It's better to conquer them than to command the steel torrent

Chapter 80｜Come on!

"The borders of our country are determined by the boots of our soldiers."

— Rumor has it that Catherine II wrote to Voltaire

"The weight of the crown can only be lightened through victory."

——Catherine II to Suvorov
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Summer passes and autumn comes.

The wheat fields in Eastern Europe are ripe. When the breeze blows, the plump ears of wheat sway gently. From a bird's eye view, it looks like a golden ocean.

There is a border observation post on a small hill dozens of kilometers south of Hwasa.

To the east of the observation post is the sparkling Vistula River, which is also the boundary river between Varland and Ivan Rus.

Several Vallander Army soldiers were playing cards idly, and only one recruit was curiously fiddling with the sentry telescope - a high-magnification binoculars.

"Mueller is still looking through the telescope. Is there a girl on the other side of the river?" someone joked with a smile.

"You were the same back then, too. You couldn't leave the telescope from morning till night, and it even burned your eyes." The most experienced exempt soldier said casually.

A few people continued to play cards to kill time.

"Senior, do the Ivan Rus people often conduct exercises like this?" the recruit suddenly asked.

"Yes, it happens every year. They always think we might cross the river and attack them." The exempt soldier replied.

"This is paranoia. My sister is a psychiatric nurse and she occasionally encounters patients like this." Someone said with a smile.

Every year, the Ivan Rus army organizes army-level exercises near the border. On weekdays, small-scale battalion and regiment-level exercises are also common.

Year after year, border defense units have long been accustomed to it.

The same is true this fall.

From Minsk in the north to Brest in the south and the Vistula River in the west, a particularly large-scale exercise has come to an end.

Exercise name: Operation September Storm.

This exercise focuses on defense, delay and counterattack, and is intended to train the country's response after a large-scale invasion. It is self-evident who the imaginary enemy is.

Of course, that's what it looks like on the surface.

The exercise was carried out with great fanfare from the beginning to the end, with multiple army groups deployed without any concealment. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Ivan Rus Empire also made a public statement beforehand.

As usual, Vallander paid close attention to the vigorous exercises on the other side of the river and maintained a state of combat readiness.

Now that the exercise is about to end, hundreds of thousands of Ivan Rus troops are preparing to withdraw to the camp. It seems that this is indeed just an exercise.

A Fokker Fw189 reconnaissance aircraft flew across the border and surveyed the Brest railway marshalling yard, and the Rb30 aerial camera took a large number of clear photos.

Brest is Ivan Rus's gateway to Western Europe and an important transportation hub.

Judging from the photos, there were far more carriages there than usual, and there was a debate in the Walland Army General Staff about this. Some people thought that this needed to be taken seriously, while others felt that there was no need to make a fuss, after all, a large number of troops needed to return by train after the exercise.

into the night.

At the Bialystok railway station, where martial law has not yet been lifted, a railway worker is pretending to work.

While no one was paying attention, he cautiously opened a carriage, hoping to find clues from the full wooden boxes inside.

The cold air hit him in the face, and the wooden boxes were frozen solid. When he opened them, he found that they were filled with ice packs.

Each tin can was surrounded by a large number of ice packs. He opened one of the tin cans and took out a glass bottle from it.

In the dim light, he looked closely and saw the label read "Military 3% Sodium Citrate Blood Product | Packaging Date August 8." He was horrified and hastily closed the box and the carriage, then found an excuse to leave the train station.

Plasma separation technology has not yet been invented, and the fresh blood drawn cannot be stored for a long time. Even if anticoagulants are added, it cannot be stored for long in a low-temperature environment.

The railroad worker is actually a Vallander agent.

He rushed to his residence as quickly as possible, changed his clothes, put on a hat, and carefully came to the secret base.

As soon as he entered the room, the people inside asked curiously, "Schreibel, why are you here?"

"Damn it! I found a large number of blood bottles in the train car! From the day before yesterday! Did you know?" Schreiber panted, "This is a danger signal... The invasion may begin soon... We must convey the information immediately... Turn on the telegraph!"

"I can't believe this is happening."

"Shut up."

At this moment, something strange happened!
A rustling sound came from outside. Before Agent Vallande inside could react, the window shattered instantly and the door was kicked open.

More than a dozen figures rushed into the house one after another, and the submachine guns and pistols glowed a strange bronze color under the dim yellow light from the light bulbs.

The scene fell into deathly silence.

A captain of the Imperial Internal Affairs Committee came out holding a Tokarev pistol.

She glanced at the people in front of her with a playful look and said sarcastically, "Look what we found, a bunch of sewer rats."

Schreiber tried to remain calm and signaled to his companions to destroy the transmitter.

Two thermite incendiary bombs were placed in the large suitcase containing the radio. The high temperature of thousands of degrees could burn the surrounding objects in a few seconds.

Noticing the small movements of the people in front of him, the squadron leader raised his gun and shot the moment Agent Vallande stretched out his hand.

A bullet fired from the Tokarev pistol and hit the agent's right hand with incredible accuracy.

The house was filled with gunshots and screams of pain.

The squadron leader bent down to pick up the fallen shell and kept it as a souvenir. She said disdainfully: "The cat and mouse game is over."

Late at night.

The movement of the second hand indicates the passage of time, and noon has passed.

Ivan Ross's embassy in Berlin received an encrypted diplomatic message. After decoding, it only contained a few words, but it was actually a code: "The Riddle of the Sphinx has arrived."

In the second half of the night, the ambassador took the prepared credentials, got into a car and went straight to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Walland.

It was still dark and there were still two or three hours before sunrise, so the car changed its route and went straight to Minister Dietrich's official residence.

Finn von Dietrich was awakened from his deep sleep, and the attendant said apologetically: "I'm sorry, Your Excellency, Ambassador Ivan Ross claims to have important state affairs, and I have to wake you at this time."

Dietrich said nothing more.

Nine minutes later, he met with the ambassador in his pajamas.

He smiled and asked, "What do you need to tell me, Mr. Brough?"

The ambassador obviously felt embarrassed to speak. He first handed over his credentials and then paused for two seconds before speaking.

"According to the instructions from Fort St. Peter, I am delivering this ultimatum to you. If our country's demands are not met, Valland and Ivan Ross will be at war in two hours."

The ultimatum required Wallander to unilaterally give up the territories gained through the peace treaty, restore the national borders before the outbreak of the European war from September 9, and pay 7 billion marks in compensation.

"Oh, is this what you wish for?" Dietrich carefully read the entire ultimatum document, raised his head, and stared at the ambassador calmly.

After a moment, he said calmly, "Come on."

(End of this chapter)