Zaitsev was doing something he had never done before, but now he had to do—lying next to a corpse that was beginning to decompose, motionless, not making a sound, just scanning the bushes two hundred meters away with a slightly open eye, looking for his prey or ...... Death.

He is very focused on this work, which is both habitual and forced. As long as he moves a little louder, or makes a sound that he shouldn't make, a bullet will burrow into his head in the next second, leaving him with the dead ghost next to him. In order not to let hunger and anxiety tempt him to make such a fatal mistake, he must concentrate all his energy.

He's being targeted.

It's not a description or an expansion, it's a true fact.

In the morning, when Captain Danilov summoned the sharpshooters to tell them that the convoy carrying supplies had been attacked by a small infiltration of enemy troops, a bad feeling haunted him, and when he and his colleagues examined the bodies, he understood what the source of the ominous feeling was.

Thirteen bodies, including three centurions and one second lieutenant of the Forces nouvelles hussars, were all shot in the head.

This means two things: first, the other side is using a rifle, and only that kind of rifle can ensure that the trajectory is stable enough, and second, they are a group of killers with excellent marksmanship;

It is a unit of sharpshooters of humanity.

It is not difficult to understand that the hairless monkeys have been tortured by the Principality's sharpshooters to the point that they can no longer bear it, and they will definitely prepare countermeasures, and the easiest and quickest way is to form the same hunting force themselves. It's easy, it doesn't take much effort, but it's certainly much better than aimless artillery coverage.

The only problem is. How could they have managed to get such a force so quickly and operate deep into the rear of the principality's army?

You know, it is not difficult to find soldiers with excellent marksmanship, there is no shortage of top marksmen in the Albion army, which has been trained longer than the new army of the principality, and the rigid thinking and tradition of the commander are not a problem, compared to their own lives and victories, tradition can be put aside first.

But organize the best shooters and train them in special tactics so that they can master the skills of sniping their prey without being eliminated by the opponent and the skills of surviving in the wild. It will take at least a month or even a few months. No matter how violent the front-line commander is, it is unlikely that he will be able to drive a group of rookies who have not yet fully emerged from the eggshell to the battlefield and give them away. Not to mention, the other side actually crossed the tightly sealed battle line and went to the rear of the fortress to move.

How did they do it?

No one can answer this question. For the big guys above. And that's not the most important issue.

"Your mission is to exterminate those mongrels. Restore the supply line. ”

For the Grand Dukes, the generals, and the tens of thousands of Duchy soldiers stationed in the fortress, this was all that mattered. Although, under the dispatch of professionals, the lost materiel was transferred to the fortress via other routes. But there is no guarantee that humanity will send more of these troops to cut off all supply lines, and once supplies are cut off, the fortress will be in a state of panic. Although the warriors of the Duchy can fight to the death with their flesh and blood, even if they don't have guns and ammunition, if the food can't be delivered, they have to choose between surrender and starvation.

In fact, it is more likely that they will surrender to humanity by killing their own commanders. The "grey cattle" were not stupid in their brains, and there were quite a few clever people among them, and if they found that they had no chance of winning, they would not mind selling themselves and the fortress for a good price, stimulated by the rout, casualties, and disappointment.

Therefore, the sharpshooters must do their best to knock out those annoying flies and restore the smooth flow of supply lines.

"The Grand Duke personally gave the order and ordered us to complete the task as best we can. ”

The captain spoke in the calmest tone possible, as if it were a trivial matter, but the sharpshooters did not think so.

No one would regard a duel as child's play, only a madman would see death as an easy, laughable game. The sharpshooters are brave, but not crazy.

But they couldn't refuse the task, or the captain would eat them before going to court-martial.

So they came to this muddy field full of corpses, searching for and hunting their fellow humans.

But it was not an easy task, and the convoy was attacked on a large road, with open land on one side and forests and swamps on the other. No one with a brain would choose an unobtrusive open place as a hiding place, and those bad guys must be hiding in the forest.

Despite realizing that this could be a trap, Zaitsev and the others had no choice but to enter the damn forest in order to find the cunning enemy and complete the task given to them by the captain.

So, they stepped into the trap.

