From the mont they landed, the Allied forces advanced rapidly and fiercely, capturing city after city.
The task force followed closely behind, searching for weapons abandoned by the German army. Most of what they found were heavy weapons; as for the weapons surrendered by German soldiers, those could be directly handed over to the Aricans.
"Ping’an, how do you say ’repair’ in German?"
Wang Huiqi, who was driving the jeep, kept asking Wu Ping’an—who was flipping through a German dictionary—about vocabulary. As mbers of the search team, they had a strict requirent: to morize ten German words every day.
"Wait, let check..."
Before Wu Ping’an could find the page, Sun Yibang, who was manning the machine gun in the back seat, imdiately answered.
"’Wartung’... It ans repair, maintenance, upkeep."
He then rattled off several related phrases, leaving both Wang Huiqi and Wu Ping’an surprised.
"Hey, A-Yi, you’re picking up German pretty fast!"
"I learned a bit as a kid..." Sun Yibang replied. "The priest at the church in our town was German. I learned so from him, but after so many years without using it, I’ve forgotten most of it... Stop the car, stop the car..."
At Sun Yibang’s shout, the jeep and the truck both ca to a halt. Standing up in the jeep, Sun Yibang raised his binoculars and looked into the woods, a smile appearing at the corner of his mouth.
"There’s an artillery position—no one there."
Soon, the group arrived at the artillery position hidden in the woods. Around the shell craters nearby, a few corpses were scattered. The German troops who had been guarding the position had long since retreated, leaving behind six cannons.
"Six Soviet-made M38 122mm howitzers. One has a destroyed barrel, and another has a damaged recoil chanism. Drag them all back to the repair depot—maybe we can get a few of them operational..."
These damaged weapons would eventually be shipped to the repair factory in Tunis. The factory had hundreds of German POWs, most of whom were logistics and maintenance personnel. Their daily work was to repair tanks, vehicles, and heavy weapons; even the factory itself had once been their workplace. To support the Afrika Korps, the Germans had established a fully equipped repair facility in Tunis. Major repairs on heavy equipnt like tanks obviously couldn’t be sent back to Germany, so everything was done locally. After the German surrender, the Allies had taken over the factory for a while, but once the task force was ford, the entire factory—with its hundreds of machines—was handed over to Pierre with a wave of the hand.
You had to admit, the rich really were different. A factory worth millions was handed over just like that, though it had been seized as spoils of war.
As they were inspecting the weapons, gunfire suddenly rang out from the distance.
A bullet struck Sun Yibang in the neck. The mont he was hit, he collapsed, blood spurting nearly two feet high as he convulsed and died.
"Germans!"
Wang Huiqi stared wide-eyed at Sun Yibang’s corpse, trembling all over. At that mont, return fire erupted nearby. The machine gunner on the jeep grabbed the MG34 and sprayed bullets toward the source of the gunfire. Dozens of figures could be seen faintly, and the hail of bullets instantly took down four German soldiers.
Under the cover of the machine gunner, the rest of the team grabbed their weapons, seeking cover as they fired back. The crisp, rapid shots of the M1 carbines rang out across the battlefield.
The Germans fought back as well, taking cover behind the corners of village walls and firing continuously. The air was streaked with red and green tracer rounds as both sides exchanged intense fire.
Compared to the Germans, the search team’s firepower seed superior—after all, they were all using semi-automatic weapons. Just as it looked like they were gaining the upper hand, a tank crashed through the hedgerow, its turret slowly turning. Wang Huiqi and his comrades froze in shock.
"A tank..."
As soone shouted, the tank slowly aid its gun and fired. Although the shell missed the jeep, the blast wave flipped it over. Luckily, the machine gunner had already moved to a new position.
"What do we do? What do we do..."
As Wang Huiqi shouted in panic, he heard the squad leader, Li Changgen, yelling:
"Panzerfaust! Where’s the Panzerfaust? Get it over here, quick!"
The Panzerfaust was an anti-tank rocket launcher captured from the Germans. Though powerful, its range was short, so the Allies rarely used it. However, for the task force, it was invaluable. To guard against German tanks, each search team was equipped with several Panzerfausts.
"Squad leader, it’s on the jeep!"
"Damn it..."
Cursing, Li Changgen rolled toward the overturned jeep. As he reached it, he saw a wooden crate on the ground containing four Panzerfaust 60s.
A shell exploded not far from Li Changgen, sending dirt flying all around them.
Gripping a Panzerfaust, Li Changgen stared at the tank and the infantry around it, his brow furrowing deeply.
"Li Lei, Han Bing, you two take two Panzerfausts and flank left..."
He then grabbed another Panzerfaust for himself and tossed one, saying:
"Co on, follow . The rest of you, keep the infantry pinned down and cut them off from the tank..."
With that, he slung his carbine over his shoulder, grabbed the Panzerfaust, and—
Wearing his helt and carrying a Panzerfaust 60 in one hand, he sprinted toward the flank. The German soldiers seed to have spotted them; a hail of submachine gun and machine gun bullets imdiately swept their way. Li An, who was following right behind him, had barely run a few steps before he was struck by bullets and fell to the ground.
Amid the whizzing bullets, Li Changgen threw himself to the ground, turned his head to look at his fallen comrade, then glanced at the enemy tanks and infantry, and cursed bitterly.
"Damn it..."
He then crawled forward through the grass, trying to get as close to the tank as possible. Under covering fire from his comrades, the German infantry had already retreated behind the tank, trying to use it as protection. This also gave Li Changgen a chance to fire, though the distance was still too great.
Just then, a burst of fla shot out from the left flank—soone over there had fired first.
"Too far..."
The rocket missed, landing in a field not far from the tank and only blowing up so wild grass. Their attack, however, drew the Germans’ attention. The German soldiers imdiately shouted and began suppressing the anti-tank team with rifle and machine gun fire.
Seeing this, Li Changgen crawled forward once more. When he was about forty or fifty ters from the tank, he raised the Panzerfaust, aid at the tank using the makeshift sight, and pressed the trigger.
"Whoosh..."
With a burst of fla, the rocket shot out. The mont it struck the front side of the tank, thick black smoke billowed out of the tank’s compartnt. A tank crewman, his body afla, had just managed to climb out before being gunned down.
A direct hit!
There was no ti to celebrate—bullets rained in from all directions...
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