Chapter 941: The King of Snipers

Crack! A single, sharp gunshot shattered the silence of the position. In the center of the middle-aged sniper’s scope, the Soviet sniper holding a rifle was slammed in the side of the chest. A crimson mist erupted, and he collapsed limply behind the cover he was hiding in.

The Soviet sniper’s spotter saw his partner get hit and fall. In his shock, he quickly judged the direction of the shot. He turned his head, his eyes sweeping over the piles of rubble and debris between the positions, quickly scanning the suspicious-looking places.

But before he could spot his partner’s killer, another bullet arrived. Before he could even process what was happening, a 7.92mm round had shattered the space between his eyebrows. The bullet, carrying blood and bone fragments, passed through his brain, taking his life with it.

“You’re saying this sniper has already killed 557 Soviet soldiers on the Eastern Front?” In the German command post, General Küchler, with an expression of utter disbelief, snatched the brief letter of introduction from the hands of the 14th Panzer Corps staff officer.

“He is a born sniper. He can hit an enemy’s head from 600 meters away. Someone has personally seen him shoot and kill an enemy soldier from a distance of 700 meters…” the officer from the vassal state who had delivered the letter reported respectfully what he knew. “The targets he sets his sights on rarely escape.”

The body of the second soldier from the Soviet sniper team had not even hit the ground before the middle-aged sniper had shifted his rifle. On the roof of that collapsed bell tower, there were indeed two more Soviet snipers hidden. He fired with difficulty, and his third bullet, crossing a distance of over 500 meters, accurately struck one of the Soviet soldiers.

The unlucky bastard who was hit immediately lost his balance and rolled down the sloping, tiled roof. With a cascade of falling broken tiles, he plunged from a height of three stories. The other Soviet sniper tried to duck back into the building, but another bullet took his life.

The fourth Soviet sniper, shot in the chest, struggled for a couple of moments, then was left hanging on the window frame of the bell tower’s roof. His arm still swayed with the inertia for a couple of moments before finally coming to a stop.

In just the blink of an eye, four Soviet snipers had all been taken out by this “down-and-out knight” who seemed to have stepped out of a Western fantasy. And it had been done so cleanly, so fluidly, without a single trace of hesitation.

“Whew!” Tossing aside the tattered cloth he had been using for concealment, the middle-aged sniper grabbed his rifle and quickly moved to the relatively safe base of the ruins. After meeting up with his sidekick, he quickly followed the route he had already scouted, running all the way to another pre-selected sniper’s nest.

And on the Soviet position, a Soviet sniper who had already been well-hidden heard the four gunshots from the distance. His eye still did not leave his scope, but his brow furrowed almost imperceptibly.

From the sound of the shots, it was probably not a Soviet sniper firing. The familiar sound seemed to have said it all—a German sniper had arrived, and a tough, skilled one at that. This experienced Soviet sniper still had no intention of moving. He just kept his gun aimed at the position where the enemy was most likely to appear, as motionless as a stone sculpture.

“This sniper ace from our country is simply a demon. His probability of hitting a moving target in succession is probably the highest record that can be achieved by a human in history,” the officer from the vassal state said with pride. Küchler could completely understand this feeling of introducing a national treasure. If his own unit had such a master, he would also be telling everyone the heroic deeds of this person.

“This record of over 550 kills, was it all done with a sniper rifle?” the German staff officer asked with doubt, his interest piqued.

“Of course not!” the officer from the vassal state replied with a smile. “If you count other means, his kill record might be double that.”

“…” Küchler swallowed. He finally knew that there was a kind of soldier in the world who could elevate killing to the height of creating a world record. Those backward Japanese were still fantasizing about “a thousand-man cut” and “a ten-thousand-man enemy.” In real life, it seemed such a fellow really existed, and Küchler was seeing it with his own eyes!

What kind of existence could so easily finish off 557 enemy soldiers? If the soldiers under his command all had such ability, then his one army group could sweep through the entire Soviet Union. But a dream was just a dream. Küchler was not so foolish as to be overly reliant on a certain type of soldier.

