As the war progressed, he later joined the fight against the Germans, rising to the rank of junior lieutenant.[1] After the war, Bykau was demobilized, but later returned to the Red Army, serving from 1949-1955. He then began work as a journalist for the Hrodna Pravda newspaper. In the same decade his first novellas began to be published, of which the most famous are "The Ordeal", "The Obelisk", "To Go and Not Return", and "To Live Till Sunrise".