Chapter 374 The Winter War (26)

These two Soviet snipers hadn't undergone interrogation training, so Matthäus employed a few methods to find out that they belonged to one of the few snow units of the Soviet army, the Siberian Ski Brigade (composed of the 9th, 30th, and 34th Ski Battalions).

In order to counter the elusive guerrilla tactics of the Finnish army, the Soviet commanders selected a group of soldiers with hunting backgrounds from the Siberian Ski Brigade to form what Matthäus and Simo saw as an inexperienced sniper unit.

However, the ones who had taken out three German snipers earlier weren't Matthäus and Simo; it was an old hunter named Yegor.

When Matthäus and Simo left, the two Soviet snipers were hanging from a large tree, their ski boards stained with blood on the back, bearing the Russian words "the fate of invaders" and hung in front of their chests.

As for the two Mosin-Nagant sniper rifles, they only removed the scopes as spoils of war, buried the guns in the nearby snow, and continued on their way.

After rushing for half a day, they finally arrived near the ambush site, where they heard faint singing in the distance.

Matthäus and Simo couldn't help but exchange glances, cautiously circling to a nearby small hill, leaning against a big tree, and looking down from a high vantage point to see a Soviet patrol not far away. Several Soviet soldiers were sitting around a bonfire, singing military songs loudly.

Matthäus sneered. "Hmm, what a clumsy trap, amateurish indeed." Nowadays, Soviet patrol teams were thrown into chaos by the elusive Finnish guerrilla teams; singing so loudly meant they were either feeling particularly bold or they wanted to attract attention. Clearly, it was a trap.

Simo took a deep breath. "It's a familiar scent. It reminds me of the traps my grandfather set when we hunted wolves."

Matthäus chuckled. "So, did you sniff out where the wolf is hiding?"

Simo shook his head. "It's nearby, but he's cunning, hiding very cleverly."

They picked up their binoculars and carefully searched the surroundings, but found nothing suspicious.

"Well, in that case, let's see if we can lure the wolf out." Matthäus carefully attached a silencer to the muzzle of his gun and aimed at the Soviet soldiers by the campfire, pulling the trigger.

With a muffled gunshot, one of the Soviet soldiers near the campfire swung his arm back violently. The soldier hesitated for a moment before clutching his arm and screaming in pain.

The other four Soviet soldiers reacted swiftly, dropping to the ground and scanning the surroundings nervously. Unfortunately, Matthäus and Simo's position gave them a clear view even when these Soviet soldiers were prone. Matthäus kept pulling the trigger, and the Soviet soldiers screamed in agony, clutching their legs.

"Help!"

"Mom!"

"It hurts!"

The pitiful screams were so clear that even Matthäus and the others could hear them distinctly.

Matthäus murmured softly, "Keep screaming. The louder, the better. Let's see if we can lure out that cunning wolf."

At this moment, the soldier whose arm was injured stumbled to his feet and ran forward.

"Tsk, where do you think you're going?" Matthäus pulled the trigger again, and the bullet pierced through the soldier's calf, causing him to fall to the ground in agony. However, he showed no intention of stopping, crawling forward while screaming for help.

"??" Matthäus followed the direction the soldier was crawling and saw a fallen giant tree, which seemed to have been dead for quite some time judging by the withering of its trunk. "Simo, see that tree?"

"I see it, but haven't found anything yet."

"Crawl faster and lead us to him." Matthäus muttered quietly, pulling the trigger again. The bullet didn't hit the soldier but instead buried itself in the snow next to him, kicking up a few snowflakes. However, the effect was still good; watching the soldier's crawling speed increase, Matthäus smirked triumphantly. "Hmph, this cunning fellow never dreamed he'd be tricked by his own comrades."

Just as the soldier crawled about thirty meters from the large tree, Simo suddenly saw a "pile of snow" beside the tree slowly moving in a strange manner. He quickly aimed his binoculars at the target for a closer look and informed Matthäus beside him.

After careful observation by both of them, they finally confirmed that the "snow pile" was indeed moving extremely slowly, almost imperceptibly, towards a larger snow mound nearby. They even saw that the "snow pile" was holding a Mosin-Nagant rifle wrapped in white cloth.

"Let's see where you're running!" Seeing the target about to reach the snow pile, Matthäus decisively pulled the trigger, and the bullet whizzed out, hitting the "snow pile" accurately in the head, sending up a large spray of snow.

Suddenly, Matthäus felt an inexplicable chill rushing from the soles of his feet to the top of his head. His whole body bristled, and without thinking, he instinctively lowered his head, burying almost his entire face in the snow.

"Swoosh...!"

A scalding bullet grazed past Matthäus's head, not only knocking off his winter hat but also taking with it a strand of his hair and a small piece of scalp. If his reaction had been 0.1 second slower, the Soviet sniper lurking in the darkness would have blown his head off.

Almost simultaneously, he heard two gunshots, one from a distance and the other from beside him, fired by Simon.

"Oh my God! Did you hit him?! Did you hit him?! Damn it! Oh God, my head was almost blown off! Damn it!" Matthäus shouted wildly, his mouth full of chaos. If it weren't for the remaining shreds of his sanity, he might have jumped up and flailed about in panic.

Simo replied calmly without moving a muscle, "I hit one, maybe there's more than one of them. You're still alive; why are you making so much noise? Be careful not to let the other side hear you."

Gradually calming down, Matthäus wiped his head, looked at the small bloodstain in his palm, shivered, and touched his chest with lingering fear.

He stepped down, put his knocked-off winter hat back on, changed his shooting position, and cursed softly, "Damn bastard, he deserves to be crushed to dust! Do you think this guy could be Yegor?"

"I don't know, but he's certainly quite cunning." Cunning enough that if Matthäus hadn't almost been hit or if the opponent hadn't also been equipped with a silencer, he wouldn't have discovered the hidden enemy until now. "You're really lucky. Are you okay?"

"My head was almost blown off; what do you think?" Matthäus replied irritably. Through the scope, he saw a patch of fresh blood under the trunk of the big tree. It must have been the Soviet sniper killed by Simo. That guy was really good at finding hiding spots; he blended in with the surroundings so well that they couldn't spot him even after scanning the area several times!

By this time, the injured Soviet soldier had crawled near the big tree. It seemed he had also seen the sniper's body. Pausing for a moment, he laboriously turned over and, panting heavily, stared at the sky, no longer moving.

"It seems there's only one left?" But the two dared not be careless; they stayed vigilant until another batch of Soviet patrol teams arrived in the evening. They buried the dead Soviet sniper on the spot and took back the half-dead Soviet soldiers before finally letting their guard down.