Chapter 8: Playing the Hartman​

Academy for Officers of the Imperial Army, The Empire

5 March, Unified Year 1922

More time passed. Tanya and I were now among the top students of the academy. Our grades were very good, and we had good relationship with some officers in key position to help us make military life and training more bearable.

The training lessons ... I believe I will never forget them. Move at night, in the dark, between the mud and the dirt, always alert in fear of betraying ourselves with noise. The "enemy" in these maneuvers were trained soldiers, armed with dogs and mana detectors, and the goal was to try to escape from right under their noses.

It had been a difficult trial, tough and full of unpleasant surprises, but it was worth it, for what followed. Apparently, the major had been so surprised by the fact that we were able to complete all the objectives, he had decided to mention us in his end-of-course report for his superiors.

The Imperial Army is a meritocracy, designed to promote the best elements within it. Therefore, because of both our high grades and Tanya's "signaling" theory, she and I were chosen for a quick graduation. Evidently, the international situation was growing more and more fraught, since the imperial military command had established to fast track the top students of the various academies to get more soldiers out in the field.

Tanya was in first place in the ranking, while I was a little lower, in third place. Therefore, both she and I were "selected" for the special accelerated course.

Tanya was not particularly disturbed by the amount of work that awaited us. She thought about everything with a free market logic: everything was legal, there were no rules. In fact, even for his decision, we decided to stamp our theses "plagiarizing" some great military leaders of our old life: Oda Nobunaga her and Erwin Rommel me.

In particular, my thesis focused on the tactics Rommel used several times in his North-African campaign, first against the British first and then Americans: attract the enemy to an area previously designed to act as a trap, and then destroy it.

"How's the work going?" I asked to Tanya through the wall of books, research notes and paper that were our sources.

"Very well" she said in a tone of voice which indicated she was concentrating hard "However, I suggest that you stop asking unproductive questions and focus on completing your work before the time is up".

"Ok, I understand" I said, focusing my gaze once again on my still half-written thesis "By the way, would you like for us to check each other's theses before delivering them?"

"I do not believe it's a good idea," she said, without looking up from her work "Everyone's work is personal. And I do not think I have enough time to correct all your mistakes"

I groaned, before focusing on my work again.

During our last few days of cadet life at the Academy, both Tanya and I worked hard in order to give the best impression of us to our superior officers. However, fate (or someone we knew) had a surprise for us…

​

"You want us to become instructors, sir?" Tanya said at my right.

We were now in a large office, lavishly decorated and tastefully furnished. In particular, we were in front of a precious wood desk and set before a painting depicting a late eighteenth-century war scene. We were standing in front of the desk, side by side, and we carefully watched the man we had before of us.

Brigadier General Christof Weitz was not a particularly handsome man. His forehead, wide and spacious, had long since begun to lose hair, leaving a sad desert in its place. Moreover, his morbidly obese physical constitution betrayed an unhealthy love for alcohol and good food, which made him in my personal opinion the ideal candidate for a heart attack. However, he was the commander-in-chief of the Academy, a powerful and respected man and above all, an officer with a rank higher than mine.

His word was Law, and as such, it had to be obeyed.

"Yes" he said drinking a glass of golden beer "Apparently, you two are the first-class students with the highest grades, and have demonstrated that you possess all the qualities and skills necessary to carry out this difficult task"

I stood completely still, trying to analyze with a clear mind what he had just told us. From what I had understood, this was a proposal that was made only to cadets with the highest potential, and in case of refusal it would not be renewed. Moreover, I did not know if it was possible for me to refuse this offer, especially coming from the chief of the Academy.

I mentally analyzed the proposal made to us. Was it a good idea to accept?

"Your proposal flatters and honors us, General" Tanya said, "We welcome the opportunity to serve in the development of new recruits!"

Once again, Tanya had caught me off guard, answering in my name before I could even think of an acceptable answer.

