Dragon Raja: Lu Mingfei's War Journey

Chapter 88: The Battle of Verdun Begins

On February 20, 1916, Lu Mingfei and his party had been in Verdun for a month and a half, and nearly two months had passed since the brief and absurd Christmas ceasefire.

For the first two weeks, they were detained in the rear and subjected to interrogations that could be described as humiliating. The military police interrogated them repeatedly, and their files were examined page by page. Any glance or any answer could be interpreted as evidence of treason.

Later, Henrik used all his connections to get them out and brought them to this godforsaken place.

They weren't just loafing around for the past month and a half; they were there to do hard labor. They were assigned to assemble the heaviest cannon ever transported by land during World War I, the Big Bertha cannon, also known as the Big Bertha gun.

This was the largest caliber gun of World War I, with a terrifying 420 mm caliber. Lu Mingfei's company used a 75.8 mm gun.

A millimeter mortar is nothing compared to this cannon.

This super cannon weighs 120 tons. It took Lu Mingfei and his company of 240 people six weeks to assemble it. They were exhausted every day, but when the last bolt was tightened and the last protective plate was installed, the steel behemoth lay completely in the forest clearing, and everyone was completely shocked.

"Are we really going to use this behemoth to attack the French positions? This is insane!" Caesar looked up, stunned, at the six-meter-long barrel and the massive cannon. Even though he considered himself a worldly man, he had to admit that he was awestruck by this super cannon; it was the epitome of violence.

Lu Mingfei was equally shocked by such a super cannon, but what shocked him even more was the cannonball next to him, which was almost as tall as him and weighed a ton.

The shell lay quietly on the specially made ammunition truck. Lu Mingfei reached out and gently touched the shell's cool, curved outer shell. It weighed a ton—this was no longer a shell, but more like a small meteorite.

He could hardly imagine what a hellish scene it would be when such a thing was launched by that monster called the Great Bertha and landed on the concrete and steel fortresses of Verdun.

"My God—if this thing hits, it could flatten half a mountain, let alone a fortress, right?" Otto leaned over and clicked his tongue in amazement.

The blacksmith's son had a clearer understanding of metal and weight than most people, which made him feel an instinctive sense of awe and fear.

The other soldiers in the company also gathered around, gazing up at the steel behemoth that had just been born in their hands. The fatigue, complaints, and anxiety under the military police investigation of the past six weeks seemed to be temporarily washed away by the visual impact of the behemoth in front of them, replaced by a sense of accomplishment.

But this sense of accomplishment quickly turned into uncertainty and unease about the onslaught to come. They had assembled it themselves, and now it was about to be used to create an unprecedented massacre.

Moreover, in preparation for the upcoming offensive, the Prussian army sent a total of four of these terrifying giant cannons to this location, along with equally formidable 380mm naval guns and 210mm giant cannons.

During the past month and a half, Lu Mingfei and his group saw one giant cannon after another rising from the surrounding woods. They heard that the Prussian army had deployed 1200 cannons for the Battle of Verdun and had used 1300 trains to transport 250 million shells.

In order to transport these 250 million shells to the front line, a great many horses died from exhaustion. During this period, Lu Mingfei and his men ate horse meat every day, which was the only good thing about their trip.

Captain Henrik stood a little further away, his face more haggard and hardened than when he was on the front lines at Christmas. Although he had used his family connections to clear himself of suspicion of treason, he had paid an unimaginable price.

His position in the family was completely marginalized. Everyone thought he was a good-for-nothing and even hoped he would die on the battlefield. As a Prussian officer, he had become friends with the enemy, which was an unforgivable sin. The family issued an order for him to wash away the shame he had brought to the family with his blood.

You either die on the battlefield or earn a First Class Iron Cross.

He had come to a complete understanding of the nature of war: there was only killing the enemy or being killed by the enemy, there was no other choice, and peace was nothing but a pipe dream.

He glanced at Lu Mingfei and Caesar with a complicated expression. These two people would be key to whether he could be accepted back into the family.

"Sergeant Hans, Corporal Hoffmann, the artillery crew is in position. We should head to the front now," Henrik said as he approached the two men.

These men don't know how to operate this giant cannon. Once the cannon is assembled, their mission is complete, and they will go to the front lines as the next assault team.

