Chapter 19: Surviving a Disaster

The flames symbolizing death were like the tongues of a devil, constantly jumping and flashing in the wreckage, licking the steel and corpses red. The Stuka dive bombers hovering over the sea of ​​blood and corpses like vultures were still unwilling to leave. Even after the bombs they carried were exhausted, they continued to harvest lives on the ground with the 92mm machine guns on the two wings.

The air raid had reached this point. The Soviet troops, who had been suddenly attacked by the German Stuka fleet during the movement, had already suffered heavy losses.

All kinds of main tanks and vehicles were either blown into pieces or directly overturned by the shock wave and lost their combat effectiveness. The infantrymen accompanying the armored troops were also torn apart by shrapnel and machine gun bullets, and the corpses were scattered all over the ground and blood flowed like a river. Only the word "hell on earth" could describe the miserable situation of the Soviet ground forces struggling and suffering heavy casualties under the German air raid.

Dadadada——

With the completion of the last round of dive machine gun strafing attack, the Soviet soldiers who fell under their guns were motionless and had no chance to stand up.

The commander of the German air fleet, who was very satisfied with his "masterpiece" and at the same time very proud, shook the joystick and led his equally arrogant subordinates to go straight in the direction they came from without looking back.

Seeing that the German Stuka fleet that had been screaming and circling over their heads finally turned around and left because of running out of fuel after wreaking havoc for nearly half an hour.

The Soviet soldiers who survived the purgatory-like air raid immediately began to emerge from their respective hiding bunkers and ran quickly towards their comrades who were mostly cold corpses to try to make a final effort.

On the other side, the members of the No. 177 command type T34 tank crew who survived the air raid were also extremely anxious and busy.

The unknown life and death of Captain Malashenko, the commander of the tank and the vanguard, is obviously the most urgent issue at the moment. Seryosha, Nikolai and the newly arrived loader Kirill.

These three can be said to be the closest crew members to Malashenko. As soon as the airstrike ended, they quickly ran to the crater where the residual heat had not yet disappeared.

"Captain Malashenko, where are you!?"

"Comrade Captain, can you hear me!?"

From beginning to end, they were unwilling to believe that Malashenko had been killed in the airstrike just now. The three young men shouted their tank commander's name while running, hoping to get a little response from the steel wreckage and the corpses everywhere.

But unfortunately, there was no voice in the purgatory-like battlefield ruins filled with the smell of burnt flesh and twisted steel to respond to their calls.

Everywhere he looked, he saw the remaining Red Army soldiers busy rescuing the wounded and carrying the remaining supplies and equipment. In the piles of human remains that were torn into pieces of flesh and blood by bombs and machine guns and were difficult to distinguish, there was no trace of Captain Malashenko.

"Uh ah ah ah ah ah wow ah ah ah ah"

The death of his comrades on the battlefield and the terrifying screams of the German Stuka dive bombers had already brought an extremely heavy blow to Kirill, the young recruit. The unknown life and death of Captain Malashenko, who had brought him encouragement and confidence in a casual conversation just two days ago, was even more cruel and painful.

It was like the last straw that broke the camel's back.

Kirill, who grew up in a red university campus full of Soviet socialist culture, had never seen such a cruel and bloody battlefield. Captain Malashenko's "death" completely crushed Kirill's will, which was already on the edge of despair. The boy, who had a head full of organ music just a week ago, finally knelt down on the ground with his hands covering his face and began to cry loudly in despair and pain.

Not many people cared about Kirill's heart-wrenching painful wails. These Red Army soldiers who had experienced the powerful combat effectiveness of the German army in the past few days of fighting had long been accustomed to blood and life and death, including the painful wails of new recruits like Kirill who had just entered the battlefield.

But after the heavy blow, the God of Fate did not seem to give up on these Red Army soldiers who had just experienced a brutal air raid.

Just as Kirill, who was kneeling on the ground, was still covering his face with his hands and mentally collapsed, a loud shout from behind him was like the most beautiful sound of hope, instantly pulling his soul back to reality.

"Hey! Come quickly, Captain Malashenko is here! He is still alive!"

He immediately turned his head and looked in the direction where the voice came from. There was a Red Army soldier holding a Mosin-Nagant rifle and wearing a grass-green steel helmet, waving his arms excitedly behind a small mound not far away to call his comrades to come forward.

Without saying anything, Kirill stood up from the half-kneeling ground. With excitement that could not be described in words, he almost rolled and crawled towards the direction of the waving Red Army soldier. With only one thought in his mind, his only hope was that Captain Malashenko must be alive.

It turned out that when the German Stuka dropped the bomb some time earlier, Malashenko was blown away by the strong wind caused by the explosion because of the long distance, but he was lucky enough not to be hit by any shrapnel.

Although the bomb blast that blew him more than 20 meters away was indeed quite powerful, Malashenko, who was once again favored by the goddess of fate, unexpectedly flew directly into a muddy haystack that had just rained two days ago.

The wet grass and sticky mud mixed together, although Malashenko's whole body was filthy like a mud man, there is no doubt that it was the sticky mud and the grass covering it that greatly reduced the impact of Malashenko's body when it touched the ground, causing him to faint temporarily after being blown away for more than 20 meters by the bomb blast and not seriously injured.

"Ahem, ahem, your mouth is full of this stinky mud! And this broken grass!"

With the help of the Red Army soldier who first discovered him, Malashenko finally limped out of the mud pit. Feeling that his mouth was full of grass and mud, he could hardly speak. In a hurry, he immediately took out the water bottle behind him and poured it on his cheeks to clean his muddy face, which was no longer visible.