Trench Bolts and Magic

Chapter 251 A Reassuring Figure for Modern People

After taking his first step, Eric discovered that the ground beneath his feet was not the land he had imagined.

After several days of shelling by both sides, coupled with a heavy rain, the area between the two trenches had become a sticky swamp filled with body parts, shrapnel, and blood. Every step he took felt like a tug-of-war with death.

The massive gray skirmisher line leaped out of the trenches and charged headlong into the Gaulish positions a few hundred meters away.

The morning mist provided some cover for Eric and his men's charge.

But it was only a tiny bit.

As they rushed out of the trench and out over a hundred meters, approaching the barbed wire that had been blasted open in several places, the sound of machine gun fire erupted from the trench ahead.

Almost instantly, Eric's fellow countryman, who was running alongside him, was struck as if by an invisible giant hammer. He stopped abruptly and then slumped into a crater, splashing mud and water, which turned a dark red.

Eric, on the other side, didn't have time to think and instinctively fell to the ground.

Bullets whizzed past overhead, splashing mud all around them.

He saw the Saxon soldiers nearby, who hadn't had time to lie down, fall one by one from left to right under machine gun fire.

The surviving soldiers either jumped into the nearest shell crater or, like him, lay prone in the mud.

A muffled thud suddenly came from beside Eric. He turned his head and saw a mangled corpse lying next to the barbed wire fence.

That was another soldier in the platoon; he was the one who had just been talking about training the assault battalion in the trench, trying to divert everyone's tension.

At the same time, heavy footsteps sounded behind Eric, and several 'Siegfried Type 1' armored knights rushed up.

Because their mechanical feet were too small relative to their bodies, they were severely restricted in the muddy terrain. These steel giants easily got stuck in the mud and needed to get out, so they were unable to keep up with the infantry immediately.

But in any case, at least at this moment when the infantry needed them most, these Teutonic Knights armored knights arrived.

The towering steel giants quickly crossed the skirmish line, then used their massive shields and torsos to shield the infantry as they rose from the ground and moved closer to the Gauls' positions.

However, this coordinated advance did not last long, and the Gallic armored knights also appeared amidst the smoke of battle.

Upon spotting the approaching enemies, the Teutonic Knights' armored knights immediately charged forward and engaged them in combat. However, the muddy and slippery ground slowed down both sides.

Large-scale battles between armored knights are rare, but Eric had no interest in appreciating the fight at the moment.

"Can't stop!"

He roared at himself and charged forward with his Gew.98 rifle in hand.

As far as the eye can see, there is a surreal scene.

Invisible bullets kept shooting out from the smoke screen, taking away lives one after another. Human figures appeared and disappeared in the firelight and smoke, like twisted ghosts.

The sky over this battlefield turned a dark orange—this wasn't due to any problem with Eric's vision.

The explosion of countless shells sent massive amounts of mud, dust, and gunpowder residue flying into the air.

Meanwhile, burning trees or other burning materials produce thick smoke.

These suspended particles in the air scatter and absorb shorter wavelengths of blue and green light from sunlight.

The light that can penetrate this 'filter' and reach the ground is mainly red and orange light with longer wavelengths.

When these rays mix with the thick, low-lying smoke and dust, they create a murky, oppressive dark orange or blood red.

In fact, the heavily polluted Ruhr industrial region also displays such scenes at sunrise and sunset; Eric even mentioned this to his students in class.

However, at this moment, his mind was completely blank, and only one thought remained in his mind.

"Survive."

It was at this moment that Eric saw the training assault battalion soldiers who had entered the trench with them the day before.

These soldiers, appearing out of nowhere, suddenly surged dozens of meters ahead of Eric and his men, as if they had sprung from the ground.

They skillfully used the craters to advance, and when they encountered undamaged barbed wire, someone would push huge wooden planks directly onto the wire to allow others to pass quickly.

In some of the craters, a peculiar weapon resembling a cannon can also be found.

It was much smaller than the cannon Eric knew, and the muzzle was almost pointing straight up to the sky, and it fired at an extremely fast speed.

With a series of 'bangs', shells were launched one after another.

As the explosions continued, the few remaining machine gun positions on the Gauls' positions gradually fell silent.

By this time, the soldiers of the training assault battalion had reached the edge of the Gauls' trenches, and the sounds of gunfire and grenade explosions were becoming more intense in their location.

Eric, whose gaze was drawn to the instructors of the assault battalion, suddenly felt his foot slip as he ran, as if he had stepped on something soft and squishy.

He looked down and saw a severed hand.

A rifle was still tightly clutched in that pale hand, perhaps the remains of yesterday's attacking troops.

Eric felt a churning in his stomach, but he couldn't vomit anything.
The distance of several hundred meters between the two trenches of the enemy and our side seemed to stretch on forever, and Eric and his comrades had no idea how long they had been running.

