Chapter 157: Chapter 157: Military Reorganization
Yezi was wearing a brand new officer uniform that Yuqi and Shuli designed with the textile factory owners.
It was a uniform very similar to the military uniform of the actual army with slight modification to the layers of the cloths since it would of been too hot to wear otherwise.
"Sorry, just had something come up this morning. Is everything ready?" Xiaoyun asked.
"It's all ready. We're just waiting for you." Yezi handed the planned script to Xiaoyun.
Xiaoyun took a short glance over it and didn't notice any changes compared to Yiming's plan before he left.
"Good luck. Don't get nervous!" Yezi and Xiaoyun both walked out of the backstage to the field.
"I know." Xiaoyun didn't look back, but raised his hand to show his determination.
As Xiaoyun walked up to the podium, he could see all the faces of the soldiers on the field.
Some were familiar faces, but most of them were completely brand new faces that he had never seen before. Some doesn't even have their military uniform yet.
He could even see Wuli and both Anjing and Mingxu among the crowd of soldiers in the left side of the crowd.
Xiaoyun cleared his throat for a second, then spoke through the microphone.
"Hello everyone. I'm your commander in chief Chen Xiaoyun..." Xiaoyun gave a short description of himself.
A short moment later...
"I know what you all might be thinking: why are we letting such a young person lead the army? A college student, of all people, and with no military experience at all."
Xiaoyun's words struck a chord with the new soldiers, who was wondering the exact same thing Xiaoyun just mentioned.
But all the experienced soldiers who has been in the town for a long time already knew what Xiaoyun was going to say.
"Let me ask you a question. Can a college student lead an entire army to direct an entire rescue operation to the city that saved hundreds and thousands of survivor to this town?"
The new soldiers started chattering among each other while other soldiers stood still in silent.
Xiaoyun cleared his throat to make the crowd fall back into silent.
"How about another question. Can a college student lead an army and come back with more equipment than they went with? And transforming an army with only rifles to an army with artillery and tanks?"
"Guess what? I'm that college student that did all that. Now do you think there is anyone who is more qualify than me?"
After few more convincing statement, some of the experience soldiers started realized the achievement Xiaoyun had done.
"I promise to you all, I'll lead you all out of the apocalypse together. We'll defend the prosperity of the town." Xiaoyun paused for a second as he turned off the mic.
"Do you all have faith in me?" Xiaoyun asked out loud.
"Yes sir! We all have faith in you!" Few of the soldiers yelled out first, leading to the entire crowd of soldier yelling it out.
"Very well comrades!" Xiaoyun saluted toward the soldiers.
The soldiers saluted back in return as a show of respect.
"Now, I'll announce a new military reconstruction plan. Yezi!"
Yezi walked up to the stage next to Xiaoyun.
"You'll continue be the 2nd in command of army. And handle all the logistic of the army."
"Yes sir!" Yezi saluted as he reply back.
Xiaoyun took out a insignia that Kate and Anna designed in the factory few weeks before the trip to the water plant, then attached it onto Yezi's officer's uniform.
As Yezi walked back down to the field, Xiaoyun moved onto the next part of the script.
"There will be a new officers rank system implemented that are directly above soldiers. To qualify to be a officer, you must serve as a soldier and perform well enough to promote all the way to captain."
All the experience soldier got extremely excited, especially the captains who has been training as an officer the past few month with Yiming.
"Then we'll evaluate your skill and put you through a military academy where you learn more about how to be an officer... With that, I'm happy to announce an list of soldiers who are now consider to be a officer rather than a soldier.
Chen Wuli, Zhang Lingang....." Xiaoyun started listing the names of the captains being promoted to the officers.
"They will receive a new rank of Major and they will be leading a regiment of one thousand people. Or four company combined. For all the name I called, please come up and receive your uniform"
The ten officer named in the list excitingly walked up to the stage as Xiaoyun opened the box next to the podium.
"Here's your officer uniform and insignia." Xiaoyun handed it personally one by one.
After handing all nine of them, Xiaoyun got to the last one.
"Wuli, here's your officer uniform and insignia." Xiaoyun handed the cloths to Wuli.
"Thank you Xiaoy——sir!" Wuli looked extremely excited as she got hold of the cloth.
As all ten of the officer walked down to the stage, Xiaoyun announced the soldier promotion listed in the script.
Next, Xiaoyun announced few more reforms in the army and few changes within the army structure such as dedicated medic unit and communication units within the regiment system.
Finally, Xiaoyun got to the last thing.
"As you know, we have captured some artillery, APC, and IVF, and few tanks. I had decided the most effective way to use them would be pooling them into one regiment rather than spreading it out.
One of the regiment today will be assigned to manage all those equipment as a special strike force."
As soon as Xiaoyun announced it, all the soldiers got extremely excited. Even the new soldiers who had no chance of being apart of it got excited.
"The person that is in charge of this regiment would be... Zhang Lingang!"
"He has been a long time soldiers since the foundation of the town. His loyalty and skill leading has been proven that he deserved the position Can we all give him a round of applause?"
The soldiers applauded as Lingang was completely caught off guard by the news.
"Beside that, everyone's locker should have a letter telling you what rank and which regiment you belong to. For now, all the soldiers who has been soldier for a month or longer, you are dismissed. Tomorrow will be the official start day."
Many of the soldiers in the crowd started leaving to the lockers until there was only five thousand people left on the field.
All of them were brand new faces that just joined into the military. Although most of them had went through mandatory training or were apart of the militia.
"I assume you all know what you had sign up for right? There's no turning back once you joined from this point on." Xiaoyun asked first before continuing.
None of them moved.
"Very well, you'll be put into a month training before you'll be put into combat. Yezi can you come up?"
Xiaoyun stepped down to the side as Yezi got up to the podium.
"Can you handle this?" Xiaoyun looked over to Yezi.
"Of course, don't worry about it. I had done this so many time. You can go do your business." Yezi reassured Xiaoyun.
"Okay." Xiaoyun walked down the stage and toward the exit of the training field.
----
As Xiaoyun walked down the street, it was already two in the afternoon.
"How am I going to make a military academy?" Xiaoyun wondered as he realized with Yiming leaving, there was no way to get more officer if he wanted to expand the army more.
Just as Xiaoyun almost arrived back to the office, he ran into the three Russian dude standing in front of administrative building.
"Oh hey, what up?" Xiaoyun waved toward the three.
"We're good. C-Can we borrow something?" One of them asked in broken Chinese.
"Which do you need to borrow?" Xiaoyun asked.
The three didn't know how to response, until one of them spoke in English.
"T-Tank. And bomb." One of them tried to draw it with their hands.
"Oh you mean the equipment that we got from the water plant. Of course you can borrow one of them. It'll be insane if you can even manufacturer one." Xiaoyun immediately gave approval to them.
"Thank you!" The three of them bowed down in gratitude.
"Wait before you leave, let me write you an authorization. They'll be confused if you just walk there empty handed. Follow me" Xiaoyun opened the door for the three to walk in.
As the four walked inside the office building, all of the office worker looked a little curious toward the three people behind Xiaoyun.
"Yuqi, can I borrow your computer for a second?" Xiaoyun asked as he walked inside the office.
"Sure." Yuqi moved to the side of the desk.