"Very well!" said General Weitz looking at us "Go to the staff office and report there. I expect you both to start service by tomorrow morning!"

"Thank you sir" Tanya saluted. I saluted too; still speechless she had managed to entangle me in such a way.

Later, once we were outside the General's office I took Tanya aside and asked her the question I was waiting to ask her.

"Just one word: why?" I asked to her once I was sure no one could hear us "Why did you accept the General's offer in my name too?"

Tanya smiled. It was a different smile than I usually saw it: it was colder ... and wicked.

"You know" she said in an almost mocking tone "I think that's why in our previous life you were a simple employee and I was a manager: you lack the initiative to seize the opportunities before you."

I was amazed (and even a little offended) by those words: I always considered myself as a person who knew how to seize opportunities. Hell, it had been precisely in an attempt to seize an opportunity that I had ended up here in this shota body, in this world and in this age because of an entity with great powers and a greater bad temper!

"What do you mean?" I asked her, my eyes full of anger.

"I mean," she said keeping smiling "what was the aim of my plan?"

"To" I said after checking that really nobody was listening to us "to work up our way in the military hierarchy before the war breaks out, so that we can get a safe place in the rear."

"And tell me: how we could climb the hierarchy if you're afraid of taking on the smallest role of responsibility?"

"B-but I thought we could focus on our career once we had done graduation" I responded to her "Now it's too early. We are already overworked and if we also take responsibility for training the younger cadets ..."

"That's the point," she said looking at me firmly "If we can manage this task too, we have good chances to impress our superiors ... in the right way"

Anxiously, I thought about it, trying to come up with a good counterargument. Seriously, between studies and exercises our existing commitments already leave us with little spare time. And being an instructor is certainly not something that can be done in the spare time.

Yet, Tanya was right.

At that moment, it was of the utmost importance that we demonstrate our skills and abilities, and any occasion to make a good impression was welcome.

Furthermore, Tanya had already accepted in my name. If I had said something when she had spoken, maybe I could have got away with it, but now... if I had refused a proposal after having openly accepted it, I would have done considerable damage to my career. And my career was the only thing that could save me from the front lines once the war started.

"But…why did you accept the offer even on my behalf?" I asked, no longer angry but just curious.

"If I had left it to you, you would have compromised everything we have done before. I saw your look: you were about to refuse. However, if you had done it, the general would have been angry with us, and our careers would have ended. So, putting things in perspective ... I just saved you and your career."

"But…why?"

"Why?" she repeated with nonchalance "Because I need you, idiot! Maybe you have not noticed, but you are the only person here except me who comes from another universe. You are the only one who can fully understand me, and this makes you the perfect ally for my strategy!"

"Strategy?" I asked, insecure about what she meant.

"Yeah" she said moving closer to me, so that my ear was a few millimeters from her mouth "My plan for getting a peaceful place in the rear and, at the same time, revenge on that damned Being X"

"And you believe that ..." I started to say, before I noticed something.

Or better, someone.

Until then I had not noticed him, but Rommel was there, with a stack of documents in his hands and his gaze focused on us.

"Ahem, Tanya?" I said, pointing to Rommel with my eyes.

She turned around, just in time to see Rommel grin at us.

"You!" she said moving away from me and striding toward my roommate "What are you doing here?"

"Well" Rommel said, trying to justify himself "I was bringing these documents to the General, and since you were right outside the door, I thought not to disturb. By the way, what were you doing together?"

Tanya began to open her mouth, but before she could formulate a single word, I beat her on time.

"We were discussing what the General has just told us. Apparently, our grades are good enough to give us the chance to educate some new novice cadets as trainers" I said, earning the wonder of Rommel and Tanya's disapproval.

"Wow" Rommel said incredulous "Does this mean that from today you will be my superiors?"

"Not exactly" I said to reassure him "We will simply have the authority to educate and discipline new cadets in shape. However, it is not exactly like a promotion. Consider it more an extra job that the princess and I will have to work on."

