The Legendary F Rank

"Don't mind him; He's just a little bit mad. I heard he killed his whole family a while back and was sentenced to mandatory military service to repent for his crimes. Don't worry, though. He can't harm anyone even if he wanted to. They have one of those tracking collars on him, and it restricts his magic somewhat, so he doesn't try anything stupid."  An older looking man on the bunk beside Haru's whispered over as he heard the interaction between the two of them.

"Is that so? Well, thanks for the info." Haru said as he folded his jackets in half and lay them on one of the shelves inside the locker.

"Not at all. I'm here to help, after all. The names Rito I'm the bunk keeper here, so I know everything that goes on here. You're the new guy. I heard that Captain Liegan was nice to you. What's that about? Did you know here before you arrived here?" The man asked while stroking his beard, seemingly thinking about all the possibilities that would explain why she was nice to Haru.

"No, that was the first time I met here. I bet she just thought that we were similar since we are both bodies enhancing mages. Major Samson asked me to deliver a letter to her a few minutes ago and believe me. That attitude changed drastically. When there's no one else around, she is a real bitch." Haru began to say as the door to the room opened up again, and everyone went quiet. 

"Room inspection." A voice called out as the man who was the first to aim a gun at Haru came into the room with a wooden cane by his side. Everyone ran to the end of their beds and stood at attention before giving a salute as he walked across the room, slowly looking at everyone's lockers. 

All of the soldiers, including Haru, stood silently and watched as he made his way to the far corner of the room. 

"What do we have here then? Private Kitagawa, was it? Why is your locker half empty and your clothes are lying across your bed? Do you not know the basic rules of organising your locker? You were supposed to take the clothes and put them in your locker. Do you need me to teach you how to do it!?" The bloody sergeant shouted out as he saw that Haru still hadn't put his belongings away. 

"But I was just doing that before you entered the room, Sir," Haru said in protest but still stayed respectful enough that he couldn't be punished for being rude, but his words fell upon deaf ears.

"Silence, Private! I won't have any back chatting in my army. You do what you are told. Do you understand?!" The bloody sergeant yelled out as Haru tried to explain what had happened, but as he did, another voice was heard muttering as he stopped yelling. 

"I wish you would just shut up. You're lucky, really. If I didn't have this thing around my neck, I would shut you up for good. But if I do that now, it would be signing my own death sentence." The man who was sitting by the window and practising black magic spoke to himself quietly as he was still sitting in the same place he was before.

"What was that? Care to speak louder?" The man asked with a smirk across his face like he was waiting all day for someone to question his authority. 

"I was just saying that he is too loud. Why would he still talk if I said he was loud? It doesn't make sense. What do you think?" The man who was sitting by the window turned his head and asked Haru what he thought.

"Well, I think it was a reasonable request. You might have just phrased it wrong. I think what you said was pretty rude." Haru replied casually as the bloody sergeant looked back and forth between the two of them in disbelief. He couldn't actually believe that not one but two soldiers were talking during an inspection.

"Is that any way to act during an inspection? Don't you know how this is supposed to go? Let me walk you through this. I come into the room. You all shut up and stop what you're doing and come to greet me with a salute. Then I walk through the room and make sure everything is in place. You don't talk. You're not supposed to talk!" The bloody sergeant yelled as Haru, and the man conversed over him. 

Jake watched from the opposite side of the room and sighed.

'Why couldn't he just shut up? This isn't a school, this is the army, and when he signed the paperwork, he agreed that he would accept any punishment that was given to him.'

"Well, I was asked a question, Sir. I couldn't just ignore a fellow soldier." Haru smiled, but as soon as he spoke, a laugh came from the mouth of the older man in the bunk next to his. 

"That's it! All of you are on cleaning duty for the next week. You can thank your new bunkmate for that. Private Kitagawa, Private Oren, Come with me now!" The bloody sergeant shouted out as he ordered Haru and the man who practised black magic outside into the corridor.

"Yes, sir," Haru replied with a sigh, expecting that he would be shouted at or taken to Major Samson for some kind of punishment. 

"Whatever," Private Orin sighed as he followed Haru and the bloody sergeant out of the room.

But unlike what Haru suspected, they carried on walking. He thought that they would just go outside to be spoken to. But it seemed that the bloody sergeant was going to take it up with Major Samson. Haru felt a little bit of regret that he disobeyed the orders, but he wondered why he should follow the orders of someone he didn't respect.

But Haru quickly became lost for answers as they walked past the Major's office and out into the courtyard where it had begun to rain.

The bloody sergeant came to a stop outside in the courtyard and then turned to face both Haru and Private Orin before shouting once again. 

"Both of you get to your knees." The bloody sergeant ordered them both as the rain poured down from the sky and wet their clothes.

Haru looked over at Private Orin once again to see what his next move was, but he seemed just as confused as Haru was. 

"Don't make me repeat it! Get on your knees right now!" He shouted out once again, seeing that they didn't listen to what he was saying. There was a pause of silence as they looked at each other again.

"But you just repeated it, didn't you? Idiot." Private Orin said in his quiet, calm tone but was still loud enough for both Haru and the bloody sergeant to hear. 

"How dare you!" The bloody sergeant yelled in outrage.

"But he does make a point. You said, "Don't make me repeat it again." And then you still said it. That is pretty stupid. I think his analysis of you being an idiot is a pretty fair one if you ask me." Haru said matter of factly as he mimicked the part where he quoted what was said. 

"Right, that's it. I was going to let this go at a light bit of beasting. But now I know that you are both disobedient and can't follow the simplest of orders. You can both spend a night in the hole with the rest of the people who can't follow orders." He called out once again. 

'For a man known as the bloody sergeant, he seems pretty tame. I thought that he would try something violent against me. But it seems that he isn't that type of person after all. But I guess I should probably go along with what he says for now at least.' Haru thought as he continued to follow the sergeant to a building that was on the far side of the base and began to descend a dark staircase. 

The stairs seemed to go down for around ten metres before they came to what looked like a medieval-style dungeon. Haru looked around and used his spiritual Qi to look for life, and soon enough, he found it. 

There were hundreds of steel doors lined up in a single corridor, and most of them had people inside. But their life forces were weak. As though they had been starved and were on the verge of death. They seemed quiet for starving people, which told Haru that they were scared of something.

And as two muscular looking guards emerged from the darkness, Haru could see precisely what they were scared of. 

Both of them were wearing masks to cover their faces and had an assortment of torture looking tools strapped to their belts. 

"Two more for a night in the hole. Make some room, won't ya?" The bloody sergeant said with a smirk now crossing his lips, like a apsychotic maniac had been awakened in place of the previously idiotic sergeant.