Dragon Raja: Lu Mingfei's War Journey

Chapter 89 The First Day of Battle

Upon hearing Henrik's shout, Lu Mingfei was the first to rush out, and soon he saw plumes of black smoke rising from the French positions in the distance.

However, he didn't hesitate for long. This was a rare window of opportunity. The French army hadn't recovered from the shelling yet, and they had to cross this kilometer-long death zone before the surviving French soldiers came to their senses.

Soon, the Prussian troops in the other trenches also emerged from the tunnels. They had made thorough preparations for this attack, not only replacing their original pointed leather helmets with the steel helmets that would be familiar in later generations a few days earlier, but also tying white ribbons on their arms to distinguish friend from foe.

Moreover, every officer wore their cap backwards to avoid being recognized by French snipers. Every soldier carried a map of the French fortifications opposite them. There were also many unarmed machine gunners who charged with the assault team so that they could immediately use any machine guns they captured from the French positions.

Every detail has been taken into account; this is an attack that cannot afford to fail.

Lu Mingfei led his men in a desperate run, employing the most effective charging posture that Hermann had taught him and that had been proven effective in numerous battles. He kept his body extremely low, almost as if he were bowing, but took large, fast strides, using the edge of the crater as leverage to leap forward.

Soon bullets began to appear. A bullet grazed Lu Mingfei's helmet. At first, there were only sporadic gunshots, but they gradually became more frequent.

"Left side! Scatter!" Just then, Lu Mingfei noticed a machine gun on the French trench ahead starting to turn its muzzle and shouted.

Almost the instant he finished speaking, a burst of machine gun bullets grazed the spot where he had just been standing. Otto and the other two soldiers reacted a little slower and fell to the ground with muffled groans.

Lu Mingfei's heart tightened, but he didn't have time to check. He half-knelt up, raised the Wraith Gun in his hand, and relying on the intuition he had developed from countless life-and-death battles, fired three shots at the firing port of the bunker. The firing port quickly fell silent.

"Otto!" Lu Mingfei turned and shouted.

"It's nothing! Just a scrape!" Otto grimaced as he got up, his arm covered in blood, but his movements were unaffected. One of the soldiers next to him had been shot in the shoulder and was being dragged forward by his comrades, while the other was not so lucky; a bullet hit the side of his neck and he was already dead.

"Don't stop!" Caesar's voice came from the right rear. His golden eyes flickered slightly in the smoke. The weasel brought back sounds from further ahead: the chaotic shouts of the French soldiers, the officers' orders to assemble, and more sounds of bolts being pulled and weapons being set up.

"They're awake! Speed ​​up! I'll cover you!" After saying that, he stopped advancing and lay down on the ground to provide fire support for Lu Mingfei and his men.

"Charge!" Lu Mingfei looked at Caesar without saying anything and leaped up again.

Caesar's scythe relentlessly caught the breaths of the French soldiers who awoke from the explosions, constantly pulling the trigger of his G98. The French soldiers who had just poked their heads out were pierced through the skull by a bullet. Shooting was probably the only skill he was better at than Lu Mingfei on the battlefield.

In normal shooting, there wasn't much difference in skill level between him and Lu Mingfei. However, after activating the Kamaitachi skill, it was as if he had activated a wallhack, and his skill level immediately surpassed Lu Mingfei's by a large margin.

With Caesar providing cover, the number of bullets fired at Lu Mingfei and his group decreased significantly.

As Lu Mingfei got closer to the French positions, the scene became increasingly horrific. Shells turned everything upside down; intact corpses were rare, with more severed limbs and flesh mixed with mud and fragments of military uniforms.

The once-solid concrete fortress was directly hit, reduced to a twisted steel skeleton, and the trenches were turned into discontinuous ravines filled with rubble and corpses.

Lu Mingfei even saw a French 75mm rapid-fire cannon whose barrel was bent from the explosion, resembling a huge scrap metal stick stuck in the ground, with the gun crew lying around it in various broken positions.

This was the result of nine hours of work by the Grand Bertha and thousands of cannons, which turned a meticulously constructed defensive system into a hellish scene. Yet, even under such bombardment, some French soldiers survived and even fought back.

"They're Prussians!" came a French exclamation from inside the trench.

"For France!" The next second, a French soldier with a blood-covered face rushed out from the corner of the trench. Before he could even raise his rifle properly, Lu Mingfei shot him in the chest, and he crashed backward into the collapsed earthen wall before slowly sliding down.

