In everyone's subjective understanding:
Survival corresponded to death.
Since the theme of the second trial involved the word "survival," didn't that mean they might die here?
Then the voice of that silver giant beast echoed through the valley:
"Survival is civilization's foremost necessity.
"Likewise, it is the first task bestowed upon every living creature at the moment of its birth!
"Only by staying alive do you earn the right to reproduce, to pursue needs of a higher order—such as power and glory.
"As recruits, you will face all manner of unimaginable hardships and incomparably brutal living conditions on the battlefields of the future.
"You may be stationed at the front lines when you suddenly hear that your regiment's supply line has been cut off by the enemy. Or, as a scout, you may suddenly receive intelligence that must be delivered to your superiors at camp no matter what, only to find that your rations have long since run out.
"So how will you ensure your own survival while completing the mission?
"Thus, your next trial is to return from here to the assembly square in the territory two hundred kilometers away within one week."
The recruits breathed a slight sigh of relief upon hearing this. It was only a two-hundred-kilometer trek under load. They could probably cover five kilometers an hour; at eight hours a day, that was forty kilometers. A week should be enough.
The first problem they might face was food.
Some began regretting not bringing food before boarding the carriage. When they saw those nearby who normally kept food stores looking overjoyed, they regretted it even more.
That sort naturally included the big fellow, Fegas.
Perhaps he had been starved too often in the past. The moment he heard that the barracks provided all the wheat rice