Book 3, Chapter 213: Given A Position

The person Advisor Pei mentioned was Chen Bitong, the martial artist close to becoming a martial arts master.

Chen Chuan remembered that before coming here, Liang Guanghai had told him that his mission was to keep an eye out on this person.

Back then, he had said that he would assign Chen Chuan to the area where he would fight. Chen Chuan wouldn’t even need to do anything intentionally. All he had to do was observe him and pay attention to his actions.

Chen Chuan had thought that he might be assigned to some other person’s team. Then, after some time and some missions, he would be sent to Chen Bitong’s team. That way, things would progress in a natural manner. He hadn’t expected to get a chance to get close to him so soon.

The higher-ups didn’t need him to do anything for now, so Chen Chuan didn’t feel any sort of pressure. He could just use this chance to observe Chen Bitong.

“I understand,” he said.

Advisor Pei became much more relaxed after hearing this. He sat back down, picked up his teacup, and motioned for Chen Chuan to have a taste. “Captain Chen, after you’re officially promoted to a squad captain, you’ll have the right to form your own team. You’ll need at least two Class One Officers to lead two different units, and they will need two members under them.

“Since you’ve just come to the merged space, we’ll give you some time to adapt to the situation.

“Use it to recruit your members. You can do it through the official platform or invite them personally, but the requirement for them to join your team is signing the NDA.

“If you can’t find anyone suitable, you can apply to the higher-ups. They’ll assign any missing members you need to form a full team.

“You don’t have to worry about that. If you’re displeased with some of your team members, you can reject them, as long as you have at least two units that can carry out missions.

“If you can’t find suitable team members, I suggest using members the higher-ups can assign to you. You can always remove them from your team later. A number of people do that.”

“Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll think about it,” Chen Chuan said.

“If you have any questions, feel free to ask me,” Advisor Pei then said with a smile.

Chen Chuan nodded at that.

They drank tea for a while. When they finished discussing things, he said goodbye to Advisor Pei and returned to his room with the metal box.

After putting the box on the table, he opened it and saw special medicine inside, but it wasn’t in liquid form, like the ones he got from Border Fusion. Instead, it was in the form of green paste that came in tubes.

The special medicines had different grades. The ones issued by the base were pretty similar to the ones from Border Fusion, though the ones given by the base could be stored long-term. They were also packaged in smaller doses and were more standardized to make them easier to trade.

But apparently, the government and mega corporations had better quality special medicine. Chen Chuan did not know the conditions to get it from the mega corporations, but only people who had reached a certain rank in the government could get it from them.

He contacted his team members and said, “Come to my room for a bit.”

Soon, he heard knocking on his door. When he opened it, Yuan Qiuyuan and Qin Qingque saluted him. “Captain!”

He returned their salute and asked them to come into his room and sit down. Then, he said, “The higher-ups have distributed special medicine for us. I asked you two to come here so that I could distribute it.”

Yuan Qiuyuan was stunned for a moment, then his face lit up in delight. “They already gave it to us?”

His eyes sparkled as he stared at the medicine in the metal box. He remembered his sister speaking about waiting for a long time after each mission to receive the special medicine. The longest instance dragged on for several months, so he hadn’t expected the higher-ups to send it to them any time soon.

“This is a special case because someone from the top brass gave the order to send it to us,” Chen Chuan said and poured a glass of water for Yuan Qiuyuan and Qin Qingque.

Once he sat down, he said, “Let’s distribute the medicine based on our contributions for the mission.

“Here’s what I was thinking. We should each take 25% of the medicine, while the final 25% will be left as a future reward for the unit. If anyone performs outstandingly during future missions, they will get the remaining 25%. If you have any suggestions, feel free to bring them up. What I proposed isn’t set in stone. We can slowly perfect the distribution system according to what happens in the future.”

“I think you’re getting too little, Captain. Without you, we wouldn’t have been able to kill the Iron Monster. How could you get the same amount of special medicine as us?” Yuan Qiuyuan challenged.

Qin Qingque agreed with him. She believed that she hadn’t done enough during the mission to get this much special medicine.

“We’re a unit. If we get stronger as a whole, it’ll benefit all of us. I don’t think I’m giving you more than necessary. If you think of it that way, though, do your best to get stronger so that you can contribute more in the future,” Chen Chuan said.

He had the medicine from Border Fusion, so his needs were met. He really didn’t need more of this special medicine. Besides, the amount of special medicine they could get from missions really wasn’t that high.

He used one special medicine once every two to three days, so 25% of the special medicine in the box would last him for around half a month. Even if he got more of it, it wouldn’t make that much of a difference to him. It would be better for his team members to get more so that they could get stronger.

“If that’s the case, you should take the remaining 25% we’re keeping as a reward. You killed the Iron Monster, and we’re both fine with you taking it,” Yuan Qiuyuan suggested.

“I agree with him,” Qin Qingque stated seriously.

