about their blunder in his life before. 

"my days kept getting interesting since her son came haha… if only my son…" Shrugging his thoughts off, Jordan glanced to his right through the window, admiring the view from the skies. Hoping to forget what he just tried to recollect. 

It didn't take long for them to reach Hornet's Nest. they then took a small walk across the main base, which is a training ground specifically made for the coalition where both Apolyon and ABEL's troops were exchanging ways of their style of combat. after they reached the training ground, Jaeger took Jordan around the elevated catwalks circling above the training ground, viewing the training which is happening inside the CQB shoothouse which they made out of plywood, yet, had no ceiling so the trainers could see clearly what was happening inside without participating. ringing of training rounds that were fired. 

"RESET! RESET! That was a s**t entry!" the drill sergeant angrily exclaimed, particularly on the group which is on the farthest side of the shoothouse. "I told you for the last time, do not breach in with your earth magic! you might collapse the whole building instead if its in a combat situation!" 

With a grunt, the trainee threw the previously provided helmet to the ground. "This is absurd! It's simpler to storm this basic dwelling with magic!" The trainee responded, "Why do we even need to do this!?" and was quickly called back when Jaeger intervened just as the instructor was ready to say something else.

"Have you thought of the consequences of your actions when you tried to use the magic that you were using?" the trainee tilted his head, confused. "using an attack with that scale, will jeopardise the mission, killing both your teammates and any possible civilians inside. I don't care much if you're a mercenary like me but you're a soldier tied with a nation, and your actions may sully your nation's name for doing so"

"why do we even need to be so discreet!? we hate those Nelimista pigs! they tortured and killed our family even when they begged for mercy, then we also should do the same!", Jaeger maintained his posture; the trainee's words struck him differently. around said trainee, their comrades roared in agreement.

The drill instructor rolled his eyes as he approached Jaeger and the Marquis, "damnit, this is why it's hard to train them, they don't have any rules of engagement, primitive war mentality is still engraved in their doctrine…" 

"say, what's your name again?"

the drill instructor saluted at him, "Owen sir! Sergeant Owen!". the merc saluted back and patted his shoulder after he did. "I'll handle this session for once, gotta give 'em a harsh reality of war" He then looked behind his left shoulder to the Marquis, "It's fine for me to train them roughly right? Sir Jordan?" 

the man in question nodded, "It is true that I said so beforehand" Jaeger then turned around, after patting the Sergeant's shoulders again, "Permission to leave your side, sir"

Jordan knew what he was up to and chuckled, "Granted". the Sergeant, on the other hand, wasn't really into the idea, "Lieutenant Colonel! sir!"

"It'll be fine mate, I'll be back later." Jaeger waved as he left them, walking down the catwalk and into the nearby training armoury, grabbing some equipment. As soon as he finished gearing up, he walked into the training ground and headed to the trainee who spoke up, who was being surrounded by his comrades. They saw Jaeger approach them and turn their attention towards him, giving him a slightly annoyed look. 

"listen up people! I give you a point about how you all wanted to kick the enemy's ass due to how they ruined your nation. but all of you are too green! none of you have even fought in combat! hence why, I'll give you a proposal…" 

the trainees looked at each other confused, "We play a game, if all of you can defeat me and three more people from our group, we'll go your way, neglecting safety and using magic, yet, you will still train with our advanced weapons. if you lose, we'll go our way, drilled with a new set of rules of war. how's that sound?"

"four against twenty? are you insane or what?"

"I'm insane enough to go deep behind enemy lines alone though" Jaeger smugged at them, taunting the trainees who took his bait. "then prove it to us if you're oh so powerful!"

from afar at the catwalk, the Sgt. Owen sighed, to think Jaeger would do something childish just to change their mind is quite mindboggling for him. On the other hand, the Marquis simply was curious about how his men fare against Jaeger, and since they're on an equal footing in terms of weaponry they were given, it made him even more curious.

right after Jaeger dragged some unknowing mercs about the situation with him, they then were guided towards the nearby woods by the Marquis as he knew the area nearby was fairly safe for them to do their friendly match. 

the two teams were separated far, as to not have a quick battle. Jaeger then opened up his comms and talked in the general comms frequency "The rules are simple, tag each of your opponents with the paint ammo you shot. magic is allowed but you are not to use it to kill. may the victor, be justice" Jaeger cut his comms and switched to his team's frequency channel. looking behind his shoulders, he can see how eager his team were to try fighting the otherworldly soldiers. "Sir, about paying us drinks after this is over…"

"yeah, yeah, i know, Y'all drinks are on me if we win"

"HELL YEAH!!" all of them cheered and loaded their training rifles. it was a modified VHS-2 rifle which can fire training paint rounds which are very safe, though retained their similarities of firing 63 grain 5.56mm NATO armour piercing rounds. how those ammo were made were somewhat classified due to how it was tied to ABEL's spec ops mercenary team training. 

"Time to hunt…" 

- meanwhile, on the other side of the woods -

"so… any plans, Captain Irvine?" asks one of the Apollyon trainees, checking the surroundings as they all moved in a line formation forward towards the southwest, where Jaeger and his team's starting location is at. the person mentioned is the one who put up the tantrum earlier. scratching his head, he looked back at his comrade. "some of us can demonize into a harpy, i assume? since they gave us a way to communicate easier, send out some to scout from above while we slowly proceed, and as they saw one of them, we split into three groups, flanking and surrounding them with numbers."

"Understood"

three of them then transformed themselves into Harpies, slinging their weapons on the back and swiftly flying up above the trees. the others then proceeded as planned, splitting into three groups while the main group had far more concentrated firepower. "to victory!"

they roared as soon the captain let out his battle cry and charged straight into the middle of the woods. meanwhile, up above, the Harpies were having a rough time trying to maintain altitude and due to the lush trees, they could barely see where Jaeger and his team were.

"any sign of them?" one of them asks, squinting his eyes as he scans down the woods. his wingman shook his head, "No, I can barely see through the thick trees. though, the wind is quite nice today"

"Hey, we're in the middle of training, not some sightseeing bud" the third Harpy remarked, maintaining a bigger distance from the two. "additionally, we don't know how Count Eoflora's son fights, you know… it's not funny to get attacked while flying like this"

The other two nodded, and then, just right after, a spray of training bullets suddenly struck them from underneath the lush treetops, painting their bodies and wings with blue paint. They fell to the ground but were saved by their opposing team. One of Jaeger's men chuckled as they caught and set the fallen Harpies down, who now transformed back into their human state.

"We got three of 'em boss, skeet shooting wasn't part of the training wasn't it?" The others laughed lightly at his joke, while the unamused Jaeger rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah, good comms you got earlier, good thing fourth gen thermals can ignore the sun's heat or we would've been spotted earlier"

Jaeger then patted the trainee and gestured that the three should walk back to the "deadman's" rendezvous and resting point. "Your captain's intuition was quite great, though it's still quite a textbook move. You'll see the difference in tactics and adaptability of both sides there via drone footage"

As the three nodded and left them, Jaeger turned around to his squad, grinning slightly devilish as he loaded a fresh magazine onto his training rifle. "check mags boys, the party is just getting started!"