"I understand," said Rommel "Do you know what? I still cannot believe a child beat me in courtship. But you're really cute together!"

I looked at him smiling until he disappeared behind the same door from which Tanya and I had left a few seconds.

We were alone again.

"What a fool, do not you think? He's very physically gifted, but I bet he does not even know how much..."

I stopped as soon as I realized that Tanya was looking at me. With the mother of all the death glares.

"What's up? I asked her grinning nervously. Angry Tanya was certainly not something I wanted to see.

"Satisfy my curiosity" she said with a dark look "By chance, have not you told yet to Rommel and your other roommates that we're not a couple?"

"Well, I tried."

​

Apparently, a rite of passage that all the cadets undergo on their first day at the Academy is being bombarded with insults and provocations by a sergeant or an older cadet. A kind of initiation, which serves to immediately make the enthusiastic and optimistic cadet understand what military life is really like.

And now, I was in front of the same scene that I had lived a year before. However, this time the instructor was I.

I already knew what the most obvious problems would be: most of the cadets were young adults or men, who would hardly accept the leadership of a child.

My physical appearance did not help me much: who would ever take an eight-to-nine-year-old boy seriously? Moreover, with a pretty and tender face like mine?

Precisely for this reason, they probably gave us this job. At the Academy, we studied to become officers, but no officer can be such if he cannot impose himself and being obeyed by his soldiers. Therefore, we had to earn the respect and esteem of our subordinates ... in the hardest way.

I took a deep breath and looked at the cadets before me. They were all men of probable age between eighteen and twenty-five. Everyone was dressed in their new uniforms and looked at me with bewilderment

I did not need super-hearing or telepathy to know what they were thinking: you could read it in their face. In all likelihood, they wondered where their instructor was, and what a child was doing there.

Only when I opened their mouth did they understand.

"Cadets!" I shouted as far as my vocal cords could allow me "Welcome to Hell!"

I took a break to see the effect my words had had. The perplexity of the cadets had turned into pure confusion. Some moved their eyes nervously, in disbelief at the scene in front of them: a cute-faced child who suddenly starts yelling like a sergeant.

"I am Frederick König, cadet of the last year of the Academy and your instructor. I was given the order to verify if there are true men among you who are able to survive the course of the Academy. And to be honest, I do not think so!"

One of the cadets in the second row grimaced. It was clear that he did not take my speech seriously, so I decided to overplay my hand.

"Do not think that since I look like an angel, the wings are about to come out! I will be ruthless, inflexible and cruel with you! I will slaughter you with gymnastics, with the discipline, with the rules and if you do not know how to hold, you will have only one option!"

"The baby is crying, maybe he wants milk!" a voice I did not recognize echoed from the last rows.

"Who said that?" I yelled, genuinely angry "Who the hell said that? Who is the filthy, cheap-looking comedian who wants to clean the bathrooms so badly?"

Nobody spoke. I got off the small podium from which I was talking until a few moments before, and I went quickly to the last rows. If there was one thing that made me angry was if someone teased me, especially if the joke referred to my "juvenile" physical appearance.

"So? Nobody said that?" I said, trying to find the culprit with the aid of sight alone "If the culprit does not report publicly within three seconds, I will have you all clean the toilets until the end of the course!"

The soldiers remained silent.

"One!" I screamed as loud as I could "Two!"

"Sir, I said it, sir!" suddenly said a cadet to my left.

I looked at him carefully. He was a boy of about twenty, with blond hair and blue eyes. Probably, he could not hold back his own humor.

And now…he would learn.

"Well, damn!" I said, trying to look as calm and cute as possible "You are honest. I admire honesty. Hell, I like you. Would you like to come with me to the cafeteria and have a nice ice cream?"

Without waiting for his answer, I gave him a very strong kick right in the middle of his legs. I know I hurt him because his expression contorted in pain and he almost fell to the ground.

