My Beloved, Whom I Desire to Kill - 313

Giselle stepped out of the tent and stood among the bushes that grew as tall as her. The headquarters was located on the mountainside southwest of the dam, south of the lake, providing a clear view of the operation zone.

The dam, which held back a corner of the vast, seemingly endless lake, felt impossibly small. It had stood there, enduring the immense pressure of the lake since before Giselle was born—its fortitude was proven. Yet, it now seemed dangerously precarious, on the verge of collapse, due to the incessant gunfire from the access road.

Two forces were locked in a fierce battle: one attempting to breach the dam, the other striving to defend it. On the rooftop of a tall defensive wall, snipers risked their lives to repel the enemy troops attempting to set foot on the dam.

Giselle raised the binoculars hanging around her neck to her eyes. Of course, Edwin wasn’t visible.

Please, let everyone, including Edwin, be safe.

She nervously toyed with her necklace, a gesture of wishing for luck, as she watched the battle from behind cover. But as time passed, the flow of the fighting became harder to discern.

The lake swallowed the sun in the west. The setting sun could not be stopped. Giselle’s heart was consumed with dread as she helplessly watched the water’s surface, once a blazing red, cool to a dark blue.

It was the moment the sun completely vanished below the horizon. The enemy troops, who had desperately held their positions until then, began to retreat along the lakeshore like an ebbing tide, moving with the perfect coordination of a directed command.

She did not feel that the crisis had passed. Instead, she had a terrible premonition that a greater one was approaching. She was wrestling with this dark feeling, praying it was a false alarm as the bleak night settled, when her whole body suddenly froze. A wave of goosebumps raced over her skin, and the fine hairs on her arms stood on end.

The instant her gut registered the physical presence of this ominous feeling, she shouted:

—Air raid!

The soldiers at the field headquarters immediately stopped what they were doing, looked up at the sky crisscrossed by searchlights, and exchanged confused glances.

They couldn’t be faulted. To their ears, the regular, low-frequency thrumming high above the lake was drowned out by the sound of the nearby wind.

It had been the same at the training camp. Giselle was always the first to pick up the mechanical sound of an engine hidden within the wind. It was a skill she had learned as a child, hunting for food, when she listened not just for human presence but for the faint sound of warplanes.

Giselle scrambled up the mountain, heedless of whether others thought she was insane, desperate to warn the anti-aircraft gun emplacement at the summit.

If she was late, Edwin would die.

She had a gut feeling that the enemy was not attempting another paratrooper drop. Previous ground attempts had already been foiled twice. If Giselle were the commanding officer, rather than risk another variable-filled bomb installation in the dark, she would switch to a simpler strategy, even if it required more firepower.

They’re going to drop the bombs directly onto the dam this time.

—Lieutenant Warren!

Fortunately, the fire control officer currently guarding the emplacement was a classmate from Giselle’s training camp. Patricia, who was chastising the artillerymen, turned around when Giselle called out, breathless.

—Enemy planes are converging!

Hearing the warning, Patricia’s face hardened. Without even looking up at the sky, she ran toward the radio operator. This was a testament to how closely she had observed Giselle’s sensitivity to aircraft sounds during their training days.

The moment the request for an aerial interception was sent, the enemy squadron appeared on the horizon in the northwest sky. With the blare of the air raid siren, the anti-aircraft guns opened fire. Only then did the soldiers from the main camp rush up and descend into the bunkers below the emplacement.

Giselle did not follow them, instead holding her ground in a corner of the post. She could do nothing, but she felt it was her duty to bear witness to whatever might happen to Edwin.

—It’s dangerous. Get inside, I told you!

However, Patricia, the officer in charge of the post, kept urging her. Feeling that she was only being a distraction, Giselle finally entered the bunker.

Had their air force arrived? As the sound of artillery shell impacts became intermittent, the roar of multiple jet engines mingled together. The bunker was narrow, and the only remaining space was near the entrance—was it a blessing that she could hear the commotion outside so clearly?

Will I be able to hear the dam collapse, too?

The hands clutching the four-leaf clover necklace were losing their patience.

—Lieutenant, is this your first air raid? No need to be scared.

Soldiers sitting nearby made suggestive remarks, looking down on the female intelligence officer who held a pen rather than a rifle.

—Be quiet. I’m focusing on the sounds outside.

She was not in the mood to frankly admit that she was afraid of the air raid, but not because she feared her own death.

