After half a day, a contingent of handpicked soldiers was led out of the trenches by Lieutenant Xia, lining up neatly in front of the tent.
“I’ve brought the men over; you can chat at your leisure.”
“Many thanks.” Nangong waved her hand, bidding farewell to the lieutenant, which made Lin Yu, standing behind her, seem rather impolite.
Having waved goodbye, Nangong turned her gaze to Lin Yu behind her. “Shall we begin the lesson?”
“Mm…”
Stepping forward two paces to stand directly in the center of everyone’s视线, Lin Yu, burdened by a double dose of social anxiety inherited from her past life and amplified in this one, felt immensely nervous as dozens of eyes fixed intently upon her.
“Now… I will explain a few battlefield first aid methods, and I hope you all can… study diligently, and then impart these skills to your… impart them to your comrades.”
Lin Yu retrieved a roll of bandages from her small satchel, and as she unrolled it, she solicited a volunteer from the crowd. “Um, I also need a volunteer to help with the demonstration…”
Their hands shot up in unison, as if this were some coveted opportunity worth eagerly volunteering for.
Noticing Lin Yu’s hesitation among the sea of volunteers, Nangong directly made the decision for her: “You, the one in the second row who didn’t raise their hand, come up.”
Realizing another medic was calling them, the unenthusiastic young man stepped out of the ranks and walked to Lin Yu’s front.
‘Oh, it’s him again…’
Meeting his gaze, Lin Yu realized she had “coincidentally” encountered him once more.
The first time, she had killed a Lanforth soldier in a shell crater; the second, she had bandaged his wounds in the medical tent. This was their third meeting, and he would serve as a teaching aid, allowing Lin Yu to demonstrate various battlefield first aid methods.
‘Is this person truly such a coincidence?’
With a flicker of irritation, she shook open the bandage packaging, trying her best to treat him as an unfamiliar stranger, and Lin Yu gritted her teeth, beginning to explain the usage techniques.
“This is the most common type of bandage; everyone on the battlefield will have at least one roll, serving as the most basic, and possibly the only, medical supply you’ll ever use.”
“For general bleeding, you can do this…”
Unloading all the knowledge she had acquired in her past life, combined with what Nangong had taught her over the past few days, Miss Quack’s little first aid class had officially begun.
In her past life as a mercenary, the medical supplies available for battlefield aid were incredibly diverse. Not to mention bandages and hemostatic agents, there were several types of tourniquets alone—elastic ones, twist-tightening ones—and explaining and demonstrating each would have taken a considerable amount of time.
However, now… the first aid kits issued to these privates contained only two rolls of bandages and a single hair tie—which, in reality, was a tourniquet mistakenly repurposed by the uninitiated for tying hair.
The men of Diacla, like the ancients of her past life, kept long hair that required grooming, and it was Nangong who had informed her they used tourniquets as hair ties.
The black-haired youth stood stiffly at attention, like a rigid pine tree, allowing Lin Yu to manipulate him as she pleased. Lin Yu, seizing this stable platform of a teaching aid, thoroughly demonstrated to the soldiers how to bandage various injured body parts.
As she settled into the rhythm of teaching, her apprehension toward strangers considerably lessened, and her pace of speech gradually quickened. She moved from explaining the use of bandages to the proper way to apply a tourniquet. She also demonstrated three emergency bleeding control methods to the soldiers, ultimately arriving at the practical session.
Lin Yu and Nangong distributed first aid kits to half of the attendees, instructing them to practice various bandaging techniques on their comrades, after which they would individually inspect if the application was correct and thorough.
These first aid skills would be the most valuable asset for the rank-and-file soldiers in the trenches, and they would maximize the reduction of casualties caused by blood loss, especially for those who tied their hair with tourniquets.
It was imperative that everyone understood and implemented these methods, which would then be spread throughout the entire defensive sector through their instruction and example.
“Alright, now…”
“I haven’t practiced yet.”
The sudden voice from behind caused Lin Yu to slowly turn. The youth who had initially been used as a teaching aid was protesting; he had been singled out by Lin Yu for the demonstration and thus hadn’t personally practiced the use of bandages and tourniquets.
Lin Yu shrugged, dismissing his complaint, and instead tucked the repeatedly folded and crumpled bandage back into her bag, continuing to address the soldiers: “Alright, everyone is dismissed now. Remember to diligently teach what you learned today to those around you; not only will it help them, but it might even help yourselves one day.”
Only after telling them they could disperse did Lin Yu meet his gaze once more. “I remember you. Last time, when you came for bandaging, you said you knew how to tie bandages, so I didn’t think you needed practice.”
