43: Chapter 43 The Night That Devours Light

The setting sun was like blood, casting an eerie dark red glow over the charred pine forest.

The smoke from the air raid had yet to dissipate, and the pungent smell of burning mixed with the metallic scent of earth, stinging everyone's nostrils.

Jack lay prone on the edge of a crater, his stomach cramping in waves—a signal of hunger and his body's most primal protest.

But the emptiness in his stomach didn't ease at all; instead, it grew even more intense.

"Everyone up! Check your gear, count the wounded!"

The Company Commander NPC's voice was hoarse, yet it carried an unquestionable resilience.

Surviving players and NPCs struggled to crawl out of their bunkers, many with tear stains on their faces and hollow eyes.

That four-hour bombardment had not only destroyed their supplies but also crushed the last sliver of hope in their hearts.

This wasn't a game; this was a slaughterhouse.

Brother Bao adjusted his glasses, which were missing a temple, and looked down to check his type 38 rifle.

A crack had split the buttstock; he rubbed it with his fingers, saying nothing.

As a skill-based streamer, he felt for the first time that all his knowledge and techniques had become a pile of useless junk.

In the face of absolute fire coverage, positioning, anticipation, and pre-firing... were all just a joke.

Dai Dai held a tin canteen deformed by the blast, silently bandaging a player whose arm had been sliced open by shrapnel.

Her medical kit had long been empty, so she had to use strips of cloth torn from her own clothes.

Blood quickly soaked through the white cloth; she could only tighten it forcefully, hoping it would provide some level of hemostasis.

The sun was sinking rapidly. As the last ray of light vanished behind the horizon, the night, like a massive curtain, quickly enveloped the devastated ridges.

At first, no one thought anything was wrong.

Night combat was the Volunteer Army's forte.

The players even felt that the fall of night was a clarion call for a counterattack.

But soon, Jack discovered a problem.

His vision was becoming blurred.

No, not blurred—dim.

The outlines of the surrounding scenery lost their sharpness, and the colors faded quickly, finally merging into a patch of varying shades of gray.

He rubbed his eyes, but the situation didn't improve.

He couldn't even clearly see Brother Bao's face three meters away.

"Holy shit, is the Night Blindness already this severe?"

Jack cursed under his breath in the team channel.

"It's not just you," Brother Bao's voice came through, tinged with confusion.

"Mine's the same. All the shadow details are gone, like the resolution's been turned down to the minimum."

A suppressed exclamation came from Dai Dai: "I... I think I can't see anything. It's just pitch black."

It wasn't just the three of them; the public channel instantly exploded.

Thousands of players were reporting the same issue.

[My screen is black! Game bug?]

[Don't fucking scare me, I just got a 4090!]

[It's not a bug. Look, you can still see the UI; it's just the game scene that's black.]

[Su Yun! You dog of a developer, come out! Are you pulling some underworld setting on us again?!]

The players' clamor and commotion made the veteran NPC in charge of the team frown.

"Quiet, everyone! What are you screaming for!" a Squad Leader barked.

"Do you want to draw the Americans' artillery fire?!"

Just then, the cold system notification rang out in every player's mind.

[Server-wide Announcement: This is not a system failure, nor is it a hardware issue.]

[Due to prolonged severe malnutrition and a lack of Vitamin A, your character has entered the [Night Blindness] state.]

[Current Environment: No moonlight.]

[Visual Range: Less than two meters.]

At the end of the announcement was a line of bright red, mocking small text.

[Friendly Reminder: Welcome to the real night.]

The entire player base fell into a deathly silence.

Night Blindness.

This term, which they had only heard of in history books or from the mouths of the older generation, slammed into everyone's faces in the crudest way possible.

Only then did they remember that they hadn't consumed any nutritious food for dozens of hours.

"Rest in place! Await orders!"

The Company Commander's order came, but it was quickly overridden by a new directive.

"No! This place was just bombed; the coordinates are exposed! We must move immediately! Everyone, keep up with the unit, grab the backpack strap of the person in front of you, don't fall behind!"

A nightmare-like march began.

"Unable to see one's own fingers"—Jack had only seen this phrase in books before. Now, he was experiencing it firsthand.

He could only rest his hand on the shoulder of the player in front of him, stumbling along the rugged mountain path.

In his ears were only heavy breathing, the sound of gravel rolling underfoot, and the occasional muffled groan of someone falling.

Fear was infinitely magnified in the darkness.

You didn't know what you'd step on next, if there were enemies around, or even if you were walking in a straight line.

Jack felt like a blind man, a useless person stripped of his most important sense.

The marksmanship he was proud of and the dynamic vision that made him famous had all become a joke at this moment.

"Ah!"

With a short cry of alarm, Jack felt the ground vanish beneath his feet, and his body suddenly plummeted.

His hand slipped off the shoulder of the person in front of him.

A sense of weightlessness enveloped him. The wind whistled past his ears.

He had fallen off a cliff.

Fortunately, after falling only a few meters, his body was caught by a horizontal pine tree.

The rough trunk and branches sliced cuts into his body, bringing sharp pain.

"Jack!" Brother Bao's anxious voice came from above.

"I'm still alive..." Jack squeezed out a few words through gritted teeth.

He hugged the trunk tightly, cold sweat soaking his back.

Below was bottomless darkness; he didn't dare move an inch.

The unit stopped.

