I enlisted four times! My former unit blacklisted me.

Lin Xia hung up the phone, stuffed it back into her white coat pocket, and the glint in her eyes resembled that of a butcher standing in front of a meat counter.

She turned around and walked towards the nurses' station.

At the nurses' station, medic Xiao Liu was organizing IV records when she saw Lin Xia approaching. She asked, "Sister Xia, what's got you so happy? Did your boyfriend call?"

"My brother," Lin Xia said.

"Your brother? The one who's a medic in the Third Regiment? What did he say? Why are you laughing like that?"

"He told me to give each of his soldiers a pig's needle."

Xiao Liu was dumbfounded: "For a brother to give his own sister this kind of instruction, isn't there at least some personal grudge involved?"

"No way," Lin Xia smiled sweetly. "My brother is a medic. He cares about his comrades' health and asked me to give them some extra nutrition. Giving them glucose and vitamins is just a normal thing."

After saying that, Lin Xia took out the pig needle.

The needle was long and thick, gleaming silver, like a small javelin.

"Brother Feng, don't blame me for being rough. My brother said you and your men are all going to get a beating today."

With a sweet smile on her face, she carefully put away the needle, then took out several disposable syringes and quickly prepared.

A passing nurse, seeing her commotion, couldn't help but ask, "Lin Xia, what are you doing? Giving an elephant an injection?"

"Give injections to people who get dizzy from running," Lin Xia said.

"Giving someone who's dizzy from running such a big needle? This isn't treating an illness, it's adding to their punishment!"

"Sis, you don't understand. When someone is dizzy from running, their muscles are numb, and you can't even insert a small needle."

"Only with a large needle can you penetrate that numb muscle layer and actually inject the medicine. That's science."

Nurse:"……"

In the ward.

Zhao Yihang was the first to wake up.

To be precise, he didn't wake up naturally; he woke up from hunger.

The little bit of food I ate last night had long been used up during the 15-kilometer cross-country run, and now my empty stomach walls were rubbing against each other frantically, emitting a mournful sound that only someone who was starving could hear.

Zhao Yihang opened his eyes groggily. The first thing he saw was a white ceiling, then the edge of the iron-framed bed, and then an IV tube hanging from the side of the bed.

He froze for a moment.

"Am I in... the medical team?"

Then the memories came flooding back like a tide.

Fifteen kilometers.

Red bricks.

Hao Qiang fainted.

Sun Dawei was stunned.

As I was running, I saw Brother Feng, and then...

Zhao Yihang suddenly sat up.

"I've broken through!"

The shout startled Qian Kun, who was standing next to him, so much that he almost fell off the bed.

Qian Kun was still dreaming of fighting a plate of braised pork knuckle when he was startled awake by the shout. When he opened his eyes, he saw Zhao Yihang sitting upright on the bed like a mummy who had come back from the dead, his eyes shining like lamps.

"What the hell did you call me...?" Qian Kun rubbed his eyes. "I was just having a dream, and you scared the pork knuckle off my plate!"

"Old Qian! I broke through! I really broke through! I'm dizzy from running!" Zhao Yihang excitedly patted the bed, the IV tube shaking wildly with his movements.

"So what if you broke through? What does that have to do with me... Wait, are you dizzy from running?" Qian Kun's eyes widened suddenly, then his face lit up with the same ecstatic joy. "You're dizzy from running? What about me? Am I dizzy too?"

"You must have been dizzy too! Didn't Brother Feng say that we all need to break through our limits? Think about it, during that last part, you were running and then you lost consciousness, right?"

Qian Kun thought about it carefully.

He remembered running until his lungs felt like they were going to explode, then Feng shouted something beside him, and then everything went black...

Then, he dreamed of a fragrant roast chicken.

"Holy crap! I broke through too!" Qian Kun trembled with excitement, suddenly sitting up in bed. But the movement was so abrupt that his head was buzzing, his vision went black, and he slumped back onto the pillow. "Ouch... my head is so dizzy..."

"It's normal, it's normal. Everyone's like this after a breakthrough." Zhao Yihang grinned. "Brother Feng said that after running yourself dizzy, waking up feels like being reborn."

"Don't you feel incredibly light and refreshed right now?"

"What a load of rubbish." Qian Kun lay on the bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. "I feel like someone has stirred my brain with a rolling pin."

"Also, my butt hurts so much. Did you guys hit my butt with a brick while I was unconscious?"

"Your butt hurts because you ran 15 kilometers and strained your hamstring muscles."

Ma Teng's voice drifted from the next bed, "My butt hurts, my back hurts, my waist hurts, my back hurts, my whole body hurts. But I broke through, so it's worth the pain!"

The two of them turned to look at Ma Teng at the same time.

Ma Teng had been awake for a while and was leaning against the headboard.

"Brothers! Our elite class, today, has achieved a breakthrough for everyone!"

"Except for Brother Feng..." Qian Kun said.

"Brother Feng has definitely broken through too," Zhao Yihang said confidently. "Think about it, when has Brother Feng ever fallen behind? He led us through the race, and we were all dizzy from exhaustion, so how could he not be? Based on Brother Feng's usual style, he's definitely the strongest one!"

"What about Hao Qiang?" Qian Kun asked.

"Hao Qiang, counts as half," Ma Teng said with a sly smile. "After all, we forced him to break through. Although the process was a bit brutal, the result was good."

"Good my ass..." A weak, almost inaudible voice came from the hospital bed in the far corner.

The voice was dry and hoarse, sending chills down the spine of anyone who heard it.

The three people who were excitedly discussing something turned their heads at the same time.

Hao Qiang lay on the bed, his face as white as a freshly painted wall.

His lips were chapped, his eyes were half-open, and his dark circles were so heavy they looked like he was wearing smoky makeup.

"Brother Qiang! You're awake!" Zhao Yihang chuckled. "Look, we were just talking about you! You broke through the fastest, you're the number one contributor to our top class!"

"Heroes...heh..." Hao Qiang forced out two gasps from his throat, sounding worse than crying, "Can you...stay away from me...I'm going to die..."

"Brother Qiang, how can you talk like that! You're the fastest runner in the whole regiment, you ran thirteen kilometers, that's even longer than our regiment's record!"

"Fifteen kilometers...heh..." Hao Qiang's voice was even weaker. "When I had run eight kilometers...I was already exhausted...the remaining five kilometers...you guys had to carry me..."

"We're supporting you while you run, so you're still running!" Ma Teng said seriously. "Brother Qiang, you need to understand, on the battlefield, if you can be supported while running thirteen kilometers, it means you're still salvageable. People who are truly beyond saving can't even be supported!"

"Then thank you..." Hao Qiang closed his eyes, and a tear seemed to glisten in the corner of his eye. "I, Hao Qiang, have been a soldier for so many years, and I have never been so humiliated."

"I'd rather have died on the track than be dragged to the finish line like a dead dog by you guys..."

"You can't say that!" Zhao Yihang said. "Brother Qiang, think about it carefully. Although you were being dragged along, your body definitely pushed its limits!"

"Once you've recovered in a couple of days, you'll find your physical fitness has improved dramatically, and your 5km time will improve by at least half a minute!"

Hao Qiang slowly opened his eyes and looked at Zhao Yihang with an expression that seemed to strain even when looking at a mental patient: "Thank you. But could you please take my leg off the IV stand first? My leg is numb."

Only then did the group realize that Hao Qiang's leg was propped up on the IV stand in an extremely bizarre position, like a pig's leg hanging from a leash.

That leg had long since gone numb.