In the end, the enemy was forced to retreat to the rear with 900 casualties and eight T-72s. The short but fierce battle was finally over. Another victory meant more losses for us. More than 680 men were killed in less than half an hour, a heavy toll for a small unit. Ammunition was now running out, at most it could hold out for a few days. Our artillery was running out of ammunition to respond to the enemy's barrage of rockets.
The battle lasted for nearly three days. Neither side would surrender. Fortunately, reinforcements succeeded in breaking the siege at the cost of more than 80,000 lives. Food and ammunition supplies were restored, but Kuznetskozhyan's lightning-fast attacks wiped out more than five divisions with losses of only one-fifth. Truly worthy of the title of the strongest in the world today.
After a long and stressful day, we all returned to the headquarters to rest and change shifts with the newly recruited units. At 9am that morning, we quickly packed our bags and handed over our work to another unit. A long, looming crowd appeared in the west, emerging as if from the darkness of the road.
Our uniforms were now a yellowish color from the soil, looking like worn khaki. The leather was stiff from the dried brown mud. The flaps of our capes flapped like pieces of wood against the yellow dirt on our knees. Everyone's faces were gaunt and lifeless. The dust had made our faces even more wrinkled, looking no different from those of drug addicts. Despite our decrepitude, the noise still rang out endlessly among the soldiers after leaving that terrible hell. We all argued loudly, gestured, laughed, sang, and composed poems.
The movement began at six o'clock yesterday afternoon and lasted all night; now the last man had left the last trench. Now we could safely return home. Everyone was tired, but they could not hide the joy in their eyes.
"Everyone, last march before leave!"
At dawn, each ray of sunlight gently outlines the shadows of all things. The sparkling dew drops still linger on the leaves like a perfect ornament, the sky is a warm, clear patch that suddenly makes people relax their minds. The gentle wind caresses everything, soothing the more or less wounded hearts, bringing the grass, trees, flowers and people's hearts to evoke gentle, quiet vibrations.
My heart calmed down before this rare peaceful scene, not thinking much, just relaxing and enjoying everything from nature. Everyone's footsteps were steady, no one spoke, perhaps no one wanted to destroy this pleasant scene. Our group just like that returned to the outpost.
On the way back by truck, the convoys of trucks carrying wounded soldiers of the Altirustzkan army went in the opposite direction for nearly ten kilometers. On them were soldiers who were seriously wounded, bandaged all over, some had died from blood loss, tanks were shot in countless places, burning and black. The faces of the soldiers showed many mixed emotions, joy because they were going home, sadness, despair because they were seriously wounded or had lost their comrades. Sitting on armored vehicles painted with cross marks, on their backs were anti-tank guns, machine guns or expired ammunition. They must have been people who had returned from the dead, just like us.
The car arrived at the outpost, then we got out together, brought our luggage and went in to greet the officers there.
We, with gaunt faces and skinny bones, were now jostling to get food. It had been a long time since we had been given food. These past few days had been nothing but fighting and punching, the "edible" food was mainly rat carcasses and sewage water, but no one dared to put such disgusting things in their mouths, let alone swallow them.
"Hurry up, whose turn is it? I'm so hungry."
"Give me some, I'm starving."
"Whoever kills the most gets to eat first!"
The noise continued. Getting a meal had never been so difficult. After waiting in line for a long time, Ilaina and I finally got our meal. It had soup, some beef, green vegetables, and mushrooms. The taste was amazing, like a delicacy. I must have been very hungry to be able to eat mushrooms, something I hated before, but now it was a delicacy. We found our seats and ate our victory dinner together. I chewed noisily and exclaimed:
"This shit is delicious!"
Ilaina sat across from me, smiled and said:
"You seem to like army food, huh, Klaus?"
"Of course! It's really delicious! How nice it would be if we could eat like this every day."
"I find it a bit salty and too strong… Maybe it's because the food here is different from Kuznetskozhyan."
"Do you need water? I'll get it for you."
After eating, we and some brothers from other units went to transport artillery shells and carry ammunition to supply our brothers on the front line. Compared to having to expose ourselves to the elements on the battlefield, this job was indeed quite good. On the other hand, the newest K-177 artillery positions had also arrived. Now we could confidently rain bombs and bullets on Kuznetskozhyan's troops. Every hour, hundreds of shells were fired towards the "no man's land" to warn and stop enemy attacks.
While carrying the last boxes of burned ammunition, I voiced a question I had always had but hadn't had the chance to ask Ilaina:
"Hey Ilaina, why are you joining this meaningless war? Also, why did Kuznetskozhyan start the war, shouldn't they find a way to develop the economy? I also wonder why you joined the Altirustzkan army, isn't that treason?"
Ilaina's complexion visibly deteriorated, and the atmosphere also became gloomy. I was a little worried, did I ask something inappropriate at this time?
"I-I… I" – Ilaina bowed her head deeply, her hands tightly gripping the corner of her shirt, her pupils suddenly filled with a layer of mist.
At this moment, I clearly touched the pain in Ilaina's heart, and I felt a little self-loathing for the questions I had just asked. But Ilaina actually answered me, and my heart began to feel some extremely wonderful emotions.
Ilaina was once a skilled sniper for Kuznetskozhyan. She killed hundreds of terrorists, a thorn in the side of the Altirustzkan government. However, Kuznetskozhyan had her parents publicly executed just because he disagreed with the government's campaign to attack Altirustzkan. Out of hatred, she surrendered herself and was appointed here.
"I'm sorry! I didn't mean my joke would come out like that." –I said awkwardly.
"It's okay... It's not your fault. They're already gone, it's too late to do it again. What about you, why do you want to get involved in this place?" - Ilaina wiped away the tears that were about to overflow from the corner of her eyes and asked me again.
