Novel Full Chapter 56 Respite on the Battlefield
After the morning’s shelling, the Prosenians seemed to have lost their drive and made no further moves.
Wang Zhong finished breakfast without any disturbances, and then Popov came over with a box.
“Come on, have a game of chess,” Popov said as he opened the box, spilled out the pieces, and the box unfolded into a black-and-white checkered chessboard.
Wang Zhong, “I only know how each piece moves.”
“Really?” Popov’s eyes widened in surprise.
Wang Zhong, “I’m dead last in skill.”
“Stop with your last place talk. Just try and see, if I can beat you easily, I’d have something to brag about,” Popov said as he sat opposite Wang Zhong, pushed the cutlery aside on the table, and began setting up the chessboard, “Anyway, we’ve got nothing else to do right now, and if we don’t find something for ourselves, Pavlov will call us to help out!”
Pavlov looked up and glanced over at the two of them, “You know I need help and you’re not coming over?”
Wang Zhong, “No, we wouldn’t want to get in the way of the Chief of Staff showing off his might.”
Pavlov snorted and handed a stack of documents to Vasily, “Take these to him for his signature.”
Vasily obediently brought over a stack of documents, “The Chief of Staff wants your signature.”
Wang Zhong raised an eyebrow, “How were these documents dealt with when I wasn’t at Corps Command?”
“I signed them before,” Pavlov said.
“As long as you sign them, that’s fine! So why bother looking for me specifically?”
“This is to give you something to do,” Pavlov spread his hands, “You should be thanking me.”
Wang Zhong looked at Pavlov’s bald head, thinking to himself how nice it would be if he were a white-haired beauty. That temperament would become an endearing feature, then one could write a book titled “My Chief of Staff Can’t Be This Cute.”
Unfortunately, the Chief of Staff was a broad-shouldered, portly bald man.
With that thought, Wang Zhong began signing the documents.
Meanwhile, Popov set up the chess game and started playing against himself.
A new staff officer was gossiping, which Wang Zhong overheard and commented, “Is it really okay to be this relaxed?”
A senior staff officer lowered his voice, “This is the battlefield, as long as the fighting hasn’t started it’s like this. Everyone does their job, kills time, waiting for the moment the battle begins.”
Suddenly, Wang Zhong remembered having a similar doubt before, but now he had become completely accustomed to the dead calm in these battlefield interludes.
He quickly skimmed through the documents, most of which involved moving supplies and a variety of miscellaneous matters that didn’t require any directives from an Army Group Commander like himself, just a signature would suffice.
While signing the documents, the telephone rang. Pavlov picked it up, “This is Corps Command…”
As he spoke, the air raid sirens started blaring outside.
Popov, “Looks like Brother Peter heard the enemy planes coming.”
Wang Zhong, “The monk is up here? How come I didn’t see him?”
Popov chuckled, “You were running around everywhere yesterday, no time to see them. In fact, both the monk and God’s Arrow Company are in position, arranged by Pavlov in the defensive positions.”
By now, Pavlov had finished speaking and put down the receiver, then said to them, “Brother Peter reports, there are 24 twin-engine bombers headed our way.”
Wang Zhong, “As expected. No Stukas following them?”
Pavlov shook his head, “No.”
Popov, while capturing a white pawn with a black knight, said, “Intelligence has sorted out recent interrogations of captured enemy pilots. The Prosenians seem to have forbidden Stukas from bombing areas that might be defended by Divine Arrow units.”
Wang Zhong, “Is it because the Divine Arrow is too efficient at killing Stuka pilots?”
“Yes, you don’t know how many Stukas Divine Arrow brought down in the first half of 915. The Knight Order even formed special mobile Divine Arrow companies. Each company has two half-track vehicles equipped with Divine Arrow launchers, one Stepunk truck for transporting ammunition, along with a mobile infantry platoon and a light anti-aircraft artillery platoon.
“Such a company, along with a prayer warrior, runs around the combat zone for mobile air defense, specializing in killing Stukas.”
Wang Zhong stopped signing and looked up at Popov, “A whole company with just one prayer warrior?”
Popov nodded, “Yes, the attrition of prayer warriors is too great and cannot be replenished quickly enough. The church has already conscripted all prayer warriors over the age of fifteen into the military, and any further losses would only mean we have to start using fourteen-year-olds—even then, it’s a drop in the bucket compared to how few prayer warriors are born each year.”
Wang Zhong sighed, “From what you’re saying, the fact that our Army Group still maintains the same number of prayer warriors as before actually means we’re getting special treatment, huh?”
Previously, when Wang Zhong commanded a division, there were five prayer warriors in the division.
Now, as he commanded an Army Group, there were still only a total of five prayer warriors—actually, there had been an increase because Ludmila had gone to have children and another prayer warrior was added to take her place.
Popov, “The massive defeat last year was too costly. Tukhachev and the late emperor really deserve to die.”
During the great defeat of the previous year, over twenty thousand tanks were lost, thousands of heavy guns, millions of soldiers, and nearly ninety percent of Supernatural Users.
The lost troops could be quickly replenished through conscription, but replacing Supernatural Users was extremely difficult because their numbers were naturally low.
The church moved up the conscription age to fifteen, but it was still a drop in the bucket—Supernatural Users are typically in it for life, with uncle-aged figures like Brother Peter still serving, along with a vast number of elderly magic users.
So such massive casualties from last year couldn’t possibly be made up for.
