In 2012, the African Republic of Mali suffered a serious military coup and ethnic rebellion. With the urgent call for help from Mali**, a mysterious French mercenary group has set foot in this war-torn land, and they are about to carry out a mission called "Serval".
In this team, there is a black-haired, yellow-haired Oriental face, who is a member of the 2nd Armored Corps Cavalry Regiment, tall and burly, and skilled in combat. In the hail of bullets, he fought side by side with his comrades, bravely approaching the enemy's stronghold.
Fu Chen, a young man from Tianjin, China, has to leave his hometown after his girlfriend was murdered and becomes a mercenary in a foreign land. However, this life-changing choice made him experience a moment of life and death in the artillery fire, his comrades-in-arms fell in the **, and he himself was also shaken by shrapnel and fell heavily in a pool of blood.
When Fu Chen opened his mailbox every day, in addition to receiving envy from netizens and information asking how to join the Corps, he couldn't help but recall the hardships he had made along the way.
He is a native of Tianjin, born in 1980, like other children of the same age, he has been studying step by step under the expectations of his parents since he was a child, and after graduating from university, he has engaged in foreign trade according to his parents' arrangement.
Although he is now envied by netizens, recalling his difficult experience, his heart still throbs.
In ordinary life, Fu Chen has been living peacefully. However, an unexpected encounter changes the course of his life. I fall in love with a beautiful girl and decide to enter the palace of marriage, but I encounter the mysterious disappearance of my girlfriend.
Fu Chen was anxious and called the police to look for her, but found her body in the rental house of his girlfriend's ex-boyfriend. This sudden blow made Fu Chen almost collapse, and he could only endure his grief to comfort his girlfriend's parents.
In the middle of the night, he returned home exhausted, and in the face of his parents' concern and inquiry, he could no longer control his emotions, and knelt on the ground and cried.
* It is speculated that the girlfriend's case is a love murder and the ex-boyfriend is a suspect, but he has never been found. This series of questions and unsolvable mysteries made Fu Chen fall into shock, confusion and self-blame, unable to extricate himself.
Even, his parents had to stop him from wanting to commit suicide many times. In the days after his girlfriend's death, Fu Chen felt like he was being evacuated, unable to work normally, and unable to find the faith to live.
Sometimes, he would suddenly go limp on his way to work, like an asteroid that had been knocked out of orbit and could not return to its normal trajectory no matter what. Fu Chen didn't know if it was because of physical or psychological problems, and in the end, he decided to resign, locked himself in his home, and refused to communicate with anyone.
Fu Chen struggled in pain for half a year and decided to go to a strange city to start a new life. However, his father found him and advised him to go abroad to escape for a while.
Fu Chen hesitated, but finally decided to consider this suggestion. After tossing and turning in bed, he remembered an article he had read about the French Foreign Legion in college, and one sentence in it made his blood boil: "To join the Foreign Legion is to say goodbye to the old life." ”
Fu Chen thinks that this is a turning point, and what prompted him to change was either that he had learned too much from life or that he had been hurt too deeply. He decided to seize the opportunity to start a new life.
Although joining the Foreign Legion was not an easy task, the idea made Fu Chen's blood boil, and he decided to seize this opportunity to start a new life.
Regardless of color or origin, soldiers from more than 100 countries have gathered here, and they have formed a mysterious mercenary group because of their common beliefs and superior combat effectiveness.
In this corps, as long as they pass the rigorous assessment, even fugitives, homeless people, and even conspirators and adventurers may become a member of the corps. Therefore, it is known as "a paradise for criminals" and "a paradise for adventurers".
After 5 years of service, all soldiers receive a good remuneration and a French nationality. However, in order to maintain the honor of the Corps, the physical and intellectual requirements of the soldiers are so high that the elimination rate is as high as 95%.
However, Fu Chen was not intimidated by this number, and in order to meet the standards of the Corps, he trained hard for a year, sweating in the gym during the day and learning French by himself at night.
His determination and perseverance make people look forward to him.
Fu Chen, a man with a dream, set foot on French soil in July 2010 and began his new journey. After three months of language training, he was undaunted to get on the train to the headquarters of the French Foreign Legion.
It was here that he first experienced the principle of "no matter where he came from". Men between the ages of 17 and 48, regardless of nationality or creed, are eligible to sign up for the crowd, from ragged Italian homeless men to thieves who have committed heinous crimes, and even murderers who have been persuaded to retire.
However, it is only through a series of rigorous tests that you can truly pass the test.
Fu Chen successfully passed the assessment and became the only recruit left, enjoying 3,500 euros per month. However, the training of the recruits does not end there, they will go through up to 4 months of devilish training, 120 kilometers of daily marching, and extremely difficult diet.
Many people were eliminated because they couldn't endure hardship, and Fu Chen also thought about giving up, but when he thought of saying goodbye to his past life, he gritted his teeth and persevered.
In March 2011, after brutal devil training, Fu Chen successfully joined the Foreign Legion and wore a white haute couture hat to represent honor. However, despite the tremendous efforts he had made to the arrival of this moment, Fu Chen's heart did not have much excitement and joy.
He always had a question in his mind: After going through so many difficulties and challenges, could he really be "reborn in Nirvana" here? On the first day he joined the Corps, Fu Chen found that most of his comrades-in-arms were from the bottom of various countries, some were gangsters, and some were stowaways.
