The young man looked up abruptly, unable to believe his ears: "Instructor! I... I was just taking a break! I can still run! Why did you eliminate me?"
The surrounding recruits also cast horrified glances, and dozens of eyes were focused on the instructor. What was going on? He was just sitting down because he was tired, and now he was being told to get rid of him?
The instructor looked at him coldly, without a trace of emotion.
"Do hunters stop to rest while hunting? Do hunters stop to catch their breath when being chased? No. Because stopping means death. The moment you stop, your will breaks. A person with a broken will is not a hunter, but prey. We don't breed prey here."
The instructor looked around at the pale-faced trainees.
"Prey deserves to be eliminated. You can get out of here."
The cold, inhuman words made the young man's face turn deathly pale instantly.
This scene was like a bucket of ice water poured over everyone's heads. They finally realized that this was no ordinary military unit; this was a true battlefield where there were no excuses, no room for luck. To stop meant to be eliminated.
At this moment, Qiao Lin also sensed that something was wrong.
She had rushed ahead in her haste to get ahead, and since she hadn't eaten much on the bus, her stomach felt like it was on fire, making her nauseous and her vision started to blur.
She clenched her back teeth tightly, and a bloody taste filled her mouth.
She remembered that she had been punished by being forbidden to eat for three days!
Three days!
Under such life-threatening conditions of off-road driving every day, how can one fast for three days?
Forget about winning first place, she might not even make it to the finish line!
Eliminated? How could Qiao Lin be eliminated! That would be worse than death for her!
"Sister Lin, are you alright? You look terrible." Li Yue ran up to her and asked anxiously.
"I...I'm fine..." Qiao Lin gritted her teeth, her gaze involuntarily wandering along the roadside. She needed food, anything to fill her stomach!
Suddenly, her eyes lit up.
Not far away, in a patch of low bushes by the roadside, she saw clusters of wild berries that were almost purple with red.
The fruit wasn't big, and they were clustered together, looking very fresh and juicy. They looked exactly like the mulberries she used to steal from the hill behind the compound when she was a child!
A thought suddenly popped into my head.
Lei Kuan only mentioned abstaining from food, but didn't say that people weren't allowed to find food on the road, which is a loophole in the rules.
Qiao Lin was overjoyed. She felt incredibly clever; there was always a way out.
Suppressing her overwhelming joy, she winked at Li Yue and Zhang Man, deliberately slowed her pace, and fell to the side of the group. Taking advantage of the instructor's inattention, she ducked down, reached out with lightning speed, and quickly grabbed a handful of fruit, stuffing it into the pocket of her training uniform.
After doing all this, she looked around guiltily and breathed a sigh of relief when she found that no one was paying attention to her. A layer of cold sweat had already broken out on her back.
She resisted the urge to immediately stuff the fruit into her mouth, her hands tightly covering the fruit in her pockets, feeling their slightly uneven shapes, planning to sneak away and eat them when she was in a secluded place.
These fruits were her hope for turning things around.
Zhang Man, who was wearing glasses, took in Qiao Lin's subtle movements. She frowned almost imperceptibly, but said nothing.
She thought Qiao Lin's behavior was stupid; the risks and rewards were completely disproportionate, and she was practically playing with her future.
After running for about another kilometer, a fork in the road suddenly appeared ahead of the group.
One was a wide, flat dirt road that wound its way into the distant mountain valley, and it looked like a long journey.
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