Chapter Fourteen: The Famous Scene

Zhou Shu emerged from the corner of the wall, his face now showing a hint of confidence.

He tightened his belt, straightened his clothes to look as sharp as possible, and finally adjusted his glasses before striding toward the entrance of the airport.

As he drew nearer to the gate, the guards all turned their attention to him. Even the machine guns atop the watchtowers shifted to follow his approach. Zhou Shu had seen many scenes like this in films and news reports; he knew this was not the moment to keep his hands in his pockets. It was important for the guards to see exactly where his hands were.

These foreign soldiers cared little for any supposed camaraderie between the military and civilians. Their unity with the people was purely physical—and often rough.

Sure enough, when Zhou Shu was about five meters from the gate, the soldier in charge of checking identification called out to him.

Most likely, it was because Zhou Shu looked young—not yet an adult—and had made no suspicious moves. He wore neat clothes and didn’t appear to be carrying heavy weapons or explosives. If any of these conditions had been unmet, his reception would have been very different.

“Stop! Stand right there!”

The soldier’s English was heavily accented, but Zhou Shu understood and immediately halted.

Seeing Zhou Shu obediently stop, the soldier walked over, scrutinized him, and asked, “What are you here for?”

“I’m here to enlist. I want to fight the aliens!”

Zhou Shu replied in clear English, enunciating each word with careful precision and pauses between them.

He couldn’t help it—he had only just learned to speak, and wasn’t yet used to it. Still, he let out a breath of relief. Although he was still a little nervous, at least he could communicate without much trouble.

If he’d failed to express his intentions clearly at this moment, that would have been truly dangerous.

Back in his own world, messing around would just mean dismantling a bathroom; here, it could mean dying on the spot.

The soldier was surprised by his answer, then looked Zhou Shu up and down again—and unexpectedly, agreed.

“Come with me.”

Zhou Shu: “???”

This time, it was his turn to be astonished.

He thought to himself, “Is this what the Hunter meant by ‘newbie quest’? Have all the NPCs been turned into fools?”

Seeing Zhou Shu’s stunned expression, the soldier urged, “Are you coming or not? Didn’t you say you wanted to enlist?”

“Oh, yes, I’m coming.”

So he followed the soldier, his mind in a whirl.

“This actually works?”

He glanced around, confirming that this was indeed a military base. Even if it had been converted from a civilian airport, security should be tight.

Even if not a guard every five steps and a sentry every ten, at least it should be off-limits to unauthorized persons.

And yet, all he had to do was say, “I’m here to enlist,” and he was let in?

This was the frontline command base—with the enemy’s territory just across the strait.

…

Still, he was somewhat pleased. The communication problem was basically solved, and he hadn’t yet consumed a “huge” amount of source energy.

In the end, he’d used up 0.2 units of energy, extracting some English conversation skills from the monster movies he’d watched.

Now, with real-life activation of those memories, he had a deeper understanding of the memory extraction process and energy consumption.

The system had mentioned that the previous 1.2 units of energy was mostly needed to protect his brain from burning out—because activating too many memories at once made the process more intense, requiring more energy.

This time, he’d only extracted a little, so the reversal process was gentler, and the energy spent was naturally less.

The system had also mentioned that there was a way to protect his brain without consuming source energy: by increasing his mental and physical attributes. As long as his mind was resilient and his body strong, he could activate as many memories as he wanted without feeling “brain-burnt.”

But energy could not be spared on brain protection alone; it was also needed to boost attributes.

Fortunately, improving his attributes benefited him directly, increasing his odds of becoming a super soldier—a win-win.

It was a clever strategy from the system.

So be it. Zhou Shu was content.

Now, with basic English communication skills, he could immerse himself in this English-speaking environment and improve further without expending energy—something he appreciated.

Snapping back to reality, he found he’d already followed the soldier into the heart of the base.

He’d seen aerial shots of this frontline base in movies and knew how vast it was. Yet, it always seemed empty from those views. Now, standing within it, he realized the base was indeed immense, but from different angles, it also felt crowded.

Everywhere he looked, there were enormous quad-rotor helicopters, reminiscent of oversized drones. But instead of cameras and batteries, they carried powered mechanical armor warriors.

Of course, for now, there were no mechanical armor warriors—only various ground crew maintaining and repairing them.

Vehicles and personnel moved busily all around.

The soldier leading him asked someone for directions, then took Zhou Shu to a vehicle and drove to the tent area.

The tent area swarmed with soldiers, coming and going in dense crowds. Some, like Zhou Shu, had just disembarked from vehicles.

The difference was that Zhou Shu rode in a jeep, while the others arrived in big trucks.

Seeing this, Zhou Shu suddenly realized something.

“These must all be new recruits. According to the plot, they’ll be fighting tomorrow, but today is their first arrival. I think I understand something now…”

As he was thinking, he followed the soldier to the entrance of a military tent, where he immediately saw a “military officer” in handcuffs confronting a sergeant.

The sergeant, holding a piece of paper, said to the handcuffed “officer,” “The higher-ups say you’re a deserter.”

“Because you impersonated an American officer and got caught, you’ll try to call out, you might even threaten the safety of the entire operation. As long as you can avoid combat, you’ll do anything…”

Witnessing this iconic scene, Zhou Shu finally understood what was happening.

The handcuffed officer needed no introduction; he was the protagonist of the film—the last time Zhou Shu had seen him, it was Tom Cruise, the newest master of the backboard.

He was also the kind of man who dared to threaten a powerful general on that general’s own turf—a bold (and foolish) move.

In the story of “Edge of Tomorrow,” the commanding general had ordered the protagonist to go to the front lines to film a propaganda piece about the heroism and victories of the soldiers. The protagonist had never wanted to be a soldier, which is why he’d become a military PR man. Using his gift for persuasion, he’d convinced hundreds of thousands to join the fight against the alien monsters.

Now, the general wanted him at the front, but he refused.

Even though the general promised him protection and insisted the beach held only a small enemy force—it would be safe.

Because they believed this battle would be an absolute victory, they wanted the protagonist to film it for propaganda.

After all, they wanted to promote triumph, not heavy casualties or defeat.

But the protagonist still refused, terrified of the front lines, and threatened to make the general take the blame. The general wouldn’t tolerate it.

So the protagonist lost his rank, was knocked out with a stun gun, stripped of his insignia, and dumped at the new recruit base as a private.

Branded a deserter.

At this moment, Tom Cruise had just woken from unconsciousness, completely confused, defiant to all, wandering to the tent entrance and still trying to contact the higher-ups.

Because of all this, Zhou Shu understood what “newbie benefits” meant.

If he remembered correctly, when Tom Cruise and the general argued, he’d said, “I persuaded hundreds of thousands to become soldiers for you.”

He used the word “persuaded,” which meant these people originally didn’t want to enlist.

It made sense—Europe was nearly overrun by alien monsters, with humanity suffering continual defeats. Most people wanted to escape, not march to certain death on the battlefield. Soldiers were in short supply.

Then, the new powered armor appeared. Thanks to the previous master of the backboard—the female protagonist—who slew hundreds of aliens in one battle, the leadership believed their chance had come, so they rallied people to enlist for the decisive battle.

They planned to form a “super soldier” corps of millions, armed with the new armor, to drive the aliens back to their home.

Now, with manpower desperately needed, Zhou Shu had volunteered to join.