I was stunned, recalling painful memories that had long been forgotten, forbidden to be dug up. Hiding the anxiety in my heart, I tried to find the right words to answer Ilaina:
"It's a long story. Do you know about the shocking Altirustzkan massacre in Kuznetskozhyan? My family and I were still there. And then, the massacre that took the lives of nearly 70,000 people happened. That night, the military broke into my house, they calmly beat my father, and my mother..."
The feelings of pain and anger that seemed to have disappeared rose up again in my heart. I gritted my teeth and said bitterly:
"They raped my mother right in front of me and my father. My father couldn't control himself and rushed forward, grabbed their guns and opened fire. He killed all three intruders but was also shot dead. My mother died in an even more tragic state..."
A little uncertain, I slowly added another sentence:
"…I successfully escaped from that nightmare place."
I lowered my head, unable to continue speaking. My limbs were stiff, my heart was aching with pain, I just wanted to sing a sad song to express my sorrow. For a moment, I almost couldn't control myself, I swallowed my tears to maintain my composure. The surroundings fell silent, as did Ilaina.
Indeed, war is just like that, always causing the utmost pain and loss to everyone. If only the Kuznetskozhyan leaders could restrain their bloodlust, if only Altirustzkan were wiser in not organizing internal wars against the enemy, we wouldn't have had to drag our bodies to this place. There wouldn't be any casualties or bloodshed, everyone could live happily together. The peaceful and boring life of the past turned out to be all I wanted and sought, not this current hell, where people have to struggle with each other to fight for life in every meter of land, every meter of trench.
Ilaina seemed to have recovered her spirits, let out a few deep breaths, she said:
"I'm sorry... Are you okay?" – Ilaina touched my hand lightly.
I tried to adjust my emotions, and at the same time, pushed away all the lingering tragic emotions. Realizing that time was running out, I said to Ilaina:
"Um. It's late, let me walk you back to the dorm."
"But what about you? You don't have a temporary home yet."
"It's okay, I can sleep outside. There's no room left." I wanted to get some fresh air anyway.
Hearing that, Ilaina seemed to be thinking about something. She said she would let me stay overnight and tomorrow she would ask her superiors for a private apartment. I was about to refuse, but when I looked into Ilaina's clear blue eyes that seemed to contain a thousand rays of light in the darkness, I unconsciously agreed.
Ilaina led me into her apartment. The small room was neat and clean, the furniture was simply arranged, and it was warm and comfortable. I hung my coat on the coat rack and waited for Ilaina to give me instructions.
"Make yourself at home. You can sleep on the sofa or on the bed, but there's only one bed here." Ilaina looked at me, the corner of her mouth curling up into a small curve.
I looked at the tiny sofa, only about 1 meter 60: …
"Umm…, I think I'll sleep on the floor. Do you have any spare blankets?"
…
I spread the mattress beside Ilaina's bed, lay down and pulled the blanket up to my chin. This was the first time I saw Ilaina let down her platinum hair, it looked longer than I imagined, smooth and soft like a silver stream in the dark night, she always exuded a mysterious beauty that made me want to explore.
"Klaus, are you asleep yet?"
I turned to look at the bed, meeting a pair of blue eyes looking at me:
"What's wrong?"
"About saving me… it's a bit late, but thank you very much."
"It's nothing, didn't you also save my life? Then we're even." I smiled, suddenly feeling very happy.
Ilaina chuckled, the corners of her mouth still tending to curve up:
"Okay, so can we consider it as us owing each other our lives?"
"For real..."
We chatted for a while and then wished each other goodnight. But I still couldn't fall asleep until midnight. The rustling of the wind rustling the treetops outside or the creaking of the window frame didn't matter. I looked at the moon hanging high, shining alone in the cold, gloomy sky, my mind haunted by screams, mountains of corpses, blood and flesh mixed together, and the terrifying roar of bombs.
When night fell on the battlefield a few days ago, I thought I would get used to it after a few days, but I was just so tired that I couldn't think of anything else and fell asleep. Until I had time to relax a bit, those terrifying images kept haunting my mind. In the darkness, I could still imagine those murderers appearing and killing me without mercy.
Something slowly condensed in the silent darkness or condensed under the dark cloth of the night. My body suddenly shivered, my limbs could not move, my throat felt like something was blocking it, unable to make any sound. All the madness of the past few days flooded my mind and body, screaming, wanting to escape so that I could stop suffering. Suddenly I felt countless arms reaching out from the darkness, slowly touching my body, drowning me. I tried to struggle, wanting to wrestle control of life and death for myself. But my body was like a statue that could not move, could do nothing but let them drown me, my body melted into the darkness, into the bottomless black hole of death.
I jumped up in an instant, cold sweat pouring down my back, my heart pounding like a drum beating in a mock battle. I let out heavy breaths, regaining my composure. I glanced over at Ilaina, her face obscured by my shadow behind the candlelight. It was still the same beautiful long platinum hair and white skin, looking at Ilaina's peaceful face, I suddenly felt my heart lighten a bit.
I walked out to the balcony dejectedly, looking at the horizon that was gradually turning red, my mind in turmoil, the stone in my heart that I could not put down. In fact, I just wanted to leave this place as soon as possible, away from this endless and meaningless war. But at that moment, I realized that I could not leave like a coward. I still had to fight for revenge, not only that, I also needed to protect Ilaina.
I realized that Ilaina was an important person to me, this feeling was quite familiar as if I had experienced it before, maybe Ilaina was really someone I knew before? But is that okay? I couldn't remember anything useful, I was a little annoyed with myself. Sitting down at the tea table on the balcony, lazily closing my eyes, I fell asleep without even realizing it.