"Understood!" Lu Mingfei and Caesar said in unison.

After a moment's hesitation, Henrik continued, "I hope you can completely forget about what happened at Christmas. It was a wrong decision on my part, and I apologize for my recklessness. I hope you will bring out your fighting strength and kill as many enemies as possible. Only by ending the war can we usher in true peace."

Lu Mingfei, Caesar, and all the soldiers around them fell silent. Looking back now, their previous actions were indeed a bit too crazy. If even one soldier's gun had gone off accidentally, there would have been a bloodbath among them, and they would have paid an unimaginable price.

"Understood—" Lu Mingfei and Caesar responded again. They didn't think Henrik had done anything wrong, but such behavior could never happen again. They were soldiers, and their duty was to kill the enemy.

"Very good, everyone, now set off for the front lines," Henrik nodded and said.

Soon, Lu Mingfei and Caesar led their soldiers and other platoons to the front line, which was located seven kilometers away. To catch the French army off guard, they dug very deep tunnels instead of trenches. These tunnels could avoid being detected by French aircraft. When they arrived at the front line, it was almost dark. However, they found that the tunnels they had dug were flooded. The water was about half a meter deep, very murky, and they could even see the rotten corpses of rats.

"Damn it!" Otto cursed under his breath, stepping in first. The icy water instantly filled his boots, sending a shiver down his spine.

"What do we do now? Are we going to have to stay here all night?"

The other soldiers looked at the dark, foul-smelling water with expressions of resistance, not because of the stench—they were all in pretty bad shape—but because of the cold. It was February, and the temperature was only three or four degrees Celsius. To spend a night in the water in such weather would be torture.

Henrik's face grew even uglier. Clearly, while they were away assembling the cannons, the maintenance here had been completely neglected. It was agreed that other companies would help with the maintenance, but it seemed that no one took this tunnel seriously at all.

"Aren't there any other tunnels?" Caesar asked, frowning.

"No, we've been notified to begin the attack tomorrow. Digging another one now is definitely too late, and the French might discover it," Henrik said, shaking his head.

"Alright, enough talk. You won't die from staying here for one night." With that, Lu Mingfei took the lead and stepped into the water.

"The platoon leader's already inside, what are you all standing around for?" Otto shouted, then followed him inside.

One by one, the soldiers stepped into the water.

The tunnel was narrow, and everyone could only move forward slowly in a single file. The water was constantly being stirred, and the stench of decay and mold mixed together, making one's throat tighten.

Occasionally, someone would step on a plank or pebbles underwater, sway, and be caught by someone behind them without a word being said.

They found a relatively dry, slightly elevated area deep in the tunnel where they could barely sit down and rest, but their legs were still soaking in ice water.

The soldiers sat down against the tunnel wall, holding their rifles to their chests; some were already shivering from the cold.

"Remember, everyone stay quiet and take turns on guard duty, rotating every two hours—" Henrik said in a low voice. Everyone nodded and then waited for the shelling to begin.

Time ticked by, and being soaked in the icy water made each second feel incredibly long. The soldiers couldn't sleep, and their hearts began to fill with resentment. It was all because of those Frenchmen that they had to soak in such foul-smelling icy water.

If they had hesitated before, they now hoped that the shelling would wipe out all the French troops on the other side, not only because of their resentment, but also because they were now in a death zone a full kilometer away from the French troops, not just three hundred meters away.

If the artillery bombardment fails to overturn the French positions, they will become sitting ducks for the French within a kilometer.

If they want to survive, they'd better pray that all the enemies are dead, because war always wears down people's kindness.

After an unknown amount of time, light shone through the cracks at the tunnel entrance, and dawn broke.

Lu Mingfei looked at the watch in his hand. It was eight o'clock in the morning, and the shelling was about to begin.

The next moment, an indescribable, enormous sound surged forth like a tidal wave. Even through the thick layer of soil, the sound was like a tangible giant hammer, slamming hard into everyone's eardrums and hearts. The tunnel shook violently, soil from the ceiling fell in a cascade, and the murky icy water was shaken into waves.

Prussia's artillery preparations have begun!

March 21, 1916, morning.

The gates of hell were blasted open by thousands of cannons.