However, in this special environment, no one cares that you are from**, and all soldiers are required to discard their house keys, cut off their mobile phone cards, change their names, and even change their birthdays and parents' names, in order to completely break with their past selves.
Fu Chen changed his name to Fang, and he was ready to welcome a new world. The discipline of the Foreign Corps is strict, as soon as the assembly call sounds, everyone needs to be in place within 60 seconds, and even if they are 1 second late, all their comrades have to do push-ups.
Those who make mistakes need to bear additional punishments, and watching his comrades sweat like rain, Fu Chen feels deeply guilty. Although the rigorous training may be boring for others, it is a kind of release for Fu Chen, because the fullness and exhaustion of his body make him gradually forget the trauma and pain of his soul.
In Christmas 2011, Fu Chen returned to his hometown where he had been away for a long time. On that day, he bought a large bouquet of white lilies to pay tribute to his lover. He quietly shared the bits and pieces of these years with her, as if at that moment, he felt that the painful wounds of the past were healing, and a new way of life was taking root in his heart.
One day, Fu Chen was playing with the computer by the window, and suddenly heard a loud noise outside the window, he subconsciously rolled down from the chair, bowed his head, and buried his head under the windowsill.
After a few seconds, he couldn't help but laugh when he realized that it was just the family of the married man outside setting off firecrackers. Although he had not experienced actual combat, the habits and qualities of the army had been deeply imprinted in his heart.
What he doesn't know, however, is that real changes in his life are about to begin. In 2012, Mali appealed to France for assistance following a military coup d'état in the Republic of Mali and a rebellion among the Tuareg people in the north.
France** immediately ordered the Foreign Legion to be sent to Mali to fight. Fu Chen was sent to the battlefield as an armored soldier, and he and his comrades fought against the elusive *** army in the Sahara Desert at up to 50 degrees.
In the harsh desert environment, where fresh fruits and vegetables are scarce, people rely on military canned food to survive, while also facing sudden attacks of sandstorms and poisonous insects.
When Fu Chen was on a mission, he was in an armored car, the heat wave was rolling, and the car was extremely hot, so he suffered from heat stroke, vomited violently, and almost died in the desert.
Fu Chen and his comrades-in-arms held out in a village for several hours, but they did not find any hostile situation. However, at this moment, they let their guard down, and several bullets suddenly shot from the roof opposite, and several African mercenaries fell to the ground.
This was the first time Fu Chen saw his comrades-in-arms sacrifice in front of him, and it was also the first time he felt the cruelty of war and the fragility of life. His body subconsciously ducked into cover and raised his gun to fight back.
A bomb was not far from Fu Chen**, and a powerful wave of qi pushed him away from the place, making him dizzy. There was a large piece of shrapnel stuck in his thigh, and he was bleeding profusely. Until Fu Chen recovered from his injuries and was discharged from the hospital, the war in Mali continued, and news of his comrades being injured or killed kept coming.
When Fu Chen was standing guard in the desert, facing the vast night and the lonely sky, he missed his hometown and relatives in the distance. During the changing of the guard, he would take a serious look at his comrades and say to them: "Look back on your life!" ”
After experiencing the baptism of bullets and war, Fu Chen has a new understanding of life. He understood that the pain he experienced when he was young and frivolous was nothing compared to the vastness of his whole life.
There is no setback that cannot be overcome, and there is no pain that can be forgotten. To live is the best commitment to life.
In June 2013, the two sides signed a ceasefire agreement. Then, the French Foreign Legion returned with honors. On the returning transport plane, Fu Chen looked through the window at the glow between the blue sky and white clouds, and a feeling of reunion after a long absence, as if he had lived again, surged in his heart.
To commemorate the experience, he shared his story online.
After Fu Chen returned to China after retiring from the army, he opened a security company, and enjoyed a happy life with his relatives and friends with the high remuneration he earned from his five-year career in the French Foreign Legion. Although many netizens were puzzled by this, he said that the treatment of the corps is the same as that of the regular French army, 1,200 euros per month, and the salary for overseas missions is doubled.
But he will never go into battle against the interests of the Motherland for money, because "the Legion is the Fatherland" is the maxim of mercenaries. In the minds of Chinese mercenaries, they see this as just a job, and when there is a conflict with the interests of the motherland, they will choose to quit as soon as possible.
Fu Chen firmly believes that everyone should have the opportunity to dedicate themselves to the motherland, but he will choose to use his own way to create a better life for his hometown and relatives and friends.
Fu Chen sighed: "When I embarked on the road of the Foreign Legion, it was like walking into a misty swamp full of unknowns. Visas, fitness, language, and luck, every step was full of challenges, but when I finally arrived at my destination, I found that it was very different from what I had imagined, and there was no turning back. ”
As a mercenary, he must forge ahead, even in the face of life and death tests. However, the danger is not limited to the enemy, but also to the comrades around you. Some people will accidentally injure others because they are nervous or stressed, while others will attack their comrades because they can't bear the long-suppressed emotions.
Therefore, Fu Chen wrote in an email to those eager netizens: "If you are doing well outside, I don't recommend you to come here. "Only by experiencing it can we truly understand, and only by losing it can we cherish it more.
Although Fu Chen had lost the happiness that was at his fingertips, he was reborn and transformed in this experience, which made him feel lucky. Although we don't know whether he really let go of the heaviness of the past, after experiencing the rain of bullets, he cherishes every day of life even more.