A Young Girl’s Frontline Diary: Notes from a Losing War

Also known as: “How We Kept Coming Back to Life in Grozny, Yet Had to Endure the Pain of Dying”

“The System gave us flawless bodies, but refused to erase our pain.”

January 1995, Grozny. Snow, black mud, jammed rifles, and tons of “Cargo 200” (the war dead).

For the seven undead members of the ragtag squad, this was their entire daily life.

As a doomed unit forced to sign the “Ashen Contract,” they had a cheat no regular soldier could help envying: resurrection. But there was a price. Every time they loaded a save and started over, they had to remain fully conscious and endure the physical agony of the moment of their previous death.

There were no miracles or magic here, only cold gun bolts, trophies reeking of corpses, and desperate killing sprees fueled by the plea, “Please, don’t make me die again.” Bearing the worst symptoms of trauma, they wielded defective weapons salvaged from piles of the dead.

The last remaining evidence of the 131st Brigade charged once more today toward the despairing Presidential Palace, launching a frenzied, suicidal assault.