Chapter 1871 - 1400: Artillery Fire Rips Through the Night Sky

Finally, the numbers on the timer hit zero.

The moment the first 152mm howitzer shell was fired, the sound seemed to tear through the night sky over the Mesopotamian Plain.

The muzzle brake spewed flames several meters long, mixed with dense gray smoke, forming a menacing silhouette in the moonlight.

The barrel abruptly recoiled over a meter backward under the massive force, slamming heavily into the hydraulic buffer, kicking up a circle of dust.

The artillery crew had long since adeptly retreated to a safe distance, eyes under their ear protectors fixed on the target zone six kilometers away.

There, the shell was still flying through the air, taking a full twelve seconds to reach its destination.

Inside the Joint Operations Base command center, Lemont was reviewing the latest satellite images when he heard the sound that sent chills up his spine.

It wasn't the sound of an explosion, but the piercing whistle of the shell speeding through the air, creating friction with the atmosphere.

The frequency change in the sound accurately heralded the countdown to impact.

A humming indicated three kilometers, a hissing one kilometer, and when the shriek reached its peak—

"Shelling! Take cover, everyone! Repeat, take cover!"

Lemont's shout was drowned out by the deafening sound of explosions.

The first shell landed accurately on the southeast corner watchtower of the base.

The 152mm high-explosive howitzer shell, weighing 43 kilograms with 6 kilograms of high-energy explosives inside, activated its fuse the instant it touched down, releasing destructive energy in one-thousandth of a second.

The reinforced concrete structure of the watchtower seemed to be crushed from within by an invisible giant hand.

The shockwave first shattered all glass and weak structures, followed by the main load-bearing pillars twisting and breaking under overpressure, causing the entire tower to collapse from the middle.

Flames shot up into the sky, painting the night orange-red, mixed with the ear-piercing screech of twisting metal and the muffled roar of crumbling concrete.

The two snipers inside the tower, Johnson and Miller from the third Delta Force team, didn't even have time to send a warning over the radio before being buried along with their M2010 sniper rifles under the five tons of rubble.

The shockwave spread outward at a speed of two kilometers per second, forming visible air ripples.

Thirty meters away, an armor-reinforced Hummer was completely flipped, spinning a full circle in the air before crashing to the ground upside down.

The fuel tank ruptured, and aviation fuel flooded the ground, igniting into a fierce blaze as it met the flying sparks.

Boom—

The second explosion was even more violent, with a fireball over fifteen meters in diameter illuminating the surrounding area as if it were daylight.

"Southeast corner watchtower destroyed! Two personnel confirmed dead!"

The combat center dispatcher's hoarse shout came through the communication channel, with a constant background of alarm sounds.

"The fire is spreading toward ammunition depot number three, only forty meters away!"

Lemont lay on the floor, feeling as if the whole world was shaking madly.

The concrete walls of the command center absorbed a portion of the blast, but dust and tiny debris still rained down from the ceiling, seeping into his collar and obscuring his vision.

He coughed violently, trying to prop himself up, but the second shell was already on its way.

This shell targeted the northwest corner generator room.

The base's backup power system was concentrated in this semi-underground building.

The shell struck the roof at an almost vertical angle, its armor-piercing warhead easily tearing through thirty centimeters of reinforced concrete, drilling into the structure, and exploding between three parallel diesel storage tanks.

Boom—

This explosion was not a single bang but a series of continuous blasts.

First, the main charge was detonated, then the first 5000-gallon fuel tank, followed by the other two tanks, which sequentially exploded from the heat and pressure.

The chain reaction produced a fireball over thirty meters in diameter, and the rolling black smoke column was visible from several kilometers away.

Over 60% of the base's lighting went out in an instant.

The emergency lighting system activated automatically, but its brightness was only 40% of normal.

The command center was plunged into an eerie interplay of light and shadow, with flashing red alert lights casting flickering shadows on the floor like a visual heartbeat from hell.

"65% power loss! Backup generators completely destroyed!"

"Main water supply pipe ruptured, fire suppression capability lost! The fire is out of control!"

Lemont's eardrums buzzed under constant pressure, barely able to make out the damage reports.

Song Heping had been stationed at this base before and knew the location of every facility.

Now he was directing artillery fire here, with every shell finding its mark.

The more Lemont thought about it, the angrier he got. Struggling, he crawled to the main communications console and grabbed the microphone: "Casualty report! I need a detailed casualty report! Now!"

The third shell came down at this moment.

The intended target was the hangar.

There, the base's most prized two MH-60 Black Hawk special operation helicopters were stationed.

But the ballistic calculations had a slight error, or perhaps it was some twist of fate.

The shell landed twenty meters west of the target, hitting the maintenance workshop adjacent to the hangar.

For the six mechanics and two Delta Force equipment specialists in the workshop, this twenty-meter deviation was meaningless.

A high-explosive warhead detonating in an enclosed space would cause catastrophic additive effects.

The shockwave bounced back and forth between walls, with peak pressure reaching over three times that of an open-space explosion.

The walls first bulged outward with spiderweb-like cracks, then collapsed entirely. The roof was completely blown off, with various tools, parts, and human organs ejected fifty meters into the air, then falling like a surreal rain throughout half the base.

A main rotor blade of a Black Hawk helicopter was ripped apart in the blast, the three-ton alloy component spinning across a distance of dozens of meters, piercing the outside wall of the command center like a giant spear, with its tip ending just five meters from the observation window where Lemont stood.