Fifteen minutes later, with Klaus’s assistance, Morin assembled the entire platoon.
After the soldiers finished checking their weapons and ammunition, they shouldered their packs and, in silent squads, formed three columns, waiting for the next order.
During that brief interval, Morin also discovered a new use for the “golden finger” in his head.
He found that he could shrink the detailed battlefield map and fix it in the upper-left corner of his vision in a translucent form.
It was like playing an RTS game or Battlefield—he now had a minimap he could check in real time.
Doing so meant he temporarily could not switch to other tabs such as “Intelligence” or “Information,” but the advantage was obvious.
He could keep track of the movements of friend and foe on the battlefield at any time, without worrying that some sudden situation in the outside world would forcibly close the entire UI.
“Platoon leader, the company is moving.”
Klaus’s voice pulled Morin’s attention back to reality.
“Move out.”
Morin wasted no words. After giving the simple order, he led his 3rd Platoon toward the positions of the other two platoons and company headquarters.
The sun had yet to rise, showing only the faintest glimmer beneath the horizon, and the light in the woods remained dim.
The soldiers’ boots stepped on dead branches and fallen leaves, making faint cracking sounds that mingled with the metallic clink of colliding equipment, forming the distinctive melody of a march.
Soon, they arrived at 3rd Company’s assembly area.
Company commander Captain Hauser stood at the very front of the formation, with the other two platoons already formed up behind him.
Morin directed his troops to quickly attach themselves to the rear of the column.
A tall, stern-looking company sergeant major strode up to Captain Hauser, came to attention, and reported.
“All present, sir!”
“Thank you, Sergeant Major!”
Hauser nodded, then walked to the front of the company and halted.
“Company! Dress on the center! Quick march!”
The company sergeant major took his place behind the captain, while the other company headquarters officers immediately moved to both sides of the formation, repeating the order and maintaining the marching order.
“Left, right, left! Left, right, left!”
The entire company, nearly two hundred men excluding the baggage elements, once again became a long gray serpent under the commands of its officers and NCOs, moving silently toward the designated attack preparation position.
After marching for about ten minutes, the column stopped behind a low thicket.
This was 3rd Company’s standby area, and also their attack preparation position as the reserve of 1st Battalion.
Through the gaps in the bushes, Morin could clearly see the scene on the open ground ahead.
The soldiers of 1st Company had already deployed into three skirmish lines, each about 150 meters wide. Of course, this was still different from the skirmish line as Morin understood it.
But for combat at the end of the line-infantry era, a formation with soldiers spaced one to two meters apart was already enough to be called a skirmish line.
Behind them was 2nd Company, arranged in dense company columns.
As the force meant to rapidly break into the enemy position once a gap was opened, the soldiers of 2nd Company had already fixed bayonets to the muzzles of their rifles, the blades reflecting points of cold light in the newborn dawn.
The entire scene was terrifyingly quiet, with only the moan of the wind blowing across the fields.
Morin glanced at the pocket watch Captain Hauser had lent him. The silver hands were steadily moving toward 5:07.
The moment the time arrived, the oppressive silence around them was torn apart by a sharp whistle.
A ranging shell streaked across the sky and exploded outside the distant village of San Isidro, sending up a column of black smoke.
On the map in the upper-left corner of Morin’s vision, the icon of the artillery position flashed, and a red parabola landed precisely on the edge of the village.
Immediately afterward, a second ranging shell fell, this time closer to the center of the village.
The ranging was complete.
In the next second, the entire sky seemed to be filled with the shriek of shells.
The field artillery battalion’s twelve FK.96 n/A 77mm field guns began rapid fire.
Although they were only small-caliber field guns, under the combined power of a salvo, they still displayed terrifying destructive force.
Explosions joined into one continuous roar, and San Isidro was instantly swallowed by gunpowder smoke and dust.
Earth, shattered stones, and the rubble of houses were hurled high into the air, then came raining down.
The “God of War” revealed its edge for the first time in that moment.
