Arc of Fire

On the Nameless Highlands.

The Prosens’ third charge was repelled.

Ilyich walked along the trench, picking at the bandage on his left shoulder as he went—he felt as if some beetle was crawling beneath it, making it unbearably itchy.

His fingernails were already caked with charred dirt and bloodstains from scratching at the bandage.

The soldiers on the front, whether they had been there from the start or were later reinforcements, were almost all injured. As Ilyich passed by Nurse Maria, he saw her bandaging Stepan with a bandage that was already filthy and no longer white.

Ilyich said, "Stepan, you’ve finally been hit?"

Stepan shook his head, "It’s just a scratch, nothing serious. I told the nurse that using this bandage might infect the wound, and then I’d have to amputate my entire arm. Better to leave it alone, just pour some alcohol on it, that way I can keep my arm."

Ilyich laughed, "Now you’re thinking about keeping your arm, but in this damn fight, we don’t even know if we’ll survive. The Prosens have attacked three times, and now only the old, weak, sick, and disabled are left on the position. If they come again..."

At that moment, someone shouted from afar, "Some oddly dressed people are coming! Their uniforms don’t look like the Prosens’, nor do they look like ours!"

He saw a small squad wearing berets and camouflaged uniforms crawling up from the communication trench on the side of the position.

The leader looked like an Antenese civilian, even wearing a felt hat popular in factories, and his clothes also resembled those of guerrilla fighters.

Virtually all the workers had become guerrilla fighters, and even those who worked for the Prosens largely belonged to the underground resistance—earning bread for their families whilst preparing to sabotage and aid the regular army in recovering their homeland.

Ilyich raised his hand, "Hold your fire, they look like our own. I’ll ask them."

Then he dashed out of the trench and shouted to the people in the communication trench, "Who goes there? Say your name, or we’ll open fire!"

The leading guerrilla fighter called out, "We’re a Suicide squad from the Allied Forces! They guided the air raid earlier, blowing up the enemy’s entire supply system! I brought them across the front lines, and our troops that were supposed to rendezvous with us ran into Prosen tanks and got wiped out, so I had to keep leading them forward!"

Ilyich looked at the members of the Suicide squad and could tell from their appearance that they were formidable fighters. Most crucially, more than twenty of these men had guided the bombing behind enemy lines and made it out, running through most of the combat zone, without a single one being injured!

They were fresh reinforcements!

Ilyich, overjoyed, asked, "Have you come to join us? We can hardly hold this position anymore, just look at us, all old, weak, sick, and handicapped. If we had your platoon of fresh reinforcements, we could definitely hold against the enemy’s next attack!"

The leading guerrilla fighter smiled, and the rank of Allied Forces’ Suicide squad members behind him also smiled.

Ilyich, "Why are you smiling?"

Guerrilla fighter, "On our way here, we conveniently blew up the ammunition depot for the artillery meant to support you and the fuel depot for the tanks. Look over there, you can still see the smoke! It’s just that you were in combat just now and didn’t hear the explosions."

Ilyich, puzzled, turned his head and indeed saw a dark column of smoke connecting heaven and earth.

"Sukabule," he cursed, "You’ve casually blown all that up? And then made it back without a scratch?"

As soon as the words were out, the officer leading the team shook his head and took out two Soldier’s ID tags. The guerrilla fighter explained, "We lost two people."

Ilyich’s thick eyebrows twisted into knots, "Sacrificing two men for such an important target?"

The guerrilla fighter nodded, "They were really skilled. Before the bomb detonated, the Prosens hadn’t even realized they had infiltrated. I could only watch from the side, not knowing how they managed to do it."

At this point, someone from the suicide squad said in heavily accented Antenese, "Don’t overpraise us, our success was mainly because the Prosens were attacking, so they neglected their rear defenses."

Ilyich turned his head to look in the direction of the horizon, then at the old, weak, and sick in the trenches, and finally at the members of the suicide squad. He scratched his bloodstained cheek, "The devil, we’re getting pounded into the ground by the Prosens, and you manage to do this so easily... the devil."

The member of the suicide squad who had spoken earlier translated Ilyich’s words, and the squad burst into laughter.

Then the guerrilla said, "See, Priest Davarish, they play a greater role when they return to the rear to receive orders from the General. I need to take them back. We only came to your position to borrow a vehicle. Are there any here... any vehicles?"

Ilyich shook his head, "No, they’re all destroyed. If you walk in the direction I’m pointing, you might come across a vehicle transporting the wounded. You can discuss it with the driver. Also, be careful of Stukas; the Ploson Air Force has been very active today."

After all, with the shortage of ground artillery shells, Stukas had become a very important means of fire power deployment.

The guerrilla waved his hand and led the suicide squad off in the direction Ilyich had pointed.

Ilyich stood still, watching them depart as the setting sun cast a blood-red glow on everyone’s back.

Stepan also came out of the trenches, leaning on a Mosin-Nagant he had picked up from somewhere, watching the assault team moving away, "It would be invigorating to fight shoulder to shoulder with those guys."

Ilyich replied, "They will be executing those especially dangerous missions, Stepan."

"What’s the difference? I see it’s just as dangerous on the front lines," Stepan shrugged, then winced from the pain in his recently bandaged arm.

Seeing him like this, Ilyich was reminded of the bandage on his own shoulder. Strangely enough, when he was speaking with the suicide squad earlier, he hadn’t felt like there were beetles scurrying around under his bandage.

Now the beetles seemed to have become active again, making Ilyich’s face twist with the itch.

As Ilyich was trying to scratch under his bandage, someone shouted, "Look! Such a big cloud of dust! It could be our reinforcements!"

Stepan stared into the distance for a few seconds before picking up the binoculars around his neck to take a long look.

Ilyich followed suit.

Through the binoculars, amidst the rolling dust, it looked like self-propelled artillery vehicles were speeding their way, with infantry packed behind them.

Ilyich became excited, shouting, "Reinforcements have arrived! Reinforcements have arrived! And we’ve got armored support! We finally have armored support!"

Stepan did not shout but leaned on his Mosin-Nagant and let out a breath.

Those on the "old, weak, sick, and disabled" positions now all cheered, "Hurray!"

"General Rocossov hasn’t forgotten us!"

"Hurray!"

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