This brief victory felt like the final flicker of a dying flame.
As the last Soviet corpse in the woods slumped into the snow, Walter Ilves and the surviving Finnish soldiers lacked even the strength to cheer. They leaned against blood-stained tree trunks, gasping for air. Before them lay a mountain of khaki-clad bodies, forming a nauseating wall of flesh. At least three hundred Soviet soldiers lay dead across this crimson-stained snowscape.
However, before Walter could catch his breath, a deeper sense of dread arrived with the renewed trembling of the earth.
Clang-clang! Clang-clang!
The sound of treads crushing bone echoed from behind the wall of corpses. This vibration was different from anything they had felt before. If the previous T-26 tanks were like hammers striking the ground, what approached now was the dull thud of a sledgehammer smashing through solid rock.
Thump! Thump! Thump!
The sound of forty-ton steel monsters grinding over frozen soil sent layers of snow tumbling from the treetops.
"Damn it... what kind of monsters are those?" a young soldier asked, his eyes widening in terror.
Behind the heap of Soviet dead, several T-26 light tanks that had served as the vanguard suddenly peeled away to the flanks, as if clearing a path for true titans. Then, several suffocatingly vast steel fortresses crawled slowly out of the smoke.
They were KV-1 heavy tanks.
These forty-five-ton steel leviathans were making their first concentrated appearance on the western shores of Vyborg Bay. The Finns held only a few Lahti L-39 anti-tank rifles; their rounds struck the 75mm sloped armor of the KV-1s only to kick up helpless sparks.
The KV-1s led the charge as mobile steel ramparts, with T-26 light tanks positioned slightly behind to cover the flanks. Countless Soviet infantrymen clung to the backs and sides of these monsters like a swarm of ants.
"Prepare the Molotov cocktails! It's the only way!" a Finnish lieutenant shouted, attempting to organize a final counterattack.
"Those are heavy tanks! One bottle won't do it! Aim for the air intakes!"
Such was the price of gambling with the Reaper. Against a monster like this, if you couldn't turn it to ash in one go, it would turn back and grind you into the mud.
From the depths of the thicket, five or six figures leapt from their snow pits simultaneously, clutching smoking Molotov cocktails and heavy bundle grenades. It was, in the truest sense, a suicide charge.
Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat!
A dense hail of Soviet bullets cut down three men instantly, but the remaining two, driven by pure adrenaline, sprinted wildly to within ten meters of the lead tank.
"Die, you bastards!"
A glass bottle shattered accurately against the broad rear engine deck of the KV-1.
Foom!
Orange flames erupted instantly, flowing fuel seeping through the cooling grilles and into the engine compartment. However, this KV-1 did not stagger into a standstill like the light tanks had. Its massive diesel engine continued to roar amidst the fire; its internal fire-suppression design held against the first wave of heat.
The flaming tank merely jerked for a moment before its turret swung around violently, its machine gun cutting the two bombers in half even as it continued to roll forward.
"It's still moving! It's still moving!" someone screamed in horror.
"Again! Use the bundle grenades on the tracks! Don't let it keep going!"
More Finnish soldiers charged forward with bloodshot eyes. This time, at the cost of seven more lives, they finally smashed a second and third bottle into the same spot and jammed a bundle of grenades into the gap in the treads.
Boom!
With a dull, heavy explosion, the steel beast, now belching thick black smoke, finally ground to a halt. Its treads were shattered, and its engine compartment had become a literal furnace. Several Soviet tankers, wreathed in flames, crawled screaming from the hatches, only to be cut down by vengeful gunfire.
Walter watched the scene with a heavy heart. To disable just one, the Finns had paid a staggering price. And behind that burning wreck stood an entire row of identical steel monsters, rolling over the corpses of Finnish soldiers as they continued their cold, relentless advance.
It was like trying to drain the ocean with a spoon. No matter how many lives they threw into the breach, the khaki tide showed no sign of receding under the cover of the KV-1s. The Finns simply could not afford this exchange rate of blood for iron.
Gaps in the defensive line multiplied, and a massive force of Soviet infantry began to seep into every corner of the woods like spilled mercury.
…
3:00 PM.
The gunfire on the western shore of Vyborg Bay had become sparse and disorganized. This was not because the battle had ended, but because organized resistance had been utterly shattered. The Soviet iron flood had washed over the western defenses and was surging forward.
Walter dragged his numb legs to a stop behind an abandoned sawmill. Not a single inch of him was clean; his white camouflage suit had turned a grimy grey-black, matted with mud, oil, and the blood of unknown men. He leaned against the cold wall, chewing heavily on a piece of black bread.
Simo sat silently opposite him. Neither spoke.
The western shore of Vyborg Bay was unrecognizable. The once-pristine snowfields and ice had been transformed into a massive, bustling transit hub for Soviet heavy equipment. Miles of beachhead were packed with Soviet trucks and artillery. Guided by signalmen, the newly landed KV-1 tank companies were forming into neat attack rows, their muzzles pointed straight at the Vyborg city center.
"The connection is dead."
In the corner, a radio operator dropped his headset in despair; it emitted only the maddening static of interference. "Regimental HQ, Divisional HQ... no response."
Walter didn't need a radio to know what had happened. With the collapse of the western line, tens of thousands of Red Army troops, supported by the invulnerable KV-1s, had severed the last land route connecting Vyborg to Helsinki. This once-prosperous city, Finland's second-largest, was now an island.
And behind them, in that burning city, thousands of civilians and wounded soldiers remained, unable to evacuate in time.
"Since Colonel Martola and Regimental HQ are out of contact, as of now, Second Lieutenant Simo and I are the ranking commanders here."
Walter looked at the remaining seven or eight stragglers. Some had lost their helmets; others had wrapped their feet in tattered burlap sacks. Their eyes were as hollow as stagnant water.
"Lieutenant..." the radio operator stammered, "where do we go? The west is cut off. We can't go back."
"Who said we were going back?" Walter reached out and pointed east, toward the industrial district of Vyborg, where thick smoke was billowing from the chimneys of red-brick factories.
"We're going to the industrial zone. In every boiler room, in every factory, we're going to settle this blood debt with them in full."
"Move! Into the city, before the encirclement closes!"
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