No matter how many times he turned around, winking and making faces, the two cheerful female soldiers simply ignored him and kept chatting with the Federal squad leader.

Halfway down the road, Big Guy understood: better to offend a petty man than a woman. Retribution—he was being played this time.

When they reached the military camp, he finally used the battlefield recorder to prove his identity, and Big Guy was sent, along with the two female soldiers, by transport ship to the front-line command center in the city of Garipalan.

For this cowardly soldier who had run away twenty-one times, the comrades of the 109th Division were merciless—they didn’t even give Big Guy a set of clothes, making him board the transport ship in just his underwear.

Dozens of minutes later, the mini transport ship landed on the playground of a university in Garipalan city. This was the Federal Garipalan Military Academy, one of the three major military academies of the Leray Federation. Because of the war, it had been requisitioned; all the cadets had been converted to reserve officers, some assigned to the Army Armored Division, others joining the Newton System’s local space fleet. After suffering a crushing defeat, they had already withdrawn with their fleet back to the Leray Central Star Region.

As soon as he got off the transport ship, Big Guy was delighted. As if it had been arranged, besides him, there were dozens of other burly men in just their underwear. While Big Guy was still puzzled, a major spotted him at once, rushed over, and kicked him into the group of nearly naked men, cursing, “What the hell are you looking at? The assembly’s been going for a minute and you’re just getting here!”

Looking at the cursing major, William Carter was about to explain when another elderly man in a white coat ran over, grabbed the mechanical arm on Big Guy’s hand, and said to the major, “There’s been a mistake, a mistake. He’s not here for the selection.” With that, he pulled Big Guy away. Seeing that someone had come to pick him up, Big Guy said nothing more. He glanced back—Olivia Bennett and Emily Carter had already been taken away by several female soldiers in medical uniforms. Big Guy sighed and followed the old man toward a building.

He didn’t know that, at the hatch of the transport ship he’d arrived on, a medic stepped out, looking confused, and said to the other medics waiting below, “There’s no one. I searched everywhere. Wasn’t there supposed to be a Big Guy?”

Chapter 6: Prisoner in the Laboratory

The old man led William Carter straight into an inconspicuous gray two-story building. Just as they reached the entrance, they saw another soldier, also in just his underwear, with a standard Federal mechanical repair arm on his hand. The old man grinned and muttered to himself, “Heh, did these bastards finally wise up today? They know I’m short-handed and actually sent two people.” He called out to the soldier, “Hey! You, what are you looking at? I’m talking to you. Come with me!”

The mechanical repairman looked disgruntled, as if he’d been given a terrible assignment, and followed the old man dejectedly. He turned and quietly asked William Carter, “Bro, what did you do to get sent to this freak’s hands?”

Big Guy was stunned, feeling vaguely uneasy, and said, “I just got here, I don’t know anything.” He thought to himself, “Crap, it must be because of those twenty-something escape attempts recorded by the battlefield recorder.” Ever since joining the army, Big Guy knew that military regulations stipulated that deserters would face a court-martial, with punishment depending on the severity—at worst, the death penalty! Especially for soldiers who deserted during wartime, almost all were executed without exception. Although he was a mechanical repairman, he had run away a few too many times.

Actually, except for the combat repair teams assigned to combat units, other specialized mechanical repairmen weren’t part of the combat sequence. In the army, they belonged to the logistics sequence, like field hospitals, and were supposed to be evacuated first when the situation turned bad. Except in special circumstances, they wouldn’t be sent to the battlefield. And if no combat order had been issued, then fleeing when one’s own combat unit was routed didn’t count as desertion.

Big Guy’s record of fleeing was already known to some; in their eyes, this mechanical repairman just ran fast and had no sense of duty to fight to the end for his country, which made people look down on him as cowardly. But at most, this would only affect Big Guy’s future in the army. The charge of desertion didn’t really apply to him.

Thinking this, Big Guy felt a bit anxious, but what could he do now that he was here? If he’d known, he would have taken a few more days on the road, or just gone into hiding in the mountains.

The old man led them through several twists and turns in the corridor, passing through several heavy iron doors, and into an elevator. He fiddled with the elevator’s control panel, popped out a panel, placed his hand on it, and a green light scanned his palm from top to bottom, then scanned his iris. Once confirmed, the elevator finally started, descending rapidly. After about five or six minutes, the elevator finally stopped. Judging by the speed, Big Guy estimated they were at least five or six hundred meters underground.

“Where the hell is this? I’m just a repairman—do I really need to be locked up this tight?” Big Guy wailed inwardly.

The elevator doors opened, revealing a corridor ahead. They walked forward several dozen meters to a transparent decontamination chamber. The old man shoved the two of them inside, urging, “Hurry up, get in! After disinfection, there are anti-bacterial suits next door—put them on yourselves!”