48 Hours a Day - Chapter 73

Chapter 73

The surprise attack threw the entire Soviet troops into a disorganized chaos . However, this was not the end of it . Their nightmare was officially set to begin that night . During the nighttime, visibility had significantly reduced, making it a lot harder for the troops to spot the guerilla members hiding in the forest . Without a visible target, they would not know where to fire .

After an entire day of traveling on foot, most of the soldiers were famished and fatigued . Usually, during this hour, they would start to prepare and cook their dinner . Nothing was usual about this time as there was a sharp-shooting reaper hiding in the dark – getting ready to harvest their souls, one bullet at a time . There were many dead bodies lying beside them, courtesy of the sniper, discouraging them from starting a fire to cook .

Moments like these displayed the weakness of the young and inexperienced commanding officer . He did not know if he should fortify the place in anticipation of backup, or simply take off and never look back . Sadly for them, another force of guerillas soon arrived, surrounding them . Then, with a merciless blow, launched the second wave of attacks on this unlucky Soviet brigade .

The guerillas with their submachine guns snowboarded their way in the dark forest right to the heart of the enemy base camp . The moment they saw the Soviets, they started to open fire! Though there were only 20 of them, their courage and blitz attack had caught the Soviets off-guard . Besides, Simone had taken care of two teams of their machine gunners . It was soon apparent that the reaction of the rest of the soldiers was a lot slower . In their mess and confusion, the guerillas had already finished shooting . By that time, the guerillas had left with their snowboards and turned to other locations to strike other brigades .

Still, two guerillas got hit, where one of them was shot in the head, falling off from his snowboard . Another one was shot in the shoulder, but he managed to escape in the end . As for Simone, she had her rifle locked and loaded . Usually, she would start opening fire at single targets when the other guerillas launched their attacks . Once the surprise attack was over, she had killed another eight enemies . The combination of an invisible super-shooter and the Baltic ferociousness of the Finnish had managed to completely devastate the morale among the Soviet ranks .

Within three minutes, another 20 dead bodies piled up on the ground, and 30 soldiers were severely wounded . Amongst these, seven were critical, choking, and bleeding out . It seemed they would not pull through the night . As for the rest, there was no way they would make their way to any battlefield without receiving medical attention . However, they would best forget their intentions, considering the agonized wails and screams of the decapitated conscripts .

The Soviets were already in extreme distress when the guerilla attacked earlier . In order to save ammo and avoid friendly fire, they retreated, for now, halting the attack and hiding out in the forest to wait for the perfect moment to strike again .

They were like predators stalking their prey from agar . Though the Soviets greatly outnumbered and had a lot more firepower than the guerillas, it did little to affect them . To them, the Soviets were simply dead mean on the chopping board . Since Finland was located far up north near the Artic, they had very long nights and only a few hours of daylight . They were accustomed to the dark, having honed their skills in the nights . This proved a great advantage to them when overpowering the uninitiated Slavs .

Zhang Heng and Simone too retreated to a safe place . They even found a little time to have dinner . Of course, in order to stay hidden, there was no fire . Perhaps the food was undercooked, hence its rather unsavory nature .  After a short while, they saw someone gliding towards them on a snowboard . The man passed, creating a cloud trail of snow and frost behind him .

Zhang Heng recognized the man . He was the same one who had brought him back to base camp with a submachine gun pointed at him . After spending some time at the base camp, Zhang Heng got to know his name as well . He was called Weller and was the one most hostile towards Zhang Heng .

He must have followed the signs Simone had left on the path when she moved here . Zhang Heng could roughly guess that he was here to discuss the time for the next round of attacks . The splash of snow and ice was an attempt to show off his skills to Zhang Heng, raising his eyebrows in intimidation, as if courting a challenge . He even cocked his machine gun, swung it around, and tauntingly glared at Zhang Heng .

Just as Zhang Heng was about to react to that, Simone quickly stood up with her M28 . She seemed akin to a lioness protecting her cub, which was Zhang Heng . Naturally, Zhang Heng was not pleased by her response . He muttered a few words and left with his snowboard .

“……… . . ”

Zhang Heng felt that there was something terribly wrong about all this . The longer he stayed with Simone, the stronger this bad feeling got . Actually, it was not that hard to deal with a simple-minded brute like Weller . He was the same kind as Cheng Cheng – a man-child .

Though Weller had a strong dislike towards Zhang Heng, he had not done anything overboard so far . At most, he would laugh at him with his friends when Zhang Heng passed him by . Sometimes, he would even wear Zhang Heng’s undercoat and deliberately walk in front of him . He had repeatedly done this, hoping to encourage a response . From time to time, he would glare at Zhang Heng with hatred, even spitting on the ground as a sign of disgust . With Zhang Heng looking away, he would often chuckle in satisfaction .

After that, Zhang Heng got to know that Weller was married with two kids . His affection for Simone was more of admiration, an infatuation . He was green with jealousy when his crush hung out with Zhang Heng all the time . The best way to deal with these types was to do nothing at all about it . As time passed, he would have to accept that this was something that he could not change .

The way Simone glared at him just now would definitely trigger his rebellious personality .

Of course, Zhang Heng did not blame her for that . After all, nobody forced her, and she did it all out of good intentions . As long as she could remember, she had been staying with her great grandfather . Undoubtedly, more straightforward than Weller . As for a woman like Maji, Zhang Heng could never know what went through her mind . She had a natural flair for stage plays . Sometimes, she even acted so well that Zhang Heng could not help but believe whatever she said . She was a true femme fatale, and that was why Zhang Heng still did not trust her wholeheartedly .

……

40 minutes later, the guerillas launched their third wave of attacks .

This time, the employed different tactics, not striking at them directly . Instead, they had two snipers picking them off from afar . This allowed them to draw fire away from the rest of the guerillas . While the Soviets were busy shooting at the sniper, the other guerilla members would appear out of nowhere and strike the distracted soldiers .

Simone had her priority on the heavy machine gunners . At the same time, Zhang Heng had also let off a couple of shots as well . These targets were a lot further away than the ones in his training sessions . He did not know if he had made any kills before suddenly…

A notification!

[Successfully killed an enemy . Game Points: +5 . For more information, please check your character panel]

Was that a lucky shot, or did he really kill the one he aimed for?