radicalducati Page 56
Page 56
Wanting to experience it a little longer, Payne didn't get up. Instead, he put his arms around her and let her lean against him to continue sleeping.
The dim light barely penetrated the curtain, making the trench as dark as dusk when the sun had completely sunk below the horizon. From time to time, muffled noises could be heard from outside, but it was impossible to tell whether they were thunder or cannon fire.
Payne glanced at his watch; it was already nine o'clock.
It looks like today is going to be a very cloudy day, perfect for sleeping.
Okay, let her sleep a little longer then.
But fate seemed determined not to grant his wish. Suddenly, Ruby jerked her head up as if electrocuted, letting out a sharp, mournful cry characteristic of squirrels:
"Ugh!...Where are my legs? I can't feel them...Oh, they're still here...Ahhh, they're so numb! So numb!!..."
Seeing Ruby kicking her short legs haphazardly, Payne chuckled and vigorously ruffled her hair. "Haha, how did you fall asleep on the table? Look, your legs are numb, aren't they?"
"Hey, you!..." Ruby immediately tried to stop him, but because she was weaker than Payne, she couldn't stop him. "Stop moving! Stop rubbing!! Ugh, you're so annoying!!"
Chapter 86 LXXXVI. Continue processing the helmet
For a moment, Payne forgot that Ruby was no longer in the splitter, and this level of intimacy was clearly a bit too much for a buddy relationship.
Therefore, when he ignored the advice and tried to massage the squirrel's numb legs himself, he only ended up with a front tooth mark on his arm (without breaking the skin).
He then inspected the results of the four beasts' hard work throughout the night in crafting the helmet, and had Grace try it on.
Although the cut-out got stuck on the bull's horn, Payne tapped it twice, and the helmet fit Grace perfectly on her head.
"Good, it seems my calculations were correct." Payne nodded in satisfaction.
"It still feels a bit tight, I need to smooth it out a bit more." Grace rubbed the area where the helmet and horns met.
Ruby also said, "I didn't expect to be so tired after the excitement wore off. All three of them couldn't stay awake and went to sleep one after another. I thought I could finish it in one go, but I ended up falling asleep on the table because I was so tired..."
"You've really worked hard." Payne skillfully ruffled Ruby's hair, but she quickly brushed him off.
The man and his four beasts quickly got ready and prepared to begin their work for the day.
The sky was covered by thick, dark clouds, like lead, obscuring the sun completely.
But even with the atmosphere set, the heavens showed no sign of raining, the temperature didn't drop much, and the air was so stuffy it was hard to breathe.
"It's so hot even though there's no sun. What a waste of all those thick clouds," Payne complained, fanning himself with his hand while pulling on his collar.
“You should be glad it hasn’t rained yet. The drainage ditches aren’t finished yet; if it rains, the trenches will become drainage ditches,” Ruby warned.
Ruby and Payne deliberately slowed down to walk at the back, watching the other three beasts chat and laugh as they headed to their respective work stations, beginning a day for the Civil Engineering Dogs.
After a while, Ruby suddenly spoke up: "Don't overthink what happened in the past two weeks. I just need your help to get through the splitter."
“Although you are my trainer, if you dare to ambush me again, I won’t mind adding a few more teeth marks to your body.”
Payne glanced at her—she said this every time after the splitter was used, and he was getting tired of hearing it.
"It's just a few more teeth marks? I don't think it's a big deal..."
"Or if you feel that you don't need a certain part of your body anymore, I'll bite it off for you."
"Tch." Payne curled his lip. "Arrogant."
If Ruby is truly a tsundere, then teasing her will be a very interesting thing.
Unfortunately, although she speaks arrogantly, she is always calm and composed, without blushing, her heart racing, or even panting.
Unless she's provoked, she won't react—Paine doesn't want to suffer any physical pain yet.
Anyway, surviving another Ruby's splitter on the battlefield is like living for another six months, so I'm happy!
Whose branching point will be next? ~I remember the peak of sheep's branching was in August and September~~
……
After obtaining the company commander's approval, Payne successfully secured two hours of free time each day for the beast girls—for training.
But this doesn't mean they can do less work. On the contrary, they have to finish the work during the day and then use the saved two hours for training.
Fortunately, this is not a big problem for the energetic beast girls; they just need to be fed more food.
This can also be used as one of Sister Niu's punishments, making her do more work. Sister Niu said she had no objection.
However, just as Payne was gathering the materials needed to make the fire rings and gloating over the awkward way the beast girls would try to squeeze through them, fate dealt him a heavy blow:
As if it could no longer be contained, the thick, leaden clouds finally began to leak, and the rainfall was heavy enough to extinguish the flames.
Upon realizing that they wouldn't have to face the terror of fire directly, all four beasts—especially Xiao En—jumped for joy.
Before he even landed, Payne grabbed him and made him continue working, saying he had to repair the drainage ditch in the rain...
Unfortunately, they were too late.
When they finished work in the evening, mud and water had already poured into the lower-lying shelter trenches like streams.
Helpless, they could only build a small dam with mud and put raincoats in front of it in order to slow down the rate of water accumulation.
As for the pre-sleep digestion activity, it naturally involved moving various items out of the trenches, so the work of making steel helmets had to be put on hold for the time being.
Because of concerns that French shells might still reach this area, the soldiers were still required to live in the sheltered trenches.
But for the soldiers on this front, they didn't know if shells would come, but if they stayed in the trenches under these circumstances, they would definitely die tomorrow.
Therefore, whether they were soldiers or junior officers, they all moved out of the underground and set up tents on the ground without anyone reporting the matter to their superiors.
