Chapter Thirty-Five: Night Raid and Ambush

  "The Message Tree" is also a plagiarism work of Ouyang Yun, who had no choice (it seems that when explaining their own plagiarism activities, they all say so), the learning team did not have walkie-talkies, but telephones were available, but there was no time or need to spend that effort. So, "The Message Tree" became a pretty good choice, not only cheap but also effective. Starting from the entrance of the residence, every 50 meters or so, a "Message Tree" was set up, and the last one was led by Li Tieshu, who had rich combat experience, they ambushed three kilometers away from the residence, as soon as they discovered enemy activity, they immediately knocked down the "Message Tree", and then the small groups behind them followed suit, this warning speed was quite fast, not much different from high-tech gadgets like telephones.

  Sakai Takashi had the General Staff Office formulate a battle plan for the surprise attack. According to the plan, three squads of Japanese gendarmerie elite armed with light and heavy weapons were led by Major Ishii Uemon in six trucks to carry out the night raid mission. The Japanese General Staff did not know that the training class had transformed into a student regiment, let alone that Yu Xuezong, a die-hard element, would give the student regiment a guard company as a gift. They only took into account the existence of the "Anti-Japanese Heroes" and formulated a plan that seemed a bit conservative in Ishii's view.

  According to Ishii's idea, this elite unit had already reconnoitered the terrain and could have directly marched to the entrance of the Chinese army's garrison, with mortars and machine guns at the ready, and given them a good pounding. But according to the plan devised by the general staff, they were required to disembark outside the garrison and split into two groups to attack from both front and rear, in order to completely annihilate the student brigade and thereby severely crush the arrogant spirit of the Chinese army, which had been stirred up by the "two heroes who resisted Japan".

  Ishii had his own thoughts in mind, but when it came to executing orders, he was meticulous. After receiving the task, he immediately brought two capable subordinates to scout out the terrain. After completing the reconnaissance mission, he left the two subordinates behind to keep watch and made an appointment with them that at the time of action, he would contact them using a flashlight.

  When Ishii's unit was still two and a half kilometers away from their destination, he ordered all combat personnel to get off the vehicle. Then, with two trusted men each holding a flashlight, they began to make contact with two subordinates who had been lurking nearby. However, after Ishii and his three men flashed their lights for nearly ten minutes, his two subordinates still failed to appear. Kamei Ichirō, standing beside him, furrowed his brow and asked, "Colonel, has something happened to Maeno and the others?"

  Ishii thought that this was the only result, and he couldn't help but have a small worry about what to do next. However, thinking of the enemy as just two hundred newly trained soldiers who had just learned how to shoot, he gritted his teeth and slammed his flashlight to the ground, pulled out his command knife and pointed it at the training camp, shouting in a low voice: "We won't wait for them, let's proceed with the plan! Attack!"

  "Charge!" Kamei followed and drew his handgun.

  Then, the Japanese army, already in two columns, followed behind the two men. One column advanced towards the main gate of the barracks under the leadership of Ishii, while the other column led by Kamei directly entered the wheat field and turned to the rear door of the student corps.

  Ishii and his men were unaware that, just as he was contacting the two units with a flashlight, not far from them, a pair of eyes had been closely watching them. When he and Kamei each led a team to leave, the owner of those eyes quickly crawled into a ditch and then ran crouched, arriving at a patch of rape field more than 100 meters outside the barracks of the student soldier corps about a minute before Ishii and his men.

  It was Li Tieshu who found Ouyang Yun and hastily said, "The little devils have divided their troops. One team should be going to ambush us from behind."

  "About how many people?"

  Li Tie-shu observed carefully and said: "There are a total of 151 people, almost evenly divided into two small teams."

  "Looking at the little devil's setup, it seems like they're determined we won't be able to hold on and will definitely run away from the back door?" Ouyang Yun said with a smile, his eyes gradually turning cold. He said: "Li Lianchang, I'm ordering now, you have full command here, Chu Tiange."

  "Big brother, I'm over here," Chu Tian Ge emerged with a bright cauliflower on his head.

  Ouyang Yun said to him: "You lead the reconnaissance team back to the barracks and ambush in the warehouses on both sides of the rear door. As long as someone appears at the door, I'll use a grenade to blow his mother's, if you can't hear my voice, don't let anyone in."

  Li Tie-shu asked: "Comrade Commander, you hand over command here to me, what about you?"

  "I'm in charge of the back door."

  "Are you bringing a reconnaissance team?"

  "What? Not enough? Li Lianzhang, let's make a bet. We won't compare who killed more devils, but which side suffered fewer losses. How about it?"

  Li Tie Shu smiled bitterly and said, "You have fewer people there, so the chances of getting injured are naturally lower - no, you only have a few people, but the Japanese have 70 or 80 people at the back door. What if... it would be..." He dared not say any more, because the phrase "total annihilation" was just too heavy.