Then how must the man inside the dam feel, with bombs raining down?

She suddenly realized she understood all too well what it felt like to be unable to escape, knowing that the current bunker could turn into a tomb at any moment. A memory of her first battlefield, long buried, resurfaced. Instinctively, she put on the steel helmet she had been issued with her uniform upon arriving here, but had only worn around her neck.

At least back then, if the dam collapsed and they were swept away by the water, they would be together. If such a thing happened today, Giselle would wander the land where she first met Edwin, alone, searching for his body.

BANG!

The sharp sound of a rifle blast nearby jolted Giselle out of her terrible imaginings.

—Enemy attack! Support! We need support!

Patricia cried out frantically. The enemy paratroopers, whom they had believed to have retreated, had in fact been massing and moving toward them under the cover of darkness.

—What are you waiting for? Get out there now!

At the barked command of an officer inside the bunker, the soldiers swiftly put their helmets back on, grasped their rifles, and streamed out.

Giselle could only remain in the bunker, unable to join them. She had no weapon.

As an intelligence officer, she was not fundamentally issued a weapon. Obtaining one in a unit that was not her own would be a complicated and time-consuming process, so she had come to the battlefield empty-handed.

Having to rely on others to protect her body made her feel like she was ten years old again. The feeling of helplessness did not last long; it was quickly overridden by worry.

Edwin is armed, right? Please…

The sounds of bullets flying and impacting something, someone’s scream. The explosion of a grenade, and another scream. The desperate plunge of an aircraft, echoing as the lingering sound of cannon fire that tore the sky.

The disharmony of death ringing out on the ground was starting to cloud her mind. The only anchor holding her violently thrashing sanity was the fear that the sound of the dam collapsing could interject itself into the chaos at any moment.

—Situation terminated!

The fighting on the ground soon ceased. When calls for a medic were heard outside, Giselle rushed out to lend a hand.

Patricia was fine, fortunately, just disheveled, but most of her subordinates were injured, some seriously. It was selfish to dwell on other things with lives hanging in the balance, but she couldn’t stop worrying about the silent anti-aircraft gun, which had been forced to stop firing.

Giselle, that’s Patricia’s job. Control yourself.

There was another friendly anti-aircraft post on the opposite side of the dam; they would be holding back the bombers. She suppressed the impulse and focused on first aid, but then…

CRASH!

An explosion that seemed to rip through the lake shook the forest, forcing her to snap her head up. A colossal column of water shot up from the surface. The enemy aircraft had dropped its bomb.

It missed and fell into the lake, but not far from the dam. The massive wave created by the collapsing water column rushed toward the concrete barrier.

The shockwave slammed into the dam. The sight of the crashing white waves flooded Giselle’s mind with memories of the days she had helplessly watched her loved ones die. She never wanted to experience it again.

Even after all the overflowing water had washed away, the dam remained standing.

The wall held. It was Giselle’s sanity that broke.

She hastily handed the injured soldier she was tending to a medic and ran to the empty gunner’s seat next to the anti-aircraft cannon.

—Lieutenant Warren!

Giselle called to Patricia, gripping the firing mechanism like a lifeline.

—I need fire direction!

The commanding officer, who was shouting into the communication device to request support, turned to Giselle and frowned.

—Do you remember how to use the anti-aircraft gun?

—Who are you doubting, Second-in-Command? No, Commander! We don’t have time for this!

A second bomb would be dropped soon.

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Here is the translation of the next part of your literary text, maintaining the fluid and natural English voice you requested:

They wouldn’t last the night at this rate.

Yet, for now, there was no other option. No sounds of friendly forces knocking could be heard at the steel door, which was not only tightly shut but also fortified with a makeshift barricade. The only external noise was the occasional, faint thud of the anti-aircraft guns.

After finishing the dressing of his wounds, Edwin sighed and leaned his body against the concrete wall, only to flinch at the rattling sound and the strange obstruction. He’d forgotten the steel helmet that was still dangling around his neck from when he’d hastily removed it.

He took it off completely and leaned his back against the wall. The coolness of the concrete soothed his heart, which had been racing from the adrenaline.

However, the moment the helmet’s appearance registered, the momentary calm vanished. Edwin ran a finger, stiff with dried blood, over the deep dent on its side. It was a trace of death passing close by.

Asure: Guys, there’s a new novel being released from Libenia (you can find it on novelupdates), if you want me to do it, let me know, I’ll do it in the Spanish version.