Chapter 14: Demons in the Smoke! Hoorah!

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After shouting these words, Andrei glanced outside through the trench periscope.

The latest barrage had only just ended, yet the enemy soldiers on the opposing position had already begun their assault.

Perhaps it was because the barrage had covered not only the enemy position but their own as well, leading the enemy to believe that all the soldiers in this sector had withdrawn.

At least, Andrei noticed that they had made no artillery preparations before charging. Their attack was plainly somewhat hasty.

But it was obvious that the unexpectedly early bombardment had not only caught Andrei’s company before they could pull back; several other units had been unable to withdraw as well.

In the blink of an eye, gunfire erupted from trenches elsewhere, while mortars whose positions were unknown also began shelling the charging enemy soldiers.

Pinned down by machine-gun fire and artillery, the enemy soldiers in that area quickly threw themselves flat. At the same time, shells from the rear of the enemy position began pounding the trenches that had opened fire.

“Sir, we…”

A recruit beside Andrei had heard the gunfire in the distance and opened his mouth to say something, but Andrei raised a hand.

“Quiet. Leave them alone!”

“Get ready. When I tell you to charge, you charge!”

Apart from the enemy advancing on the distant positions, soldiers were also slowly approaching Andrei’s position. But since the defenders had neither fired back nor shown themselves, the enemy had no idea anyone was there.

As the enemy drew closer and closer, Andrei could not help holding his breath.

The crucial moment had arrived. The instant they were exposed, the enemy artillery would shift its fire onto them. Under that bombardment, the entire company would be wiped out!

Even with players among them, no one could withstand a continuous artillery barrage!

The enemy was getting closer by the second. Watching them approach, Andrei felt his heart rise into his throat.

What he feared most was that they might probe the position before launching their assault—for instance, throwing a volley of grenades before anyone reached the trench.

His second greatest fear was that some idiot player might suddenly lose his mind and leap out to slaughter them without a thought. After all, one of the players’ defining traits was their complete unpredictability.

Fortunately, these enemies did not seem to possess especially extensive combat experience. At least they had not thrown a volley of grenades first and then considered what to do next.

The players, meanwhile, were behaving themselves. Perhaps Andrei’s cautious manner had convinced them that they were in the middle of an scripted sequence. In the chat, they were all warning one another that no one was to act without orders!

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Just as this group of soldiers in iron-black uniforms drew near, almost reaching the edge of the trench, Andrei suddenly blew his whistle with all his strength.

The shrill whistle pierced the air and startled the enemy outside. Before they could react, a string of smoke grenades had already been thrown out by the players.

God only knew what brand of smoke grenades the players were using. The smoke spread astonishingly fast. Though there was no wind to carry it, in only a second or two, the entire stretch of trenches had been engulfed in gray-white smoke.

“Brothers, charge with me! Urraaa!”

Brother Haonan, the most ferocious of the charging players, dashed out at the head of the assault, bellowing a battle cry with a distinctly Russian flavor.

The other players and the nearby soldiers heard that roar and seemed to be injected with a shot of adrenaline. One after another, they charged out with bayonets fixed.

Although the smoke obscured everything ahead, the players could still see the marked enemies within it.

Rat-tat-tat! Rat-tat-tat!

Brother Haonan wielded an M1918 and unleashed a fierce stream of controlled bursts at the enemy. In moments, he had emptied an entire magazine. The other players also raised various automatic weapons and opened fire, killing a large number of enemies in an instant.

“Smoke grenades! Don’t forget the smoke grenades—keep laying down smoke!”

“Don’t stop! Everyone, charge!”

Andrei rushed out alongside them, clutching his nameless pistol. As he ran, he called out to the players ahead, warning them not to get carried away with the killing.

Without the smoke grenades, every one of them would have been easy prey before the enemy’s heavy machine guns and artillery!

But clearly, the players’ combat skills—or rather, their gaming skills—were far more polished than Andrei had imagined.

All along the way, they kept throwing smoke grenades while firing relentlessly. From time to time, a player carrying a melee weapon would plunge into the smoke and butcher the bewildered enemy soldiers still struggling to understand what was happening.

As they killed, they discussed in the chat how the NPCs in this game reacted far more slowly than the NPCs in Battlefield.

Reading their comments, Andrei could not help rolling his eyes.

Wasn’t that obvious?

For ordinary people, being suddenly buried beneath a heap of smoke grenades and then swept by more than a dozen submachine guns and machine guns was enough to leave them helpless. If they could organize an effective counterattack immediately, that would be the real miracle!

The ordinary soldiers did not possess equipment as excellent as the players’, but they were utterly fearless. With bayonets fixed, they charged forward as well.

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“Urraaa! Slaughter those damned Black Eagle devils!”

“Long live the Cambrian Empire! Long live the Tsar!”

“You filthy dogs, taste my cock!”

Perhaps the other soldiers understood that they were fighting for survival in a desperate situation. Or perhaps it was the result of Andrei’s leadership skill, unimpressive though its effects might have been.

At that moment, the soldiers unleashed a truly formidable bayonet charge, driving the enemy into total disarray.

Although the smoke blocked their vision and prevented them from seeing clearly ahead, they did not need a perfect view.

They were not firing rifles. All they had to do was identify the soldiers in black uniforms, charge them, and stab them to death with their bayonets!

Andrei had expected to be nervous about charging in and killing people, afraid that he might accidentally shoot one of his comrades with his little pistol.

But seeing these men in action, he realized he had been worrying for nothing.

At the speed he was advancing, he would not even make it in time to kill an enemy while the fighting was still hot!

After charging for some distance, Andrei began to worry that the soldiers might become separated in the smoke, so he blew his whistle once again.

The moment the whistle sounded, a soldier carrying a bayonet immediately ran over to him.

“Captain, our men are all mixed up! What if we hit our own?”

Still surging with excitement and never slowing his pace, Andrei shouted:

“Fire on anyone charging toward us! Anyone coming at us is certainly an enemy! Even if they’re our own men, anyone running toward the rear now is a deserter!”

“Brothers, charge! Urraaa!”

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