Chapter Forty-Four: The Battle for the Floors

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  "Yankee come!" A German soldier guarding the window sill sealed with wooden boards heard a faint footsteps passing by and whispered to several other soldiers in the house.

  "You and he hold down the first floor, the others come with me!" Burkman said, pointing to the soldier under the windowsill and another German soldier.

  "Yes!"

  Berkman nodded at the two of them and led several others upstairs. As he turned the corner, Berkman looked back at the two young soldiers left on the first floor, sighed, and then followed up!

  "Conway, let's go into this building and then to the top of that one, it'll be safer!" Rembo called out to Conway, who was walking cautiously along the wall, pointing to the corner of the street ahead.

  Conway made a gesture of complete halt and observed for a moment before nodding. "Alright, but it doesn't seem safe to go from the building either!"

  "At least it's a lot better than being exposed to the German machine guns like we were!"

  "Alright, you're in charge here!"

  "Thanks for the reminder, I almost forgot!" Renbo smiled at Conway and glanced at Hill who was carrying a flamethrower behind him, "Hill, now it's your turn!"

  Hill covered his face and came to Conway's position, saying: "Get out! Get away from me!"

  Conway glanced at Hill, picked up his gun and retreated to a few meters away from Hill, keeping watch for him. Hill came to one side of the entrance of the building, leaned against the wall without looking inside, picked up a piece of broken stone about the size of a grenade from the ground, and rolled into the house with it stuck to the floor.

  "Hand grenade!" The German soldier hiding under the window didn't see anything clearly, he only saw a spherical object rolling into the room and thought that the American had thrown in a hand grenade. He loudly reminded his companions and quickly hid behind a simple shelter made of solid wood tables and sofas, and another German soldier who was also taking cover under the windowsill, also saw something being thrown in and simultaneously retreated into a simple shelter made of solid wood cabinets, waiting for the explosion to fire at the American soldiers who would charge in.

  However, after counting for two seconds, there was no explosion. The German soldiers under the window knew they had been deceived and quickly got up to prepare for defense and counterattack. As a result, they were met with a huge flame that engulfed themselves.

  After Hill threw a stone into the house and heard someone inside, he didn't rush in. Instead, he stepped back from the doorway, fired at the wall, and used the ricochet to splash the flamethrower's flame into the house. The massive flames instantly turned the interior into a burning furnace. Two German soldiers hiding on the first floor were unable to dodge the flamethrower's flame, which splashed onto their bodies, igniting them. Unable to withstand the intense pain and suffocation, they rushed out of the door with their bodies engulfed in flames, only to be shot dead by Conway and other soldiers who had taken cover on one side.

  The German soldier was dead, but the flames burning on his body did not stop, sizzling and crackling, and soon the air was filled with the smell of charred flesh. Before long, the soldier's corpse was reduced to a pile of black charcoal in the raging fire. A new recruit behind Renbo, who had never seen anyone die from being shot by a flamethrower before, couldn't help but lean against the wall and vomit loudly. The other soldiers who had not seen anyone burned alive also looked pale and turned their heads away, unwilling to look again.

  Lombo patted the soldier's back and said, "Well, Charlie. Go ahead and vomit. Once you've vomited, you won't be sick again when we meet!"

  Hill stood by with a flamethrower gun and said coldly: "What a waste!"

  "You're a son of a bitch!" Charlie, who had been vomiting continuously, struggled to get up, pointing at Hill and saying so before he couldn't help but dry retch again.

  Hill sneered and turned his head back, no longer looking at Charlie.

  Conway heard that the house was finally quiet, and he threw in a hand grenade. Boom! The blast wave blew the fire points in the house to one side, Conway rushed in immediately, and Rumbold also stopped checking and slipped into the house with Charlie.

  "Be careful, just don't want to be like that German, don't touch those still burning things!" Rembo loudly reminded the soldiers who came in one after another, it's not fun to have napalm stuck on their bodies.

  "I think there's still a German up there!" Conway exclaimed, standing at the middle landing of the stairs and pointing to the second floor above.

  "Watch out! There are Germans above us! Everyone take cover!" Kangbo turned back to remind the soldiers behind him.

  Conway crept up to the second floor landing, laid down his gun, and carefully peered out into the long corridor to the left. He saw a German soldier intently holding an assault rifle, aiming at the stairwell entrance. As soon as he spotted a helmet poking out from below, he opened fire, sweeping the area. Conway quickly pulled back, and the bullets hit the wall of the stairwell corner, leaving several small bullet holes.

  "Two in the hallway!" Conway called out without turning around, holding out his hand for a grenade to Renbo, "Give me a grenade!"

