This heretic cannot be burned, he must be hung up and whipped!

Rising Flames: 1914: Chapter 2 Where are my teammates? Save them!

"I swear if I can get home alive I will never celebrate foreign festivals again - cough cough!"

He made up an excuse to go to the communication trench at the rear to calm down. Seeing that there was no one guarding around, Neos searched his body and finally found a crumpled box of cigarettes from the inner pocket of his coat. There was "Memphis" written on it in German.

He was craving for cigarettes. To stay abstain from cigarettes and alcohol in such a high-pressure environment on the battlefield was something one could only call a god. He had to relieve his emotions immediately.

"Ah-"

How could you carry cigarettes without a lighter? Neos pulled a matchbox from the same pocket and struck it several times, but it didn't light. Indeed, after all, the veteran said the unfortunate body he'd inherited had been lying in the trenches for three days; the humidity should have soaked the matchbox.

"Chacha"

A burst of hurried footsteps came from the trench in front, and a soldier bent over and quickly rushed to Neos, slapping him to the ground.

"Pastor, if you want to see God so badly, you can stand up straighter than you did in boot training."

Neos glanced at the soldier's movements. He had kept his head firmly in the trench the entire time, while he himself had stuck his head out of the trench like an idiot, even planning to light a cigarette at night!

The soldier turned up his collar to show Neos the three white rank stars embroidered on it, and then folded the collar back.

"I'm Sergeant Valentine, your new commanding officer. The day after you fell unconscious, the previous commander, Sergeant Oberlanden, was shot to death by a heretic while standing in the trench smoking like you are."

"First time on the front lines after coming out of the church's training camp?"

Realizing that he had acted foolishly on the battlefield, Neos smiled wryly and nodded.

"I know that the people in your church act recklessly, relying on some kind of divine power or ritual they possess. But on the battlefield, bullets don't care about your magical abilities. No helmet? No armor? One bullet and you'll go to God—follow me."

Sergeant Valentine pulled Neos forward, bending over, and after turning two corners they came to a pit deep enough for several men to stand with their backs straight and smoke.

A few tired soldiers were also smoking. They glanced at them and continued to look at the sky.

The moment the match lit, Neos saw the scar at the corner of the other man's eye wriggle in the light and shadow, the orange-red flames outlining the overlapping contours of their bodies. As the first puff of cigarette choked his lungs, he heard the crisp sound of his teeth chattering and clashing.

"Three months ago, when the heretics launched their full-scale attack, I was still a new recruit. I was promoted when I survived three hours on the battlefield and was the only one in the entire platoon to be withdrawn from the front line.

Every time my unit was crippled, I was promoted a level, and somehow I became a sergeant."

"Our...our battalion is on the front lines...what's the casualty rate?"

The cigarette butt flickered in the darkness as Valentine gestured, "I've just taken over this battalion as well, but based on my experience, this battalion has a lot of veterans. If we don't face the main force of the heretics, with luck, we can probably hold out for three months before we can take over the new troops."

"Three months—" Neos swallowed and clenched the cross tightly in his hand.

"Take a deep breath." Fingers stained with gun oil pressed against his ribs. "Forget about shooting. Learn to dodge first. The Church didn't train you to be gray animals like us to fill the battle line. You don't have to face the direct fire of the heretics—perhaps the artillery witches among the heretics who specialize in sniping you are the ones you should pay attention to."

"Sniper? With artillery?!"

"Yes, when you see her she will also notice you, and then run to the back where there are fewer people. Their shells sound different from the heretics' heavy artillery, you have to learn to listen. There will be a whistling sound before the shells fall, like the scream of a kettle before it boils dry." Valentine threw the cigarette butt on the ground and crushed it.

"Run. Count to three and then lie down. No matter how ugly your position is, keep running unless the shells kill you. Don't run into crowded places. You're a bunch of damn shell magnets. Leave us ordinary soldiers alone."

After resting for a while, Neos took the allocated rations and returned to his "temporary dormitory", a cat-ear cave used to hide from artillery, with several ammunition boxes piled inside. He borrowed a bayonet and opened it to take a look.

The shell flashed with a cold light, and the shell did not look like ordinary copper alloy. It felt slightly warm to the touch.

"Could there be radioactive elements in it?" Neos pinched his nose. Hmm, no bleeding.

Suddenly, his fingers felt a strange indentation on the smooth surface of the shell. Neos struck a match and leaned over to take a curious look (everyone, don't imitate this stupid battlefield behavior), and couldn't help but recite:

"In the midnight when the abyss roars and brimstone hides the stars,

Let all saints give ear, for the voice of the Lord pierces the trenches:

'Behold, I will make the walls of the new Antioch as strong as bronze,

Turn the bones of the hermits in the seventy-seven watchtowers into morning stars,

Their sighs will be their arrows, their anger their shield,

Resist the crawling maggot of heresy.'"

No, man, are you sure carving this on a shell won't destabilize it?

