Cannon Fire Arc

Feliz stepped out of the car and demanded, "What\'s the matter? General Giles is in the car!"

The Major who stopped the car saluted those inside, then loudly said, "The Chief of Staff has instructed me to stop you at all costs."

Giles frowned, "What\'s happened?"

"When Major General Kluge, the commander of the Ampula Division, went to inspect the artillery observation post you were heading to, he was shelled. The crossbeam on top of the bunker collapsed due to the artillery fire and Major General Kluge was injured in the shoulder. He has been sent to the division\'s field hospital for emergency treatment.

The Chief of Staff believes that under these circumstances, you should not proceed to the frontline," the Major blocking the road loudly stated.

Turning his head to Giles, Feliz asked, "Could the enemy have received intel? Was this barrage aimed to target you?"

Giles was silent for a few seconds before saying, "Now with no one commanding the Ampula Division, I\'ll head directly to the division headquarters. I want to see if this \'White Horse General\' can still locate me and bombard me!"

————

On Wang Zhong\'s side, he witnessed the division commander being carried away.

After all, with a bunker in place, it was difficult to kill the enemy inside using the indirect fire of howitzers.

This time, the shell had simply landed near the bunker, causing it to collapse. The division commander was just unlucky to get hit by the falling debris in the shoulder, while others in the bunker were unharmed.

And this was after Wang Zhong had already pre-calculated the distance and firing parameters.

It seems that to ensure casualties, direct fire from heavy artillery was still necessary.

A direct hit from a 203mm shell on the bunker – how could anyone survive that?

Just at this moment, the enemy began to deploy smoke.

Wang Zhong announced, "Prepare for battle!"

On the east bank, Wang Zhong had set up several layers of defense.

The enemy\'s fondness for deploying smoke was well known to all the guards of the First Guards Division, so the defense on the east bank fully took this into account.

Wang Zhong had set up fire points on the second floors of the riverside buildings.

They were somewhat reminiscent of the design philosophy of bastions from World War I.

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The breakwater itself was very steep and difficult to climb, so even if the enemy swam across the river and landed on the beachhead, they would have to use stairs.

The machine guns on the second floor could perfectly cover these staircases with downward diagonal fire.

Yes, this was the first \'gate of hell\' Wang Zhong had set up for the enemy. Even if they managed to cross the river under the cover of smoke, they\'d face blind fire from machine guns – the smoke wouldn\'t affect this firepower. Instead, it would make it difficult for the enemy in the smoke to locate and counter the machine gun positions.

Even if the enemy broke through this \'gate of hell,\' Wang Zhong had set up a second defensive line.

Wang Zhong had sealed off most of the windows on the first floor of the riverside buildings, leaving the rooms facing the riverbank empty with not a single defender inside.

The defenders were all located outside the room doors.

In this way, the enemy wouldn\'t be able to see inside the rooms clearly. If they used explosives to blast through the sealed brick and sandbag windows and rushed in blindly, they\'d be met with submachine gun fire from those waiting at the door.

Moreover, Wang Zhong had also placed landmines in the rooms facing the river.

Mines placed outside would be detonated by the blast pressure, but what about the mines inside the room, especially when the room\'s windows were sealed with bricks and sandbags?

This design would minimize the chances of blast pressure triggering the explosion.

Of course, some of the ground floor buildings along the river had been converted into anti-tank gun positions, for which Wang Zhong employed a different defensive logic.

For these buildings, the walls facing the river were demolished, leaving only the load-bearing columns, with machine gun fire points positioned within the second row of buildings.

Once the anti-tank gunners evacuated, the ground floor of these buildings would become pure zones of fire damage.

And by demolishing the ground floor walls facing the river, it also facilitated the movement of anti-tank guns like the ZIS-30 tank gun, which could move directly in and out of the first floor.

If the enemy breached this line of defense, it would be exceedingly difficult for them to assault the second floor.

Because Wang Zhong had removed all the stairs going up to the second floors of the riverside buildings, normally using wooden ladders to go up and down, which would be pulled up during combat.

Unless the Prussians learned to double jump, they were not going to make it up.

And even if they did get up, there were soldiers from the First Guards Division waiting with submachine guns.

If all of these measures proved useless, and the enemy completely took over the buildings along the street, they would find that they couldn\'t enter the bunkers underneath the riverside buildings.

All the entrances to the bunkers were on the second floor of the buildings across the street, connected by tunnels.

If the enemy wanted to attack the second row of buildings, they\'d have to face bunker fire from behind.

When this entire design was presented, Pavlov and the rest were shocked because Ante\'s military academy had never taught them to design defensive positions like this.

Wang Zhong didn\'t tell them that this wasn\'t actually his own creation, but rather from trench warfare.

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He himself had not anticipated that one of his favorite movies as a child would come in handy after having traveled through time!

Now Wang Zhong was just waiting for the enemy to come and see if what he had learned from military films was actually useful.

After the enemy\'s smoke deployment was complete, faint whistle sounds could be heard from across the river.

Vasily said nervously, "The whistles, the enemy is going to attack."

Wang Zhong ordered, "Close all bunker doors."

Pavlov immediately relayed the command.

