Chapter 492: Chapter 486: Sneak Attack! Deceiving! Is this Okay?
The cold round-headed Minie bullet, driven by gunpowder, became scorching hot and flew out of the gun barrel at a speed that couldn’t be predicted by the naked eye, heading straight for the chest of the Russian Imperial soldier.
Carrier of powerful kinetic energy and heat, the bullet tore through the green uniform almost instantly, making intimate contact with the hot body of the Russian soldier. The unfortunate carbon-based life form was utterly powerless to stop the high-speed spinning bullet.
After the bullet tore through and shattered the skin layer of the body, although its speed and direction changed to some extent, it still went into the dermis with an unstoppable momentum. The pressure wave of the cavity effect formed thereafter was like throwing a stone into a calm pond. The body fluid in the dermis would transmit this impact in circles outward. The initial wound, under the action of the pressure wave, gradually expanded all around, forming damage to muscles, organs, blood vessels, and even nerves, rendering them irreversibly harmed. Even bones not directly hit would break under this pressure wave.
Scarlet blood gushed out of the wounds, and after a series of screams, hundreds of Russian soldiers fell immediately.
The surviving Russian soldiers, after witnessing the horrific conditions of their comrades, had a tinge of fear in their eyes.
For a moment, they wanted to turn around immediately and flee the battlefield, but they knew that their commander would never allow them to flee just like that. There must be a supervisory troop behind them, responsible for watching their every move. Once they detected signs of unauthorized retreat, these members would mercilessly shoot at them.
Moreover, even if they could successfully dodge the bullets of the supervisory team and retreat from the battlefield, where could they escape to? They would still have to return to the army, where the punishment for escaping the battlefield without authorization by the Russian army was far more frightening than dying in battle here.
Under the dual pressure of supervision and military law, this group of Russian soldiers could only brace themselves and charge forward. As long as they could reach the barbed wire and break through it, they could have a life-and-death struggle with those guys in the trenches.
The Russian Imperial soldiers bit their teeth, a ferocious look appeared on their faces.
90, 85, 80...
As the distance to the barbed wire got closer, the expressions of the Russian soldiers turned more ferocious.
Meanwhile, three artillery companies about a kilometer away from the barbed wire also finished calibration.
Under orders from their artillery commanders, each artillery company began shooting at the positions of the Allied Forces.
"Fire!"
Over 20 shells were hurled towards the vicinity of the trenches. Major General Canrobert hurriedly ordered the soldiers in the trenches to squat down. The shells fell around the trenches, kicking up a lot of dust and making the entire battlefield hazy. The uniforms of the Allied Forces were also stained with dust.
Fortunately, the over twenty shells did not cause any damage to the Allied Forces.
The Russian army, relying on intuition for shooting, clearly could not compare to the French artillery units guided by systematic theoretical knowledge.
However, the artillery attack wasn’t entirely useless, at the very least it bought the Russian Imperial soldiers some time.
By the time the Allied Forces reacted, the Russian Imperial soldiers were already beside the barbed wire. The engineers among them pulled out pliers to begin clearing the barbed wire one by one.
The surrounding Russian Imperial soldiers, to cover the engineers’ actions, also stood in place and shot at the Allied soldiers in the trenches.
As the distance between the two was less than 200 meters, the Russian soldiers with smoothbore guns also caused casualties to the Allied Forces, with a few Allied soldiers being hit by the bullets.
"Fire, don’t stop!" Major General Canrobert once again issued orders to the Allied Forces.
The Zuav Corps, Scottish Rifle Corps, Sardinian Hunting Corps, and Ottoman Infantry Corps began a second round of shooting across the other end of the barbed wire, with some perceptive soldiers specifically targeting the engineers.
The engineers responsible for cutting the barbed wire were directly killed, and the second round of shooting claimed over a thousand more lives.
Just when the morale of the Russian soldiers was once again at risk of wavering, the second round of the artillery companies’ attack came.
The trenches of the Allied Forces were once again hit. The dust and the smoke produced by gunpowder that didn’t fully burn interfered with the shooting of the Allied Forces.
This gave the Russian Imperial army a brief respite, allowing them to adjust their status.
Major General Canrobert, staying in the trenches, frowned and looked at the distant artillery units, then glanced at the pocket watch in his hand and muttered quietly, "It should be time!"
...
"That’s right, just like that!" said Lieutenant General Orlov in the distance, utterly unaware of his own predicament. Holding binoculars, he watched the shells pounding the trenches with excitement.
"Commander, shouldn’t we retreat a bit?" the two brigade commanders beside Lieutenant General Orlov continued to persuade him earnestly.
"Retreat? Why should we retreat!" Lieutenant General Orlov, displeased, rebuked the well-intentioned brigade commanders with a scowl, "We’re at a critical moment, and you want me, the commander, to retreat to the rear!"
The two brigade commanders glanced at each other, seeing helplessness in each other’s eyes.
No one can persuade an officer who’s lost his head!
