Munitions Empire

Chapter 262: Bayonet on 258

"Charge!" Soldiers of the Kingdom of Germelin held their weapons and surged forward like a dark wave towards the defenses of the Leite Kingdom.

The smoke from exploding shells had not yet fully cleared, and the soldiers in the trenches hadn't had time to prepare for the incoming enemy when they saw the densely packed forces already near their trenches.

"Bang!" A soldier armed with a K1 rifle aimed at an approaching enemy and skillfully pulled the trigger.

A gunshot followed, but because of the chaos, he couldn't see whether he had actually hit his target.

No choice, he had to duck back into the trench and reload his rifle—a complex process, and indeed still too slow compared to bolt-action rifles, despite the needle gun's loading operation.

After firing, the soldier had to clean the barrel, then load a new bullet into his rifle, and amidst the chaos, he also had to be cautious that the long firing pin inside the barrel of his rifle wouldn't cause any accidents.

This was one of the main reasons needle guns were quickly phased out: they were too expensive and tedious to reload, and the cartridges were difficult to preserve. In short, aside from being more advanced than flintlock guns, they were almost without merit.

Finally, the soldier from Leite Kingdom had finished reloading and raised his rifle to aim at the distant enemy once more.

The enemy was now much closer; he could even see that they were carrying almost identical weapons to his own.

He pulled the trigger, then withdrew his neck, not even bothering to check if he had hit his target.

The battle had been raging for two days now. The enemy couldn't attack at night, so the fighting had been incredibly fierce for two consecutive days.

In this era, there were no complex special tactics; coordinated infantry and artillery tactics had not yet been developed, so it was purely "artillery bombard, infantry charge, infantry charge then artillery bombard, artillery bombard then infantry charge..."

However, with their overwhelming superiority in numbers, the Kingdom of Germelin was nearing success. As they committed more and more troops, Leite Kingdom's defenses were increasingly stretched thin.

The only Maxim machine gun in the legion had malfunctioned. After slaughtering close to 500 people, an internal part of this machine gun seemed to have broken, so the legion's only trump card was completely out of the fight.

All that was left was a contest of true will. Leite had lost more than 100 soldiers in two days of combat, with another 200 wounded and unable to continue fighting.

This was already a fifth of the total number of troops. If artillery men and other personnel were excluded, nearly a third of the infantry legion's front-line combat forces had been put out of action.

That the troops hadn't collapsed yet was entirely because among them were numerous interns from the Great Tang Military Academy holding the line.

As the backbone of the force, they usually served as platoon leaders for the infantry squads. Their regular training had made the unit remarkably tough.

It was just unfortunate that with no major differences in weaponry between the sides, the battle inevitably became bloody.

Soon, the enemy's troops approached the trenches, and intense hand-to-hand combat ensued. The sound of gunfire mixed with battle cries echoed throughout the position.

"Fix bayonets!" Seeing the enemy troops getting dangerously close, an intern from the Great Tang Military Academy, wearing a bright yellow uniform, drew his saber and commanded loudly.

A Leite Kingdom officer, holding a Left-Wheel Handgun, looked at the young officer and said persuasively, "Kid! You're just here to intern, there's no need for you to take risks here. Leave immediately and relay a message to the commander, tell them we've done our best!"

The young intern officer, holding a Longsword in one hand and a handgun in the other, smiled and replied, "I'm here to intern, but does interning mean I'm not part of the battle? Does it mean I'm not a soldier of Leite Kingdom?"

A soldier, while fixing a bayonet to his gun, continued to urge, "But you really don't need to persist here!"

"You almost made me forget I'm just an intern, haha. I've never seen you as outsiders, so why won't you accept me as one of your own?" The young officer sniffled and looked towards the direction of the enemy. "Enough talk, prepare to fight!"

The soldier, bayonet already fixed, continued anxiously, "That's not it, sir, we just..."

The young man raised his handgun, pointed towards the direction from which the enemy charged, and shouted loudly, "There's no 'just'... Unfortunately, my teachers taught me courage, they taught me strength, but they most certainly did not teach me to retreat! If I can't consider you my own family, then... how can I ask you to stand by me, to live and die together?"

"Sir!" All the soldiers gathered around him were moved by his words, everyone gripping their rifles tightly.

The young officer glanced at the formal officer of Leite Kingdom beside him, nodded his head slightly, and continued to shout, "All soldiers! Follow my command! At all costs, plug the gap in the front lines! Drive the enemy back! Protect the civilians behind you! Protect our...