Lu Mingfei flipped over and jumped into the trench. When he landed, his foot went weak and he stepped into the abdominal cavity of a corpse, making a nauseating sound. He didn't have time to think and immediately moved forward along the trench wall.

Inside the trench, several surviving French soldiers, their faces covered in blood, their eyes glazed or crazed, were trying to put up a last stand with their rifles and bayonets.

Lu Mingfei crouched down to dodge an incoming bayonet, then swung a shovel at the opponent's knee with his other hand, followed by a shot amidst the opponent's screams. Otto then jumped down and, like a heavy tank, rammed into another French soldier.

Caesar appeared like a ghost at the corner of the trench, his rifle precisely striking down a French soldier in the distance who was trying to operate a Hotchkiss machine gun.

"Clear this section of the trench! Quickly!" Lu Mingfei commanded breathlessly.

Prussian soldiers behind him kept jumping into the trenches and spreading to the flanks, white ribbons moving swiftly in the dim trenches.

Before long, they captured the trench. They had succeeded, at least in the first phase. They crossed the 1,000-meter-long death zone and stormed into the French front line.

But Lu Mingfei felt no joy. He leaned against the trench wall, breathing heavily, raised his wrist, and glanced at the blood-stained watch worn backwards. It was 4:20 p.m.

The battle has only just begun.

Next, they will face an even more brutal trench clearing operation, the possibility of French artillery counterattacks at any time, and the most crucial task: to hold onto this newly captured salient exposed to enemy fire from deep within enemy territory.

"Check the ammunition, collect grenades and French weapons! Are the flamethrower teams in position?" Lu Mingfei shouted the order.

According to the map he obtained, the French army had built more solid trenches and concrete bunkers in the forest ahead, and the only way to clear those bunkers was with grenades and flamethrowers.

Flamethrowers were also issued for this battle, marking the first time such weapons appeared on the battlefield on a large scale.

"Ready!" Soon, three soldiers appeared not far from Lu Mingfei, one of them carrying a heavy metal canister connected to a long, thick hose and nozzle.

Just then, the company's communications officer ran over, bent over, and said, "Platoon Hans! The company commander has ordered us to immediately advance towards the forest, clear out the remaining enemy forces, and establish forward positions!"

When the order came, there was no rest, no waiting. They were the sharpest blades, and they had to keep thrusting forward until they broke or pierced the enemy's heart.

"Everyone, check your ammunition! Flamethrower team, follow me to the middle! Otto, lead your men to the right, Caesar to the left, clear the trench extension, watch out for those half-collapsed bunkers and anti-artillery holes! Don't attack the bunkers directly, mark their positions, and wait for the flamethrower or subsequent demolition teams!" Lu Mingfei issued the orders in one breath.

"clear!"

"Walk!"

Three thin streams of gray water surged out of the newly captured trench section once again, rushing towards the forest that had been ravaged by artillery fire but still harbored endless killing intent.

The forest was no longer what it used to be; tall trees were snapped in half by bombs, leaving only charred stumps and fallen trunks, and the ground was riddled with craters.

Lu Mingfei led the main force and the flamethrower team forward, groping their way along a relatively obvious trench. The resistance here was more sporadic, but also more deadly.

The surviving French soldiers often hid in extremely concealed corners, waiting for the Germans to get very close before suddenly opening fire.

"Bang!" A gunshot rang out, and a soldier next to Lu Mingfei fell backward without uttering a sound, a clear bloody hole in his forehead. The French soldier who fired the shot was hiding in a gap in a section of collapsed concrete fortification, the muzzle flash disappearing in an instant.

"Over there!" Lu Mingfei and several soldiers immediately raised their guns and returned fire. The bullets sparked as they hit the concrete, but it was difficult to harm the enemy inside.

"Let me do it!" The soldier holding the flamethrower's voice trembled, but his movements were resolute. Under the cover of his comrades, he reached the concrete fortification and pulled the trigger.

A fiery dragon, tinged with orange-yellow and as thick as oil, suddenly spewed from the nozzle, emitting a terrifying roar, and poured into the concrete crack.

A bloodcurdling scream rang out instantly, followed by a stench of burning flesh mixed with the smell of fuel. Soon after, the extremely agonizing screams ceased.

