Codegease: Air and Land Warfare 1946

"Understood!" the gunner readily agreed. "High-explosive shells! High-explosive shells! Gunners, prepare to fire!"

……

"Comrades! Come with me!" The lieutenant hid on the side of the street and called all the soldiers out of the inner rooms of the buildings along the street, and they waited near the windowsill on the first floor.

"Our reinforcements are coming! Prepare to receive my orders!"

"Their assault guns have opened fire! Lieutenant!" Before a soldier could finish speaking, a shell landed on the ground behind him and exploded.

"We don't have any tanks, Company Commander!" a soldier called out cautiously, clutching his helmet.

The machine guns on the roofs of the assault mortars and the hand-held firepower of the infantrymen were pinning down the soldiers, making it impossible for them to advance. The ZIS-3 field gun, which had just destroyed an infantry fighting vehicle, was also unable to advance to a position where it could be fired upon—the wreckage of the black armored vehicle blocked the gunner's view of the next vehicle target, and the road ahead was in such a mess that trucks couldn't pass, making it a difficult task to push the gun across by manpower.

Sure enough, the assault gun seemed to have gotten bolder. As it drove towards them, it fired a second shot, which landed just over five meters in front of Lemilia.

"No, no, no!" Another comrade beside him also sounded worried. "We need to retreat! Comrade Petrovsky!"

But look at the lieutenant's actions—he didn't care at all about the mud kicked up by the shells, which fell on him like a bucket of water. He was like an ordinary stone, stuck there, blending into the pile of rubble beneath him.

"Hold on! Comrades!" he shouted to the soldiers without turning his head, "In the name of Comrade Stalin! Stay in your positions!"

……

Meanwhile, on a nearby street, a team of soldiers, along with a T-34 tank, were advancing towards the intersection where the assault gun had fired.

A dozen or twenty soldiers walked away from the column, pulling a rather large handcart, and turned to the side of the road, seemingly not intending to continue.

"Comrades, spread out! Quickly!"

The soldiers pushing the cart scrambled aside the odds and ends, and soon three sturdy 120-PM-43 mortars were deployed there.

"Very good! Comrades!" The leader looked ahead through his binoculars. "Wait for my order! Prepare to load!"

Next to each mortar, while one soldier was calibrating it, another soldier would bring over a 120mm mortar. Once the calibration was complete, they would stand on a rock or a wooden box, tiptoe, and place the shell into the 1.8-meter-long mortar barrel, ready to load it in.

"preparation!"

"Fire!—"

The muffled explosion lingered in the cannon barrel for a moment before three shells, each weighing 16 kilograms, flew into the sky in unison.

……

"Hey! What's that sound?!"

Lemilia was still lying on the street listening to his comrades' whispers when an air raid siren-like sound came down from the sky, and shells rained down on the ground not far from the enemy's assault guns.

At this moment, behind the lieutenant and his men, the ZIS-3 field gun remained unharmed, and a high-explosive shell blasted through the building where the enemy was stationed.

"On your marks, comrades!" he began to shout. "Prepare your weapons!"

The enemy, who had been advancing, began to hesitate, remaining in the middle of the street, seemingly intending to go in another direction. Shells continued to rain down on the enemy positions in the distance like meteors, creating terrifying, muddy rose-like explosions, and the roaring explosions spread like giant pythons across the entire street.

"Comrade! Cheer up!" Lemilia continued to raise his voice, looking at his comrades behind him as he raised his PPSh submachine gun high. "For victory and honor!"

On the other side of the street, the SG-43 heavy machine gun was already in place. It was at this moment that the enemy's assault gun began to slowly turn its turret toward the other street.

Lemilia heard the familiar sound of a diesel engine approaching.

Immediately following was a thunderous cannon blast. He peered out and saw the dark assault gun suddenly spark from something, then come to a halt with a loud bang, like a train abruptly stopping.

"Follow me! Comrades!" The lieutenant was overjoyed. He quickly stood up, raised his rifle, and shouted to the soldiers, "Hurrah!"

"Hurrah!—"

Heavy machine guns roared, and the ZIS-3 field guns howled once more. Soviet soldiers, following Lemilia, charged madly toward the enemy positions. Gunfire, running, and shouts mingled together, like a flood bursting through the dust-shrouded streets.

"They can't hold out! Comrades!" Lemilia's voice didn't quiet down at all, even drowning out the PPSh gun in his hand. "Charge! For victory!"

"Hurrah!—"

The comrades' battle cries grew even more hysterical. Whether it was the powerful impact of the heavy machine guns and field artillery or the sheer awe-inspiring charge, the enemy's gunfire in the streets gradually began to fade away.

They successfully drove the enemy into a building at a distant street corner. Just then, on another smooth road, the T-34 tank fired another shot and rushed over with more soldiers, advancing alongside the lieutenant and his men.

The T-34 stopped at a small building on the side of the street and continued firing from a distance of several dozen meters from the enemy-held building. Seeing this, Lemilia also moved closer to the tank and waved to the soldiers!

