Chapter 216: The Alleged Life or Death
Translator: WQL Editor: DarkGem
Anyone else with Zhang Tie's wounds would have been long dead. By the time Zhang Tie was hurriedly sent to a field hospital on the frontier by military officers and common soldiers of the Iron-Blood Camp, he had 186 wounds and 47 fractures. After being hit by the LV 8 sky battle qi, his guts were all heavily wounded. Even the amount of blood he lost on the way would have brought two lives to an end.
The moment a doctor of the field hospital caught sight of Zhang Tie, he didn't even give him a second glance. After single one at his thoroughly broken imperial Sharp-Arrow Type-B light lieutenant armor, he had just shaken his head and told those military officers of the Iron-Blood Camp who had sent Zhang Tie here, "This person is dead, no need to save him any more."
Finally, once a great amount of field doctors were threatened by the military officers of the Iron-Blood Camp with sabers to their necks they started working on Zhang Tie.
It was a miracle that he was still not dead. After that, he was transferred to Blapei behind the frontier.
However, there were no more miracles for Zhang Tie. A broken earthen jar would never regain its original look, even if it was repaired. Would be unable to hold the items that it had once contained.
At this moment, Zhang Tie's body was like that earthen jar which was fixed. His bones, guts, muscles, channels, and veins had suffered irreversible wounds. In the future, even though no scars were left on his skin, Zhang Tie would never be the same as before, as that invisible damage not only completely destroyed his cultivation but also would left a lot of painful aftermath.
Zhang Tie's attending doctor told him that he might feel very uncomfortable and greatly pained in many places when the season changed in the future. He told him to pay more attention to his health. When he grew older, after 40 years old, these aftermath would show even more.
'Am I good for nothing now?'
It was actually very easy to test this conclusion. When Zhang Tie could walk, he attempted to sense and polish his burning points.
His head and p*nis were not heavily wounded while the golden swirl of spiritual energy still existed in his mind, the fact which made Zhang Tie feel very lucky.
The Shrine burning point and the three burning points on his spine were as if they had not been ignited at all. Zhang Tie couldn't feel them at all. When he forcefully moved his spiritual energy down towards the burning points in his body, that wisp of spiritual energy dispersed in his body the moment it left his head. No matter how many times he tried, compared to the past when he polished his burning points, this sense of dispersing spiritual energy made him so uncomfortable that he almost spat out a mouthful of blood.
In the past, Zhang Tie felt like his body was a water pipe. The spiritual energy was the water flowing in the water pipe while the burning points were the land to be irrigated. During cultivation, you needed to introduce the water to the burning points through the water pipe. However, this time, Zhang Tie felt that his body was not a water pipe any more, but instead a bamboo-woven basket. It was covered with holes. No matter how much water was poured into this basket, all of it would leak out. You could not use a bamboo basket to irrigate the land at all.
For several days, Zhang Tie dried all of his spiritual energy, but failed to turn the bamboo basket into a water pipe. He could not bring even a drop of his spiritual energy onto his burning points.
He gradually lost hope. The huge and proud spiritual energy in his mind could only be used to practice "Mental Arithmetic by Abacus" now. Even after activating the Trouble-Reappearance Fruits, he was give an alert that his health couldn't bear the spiritual impact from Trouble-Reappearance Fruits. Therefore, they could not be used either.
Zhang Tie felt that he had suddenly become a penniless beggar from a billionaire. If his spiritual energy could not even be used to ignite his Shrine burning point, what could it be used for?
'Is there truly no other way?' Zhang Tie asked himself.
'No, it's not the moment to despair yet.'
A bright light flashed across his mind. He still had the Castle of Black Iron and that marvelous small tree.
At this time, the two items were his final hope that kept him from collapsing spiritually.
After many experts' diagnosis, the hospital's conclusion was that Zhang Tie could only be a commoner who had not ignited Shrine burning points at all. In this age, this conclusion meant that Zhang Tie was a disabled man from then on.
A commoner who hadn't even ignited his Shrine burning point. He would not be able to cultivate, fight, or run as fast as wind with endless strength, neither would he be able to wave that "Man's Certificate" and "Woman's Excellence". He could not even do heavy labor work. Any LV 2 warrior could easily take care of ten Zhang Tie. In the Iron-Horn Army, to tell the truth, Zhang Tie was not even qualified to be the lowest-ranked cannon fodder.
Therefore, Major General Shwartz dispatched Zhang Tie into the Logistics Department and arranged a civilian's post for him.
On the fifth day since Zhang Tie could use a crutch to walk, he was out walking in the garden supported by a nurse. When he returned to his ward, he saw Reinhardt, Guderian, Liu Xing, and some other military officers of the Iron-Blood Camp waiting for him.
"Boss!"
At the sight of them, Zhang Tie became very excited.
Seeing Zhang Tie coming back, all the military officers waiting in the ward revealed a smile and surrounded Zhang Tie.
"How's your body?" Reinhardt patted Zhang Tie's shoulders with a wisp of tiredness at his eye corners.