It had been several hours since he had traveled to this world. All he had seen was the increasingly chaotic situation in his own camp, and the so-called "hell" he had only heard from the soldiers. Neos couldn't help but think maliciously:

"We Orientals have black pupils. Could it be that the Church is looking for an excuse to go to war with the East? And what about the War Wolf Assault Beast? I guess it's just a larger Czech Wolfhound. But these Orientals are quite fierce. They're almost reaching Austria. Could it be that they're facing the Mongols? Hiss! How can the military factory make artillery shells without even polishing off the burrs?"

Although it was a relatively soft "copper alloy", the concave edge of the text was extremely sharp, cutting a cut on my finger, and blood flowed along the prayer.

"What bad luck! Never mind, go to sleep! I'll try to survive for three months and get home!"

After closing the ammunition box and making the bed with blankets, Neos pulled his hood tighter and began to feel sleepy.

--------

"Snapped!"

His cheeks were burning with pain. Neos opened his eyes and saw a young soldier with a look of fear on his tender face. He said in a trembling voice:

"It's...it's so weird outside..."

The trench was as silent as a tomb. No snoring, no mumbling in dreams, not even the slightest breath. Neos clutched the cross tightly, the only thing that gave him strength. He followed the soldiers to the trench front. The lights in the prayer room, storage room, and command post had all gone out at some point. The moonlight was swallowed by the thick fog, leaving only a damp touch.

Damp stencils, slippery moss, and...a rhythmic snapping sound.

"Clap!"

The sound seemed to come from the top of the trench.

The silence of the trench weighed heavily on Neos' chest. He held his breath, his eardrums aching from the pounding of his own heartbeat. The recruit's hand, clutching his sleeve, trembled.

"Clap!"

The sound came again, closer this time, like wet meat hitting wood. Neos looked up. The sandbags at the top of the trench shone pale as adipose wax in the moonlight, and the mud seeping out was dripping into his collar. The recruit suddenly loosened his grip as if he had been electrocuted. The dull thud of the rifle butt hitting the ammunition box startled both of them and made them curl their necks.

"I, I'll go find the periscope..." Neos swallowed, his voice as thin as a thread.

He remembered what Sergeant Valentine had taught him a few hours ago. To stick his head out of the trench without any protective measures was to seek death.

The wooden box used as a footrest was swollen with mud and water, and liquid oozed out when the boots stepped on it. Frost formed on the copper tube of the periscope, and Neos moved forward.

The no-man's-land ahead, reflected in the lens, looked like an old photograph dotted with sulfuric acid. Barbed wire flanked the fog, and the shadows of crosses stood like tombstones. Neos spun the lens and suddenly froze.

The cross at the farthest end was falling, snap, snap.

There was no wind, no sound of footsteps, but the rotten wooden stake fell as if gently pushed down by invisible fingers. Then came a second, a third... The wave of falling stakes approached from afar, as if a giant, transparent beast were crawling along the ground. Mist surged in, and the acrid stench of sulfur filled the trenches.

"Damn it! Something's wrong!" Neos jumped down from the wooden box, the hem of his black robe brushing across the recruit's pale face. "Is there an alarm? Never mind, shoot! Quick!"

The recruit raised his rifle tremblingly and fired three shots into the thick fog. As the gunfire ripped through the air, Neos caught a glimpse of a human-shaped dark figure flashing through the depths of the fog.

"Why is there no movement?" The fog seemed to absorb sound. Neos said, "Sound the alarm, quick!"

But the new recruit had already collapsed on the ground: "I, I don't dare... go alone..."

"I'll go with you. God will bless you, okay? Be good and listen. I'm blessing you on behalf of God now. You've been strengthened. Let's go!"

Neos took out a silver cross and waved it in front of him, then touched it to his forehead. The recruit's eyes lit up, the fear on his face dissipated, and he nodded, giving his gun to Neos first.

The metal was cold as ice, the sights awfully crooked, but the lingering warmth of body heat in the grip reminded him of the coffee cup in his office. Neos clutched the silver cross in one hand and the gun in the other, a prayer rolling over his tongue:

"Amitabha, the Three Pure Ones, the Virgin Mary, Allah, the Jade Emperor, Amaterasu—wait, this is too unlucky, may the Emperor bless you…"

As the mist drifted over the parapet, the recruit's silhouette blurred into a gray mass. Neos stared at the muddy heels of his boots and counted the two men's staggered footsteps: "One, two, three..." On the seventh step, there was a sudden, dull thud of something heavy falling to the ground ahead.

"Brother? Are you there?" Neos' call was chewed into a flocculent echo by the fog.

The recruit's toes suddenly straightened, their shoes leaving messy drag marks on the ground. The fog in the trench suddenly thickened, and suddenly, a faint chanting became heard. By the time Neos wiped the stinging ice from his eyes, the figure in front of him had disappeared behind the pale curtain of thick fog.

"Ding!"

The gun barrel seemed to hit something metal, making a crisp sound.

"Is there anything metal on him? No, who is that in front?!"

