Boom! Boom! Boom!
Less than five kilometers from Epsom lay the artillery positions of the German 8th Army Corps. The artillery attached to ten Infantry Divisions was bombarding Epsom and its surrounding areas with ferocious fire.
Ever since Emperor Qin Tian of the Empire had taken command of the 8th Army Corps, he had placed special emphasis on strengthening infantry firepower. Artillery was the crown jewel of that effort. After the 8th Army Corps won a great victory on the Eastern Front, the German military likewise strengthened the firepower of all its units during a winter-long period of rest and reorganization. As a result, the German military now possessed artillery power unrivaled anywhere in the world.
The 8th Army Corps possessed a total of 180 150mm heavy howitzers, 360 105mm Light Howitzers, and 540 75mm Field Guns. Excluding light artillery such as mortars, it had 1,080 artillery pieces in all. Such a number of guns was already terrifying. In another time and space, only the Americans during World War II could have compared with it.
The artillerymen, bare-chested, hauled shells over, rammed them into the barrels, and fired. They did not concern themselves with whether the shells struck their targets. Before an offensive, the German military's fire preparations usually took the form of saturation bombardment—shelling a designated area. Under such dense artillery fire, very few could escape. Even with God's protection, those lucky enough to survive were few in number and no longer posed much of a threat.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Shells exploded across the British positions, sending dirt and stones flying in every direction. Before long, the British positions looked like the surface of the moon. Everywhere were craters left behind by explosions.
The defensive works built by the British were being continuously destroyed beneath the German military's fierce