Chapter 980 - 203: Blitzkrieg
Vasily rubbed his frozen fingers. "Weren’t they saying the Krauts were going to pull some big move? How come it’s been days now and there’s not a peep from their side?"
To say there wasn’t a peep at all would’ve been impossible.
But what there was, was nothing more than the usual back-and-forth between the two sides—chucking a few tons of shells at each other’s positions, or sniper duels that had nothing to do with trench-ratting line-fillers like them.
Thanks to the long standoff, trenches, bunkers, and barbed wire had been piled up in great heaps; whichever side wanted to go on the offensive would have to pay a horrific price, while the gains they got in return were often pitifully small.
No matter how cheap these gray beasts were, they weren’t like the United Kingdom’s colonial troops, supposedly endless.
Over time, the Eastern Front had settled into a bizarre "sit-down war."
The veteran Igor pulled a rusty tin box from his coat, took out a half-smoked cigarette and clamped it between his lips. Only after he lazily exhaled a cloud of smoke did he speak at his leisure: "No idea. Maybe the Krauts set their main battlefield up north. Isn’t that pretty close to Saint Petersburg?"
"Saint Petersburg’s a big city. Any of you ever been?"
"Idiot. If anyone had been to a place like that, you think he’d still be squatting in a trench with you, playing grunt? At least he’d have wrangled himself a major’s rank."
Cursing as he spoke, Vasily carefully fished a bottle of vodka out of the ammo crate, tipped his head back, and took a fierce pull. The icy liquor slid down his throat into his gut and, in a heartbeat, turned into a ball of raging fire.
Whoosh—
He looked at Igor with contented eyes. "Squad leader, lemme have a drag too."
"Screw off. You’ve got booze, and I didn’t see you sharing a drop with me."
Vasily had just opened his mouth when a thunderous rumble rolled in from afar.
He instinctively looked up, just in time to see a scarlet haze leap up along the horizon as the first volley of shells tore apart the silence shrouding the trenches.
Dirt mixed with shrapnel came crashing down on their heads. He stumbled and dove into a shell hole, his ears ringing.
"Standard barrage! Find cover!"
Igor’s shout was swallowed by the second wave of explosions; this time the blasts shook the wooden bracing of the trench so hard clods of earth pattered down. Clinging to the sandbags, Vasily peeked out—what had been sparse shell bursts were now packed as dense as a rainstorm.
Stranger still, in the past their artillery duels had always been rhythmic, you fire, I fire in turn. But this time the German guns were like some tireless giant beast—third volley, fourth, fifth...
The oil lamps in the trench were all blown out, and screams kept sounding in the dark—some poor bastard had half his arm sliced off by shrapnel, someone else got lifted clean out of the trench by the blast wave.
"What, our artillery’s just eating for nothing?!"
"Something’s wrong!"
"Usually they stop after half an hour!"
Forcing himself to stay calm, Igor grabbed a Helmet half-buried in dirt and jammed it onto his head. "This isn’t just a simple barrage. The Krauts are about to attack!"
No one could make out what he was saying. All Vasily saw was his squad leader’s mouth opening and closing, then his collar being grabbed as the squad leader yanked him up.
"Grab your Weapons and get ready to meet the enemy!"
He roared himself hoarse, hauling one soldier after another to their feet and shoving them up into the trench line.
In the distance, smoke and fumes were everywhere.
The German barrage had shifted away from over their heads and was now pounding the positions of their comrades nearby. Under the gray-black sky, the smoke completely veiled the once open plain in front of the trench.
They stared outside for a long time.
The ground was still trembling, their ears filled with a harsh, shrill ringing.
They could neither see clearly nor hear much, but everyone knew the enemy was hidden in that smoke. The immediacy of this unknown terror made many green recruits piss their pants.
Click—
Like the faint sound of a rat gnawing on a tin can.
Right after, an Armored Infantryman wearing a steel mask, like a Devil out of Hell, silently emerged from the smoke and raised the strange-looking Weapon in his hands toward them.
The striking Iron Cross emblazoned on their Helmets made Vasily instantly realize who they were. "Damn it, it’s a Prussian armored division!"
Bang—
Gunfire crackled like frying beans as these veterans, who’d survived at least a year on the Eastern Front, responded at once.
Bullets sparked in dense showers off the Armored Infantryman’s mask and Chest Armor.
But that Armored Infantryman, like some Devil clad in Armor, didn’t even flinch. He took aim at Vasily and suddenly squeezed the trigger.
Whoom—
A Fire Dragon swelled suddenly in Vasily’s field of vision. At the instant of life and death, his squad leader Igor lunged and shoved him back into the trench, only to be swallowed by the Fire Dragon an instant later.
"Squad leader!"
Vasily let out a despairing wail. Choking down the grief in his chest, he ejected the rounds, pulled special armor-piercing ammo from the crate, and loaded them into the chamber.
But when he poked his head up to fight back, what he saw was a countless number of Armored Infantry. They were advancing slowly, using more than a dozen heavy Land Cruisers as moving cover.
Their portable steam engines belched thick black smoke; their slow, steady footfalls were already the tolling of Death’s bell. Any resistance before such terrifying Power was nothing but a mantis trying to halt a chariot.
"God!"
Vasily whispered in despair. The instant he pulled the trigger, an Armored Infantryman with a bright Iron Cross on his Helmet had also taken aim at him.
Bang—
The two shots cracked almost at the same time.
One Armored Infantryman took a hit and staggered, lifting his arm to glance at the Arm Armor now caved in with a huge dent. He spat a filthy curse, then kept on advancing.
Vasily, however, had collapsed forever in the trench.
The Prussian Armored Infantry stormed into the trench, first scouring it with flamethrowers, then yanking the starter cords of their Chainsaw Swords and launching into close-quarters slaughter.
The few Armored Infantry units the Russians had placed in the line, some hadn’t even managed to get their Armor fully on before being roasted to charcoal by Prussian flamethrowers. The rest were no match at all for the Prussian Armored Infantry, superior both in number and quality, and were wiped out in short order.
Having breached the first defensive line, the Prussian armored division didn’t pause for a moment and continued its advance.
Only now did ranks of Prussian soldiers in pointed Helmets emerge from the lingering smoke behind them. Wearing steel Helmets, they led mules and other pack animals, heavy medium and light artillery pieces dragging along behind.
These well-drilled Prussian soldiers set up their artillery positions with maximum speed.
Moments later, dense shellfire once again thundered along the enemy’s secondary defensive line.
Bzzz, bzzz, bzzz—
Overhead, Tsarist Russia’s Airships scrambled into the sky and drifted slowly toward this sector.
A Prussian artillery colonel bellowed, "Ignore those Airships! Keep covering our armored division’s advance!"