On the French lines, all the French soldiers were huddled idly in the trenches. For some time now, the command had been sending out messages that the Prussian army was about to launch an attack. At first, they were all on high alert, but after lying in the trenches for several hours, they saw nothing.

They would be on high alert once or twice, but after it happened too many times, they inevitably began to relax.

"Schmidt, do you think the Prussian army might attack us?" A French soldier emerged from the latrine at the end of the trench, tying his trousers as he muttered to a group of companions sitting on the ground playing cards.

"Who knows? The gentlemen up there probably need some news for the Parisian newspapers." The soldier named Schmitt didn't even look up, focusing intently on the cards in his hand.

"Hey, Pierre, stop fiddling with your junk and want to play a game? I'll give you a cigarette if you lose."

The soldier named Pierre was crouching in a slightly drier corner, intently carving a delicate pattern on a brass cartridge case with a small file. It was a rose that was already taking shape.

His nose was red from the cold, but his eyes were unusually focused. "You don't understand, Schmitt. I am a sculptor sculpting my own artwork."

"Nobody here will buy your artwork; all we can give you are lice," Schmitt said casually.

A low chuckle suddenly rang out from the trench. Someone shuffled the cards, while someone else slammed the dirty cards onto the ground.

"When the war ends and I return to Paris, my artworks will be snapped up, and you'll all be envious."

Pierre snorted defiantly, then lowered his head and continued carving patterns on the cartridge case.

Just as he was carefully engraving the last pattern on the brass cartridge case, satisfied with blowing away the debris, and preparing to show it off to his companions, he subconsciously looked up at the sky.

"Did you guys hear anything?"

The next moment, the sky collapsed.

This is not a metaphor.

Countless blazing streaks tore through the leaden morning sky, shrieking as they fell at near-vertical angles.

Without any warning, the ground behind the trench suddenly exploded, as if the earth had been violently overturned by an invisible giant hand. The shockwave swept across the trench, tearing apart wooden planks and raining down dirt and rubble.

Pierre, who called himself a sculptor, along with the rose-shaped bullet casing he had just finished, was overturned in the first violent tremor and disappeared into the collapsing earth and smoke, without even leaving a cry of alarm.

"Artillery fire!!!" someone screamed, but the scream was instantly swallowed up by the explosion.

Schmitt, who was playing cards nearby, felt a sharp pain in his ear and was slammed against the trench wall. His vision was filled with white light, and before he could even lie down, the second shell had already landed.

boom!!

This time it's even closer.

The front section of the trench was completely flattened. The entire group of soldiers who had been huddled there disappeared into the rolling mud without even making a sound. Broken wooden beams, fragments of human bodies, helmets, and rifles mingled in the air before crashing heavily back to the ground.

"My God!!!"

Someone roared hoarsely, but was immediately interrupted by the third explosion.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Shells began to fall in droves, 380 mm, 210 mm—shells of different calibers roared in turn, each landing reshaping the terrain.

The trench is collapsing.

No, the entire position is collapsing.

"Hide! Hide!"

The officer's shout was shattered into pieces the moment it left his mouth.

Schmitt was thrown to the ground in the mud, his mouth full of blood and dirt. He tried desperately to get up, but found that he had no feeling in his left leg. He looked down and realized that his left leg had disappeared at some point.

He tried to shout, but the shells kept falling, swallowing him and his shouts.

Meanwhile, a kilometer underground, in the tunnels of the Prussian army.

Lu Mingfei leaned against the violently shaking earthen wall, his hands tightly gripping his rifle. With each shelling, the water surged violently, splashing cold sewage onto his face.

Especially when the four giant Bertha cannons fired, the whole world seemed to tremble, and the tunnels seemed on the verge of collapsing.

"This isn't artillery fire—this is—plowing the land—" Otto said, his voice trembling.

No one objected. Even from such a distance, they could still feel the earthquake-like tremors. They dared not imagine what the French army on the other side was going through.

The artillery fire was erasing the French positions from the map.

These shells were not constantly bombarding one place, but were continuously extending into the depths of the French positions, destroying all pre-set defenses, communication hubs, artillery positions, and reserve forces.

The shelling lasted from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., a full nine hours, and finally ended an unprecedented artillery preparation in the history of human warfare.

"Everyone! Launch the attack!"