Arc of Fire

The timeline rewound a bit, to three minutes before the battle began.

Jonathan, dressed in military uniform, swaggered towards the Bridgehead Fort.

Since everyone’s attention was on the convoy, not many found anything amiss with him.

At the entrance of the Bridgehead Fort, a guard raised his right hand in a "stop" gesture, and then questioned Jonathan in Prosenese.

Jonathan showed the guard the snacks and wine in his hand—actually stolen from the canteen of the troops guarding the bridge after he had entered.

Seeing the food, the guard grew more puzzled, but Jonathan made a "shush" gesture. The guard thought for a second as if he had realized something, and then opened the door with a "go ahead" gesture.

Jonathan entered the Bridgehead Fort, shut the door, and immediately locked it from the inside—these fortress gates could be locked from the inside, making them impenetrable from the outside, even with a key.

He placed the food on the table.

A Prosen private, originally looking out of the firing port, turned around at the sound and saw the food, cheerfully said something, and walked over to pick up a sausage.

That’s when the soldier noticed Jonathan was an unfamiliar face and froze.

Without a word, Jonathan drew his curved knife and slashed down, and the private immediately clutched his throat and fell backward.

Jonathan caught the falling private and carefully sat him down on a chair next to the table, then quietly climbed to the second floor of the tower with his curved knife.

A sergeant, sitting at a table writing something—perhaps a letter home—did not notice Jonathan creeping up on him.

So Jonathan slashed the sergeant’s back with the knife, its blade sinking completely into the man’s body.

The sergeant struggled to turn around, but his body no longer obeyed him; he could only roll his eyes to their limit to see Jonathan from the corner of his view.

Jonathan pulled out the curved knife and struck the sergeant’s neck with another slash, completely separating his head from his body.

He picked up the tarpaulin from the table and began wiping the blood off the curved knife when a bird call came from outside.

Jonathan quickly stashed the knife, returned to the first floor, opened the front door, and then the people outside pushed the body of the sentry inside, saying, "Doc took away the enemy checkpoint’s commander. Our guys are all in place now, you give the signal to start the action with the machine gun."

"Got it," Jonathan said.

The man outside glanced at Jonathan. "Can you use the machine gun?"

"I just prefer cold weapons, doesn’t mean I’m crazy enough not to use firearms, relax. I can even throw grenades! Plus, there are three machine guns in this tower, get two more guys up here."

The decisive man outside turned and quietly called out, "Philip! Come quick, the three of us will hold the Bridgehead Fort."

Soon, a fully-armed Commando Team member entered, followed by the man who had been speaking outside dashing in.

Jonathan quickly shut the door, locked it, and then the three of them pushed a nearby cabinet to block the entrance.

They then rushed up to the platform on top of the tower.

There was a searchlight on the tower, but it was fixed, shining toward the direction of the gate to provide light for the entrance.

"Perfect," Jonathan laughed. "Later, we can use this light to dazzle the enemy so they can’t aim at us properly."

"Sounds good! Alright, Big Joe, start it up!"

Jonathan nodded and positioned himself at the machine gun. It was not a Maxim, but the Prosen MG34. Thankfully, Jonathan had learned how to use Prosen weapons. He checked the gun mechanism, adjusted the tripod’s handwheel, and then aimed the muzzle at the entrance checkpoint.

He hadn’t yet fired when gunshots first rang out from across the bridge.

It was the sound of the Sten Submachine Gun.

The Balas Army convoy had just passed, and the area had just quieted down, making the gunfire particularly jarring.

Jonathan immediately squeezed the trigger, and the Prosens’ machine gun let out the sound that had already given many Allied Forces warriors PTSD. Tracer bullets wove a line of fire across the entrance checkpoint.

Jonathan was sure he had mowed down at least five Prosens with that burst, while the other Prosens lay trained on the ground.

But the checkpoint’s machine gunner quickly turned the muzzle towards the tower and fired, missing due to the blinding searchlight.

The next moment, the Prosen machine gunner heard the sound of a grenade safety pin being pulled.

Prosen grenades were pull-type, just yank the ring to ignite the fuse, whilst Allied grenades had the lever fly off once the pin was pulled, the spring would eject the lever while the striker smashed into the detonator.

So when an Allied grenade was activated, it had this distinct ’ping’ sound, followed by the lever flying high.

The shooter turned back just in time to see a grenade land at his feet.

The explosion lifted him completely out of the cover.

Commandos emerging from the darkness with Sten Submachine Guns swept through the checkpoint with machine guns, quickly clearing the entire place.

Suddenly, a piercing alarm sounded from the direction of the main barracks, and a great number of Balas uniform-wearing Prosens warriors rushed out of the barracks and into battle positions.

On top of the Bridgehead Fort, Jonathan swung the muzzle toward the barracks and started shooting, instantly felling seven or eight men. Then the Prosens threw a smoke bomb.

Jonathan didn’t care, and continued to block the dormitory with the machine gun from memory.

