Arc of Fire

Dmitri pressed his eye to the eyepiece and joyfully said, “I can see very clearly!”

Just at that moment, Wang Zhong, from an overlooking perspective, spotted the enemy.

A Mark II tank appeared on the southwest main road.

It seemed that the Prosen Army of this era also assigned the already outmoded Mark II tanks to the reconnaissance troops.

Behind the Mark II tank was a wheeled reconnaissance vehicle, followed by a half-track laden with soldiers.

Even though it was only a reconnaissance unit, why did so many of them come marching up in such a grand procession…

Suddenly, Wang Zhong noticed that this group seemed unrested, their faces showing extreme fatigue, their clothes all wrinkled and covered with leaves, as if they had slept in the wild overnight.

Could it be… the land mines had taken effect?

At this moment, the second and third Mark II tanks entered his field of view; the strength of this vanguard was somewhat substantial.

Seeing so many people, Wang Zhong decided to give them a surprise, while also shaking the enemy forces.

He said to Yegorov, “Call Artillery Unit A.”

After deciding to split B4 into two positions yesterday, they took action overnight, distributing the four guns to different locations and renaming the original position Artillery Unit A.

Of course, this ‘A’ was a Cyrillic letter.

While picking up the handset, Yegorov complained, “I’ve become a telephone operator!”

Vasily said, “Then let me do it!”

"You listen to your walkie-talkie, otherwise the brigadier will get angry again. Connect to Artillery Unit A.”

Dmitri hurriedly began calculating the enemy’s coordinates.

Yegorov said, “Connected. Here!”

Wang Zhong took the handset and immediately began to report the coordinates.

Just having calculated halfway, Dmitri was shocked, his eyes widening as he looked at Wang Zhong.

————

Major Hank stuck his head out of the turret, observing the city with a telescope.

The Air Force’s bombing appeared to be highly effective, and the destruction of the city’s outer defenses was clearly visible.

The Ante People were hastily repairing the damaged fortifications. Perhaps this was an opportunity for a rapid assault?

As Major Hank thought this, he let out a huge yawn.

Last night, the reconnaissance battalion did not dare to camp in Karlinovka for fear of mines, as they had no engineers to deal with the land mines.

Camping in the field, Major Hank hadn’t slept well.

He hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in many days and had hoped to take a bath and get a good rest in a clean bed last night, but it all fell through!

Damn General White Horse! Too cunning, too bad!

Just as he was thinking, a sharp screech suddenly came from the sky; it was the sound of artillery shells tearing through the air!

The moment the screeching sounded, the reconnaissance battalion, still not deployed around the tank, dropped like flies to the ground.

Those still on the half-track also rushed to jump off and flopped down in the fields off the road shoulder.

Major Hank immediately ducked back into the turret and closed the hatch—this had all become muscle memory.

Only after completing these actions did he realize that the whistling sound was clearly that of heavy artillery, at least 122 millimeters.

With the armor of a Mark II tank, resisting such heavy artillery might be problematic—

That instant, the shells hit the ground.

————

Wang Zhong called for a volley, with a total of four rounds.

The first round fell right in the front of the enemy’s formation, about four or five meters from the leading Mark II, and the blast wind simply flipped the small frame of the Mark II tank onto the road.

When the tank flipped, Wang Zhong clearly saw two prone infantrymen get crushed underneath.

The dust cloud from the explosion immediately swallowed up the surrounding prone enemies.

The second round fell into the field, a bit far from the enemy column, but the chunks of earth it tossed flew tens of meters, landing on the road and clanging against the enemy helmets.

The third round flew over the target and landed at the rear of the column, overturning the rear half-track vehicle.

The fourth round hit dead center in the middle of the column, among a cluster of densely packed prone figures.

Wang Zhong distinctly saw a Prosen soldier, along with his equipment, literally launched dozens of meters into the air, as if he “caught a plane.”

By conservative estimates, this vanguard of the enemy had lost half its force to these four 203 millimeter shells!

No wonder they say artillery is the God of War!

Is it really that powerful?

Wang Zhong couldn’t help but think back to the day he had first traversed to this world, when he was welcomed by a 381-millimeter artillery round in Ronied; it was nothing short of a miracle he survived.

There must have been about a hundred people in that room, and only two lived; he was one of those lucky survivors, unbelievable.

At this moment, cheers came from outside.

The soldiers didn’t have telescopes, their field of view wasn’t as good as Wang Zhong’s, but the dust clouds created by the four artillery rounds rose tens of meters high, and they could see them clearly without scopes.

"Ura!”

Dmitri didn’t cheer but calmly recited, “Adjustment for firing, adjust the elevation to…”

Mishka, the artillery trainee nicknamed with a clipboard, was quickly taking notes on the side.

Wang Zhong said, “No, there’s no need to fire again.”

Dmitri replied, “No need to fire? More accurate attacks could deal a heavy blow…”

"This is enough. The key is to tell the enemy that we have such weapons so they will never take us lightly again,” Wang Zhong lectured with the tone of an elder to a junior.

————

Major Hank crawled out of the tank’s bottom hatch—now it was no longer the bottom hatch, it should be called the top hatch.

He looked around.

Five vehicles were burning, and at least 80 motionless Prosen soldiers lay on the ground.

They had adopted the correct prone position for shell avoidance, but still could not withstand the local overpressure produced by heavy artillery.

More people were lying on the ground, howling; cries of “Mama” rose and fell in waves.

Major Hank wanted to soothe his troops and decided to stand up on the overturned tank. But as soon as he tried to pull his leg out of the hatch, he realized it was bent at an impossible angle.

The moment he realized his leg was broken, the pain which adrenaline had been blocking finally surged through him.

Major Hank screamed at the top of his lungs, “Sanitater (medic)!”

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