“He’s not the type to just brute-force it! When he runs into trouble, he will reasonably use support and all the favorable factors at his disposal to seize the initiative,” the officer from the vassal state who had come with him said, chattering on like a salesman, boasting about his soldier. “He is a true genius of sniping.”

“If I were you, I’d drop a round of mortar fire in that direction! To be honest, I don’t have the courage to face a master who even brings a few covering teams with him when he goes out, or rather, I’m not willing to do such a dangerous thing when there’s an alternative,” the middle-aged sniper said, panting heavily, to the German platoon leader. “While he’s probably still not gone, we should be able to finish him off.”

“The two mortars in the company, get ready on the coordinates he gave. Two salvos, four rounds!” The platoon leader had been a little skeptical of the middle-aged sniper’s words at first, but since this barrage was not beyond his authority, he was happy to provide some help to his comrades. After all, the other had come from afar. It wouldn’t do to refuse such a simple request for a bombardment.

And so, a short barrage began. The first two shells landed accurately near the suspicious target, and then two more landed even closer. The dust obscured the view. One of the two Soviet snipers was seriously wounded by the shelling and was on the verge of death. The other, although he still hadn’t moved, had no choice but to give up aiming, close his eyes, and hold his breath.

There was no fancy technique. Just using the cover of this round of artillery fire, the middle-aged sniper had found a suitable position, raised the rifle in his hand, and aimed at the smoke-filled position opposite him.

When the Soviet sniper opened his eyes again, he saw in his own scope, on the natural cover opposite him, a middle-aged man in a tattered German SS uniform, holding an old Mauser 98K sniper rifle. His finger instinctively wanted to go for the trigger, but he found that the muzzle of the other’s gun was already flashing.

“Damn it!” this Soviet sniper muttered, and then his head was pierced by a bullet. He fell unwillingly, letting his blood flow from his hair into the rubble beneath him, seeping into the earth and finally drying.

On the German position, the platoon leader watched in shock as the middle-aged man cautiously retreated from his firing position to a safe spot. He finally couldn’t help but ask, “How did you know where he was hiding?”

The middle-aged man gave a harmless smile, then slung his old Mauser sniper rifle over his back and only then replied, “Because I’ve killed a lot of people in this situation. I’m very experienced. I was hoping your artillery fire would be a little more accurate. If you had finished him off, I wouldn’t have had to fire another shot.”

Küchler finally sat in his office chair and read out the name of this legendary sniper from Finland: “Simo Häyhä.” This god of snipers, who had shone so brightly in the Soviet-Finnish War in another timeline, because Akado had changed history, had ultimately not appeared on the stage of the Soviet-Finnish War. But as a volunteer provided by the Finnish government to Germany, he had appeared on the German-Soviet front and had, today, achieved an astonishing kill record of 562 men.

“A man like this should be sent to a sniper school, not wasted on the battlefield—even if he is a Finn, he shouldn’t be wasted on the battlefield like this,” Küchler finally said. He took out his fountain pen, wanting to personally write a letter of recommendation.

But just as he was about to put pen to paper, this general seemed to have changed his mind again. “Wait a little longer! A little longer! After I have completely occupied Stalingrad, I will find a good time to recommend this sniper genius back to Berlin. He should have a medal, an Iron Cross that represents honor!”

It was the same corner, wedged between two ruined walls. The young sidekick was packing up the tattered tent. In the dented military mess tin, the watered-down potato powder was still being heated on time. And the middle-aged man was still sitting on a rock, holding his mess tin and wolfing down the not-so-tasty mashed potatoes. The only difference was that this time, in the unpalatable mashed potatoes, there were some vegetable leaves and sliced dried sausage.

“We infantrymen are poor people, not like those armored soldiers and air force pilots who have plenty to eat and drink,” the German platoon leader, who was sitting not far away, said with respect. “The whole company only managed to scrounge up these five cans of food. If we’re brothers, take them. Don’t think it’s too little.”

Simo Häyhä was not one for false modesty. He nodded and accepted this generous gift. “Alright! I’ll take them all! The men of our 1st Finnish Volunteer Division have a hard time. We’ve never even seen such good things. I’ll take them back for my comrades to have a taste. Thanks.”

The young sidekick came to the German platoon leader, held the cans in his arms, and smiled, revealing a set of white teeth.

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