  Boom! The explosion of the grenade made the entire floor feel like it had shaken, with a large amount of dust falling from the ceiling. The blast did not harm the German soldiers guarding the corridor, but only caused them to take cover. Conway immediately crouched down at the corner of the corridor, aiming his gun at any possible position where enemy troops might appear.

  "Up!" Renbo shouted loudly and waved his hand at the soldiers behind him.

  Rat-a-tat, Conway's submachine gun was trained on the German soldier who had been guarding the corridor earlier, trying to peer out from his hiding position, the submachine gun's bullets kept suppressing the German soldier.

  "Take cover behind the gates! Eighth gate, one o'clock! There's another at the end!" Conway warned Renbo, "I need to reload!"

  Renbo took over Conway's suppression, bullets whizzing into the German soldiers' hiding place, making it hard for him to show his head. However, the German soldier did not give up resistance, pulled out a wooden-handled grenade, pulled off the safety ring, counted silently for a few seconds, and immediately threw it at the stairwell position.

  "Grenade!" - Renbo pulled Conway back and flung him to the ground, Conway was caught off guard and was slammed into the mud by Renbo's powerful throw!

  "Damn it—" Conway was about to curse when he heard a loud "boom" and something heavy fell on his body. He pushed it away with his hand, and to his surprise, it was Renbo, covered in blood.

  "Lombo! Lombo!" Conway hugged Lombo and shook him, finding that Lombo moved slightly, seemingly not dead. "Medic, quickly carry Lombo away, he's injured!"

  "Conway, get out of the way and let me burn him!" Hill said to Conway, glancing at the unconscious Rembo.

  "No way, this position can't burn him!" Conway said without hesitation.

  "What's going on? Are we just going to be blocked here at the stairs by him?" Hill said, getting impatient with his flamethrower.

  "Charlie, come here! I'll count one, two, three and you tackle him. After I rush into the first door in the corridor, you take over and continue to pin him down. Got it?" Conway called out to Charlie, who had been coughing behind him but was now much better.

  Charlie nodded and was about to rush out when Conway shouted, "Grenade, fall back!" as he saw a long object with smoke still trailing from it flying towards them from the corridor.

  Boom! The grenade didn't harm the US soldiers who were already on guard, but one unlucky soldier was a bit late to react and had a piece of flesh scraped off his arm by shrapnel, hurting so much that he almost cried!

  "Damn bastard! Come out and fight me one on one if you dare! Why use such a despicable weapon!" Hill couldn't hold back anymore, shouting at the German soldier hiding in the corridor.

  "Shut up, Hill! You think he'll just come out stupidly like that?" Conway glared at the somewhat reckless Hill.

  Hill also felt that this approach could make German soldiers come out, which was unbelievable, and he sulkily hid to one side.

  "Don't be afraid, Charlie! Let's go again!" Conway encouraged Charlie, who was still a bit shaken.

  Jones followed Rumbold and saw that the people upstairs were stuck at the stairwell and couldn't go up. He was anxious and asked, "What's going on?"

  "Sir, there are German guards in the corridor!"

  "How many people?"

  "Two!"

  "What? Only two Germans? Seal them in there, all of you get out of the way, I'll go take a look!" Jones pushed aside the soldier who had made the report and walked inside.

  There were still several places burning on the first floor, as if unwilling to be extinguished, as if predicting that the Germans would not be easily eliminated by American soldiers, half dead and half burned. Jones had just reached the door when he met Rimbau being carried down by several people in a flurry.

  "Renbo? What's wrong with him?"

  "Sir, he's been hit by a grenade!"

  "For Pete's sake! Get him down for treatment!" Jones glanced over at the unconscious Rembo, then suddenly there was another grenade explosion. "What's going on? Is anyone hurt?"

  "No, sir!"

  Jones took a few paces to the head of the stairs and saw Conway directing Charlie to advance into the corridor, saying "Let me see!"

  "Beware, sir, the enemy is cunning!" Conway warned Jones, giving him a cautious nod.

  Jones took a look at the corridor and found it clean and tidy, with no place to hide, so once he exposed his head, he would be shot dead by the Germans who had been waiting in secret. Obviously, hard charging was not an option.

  "What do you plan to do?" Jones asked Conway.

  "Sir, I plan on having Charlie suppress the enemy, then I'll make a run for the first door, and work my way up from there!" Conway explained his actions.

  "No way! The Germans have all the doors locked, and forcing our way in won't necessarily get us in, and we might even trigger some of the traps they've set!" Jones said flatly. "Tell me, where are they hiding?"

  "There's one at the entrance of the eighth house and another at the end of the corridor, they've got us trapped!"

  Jones thought for a moment, and suddenly remembered the simple earth tank he made in Omaha at that time. Suddenly, he had an idea, "Get a few people to help me move that cabinet on the first floor up here! I think we have a way to get rid of him!"