"For those who don't know, this training had been newly developed by Everwhite." James loudly spoke. "It's called the long road."
"The long road?" Isaac mumbled cluelessly.
It seemed that everyone had the same thoughts. Everyone except Ellia, who had a neutral expression. She even seemed to be sighing in disappointment. 
'The long road is a training tactic invented before I was even born.' Ellia thought as she darted at James. 'How shameless for Everwhite to take all the credit.'
The imperial army started to use this training as a faster way to turn recruits into battle-ready soldiers.
"Let me explain, lieutenant," James said as he made sure everyone was listing. "This training exercise is for you to grow mentally. And for the training, everyone is to downgrade their clothes to a tank-tops and shorts. And after that, you are to hold down camp in the middle of the forest for a week."
"We would freeze to death in an hour, not to mention a week," Owen spoke up. "There's no way we can survive…."
"Then deal with it." James coldly replied but quickly flashed a smile as he looked towards Aerie. "Also, Private Hayes will be the only one with proper winter clothing as she is the weakest."
Hearing such words come out of his mouth, Aerie felt a sense of uncomfortableness weigh down on her shoulders. 'E-eh me?!'
'Because she's the weakest, my ass.' Ellia thought as she smirked.
Stripping the whole squad from their comfy warm clothes, except for one squad member, creates a strong sense of resentfulness towards that one person.
And with that, you're forced to go on a one-week land navigation training course, basically naked in the snow. Days go by, and you might even think about killing for a pair of cloth to slap onto your body. The whole point of the training was to build trust with your squad members.
It was a cruel way to train recruits, but if you could get through that, you would have already become a battle-ready soldier.
Since Ellia knew about such things, she obviously knew of a way to prevent such things, but something bothered her. There was a slight chance that the training could differ from the original way.
"And is that it? Just change clothes and survive?" Ellia asked.
"There's a catch, second lieutenant." James smiled as he gazed down at Ellia. "You all are to survive for a week inside this forest. If you survive until then, everyone is going to fight against me."
"That doesn't sound too hard." Owen chuckled, causing James to give him the nasty eye.
"If I see a single scratch on private Hayes by the end of the training, then you simply fail! And by failing, I mean getting kicked out of Everwhite! So do whatever it takes to keep her safe!" James bellowed.
"E-eh?!" Aerie yelped as her shoulders tightened. 'T-then if I mess up, everyone's going to fail...?' She thought as she clutched her head with negative things.
'Because of her soft personality, this might be tough on her.' Ellia thought as she glanced over the shivering Aerie. 'This is going to be a bit tough… but it shouldn't be impossible.'
"And that's not it. There will be modified drones coming after you all." James said.
With those words, everyone crinkled their eyes in seriousness, except Ellia, who had a dumbfounded look.
'Modified drones? What the hell is that? Like the ones that fly in the air?' Ellia asked herself, hoping someone would answer, but alas, Ruth wasn't here to do so. 'I'll have to ask later.'
"Here are your clothes," James spoke as he tossed six bags onto the ground. Nothing more than a white tank-top and shorts. Looking at the bags, everyone shivered in coldness.
"You're one week time will start when everyone changes clothing." Uttering nothing more, James turned around and left.
"What's a modified drone?" Ellia suddenly asked while turning to the others. Everyone gave her a look, not knowing if she was joking it playing around.
"It's a robot that kills," Alex spoke, resulting in Ellia a roll of her eyes.
"It would help if you gave more detail."
"Okay, okay," Alex sighed in helplessness. "The actual name for this drone is Ullr; just pointing it out. And for its combat prowess, it's intermediate at most. Equipped with a standard automatic assault rifle, it would do tinny work against a superhuman."
"Did you research about this or..."
Alex then leaned over to Ellia's ear and whispered. "I thought you knew about this, but I was the one who made Ullr..."
Hearing his words, Ellia flinched as she stared at Alex with widened eyes.
"Ah... I must've forgotten about it." Ellia said as she threw her hands up into the air.
Alex tilted his head with furrowed eyebrows. 'I don't think you could just forget that...'
"Anyway... I think we should get going..." Issac interrupted as he grabbed a bag from the ground.
Aeire watched everyone in guilt as they grabbed their new set of clothes.
"It isn't that cold," Mike laughed as he took off his upper coat and flexed his entire body.
"We're not meat sacks like you..." Levi mumbled as he took off his coat and shivered while clutching himself with his arms. "A-a week like this..."
"What are you fools talking about, eh?" Owen smirked as he licked his lips and darted toward Ellia. "I might enjoy this training..."
"A-Ah! Don't stare at the second lieutenant with your beastly eyes!" Aeire scram as she rushed to Ellia. Using her body to cover Ellia as she changed clothes.
Unbeknownst to everyone, Ellia had a whole different problem serging through her head.
'It's to reveling...' Ellia mumbled as she looked down at her body. The side of her breasts peaked out of the tin tank-top. Her shorts were also too small to be called a proper piece of clothing.
"Holy shit, I didn't think it was this big..." Issac mumbled loudly, causing everyone to look his way. Then, swiping on his holographic display, his expression because grim. "The training ground is a total of 32000 acres..."
"That big...?" Ellia turned around, walked towards Issac, and looked at the display. "You're right... and if not bigger."
"32000? That's a damn joke, right?" Owen looked at Issac and Ellia in disbelief. "Why's there a need for that much land for training? It's just us that's training, right?"
Hearing those words, Ellia started to rub her chin as she thought of the many instructors she had seen before. "Maybe we're not the only people training here."
"What do you mean by that?" Issac asked.
"Well, since I got here early, I saw many more instructors other than instructors James."
"But instructor James never mentioned other students..." Mike said, giving Ellia a smirk.
"Well... the enemy doesn't voluntarily give information about themselves, do they," Ellia said with a shrug.
Both Aerie and Alex stared at the group, trying their hardest to keep up with them. On the other hand, Levi was hanging off the back of Mike, tired of keeping himself warm.
"Y-you aren't cold...?" Alex spoke while his teeth chattered from the cold, even going as far as clinging onto Aerie to give his body even a tiny bit of warmth. But, of course, such actions caused Aerie to feel a bit dizzy.
"What are you doing?" Ellia asked as she approached Alex with a stern face.
"I'm preventing myself from having to amputate my limbs due to frostbites!" Alex retorted.
"I thought you said you could handle the training," Ellia said as she pulled him away from Aerie, finally giving her room to breathe.
"I didn't think it was going to be like this..." Alex whined, causing Ellia to roll her eyes.
"It's only the first day, kiddo..."
Alex looked up at Ellia and asked. "Is it just me but have you been calling me a kid for a while now?"
Ellia looked at Alex as if he was the dumb one. "Yea, because you're acting like a kid."
"Ah..." Ellia's words pierced through Alex's heart like the sharpest of swords.
"Okay, that's enough!" Issac shouted with a clap of his hands. "We don't have much time. Let's get going."