Three more, ask for a recommendation ticket!

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Major Gavrilov was right that the Soviet soldiers lacked medicine.

When the Volyn Fortress occupied the German warehouses, they could actually search for German medicines, but no one thought about this at that time, they only thought about the most important things...... Food.

On the third day, the wounded died.

He had only suffered minor injuries...... A piece of shrapnel the size of a fingernail passed through the canvas of the car and then stuck to his right shoulder, and he didn't notice it at the time, still holding a submachine gun and firing at the enemy.

It wasn't until he walked into the swamp that he felt pain, but the warrior didn't take it to heart, and even pulled it out by pinching the tail of the shrapnel with his fingers, and then found a cloth to bandage the wound.

However, the hot and humid environment and the germs everywhere soon caused the wound to become inflamed and rotten, and the fever began, and the next day when the bandaged cloth was removed, the others were horrified to find that small worms had grown on the wound.

On the third day, the warrior stumbled along with the troops, fell headlong to the ground and never got up again.

And that's not all, what is even more terrifying is that on the fifth day, the troops spent the night in a damp wood...... The marshland is well-watered and fertile, and if there is a piece of land that is a little higher, it will be overgrown with trees and weeds.

The Soviet soldiers even caught a few hares in the woods, so everyone drank the fragrant rabbit soup that night.

The next morning, the whistle blew before dawn.

This was the marching habit set by Major Gavrilov.

In order to have enough time to march, the troops always got up before dawn to prepare, marched as soon as it was dark, rested two or three times, and did not see the road until it was dark.

This decision was of course the right one, because it is not difficult to imagine that the same thing is happening south of the swamp...... The German mechanized troops attacked the Soviets in a big way, and the pace of advance was certainly not slow, and if Major Gavrilov and his party walked slowly, they would fall into the German encirclement when they got out of the swamp.

When the soldiers were tidying up their bags, they found that the three wounded could not wake up, and they had already lost their breath when they took a breath.

This was puzzling to the paramedics, as one of the three wounded had only minor injuries, and it was not normal for all three to die at the same time, so it was natural that they should be examined as necessary.

As soon as he lifted his clothes, everyone was startled: the three of them were densely packed with leeches, all of them fat, big and red.

Obviously, the three of them unknowingly let the leech drain the blood in their sleep...... Leeches inject an anesthetic into the body as they suck blood, so that they don't feel pain at all.

Several of the female soldiers screamed and ran around in fright, and Agata was also frightened, and until she walked on the march, she kept rubbing her arms and checking for leeches sticking to her body.

On the night of the sixth day, when the troops had found a habitat and were stationed, Major Gavrilov called a meeting of several officers, including Shulka.

The campfire next to it was boiling water, and Major Gavrilov pointed to a point on the map by the light of the fire and said, "Our location is very much here...... If we calculate more than 40 kilometers per day, we should have walked about 250 kilometers! ”

That's another trouble going deep into the swamp...... There was no GPS navigation, and there were no obvious landmarks in the swamp, so it was impossible to determine where you were.

"Now it's time for us to make a decision!" Major Gavrilov took the water handed by the orderly, took a sip, and then continued: "Should we continue deeper into the swamp or get out of this swamp!" ”

So Shulka understood what Major Gavrilov was worried about: no one knew where the Germans in the south had hit, so it was impossible to determine whether it was the Germans or the Soviets who came out of the swamp.

"I think we should keep going!" Captain Venyakov advised: "At the pace of the march of the Germans in the Minsk direction, they may well have advanced under the city of Kiev!" ”

Major Gavrilov shook his head and said: "We can't go to Kyiv, because there is only enough food for two days, and it will take at least five days to get to Kyiv...... Some of us may make it out alive, but at least half of us will stay here forever! ”

"Then we have no other choice!" Captain Venyakov said: "Go ahead one day, and then get out of the swamp!" ”

"No, we should get out of the swamp tomorrow!" Major Gavrilov said: "Because we dare not guarantee that one day we will be able to get out of the swamp!" ”

The officers could not help but be silent, this was undoubtedly dangerous, but they had to admit that Major Gavrilov was right...... They had to give themselves a little room to maneuver, and if the estimated position was not the same as the actual situation, or if they were disoriented and ran out of food and did not get out of the swamp for some reason, it would be more painful than encountering the Germans.

Major Gavrilov turned his gaze to Shulka and asked, "What do you think, Shulka?" ”

"I have no ideas, Comrade Major!" Shulka replied.

Shulka really has no say in this, after all, he can even get the northeast and southeast wrong.

When he returned to his camping position, Shulka racked his brain to recall the details of the war in the southern part of the Soviet Union...... The progress of the German Army Group South did not go well, but the Soviets suffered heavy casualties despite being caught off guard.

Soon, the Southwestern Front of the Soviet Union was ordered to retreat 200 kilometers to organize defense within 8 days.

The reason is that after 200 kilometers there is a line of defense that the West calls the "Stalin Line". (Note: "Stalin Line" is the name of the Western West, and the Soviet Union has never used this designation.)

This line of defense was the state border of the USSR in 1939.

It was popular to build strong fortifications on the border during this era, most notably the Maginot Line in France, the Siegfried Line in Germany, and the Mannerheim Line in Finland.

This was clearly influenced by the trench warfare of World War I.

The Soviets were no exception, building a series of barricades along the border and connecting them with a line of defense...... This is the so-called "Stalin Line".

Originally, this "Stalin Line" could still play a little role, but the problem was that the Soviet army expanded westward after 39 years and pushed the border to Poland, so the Soviet army was busy building fortifications on the new border and ignored the "Stalin Line" and even moved the equipment of the "Stalin Line" forward.

As a result, this "Stalin Line", which had been given great hope, could not stop the German advance at all.

At this time, Shulka calculated and felt that after getting out of the swamp, he was in the position of the "Stalin Line".