Chapter 73: A Guaranteed Third-class Merit
The team members had trained tirelessly for four months, day and night for four months.
They had been waiting for this day.
No one wanted to be the one eliminated.
Therefore, when Gao Cheng ordered the competition through the match, with survival of the fittest and competition for positions.
The eighteen team members faced brothers who had endured hardships together and struggled through difficulties, yet at this moment they could only treat them as opponents, with very complex emotions.
They both did not want to go through such a cruel thing, whether eliminating others or eliminating themselves.
At the same time, deep in their hearts there was also a refusal to admit defeat; they had persevered for four months and were just waiting to go to the regiment to compete, not wanting to fall before this final step.
After a period of intense ideological work, everyone finally recognized their own hearts clearly.
Three words—
Don’t want to lose!
For the honor of Steel Seventh Company, and also to not let down their own efforts and dedication, they had no choice but to give their all, holding nothing back in a decisive battle.
This was respect for themselves, and even more so respect for their opponents.
Chen Jun, this special training captain, was not included; among the seventeen team members, eight had to be eliminated, with an elimination rate reaching the terrifying 47 percent.
That meant eliminating half.
Such a frighteningly high elimination rate was just a screening for outsiders, but it was different for the special training team members.
This was a life-and-death battle!
Therefore, to obtain the qualification to join the competition team, all seventeen team members brought out their full strength, and no one dared to slack off even slightly.
There had been no assessments for four months, so Gao Cheng did not know the team members’ results.
As a result, when the competition elimination match began, the improvements brought by the four months in the hell furnace truly caught Gao Cheng off guard.
It made the corners of his mouth almost grin to his ears!
Gao Cheng knew the special training results would definitely improve, but he never imagined they would improve so greatly, so much that he thought he was dreaming.
Not to mention shooting at the target like they were possessed, with eight out of ten people able to score full marks.
Whether it was the sniper rifle’s 500-meter precision shooting, where Cheng Cai hit the ten-ring with all five shots, effortlessly achieving full rings.
Or the rifle’s 150-meter precision shooting, where two out of the three contenders scored full marks of 100 rings.
Even for the vehicle-mounted machine gun’s precision shooting, with ten bullets in two-round burst fire, there were team members who performed beyond standard, achieving a heaven-defying result of all first shots hitting the bullseye and the second shots all within the eight-ring.
Even though the shooting distance was only fifty meters, the vehicle was moving at thirty kilometers per hour, and even single shots hitting the target tested skill greatly.
Not to mention two-round bursts, completing the rare feat of all first shots hitting.
The machine gunner team member who performed so excellently was Wu Liu Yi, the No. 2 seed competitor who ranked second only to Chen Jun in the baseline test and in the number of events participated.
The other two team members’ results were also not bad.
Their two-round bursts had no misses, and the bullet holes were distributed very tightly, all concentrated within the eight-ring, with ring counts only a few less than Wu Liu Yi.
And the three machine gunners performed so excellently in this event.
It was thanks to Chen Jun, during the special training period, who specifically arranged balance shooting training for them targeting the extremely difficult-to-control characteristic of vehicle-mounted shooting.
In the early stage, holding rifles on a specially made large swing; in the mid-stage, holding rifles and aiming on a swaying large swing; in the late stage, live-fire shooting on a swaying large swing.
Even swaying on a vehicle could not compare to the swing’s sway.
Being able to shoot steadily on a swaying swing naturally made it easy on a vehicle.
The machine gunners each turned into sharpshooters; Cheng Cai, who was named by Gao Cheng to train pistol and dynamic shooting, as well as another reserve competitor, both performed notably in the test.
They had almost achieved the terrifying result of every shot on target, starting from 45 rings.
Pistol target shooting becomes very difficult beyond 25 meters.
Regular troops use 25-meter precision targets; at 50 meters, they only aim for hits on target, and as long as they hit the target it’s fine, yet even five shots on target is very difficult.
80 meters exceeds the effective range, meaning the range for point-and-shoot; it requires shooting parabolas for prediction, with difficulty at least several times higher than 50 meters.
It is generally only used in the all-army grand competition or sharp knife troops’ competitions.
The mid-year grand competition organized by T Division this time, at the highest difficulty of 80 meters, still required contestants to shoot for precision.
It was truly difficult on top of difficult.
They probably never imagined full rings would appear, after all, this difficulty was too great; even 40 rings would give a chance to contend for first.
This was also why, during the initial baseline test, Chen Jun scored 49 rings, nearly shocking Gao Cheng’s jaw off, giving him confidence that this event was secure.
And with all shooting results performing brilliantly, Gao Cheng was truly enlightened, feeling for the first time that shooting at the target seemed quite simple.
Of course.
This was just Gao Cheng’s momentary illusion; in reality, the difficulty was always there.
After all, Steel Seventh Company’s full year of shooting in the past had fewer full rings on the field combined than appeared on the target range today.
Almost everyone could hit full rings, which was truly unbelievable.
Shooting at the target was already perverted enough, shocking Gao Cheng numb with one full ring after another, but then coming to the military gymnastics subjects, Gao Cheng began to think he was dreaming.
Because one result after another was simply perverted.
Under the unique methods that once cut straight to the point and doubled training effects, the special training team members had all made leaping improvements in these four months.
What is leaping?
That is breaking conventions, astonishingly heavenly.
To enter the competition team, the team members’ strength at this moment had all reached life’s peak, with explosive confidence in themselves.
Once on the parade ground running, they all turned red-eyed, each like a wolf starved for a month.
Others gave their best; they went all out desperately.
The four team members in the 3 kilometer sprint prelims, the slowest all broke through to under 10 minutes.
Chen Jun was a seed competitor and did not participate in the elimination.
Even though the 3 kilometer sprint was unarmed running, this speed was already extremely exaggerated in the troops, reaching the national level three athlete standard.
Last year’s entire regiment 3 kilometer sprint, all competitors had only one who broke through to under 10 minutes.
The final result was nine minutes fifty-eight seconds.
And Steel Seventh Company’s four competitors all surpassed him; the slowest had nine minutes fifty-four seconds, and the fastest Wu Liu Yi even reached nine minutes zero five seconds.
This result once again broke the regiment record.
It was only ten seconds slower than the entire T Division 3 kilometer sprint division record of eight minutes fifty-five seconds, with the gap already very close.
If Wu Liu Yi exploded a bit more, he might break the entire division record.
That would surely be a third-class merit!
Chen Jun, as the No. 1 seed competitor and captain, did not take the field to participate in the 3 kilometer sprint.
But recalling a few months ago on this parade ground, Chen Jun had tied Wu Liu Yi purely on hard power, everyone believed Chen Jun’s strength would not be inferior to Wu Liu Yi.
And what the actual result would be, even Chen Jun himself did not know.