Relying on the fact that the human sharpshooters were as good as they were, if not better, and had plenty of time to set traps and camouflage themselves, Zaitsev lost several of his comrades in three hours - he counted a total of four shots from Ferguson's rifles, two of which were clearly screams from colleagues stepping on some kind of trap, and so far none of the Principality's rifles rang out.

And that's not even the worst, something much worse than that is tormenting the young hunter of the Ural Mountains to the point that he can barely control himself.

There's a dangerous guy who's searching for him.

There was no clear evidence of a sharpshooter lurking around, it was the edge of the forest and swamp, there were no footprints on the ground, no signs of fallen leaves, and no fresh smell of dirt left over from traps in the air. Unless someone can descend from the sky or come from the swamp to leave such a trace, everyone knows that only a magician can do this, but the priest who was in charge of the outer survey swore by his family that there would be no trace of Mana in the forest, and there could never be a magician in it.

Is it a delusion? Zaitsev doesn't think so. As an experienced hunter, his instincts have always been accurate, and this time the invisible sense of oppression is particularly strong, so he does not dare to slack off at all.

Scanning the surroundings again, the surroundings were still quiet and pleasant, there was no sign of danger, and the nearest suitable ambush site was at least 300 meters away from him. At this distance, even he could hardly guarantee that he would hit the target, and there didn't seem to be a zài anomaly in that location.

Cautiously retracting his head, the young hunter's breathing became rapid.

He could now be sure that there must be a sniper lurking nearby, motionless waiting for him to reveal himself. You must know that this is a forest, but now it is so quiet that you can't even hear the birds, which is not normal at all.

Obviously, there was a great danger lurking in the forest, and the birds that instinctively felt it were gone.

"I still have a chance, and I still have a chance. ”

Muttering a few times in his mind, Zaitsev pondered the impasse at hand.

He couldn't be sure where his opponent was, or even if there really was such an opponent, this was not a trench, there was no one to prepare a gun for him to load well, he only had one chance to shoot, and if he didn't hit the target, he would be slaughtered. But he decided to take a risk and move to another ambush spot - out of professional instinct, he memorized the terrain and the route of movement, as well as all the locations that could be used as lurking points.

Breathe slowly, slowly, so that your heartbeat and body temperature are stable. Zaitsev clinged to the ground, crawling little by little with his hands, reducing his range of movements to a minimum, moving only a few inches at a time, without making a sound or revealing his tracks, stopping from time to time during the crawl, waiting for a while, and then starting to crawl again.

With a distance of less than 50 meters, it took Zaitsev 20 minutes to reach his destination: a corpse blocked the gentle slope ahead. After making a cross on his chest, he carefully lifted his hat.

There were no bullets, no gunshots, and it seemed safe, but the chill on his back did not subside in the slightest, but intensified - the killer remained patient, did not shoot lightly, and still had no suspicious targets near Zaitsev.

The air inhaled into his lungs suddenly turned cold, and the severity of the situation had apparently risen to another level: the bastard was either well hidden, or his hiding place was too far away from this ambush point and out of sight. Zaitsev is not sure which one is for the time being, but either one means that his chances of victory are slim to none, and it is impossible for him to kill an invisible devil.

"Hell!"

Zaitsev gritted his teeth and cursed in his heart:

"Where did the hairless monkey get such a dangerous guy?"

Almost as soon as he realized the danger, his right hand immediately trembled. He had to put down his rifle and gripped his right wrist tightly with his left hand, his claws digging deep into his skin.

Becoming prey for the first time made him nervous, and the difficulty of the enemy made it even worse. Legend has it that the protagonist becomes excited and eager to try when he encounters an opponent who rivals him, but that is only in the story and in the dreadnought - as a soldier, Zaitsev is simply nervous and uneasy.

Even though he is a good and a combat hero, his mind is no different from that of an ordinary soldier, and the fear of death still finds him and haunts him.

With pain and deep breathing, after a quarter of an hour, breathing and heartbeat finally returned to normal, and Zaitsev rejoined the silent duel.

It's a long-term contest with both sides searching for their opponents while keeping quiet. Wait for the opponent's patience to run out, withdraw from the fight, or reveal their position. Only then will the duel end.

The breath grew long, the air around them seemed sticky, and in the span of time that seemed like an hour in a second, the sharpshooters, who didn't even know each other's appearances, searched for each other, waiting for the moment when the trigger was pulled. (To be continued......)