To facilitate entry and exit, the division headquarters had kept one door open to the surface, but now that they had closed this door, leaving from the division headquarters bunker meant going through a long tunnel.

Because there was no airflow inside, the white smoke from outside didn\'t drift into the bunker.

Wang Zhong used his external device to look through the smoke and watch the enemy\'s movements.

At the ford, the enemy seemed intent on building a pontoon bridge, so the primary forces emerging from the trenches were the bridging units.

Wang Zhong: "Order the heavy mortar fire, firing plan three."

Firing plan three was to cover the opposite river crossing.

Dealing with the floating bridges set up by the enemy was no easy task, and the enemy would come streaming over endlessly. With only one division at his disposal, it was best to hinder the enemy\'s advance as much as possible.

As the sound of the mortars exploding reached them, the enemy troops began to swim across, armed.

The Prussians even brought out steel boats, placed them in the river to transport heavy weapons, pushed along by the swimming soldiers.

At that moment, the enemy\'s machine guns and armored vehicles on the shore began to spray the second floor of the buildings on this side of the eastern bank with random gunfire through the smoke.

Unfortunately for them, Wang Zhong and his men had concealed their firepower positions well, and the enemy had not discovered the true locations of their firepower.

Just then, the telephone rang. Pavlov was thrilled: "The line is connected! Good."

He picked up the phone: "Division headquarters, yes, the enemy is crossing the river, there\'s no need for the reserve troops to move yet, just wait."

After hanging up, Pavlov looked back: "Colonel Eugene is a bit anxious."

Vasily: "I\'m also very anxious, shall we open fire? It\'s too quiet."

Wang Zhong: "Aren\'t we still hearing the sound of the heavy mortar barrage?"

"But that\'s too far away. It lacks impact," Vasily said, looking outside the window, "shall we open fire?"

Wang Zhong: "Don\'t rush it, the enemy\'s charge whistle only blew a few minutes ago."

Popov: "You should be as calm as a general."

Wang Zhong thought to himself that his calmness was because he had \'smoke-penetrating eyes\', knowing exactly where the enemy swimmers were.

Glancing at the time, Pavlov asked: "Shall we order the artillery battalion to fire? We might hit some of the enemy\'s reserves."

Wang Zhong: "Why can\'t you stay calm? This first wave of enemy attacks will definitely fail, relax."

After he spoke, the whole divisional bunker fell silent.

Wang Zhong focused intently on observing the enemy from his vantage point until he felt someone tugging at his clothes.

He looked back and saw Nelly, the little maid: "I\'m really nervous, what should I do?"

Wang Zhong: "What, don\'t you believe my arrangements can deal a heavy blow to the enemy?"

"It\'s not that."

Extending his hand, Wang Zhong patted Nelly on the head: "Rest easy."

Right at that moment, Wang Zhong saw the first wave of enemy troops landing. They first tried to climb the breakwater, but finding it impassable, surged toward the stairs.

Wang Zhong: "Fire!"

Pavlov to the speaking tube: "Fire!"

The machine guns on the second floor instantly opened fire, forming a web of bullets that completely sealed all the staircases.

The enemy, shrouded in smoke and unable to see clearly, was knocked down by the fierce storm of gunfire.

Some of the veteran Prussian soldiers lay down, using their experience and instincts to dodge the barrage.

But the Prussians were persistent, crawling along the stairs until a blind bullet struck them down.

Wang Zhong: "Mortar!"

Heavy mortars were assigned to each regiment, and following Wang Zhong\'s order, the ones given to the Fifth Belensk Regiment opened fire.

The shells kept falling on the beachhead.

Even though the mortars were not very accurate, the enemy was packed so densely that it didn\'t matter.

At that moment, Wang Zhong saw a Prussian officer shooting a flare toward the second floor where the gunfire was coming from.

The red light of the flare, even through the smoke, roughly indicated the direction.

The only problem was, this officer was guessing the location based on the flashes of gunfire; the flare actually didn\'t land on the machine gun position.

However, the infantry guns across the river opened fire.

Those runs just happened to be outside the range that Wang Zhong could light up.

After all, the range of the Prussian infantry guns was decent.

The shells continued to fall on the second floor, and using the density of their fire, they actually silenced a machine gun!

Wang Zhong: "Call the artillery battalion, enemy infantry guns are outside of my line of sight, but they can\'t be too far away!"

Pavlov was about to pick up the phone when he heard the sound of heavy artillery: "Wait, is the artillery battalion firing?"

Vasily: "Maybe the artillery observation post saw the position of the enemy\'s infantry guns."

Wang Zhong had set up an artillery observation post on the rooftop, but he thought that the artillery officers there had been sacrificed during the preparation of fire.

It seems that was not the case.

The enemy artillerymen, who had been bombarding the location indicated by the flare, ceased fire.

The machine gun fire promptly resumed.

But in that gap, many Prussian soldiers had already crossed the first deadly barrier.

Clearly prepared for the second obstacle, the Prussians directly used explosive charges to blow open the sealed windows.

However, they were unaware of the mines behind the windows.

The first Prussian soldier to climb through the window was blown out of it.

Wang Zhong saw it all clearly and laughed heartily.

The others in the map room were all puzzled, not understanding what Wang Zhong was laughing about.