  Ouyang Yun smiled and said, "Compared to the casualty rate, it's already pretty good! Alright, the enemy is about to arrive soon. Tiange, what are you still dazing around for? Quickly take your brothers back, everyone else hide quickly, all actions listen to Li Lianzhang!" After finishing this sentence, he slightly stood up and dove into the vegetable field, disappearing from view in an instant.

  About a hundred meters away from the garrison, Ishii waved his hand and all the Japanese soldiers who were advancing cautiously immediately stopped in unison. He looked at Hota, who was following closely behind him, and gave a low order: "Hota, take two men to scout ahead." Hota responded with a "hei" and pointed to two subordinates, and the three of them crouched down and ran towards the garrison, observing the fields on both sides carefully as they went. Every 50 meters or so, they would stop and look around cautiously before continuing on. After about 20 minutes, Ishii signaled for everyone to halt and crouch down or lie prone about a hundred meters away from the garrison gate.

  Hata spoke in a low voice to Ishii: "Colonel, shall I lead the men to take out the Chinese sentry first?"

  Ishii nodded and gave a low order: "Matsushita, Saito, set up the machine gun and mortar. Others, get ready to attack!" After that, he took a rifle from a Japanese soldier and aimed at the sentry who was leaning against the wooden wall in the guardhouse, preparing for the possibility that the enemy might discover the group of Potada and launch an attack first.

  Matsushita, Saito and others received the order, and under the command of Mali, they began to look for a suitable location to set up machine guns and mortars; while Hata's three men crouched and ran quickly towards the guard tower.

  Suddenly, with the bright lights on both sides of the wall beside the gate of the garrison, a loud and powerful shout "Da" rang out in the oilseed rape field just twenty or thirty meters away from Shi Jing. Almost at the same time, the sound of gunfire like stir-frying beans erupted simultaneously in the wheat fields and oilseed rape fields around Shi Jing and his companions.

  Ishii barely had time to raise his left hand in front of him, and his body was simultaneously hit by several bullets. After uttering a single "hachi", he went limp like a puppet with its strings cut.

  The Japanese army never thought that the enemy would be lurking so close to them, and the sudden flash of the searchlight had also blinded many people. Many people didn't even have time to react before they were killed. Some Japanese soldiers who were lying on the ground managed to survive the first round of shooting and quickly turned their guns towards the rape field and started firing. However, at such a close distance, the Type 38 rifle's limitation of having to pull the bolt after each shot limited their accurate shooting. Before they had a chance to fire a second shot, dozens of hand grenades and four mortar shells that had been pre-aimed came crashing down on them, many people were blown up before they could even grab their rifles, some lost legs or arms, and others died instantly without even having a chance to react. This was not the end, the explosives that Ouyang Yun had previously ordered to be buried on the side of the road were detonated by the hand grenades and mortar shells, causing another fierce explosion. This time, those Japanese soldiers who stood up to engage in close combat were doomed, one by one they were torn into pieces.

  There were seventy-nine devils in Ishii's team, and as a result, more than half of them were wiped out in an instant. The survivors were mostly missing arms or legs. Because Ishii died too early, the machine gunners and mortar gunners who were emphasized by Li Tieshu to be taken care of were unable to play their due role, so from the moment the searchlight shone on this group of Japanese soldiers, their tragic fate was already sealed.

  "Commander Li, charge!" said a student soldier crouching beside Li Tieshu.

  Li Tieshu shook his head and shouted loudly, "Everyone throw two more hand grenades!" Then he said to the recruit, "Remember, when fighting against the Japanese, in a situation where we have the upper hand, never underestimate them without completely disarming them."

  "Boom!" After a series of continuous explosions, Li Tieshu stood up, raised his pistol and shouted: "Original three companies, charge for me!" He led the charge out.

  Li Tieguai had dealt with the Japanese many times and had a deep understanding of their combat methods and so-called Bushido spirit, which is why he made these decisions. However, many of the new recruits were participating in battle for the first time, and under the circumstances of having the upper hand, they became dizzy-headed and didn't hear that only the veterans were ordered to charge forward, so they also rushed out together. As a result, when they saw the hellish scene on the battlefield, many of them immediately turned pale with fright and couldn't even hold their guns steadily.

  Those Japanese devils, who looked like they were on their last breath, suddenly became energetic and started throwing hand grenades, firing guns, and some even jumped into the crowd and detonated the explosives on their bodies.

  The old soldiers were fine, not only maintaining vigilance but also taking action without hesitation. The wounded Japanese troops who encountered them basically had no way out, but those new recruits were miserable. Some of them got themselves killed, which was nothing to be surprised about, but they also dragged down the old soldiers around them.

  Some old soldiers, when the devils rushed towards the recruits, in order to save them, ended up sending themselves under the enemy's guns and bayonets.

  In the end, although the Japanese army was annihilated, the Student Army still lost two old soldiers and six student soldiers, and nine old soldiers and eleven student soldiers were injured. In Li Tieshu's view, these casualties could have been avoided.