When Hu Hao told the officers to locate the Allied command center, they were entirely clueless as to how. They all stared at him blankly.
“You need to use your brains. Based on the Allied forces’ current deployments and the actual situation on the ground, it is entirely possible to deduce the location of their command center.
“In war, the soldiers on the ground rely on courage, but as you command larger and larger forces, you must rely on your intellect. You can’t expect to become a division commander and still lead the charge yourself, can you? If a division commander is leading the charge, it means you’re fighting a battle to the bitter end!” Hu Hao explained, addressing the room.
“Yes, sir!” the officers nodded in understanding.
“Li Nan, begin test-firing on the areas where the Allied forces are likely camped. Don’t expect to kill many of them. The goal is to let them know that the moment we have an opening, we will counter-attack. Force them to fight us properly.
“We need them to train our troops. If they refuse to fight and we lack a capable sparring partner, how are our forces supposed to improve their combat effectiveness?” Hu Hao instructed Li Nan and the others.
“Yes, sir! We are calculating the coordinates now!” Li Nan replied immediately upon hearing the order.
“Good. Continue with your operations. I will be watching!” Hu Hao nodded.
“Yes, sir!” Li Nan acknowledged.
Hu Hao then had a staff officer bring a desk over. He sat down and resumed his writing. If anything required his attention, a staff officer would inform him, and he could easily step back into the command center.
About twenty minutes later, Li Nan’s artillery opened fire.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!” The artillery positions concealed within the city suddenly roared to life, hurling shells toward the areas where the Allied forces were presumed to be resting.
“Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!” As the Allied soldiers tried to sleep, they heard the terrifying shriek of incoming artillery shells. Meanwhile, Eastern Spirit artillery observers perched atop high-rises peered through their binoculars, trying to pinpoint the Allied encampments using the flashes of the explosions.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!” Almost immediately, blinding flashes erupted about ten li away, followed closely by the deafening roar of explosions.
“Damn it! They actually fired first! Take cover! Take cover! Order our artillery to calculate the coordinates of their firing positions! Ha, I never expected that we wouldn’t attack them, yet they would dare to attack us!” Kelly stood watching the distant explosions.
The shells were landing squarely in the areas where his infantry was resting. This bombardment would definitely inflict casualties. However, Kelly wasn’t panicking. By firing, the Eastern Spirit forces had exposed the locations of their artillery.
“I truly didn’t expect them to open fire at a time like this. It’s baffling!” Jasman stood nearby, shaking his head with a wry smile.
“Perhaps it isn’t the commander we suspected. It could just be a scattered remnant of the Eastern Spirit army that failed to retreat in time. After all, our forces are moving into position in other directions as well; even if they retreated now, they couldn’t rejoin their main force!” Kelly suggested, looking at his Chief of Staff.
“Let’s put that aside and just observe for now. It’s too early to draw conclusions. However, I genuinely don’t understand their reasoning for opening fire now!” Jasman replied, still shaking his head with a smile.
He couldn’t fathom why the Eastern Spirit forces would choose this moment to bombard them just to kill a handful of infantrymen. Firing now was far less effective than firing during an Allied assault. The Eastern Spirit artillery was essentially firing blind.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!” The explosions continued, gradually walking forward and extending deeper into the Allied encampments.
After watching for over ten minutes, Kelly began to feel something was wrong. Their casualties were mounting, and the artillery fire was extending. They had no idea where the next volley would land. The entire 1st Corps was now on edge, staring tensely toward the source of the explosions.
“What is the meaning of this? Are they just going to keep firing endlessly?” Kelly asked his Chief of Staff.
“What are they playing at? They’ve been bombarding us for over ten minutes with no sign of stopping. I say we have our artillery return fire and show them we have big guns too!” Jasman suggested, looking at Kelly.
“Order the artillery to locate their positions and return fire immediately! Damn them, they dare challenge us to an artillery duel? They have at most 50 howitzers over there; we have over 200! I will blow them to pieces!” Kelly ordered furiously.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!” Explosions continued to rip through the Allied camp in the distance, killing and wounding many soldiers. Kelly stood firm, waiting for his own artillery to open fire.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!”
A few minutes later, an Allied artillery position to the southwest of the command center began bombarding Yonghe City. Based on their calculations, they had pinpointed the Eastern Spirit artillery positions within several of the city’s parks, and they were now raining shells down on those specific areas.