Chen Chuan was a decisive person, so he just nodded and said, “Alright. Then, we’ll settle the distribution this way.” He split up the special medicine accordingly.

Once the two got their rewards, they saluted him. “Thank you, Captain.”

Aside from the medicine, the higher-ups had also issued them monetary rewards, but that wasn’t important compared to the special medicine.

Third Limit martial artists had too many ways to earn money. Those who came here mostly wanted the special medicine and to get stronger.

As for recruiting more team members, this wasn’t a good place for that due to the lack of resources. The merged space only had enough resources to maintain basic communications and the storage of information. It couldn’t support Chen Chuan logging onto the official platform, so he could only do that after he left.

Two more days passed, and the official order for Chen Chuan’s unit was finally issued. The fort organized a simple appointment ceremony for Chen Chuan in the briefing hall.

Yuan Qiuyuan found himself longing for this. Getting promoted to a Class Two Officer simply got his information updated. He did not get a ceremony to celebrate his promotion.

Officer Yao, an aide-de-camp, had come to perform Chen Chuan’s ceremony. According to procedure, he helped Chen Chuan put on the squad captain’s uniform. It was made in the style of a military overcoat, which looked like a cloak. It was really cool and set him apart from the soldiers around him.

After that, Officer Yao gave Chen Chuan a new sword, and Chen Chuan immediately secured it at his waist. Officer Yao examined Chen Chuan decked in his military overcoat and with a sword by his hip and nodded. The crowd clapped and cheered.

Yuan Qiuyuan turned to Qin Qingque and said, “The captain sure looks cool in that uniform.”

Qin Qingque nodded.

Officer Yao then took out a sealed handgun and handed it to Chen Chuan. “Captain Chen, Commander Qiao has sent you this gun as a present. Take it. He has high hopes for you.”

Chen Chuan took it with both hands and said, “Please thank him for me.”

“I will,” Officer Yao said with a smile.

After the ceremony, Chen Chuan returned to his room. He removed the holster and found a black handgun inside. It had a simple design and seemed just like a normal gun.

It was a Stellar Handgun.

Chen Chuan recognized it instantly because of its fame.

It belonged to the first batch of military-grade handguns that underground firearms manufacturers had produced during the fight to topple over the royal family. These handguns were also used to execute the royal family. Its pictures were printed in all the textbooks, so it was impossible for Chen Chuan to not recognize it.

Hence, the handgun held great meaning and commemorative value. Many senior military officers loved having them. Even though it was no different from any other handgun, it was quite rare in the market.

It had to be stored properly.

Chen Chuan recognized that the gun itself wasn’t the true gift. Instead, Commander Qiao had stated his stance by this action.

I’m putting a lot of value in this person.

This would let Chen Chuan avoid a lot of trouble.

Commander Qiao might really be regarding Chen Chuan favorably, but he could also be doing this just to make it easier for Chen Chuan to carry out his mission.

In any case, it wasn’t a bad thing.

Chen Chuan took some time admiring the gun before putting it back into its holster. Just then, he received a message on his Realm Pass.

It came from the Logistics Department. They had finished repairing the Iron Monster’s spear, so he could retrieve it whenever he wanted.

The Iron Monster’s long spear had a high collector’s value, so he had asked the soldiers in charge of weapons maintenance to repair it.

Since it was a mutated weapon, it should have been a difficult task, but while inspecting it, they noticed that the mutated tissue had withered away. Because of that, they didn’t need to consider much else and could just reconnect the broken parts.

Chen Chuan set aside the handgun, removed his sword, walked out of his room, and went to the Logistics Department.

Along the way, Yuan Qiuyuan called him, and said quite excitedly, “Captain, did you hear that Instructor Chen is going to come to Fort 4 tomorrow? You must have heard of him before, right?”

“Of course I have,” Chen Chuan said.

Instructor Chen was, of course, Chen Bitong. He had once been an instructor in the merged space training martial artists. Chen Bitong had also refused promotions over the past twenty years, so his rank wasn’t high, which is why most people referred to him as “Instructor Chen.”

“I heard that Instructor Chen is on a break from the front lines, and whenever he passes by a fort, he stays for a few days to teach the younger officers. We’re talking about Instructor Chen here. If we can get a few tips from him, it’d be great. I heard that Fort 4 is going to throw a welcoming ceremony for him tomorrow. Are you going?” Yuan Qiuyuan continued excitedly.

Chen Chuan knew that while the higher-ups had assigned Yuan Qiuyuan and Qin Qingque to his team, they didn’t know about his mission. It was to prevent any slip-ups caused by too many people knowing about the mission.

However, setting aside the suspicious aspects about Chen Bitong, he was famous among the young martial artists in the rear. He had fans everywhere, and it seemed like Yuan Qiuyuan was one of them.

“I’ll be there tomorrow,” Chen Chuan replied.