The flamethrower soldier quickly shut off the valve, panting heavily. Using this weapon in actual combat for the first time was no less psychologically impactful for him than it was for the enemy when they first encountered it.

Lu Mingfei patted him on the shoulder without saying anything. This is war, using the most extreme means to destroy another life.

They continued forward, and the battle in the forest turned into the ugliest and most mentally taxing close-quarters combat, where every meter forward could cost them their lives.

From Otto's side came the sounds of grenade explosions and intense gunfire, while Caesar's direction was relatively quiet, but the occasional gunshots always accurately claimed the lives of French soldiers attempting a sneak attack. His Kamaitachi became the most terrifying target-finding radar in this complex environment.

Finally, a concrete bunker appeared before them. It was low and sturdy, like a giant concrete tortoise lying on the ground.

The shelling left numerous craters around it, and even traces of direct hits, but the main structure remained intact. Several narrow firing ports stared blankly forward, like the eyes of a monster.

"Stop!" Lu Mingfei raised his fist, and the team immediately dispersed to find cover.

The bunker was silent, but that silence was more unsettling than the sound of gunfire. Everyone knew there were enemies inside, and machine guns.

"There are fifteen people inside," Caesar said as he approached Lu Mingfei. He could hear the heartbeats of fifteen people inside.

"It's too far, the flamethrower can't reach it," the flamethrower soldier said after observing for a while.

"A grenade," Lu Mingfei gestured.

Immediately, two soldiers crawled closer to the bunker, struggling to tie several wooden-handled grenades together to make a cluster grenade, attempting to roll it under the bunker's firing port to blast a hole.

But the bunker was cleverly designed. There was a bulletproof ramp in front of the firing port. When a grenade was thrown under the bunker, it started to roll back and finally exploded on the ground in front of the bunker.

Just then, a firing port in the bunker suddenly spewed fire, and machine gun bullets swept over, pinning Lu Mingfei and the others down. A bombardier was hit in the shoulder and dragged back.

"Damn this turtle shell!" Otto cursed as he fired, but the firing ports on the bunker were too small, and he couldn't hit anything.

Lu Mingfei looked at the bunker with a solemn expression. If they were to launch a direct assault on the bunker, he didn't know how many lives would be lost.

Should we go around them? But the map shows that there are several similar bunkers in this forest, forming crossfire. If we go around one, our side will be exposed to the guns of another. And their job is to take down the enemy's bunkers.

"Give me the flamethrower," Lu Mingfei said to the flamethrower soldier next to him. The soldier was taken aback, but still handed the flamethrower to Lu Mingfei. At the same time, the assistant gunner carrying the fuel tank also untied the fuel tank and handed it to Lu Mingfei.

Lu Mingfei slung the fuel tank over his shoulder and said to Caesar beside him, "Cover me."

Caesar nodded solemnly, holding his breath as he aimed at the firing port.

Lu Mingfei quickly darted out. The French soldiers in the opposite bunker saw someone and immediately tried to fire, but a bullet pierced his eye. The other French soldiers next to him immediately tried to take over the machine gun and continue firing, but it was too late.

Lu Mingfei had already darted to the front of the bunker. He was so fast that the French soldiers at the other firing ports hadn't even fully reacted yet.

The next moment, Lu Mingfei blocked the flamethrower nozzle onto the firing port and pulled the trigger. Hellfire instantly poured into the bunker from the firing port, turning it into a burning oven in an instant. A shrill, inhuman scream came from the bunker, which then quickly subsided.

All that remained was the crackling of the flames, while thick smoke, carrying the horrible smell of burning meat and chemicals, billowed from the various holes.

This is Verdun, where the brutality of war was pushed to a new extreme.

As darkness fell amidst the smoke and fire, they cleared out the charred corpses from the bunker and then used the bunker and the surrounding trenches as their position for the day.

They were just the vanguard, tasked with occupying the gaps created by the French forces; the main force would attack tomorrow.

Lu Mingfei began to count the number of people. There were fifty people in the three platoons. Two had died in the previous battle, and three others were injured.

Today is only the first day of this battle, and even with so much artillery fire, there is still the presence of him and Caesar, two half-bloods.

Lu Mingfei was somewhat confused. Verdun, this meat grinder, had only just begun to stir, but he didn't have much confidence in leading the others to survive.

After all, the name Verdun is too terrifying; a generation of Frenchmen were killed here, and a generation of Prussians were killed here.

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