"Not bad, I can walk now." Saying this, Zhang Tie looked around the military officers in the ward as he failed to see some familiar faces, especially that generous bald tough guy. Zhang Tie's heart suddenly pounded, "Where's First Lieutenant Freo?"
After asking this, Zhang Tie cast a glance over them and noticed that their smiles lacked the generosity and passion that they always had in the usual time. The moment they heard the name Freo, everybody's smile faded away.
"Freo sacrificed that night!" Major Guderian answered Zhang Tie in a low voice.
"How could be that?" Zhang Tie disbelieved that. How could that first lieutenant waving his double axes as fierce as a tiger sacrificed? Zhang Tie remembered that after he threw out his last spear to kill the flute-blowing guy, he could still hear Freo's tiger-like howls on the battle field. At that moment, the Black Feathers Regiment had already present a chaotic situation. As Freo was alive before this chaos, how could he died after that.
"After you were heavily wounded and fell on the ground, in order to save you, First Lieutenant Freo rushed into the encirclement of Black Feathers Regiment. Because our enemy greatly outnumbered us and Freo wanted to protect you, when he picked you up and prepared to retreat, he held back many attacks for you..." In a hoarse voice, First Lieutenant told Zhang Tie about what happened then. At that moment, Reinhardt who wanted to save Zhang Tie was stopped by some high-rank fighters of the enemy while being surrounding by a great number of common soldiers of Black Feathers Regiment. Therefore, he could not break in the encirclement for the time being. As Black Feathers Regiment had determined to kill Zhang Tie, the other members of Iron-Blood Camp could not break in either. Without Freo, Zhang Tie had definitely been slashed into flesh paste.
Freo sacrificed himself for Zhang Tie.
Zhang Tie's tears dropped off in lines...
"Don't be sad, since the moment you caught up with the train in the Blackhot City, everybody in Iron-Blood Camp would like to sacrifice themselves for you like how you would like to sacrifice yourself for everybody of Iron-Blood Camp!"
Hearing Reinhardt's words, Zhang Tie burst out tears like a kid.
...
After the military officers of Iron-Blood Camp came here to visit him, Zhang Tie understood the plot designed by the enemy. That day, all the booty of the Iron-Blood Camp had been sprayed with a strange medicament by the Sun Dynasty, including weapons, armors and coins. People could neither smell nor see that medicament; however, an animal called black fox fed by Sun Dynasty could smell it. With a lot of common soldiers as a bait, Sun Dynasty let Iron-Blood Camp expose the location of its wolf den when they gained a great amount of booty. After knowing their encampment, the enemy dispatched the most terrifying Black Feathers Regiment and gathered superior force that many times more outnumbered than that of Iron-Blood Camp, wanting to totally clear Iron-Blood Camp from that battle zone through a raid in the midnight.
However, the raid failed which gradually turned into an attack by force and finally evolved into a deep-night bloody battle between the elites of Iron-Horn Army and Brilliant Feathers. In this bloody battle, Iron-Blood Camp lost more than 600 people while over 1700 people of Black Feathers Regiment were killed after being chased by Iron-Blood Camp over 20 km.
Given number, the last winner of that battle was Iron-Blood Camp. The total number of the soldiers of Black Feathers Regiment who were fed and trained with secret medicament and other special patterns was less than 10,000 people in the Brilliant Feathers Army. However, Iron-Blood Camp killed 1/5 of the total amount of soldiers of the undying regiment of the Brilliant Feathers Army in that night. From wars between two regiments as a whole, this was a huge victory for Iron-Blood Camp.
If Zhang Tie didn't kill that Double-Moon Muling in black robe who commanded the Black Feathers Regiment by blowing the flute, the final outcome could definitely be that Iron-Blood Camp of No. 39 Division didn't exist any more although over 1700 people of Black Feathers Regiment were killed.
Judging from his military exploits, Zhang Tie was absolutely qualified to be promoted to be a first lieutenant. Nobody would speak ill of him about this promotion.
If Zhang Tie was the youngest second lieutenant of No. 39 Division before, he was already the youngest first lieutenant of Iron-Horn Army at the present.
Now, the Iron-Blood Camp was almost paralyzed, suffering a great fundamental loss. It would take at least 3-4 months' rest and reorganization for Iron-Blood Camp to return to the battle field. For such an elite troop, it was not as easy as just piling up a number of people to recover its combat effectiveness.
"No matter what, you have to live well. Even if you could not go back to the battle field, you have to live well for Freo!" Reinhardt told Zhang Tie before he left.
Zhang Tie knew that his life was not only his own but also Freo's. Therefore, no matter what, even if he was disabled, he had to live well and brilliantly, not only for himself but also for Freo...
In the first month since Zhang Tie came to Kalur battle zone, Zhang Tie experienced four things: becoming the "One-Hundred People Down"; being promoted to be a first lieutenant; being disabled; being dispatched away from the Iron-Blood Camp of No. 39 Division...
In this month, Zhang Tie, at the age of 15, firstly understood the truth of life——Men should be born as summer flowers and die as spring thunders...