Several soldiers fumbled to untie their puttees, tying them into a rope, and pulled Jack up with great effort.

This accident left all the players with lingering fears.

They were no longer tourists experiencing war, but prisoners who could die at any moment in these lightless mountains.

The unit stopped in a leeward hollow.

An experienced veteran Squad Leader NPC fumbled to pick something up from the ground and distributed it to everyone.

"Don't just sit there, chew on this."

Jack took it; it felt rough and had the sticky texture of pine resin. It was pine bark.

"Squad Leader, can you eat this stuff?" a new player couldn't help but ask.

"You can't eat it, but it can fool your stomach," the old Squad Leader's voice was calm.

"Chew it well, swallow it. Having something in your stomach makes you feel a bit better.

I still have half a leather belt; it can stave off hunger if boiled soft. If you want to survive, don't treat yourself like a human."

The players were silent, following the veteran's lead and stuffing the hard, dry pine bark into their mouths.

A bitter, pungent taste spread through their mouths, making it hard to swallow. But no one spat it out.

Just then, the distant sky suddenly brightened.

A Flare, trailing a pale tail of fire, rose high into the air.

The world regained its color in an instant.

The light was so blinding that everyone's eyes felt sharp pain.

But they also clearly saw their surroundings: they were in an open area, and less than three hundred meters ahead of them—

—was a temporary US defensive line! Sandbags, barbed wire, and the dark muzzles of machine guns.

Exposed!

"Hit the dirt!"

Before Jack's roar could fully leave his mouth, the howl of hell echoed through the valley.

Da-da-da-da-da—!

m2 heavy machine guns spat lethal tongues of fire, bullets like red-hot iron whips lashing out at the completely uncovered ground.

Dirt, gravel, and flesh were all blasted into the air together.

The moment the players regained their sight, they became the most conspicuous targets.

Screams rose one after another, and the once-crowded unit was instantly torn open with bloody gaps.

The Flare's light died out.

The world returned to darkness.

But the machine gun fire didn't stop.

Relying on their memory of that brief moment, the US soldiers fired frantically in the general direction.

Tracer rounds cut through the night sky, briefly illuminating terrified and distorted faces.

"Return fire! Return fire!" Brother Bao lay on the ground, firing a few shots wildly toward the remembered muzzle flashes.

But this kind of return fire was meaningless. They couldn't see the enemy and could only judge positions by sound and tracers.

Yet the enemy had seen their positions crystal clear.

Another Flare rose into the air.

A new round of slaughter began again.

Dai Dai curled up behind a rock, not daring to lift her head.

A wounded player groaned beside her, his voice growing weaker.

"Medic... save me..."

After the Flare went out, Dai Dai fumbled her way over.

In the darkness, she felt something wet beneath the person.

"Are you thirsty? I have..." She subconsciously thought the canteen was leaking.

She was so thirsty that she cupped the warm liquid in her hands and brought it to her lips.

A heavy taste of rust and salt instantly exploded on her taste buds.

It was blood.

"Ugh—" Dai Dai slammed onto the ground, retching violently as tears and stomach acid poured out.

The battle continued in an extremely asymmetrical state. The Volunteer Army could only take the beating passively, suffering heavy casualties.

"We can't go on like this! We must take out that machine gun nest!" The Company Commander issued orders in the dark.

"Follow me!"

Beside Jack, a young NPC soldier stood up.

He was very small and thin, his voice still carrying a hint of childishness.

"Company Commander, I can't see."

"Then don't go, stay down!"

"No, Company Commander." The young soldier's voice was stubborn.

"Big brother, you're a sharpshooter. Can you see?"

Jack's heart was stung sharply.

He wasn't any damn sharpshooter; he could barely even see his own muzzle now.

"I can't see clearly either," he answered with difficulty.

The young soldier was silent for a moment, then untied a straw rope from his body and handed one end to Jack.

"Comrade Jack, I'm asking a favor," he said in a tone that was almost a plea.

"When we charge later, lead me with this rope. Wherever you run, I'll run. I won't hold you back."

Jack gripped the rough straw rope, feeling as if it weighed a thousand pounds.

"Okay." He said only one word.

The order to charge was given.

Jack pulled the other end of the rope, charging forward stumbling.

He couldn't see anything and could only judge the direction by instinct and the sound of gunfire.

A force came from the other end of the rope; the young soldier followed him closely.

Another Flare rose.

Jack saw it clearly: the machine gun position was on a mound fifty meters ahead.

"Now's the time! Charge!"

He roared, pulling the rope as he lunged forward.

Suddenly, the rope in his hand went light.

It snapped.

A stray bullet had severed the rope.

"Xiao Li!" Jack shouted back.

In the darkness, he couldn't see the young soldier.

But he heard him.

He heard that young and resolute voice ring out amidst the hail of bullets.

"I hear it! I hear you! Fuck you, you American devils!"

That young soldier, in the darkness without guidance, didn't stop or lie down.

Following the loudest and most lethal roar of the machine gun, he charged straight toward it.

Jack saw the trajectory of a tracer, briefly illuminating the small, thin figure.

He spread his arms wide, like a moth to a flame.

Then, he heard the dull thud of a body slamming into sandbags.

Immediately following was the blast of a grenade.

The m2 heavy machine gun that had been roaring frantically went silent.

The world once again fell into complete darkness and silence.

Jack knelt on the ground, still clutching the severed half of the straw rope tightly.