Chapter 13: A Leisurely Life

After going through several experiences, I finally understood that when a normally stern officer suddenly becomes unusually kind and approachable, it’s never a good sign.

Because nine times out of ten, it means they’re about to face a deadly battle.

Unfortunately, by the time I realized this, my comrades had been replaced one batch after another, and I didn’t even know how many of them were buried without a trace…

—Excerpt from Hu Biao’s Diary Collection “Nonsense”—

At that moment, Hu Biao was watching Dr. Zhou Kun, who was struggling to chop firewood with an axe.

It’s worth mentioning that when Zhou Kun introduced himself to Hu Biao and the others, he never mentioned that he had already graduated with a doctorate from a prestigious university and had received numerous high-paying job offers.

He simply said he had studied abroad in the United States.

Because in the modern world, studying abroad is no longer a rarity.

In fact, due to the sheer number of overseas students, some who didn’t attend elite schools ended up earning less than domestic college graduates upon returning.

So Hu Biao and the others didn’t think much of Zhou Kun.

Now, watching Zhou Kun—who probably had never done manual labor before—chopping wood with such delicate precision, Hu Biao couldn’t help but tease him relentlessly:

“Put some muscle into it, Zhou Kun! What are you, putting on a show of fragility here?”

“Hey, hey, careful, buddy, watch you don’t chop off your toes…”

After great effort, Zhou Kun finally chopped through a small tree stump, feeling a sharp ache in his arms. Listening to Hu Biao’s nagging voice buzzing in his ear like a fly, he turned around and snapped, “Damn it! If you’re so great, why don’t you do it since you’re just standing around?”

Hearing this, Hu Biao was annoyed:

“What do you mean I’m just standing around? I’m in charge of chopping vegetables and cooking rice. Wang Peng hasn’t come back with the water yet; how can I wash the rice or vegetables without water?”

Just as Hu Biao finished speaking, a hurried shout came from nearby:

“Hu Biao, Zhou Kun, can you two stop chatting? Don’t you see I’m struggling here? Come help me carry this!”

They turned around to see Wang Peng, a man they suspected was a former PLA soldier, bent over and hunched like a giant shrimp, laboriously carrying a yoke with two water buckets swinging wildly as he trudged toward them.

Seeing this, Hu Biao and Zhou Kun hurried over to help. But when they looked inside the buckets, there was only half a bucket of water at most, while Wang Peng’s pants were soaked through.

Zhou Kun couldn’t help but comment, “Wow! I thought you’d carried a lot more water. Old Wang, if you only carry half a bucket each time, how many trips will it take to fill the water tank? Hu Biao is still waiting for your water to wash the rice and vegetables.”

Upon hearing this, Wang Peng nearly cursed.

He was still a young man with decent strength and stamina. After all, how many young people these days carry yokes? He could carry something weighing a hundred pounds without much trouble.

But carrying the same weight or even less, balanced on a yoke across his shoulders, was a completely different story.

The yoke pressed painfully on his shoulders, making him bend at the waist; the swinging buckets caused the water to slosh about uncontrollably.

To make matters worse, the well was over a hundred meters from the kitchen—a long, exhausting trek.

Despite all this, Wang Peng, a fit middle-aged man and a former PLA veteran, found it hard to complain.

In the end, all his grumbling boiled down to: “Hu Biao, when you wash the rice and vegetables, use less water, just enough.”

“Got it. Just wait till you taste the fragrant rice I cook,” Hu Biao replied confidently.

He grew up in a small county town on the urban-rural fringe and had been cooking simple meals since childhood.

When he started his business running a small local snack shop, his cooking skills were honed, and he was confident that cooking a pot of rice was no big deal.

However, his confidence didn’t last long.

The problem was that he was used to using a pressure cooker or rice cooker. Cooking rice in a large iron pot like the army’s old-fashioned ones was unfamiliar territory.

After rinsing the brown rice twice and dumping it all into the pot, he realized he had no idea how much water to add—whether it was too much or too little.

After pondering for a while, he decided to steam it for a bit and see.

The plan was simple: if there wasn’t enough water, add some; if there was too much, add more rice. The goal was just to get the rice cooked.

Just as Hu Biao was hesitating whether to pour a ladle of water into the pot, a violent coughing fit rang out.

Following the sound, he saw Zhou Kun, his face blackened by smoke, coughing so hard it looked like he was about to cough up his lungs.

Stepping forward, Hu Biao glanced at the stove.

It was stuffed full of firewood by Zhou Kun—how it could even ignite was a mystery.

Before he could complain, there was a loud clatter. Turning around, he saw Gao Yi and Zhang Wei had just finished building the mud stove and were setting a large pot on it.

Wang Peng poured the half bucket of water he’d just carried into the stove, and it immediately collapsed.

The pot fell to the ground, its rim chipped, and the half bucket of water Wang Peng had worked so hard to fetch spilled everywhere.

For a moment, facing this chaotic scene, the five rookies from the modern world looked at each other helplessly.

All five thought the same thing: We’re screwed. If we can’t even handle such a small task, how will we survive even the cook unit?

Fortunately, at that moment, an angelic voice rang out:

“Oh my God! How can you guys mess up such a simple thing? Don’t just stand there like fools, let me show you how it’s done.”

Under the guidance of the old man—no, the old squad leader—the group got back to work.

Though still a bit clumsy, they managed to prepare lunch.

More importantly, despite his grumbling, the squad leader didn’t go to headquarters to complain and replace them.

“Squad leader’s actually pretty decent,” Hu Biao thought before going to sleep that night.

*****

Overall, in the three or four days since joining the intelligence company, Hu Biao and the other four unlucky men who had crossed over from the modern world were living relatively well.

With the squad leader’s almost hands-on teaching, Hu Biao could now steam a pot of good rice. He could also prepare dough, knead it, and make steamed buns and noodles quite competently.

Zhou Kun, Wang Peng, and the others became adept at chopping wood, making fires, fetching water, washing vegetables, and cutting ingredients.

After all, they all had at least a high school education.

With their learning ability, as long as they applied themselves, simple kitchen tasks could be mastered quickly. On the other hand, if the squad leader tried to learn mechanical operations, he probably wouldn’t succeed.

This just showed that more education really does have its benefits.

After settling into kitchen duties, although they hadn’t found a chance to sneak away yet, at least they didn’t have to worry about being sent to the trenches.

So Hu Biao and the other four felt relatively content.

If there was one thing that still bothered them, it was that although they could barely eat enough each day, their meals mostly consisted of pickled vegetables, with very few fresh greens.

For modern people used to having meat almost every meal, going so long without any fat or oil made their stomachs grow empty.

Hu Biao even dreamed one night of eating thick slices of fatty pork—the legendary three-finger-thick slabs.

Fortunately, this situation finally saw a turning point on the morning of August 28…