"Slaughter them all! Comrades! Leave no survivors! Attack!—"

He watched as the soldiers ran towards the building entrance. Although some were shot and fell to the ground, how could the rushing water stop its surging momentum because of a few rocks? The soldiers got closer and closer to the building, and finally rushed into the first-floor window and fought the enemy.

"Well done." The lieutenant and a dozen soldiers stayed with the T-34 tank, waiting for the battle to end—too many people in such a small target and confined space would only cause trouble.

"Hey! Comrade! Over here?" A soldier nearby seemed to have noticed something strange coming from the room next to the T-34.

"Ok?"

But while Lemilia was still hesitating, a machine roared, and the outer wall of the building suddenly collapsed towards the T-34 like a sandbag wall being pushed down!

"Damn it!" The lieutenant and the soldiers around him who didn't have time to run away were instantly hit by bricks and tiles of different sizes and fell to the ground.

"Oh my god..." That wasn't the end of it. Immediately afterward, from inside the collapsed outer wall, a steel puppet wielding a spear charged towards the tank!

The shot pierced the tank hard. Although everyone knew that such an attack couldn't possibly penetrate the T-34's armor, the giant hadn't even intended to pierce it. Lemilia clearly saw that the tank turret, which was about to turn, suddenly froze, like a clockwork mechanism that had lost its grip!

The T-34's turret ring was damaged, so only the movable tracks could change the firing direction. But the puppet seemed to know this, and quickly and skillfully broke off the spear handle and forcefully inserted the not-so-slender steel pipe into the axle of the tank's road wheel. The T-34 was now like a dead pig lying on the ground, helplessly swaying in place with the vibration of the engine.

"Damn it..." The lieutenant hurriedly removed the stones from his body, seemingly forgetting to tell his comrades next to him something. Now, the soldiers, who were quite far away, could only watch it lying behind the tank. Since they had no way to harm the doll, they could only shrink into a place where the doll couldn't see them.

"Cough, really..." Lemilia was finally out of trouble. Lying on the ground, he watched the machine gun fire from the puppet's hand, his anger burning. The puppet was right next to the tank not far from him, and he had to find something to deal with it—he did have a bottle of Molotov cocktail, but it had been smashed into shards by a rock, which had given him some insignificant internal injuries.

Looking to the side, I saw another soldier lying by the rocks, groaning in pain, with a grenade strapped to his waist—an anti-tank grenade.

"Alright, comrade, I'll requisition it..." The lieutenant muttered with a chuckle, as he picked up a grenade and prepared to pull the pin, slowly getting up from the ground.

The moment the safety was pulled, the lieutenant sprang to his feet as if he had been injected with adrenaline, and strode onto the T-34 in three quick steps.

"In Kursk, I wasn't even afraid of the German 'elephants'!..."

He continued running wildly, stepping onto the tank turret, leaping forward, pulling the grenade-wielding hand back, and aiming intently at the puppet's head.

The doll was also terrified by this scene, and instantly lost its balance, leaning back as if it was about to fall to the ground.

"You! Who do you think you are!..."

The anti-tank grenade slipped from Lemilia's hand, and with the cloth strip on its tail used to stabilize the trajectory of the projectile, it darted onto the mech's head like a wildcat.

Sunderland's head exploded into a fountain, and Lemilia also crashed heavily to the ground. Immediately afterward, a crash filled with the sound of mechanical operation rang out, and the doll lay slumped in front of the T-34, waving its arms wildly.

"Come on, comrades!" The lieutenant called over all the Soviet soldiers nearby.

"Cocktails! All of them in your hands! Light them up!"

The soldiers swarmed forward, each holding a lit Molotov cocktail, panting as they took a running start, ready to throw it.

The next second, nearly ten bottles of Molotov cocktail flew out of the hands of the Soviet soldiers like a pack of hungry wolves, leaping through the air and leaving bright flames as they flew toward the twisting body of the steel doll. The atmosphere of fanaticism and despair mingled together the moment the glass bottles shattered.

"Hurrah!—"

Section 122, Chapter 75: The Old Dreams of Kursk

Time goes on, and the night goes on.

The fighting continues, the gunfire continues.

Unlike bullets and shells that mean certain death upon landing, soldiers, as human beings, need rest.

Right now, Lemilia and his soldiers, following orders, had finished cleaning up the battlefield, moving the wounded and the dead, and were resting peacefully with their comrades in a house far from the front lines. A day or two of fighting at a moderate altitude had taken a heavy toll on their physical and mental health, so if this building didn't have any major breaches and could provide some shelter from the wind, they could go inside and lie down.

The lieutenant, wrapped in a blanket and full uniform, leaned against a partition wall inside the room. His helmet and submachine gun were placed aside, and he hadn't taken off his smelly shoes in case of an emergency.

"Lieutenant?" Hmm? Someone was calling him softly.

"Lieutenant Petrovsky?" Lemilia closed one eye, tilted his head to the side in the direction of the voice, and saw another comrade wearing a blanket, sneaking towards him.

"Aren't you asleep yet, Lieutenant?" The private squeezed in next to him.