"You jackass!" I said going back to my drill sergeant façade "It's better for you to keep your mouth shut, because if you open the dustbin you have under your nose again, I'll put my gun inside and pull the trigger!"

I looked up to see if this action had had any effect on the others. Apparently yes, because I saw some (the closest ones) quiver of nervousness.

"And this applies to all of you! You are not here to discuss or to think, you are here to obey! To serve our glorious Fatherland! From now on, you are allowed to speak only when you are questioned in person. Moreover, every time you talk you will start and finish the sentence with sir! You understand me?"

"Sir, we understand, sir!" the cadets shouted around me.

"Good!" I said before focusing again on the cadet I have just kicked in the groin "As for you, Mr. I-do-not-know-when-to-keep-my-mouth-shut, you are assigned to cleaning the latrines for the next three weeks! You understand me?"

The cadet said something I did not understand, so I slapped him on the right cheek.

"What the hell. Try to speak clear!"

"Yes-yes sir…" he finally managed to say, still holding his groin (or what was left of it)

"Very well" I said extending my hand to help him pull himself up "Come on, get back on your feet!

He started to hold on to my hand, but before he could catch me, I kicked him again. In the same point as before

"Lesson number one, mister: your enemy will not fight fair. Remember it!"

The cadet looked at me with a look of pure hate, but this time he kept his mouth shut, perhaps because he understood what would happen if he did.

​

"Did you really kick him in the balls?" Tanya asked me in an almost surprised tone.

"Yes" I replied to her "I know I should not have done it, but that cadet had provoked me, and I ..."

Tanya put her hand on mine. I looked at her, waiting for a look of anger or criticism, but instead she was watching me smiling.

"Do not worry. Our new role as instructors includes this too. You have not done badly, in fact, I think you did very well!"

"Well? I literally kicked a man under my command! In the groin!"

"So?" she asked in an almost rhetorical tone, "Keeping unruly recruits in line is the duty of an officer…"

"But not like that!" I said, shocked by her indifference "Here we are talking about human beings, like us. I agree with you on the discipline, but we cannot exaggerate!"

Tanya's smile cooled, becoming progressively less human and more demonic.

"Frederick, seriously? Do not tell me that you feel pity for them? They chose to enter here in the Academy of their own free will! They have not been forced! Now they have to pay the price of their choice!"

I took a deep breath. What Tanya had said should not have surprised me so much. I had learned at my expense, through our long and troubled "friendship", that she had a domineering personality with a serious superiority complex. She saw people around her as rivals or as resources, not as human beings, and treated them as such.

Yet, I could not help being undermined by such a lack of ethics.

One thing, in particular, scared me: what would have happened if, by acting the bad officer, I would have become it for real? What if I could not take the facade off? And if little by little, this personality had the upper hand?

In my previous life, I admit, I had never been a sweet and kind person, but everybody has standards. And being cruel without reason, just because you had the chance to be it, it was very far from my standards!

This was insane, this was sick, this was…psychopathic!

"..rick? Frederick, are you listening to me?" Tanya's voice brought me back to reality.

"Huh?" I answered, desperately trying to remember what I had not heard

Tanya sighed, "I was telling you that tomorrow we have a joint exercise with our units. Therefore, it is better for you to put your cadets under pressure, so mine will not win too easily!"

I smiled. Tanya's jib was enough to drive from my mind all the concerns that had afflicted me up to a second before.

"Do not hope too much about your victory!" I said, restraining myself from making a mouthful of it "My cadets are in great shape and cannot wait for a challenge."

"But mine would rather die than disappoint me" Tanya said with a mischievous smirk.

"If so, why not make a little competition?" I said, excited by her provocation

"What kind of competition?" she asked to me.

"A very simple one. Tomorrow, let us see our two units in action, and the victory will go to the commander whose units manages to get the best score!"

Tanya smiled again, before extending her hand and shacked it with mine.

"See you tomorrow, artichoke!"

"Prepare to lose, princess!"