Chapter 1 Prologue

  By the end of 1940, after occupying Northern and Western Europe, Fascist Germany formulated a plan to fight against the Soviet Union codenamed "Barbarossa". On June 22, 1941, at dawn, Germany tore up the German-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact, mobilized Finland, Hungary, and Romania, and launched a full-scale attack on the Soviet Union with an army of 5.5 million, nearly 5,000 aircraft, and more than 4,000 tanks, attempting to conquer the Soviet Union within three months. The German-Soviet War broke out.

  The Soviet people, led by the party and government headed by Stalin, rose up to counterattack and began the Great Patriotic War. In the initial period of the war, the Soviet Union was in a defensive stage, due to inadequate preparation for Germany's sudden attack, suffering heavy losses and severe setbacks. By mid-July, 28 Soviet divisions were defeated, with over half of their personnel and weapons lost. The German army advanced fiercely, making rapid progress, penetrating deep into Soviet territory 300-600 kilometers, occupying vast areas of Lithuania, Latvia, Ukraine, Belarus and other regions.

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  "Whoosh..."

  "Hush!"

  With a sharp whistling sound, a shell from an unknown source exploded less than twenty meters away from Chu Si Nan, the massive force sending a column of mud shooting into the air, covering him in mud from head to toe.

  "Damn it!" Chu Si Nan swiftly moved his body, like a nimble viper, quickly crawling into the crater that had just been blasted out. Any military expert would know that this place was relatively safer, as two shells rarely fell into the same crater under normal circumstances.

  "Ah!"

  Just as he was about to fall into the pit, a sharp pain shot through his right arm from the elbow, and then he caught a whiff of faintly fragrant roasted meat.

  "Madwoman! All of her mother's madwomen!" One rolled into a pit, Chu Si Nan cursed loudly while hastily pulling out the shrapnel stuck in his elbow. The shrapnel was about four or five centimeters long, and the explosive force made it scorching hot, no wonder there was a smell of roasted meat earlier.

  "Whoosh..."

  "Hush!"

  Another shell fell not far away, the huge roar did not interrupt Chu Si Nan's angry curses, but the next scene made his cursing voice stuck, because of surprise, his dry and cracked lips opened wide, it was really possible to directly stuff in two eggs.

  Only to see in the white birch forest less than 500 meters away from him, a group of people rushed out like crazy, with dense artillery fire. These people either had empty hands or held old-fashioned "Mosin rifles". What surprised Chu Si Nan the most was the military uniform these people were wearing, which should be... should be the Soviet brown "October" military uniform during World War II, especially the Soviet-style beret on their heads, which further proved this point.

  Chu Si Nan was completely confused, he thought to himself what's going on here? Military exercises are just military exercises, but can't set the hypothetical enemy as the Soviet Red Army? Although he didn't have a good impression of the Soviet Red Army, the consequences of doing so would only lead to diplomatic conflicts. Are they going to go to war with Russia? No reason for that! Even if they want to go to war, it should be with those damn Japanese and American bastards first, let alone the Russians?!

  "Whoosh..."

  Hush

  Another shell came down from the sky, Chu Si Nan subconsciously crawled and fell to the ground. The landing point of this shell was very close to him, the huge explosion made his eardrums buzz, and for a moment he almost lost his hearing.

  With a forceful shake of his head, Chu Si Nan shook off the dirt on his head and looked up again at the group of strange people who came out of the woods.

  "No, damn it, this isn't an exercise! This is war!"

  When he saw the scene in front of him clearly again, Chu Si Nan couldn't help but let out a crazy cry in his heart. He saw that hundreds of meters away, an artillery shell had landed right in the middle of the group of strange people, and for a moment, it was really flesh and blood flying everywhere, with limbs severed and dancing in the air. Chu Si Nan wasn't stupid, he naturally knew that on the training ground, those blank shells couldn't possibly produce such an effect.

  The old-fashioned firearms, the Soviet military uniforms in World War II, the intense real gunfire, and the bloody scenes all made Chusinan feel like he was going crazy.

  "Where the hell am I? Where the bloody hell am I?! Chu Si Nan crawled out of the crater like a beast, shouting loudly and crazily, hoping someone could give him an answer."

  "Hush!"

  A shell landed not far away, and the powerful shockwave sent Chu Si Nan flying to the ground as he was about to go crazy. A piece of shrapnel that was almost invisible to the naked eye grazed his forehead and tore open a wound three inches long above his eyebrows.

  "Damn! I damn! Damn! Damn!"

  A huge dizziness and severe headache on his forehead, instead, made Chu Si Nan wake up from his madness. He sat in the pit for a while, then suddenly waved his fists and punched hard in the pit filled with floating soil, still cursing non-stop as he hit.

  Just as Chu Si Nan was frantically venting, the people who came out of the jungle wearing World War II Soviet military uniforms had retreated to the edge of the pit where he was hiding. These people saw Chu Si Nan who was frantically "smashing" and basically didn't react at all, except for one person who looked like an officer, holding a handgun in his hand, which Chu Si Nan recognized as a Soviet-made TT-33, the most commonly used sidearm by Soviet officers during World War II.

  The officer now passes in front of Chu Si Nan, but immediately turns back, staring at him with bloodshot eyes, and only speaks after a while, speaking in Russian. Fortunately, Chu Si Nan is a Mohe person, so he can naturally understand Russian, and the officer asks: "Are you Chinese? How did you end up here?"

  Chu Si Nan had yet to recover from his shock, staring blankly at the short military officer standing in front of him, speechless.

  Seeing Chu Si Nan not saying a word, just staring at himself foolishly, the officer sighed and shook his head. He turned around to look in the direction of the woods, then turned back and said: "No matter why you came here, now follow us immediately, the Germans are coming soon."

  Chu Si Nan still hadn't reacted, he sat on the ground, as if his soul had been lost, in a daze.

  "Bartoliev, Bartoliev!" Seeing that Chu Si Nan still didn't speak or move, the officer furrowed his brow and then turned to shout at a large soldier who had just passed by him.

  "Halt!" The big soldier stopped abruptly and replied.

  "Take this guy with us and retreat, we can't let him fall into the hands of the Germans." The officer ordered.

  "Yes." Although Bartolev looked unwilling, he accepted the task. He walked forward, pulled Chu Si Nan's arm and helped him up from the ground, then followed behind the officer, continuing to retreat in a northeast direction.