“The Allied artillery is returning fire!” Seeing the flashes in the distance, Hu Hao knew the Allied guns were responding. Soon after, explosions rocked the city as shells slammed into the designated park areas.
“Order the artillery to cease fire! Locate their artillery positions and wipe them out!” Li Nan commanded. Hu Hao nodded approvingly but remained silent.
“Calculating coordinates now!” several artillery staff officers reported.
“Hmph, keep firing if you dare! I guarantee the enemy commander is a complete fool. Daring to challenge us with such a pitiful number of guns? Ridiculous!” Kelly sneered when he noticed the Eastern Spirit artillery had ceased firing.
His force was a heavy mechanized corps; how could they possibly lack artillery? Not only did they have artillery, but they possessed a massive amount of it.
“Have the subordinate units tally the casualties. We’ve likely lost several hundred men. What a waste!” Jasman remarked.
By ‘waste,’ he meant the Eastern Spirit artillery firing now was a waste of ammunition. If they had waited to fire during an Allied assault, the casualties inflicted would have been far greater.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!” The Allied artillery continued to pound the parks inside Yonghe City.
“We’ve located their artillery positions!” an Eastern Spirit staff officer announced.
“Transmit the coordinates to the artillery commander immediately! Tell them to wipe out the Allied guns!” Liu Yichuan ordered without hesitation.
“Yes, sir!” The staff officer quickly relayed the calculated coordinates to their own artillery batteries.
A few minutes later, the roar of artillery once again erupted from within Yonghe City. This time, the shells flew straight toward the Allied artillery positions.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!” Massive explosions rocked the southwest corner of the Allied encampment, startling Kelly, who had just returned from the observation port. He rushed back to the southwest observation port and peered through his binoculars.
“Damn it! They’re bombarding our artillery positions! They… they…!” Kelly stared at his Chief of Staff in shock.
“It is the commander from Bopa City! This is exactly how the artillery positions of the two corps we lost earlier were destroyed! We must order our artillery to cease fire immediately! They baited us into firing to reveal our positions!” Jasman urged Kelly.
“Damn it! If we don’t fire back, they’ll just keep shelling us! How are our troops supposed to rest tonight? If this keeps up, we’ll have no choice but to launch an attack!” Kelly raged.
That Allied artillery position housed dozens of guns. After being pounded by Hu Hao’s forces, there likely wouldn’t be many left intact, and the artillerymen themselves were in grave danger.
“No, we cannot attack! We just ordered the men to rest. They’ve let their guard down and are trying to sleep.
“If we order an attack now, morale will be abysmal. On top of that, forcing them back into combat right after telling them to rest will breed severe resentment among the ranks!” Jasman shook his head firmly.
“Then what do we do? Just let them bomb us? Won’t that lower morale too?” Kelly countered.
“Damn it, they’re doing this on purpose! They just want to torment us. If we had known this would happen, we would have launched the attack right from the start! At least then we would have forced them to reveal their firepower. Now, no matter what we choose, it’s a bad option!” Jasman said, equally frustrated.
“Can we retreat? Order the troops to fall back for now!” a senior staff officer suggested from behind them.
“Absolutely not!” Kelly and Jasman shouted in unison. They were the 1st Corps of the Mara Empire! Retreating at the first sign of trouble was completely unacceptable!
“But you’re saying we can’t attack, and we can’t counter-attack. We have to think of something, right?” the senior staff officer pressed.
“We must find a solution. We cannot remain passive like this. If this continues, the soldiers will start cursing us!” Jasman paced, trying to formulate a plan.
“Could we deploy the air cavalry to strike their artillery positions?” another staff officer asked.
“No. Our air cavalry would likely be blown out of the sky by those rocket launchers before they even reached the artillery positions. I say we contact the bomber squadrons and have them carpet-bomb those areas!” Jasman suggested, looking at Kelly.
“Contact the bombers immediately! Order them to bomb Yonghe City and destroy their artillery positions!” Kelly ordered the staff officers behind him without hesitation.
“Damn it. We don’t even know who we are fighting yet, and we are already resorting to calling in bombers!” Jasman cursed under his breath. He was beginning to realize just how difficult this opponent was going to be.
(End of Chapter)