The Twilight of Empire: Starting from Dunkirk

Chapter 15 The Miller's Daughter

May 30, 1940, 9:30 AM. Northern France, on the banks of the Lis River, near a secluded bend in the river near Melville.

The sky wasn't blue; instead, it had a sickly grayish-white hue, like an eyeball with cataracts.

Beneath this layer of murky clouds, a buzzing sound, like that of an angry bumblebee, was hovering overhead.

"Stay hidden! Turn off the engine! Don't look up!"

Arthur's voice came through a throat intercom into the cabs of every truck. His voice was low, yet carried a chilling undertone.

This is not a case of being overly sensitive.

Ever since Jeanne intercepted the German Army Group Command's hysterical rant on the public channel half an hour earlier—about the "sugar tragedy" and "twelve damned Opel trucks"—Arthur knew very well that their "newbie protection period" was over.

They are no longer the respected "7th Armored Division Logistics Company," but the number one saboteurs on the entire Army Group B's wanted list.

The striking black Iron Cross emblem on the car door was no longer a talisman for crossing the line of fire, but a bright red bullseye painted on the forehead.

Once spotted by the overhead "eye in the sky," this reconnaissance plane will not wave its wings as amicably as before. It will immediately press the radio transmitter to send the coordinates to the Ju-87 "Stuka" dive bomber wing circling above the clouds.

At that time, they will no longer be greeted with champagne and cigars, but with several 500-kilogram aerial bombs falling from the sky, and the terrifying whistling of the "Jericho Horn".

"Quick! Get moving! Unless you want to turn into turkeys in the oven!"

Urged on by Arthur, twelve Opel Lightning trucks disguised as German soldiers suddenly darted into the dense poplar grove by the roadside like startled rabbits.

The drivers slammed on the handbrakes, their movements so rough they nearly snapped the levers. The engineers jumped out of the vehicles, frantically breaking down the surrounding bushes and covering the reflective windshields and rearview mirrors with dead branches and camouflage netting. Everyone held their breath; the pounding of their hearts could be heard clearly in the deathly silence of the forest.

A few seconds later, a huge shadow swept across the treetops.

That was a Henschel Hs 126 reconnaissance aircraft.

This high-wing monoplane, known to the Germans as the "Flying Eye," was flying slowly along the road at an extremely low altitude—only about two hundred meters. Its belly-mounted Carl Zeiss Rb 20/30 aerial camera, like a greedy single eye, was constantly opening and closing its shutter, recording every inch of the ground on film.

Arthur leaned against the trunk of an old oak tree, holding the telescope he had taken from the dead man, and held his breath.

Through the gaps in the leaves, he could even make out the face of the observer in the back seat of the plane. The German was leaning out, scanning the river below with binoculars.

In the RTS view, a bright red "Reconnaissance Alert" icon is flashing wildly in the upper right corner of Arthur's retina.

[Warning: Enemy aerial reconnaissance unit approaching.]

Current concealment level: 85% (covered by trees)

[Exposure risk: Moderate. Remaining silent is recommended.]

"Damn flies."

Sergeant McTavish squatted beside Arthur, chewing on a blade of grass, his hand gripping the handle of the Bren machine gun tightly. "Sir, should we shoot it down? At this distance, I can take it down with half a magazine..."

"Get that damn finger off the trigger, Sergeant."

Arthur gave him a cold look. "This plane is equipped with a radio. If you fire, in five minutes, an entire squadron of Stukas will turn this place into the moon. Do you want to be a hero, or a piece of charred remains?"

McTavish would never have the chance to see the "lunar surface" in his life—in his barren imagination, it was probably a place even worse than the Scottish Highlands after being hit by a meteorite. But he understood the warning in the lord's tone, a warning more chilling than the cold wind.

The sergeant shrank back, reluctantly pulling his finger out of the tempting trigger guard as if he had been burned.

The Hs 126 circled twice in the air, but found nothing amiss. Finally, it flapped its wings and flew southeast—towards Bettina, where the main force was engaged in combat.

Arthur breathed a sigh of relief only after the engine noise completely disappeared into the clouds.

But before he could fully relax, the situation on the RTS map made him frown.

The green area that originally represented "safety" on the map is shrinking rapidly, like a piece of jade being thrown into strong acid.

Arthur's gaze fell upon a scarlet arrow hurtling westward at an astonishing speed.

The brightness of that spot of light far surpassed that of the mediocre neighboring units around it, like a ruby ​​mixed in with broken glass, radiating a heart-pounding frequency.

