Chapter 56 Target the Tie-Wearers!

Morin quickly moved through the ruins and shadows of the buildings with two squads of reserve soldiers.

His thinking was clear: given the combat effectiveness displayed by the Britannians, a frontal confrontation was suicide.

To relieve the pressure on the flank, they had to disrupt the enemy’s attack rhythm.

And the most effective way to disrupt the rhythm in street fighting was to try to take out their commanding officers.

The characteristic of officers in this era to charge to the front lines certainly gave Morin this opportunity.

Soon, Morin and his soldiers arrived at the left flank position, where the fighting had already reached a white-hot intensity.

The International Brigade fighters were fighting a desperate battle against the constantly surging soldiers of the Northumberland Musket Regiment, relying on the broken buildings and barricades.

But the situation was very grim.

Even with the ‘Street Fighting Theory’ backing them, neither the International Brigade, the National Army, nor the Saxon soldiers had received the corresponding training.

To be honest, if it weren’t for the natural advantage of the defending side, their performance in street fighting was not much better than the enemy’s.

The Britannians had already breached the first row of buildings, and both sides were now fighting room by room, house by house.

Morin did not rush to join the frontal battle. He led his soldiers to quietly climb a three-story building on the side.

From here, he could clearly see the main body of the Britannian force on the street below.

He shouldered his rifle and carefully scanned the enemy crowd.

Soon, he found his target.

It was a Britannian officer wearing a tie, waving a small revolver, and loudly shouting something.

In this era, the identity markers of officers were very obvious.

They usually wore more elaborate uniforms, carried a saber or pistol, and always issued commands from the rear of the formation.

Morin took a deep breath, and steadily pulled the trigger.

“Bang!”

The gunshot was unremarkable, blended into the noisy battlefield.

But the Britannian officer commanding the battle suddenly shook violently. A bloom of blood burst from his chest. He looked down in disbelief, then fell straight down.

The soldiers around him were stunned.

Before they could react, several veteran soldiers with excellent marksmanship around Morin also found their targets and opened fire in succession.

“Bang! Bang! Bang!”

Several more people who looked like officers or non-commissioned officers fell to the ground.

Following this, the others also fired frantically at any target they could aim at.

This single action threw the Britannian forces in this area into complete chaos.

The relatively rigid military tradition of Britannia meant that the initiative of their grassroots soldiers was clearly not as high as that on the Saxon side. In most cases, they had to fight under the direct command of a superior officer.

So, after several officers fell, the soldiers were suddenly in disarray. They didn’t know whether to continue attacking or retreat, and they just froze in place.

Seeing this, the International Brigade soldiers began to counterattack, completely suppressing the Britannian soldiers.

“Nice job! Keep going! Target those wearing ties!”

Morin ordered in a low voice.

The small team he led was like a group of hunters lurking in the dark, constantly sniping key enemy personnel with accurate cold shots.

However, their attack quickly allowed the enemy to pinpoint their approximate location.

A large number of riflemen began firing wildly at the building they were in, causing plaster to pour down the walls.

After several consecutive bullets struck the window frame, Morin and the others dared not show their heads.

To make matters worse, the International Brigade soldiers on the left flank still couldn’t withstand the casualties and began to retreat.

But Morin couldn’t blame them. After all, most of the International Brigade members, who came from all over the world, had no military experience before arriving in the Kingdom of Aragon.

They were rushed into battle after less than three months of basic training upon receiving their equipment.

So, setting aside morale and tenacity, purely from the perspective of combat readiness, it was hard to say they were much stronger than the Kingdom Army’s ‘conscripts.’

With their retreat, the 3rd Platoon’s previously stable defensive area was gradually turning into a salient exposed on three sides, just as Morin had predicted.

This was the situation he least wanted to see.

If the enemy moved any faster, his 3rd Platoon was highly likely to be completely surrounded.

“We have to retreat!”

Morin made a decisive judgment.

He sent out the last remaining messenger by his side.

“Go notify Platoon Sergeant Klaus! Tell him to gather all the squads he can find, including the heavy machine gun positions and the field guns, and immediately abandon the current positions and retreat to the third line of defense deeper in the city! I will figure out a way to delay the enemy for them. Go quickly!”

The messenger took the order and ran.

Meanwhile, Morin himself made an even bolder decision.

He looked at the remaining soldiers beside him, including Corporal Bowman and the two battered squads he commanded, who had just retreated and regrouped. There were a total of twenty-nine men left.

“Corporal Bowman!”

“Here! Platoon Leader!”

“Do you dare to try a big move with me?” Morin looked at him, his eyes blazing with a wild light.

Corporal Bowman grinned, showing his white teeth.

“However you say we should do it, Platoon Leader, we’ll do it!”

“Good man!”

Morin slapped his shoulder heavily, then pulled out the sketch map of Seville from his orderly’s satchel and said to him.

“We are not retreating. We are going further in! We’ll penetrate behind the enemy’s ass, give them a harsh surprise, and then circle back to the defense line!”

“Penetrate?”

Although Bowman and his soldiers didn’t quite understand what Morin meant by ‘penetrate,’ they all became excited.

After all, in their view, as long as they followed Morin, they would be able to give these Britannians a lesson they would never forget.

Soon, Morin, leading these two dozen men, vanished into the labyrinthine ruins, leveraging his ‘if it’s not off, it’s on’ full map vision ability.

At the same time, Platoon Sergeant Klaus received the messenger’s order.

The steady and capable Platoon Sergeant frowned upon hearing Morin’s plan.

He knew how risky the Platoon Leader’s decision was; if it failed, that small detachment would be gone for good.

But he also knew clearly that this was the only way to buy time for the main force to retreat.

And he had a feeling that only Morin could pull off such a dangerous maneuver…

“Understood, execute the order!”

Klaus did not hesitate and immediately began to organize the troops.

He quickly relayed the order to all the squads he could find, instructing them to retreat in an orderly manner, covering each other.

The heavy machine gun teams dismantled their bodies and tripods, retreating first under the cover of the infantry.

And the two precious field guns, through the efforts of the gunners, were reharnessed and towed toward the depths of the city.

Although the entire retreat process was tense, it proceeded in an orderly fashion under the command of the veteran Sergeant Klaus.

(End of this Chapter)