<>At his first day of school, Arima fell asleep in the second period and was lectured by the teacher. After that incident, Scatha seriously started to teach Arima about respect toward the teacher. In just a few days, Arima had turned extremely respectful each time he was facing a teacher.
Arima could only do that as Scatha told him that he would need to attend school until he was eighteen if he didn"t follow that rule. After some time, Arima also realized that Scatha had already totally "tamed" him. He wondered when and how she managed to do that but he knew that he felt natural respect for her.
In his school time, Arima was quite successful with teachers since he always had perfect grades and att.i.tude. He even was quite appreciated by his cla.s.s member. The guys would find that it was quite enjoyable to be with him and the girls were not an expectation as Arima was quite popular.
Of course, everyone spent their school days with Arima without knowing that they were learning along with a soldier. Nothing really impactful occurred in Arima"s schooling, he just had a cla.s.sic life while sometimes departing in mission with his squad. His absences were always directly covered by the princ.i.p.al himself.
Something particular only happened after half a month after he entered school. He was just walking home when he pa.s.sed by a park and witnessed something. His eyes narrowed as he saw a group of kids beating a small dog for fun.
Arima"s expression twitched and he restrained himself from drawing the gun he always kept in his jacket. He walked toward the group and grabbed the dog. He glanced at the kids who were staring at him "Scram" He said coldly but the twelve-year-old kids just mocked him and laughed.
Of course, that would be the normal reaction. Only people who once experienced an actual battlefield could understand the killing intent escaping Arima"s eyes. That detail was something the children didn"t understand, but an old man who was sitting on a bench no far, pushed his gla.s.ses to look at Arima with his dark eyes.
Arima clicked his tongue and kicked the first kid without letting the pup go. He obviously held back but the idiot who he kicked flew before falling unconscious on the ground. The other kids finally reacted as they should and paled. They couldn"t understand threats but they were intelligent enough to escape the pain.
That thought disgusted Arima even more as he thought of the small animal they were just beating "As I said, scram" He repeated and the last ones ran away. Arima then inspected the dog"s state and sighed in relief when he saw he had nothing broken.
He then suddenly turned around and grabbed an object flying at him, he looked at it and frowned "Use it" A hoa.r.s.e voice said and Arima spotted the old man walking with a cane. The object he had thrown was a disinfectant spray for light injuries.
Arima nodded "Thanks" He said and treated the dog quickly.
The old man grinned "You"re an interesting child. Why were you so angry? They"re just kids" He asked.
"They got on my nerves, that"s all. Even if they"re too immature to understand that what they"re doing is immoral, a small amount of fear and pain will wake them. At least," Arima paused and carried the dog "That"s what I need to calm myself when I see something like that" He snickered and pointed at the dog in his arms "This little fellow is ten times worth their lives for me" He added and left.
"…I see, quite interesting indeed" The old man chuckled when Arima left and also walked out from the park too.
The same day, Arima brought back the dog to his home and decided to keep him after he checked that there wasn"t any collar or electronic card. He was a small white Labrador and Arima called him Rocky.
"He"s cute" Scatha said as she rubbed the dog"s ears. She looked at Arima and smiled "You have to take care of him" She said.
Arima nodded "Sure, don"t worry" And then, from that day onwards, nothing really changed in Arima"s life. He continued to go to school and spent time with his dog while also learning blacksmithing with Scatha. Although he underwent missions with his squad a least once every two months, it had already become something natural for him that it could be qualified as a normal thing.
Then, three years later, when Arima was sixteen, he was suddenly called by Moria along with the entire squad and announced that they had a new mission. But this time, it was something a lot different from all of the previous times.
"This time, we"re targeting something a lot bigger than we ever did" Moria declared "Of course, we won"t be alone for this. As you all know, no army is always united in every kind of way. Our special division was basically hired by another but we don"t have the right to refuse since the higher-ups had already accepted even before I learned about it" He said and shook his head.
"So, what are the details?" Erin asked.
"We will be going against a true military facility this time. With tough defenses and trained soldiers" Moria said and used a small device to project a map on the wall of the room. The image displayed an island located in the middle of the ocean.
Jin frowned "What is this? It"s not even in any border. Are we attacking some kind of secret organization or independent force?" He couldn"t help but inquire and he wasn"t the only one wishing for an explanation.
Moria lit up a cigarette with dead eyes and sighed "Listen, we don"t know. These days, the biggest powers are Russia, US, and China. That island is obviously not ours, so, we can suppose, it"s either Russia or China"s propriety. Anyway, our mission is to check things out, look at what the facility is, and then destroy it if it"s necessary" He said.
