Battlefield Priest's Diary

Chapter 108 The Mobile Church
February 1916, Baldeco, northern France.

The distant roar of exploding shells echoed intermittently. In this small town of less than 10,000 people, no citizens could be seen venturing out. People were either fleeing or hiding at home in order to cope with the dangers of war.

After all, this place is only 70 kilometers away from the front line, and no one knows whether the Germans will reach here.

Maybe they won't call today, but what about tomorrow? Or a month from now?
Pedestrians disappeared from the street, and birds, starving, began to gather on the street. They had even become accustomed to the distant sound of cannons. Sparrows hopped and skipped in the church cloisters, searching for possible food scraps in the cracks of the wooden floor.

Caw! A piercing cry shattered the silence, startling the sparrows into a flurry of flight. A black crow emerged from the window and perched on a branch, its small eyes scanning its surroundings.

As his vision gradually cleared, the first thing Qin Hao saw was a huge cross facing him, with the image of the crucified Son of God clearly visible on it.

The Easterners, who were originally in a daze, suddenly became alert.

Standing up and looking around, Qin Hao found himself in a small church. The surroundings were dimly lit, with only a few rays of sunlight filtering through the cracks in the door panels.

Thinking about Verdun mentioned in the diary, Qin Hao became serious.

There were no obvious gunshots or artillery sounds, nor was there any smell of blood. There were no signs of street fighting in the surrounding area, so it could be judged that this was not the front line of the battlefield.

A gust of wind blew in through the crack in the door, making him feel a little cold. Qin Hao reached out and touched the side, finding a thin, dark black priest's robe.

In addition, there was a crumpled piece of paper with writing on it.

Qin Hao unfolded the paper.

"On January 20th, Lord, forgive me! I sadly discovered that I was a coward... When I first performed the Last Anointing for a wounded soldier, looking at the festering wound, I vomited in front of him."

"On January 22, I was going to the front line in a few days, but when I was packing my things, my fingers involuntarily replaced the 'Regulations for Mass in the Battlefield' with the 'Battlefield Escape Manual'."

"On January 24th, last night was even worse. I secretly burned my right index finger with a candle flame, just to try and stay at school for another week to recover. I think the medical staff must have noticed. I instinctively avoided his eyes and practically ran away from the dressing room."

"January 29th, I don't know if this counts as turning away from the Lord's glory, but I'm really scared..."

That's all. It seems to be some clergyman who was so terrified by the battlefield that he had a mental breakdown and deserted.

After a moment's hesitation, Qin Hao put on the priest's robe to keep warm. Reaching inside, he found several personal items commonly used by priests, with a faint name embroidered on the hem—Potan El.

This must be the name of the guy who escaped. So, where are we now...?

dong dong dong!dong dong dong!
The knocking sounded, and Qin Hao immediately became alert.

He tucked the cross-shaped knife into his sleeve and pulled open the bolted door with one hand.

A man in his forties, wearing a flat-topped baseball cap and a coarse cloth jacket, stood at the door, and a strong smell of engine oil and sweat wafted out.

The man glanced at Qin Hao's Asian face, then at the priest's robe he wore, and finally at the cross on his chest. He seemed puzzled at first, then tentatively asked, "Father Potan El?"

After a second of hesitation, Qin Hao nodded to the other party without making a sound.

The man immediately became very happy.

"Finally, we've been waiting for you, Father. Please come with me quickly. They said you should have arrived the day before yesterday. If we hadn't found you by now, I wouldn't know how to explain it."

The man took the "luggage" from Qin Hao's hand and led the way, stopping in front of a "big guy" outside the church.

A French-made Renault truck with its entire rear covered in a tarpaulin.

"Please get in, Father El, we've been leaving quite late." The man wearing a baseball cap opened the car door.

With the information unclear, Qin Hao chose to adapt to the situation.

He reached out and pulled himself into the passenger seat of the truck. The driver took the crank handle and walked over, and soon the truck sputtered to life.

As the car drove onto the road outside the city, Qin Hao tried to extract useful information from the other party.

However, being talkative is probably a common trait among drivers all over the world, and the Asian man revealed everything before the other party even asked him many questions.

Strictly speaking, what this guy named Raymond Gilbert was driving wasn't a truck, but a church.

A church—this awkward combination of words is actually the most fitting description.

The war with the Germans had been going on for over a year, and the soldiers on both sides were on edge every day, with more and more soldiers becoming mentally unstable on the battlefield.

Since last year, the French army has been converting decommissioned Renault trucks into temporary altars, which are being used as mobile churches on the front lines.

These trucks were assembled with ammunition boxes to form altars, as well as penitential corners and first aid areas, and were equipped with morphine and bandages—turning them into a kind of multi-purpose "mobile base."

The original owner of Qin Hao's clothes was a priest assigned by the French Catholic Church to accompany the "mobile church".

No wonder this guy ran away; as far as he knew, doing "field work" at a "mobile church" was quite dangerous.

Because they looked so much like ordinary transport vehicles, these "mobile churches" were once a prime target for German aircraft and artillery, and were bombed every now and then.

At the same time, the survival rate of battlefield clerics in vehicles was probably only half that in trenches.

hiss~~
It seems I got on the wrong bus.

However, after glancing at the driver beside him and the two armed soldiers escorting him from behind, Qin Hao decided to remain silent for the time being.

After all, if he were to say he had gone to the wrong place at this point, he would probably be in big trouble.

The wheels rolled forward, leaving billows of dust on the country dirt road.

Qin Hao occasionally saw civilians in plain clothes waving their hands on the roadside trying to get the car to stop, but Raymond, the driver, ignored them and sped through.

“Father, I’m not a bad person. Our vehicle is heading to the battlefield. Taking civilians along would be bad for them.”

"Besides, there are a lot of German spies in the countryside now. If even one of them manages to infiltrate, we're all doomed."

Raymond gripped the steering wheel, explaining as he glanced at the young priest beside him. When he saw that the priest offered no advice but simply nodded silently, Raymond mentally upgraded his opinion of the young priest by one notch.

He doesn't seem like someone who abuses sympathy.

This is a good thing.

Looking at the priest's young face, the 40-year-old truck driver figured he was probably a rookie just sent to the battlefield, and began to comfort him.
"Don't worry, the fortress has been quite peaceful lately. The German shells are just for show. You just need to go to the front lines, offer some prayers to the soldiers, read some letters home, and then you can..."

Before the truck driver could finish speaking, his vision suddenly went black. He tried to lift his head and discovered that a large number of triplanes were roaring overhead.

Boom!! Boom!! Boom!! Boom!!
A thunderous roar came from ahead of the vehicle. The sky was dyed red by artillery fire, and plumes of black smoke rose from the ground. Even the ground beneath their feet seemed to tremble.
-
In February 1916, the German army launched a feigned attack on Champagne. French commander Joffre fell for the trap and redeployed a large number of personnel and equipment from Verdun fortress, leaving the local defenses weak.

On February 21, 1916, the German army, led by Crown Prince Wilhelm, launched a full-scale attack on Verdun with a total force of 210,000 men, 1200 artillery pieces and air force units on a battlefield 40 kilometers wide.

Within 48 hours, the German army broke through three French defense lines in succession, and the strategic city of Fort Douaumont was captured by the German army, cutting off almost all of the French army's main supply lines.

Verdun is in grave danger.

(End of this chapter)