After three rounds of rapid fire, the bombardment came to an abrupt stop.
The battlefield once again sank into a brief deathly stillness.
Morin could feel the breathing of the soldiers around him growing heavy, and quite a few faces showed excitement.
In their eyes, such fierce artillery preparation was enough to utterly destroy the will to fight of those Aragonese peasant soldiers in the village.
The instant the shelling stopped, a piercing whistle cut through the silence of the battlefield.
It was the signal to attack.
Beyond the bushes, 1st Company’s three skirmish lines began advancing slowly.
The soldiers moved with uniform steps, their Gew.98 rifles held level before their chests, muzzles pointing straight at the village shrouded in smoke.
Their movements were not fast, but every step was steady and powerful. The entire formation showed almost no disorder as it advanced.
At this moment, the discipline of this army was displayed to the fullest.
After 1st Company’s skirmish line advanced roughly a hundred meters, 2nd Company in the rear also began to move.
The soldiers in dense columns followed at the same rhythm under the officers’ commands.
They did not deploy, instead maintaining their tight ranks, ready to thrust into the enemy lines with maximum impact once 1st Company opened a breach.
The rising sun spilled golden radiance across the fields, illuminating the spikes atop the soldiers’ helmets and the rows of coldly gleaming bayonets on their rifle muzzles.
A gray wave of 360 attacking soldiers surged silently toward San Isidro.
The entire process was so quiet it was almost eerie.
Apart from the rustle of boots on the ground and the occasional low orders from the officers, there was no other sound.
Morin crouched behind the bushes, his heart tightening unconsciously.
On the map in the upper-left corner of his vision, the blue icons representing 1st Company and 2nd Company were steadily approaching the gray diamond that represented the unknown enemy.
Everything seemed to be exactly as Captain Hauser had predicted.
The defenders in the village seemed truly to have been scared witless by the fierce bombardment just now, shrinking into the ruins and not daring to show themselves.
1st Company and 2nd Company quickly covered more than half the distance without encountering any resistance at all.
Morin even noticed that some of the soldiers of 3rd Company around him had already relaxed and begun talking in low voices, as if they thought this battle had ended ahead of time.
Company commander Captain Hauser also wore an easy smile. He even took out his pipe and tapped it against his heel, preparing to enjoy a moment of leisure before victory.
However, this optimistic atmosphere did not last long.
Just as the foremost skirmish line of 1st Company was less than two hundred meters from the outskirts of the village, a burst of dense gunfire suddenly erupted from the ruins.
Several blossoms of blood immediately splashed across 1st Company’s skirmish line. A few soldiers fell at once, rolling on the ground in agony.
The defenders, having recovered their senses, began to counterattack.
The attacking ranks showed a slight stir of disorder under the sudden assault, but it was quickly suppressed by the whistles and shouts of the NCOs.
“Halt! Present arms!”
“Aim!”
“Volley!”
With the sergeant major’s shrill whistle and the officers’ commands, 1st Company’s skirmish line halted in unison, dropped to one knee, and raised their rifles.
Then they pulled the triggers toward the direction from which the gunfire had come.
After a dense volley, the fire from the edge of the village weakened noticeably.
“Forward!”
The soldiers rose again, holding their rifles as they continued the charge.
Halt, aim, fire, charge. This process repeated over and over across the next few dozen meters.
Although soldiers were continuously struck and fell, the company’s momentum was not greatly affected.
Relying on the discipline brought by harsh training and the precise volleys of their Gew.98 rifles, they suppressed the defenders’ fire in the village for a time.
The scales of victory still seemed to be tilting toward the Saxons.
But Morin did not relax in the slightest.
All his attention was focused on the small map in the upper-left corner of his vision.
Just now, as the soldiers of 1st Company and 2nd Company drew closer, a brand-new red icon had lit up without warning on the outer defenses of San Isidro.
[Kingdom of Aragon Army — Vickers Machine-Gun Position]