It only showed that the Prosenians had indeed seized on the weak point of supernatural forces—their scarcity.
In low-intensity, localized conflicts, these prayer warriors and Sound Array Masters can have a significant impact, but in a large-scale, total war, these people are at a loss.
Because the losses cannot be replaced, they are essentially a one-time consumable resource.
Wang Zhong, “But even with so few prayer warriors, they still pose a significant deterrence to the enemy.”
“Yeah,” Popov continued to play chess with himself, but it didn’t seem to interfere with his conversation with Wang Zhong, “Judge also got some interesting news. The Prosen Science Academy seems to have installed radar on planes, preparing to use radar to guide rockets and attack our planes.”
Wang Zhong’s mouth hung open: “Radar-guided rockets?”
Popov: “Hard to believe, huh?”
No, joke, I’ve killed over 1000 players with semi-active radar-guided munitions in War Thunder, okay!
Wang Zhong: “Can Prosen’s radar technology really mount that stuff on airplanes now?”
“It seems they’re placing it on four-engine heavy bombers, with the rockets in the bomb bay and fired using multiple launchers.”
Wang Zhong frowned tightly: Aerial radar-guided semi-active warhead aircraft? Damn, that’s pretty cool, isn’t it!
But can the performance of current radars and radar-guided munitions really handle this thing?
Popov: “It could be made up to bluff their pilots.”
At that moment, the sound of anti-aircraft guns firing came from outside, clearly Brother Peter had heard enemy planes approaching.
Wang Zhong glanced at the sky: “We’ll see if our camouflage can fool the Ploson Air Force.”
The collapsed two-thirds of the City Council building had been disguised as the Corps Command, with anti-aircraft guns primarily arranged in its vicinity.
The real Corps Command was still protected by anti-aircraft guns, but few in number and well concealed—this was the backup.
Together with the backup was a praying hand and a Divine Arrow launcher.
The other four praying hands were protecting the fake command center, the fake logistics center, the real logistics center, and the artillery positions.
Popov: “I think it’ll be fine. The Ploson Air Force is pretty easy to dupe—this is my feeling; the Army can sometimes be quite cunning.”
Wang Zhong thought so too.
He switched perspectives, sure enough, he saw the flight path of 24 bombers heading straight for the fake Army Group command, obviously intending to bomb the command center.
Of course, this flight path also passed the fake logistics center, and they would probably drop some bombs there as well.
But the real logistics center and the warehouse where Wang Zhong was, weren’t on the enemy’s flight path.
It seemed the deception was highly successful.
Wang Zhong switched back to the naked eye perspective and continued endorsing documents.
Pavlov said: “Is the enemy really not planning on attacking today?”
Wang Zhong: “Definitely. The Prosen Infantry Troops will only make limited attacks in secondary directions at most. Attacks are the business of the Armored Division and armored grenadiers.”
Popov: “I heard it’s because the emperor favors those technical units since their Junker officer corps influence is lower. You can tell by the direction of Prosen propaganda after the Melania and Carolingian campaigns; the accomplishments of the infantry divisions are basically overlooked.”
Wang Zhong: “I heard they also highlighted a young non-Junker general, Erwin, in their propaganda.”
“Yeah, his father was an engineer, and he himself was planning to become one.”
Engineer!
You can tell right away this person has the makings of a tough candidate for Tongliao.
At that moment, the sound of bombs exploding reached them from outside; Wang Zhong switched views and saw the bombs landing near the fake command center.
Probably due to the anti-aircraft gun positions driving them off, the enemy planes dropped their bombs from a high altitude, so most missed the City Council building that was collapsed by two-thirds.
Wang Zhong had just switched back when the phone rang.
Pavlov picked up: “Corps Command. How many enemy planes? Understood.”
He hung up and reported to Wang Zhong: “Brother Peter heard enemy planes again, four-engine, but just one. He speculates it’s the enemy’s new modified high-altitude reconnaissance plane.”
Wang Zhong nodded. Suddenly he remembered something and asked, “Are our artillery positions well concealed?”
“Not exactly, the artillery just arrived yesterday afternoon. Like the enemy, they had no time to set up well-camouflaged artillery positions.”
Wang Zhong: “Then won’t the enemy reconnaissance spot everything?”
Pavlov: “Don’t worry, although we didn’t have time to properly hide the real artillery positions, we brought wood, and fake artillery positions have been set up.
“Without low-altitude reconnaissance, the enemy can’t see through it, they can only guess.”
Wang Zhong felt relieved.
Vasily said: “Could the Prussians suddenly get smart and use fake artillery positions to deceive our reconnaissance?”
Pavlov shook his head: “Even if they thought of it, there are no trees nearby to chop down. We brought wood from Yarvik to make fake targets. After all, the fake artillery positions performed well in previous battles.”
The moment his words fell, the rumble of enemy planes drifted in again through the warehouse’s ventilation window.
Wang Zhong switched views and saw a four-engine heavy bomber flying in from the west.
But such a heavy bomber wouldn’t perform solo bombing missions, it could only be the new modified high-altitude reconnaissance plane.
Brother Peter’s judgment wasn’t wrong.
At this point, Popov said: “So, are we going to spend today amidst constant air raids and bombardments?”
Wang Zhong: “You’ll get used to it. Of course, you could also help me sign some documents.”
Popov gave a faint smile: “No, I’m the Military Bishop, that’s not within my authority.”