Chapter 677 07.676: “The earth began to tremble”

“Take me to see.” As soon as he arrived at the position, a knife was put to his neck. The situation that Horatio least wanted to see happened.

“Please follow me.” After saying this, Louise turned around and led the way hurriedly.

Seeing this, Horatio quickened his pace and followed closely.

The two men moved back and forth in the narrow communication trench, brushing past rows of Krieg soldiers who were constantly pouring into the trench.

These soldiers remained silent beneath their masks, rushing to their positions as quickly as possible, facing the coming battle fearlessly.

After a difficult journey, they finally squeezed into the front battle trench.

Horatio lifted his foot and stepped onto the wooden steps sunk into the earth to reach the lookout point.

He reached out and picked up the trench telescope, his eyes piercing through the smoke-filled, silent no-man’s land, and locked onto the rebel trench opposite.

There were no rebel soldiers to be seen on the trenches, only the bayonets on their guns flashing cold light in the darkness.

Those bayonets were like dormant poisonous snakes, faintly revealing the enemy’s movements.

“Staff Officer Clausewitz, I’d like to hear your professional judgment. Do you think the enemy is gathering its forces in preparation for an attack?” Horatio asked with a serious expression, moving aside to make room for the staff officer.

The staff officer stepped onto the observation post, staring intently into the distance, muttering to himself: “One floor… two floors… three floors…”

Then, he took a deep breath, his face instantly became extremely serious, and he said in a deep voice: “The bayonet has three layers.”

“What does this mean?” Horatio was not a professional Astra Militarum officer, and he knew that he would need to consult the staff officer on some military matters.

After all, the other side had been squatting in the trenches for more than two years, so they naturally understood trench warfare more thoroughly than he did.

“The trench structure is usually divided into a front shooting slope and a rear standby slope, with the wooden planks in the middle being the passage.

Now their bayonets are distributed in three layers, which means that the front shooting slope and the rear standing by slope are already occupied by soldiers, with personnel maneuvering in the middle.

This shows that the enemy has mobilized a large number of troops from the rear to the front trenches and is likely to launch an attack within the next 24 hours. “Staff Officer Clausewitz explained in detail.

“Let the soldiers clear the position! Move these bodies away! They crush the barbed wire and block the soldiers’ shooting range!” Horatio gave the order immediately.

“Engineers! Engineers!” the staff officer also shouted loudly.

“Here!” A sergeant with a flame and an engineer shovel logo on his helmet quickly pushed through the crowd, hurried over, and reported to the staff officer, standing at attention.

“Take emergency epidemic prevention measures, let the flamethrowers set fire to the pile of corpses in front of the trench! Organize combat engineers to re-deploy razor blades or barbed wire!” The staff officer issued orders in an orderly manner.

“Yes!” After receiving the order, the sergeant turned around quickly and left quickly to carry out the mission.

Horatio also immediately gave orders to the infantry company.

In a blink of an eye, more than 8000 soldiers on the position quickly moved, spreading out along the trenches, filling the front line as evenly as possible.

The companies began to busy themselves with clearing the bodies from their positions.

To save time, the soldiers carried the bodies out of the trenches and dumped them nearby.

When the corpses are piled to a certain height, they are set on fire using a flamethrower.

In an instant, a raging fire broke out, illuminating the soldiers’ gray and black gas masks red.

Thick smoke rose up and filled the sky above the battlefield for a long time.

Although this careless way of dealing with corpses, including their own, was somewhat less honorable in the eyes of other mortal legions, the Krieg death soldiers did not care about it.

For them, there is no need to be buried. Being able to fight for the empire until the last moment of their lives rather than slowly rotting in mediocrity is already the most perfect ending.

The 1314th Infantry Regiment also spread out its battle line as much as possible, and Farida also specially reserved a general reserve force in the command trench to be on standby at any time.

Once Horatio could not hold out, she could immediately draw on this general reserve force, cross the communication trench, and rush to support the 1313th Infantry Regiment.

Horatio reached for the pocket watch Thei had given him and glanced at it.

At this moment, he was extremely nervous because of the enemy’s impending attack, and he also felt blocked and suffocated due to wearing the gas mask for a long time, as well as a strong sense of suffocation.

Looking up at the distant sky, the dark clouds were as thick as ink, layer upon layer, covering the sky and blocking the sun, making the daytime look as dark and depressing as the early morning. This depressing atmosphere weighed heavily on everyone’s heart, and a cruel and fierce battle was about to break out.