In Arthur's system of evaluation, the German army was also divided into different levels.

Those ordinary infantry divisions that marched slowly in the rear, such as the 225th Infantry Division, only had the most basic, dusty "Wehrmacht" insignia above their heads. In the system's judgment, they were nothing more than a mass-produced group of "white-label trash" without any special attribute bonuses, the kind of expendable supplies whose deaths wouldn't even make the commander frown.

But the area surrounding this battlefield is practically an exhibition of "ace all-stars".

To the south, the arrow that was weaving through the enemy lines like a sharp arrow flashed with a ghostly blue light, signifying extreme danger: [7.Pz.Div (Ghost)· Heroic (Heroic)] [Commander: Erwin Rommel] [Traits: Mobility +40%/Ambush Bonus/Sight Suppression] That was the "Devil's Army" that struck fear into the hearts of the entire French army, so fast that even the system's refresh rate could hardly keep up.

To the north, the still massive red glowing spot, though stagnant, represents the 6th Armored Division that he had just tricked: [6.Pz.Div (Kempf)· Elite] [Status: Severe Mechanical Failure (Debuff)/Extreme Rage] Although the icon displays a glaring "Engine Damage" negative status, it is still a wounded heavy beast; even a starved camel is bigger than a horse.

Further to the flank, there was the 10th Panzer Division, belonging to Guderian's 19th Panzer Corps. The heavy armor shield icon on it was enough to make one's teeth ache.

But what sent chills down Arthur's spine the most was the relentless light in the east.

In terms of troop size, it was merely the size of a reinforced mechanized company—two half-track vehicles, a few motorcycles, and a few dozen men. On a large map, this force was comparable to a reconnaissance platoon of an armored division.

But it bears a tactical prefix, gleaming with gold, that only model units are entitled to:

【GD (Großdeutschland) · Legendary (Legendary/Sample)】

In the commander section, that name was flashing an ominous crimson:

[Tracker: Major Heinrich von Stransky] [Unit Status: High Morale (Locked) / Well-Equipped (120%) / Personal Hatred (Max)]

This doesn't mean that these few dozen men could defeat one of Rommel's divisions, but rather it's the highest evaluation given by the system based on "unit density" and "overall effectiveness".

This means that every soldier in this small unit is an "Alpha-class" individual selected from hundreds of thousands of German soldiers; their morale is always locked at a constant level, their shooting accuracy and tactical execution are 1.5 times that of ordinary troops, they receive double the salary, and they are equipped with the latest automatic weapons.

This is a scalpel that can precisely sever your throat even in a battlefield where tens of thousands of people are fighting.

"What a vengeful German Shepherd."

Arthur looked at the spot of light that still stood out conspicuously among the group of big shots and couldn't help but mutter a complaint to himself.

"Why abandon the main British force in front of you, and forgo the readily available military merit, to lead half a company on a chase of my few beat-up trucks for dozens of kilometers?"

He shook his head, a hint of helplessness on his lips.

"So what if I borrowed your name and ruined your reputation? Is it really necessary to relentlessly pursue this like a wronged woman who has been abandoned? It seems that this Prussian nobleman's mental fortitude is not as thick as their tank armor."

Despite his complaints, Arthur unconsciously tightened his grip on his cane.

He knew perfectly well that this meant the nature of the conflict had changed. This was no longer a simple cat-and-mouse game, but a deadly personal feud. Strunzsky had broken free of the normal chain of command and become a cruise missile specifically designed to destroy him.

The entire Flanders plain resembles a fishing net being tightened.

And he was that fish that slipped through the net, unaware that he had already been targeted by a harpoon.

"We can't take the main road anymore." Arthur looked at an inconspicuous gray branch line on the map. "It's too conspicuous. We need to find a place to hide until dark, and then use the cover of night to infiltrate the Ahe River defense line."

His finger slid across the holographic map, eventually stopping at a small green dot located on the banks of the Lis River.

[Location: Old Windmill] [Status: Neutral/Civilian Facility] [Currently Occupied: No Hostile Units] [Concealment Ratio: High]

"Everyone get in the car." Arthur put away the map, waved his cane, and said, "I'm taking you to a good place. Hopefully, there'll still be flour there, not German machine guns."

……

The convoy bumped along a muddy country road.

The scenery here was a stark contrast to the smoke-filled battlefield just kilometers away. The Lis River flowed quietly, its waters a murky, yellowish-brown.

In local legend, this river is called the "Golden River".

