A biting, salty wind swept through Omdur's harbor, blowing across the bewildered or impatient faces in the queue.
Long wooden piers led to a dozen towering, old-fashioned wooden sailing ships. Their hulls were weather-beaten, their planks dark, their rigging tangled like spiderwebs. They looked far less reassuring than the brand-new training facilities at the recruit camp.
Not Playing If I'm Not Having Fun stood in the boarding queue, the sea wind cutting through his brand-new green cotton uniform and sending a chill through him.
He instinctively tightened his belt to pull his clothes closer, but his gaze drifted back toward the increasingly indistinct outline of the recruit camp in the distance.
A month ago, when he had been dumped there, he had been rather unhappy. Having to train like a recruit seemed unnecessary. Now that he was leaving, he found himself feeling an oddly misplaced nostalgia.
He missed the broad, level firing range, the recoil of a Flintlock, and the choking smell of gunpowder smoke.
Not Playing If I'm Not Having Fun even missed that rock-hard plank bed a little... at least it was stationary and dry, and he didn't have to worry about it sinking to the bottom of the sea the next second.
Honestly, Not Playing If I'm Not Having Fun had only now discovered that he might suffer from seasickness. He hadn't even boarded yet, but simply looking at those wooden sailing ships from the dock already made his knees weak.
That month in the recruit camp had been incredibly fulfilling.
From loading and shooting to battlefield bandaging, from bayonet fighting to putting on armor, Not Playing If I'm Not Having Fun had soaked up all sorts of knowledge he might never use in real life like a parched sponge.
"Fuck, we're finally leaving this hellhole!"
A