They mechanically followed the movements taught to the assault battalion soldiers, leaping forward under the cover of shell craters. It seemed that only by following behind this mysterious unit could they feel a little safe.

Finally, they approached the edge of the Gauls' first trench. Taking advantage of the height, he could see a dark-skinned Gaul soldier in a blue uniform raising his head from the trench.

His rifle seemed to have just run out of bullets, and when he saw Eric, his face was filled with terror.

Eric barely hesitated, yelling as he jumped into the trench and thrust his bayonet downwards.

The sharp tip of the bayonet pierced the enemy's chest. He first felt resistance, then warm liquid splattered onto his hand.

The black soldier's eyes widened, he made a gurgling sound in his throat, and he collapsed.

More and more Saxon soldiers jumped into the trench around Eric.

The battle immediately escalated into a more brutal hand-to-hand combat phase.

The dull thud of a rifle butt shattering, the crack of an entrenching tool slicing into bone, the agonizing screams of the dying, and the roars of the victors mingled together.

Eric pulled out his bayonet and leaned against the cold, damp breastwork, breathing heavily. His world consisted only of the few meters of blood-stained trench in front of him.

He succeeded; he survived the first wave of the attack and made his way into the enemy trenches.

But when he looked around, he also noticed that many of the familiar faces in his company were missing.
After catching his breath, Eric followed his comrades and continued their advance into the depths of the Gauls' trenches, attempting to reach the Gauls' second line of defense through the communication trenches.

This was the order they received from the company commander before the attack.

But he hadn't run more than a few steps when he collided head-on with a tall black soldier.

The other man yelled and slammed the butt of his rifle, which he hadn't had time to fix the bayonet to, into his shoulder blade. The excruciating pain almost made him faint.

He staggered and tried to attack the other man with his bayonet despite the pain, but slipped and fell backward into the mud.

Taking advantage of the opportunity, the black soldier raised his rifle with a ferocious expression, ejected the spent cartridge from the previous shot, and aimed at his chest, intending to fire.

"Tap tap tap—!"

A series of crisp, continuous bursts of submachine gun fire rang out at the corner of the trench. The black soldier's body jolted violently like a puppet with its strings cut, and then he collapsed limply.

Eric, still shaken, looked up and saw several soldiers from the training assault battalion appear at the end of the trench like the Grim Reaper.

The captain who fired had a cold look in his eyes and looked very young—just like one of my students back home.

As the other person passed by, they casually picked him up and said, "Soldier, don't stop, keep attacking!"

Eric was still in a daze when the young captain lifted him up.

The sharp pain in his shoulder and the dazed feeling of surviving the ordeal mixed together, causing his mind to momentarily shut down.

The cold, clear command drilled into his ears, making him shudder.

He looked at the captain in front of him, whose face was as young as his student's, but found that the man's eyes were sharper than someone his age could have imagined.

Private Eric nodded subconsciously, gripped his rifle tighter, and followed the training assault battalion soldiers deeper into the trench.

He soon witnessed what it truly meant to "clear the trenches".

These training assault battalion soldiers, who were surrounded by many 'legends', worked together seamlessly. One soldier stretched out his submachine gun and fired at the corner of the trench, while another skillfully pulled out a grenade, removed the fuse, paused briefly, and then threw it into the trench ahead.

"boom!"

The blast wave, carrying dirt and debris, hit Eric in the face, and he could even hear screams coming from afar.

Before the smoke cleared, the soldier who threw the grenade and another soldier darted out and pulled the trigger into the depths of the trench.

Meanwhile, the soldiers who had just provided suppressive fire took the opportunity to change to a new magazine.

"Tap tap tap tap!"

After a long string of short, powerful gunshots came from deep within the trench, there was no further movement ahead.

But the moat built by the Gauls was like a maze; you never knew where a new enemy might suddenly appear.

Just as Eric and his men were about to advance through the communication trench into the second trench, they were once again suppressed by fierce fire.

The continuous and heavy gunfire sounded like the Gauls had moved heavy machine guns directly into the trenches.

"Enemy firing position ahead, eliminate it quickly!"

The young captain spoke again, his voice calm and unusually clear amidst the chaos of the battlefield.

Soon, two soldiers from the training assault battalion caught up from behind.

As they passed Eric, he could see that they were carrying heavy metal canisters on their backs, and the big-headed one was holding a strangely shaped nozzle.

Without hesitation, one of the flamethrower soldiers stepped forward, leaned against the trench wall, and then extended the nozzle.

The next second, an angry fire dragon roared and charged out.

The orange-red, viscous liquid instantly covered the trench, which was more than ten meters long, and flames rose, turning everything into charcoal.

A scream more piercing than the sound of gunfire shattered the battlefield; the sound was not like a human voice, but more like the final lament of some creature enduring extreme pain.

(End of this chapter)