This wasn't because there was gold dust at the bottom of the river, but because the finest flax in France was soaked in this river for degumming. The rotting flax stalks released a special chemical that turned the river water yellow, while simultaneously bringing enormous wealth.

But at this moment, Arthur did not smell the sour smell of fermented flax, but the rusty smell of approaching war.

Turning a bend in the river, a huge, ancient windmill came into view.

It was a typical Flemish wooden windmill, its black blades hovering motionless in mid-air like a giant cross. The main building of the mill was made of red brick, and the walls were covered with ivy, making it look quite old.

Even on the brick wall, Arthur can see some old bullet holes—scars left here from the First World War more than twenty years ago.

"Stop the car. Set up a cordon."

Arthur gave the order.

The soldiers quickly jumped off the trucks and established a defensive position using the low walls and bushes surrounding the mill. Lieutenant Jeanne, carrying a submachine gun, followed Arthur cautiously toward the tightly closed oak door.

"Thump, thump, thump."

Arthur tapped the door knocker with his cane.

No one responded. The only sound was the creaking of the windmill blades in the wind.

"Nobody here?" McTavish asked, preparing to kick the door open.

"No, someone's there," Arthur said, looking at the still-damp geranium by the door. "And they're watching us."

The door slowly opened a crack.

A dark, double-barreled shotgun was extended.

"Get out of here, you German."

An aged but powerful voice came from under the door, speaking French with a heavy northern accent, "You've already eaten all the flour here! Go look elsewhere, maybe there'll be some food in hell!"

Arthur did not draw his gun. He simply turned slightly to the side, revealing the British Army uniform insignia beneath his leather overcoat, and gestured for Jeanne to come forward and negotiate.

"Sir, please put down your gun," Jeanne said in gentle French. "We are not Germans. We are British Expeditionary Force soldiers, and there are liaison officers from your country. We just want to find a place to take shelter from the air raids."

The eye peeking through the crack in the door blinked, as if trying to confirm something.

A few seconds later, the door opened completely.

Standing at the door was an elderly man with gray hair. He wore faded old French army trousers from World War I, and his left leg was a wooden prosthetic, causing him to walk with a limp. He even had a Verdun Battle medal pinned to his chest, oxidized and blackened.

Pierre, the owner of the mill, was also a survivor of the last World War.

"British?"

Pierre put down his shotgun, his cloudy eyes sweeping over Arthur's eclectic attire—a German leather overcoat, a British uniform, and that somewhat affected walking stick.

"Hmph, what a mixed bag of clothes," the old man muttered, but his hostility had clearly subsided. "Come in. As long as you don't mind the musty smell."

The mill's interior was vast, with a massive wooden gear dominating the center. The air was thick with the mingled smells of aged flour and machine oil.

"Why didn't you flee?"

Arthur found a clean chair, sat down, and lit a cigarette. His gaze swept over the room like an eagle's—simple furniture, a black-and-white photo of a family of three hanging on the wall, the man in his military uniform, and several empty flour bags piled in the corner.

"Escape? Where to escape to?"

Pierre poured Arthur a glass of cloudy cider and tapped his wooden leg with a self-deprecating laugh.

"Twenty years ago, I lost a leg in Verdun, but I didn't run. Now I'm seventy years old, am I really going to throw my old bones out on the road for these gray-clad German bastards?"

The old man stubbornly raised his chin, a pride and naiveté unique to veterans of that "age of knights."

"Besides, Germans are soldiers too. I've met their fathers, on the Somme, in Verdun. They may be ruthless, but they follow the rules. I don't believe they would mistreat a lame old man and a child."

Arthur paused for a moment, his fingers holding the cigarette between his fingers.

"child?"

As if in response to his question, soft footsteps echoed down the wooden stairs.

A small head peeked out from behind the railing.

It was a little girl, about seven or eight years old. She wore a patched floral dress, her golden hair was messy, and she was clutching a rag doll made of tattered cloth tightly in her arms. The doll had only one eye, made of a button.

The little girl didn't scream or cry like most children. She just stared at the room full of heavily armed soldiers with her big, clear, sea-blue eyes, as pure as the upper reaches of the Lis River.

Finally, her gaze fell on Arthur.

Arthur's image at this moment was far from flattering. His face was smeared with engine oil and gunpowder, and the bandage on his left arm was stained with blood. He exuded a cold, hard, and intimidating aura of killing intent.

But in her eyes, this brother just seemed to be... very tired.

She ran down the stairs, her bare feet stepping on the dusty floor.