"Actually, this island was found in our radars a few days ago only and to be honest with you all, I think it"s a bit fishy. You can call it a trap, but at the same time, a trap like this feels weird. In the end, we can only go inspect ourselves. We will be accompanied by multiple others squads like ours and we will improvise there" Moria finished and waved his hand before leaving the room "We leave in two days, gather at the vault by the morning"
Erin fell into deep thought and also sighed "We have to be careful everyone. At least," He paused and went to the exit too "We need to survive" He said and left the room.
The rest of the squad engraved those words in their minds and all followed their captain. Arima stayed alone in the reunion room and projected the image from before one more time. He sat down on a chair and stared at the outline of the island and what the satellite had managed to map. He had nothing else to do, so he thought that he could maybe spend some time memorizing this and see if he could get some useful information.
At the same time, Tieria came back in front of the door and looked inside. She came back after she noticed that Arima didn"t follow everyone. When she saw him inside the meeting room, she was a bit surprised but then entered and sat down beside him, looking at the projection too.
Arima looked wide-eyed at her and then smiled wryly as he concentrated on the map again.
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"Take this" Two days later, when Arima was supposed to leave with his squad, Scatha handed him a folded clothing. When Arima took in in his hands, he was surprised by its weight. He unfolded it and ended up with a long black coat which had throwing-knives in the interior pockets.
"What is this?" He asked while touching the material.
"It"s a custom coat I commanded" Scatha smiled "It"s bulletproof, heat and cold resistant, with exactly twenty hidden pockets, and made with Eion refined plaited silk"
Arima listened and gaped at the coat for a moment. He only wore it after a minute of contemplation "For now it"s still a bit too big, but you"ll grow up" Scatha added.
"Mm" Arima tried to move a bit and then took one of the knives out of the pockets. He played with it a little and noticed a small b.u.t.ton on it "What is this?"
Scatha smirked "A pin" She answered and Arima trembled. He slowly put back the knife in his pocket and sighed.
"You could have told me before I started messing around with it" He stared at her mother and complained.
Scatha chuckled a bit "I just wanted to see your reaction. Don"t worry. That"s something I made. To explode, the point of the blade needs to hit something or else, you"ll need to press the b.u.t.ton after thirty seconds pa.s.sed" She explained "They are Eion charged. They"re quite expensive, use it wisely. I"ll teach you how to make them later"
Arima wryly smiled and nodded. He said goodbye to Scatha and caressed Rocky before leaving the home. He had been given a bike for his sixteenth birthday. It was a futuristic looking bike with a clean and polished frame, propelled with Eion. For Arima"s ident.i.ty, it was normal to have Eion energy in his daily life. But in the last years, the government made great advances on the plan to give Eion energy to the general public.
Arima put on his riding gla.s.ses and directly went to the orphanage out of the town. When he arrived, he joined with some members of the squad and went to the armory with them.
The rest of the squad had already started to gather their equipment there and Arima also began. He took his rifle, as always, and then went with a semi-auto magnum for his second weapon. The squad also didn"t need night vision equipment anymore. The latest nanomachines had already taken care of that "problem".
Arima took his last weapon, a knife, and went back to the entrance while playing with it "What is that coat?" Tiria asked directly when she saw Arima.
"It looks like a custom cloth for combat. Can I look at it?" Tieria also joined the conversation and asked.
"Sure" Arima smiled and took off his coat. Tieria admired the work along with the squad members.
"It must be cool to have a mother who has connections in renowned and even secret military facilities" Jin commented.
"Yeah…" Gano wryly said.
"You even have Eion explosive knives, those are hard to make and are quite expensive" Jin added as he looked through the pockets of the coat.
"Yeah, yeah" Arima grabbed his coat back and put in on again "It"s enough "looking"" He declared and the squad lightly laughed.
Later, when Erin and Moria both checked that everyone was there, the squad left the orphanage and didn"t go to an airport this time but directly went by helicopter to the nearest harbor.
It was a harbor just in the name as it was a military facility. Moria led everyone inside one of the hangars when he talked to the commandant of that place.
When the members of the squad saw what was inside the building, their expectations were actually crushed by something bigger. They thought that they were going to go by boat, but the vehicle they were presented with was a compact submarine.
"…I never boarded a submarine" Jin said with a complaining, and kind of stressed tone.
"Most of us, Jin" Farro retorted when he heard him.
"I can"t swim, and I have a fear of deep water…" Jin added and everyone made a silent prayer for him.
"Let"s go" Moria ignored Jin"s pleads and opened the hatch before entering the submarine. The squad followed him and Jin entered last with a darkened expression.