Arc of Fire

Wang Zhong spurred his horse into a gallop, dashing out of the village.

Most of the machine-gun fire was on the second floor, so Wang Zhong wasn’t shot down by friendly fire.

As he charged toward Xie Liaosha’s tank crew, a tank shell fired by the enemy was deflected by Tank No. 67, which blew off Wang Zhong’s hat.

Wang Zhong had no time to care about that, as he sped along he shouted loudly, “Enemy planes are coming! Get moving!”

At this moment, the engine’s roar was already overhead, and lifting his head, Wang Zhong saw the dark shadows of enemy planes against the setting sun.

Wang Zhong shouted, “Move! Dive towards the belly of the enemy planes! This type of Stuka has serious locking issues during a dive; it’s not good at hitting moving targets!”

However, Xie Liaosha’s crew showed no response!

Faithful to protocol, Xie Liaosha was hunkering down inside the tank turret during combat, and with the tank’s own mechanical roaring, he probably couldn’t hear Wang Zhong’s shouts at all.

Wang Zhong had never cursed the Ante Empire’s terrible radio level so much.

At this point, he saw a nearby infantryman carrying a captured Smoke Bomb and he called out, “Give me a smoke bomb!”

The infantryman turned out to be Sergeant Grigori, who, upon hearing Wang Zhong’s shout, directly unhooked the belt carrying smoke bombs and flung it precisely onto Bucephalus’s saddle.

Wang Zhong pulled out a smoke bomb and, after pulling the pin, held it in his hand, but in his haste handled it upside down, causing smoke to spray out and smother his face.

He quickly tossed away the smoke bomb and pulled a new one.

Then, he tugged the reins to make Bucephalus run upwind, trying to use the smoke to cover Tank No. 67.

As an experienced War Thunder player, Wang Zhong was aware of how difficult it was to “search for the enemy” in the sky. Moreover, real-world smoke would drift with the wind, and if the battlefield was filled with smoke, the enemy aircraft could only drop bombs blindly.

In the midst of the chaos, a Prussian soldier suddenly emerged in front of Wang Zhong!

The enemy was startled by the sight of the white horse, and it took him a moment to think to shoot, but Bucephalus kicked him back into the smoke.

Wang Zhong hadn’t even had time to react; he hadn’t switched to the overhead view and so had no idea the enemy had gotten so close!

Wasn’t pulling this smoke actually helping the enemy get closer to the tanks?

He quickly switched to an aerial view to confirm the position of the nearby enemies.

Looking down, he saw the enemy planes circling overhead.

Could it be that the enemy’s radio technology had improved to the point of coordinating between the air and ground, and the enemy planes knew that their biggest threat below was one heavy tank?

They wouldn’t drop bombs without being sure where the heavy tank was?

As soon as the thought crossed his mind, Wang Zhong saw an infantry officer on the ground pull out a flare gun and fire it towards where Tank No. 67 was parked.

A red flare traced an arc through the sky, heading towards Tank No. 67.

There was guidance from the ground! Was this really an army from the time of Operation Barbarossa?

Wang Zhong could see it all too clearly from the overhead view, and naturally, so could the enemy aircraft.

The enemy plane rolled into a diving posture.

The famous shriek of the Stuka tore at Wang Zhong’s eardrums.

Just then, Tank No. 67 began to move, whether it was because the smoke had obscured their line of sight, making it impossible to shoot, or because they heard the “Death Scream.”

Anyway, it started moving.

Seeing this, Wang Zhong pulled the reins and turned to flee. He had done everything he could; now it was up to the crew’s fate.

At the first loud bang, Wang Zhong distinctly felt the wind blow from behind him.

This was followed by a series of massive explosions. From the sound alone, Wang Zhong felt Tank No. 67’s crew was done for.

Looking down from the aerial view, indeed he saw Tank No. 67 had stopped, settling in the plain, with several large craters visible from the air nearby.

The enemy plane having completed its bombing run was pulling up, seemingly planning to find an angle to drop the 50KG “little sweet potatoes” hanging beneath its wings.

Although 50KG was small among aerial bombs, for ground troops, one of these was akin to a gas cylinder; even if you were lying down, the blast wave could still cause serious injury.

At this moment, Wang Zhong saw Sergeant Grigori leading a squad of submachine gunners charge forward, using the craters from the aerial bombs as cover to protect Tank No. 67.

Wang Zhong remembered his previous order to this group: protect the heavy tank at all costs and take down any approaching enemy.

Even without knowing whether the tank had been destroyed, the order was being faithfully executed.

The only good news was that the 500KG heavy aerial bomb’s blast had dispersed the smoke, giving Grigori’s group a clear line of sight and the chance to maximize the firepower of their submachine guns.

The enemy infantry rushing up only had submachine guns for the officers, so it was natural that they were outgunned in the firefight.

Suddenly, a stick grenade was thrown towards the crater.

Sergeant Grigori threw his submachine gun to the side and caught the grenade, tossing it back.

The explosion sent the Prussian who threw it tumbling.

But taking advantage of the submachine guns’ pause in fire, more grenades were thrown!

Sergeant Grigori drew his entrenching tool and, like playing badminton, hit the grenades back one by one.

There he was, the Slavic superman, the original Astarte!

Just then, the completely silent Tank No. 67’s engine spewed out a cloud of thick smoke.

The enemy troops, who had been swarming forward, stopped in their tracks, terrified by the awakening steel beast.

The coaxial machine gun in the turret rang out, and tracers demolished the enemy’s remaining morale.

But!

The Stuka came back around!

Wang Zhong just happened to run near a machine-gun position at the edge of the village and he shouted, “Fire at the sky! There’s no visibility on the ground anyway!”

With smoke covering the ground, machine guns really couldn’t be fully utilized.