The loss of a street barricade defense line did not mean the end of the battle, but rather the beginning of a new round of struggle.
Passing through the devastated blocks, Lynn cautiously and quickly observed the surrounding environment. He saw scattered pieces of abandoned paper in front of the basement door where the headquarters of the 6th defensive zone had been this morning, and there were no sentries on duty. It seemed that not everyone was determined to fight to the death here.
If one were to die, at least it should be meaningful!
The next street corner was the next defensive line, and Berlin had become a complex defensive system. The closer to the central city area, the denser the defense works tended to be, and the number of defending troops was considerable— it was said that major symbolic buildings such as the Reichstag and the Imperial Chancellery were even guarded by entire battalions of soldiers.
Under the gaze of their own combat personnel, Lynn and his group bypassed the barricade and entered the rear of the new defense line from the side of the ruins. They suddenly felt that there were more SS soldiers around them, while the Wehrmacht soldiers became a minority here.
Finding a relatively safe corner, Lynn and Tanzer together laid Sergeant Helvich flat, removed his helmet, and took out a water bottle. They used a handkerchief to wipe his young and handsome face. There was a deep wound on the right temple— although it wasn't bleeding profusely, it looked like it would be difficult to heal naturally. It would be best to stitch it up and properly disinfect it. So, Lynn sent Wolfram to see if he could find a medic, while Bruhl and Noah went to find ammunition supplies. Lynn also took off the battery box on his back, stared at Helvich's face for a moment to make sure his breathing was basically normal, and then sat down beside him.
The energy and physical strength accumulated in the early morning seemed to have been exhausted in the previous tense battle. Bruck, Tanzer, and Tichmell all looked tired. Turning to look at the soldiers around them, if they weren't hiding in some cover that seemed to be able to avoid artillery fire, then they were rushing to somewhere in the defensive position. Lowering their heads and bending over seemed to be the standard posture for everyone.
This was the Empire's last day, and it was the ultimate collision of will and steel.
Looking at the SS soldiers in "pea" combat uniforms coming and going, Lynn's mood calmed down a lot. How he hoped that a familiar face like "Butcher", Eric, or another friendly companion would suddenly appear before him, so that he could have a pleasant surprise in this extremely pessimistic environment. However, as time passed, this hope never became reality. With the approaching sound of guns and cannons, more soldiers withdrawn from the front lines flooded into the barricade defense line. Most of them had panic on their faces, like startled rabbits running through the barricade to find new shelter, and the German soldiers on the defensive positions were fully focused on the front, vigilant against the Soviet combat units that could appear at any time. They had no guard against these groups of comrades who had withdrawn into the barricades in groups or as scattered mercenaries, even though among them there might be Soviet special operatives.
"Uh... what is this..."
Sergeant Helvich, lying on the ground, finally opened his eyes, and his eyelids and speaking speed were both slow— this was more in line with the condition of a comatose person waking up for the first time. However, the young gunner seemed to have amnesia, looking around with curiosity and confusion, and his gaze finally fell on Lynn's face. After a few seconds of hesitation, he suddenly widened his eyes and called out the names of the two gunners who had been with him earlier.
Lynn glanced at the barricade, although he did not witness the two gunners being killed directly, judging from the situation earlier, their chances of surviving were not high. And even if their luck was extraordinary, they might not have taken the same route to withdraw to the same barricade position.
"Why... why didn't you let me stay there?" Helvich struggled to sit up, looking at Lynn with a disappointed expression.
For this question, Lynn couldn't answer for a while. Perhaps it was pity for this skilled artilleryman, or perhaps a chance encounter left a good impression. In fact, these reasons were not even enough to convince himself.
Seeing Lynn silent, Helvich immediately lay back despairingly, his deep blue eyes staring blankly at the gloomy sky.
About ten minutes later, Wolfram came back with a roll of bandages and a small bottle of alcohol, explaining that the field hospital was overcrowded, and the only two medics were busy, so it was impossible for a moderately injured Wehrmacht sergeant to be rushed over. Seeing that Helvich was basically clear-headed, Lynn signaled Wolfram to sit down and rest, and then personally cleaned and bandaged the wound for the artillery sergeant. During this process, Helvich's eyes still looked empty, as if his soul was lost on the battlefield just now.
As time passed, there were no more German soldiers retreating outside the barricade. Lynn knew that those soldiers of the Volkssturm who had rushed to the battlefield with naive expectations were either killed by Soviet artillery fire or lost their will to fight in the face of the huge disparity between reality and ideals. Some might have cleverly used the terrain to hide and escape, everything was possible.
Whoosh—Boom!
The shells fired from the front came with a long and sharp sound, instantly collapsing half of a four-story building facing the street. Following this deafening explosion, the fierce Soviet attack finally extended to this barricade defense line.
Looking around, at least one company of SS soldiers were deployed on the front barricade position, and four anti-tank guns were supported in the rear positions. Although two of them had slightly smaller calibers, the outer circle was reinforced with sandbags or even cement, and behind the dilapidated buildings in the distance, there was at least one Panzer IV tank hidden with a long-barreled gun and skirt armor plates.
Behind a ruin like a mountain ridge, Lynn and his soldiers didn't need to worry too much about the direct fire of the enemy tank cannons. But hearing the intense gunfire and explosions, Helvich's eyes finally changed, and he struggled to sit up for the second time. At this moment, Lynn gave him a calm and confident look, enduring the roaring of both sides' artillery and said, "Don't worry, we're all your friends! We're all here!"
Staring at Lynn blankly, for a moment, Helvich's dark and desperate expression finally visibly eased, he sighed deeply, as if he had spit out all the filth in his body, then slowly lay back down, muttering something under his breath.
The continuous explosions filled the ears, and Lynn couldn't hear what the artillery sergeant was saying. Turning his head to look at the others, they were all waiting silently in this situation.
After about the time it takes to smoke a cigarette, the shells falling on the German barricade and the surrounding area gradually became sparse, and it seemed that the Soviet army was just probing the strength and defense deployment of the defenders with their attacks. Bruhl and Noah ran back quickly under the artillery fire. The former carried a rectangular wooden box about the size of a wine crate, containing hundreds of rounds of different types of ammunition, and the latter even managed to obtain a metal box similar to a squad machine gun ammunition belt container.
"Four anti-tank rockets!" Noah's eyes flickered with slight excitement.
Lynn exclaimed loudly, "Let's teach those Russkies a lesson when we get the chance!"
Helvich, who was sitting up, looked at the SS soldiers who had saved him with a seemingly indifferent but actually complex gaze. Although his head was wrapped in gauze, his complexion had improved after Lynn cleaned it, and the stains on his face had disappeared.
Just as they were talking, the Soviet artillery fire continued to weaken until it completely ceased. Berlin was still in a state of war, and the sound of gunfire in the distance occasionally became intense, but the barricade suddenly fell silent, which made people feel somewhat uncomfortable. Several soldiers on the barricade curiously peeked forward, while Lynn sniffed, the smell of gunpowder in the air wasn't too strong.
"The Russkies' attack was smashed to pieces by us!" Wolfram seemed to be gloating, but it wasn't unpleasant at all.
"Hey, guys, guess what I saw at the makeshift ammunition depot just now?" Bruhl distributed bullets to everyone while grinning, "Two Tiger tanks, brand new Tigers!"
Hearing this news, Bruck and the others relaxed their brows. In the battlefield cognition of this era, "Tiger" tanks were almost invincible existences. It was said that there had never been a case where this type of tank was destroyed from the front by the enemy, and there were very common claims that one Tiger tank destroyed n Allied and Soviet tanks, some even reached the level of godlike.