After finishing all that, the man prayed for the rain to stop, and the beast prayed for it not to stop. They both lay down on their beds, listening to the raindrops hitting the tent, and soon fell asleep.
……
It seemed that the prayers of the four beasts were more powerful, because when they woke up the next day, the rain still showed no signs of stopping.
Although repairing the trenches in the rain would be hard work, the four beasts felt it was all worthwhile as long as they thought about how their desensitization training regarding fire could be postponed.
Seeing the four tails, each with a different shape, wagging happily (except for Xiao En, whose tail was too short), Payne was very dissatisfied with this侥幸心理 (a mentality of taking chances). He even reprimanded the four beasts after work:
"No one can guarantee that the French won't use flamethrowers in the next battle. You must learn to overcome your fear! The best way to deal with flamethrower soldiers is not to run away, but to deliver grenades into their arms!"
All four beasts obediently expressed their understanding, but due to divine intervention, the training could not proceed for a long time.
Moreover, even after they spent several days repairing the trenches and drainage ditches in the rain, the rain still showed no signs of stopping.
Since there was no possibility of fighting on this front, no one was interested in doing the math of filling in water and draining it at the same time. They wanted to wait for the sky to clear and the ground to dry before continuing construction.
So they got a wet holiday.
Payne intends to use this opportunity to resolve the helmet issue for Lacey and Ruby.
Since he had spent the most time petting these two beasts, Payne knew their ear positions and sizes intimately. He didn't even need to use a ruler; he simply drew the positions for the holes on his helmet.
Ruby's helmet is easy to handle, just like Xiao En's; you just need to drill two holes.
Lacey's situation was complicated; she needed to punch holes in all the circular paths drawn with a pencil to achieve the effect of cutting out a single, huge circular piece.
After Pine punched holes in the two magazines, Lacey and Ruby tried them on first, and it proved that Pine's efforts were worthwhile; both pairs of ears, one big and one small, accurately emerged from the holes.
It was quite amusing to see furry creatures emerging from under the steel.
However, when Lacey was trying them on, the irregular edge snagged her ear, scraping off a small patch of skin.
However, Payne's work ended there, and he then reassigned the task of polishing the edges to Grace as punishment.
Perhaps feeling that the rainy atmosphere was just right, Payne, who was unable to work, train, or attend classes, took out the tea leaves he had just been issued and planned to have a potluck tea ceremony.
But just as he was about to persuade Ruby to take out some of her stock for afternoon tea, he saw two figures appear outside the tent, one black and one white, with two tails swaying behind them.
"Excuse me, are you Payne, the B Company animal trainer?"
Chapter 87 LXXXVII. The Black and White Duo
Since the front line had advanced more than ten kilometers, the defensive line had become very quiet. Therefore, Tomato Head, who had become bolder, not only brought a lot of good stuff from the logistics warehouse, but also diligently delivered it to Company B.
Only then did everyone find Tomato Head much more pleasing to the eye.
Among the good things sent was a new product that had recently been promoted on the front lines—tea bags.
Paine never imagined that tea bags, a small gadget that Earthlings take for granted, had only just been invented in this world.
Perhaps tea bags also appeared on Earth during World War I.
However, tea bags here are not cheap, common items, but rather high-end products.
It's not that the tea leaves inside the tea bags are expensive, but rather that because this product was newly invented, not many people knew about it, and the demand was small. Therefore, no one had considered mass-producing it industrially, so all the tea bags were hand-sewn...
It is said that this is another product specially supplied to the front-line troops, and those in the rear have no way to buy it.
But Payne didn't care about any of that. In order to fully extract the flavor of the tea, he directly used his dagger to open the tea bag, poured the tea leaves into the lunchbox, added the collected rainwater, and placed it on the makeshift earthen stove.
If we could boil water with firewood at this time, the atmosphere of this picnic would be perfect.
Unfortunately, it has been raining for so many days, and the few remaining broken branches on the ground, whether in the trench area or the no-man's-land, are already soaked.
Kerosene was too precious, so Payne could only cut off a small piece of the captured sandbag skin to use as fuel.
I don't know what material these sandbags are made of, but they are quite durable and don't produce black smoke, so they are indeed very suitable as fuel.
It would take some time for the water to boil, and Payne wondered if he should ask Ruby to bring out some of their stock for afternoon tea.
Since there wasn't much work to do these past few days, Ruby, itching to get her hands dirty, would sometimes venture into the no-man's-land and return to the grove where they had previously camped to collect some pine cones or something.
Just then, the sound of footsteps on mud grew louder as two figures approached the tent.
Because the tent was so low, Payne could only see two pairs of legs in tattered military pants standing there, with two tails, one black and one white, swaying behind them.
"Excuse me, are you Payne, the B Company animal trainer?"
A very lively voice rang out, which is quite unusual among beast girls.
“Yes, it’s me.” Payne casually poked at the flames with a twig. “Don’t stand outside in the rain, come on in.”
The two beasts seemed to pause for a moment, then vigorously shook off the water and bent down to enter the tent.
The black figure is probably a female dog, with triangular ears even larger than Lacey's, a black bob haircut, and exceptionally sharp, jet-black eyes. She looks like a hunting dog, and quite handsome.
"Number 6742, reporting for duty." The dog girl gave a meticulous military salute.
The white figure is a horse girl with long, pure white hair and bright, sparkling ruby-like eyes that look full of vitality.
"Number 3515, reporting for duty." Ma Niang gave a military salute, albeit casually.