Just as Lieutenant General Orlov was concentrating on watching the war around the barbed wire, in the shrubs on the flank of the Polish First Division, a Bashbozuk cavalry team of hundreds was preparing to launch a surprise attack on the artillery forces of the Russian Empire under the leadership of their commander, the septuagenarian "Kurdish Saintess" Fatima Hanum.
This was a plan concluded by General Canrobert after a discussion with Jerome Patterson, Brigadier General Bazan, and others.
Fully utilizing the excellent mobility and guerrilla capabilities of the Bashbozuk, they were to lie in wait in the shrubs ahead of time and launch a surprise attack on the artillery positions to achieve the destruction of the artillery company.
To relax the vigilance of the artillery forces, the Bashbozuk soldiers remained inactive before two rounds of artillery bombardment.
After the two rounds of artillery bombardment ended, all the soldiers of the Russian Empire would inevitably be around the barbed wire.
That would be the time for the Bashbozuk to hunt down the artillery forces, and now, with two rounds of shelling already past, it was time for the Bashbozuk cavalry to move.
Fatima Hanum, holding a Turkish scimitar in her left hand and raising a Muslim battle flag in her right, shouted loudly, "Praise be to Allah!"
The surrounding Bashbozuk cavalry also spontaneously shouted loudly in various languages such as "Allah bless!", "Praise be to Allah!" and the like!
Under the leadership of Fatima Hanum, the cavalry team of hundreds charged out of the shrubs and launched an assault towards the direction of the artillery forces, like an unstoppable tornado, swearing to destroy everything in sight.
For a while, the whole earth began to tremble slightly. Hearing the commotion from afar, Lieutenant General Orlov looked towards the source of the sound and saw the cavalry team led by Fatima Hanum charging towards their camp, their immediate target being the artillery forces.
"Oh God!" A strong dizziness surged into Lieutenant General Orlov’s mind, and he quickly said to the two brigade commanders beside him, "Quick, fall back to defense!"
Seeing this, the two brigade commanders did not hesitate at all and led the infantry unit that had not yet been engaged in battle back, trying as much as possible to rescue the cavalry.
Just a second after the two brigade commanders left Lieutenant General Orlov’s side, a bullet was fired from the allied forces’ camp, targeting Lieutenant General Orlov.
The heated Minie bullet crossed a distance of over 500 meters to reach Orlov’s side. Because the allied forces held a higher terrain, this descending bullet shattered Lieutenant General Orlov’s right cheekbone, pierced through the upper jaw and tongue, and finally created a large hole in his lower jaw and cheek before shooting into the ground.
Poor Lieutenant General Orlov couldn’t even utter a final farewell and immediately died.
With a "thud" sound, Lieutenant General Orlov’s body fell heavily to the ground.
The two brigade commanders, hearing the noise, turned around to take a glance, but it was already too late.
"Commander!" The unexpected turn of events led the two brigade commanders to cry out loudly for Lieutenant General Orlov. In the next second, four more Minie bullets were fired from the allied forces and hit the bodies of the two brigade commanders.
The two brigade commanders also died there alongside their commander. The Russian Imperial Army, originally on an offensive posture, immediately collapsed in morale after consecutively losing the commander and brigade commanders.
"Run!"
A shout came from somewhere, and including the regimental commanders, the mid-level officers and soldiers of the Russian Empire began to frantically turn and retreat, completely unaware of how foolish it was to expose their backs to the allied forces.
A stampede incident triggered by the retreat also occurred along with this, and faced with such a situation, Major General Canrobert immediately issued an order for fire-at-will to the entire army.
Faced with targets whose backs were turned towards them, even the worst marksman could rely on luck to take one down.
Over 2,000 more soldiers of the Russian Empire were killed by the allied forces due to a hasty retreat.
On the other hand, the few hundred Bashbozuk cavalry also successfully completed their mission.
The cavalry that rushed to the artillery camp, before the artillery forces could react, slammed their scimitars hard into the bodies of the opponents.
The scimitar made a soft "pfft" sound as it entered the human body, and blood flowed as the scimitar was drawn out, causing Russian artillerymen to fall to the ground with miserable screams.
A cavalryman who killed an artilleryman did not hesitate at all and immediately aimed at the next artilleryman, the blade fell swiftly again. Another vibrant life was claimed by the cavalry.
After the few available artillery companies were thoroughly slaughtered, the Bashbozuk cavalry turned their attention to the fleeing Russian infantry.
Relying on their strong mobility, they transformed into grim reapers on the battlefield, ruthlessly harvesting one infantryman after another.
The Russian soldiers who were only bent on fleeing had no intention of confronting them head-on. In their minds, they only needed to outrun the Zouave cavalry and perhaps their own fellow soldiers beside them.
Thus, a miraculous scene occurred on the Silistra battlefield: hundreds of Bashbozuk soldiers chasing tens of thousands of Russian soldiers in a wild slaughter, with not a single Russian soldier choosing to turn and confront the Bashbozuk cavalry team, each one of them wanting to escape here as soon as possible.
Blood dripped from the Bashbozuk scimitars, and the Bashbozuk cavalry appeared tireless as they swung their scimitars.
Until the arrival of the Cossack cavalry...