On the night of May 24, in the sea west of the fortress of Sevastopol, a fleet from the port of Constanta in southeastern Romania quietly approached the Crimean peninsula under the cover of night.

In the fleet, on the transport ship "Sardinia", Lieutenant Batistuta, the platoon leader of the first company of the N company of the NP battalion of the Marine Brigade of San Marco, stood at the bow of the transport ship, holding a telescope and staring at the sea in the east.

The outline of the coastline flashed in the telescope, and from time to time there were flashes of fire on the ground, which were the light of the explosion of shells when the German-Italian combined fleet shelled Cape Kersen.

According to the information revealed by the battalion commander Major Garibaldi during the battalion headquarters operational meeting, the shelling of Cape Kersen by the German-Italian combined fleet at night was not only to destroy the Soviet fortifications on the ground, but also to indicate the target to the imminent landing of the San Marco Marine Brigade at night.

After all, when you make a landing on the sea in the dark of night, it is easy to deviate from the target if no one indicates the direction.

The San Marco Marine Brigade consists of four battalions, "Barfire", "Grado", "Tobrucque" and NP Battalion, of which the first three battalions are Marine Battalions, and the NP Battalion consists of two special forces, N Force and P Force.

Unit N has 580 men under its jurisdiction and specializes in swimming and diving operations.

Unit P has 240 men under its jurisdiction and is good at airborne operations.

The NP battalion was to attack as the first landing force to seize a landing ground for the follow-up units of the Marine Brigade "San Marco" at Cape Kerson, southwest of the fortress of Sevastopol.

Thinking of the battle he was about to join, Lieutenant Batistuta put down his binoculars and muttered something in his mouth.

"We have so little time to prepare."

Looking at the waterproof watch on his wrist and seeing that the watch hands were already pointing to twelve o'clock at midnight, Lieutenant Batistuta returned to the cabin to meet his men in the platoon.

Lieutenant Batistuta had a platoon commander and two squads, while the Italian infantry squads, unlike the Germans, had 20 men each, divided into a machine gun crew of 9 men and two light machine guns, and a rifle crew of 11 men.

Calling the officers and non-commissioned officers among his subordinates, Lieutenant Batistuta said: "Gentlemen, the twenty-fourth of May has just passed, and now it is the twenty-fifth of May, and the time has come for us to leave, and our brigade will be used as a sharp knife to stab the Russians in the back, and our NP battalion will be used as the tip of the sharp knife to pierce the Russian lines, and we can only win, not lose." ”

"There can only be victory, not defeat!" Officers and non-commissioned officers shouted in unison.

"Gather your subordinates and assemble outside the cabin." Lieutenant Batistuta said.

With that, Lieutenant Batistuta picked up the M1938 submachine gun on the table on the side and hung it on his chest, and walked out of the cabin with his marching bag on his back.

On the deck, soldiers and officers of the NP Battalion walked out of the cabins one after another to form a neat line, and then separated and walked to the left and right sides of the ship.

On the left and right sides of the "Sadinia", the crew methodically lowered the lifeboats to the surface.

Lieutenant Batistuta and five soldiers attached to the platoon slowly climbed down the rope ladder and jumped into the lifeboat.

Once they were seated, the crew of the lifeboat hoarded their oars and rowed towards the sea to the east.

Lieutenant Batistuta looked up, and the fire on Cape Kerson in the distance was particularly dazzling in the night, indicating the direction of the landing for the approaching troops.

The sailors paddled hard, and one lifeboat after another made their way through the dark sea and quickly approached Cape Kerson.

There was no light from Cape Kerson except for the fire from the explosion of artillery shells, including searchlights that strafed the sea, and the Soviets strictly enforced the wartime light control orders.

In order to save the precious physical strength of the officers and men of Unit N to cope with the battle that would inevitably break out after the landing, the first stage of the voyage was completed by lifeboats.

When the lifeboat slowly approached about a kilometer from the shore, the soldiers of the N force on board jumped into the sea.

Lieutenant Batistuta checked the equipment he was carrying, and then jumped into the sea with a black lifebuoy on his back.

The moment he fell into the water, a chill invaded his body from the skin of his whole body, and Lieutenant Batistuta couldn't help but shiver.

With the strength of his body, which he had cultivated over many years of hard training, Lieutenant Batistuta quickly adapted to the cold brought by the water, waved his hands and feet, and paddled eastward in a breaststroke position, and behind him, the lifeboat turned back one after another.

Time and distance passed imperceptibly, and when Lieutenant Batistuta visually measured himself five hundred meters from the shoreline, the fire of the shell explosion on Cape Kerson quickly diminished, and then vanished, and the earth and sea were all covered in night.

With the position left before the fire was extinguished, Lieutenant Batistuta continued to swim ahead, and with the help of the starlight, the tall silhouette of the cliff on Cape Kerson could be faintly seen in the distance.

The distance of five hundred meters disappeared meter after meter, and Lieutenant Batistuta glanced at the rocky cliffs of Cape Kerson on the right, swam to the left, and continued along the shore into the bay of Kozacha on Cape Kerson.

The southeasterly hollow of Kozacha Bay leads directly into Cape Kelsen, and the bay contains Soviet-built dock facilities along which Lieutenant Batistuta and his men can go ashore and bypass the difficult cliffs.

Before setting off, Lieutenant Batistuta had seen aerial photographs of the pier, which showed that all the buildings on the pier had been destroyed in the previous bombardment and shelling, and that as long as he and his men were able to get ashore and rush into the destroyed buildings, the first step of the mission could be said to be successful.

As for the second step of the mission, it is to eliminate any enemies found inside the building, while also dealing with a possible counterattack by the Russians.

Less than 200 meters after entering the bay of Kozacha, a rectangular pier stretches out from the coast on the right.

This was it, Lieutenant Batistuta swam towards the pier, and soon he found the pier made of cement.

Taking advantage of the docks, the sea, and the night, Lieutenant Batistuta and his men quietly approached the shore along the pier, and then rushed up the front slope of the shore.

Lying on his stomach on the shore, Lieutenant Batistuta was in good spirits, reached out and took off the wet military shoe cover from his back and put it on his foot, and then took off the M1938 submachine gun behind his back and held it in his hand.

There was only one lone house on the ground ahead, presumably a dock office or something, but the roof had been lifted off and half of it had collapsed.

To the north and south of the dock office, after passing through an open field, there was a complex of buildings each, each of which was not very large, with only seven or eight houses.

Batistuta turned and made a few gestures to the deputy platoon commander behind him, and the deputy platoon commander, Romagnoli, then led a group to the dock office.

The figure of the first squad entered the dock office, and the whole process went smoothly, and there was no exchange of fire, and Lieutenant Batistuta then led the second squad to the complex north of the dock office.

The process of occupying the northern complex was also smooth, and after seeing the second squad successfully occupy the dilapidated northern complex, Lieutenant Batistuta's hanging heart was put back in his stomach.

The next task is to wait for dawn and wait for the follow-up troops······

Bang······ A crisp gunshot interrupted Lieutenant Batistuta's train of thought, and before he could find the direction where the shots rang out, he clicked······ A barrage of machine-gun fire followed.

Looking to the south where the gunshots had rang out, Lieutenant Batistuta saw strings of tracer bullets flying by, cutting through the night like electric whips.

Someone is exposed, good luck to you!

Looking at the fires rising in the south, Lieutenant Batistuta thought silently.