Our motherland!"

"Yes!" Everyone responded with fervor.

"Fix bayonets!" "Fix bayonets!" Not far away, inspired lower-ranking officers passed down the order, one after another.

Soldiers pulled out their bayonets from their waists, attached them beneath the muzzles of their rifles, securing the catches, the gleaming blades unusually blinding in the sunlight.

"I won't tell you 'charge for me,' I will shout 'charge with me,' now, charge with me! Soldiers!" The young officer, raising his Longsword high, was the first to rush out of the trench.

"God bless Leite!" All of the nearby soldiers of the Leite Kingdom, holding their rifles with fixed bayonets, followed him and leaped out of the trench.

"God bless the Leite Kingdom!" For a moment, their cries resonated through the sky.

"Bang!" Holding a handgun in one hand and a Longsword in the other, the young officer took the lead, charging into the enemy crowd that was now very close.

He swung his Longsword to deflect the thrusting bayonets and raised his handgun to fire a shot directly into an oncoming foe.

At the Great Tang Military Academy, the instructors didn't rigidly teach the students to engage the enemy in close combat; instead, they taught them to take advantage of every weapon at their disposal.

The enemy clearly hadn't anticipated this young officer to be wielding a handgun, a burst of blood bloomed on his forehead and he fell backward.

The soldier from the Kingdom of Gemalin standing shoulder to shoulder with the fallen enemy clearly panicked, he turned his rifle around, only to be felled by a second shot.

The Leite Kingdom soldiers following behind the young officer from the Great Tang Military Academy also surged with momentum, evidently surpassing their enemies in close combat skills.

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With cries like an avalanche, they thrust the weapons in their hands, killing their opponents or perishing alongside them.

Casualties skyrocketed in an instant, beyond control. This brutal, irrational melee, amidst the chaos of the battlefield, allowed for any unexpected event.

Enraged, it was entirely possible for one side to forsake defense in a bid to ensure mutual destruction with the enemy before them.

Hence, soldiers from the Kingdom of Gemalin fell, as did soldiers from the Leite Kingdom; before long, countless bodies lay across the battlefield.

"Bang!" A soldier from Gemalin, hidden among the crowd, raised his K2 lever-action rifle and shot dead a Leite Kingdom soldier attempting a bayonet thrust.

Then, he spotted a valiant young officer from the Leite Kingdom, who had just taken down another enemy.

His index, ring, and pinky fingers forcefully pushed forward, then snapped back into place—the lever-action rifle was reloaded. He raised the rifle again, aiming at the young officer in the bright yellow uniform.

"Bang!" A crisp gunshot rang out, and the young intern officer from the Great Tang Military Academy, preparing to clash with an enemy charging straight at him, felt as if his abdomen had been hammered by something.

He looked down to see blood already seeping out from inside the bright yellow uniform, some flowing out of the bullet holes onto the fabric, trickling down along the seams to the buttons and the belt.

"Damn!" He staggered, then got jostled by an onrushing enemy. As he fought to keep his balance, a wave of dizziness washed over him.

Another enemy charged at him, and by this time, the young officer was down on one knee. Using the Longsword as a crutch planted in the ground, he raised his other hand and fired, discharging the last bullet in his Left-Wheel Handgun.

The enemy let out a cry of pain and collapsed; the young intern officer dropped his arm holding the handgun and gasped for air that reeked of blood.

"Bang!" Another shot was fired, and a burst of fresh blood sprayed from the young officer's shoulder. He lost control of his body and crashed down, landing on the pile of corpses beneath him.

More soldiers from the Leite Kingdom fell to gunfire, more riflemen from the Kingdom of Gemalin surged forward.

The fight remained deadlocked, with gunfire intermittently breaking out. More soldiers from the Leite Kingdom joined the fray, engaging in hand-to-hand combat, as their ammunition-depleted Gemalin counterparts were bayoneted to death by the enraged Leite soldiers.

An hour later, cheers erupted from the battlefield, and the flagpole bearing the royal standard of the Leite Kingdom was swung back and forth, the banner fluttering above the position.

After a fierce battle, the position remained in the hands of the Leite Kingdom, repelling the Gemalin Kingdom's assault once again.

However, more soldiers from the Leite Kingdom had fallen, unable to see the victory they had bought with their lives.

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