Chapter 324: Surrounded by the Enemy I (1/2)
Captain Andreas Jaeger rapidly loaded his quick loading tube into his 1419 Jaeger rifle's muzzle. After finishing this task, he affixed his bayonet upon his rifle and prepared for the next wave of attack. He was surrounded and outnumbered while running low on munitions. If something did not change soon, he and his company of elite light infantry would quickly be defeated.
Recently he and his company of Jaegers had been deployed to the front lines to hunt down and destroy the various Italian skirmishers that had popped up on the field of battle. With the superior range and camouflaged equipment, these brave men had led the charge in the ongoing campaign against Austria's enemies within Northern Italy.
The Jaeger Corps had taken up the role of the Royal Austrian Army's premier light infantry as they advanced beyond their main force and hunted down all potential obstacles on their journey. After discovering the locations of the Italian Skirmishers by sheer coincidence, they had begun an extensive campaign to clear the path towards the city of Milan.
Unfortunately, the Italians realized their information was leaked after the Jaeger Corp several minor skirmishes between the Italian ambushers and the Austrian Jaegers. Because of this, the Italians had responded by successfully encircling Andreas' Company while forcing them into defending their position within a small village against a couple of thousand Italian soldiers.
At the moment, the Austrian Jaegers were holed up inside an agricultural village that lies within the vicinity of Milan. During their brief period of respite, they had used their time wisely gathering whatever resources they could find within the town to create a makeshift barricade in an attempt to funnel the Italian Soldiers into their line of fire.
As Andreas finished loading his Jaeger Rifle, he popped his head out from behind cover, aimed down its sights at the charging Italian Horde, and fired his projectile straight into the torso of one of the Italian men at arms.
The hexagonal bullet pierced through the man's breastplate as if it were made of butter before blowing out his insides. Blood flew into the air. However, Andreas did not enjoy the sight. Instead, he ducked behind cover once more and rapidly began to reload his weapon.
While this was going on, all of his men were using a similar strategy. However, in between shots, arrows would rain down upon Andreas, and his forces, one of these arrows fell upon Andreas' camouflaged steel helmet, getting stuck within the netting and faux foliage contained within.
Luckily for him and his men, their armor was vastly superior to the primitive weapons used by the Italians, and they could easily resist the attacks; with this in mind, Andreas finished loading his rifle before aiming down its sights at the next attacker.
The moment he pulled the trigger, the hammer of his action fell, and the flint sparked the gunpowder propelling the hexagonal bullet downrange and into the torso of the man who was no more than five meters away.
After doing so, Andreas did not load his rifle and instead prepared himself for the enemy charge. Before long, the soldiers under his command had also prepared their bayonets and thrust them towards the oncoming Italian soldiers, piercing through their mail and gambeson armor and into their vital organs.
The Italians were funneled into the gaps between the makeshift barricades, a few men at a time while facing the bayonets of a dozen or more Austrian. After well over a hundred Italian soldiers, the wall began to break apart, and Andreas was forced to retreat. As such, he gave the command to his soldiers while gritting his teeth in defeat.
”Fall back to the secondary line!”
With this said, his soldiers who were still standing against the onslaught abandoned the first barricade, where they advanced back towards the second line of defense constructed within the village. As Andreas and his soldiers crossed back to the secondary objective, the defenders behind it opened fire upon the rampaging Italians, where the Austrian Jaegers quickly began to reload their rifles and fire a second volley.
Andreas seriously wished at this moment that he had a Schmidt gun nearby to help deal with the massive numbers they were fighting against. They were too far ahead of the main army to gain support, and the closest units nearby were other Jaeger companies who were most likely unaware of their ongoing predicament.
As his men were firing upon the nearby enemies, he noticed that one of his soldiers was carrying a pouch filled with several grenades, the moment Andreas saw this, he ran over and questioned the man.
”Where the hell did you get these? We're not grenadiers!”
The soldier was so focused on fighting the battle that he forgot he was carrying grenades with him, as such a wide grin appeared on his face as he took ahold of one of the primitive steel grenades and lit its fuse before tossing it into the Italian mob. As it exploded, the device sent shrapnel in all directions, claiming the lives of the nearby Italian soldiers. When the soldier saw this, he began to cheer before answering Andreas' question.
”I had forgotten I had these little bastards! I won them in a card game with some grenadiers; I suppose we're just lucky that high command hasn't begun to crack down on inter-unit gambling yet!”