"Sophie! Go back!" Pierre shouted sternly.

But the little girl didn't listen. She walked straight up to Arthur and pulled something out from behind her back like a treasure.

It was a piece of black bread. It was only the size of a palm, as hard as a rock, and even moldy on the edges.

"elder brother."

Sophie's voice was soft, yet it silenced the noisy mill.

"Eat it. Grandpa said it will stop hurting if you eat it."

She stood on tiptoe and struggled to hand the piece of black bread to Arthur. She saw the blood on Arthur's arm and naively thought that her brother had been injured because he was hungry.

McTavish froze, holding the half-open can. Williams, who was cleaning his gun, stopped what he was doing. Jeanne turned away and quietly wiped her eyes.

Arthur looked at the rough, even slightly musty bread.

In his RTS God-like perspective, the world is made up of data. [Unit: Civilian (Child)] [Status: Malnourished/Unarmed] [Value: 0]

As a rational time traveler, and as a commander tasked with leading these dozens of people out of hell, he should either refuse, or politely accept and discard the items, and continue studying his retreat route.

Because in this meat grinder, compassion is the most useless burden.

But he reached out his hand.

The hand, clad in an expensive deerskin glove and having pulled the trigger countless times, trembled slightly as it accepted the black bread.

The bread was so hard it hurt my palms.

"Thanks."

Arthur took off his peaked cap with the German eagle insignia and placed it on his lap, trying to make himself look less like a fierce warlord.

"But I don't want to eat alone."

He didn't eat the bread; instead, he placed it in his shirt pocket—close to his heart—as if it were a precious treasure.

Then, he snapped his fingers.

"McTavish! Bring me that damn 'special supply box'!"

The Scottish sergeant grinned, as if he had been waiting for this order. He rushed out and carried a heavy wooden crate from the supply vehicle that was originally intended for Rommel.

Use a crowbar to pry open the box lid.

It didn't contain bullets or grenades.

It was corned beef in cans, French foie gras, and a whole dozen red round tins—Scho-Ka-Kola (a type of caffeinated German military chocolate).

"Wow……"

Sophie's eyes lit up instantly, with the instinctive gleam a child has when seeing candy, bright enough to illuminate the dark mill.

"Come here, little one."

Arthur opened a box of Scho-Ka-Kola, broke off a piece of dark brown chocolate, and held it to Sophie's lips.

"This is a German magic potion. After you take this, no one will dare to bully you anymore."

Sophie carefully licked it, and the bittersweet flavor exploded on her tongue. She smiled, revealing a row of small, white teeth.

"It's so sweet! Grandpa, you should have some too!"

She held the chocolate up to Pierre.

Looking at his granddaughter's smiling face and the British soldiers distributing food throughout the room, the stubborn old soldier finally shed two streams of turbid tears on his face, which was as weathered as dried tree bark.

Arthur leaned back in his chair, watching this heartwarming scene.

"Sir, you've changed."

Jeanne sat down beside him, holding a cup of hot coffee, and spoke softly.

"I thought you only cared about that damn loss rate."

This is Jeanne's most profound and only impression of Arthur Sterling over the past 48 hours.

In this man's eyes, war was never about passion, glory, or sacrifice. War was simply a huge, blood-soaked balance sheet.

She had witnessed firsthand how calmly he calculated the time of the Gloucester Regiment's demise, as if calculating how long a match would burn; she had also seen how he, like a miser, squeezed every last drop of mobility from the convoy through fuel rations accurate to the liter.

To him, soldiers were not flesh-and-blood people, but "human resources"; tanks were not steel monsters, but "armored units." The living were "usable assets," and the dead were "written-off bad debts."

He was like an auditor from hell, whose cane wasn't for commanding battles, but for crossing out unprofitable names from the Book of Life and Death.

"I even think that if you were thrown into a meat grinder," Jeanne smiled bitterly, looking down at her reflection in the glass, "you'd probably be calculating how much enemy ammunition you'd lose in the last second before you died."

But now, this man, whose eyelashes are hollow, is carefully placing a moldy black bread into the pocket close to his heart.

"I haven't changed, Jeanne."

Arthur put his hat back on, the brim obscuring the emotions in his eyes. He had reverted to being the cold-blooded commander.

"I'm just making a long-term investment. This loaf of bread is worth more than all the guns in this house combined."

He paused, then looked out the window.

There, the setting sun was turning the Lis River a blood red.