He struck a match, trembling, and tiny ice crystals drifted in the dim light. As he pointed his rifle's crosshairs forward, the tip of his boot suddenly struck something warm—a new recruit's cap. The St. Anthony medallion pinned to the brim was melting, and the metal surface was covered in dense, fly-egg-like particles.

"His-"

The sound of cloth tearing came from above. Neos looked up suddenly. In the halo of the matchlight hung a pair of boots stained with frozen soil—and a black robe. Who was that?

"Who are you! Speak! Or I'll shoot!"

Looking up along the black robe, he saw a noose tied around his waist, strung with seven oak medallions, each engraved with the totem of an inverted cross and an Ouroboros. When his gaze moved to his neck, the silver cross in his palm suddenly became blazingly hot.

Head...where's the head?

Neos's match went out.

"Hallucination...hallucination? No, shoot first!"

Just as Neos was about to pull the trigger, a distorted, inhuman voice rang out in his ears:

“We are no longer supplicants trembling before a merciless God.

We say: Blessed are those who are strong in heart, for they will ride out the storms."

Neos felt a sharp pain in his head, as if it were about to explode. The smell of sulfur filled his nostrils. The speaker seemed to be right next to his ear!

He looked to the side and saw an arm stretched out to his ear. In the moonlight, he saw that the arm was holding a terrifying human head with a blood-red pentagram printed on the forehead. A pair of playful eyes looked at him from the dark eye sockets.

"Go away!!!"

"boom!"

The blindly fired bullet grazed his head and struck his arm. Neos fell to the ground, tumbling and crawling back. Deep in the fog, more fluorescent green pupils lit up, and the sound of chanting rose and fell like rusty gears grinding against his nerves.

"Help! Help! Where are my teammates?!"

The materialistic worldview built up by more than ten years of compulsory education was shattered by a head at this moment. When Neos, whose san value dropped to zero, rolled and crawled to the corner of the trench, he did not see the mark of the silver cross on his palm, which was emitting a faint blue light.

In Flames: 1914: Chapter 3: Horror Game with and without Weapons: Two Different Experiences

"boom!"

There was no response to the previous few gunshots, but the last one finally woke up the silent night in the trench, and the gunshot instantly tore through the silent darkness.

　It seemed that the Japanese army realized that the infiltration had been discovered, and the fog began to dissipate, revealing a chaotic battlefield.

Neos sat uneasily in a cat-ear cave, looking terrified. His ears were filled with sounds coming from all directions - screams, wails, roars, fighting, and intermittent gunshots. The music of hell played in his ears. The air was filled with smoke and the smell of blood, suffocating.

"Heretic! Get out!!" Suddenly, an angry shout came from the trench on the right. It was the voice of Sergeant Valentine.

Neos' heart sank. He knew he had to act. Sergeant Valentine was his teammate, one of the few people he could trust in this deadly land. Neos had no combat experience, and staying alone on this damned front was a death sentence. He had to find his teammate, or else death would be the only thing waiting for him.

He quickly glanced around, his eyes fixed on a machine gun emplacement. There lay a bar riddled with nails and a machine gun. Without hesitation, he climbed the wooden steps and tried to reach the machine gun. However, as he reached out to grab it, he realized it was incredibly heavy.

"It's so heavy!" Neos gritted his teeth and tried to pick it up, but was embarrassed to find that he could not shake this 60-kilogram behemoth at all.

"That man holding a machine gun in one hand on the battlefield in the Pacific War is really the prototype of Captain America, damn!"

In desperation, he abandoned his machine gun and grabbed the trench stick, a strange-looking toilet plunger with a weight on the end, obviously designed for close combat.

Neos gripped the stick tightly, feeling its weight and texture, and an inexplicable sense of security arose in his heart.

After all, playing a horror game with weapons and without weapons are two completely different gaming experiences.

As he wielded this trench stick that was more than half a meter long and weighed nearly ten kilograms, Neos' courage gradually surged in his heart.

He took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. The chaos in the trench continued, and the shouting and screaming gradually subsided. Neos knew that he had to find Sergeant Valentine as soon as possible, otherwise it would be too late!

He gripped his trench club tightly and rushed in the direction of the sound. Every step was muddy and bloody, and the screams of his comrades and the roars of the enemy echoed in his ears. His heart was pounding like a drum, and his breathing was rapid, but the trench club in his hand gave him strength.

"Come on, you bastards!" Neos cursed under his breath, a flicker of determination in his eyes. He knew the ensuing battle would be a bloody life-or-death struggle, but he had no escape. In this chaotic battlefield, only courage and his weapon could keep him alive.

Sergeant Valentine's roar guided him: "Fucking heretic bastard!"

Neos ran towards the sound, and the moment he turned the corner, a fishy wind blew in his face.

A heretic soldier wearing a heavy gas mask was struggling with the sergeant. The heretic soldier pressed his knee against Valentine's chest, the tip of the dagger pressing down slowly against his Adam's apple. The sergeant's left hand, its fingers twisted at an odd angle, still held the heretic's wrist tightly.

PS: I have to say that the expression he holds up his head looks a bit like Tang Niu ()