"Ah..." the lieutenant pursed his lips, replying in a similarly soft voice, "You're gone now that you've arrived..."

"Ahem..." The private stuck out his tongue. "I... I can't sleep, comrade..."

"Why? Did you not get to pick up any girls or didn't get to drink any?"

"Uh, well, just now, you led me and a few other comrades to use anti-tank grenades and cocktails to blow up those enemy dummy figures that were several meters tall."

"What? You want to court death again?"

"No, no, thinking about these things still makes me a little excited, oh, and a little scared too, it's making me a little excited..."

"So? Comrade?"

"Well, I'd like to know, Lieutenant," the private leaned closer. "What have you bombed before?"

“In the past, well…” Lemilia rolled her eyes, as if she didn’t want to talk about it, “We bombed German fascist machine gun positions, and of course, we also bombed those beasts’ tanks and armored vehicles.”

"That's exciting!" the private asked, intrigued. "So, what kind of tanks and armored vehicles have you blown up?"

"How old are you this year? Private?"

"Me? Me? I'm 19. I haven't been in the army for long." The private didn't quite understand why the lieutenant was asking this.

“Oh, I see.” Lemilia nodded. “It seems you weren’t old enough to be drafted when I was in Kursk.”

"what?"

"Shortly after I enlisted, I became an anti-tank soldier." The lieutenant's mouth didn't stop. "Let me start thinking from the most recent time... Before I was wounded in 1944, I was always supporting and covering, and the other comrades were the ones who blew up the tanks. Only the year before, in November 1943, did I blow up a Panzer IV tank, and then in early August I disabled a StuG III assault gun."

"Ah, of course, it was still in Kursk. My first finished product was that thing, the German 'elephant,' what was it called Ferdinand?"

"Ummm, an Elefant tank destroyer?"

“Oh right, that’s the name.” The lieutenant nodded. “I think even our company commander hadn’t seen it before. It seems like I was the first one to encounter it in the first battle…”

"This is terrifying..." The private couldn't believe his ears.

"Go ahead and be scary if you want, I'm tired, comrade." The lieutenant's voice was heavy with sleepiness.

"Oh, um, could you tell me what it was like when you encountered it?"

"Cough... Let me think. I remember when the company commander assigned tasks, I was an anti-tank soldier, so I would wait in a hole a few hundred meters away from the position, waiting for the enemy's tanks and armored vehicles to drive up to the side, and then I would throw anti-tank grenades and cocktails to take them out."

"Oh, of course, I didn't go alone. A few comrades came with me and squatted in a nearby burrow. One of them was named Chernov, who was from Nizhny Valvstok with me, and we got along quite well."

"Uh, and then you and he took care of the 'elephant' together?"

“Initially, the elephants were accompanying the German infantry as they attacked our positions.” Lemilia ignored him. “I was peeking through a crack in the burrow at where the fascists were coming from. Our shells were hitting the elephants, but nothing happened to them. Then the elephants fired a shot—it sounded like at least an 88mm gun—and the Germans following behind the vehicles slowly crouched down and started firing as well…”

"You really can't break through it?"

"Damn it, you think those German fascists, those guys who are harder than Siberian rocks, are just playing around?" Lemilia said with a look of disgust.

"So how did you finally deal with that monster?"

"Later I noticed that the elephant was getting slower and slower, and finally it came to a stop with a creak and didn't move for a long time. Then I heard the sound of the rope pulling on the metal box next to me, so we grabbed our submachine guns, sprang up, and rushed out to fight the fascists."

"Didn't the elephant shoot you with a machine gun?"

"Ah, I don't remember it having a machine gun. Anyway, it never fired at me."

"And then?"

"At the time, I was thinking that since the elephant couldn't move and it didn't have a turret, I could just wait for it to die. Then I looked back and saw our tanks coming from the direction of the position towards the elephant. But then the elephant actually opened fire. I quietly looked in the direction it fired and saw a T-34 tank tremble like a bundle of straw that had been kicked, and then it started to smoke and catch fire."

"Then a few more of our shells came flying in." The lieutenant paused. "The elephant was still fine, but our tanks were being turned into ovens one after another. That's when I realized that if we didn't blow it up quickly, the consequences would be severe. So I started looking for cocktails, a lighter, and getting ready..."

"Huh? No anti-tank grenades?"

"Hey, comrade, back then we didn't have the RPG-43 we have now. I got the RGD-33, which had to have its handle and head assembled and its fuse installed before it could be thrown. That's when I discovered that the heads of my two grenades were missing..."

"This……"

"Then I looked outside and saw that I only had a bottle of intact cocktail outside the cave. Before the enemy could pin Chernov down, I rushed out and quickly grabbed the cocktail."

"Then light it and throw it out?"

"No, I realized I'd dropped the lighter into the hole... so I had to pull it back in. Chernov was loading ammunition, so I had to hold him off for a while. Once he was done, I started throwing the cocktail, and thankfully, I managed to throw it right onto the elephant's body."

"then?"

"Then I got scared and pulled back, but then I suddenly noticed a graze from a bullet..."