Upon hearing Lin Yu’s words, the youth silently skirted around her and walked back into the crowd.
“You don’t remember me?”
“I do. The new medic.”
He did not stop walking, nor did he provide the expected answer to Lin Yu’s follow-up question.
The ideal answer would have been, “Are you the one I saved in that shell crater?” If he had said that, Lin Yu could have further inquired about the deceased Lanforth soldier. Unfortunately, he didn’t remember, simply regarding Lin Yu as a new medic, much like that detestable quartermaster.
Realizing this, Lin Yu silently prepared to leave as well.
‘It seems I was utterly unremarkable a few days ago… and perhaps I’m not very remarkable even now?’
No one would have noticed a face far too young beneath that steel helmet, nor would anyone have noticed the body of a fifteen-year-old girl beneath that uniform.
However, she hadn’t walked two steps back before Nangong stopped her: “Don’t leave yet; it seems your students still have a few questions that need answering.”
Lin Yu gently shook her head, preparing to find an excuse to decline. “Could you handle them for me? I’ve been talking for so long, my throat really hurts… I want to go back and get a drink of water.”
But Nangong promptly grabbed her by the collar, declaring her water escape (TL Note: A humorous reference to the ‘Water Release’ ninjutsu from Naruto, implying her attempt to escape for water failed.) a failure. “I can’t handle these people’s questions. It’s better for you to explain it on the spot.”
Lin Yu was pushed back in front of the helmeted soldiers. The previous dismissal order had only caused a small portion to leave on their own, while the rest still stood scattered about.
Seeing her face them again, the murmurs in the crowd gradually grew louder, until finally, a brave soul loudly posed the first question: “Are you a medic miss or a medic mister?”
‘Nerve!’
Lin Yu covered her forehead. One moment she had been expecting profound questions, perhaps about emergency treatment for pneumothorax… the next, these rank-and-file soldiers revealed their true colors, insisting on probing her gender.
She sighed softly, stating helplessly: “Undoubtedly, a medic miss.”
‘Do I really look so unfeminine? Is this a good thing or a bad thing…’
“What’s your family name!”
“What’s your given name!”
“How old are you!”
“What are your measurements!”
‘Hey, some truly bizarre questions have snuck in.’
‘It’s not like there’s any need to ask about this figure anyway.’
These soldiers seemed accustomed to setting up bets for all sorts of questions; there was probably an odds ratio regarding her true gender, and causing some of them to lose their pay truly was… something she felt not the slightest bit sorry for.
“Could you please ask questions related to first aid?” While trying her best to raise her voice, Lin Yu also cast a pleading glance towards Nangong.
Once their eyes met, a silent understanding passed between them, and she felt relieved to hand over the initiative of the conversation to Nangong.
“Ahem, please refrain from asking irrelevant questions. It will cause Dr. Lin unnecessary trouble.”
‘Oh, they called me a doctor!’
A flicker of excitement sparked within her.
The crowd fell silent, until finally, one voice asked a question pertaining to “first aid”: “If there’s a femoral artery rupture, how do you stop the bleeding in an emergency?”
“Wait to die.” Nangong answered bluntly and without hesitation, then took Lin Yu’s hand and turned to leave.
An unsettling atmosphere instantly enveloped everyone. The soldiers now remembered that merely learning how to stop bleeding was utterly insufficient to save their lives on the brutal battlefield.
Which part of the body could take a bullet and still allow one to bound around alive and well? The head? The torso? Or the limbs?
None of them.
With the power of modern rifle rounds, a single shot to any body part would take half a life. Bullets would tear through the body cavity, tumbling mercilessly, leaving vast empty spaces and wounds that would prove incredibly difficult to heal. Without immediate hemostasis, one would go into shock, fall unconscious within half a minute, and swiftly pass on to the next life.
Privates would not be accompanied by field doctors, thus preventing them from receiving immediate treatment when injured. Internal bleeding, organ damage, or arterial ruptures that couldn’t be tourniqueted would claim lives almost as quickly as a direct headshot.
Over a thousand… now eight or nine hundred men were hunkered down in these trenches, with only two medics. The stark ratio of 450:1 ensured that most would not receive timely and effective aid during combat.
Lin Yu suddenly asked Nangong, “If there were magic, perhaps such injuries could be healed…”
“Perhaps,” Nangong replied casually.
With the first aid training concluded, Lin Yu accompanied Nangong back to the tent, resuming their blood-soaked daily routine as medics.