"Mr. Pierre," Arthur suddenly spoke, his tone turning serious, "you must leave here. Head west, to the sea."

"Why?" the old man asked, puzzled, as he ate his canned beef. "Weren't you blocking the Germans?"

"It can't be stopped."

Arthur stood up and walked to the window.

On the edge of the RTS map, the red dots representing the German army are spreading like cancer cells. Moreover, this time the unit numbers appearing are no longer those of the old Wehrmacht divisions that adhere to the Geneva Convention.

When his gaze swept over these newly appeared units, the system did not use the same evaluation system for the IDF based on the Iron Cross, such as elite, hero, and legend.

Instead, there is a completely independent SS-specific rating tree based on the black "double lightning" Rune's style.

This system did not value tactical skills. In fact, the SS in 1940 were far less skilled than the Wehrmacht. It only measured one indicator: irrational fanaticism.

Ordinary SS Special Mobile Units (SS-VT, the predecessor of the later "Das Reich") were designated as "Vanguard," representing a reckless but deadly desire to attack.

The SS divisions, reorganized from the police force, were designated as "Enforcer," signifying iron-fisted control over the occupied territories.

But the unit in front of us had an insignia that was the darkest, most distorted deep purple in the entire evaluation tree.

Arthur saw the distinctive skull symbol.

[Hostile Force Identification: 3rd SS "Totenkopfverbände" Division] [Rating: Fanatical/Catastrophe] [Commander: Theodor Eicke]

A blood-red warning popped up in the system's notes section, the font trembling slightly as if gripped by some kind of algorithmic fear:

[Warning: This unit belongs to "unconventional combat forces".]

[Composition Analysis: The team was composed of core members of the concentration camp guards.]

[Characteristic judgment:

Mindless: No matter how high the casualty rate, this unit will not rout until the last man dies.

No Mercy: This unit does not accept surrender and does not take prisoners of war.

Purge: Deals 200% extra damage to civilian/prisoner of war units.

Scorched Earth: Automatically triggers "plunder" and "arson" events when passing through an area.

That wasn't an army. It was a bunch of brainwashed beasts in human skin.

They knew nothing of Prussian chivalry, nor of the trench rules of Verdun. To the Wehrmacht, war was a profession; to them, war was a sacrifice.

In their dogma, everything on this land—whether prisoners of war or civilians—is merely livestock to be slaughtered, an inferior race that needs to be "purified."

This inhuman madness even sent chills down the spines of the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces. Even top strategists like Guderian and Manstein were disgusted by the prospect of having to fight alongside these mad dogs.

To these noble officers who valued chivalry, entrusting their flank security to a prison warden like Theodor Eck was an utter disgrace to the entire German officer corps.

To them, the Wehrmacht was fighting a war, while the SS was just carrying out a "pest control operation" that even a butcher would find disgusting.

"Listen, Pierre."

Arthur turned around and looked directly into the old man's eyes.

"This is no longer the war you know. And the Germans of today are no longer the Saxon peasants you saw in Verdun."

"These newcomers, they're wearing skull collar tabs. They're beasts."

Old Pierre fell silent. He looked at his son's photo on the wall, then at Sophie, who was playing with McTavish.

"This is my home, Major." The old man stubbornly shook his head. "The mill can't function without people. Without people, the windmill won't turn."

"Besides," the old man pointed to his wooden leg, "I can't run. This child won't survive with me in tow."

Arthur fell silent.

He knew the old man was telling the truth. In this chaotic world, a cripple traveling with a child might face a worse fate than staying behind.

"Then let's pray."

Arthur said in a low voice.

He couldn't force them to leave. His truck was already full, and the breakout battle ahead was extremely risky. Taking civilians with him would be tantamount to suicide.

This is a feeling of powerless frustration. Even with an RTS system and cutting-edge tactical thinking, he cannot save every good person who appears in his life.

Night falls.

The soldiers slept fully clothed in the mill yard. Sophie, clutching her doll, fell asleep in McTavish's arms—the gruff Scottish sergeant was now as tender as a father.

Arthur sat on the top of the windmill, smoking, watching the flashes of gunfire on the distant horizon.

The windmill's massive blades turned slowly in the night wind, emitting a dull thud, as if counting down the days to the world's impending destruction.

He touched the hard, dark bread in his pocket.

"System," he asked in his mind, "does the evaluation criteria for this mission include conscience?"

The system did not respond. Only the red arrow representing the "Skeleton Master" on the RTS interface was slowly approaching the peaceful mill.

Distance to contact: 4 hours.