Horatio was absorbed in following the progress of the reconstruction of the position and the passage of the marching column to the rear.

The team is ten kilometers long, and there are only three kilometers left where no troops have entered the trenches, but the first and second line trenches are already full of Krieg soldiers on standby.

As time went on, more and more soldiers took up their positions.

It’s just that time was too tight. With so many piles of corpses, the engineers only had time to clear those that blocked the firing range, overwhelmed the barbed wire, and obstructed the passage of necessary communication trenches. They didn’t have time to clear the entire position.

Therefore, the replacement soldiers of the 1313th Infantry Regiment and Horatio had to fight among piles of corpses, some of which had been dead for several days and were beginning to rot.

Louise returned to Farida’s 1314th Infantry Regiment to assist her in organizing position defense and reinforcement plans.

According to the original plan, the two regiments were required to fill the 34-kilometer-long front line and cooperate with the other two regiments to block the Passchendaele-Ypres Line. The entire original 15th Siege Regiment operated around this blockade line.

However, now the 1314th Infantry Regiment had to urgently shrink its defense line to assist the 1313th Infantry Regiment, and the gap was filled by the nearby 1124th Infantry Regiment.

Horatio received news that as long as he could hold out until the next day, he would receive a reinforcement force of 20,000 people.

He checked his pocket watch and calculated the time carefully.

“The firing and standby positions in the combat trenches and logistics trenches were all fully manned, and only the firing positions in the command trenches were left to deploy infantry.

Deploy troops immediately at the beacon location you see.” Horatio explained the arrangements to Krieg’s lieutenants while waving his command hand to make instant dispatches on the huge battle line.

As the orders were passed down layer by layer, the Krieg soldiers quickly acted according to the instructions of the beacon.

The most forward combat trench is usually called the “first trench”, but it is not a single trench, but a tightly arranged and scientifically reasonable defense system.

It is usually composed of at least two layers, each layer is reinforced and hardened with heavy sandbags or quick-setting soil, and the inner wall is supported by log piles.

The trenches are connected by narrow and long longitudinal S-shaped communication trenches, and each communication trench is equipped with a blocked shooting hole.

Once the enemy broke into the trenches, Krieg soldiers could block the communication trenches by deploying light felling guns.

boom! boom! boom!
A dull sound of artillery fire, like the thunder of a war hammer, rolled in from the distant sky.

Horatio raised his head sharply and looked up. Then, he could clearly hear the sound of a cannonball whistling through the sky.

call out! puff!
call out! puff!
Accompanied by a sharp sound of breaking wind, the heavy shells fell heavily on the mud, triggering the fuse, and the dark red flames instantly splashed up mud waves more than ten meters high.

“Get into hiding! Get into hiding!” Horatio shouted loudly, asking the soldiers to stop the task of resting in the trenches, quickly return to the fighting positions, and retreat into the cleared cat ear holes.

Each platoon only left a few sentries to stay in the trenches to monitor the enemy’s movements.

Even though he came from the Imperial Navy, Horatio knew that the bombardment meant that the enemy was about to launch an attack.

But he didn’t know how long this bombardment would last.

Is it weeks, days, or hours?

After a little thought, Horatio quickly deduced that the enemy bombardment would not last long.

After all, after two years of seesaw warfare, the rebels’ artillery shell stocks were running low.

The shells observed so far were all fired by the Earthshakers, which were deployed outside the range of the Krieg artillery, in a position that allowed them to attack safely while also being able to hit the blockade positions.

This means that the front-line positions will be subjected to unilateral artillery fire.

However, the Krieg artillery was already ready.

At the command of the gunner, the gunners shook the gun barrel vigorously, and the loading team used a crane to lift the shells, moved them to the barrel, and then used the ramrod to stuff the shells steadily into the barrel.

Once the enemy launches a trench charge, the first wave of attack they will face will not be bullets, but a dense rain of artillery shells.

Krieg’s artillery can also attack the enemy’s positions, but before the enemy launches a charge and walks out of the trenches, the killing efficiency of this simple artillery fire is not high. In addition, the next attack will not be launched by their own side, so no commander will waste precious artillery shells at this time.

“The enemy’s attack on our position has begun. I will try my best to stop them and let your soldiers prepare for a flanking charge.” Horatio said to Farida Hood, the acting military supervisor and commander of the 1314th Infantry Regiment, through the walkie-talkie.

(End of this chapter)