However, this did not stop the Prosens from forming a flanking maneuver on the Bridgehead Fort.

From the direction of the checkpoint, Commando Team members seized the machine gun and fired on the Prosens, forming crossfire with the Bridgehead Fort.

Jonathan kept shooting and shouted, "Quick, the ammunition! Martin, the ammo!"

Martin hefted two large buckets of ammunition as he climbed up from within the Bridgehead Fort, simultaneously reminding, "Time to change the gun barrel!"

Jonathan glanced at the gun barrel that was already turning red and shook his head, "Never mind, we won’t be using it much longer, if it breaks, it breaks!"

Martin put down the ammo and took out a water bottle, "Let me pour some water on it!"

The water from the bottle instantly evaporated upon touching the gun barrel, the steam even scalding Jonathan’s eyes, but he still did not cease firing as the last strip of ammunition was quickly used up.

He opened the feed cover, "Load!"

Martin stuffed a new ammo belt into the weapon.

At this moment, shouts from the Prosens rose from beneath the tower.

As Jonathan was about to close the feed cover, he looked up to see a stick grenade flying towards his face.

He immediately caught the grenade and threw it back.

The grenade exploded just as it hit the night sky, accompanied by the screams of the Prosens below.

Martin helped Jonathan close the feed cover, shouting, "Ready!"

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Jonathan resumed sweeping fire.

Martin pulled the pin of another grenade and hurled it downward to blast the enemies who had crept up to the base of the tower.

At this time, George, who was also firing a machine gun behind them, yelled, "Load!"

"Coming, coming! Does your gun barrel need cooling?"

"This is a Maxim, it has water cooling! You got the wrong ammo, bro!"

"Darn, you should have told me it was a Maxim earlier!"

Jonathan could hardly care about the two behind him; after firing around thirty shots, he saw another grenade flying toward his cheek—

So again he caught the stick grenade and threw it back.

The second grenade had barely exploded when a third one was already on its way.

Jonathan simply grabbed a sapper shovel next to him and batted the grenade back like a badminton racket.

With the third grenade still unexploded, a fourth came flying in, forcing Jonathan to keep swinging the shovel, unable to open fire.

Suddenly, an explosion was heard from the ground floor; it sounded like a Prosen had tossed a grenade through a firing hole. However, there was no one on the ground floor!

Then, suddenly, the nearby anti-aircraft gun position opened fire.

The 20mm automatic cannon raked the area around the fort, knocking down all the enemies surrounding the tower.

"Good job!" Jonathan yelled in the direction of the anti-aircraft guns, "Watch out for them trying to flank you!"

The reply was the sound of Sten submachine guns firing, as the Commandos had already occupied positions around the anti-aircraft gun emplacement.

The 20mm cannon left the Prosen defenders in disarray, breaking their siege on the Bridgehead Fort.

Suddenly, a Maxim heavy machine gun on the Prosen dormitory’s attic began to fire.

Its target was the anti-aircraft gun position, where two Commandos operating the 20mm gun were hit and fell at their stations, and another Commando carrying ammunition was shot in the back despite diving to the ground.

With the advantage of height, the Prosen machine gunner began to rain fire, pinning down the Commandos in the direction of the anti-aircraft gun position.

Jonathan swung the gun around, aiming at the attic, but regretfully, his angle did not allow him to hit the machine gunner sheltered behind the attic walls.

At that moment, a heroic Commando Team member appeared on the roof! He waved at Jonathan, clearly signaling for him to cease fire.

Just as Jonathan’s belt of ammo ran out, he opened the feed cover and pulled out the spent belt.

Jonathan had ceased fire, but the Prosens on the ground had noticed the Commando on the roof and began concentrating fire from their Mauser 98Ks.

Jonathan quickly loaded a new belt of ammo and began suppressing the groups of Prosens.

Before he could fully suppress the enemy, the Commando on the roof stood up.

The bullets from the 98Ks shattered the tiles under his feet, clearly, the shooter had not adjusted his sights well.

The Commando advanced amidst the whizzing bullets and dove beside the attic window, pulling out two grenades, biting the pins with his teeth, and pulling out the safety levers.

With a grenade in each hand, he released the arming levers, tossed the one in his left hand into the room, and as he prepared to throw the one in his right, he was hit by a bullet.

The young Commando’s face was etched with pain, but he still managed to throw the right-hand grenade into the room.

Almost simultaneously as the grenade entered, both exploded; the machine gun was blown out of the window and smashed on the ground below.

The Commando warrior slumped next to the window, with 98K bullets continuing to strike around him.

Tiles shattered, unable to support the weight of the warrior, and he slowly slid off the roof, crashing to the ground beside the machine gun.

Jonathan having witnessed the aftermath of the grenade explosion stood up, dismounted the machine gun from the tripod, and with a roar, continued sweeping the enemy while holding it in his hands.

Seeing this, Martin was shocked, shouting, "It’s more accurate on the tripod!"

Jonathan: "Ahhhhh!"

"Big Joe, calm down!"