Chapter 676: Burning Eastern Europe, Part Three
"You should fear war," the burly, curly-haired man in front of Yannick remarked, turning his head. "The Russians are not weak."
"So what?" the fair-haired youth puffed out his chest. "I am a glorious Crusader, and under the light of God, I will eliminate all heretics and invaders!"
The burly man shook his head, scoffing:
"God won't block cannonballs for you..."
Drasowitz immediately interrupted him loudly:
"Krzysztof, you'll undermine morale like that!"
He then turned to Yannick and whispered:
"He's Livonian, you see... his family all died."
Livonia was originally a northeastern Polish province, occupied by Russia during the "First Partition." After that, Catholics there were repeatedly persecuted. Krzysztof's family was executed for "supporting the anti-Russian resistance," but he was young at the time and managed to escape.
"Let's go in there."
Empty houses were plentiful here, and as long as they didn't stray too far from the eastern breastwork, they could pick any "temporary barracks" they wished.
Once Drasowitz cleared away the debris outside the door and pushed it open, he was immediately hit by a foul smell. Then he saw a dirty, roughly ten-year-old boy huddled in a corner, watching him timidly.
Yannick followed him in, glanced at the child, and frowned:
"Why are you still in the village? The Russians are coming."
Hearing Polish, the child immediately spoke cautiously: "S-sir... do you have anything to eat?"
From the voice, it was a girl.
Krzysztof squeezed forward, took a piece of dark bread from his backpack, and offered it to her:
"Here, eat."
The child snatched the bread and took a bite. Then she turned and called out:
"Kaczy, there's food! Come out!"
A moment later, a little boy, perhaps six or seven, and even dirtier than her, crawled out of the fireplace. He took half the bread and began to devour it.
Drasowitz looked at the two children:
"Didn't you leave with the adults?"
The girl chewed her bread forcefully, stating plainly:
"Auntie didn't take us..."
It took Drasowitz a while to understand. The children's father had died of illness last month, and their relatives had simply abandoned them there.
The corporal hesitated. He took out his own food and motioned to Yannick:
"Give me yours too."
He handed the girl several large pieces of dark bread and some smoked meat, pointing west:
"Take your brother and keep walking this way. In two or three days, you'll see a supply station. The supply wagons there might be able to take you to Slutsk."
The girl looked at the food in her hands, enough for her and her brother for four or five days. She curtsied to the soldiers in thanks, then, amidst the rumble of cannon fire, she pulled the little boy and ran out of the village.
Yannick watched them go. He made the sign of the cross:
"May God protect them."
No sooner had he spoken than he heard the whistling screech of a cannonball tearing through the air past his ear. Immediately after, a black iron sphere slammed into the ground, kicking up a shower of dirt.
With enormous inertia, the cannonball bounced off the ground, fell, then bounced again. After that, it gently swept over the backs of the siblings.
"No!"
Drasowitz roared. He dropped his rifle and ran frantically towards them.
On that patch of dry grass, there was only blood splattered far and wide, and fragments of the girl's dirty clothes.
They were gone.
The corporal felt a tightness in his chest. He bent down and cried out desperately:
"Aaaargh—aaaah!"
A few other soldiers gathered around. They stared blankly at the ground, utterly silent.
Suddenly, Krzysztof, eyes red, raised his rifle. He pointed it in the direction the cannonball had come from and squeezed the trigger forcefully.
A shot rang out.
He fumbled for his powder pouch, his breathing ragged, and tremblingly poured powder into the barrel.
A sergeant heard the shot. He ran out of a nearby hut with his men and yelled at Krzysztof:
"Henryk, what are you doing? No firing without orders!"
"Those bastards!" Krzysztof gritted his teeth, a guttural sound escaping his throat.
Drasowitz quickly took his rifle away. He spoke to the sergeant:
"Sergeant, please forgive him. Two children were just killed, so..."
He suddenly paused. He dashed towards a haystack next to the sergeant, and after frantically digging for a few moments, he pulled little Kaczy out.
"He's alive!" he shouted, turning.
Half an hour later.
The little boy slowly woke up in the stinking farmhouse. He looked around, bewildered.
The kind soldiers were all there. But his sister was gone.
The Russian shelling continued all day.
Drasowitz no longer spoke of "cannonballs won't hit us." The density of Russian artillery fire far surpassed any battle he had witnessed before.
Half the village houses were destroyed by cannon fire. The soldiers no longer dared to stay indoors; instead, they gathered in small groups of three to five beneath the breastwork.
The next day at 10 AM, along the more than ten-kilometer-long Polish defense line, bugle calls sounded almost simultaneously.
Without needing a reminder from his captain, Drasowitz loudly called out to the new recruits:
"Everybody up, quickly! The Russians are coming, prepare to form ranks!"
He had just joined the line behind the breastwork with a few new recruits when he faintly saw a large number of Russian soldiers in gray uniforms emerging from the distant thickets.
More and more gray filled their vision. Over ten minutes later, the tide of gray had already covered the open ground in front of the breastwork, like a boundless dark cloud, slowly surging towards the Polish defense line.
Soon, Drasowitz and the others could faintly hear the drums from the Russian side.
Krzysztof swallowed, his voice hoarse:
"Damn it, how many of them are there?"
Drasowitz glanced at his captain and whispered:
"Don't worry, it's not even eight hundred men. They're probably just skirmishers used for probing."
The captain rode past them on horseback, shouting loudly:
"Stay calm, everyone, and don't move!"
Soon, that dark cloud had advanced to just over a hundred paces away.
The only two cannons in Zagazig Village were wheeled out from behind the haystacks and began firing at the Russians.
Cannonballs left streaks of crimson among the Russian ranks but failed to slow their advance. When the closest Russian soldiers approached within sixty paces of the breastwork, they stopped to fire.
"Prepare—"
The captain's voice finally came. Drasowitz immediately raised his rifle, simultaneously motioning to the new recruits beside him:
"Did you hear that? Raise your rifles, but don't fire yet!"
Yannick excitedly aimed at the tallest Russian in his sight. Then he heard the officer's command, "Aim—"
"Fire—"
The moment his finger touched the trigger, he heard a dull thud. He turned his head to see half of his comrade's head, who stood to his left, missing. A pungent, metallic smell of blood immediately enveloped him.
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