As a large number of bayonets appeared in the range of the fire, the puppet army's guns fell to the ground involuntarily. Some of the Eighth Route Army were re-screwing the grenade caps, and some were putting away their revolvers. There was a loud sound of falling ground in the darkness not far away, and soon those carrying machine guns came out.
The puppet soldiers were secretly lucky. Fortunately, the platoon leader was a hero, otherwise, how could they be alive now? They would all be turned into sieves!
The wounded didn't dare to groan. The more than 30 puppet soldiers who were responsible for escorting the wounded took the initiative to unload their equipment, threw away their guns, took out their grenades, took off their bullet belts, untied their armed belts, and put down their dry food bags. A dozen Eighth Route Army soldiers began to collect the things on the spot. A young and handsome Eighth Route Army soldier saw that the things were almost collected and ordered loudly: "Except for the wounded, the military uniforms must also be taken off!"
"Ah?... This... is fine."
The puppet soldiers began to take off their uniforms again. The autumn night was really chilly, and fortunately the Eighth Route Army allowed them to squat by the fire.
The platoon leader of the puppet army explained to Hu Yi that the mopping-up line had just been pushed westward. There was a village thirty miles northwest of Niujia Village, which was a temporary transit point. A squad of Japanese soldiers and a battalion of puppet troops had temporarily stopped there to provide support and transport the wounded, as well as to ensure that the food and other supplies seized by the mopping-up troops were transported out of the mountain to the west.
Now the Japanese squad leader has chased the Eighth Route Army and the fleeing villagers southward into the barren mountains. Currently, there is only a medical team and the wounded left in the village.
Many of the new recruits in the ninth platoon were originally wearing puppet army uniforms, and now they just had to take the hats of the wounded and wear them, so more than 30 sets of puppet army uniforms were enough. The team changed on the spot. The little girl was difficult to deal with, so they had to put a puppet army jacket on her, and then found a tattered felt hat in the ruins, put it on her to tie up her pigtails, smeared some dirty dust on her little face, and turned her into a silly boy who was just there to make up the numbers.
I never thought I looked good in this puppet army uniform, but after wearing it, this Eighth Route Army soldier with broad eyebrows and narrow eyes looked heroic. The puppet army platoon leader thought, why does the wide-brimmed hat look so majestic and domineering on this man's head
"What do you want to say?" he asked after straightening his wide-brimmed hat.
The puppet army platoon leader came back to his senses: "Uh... the medical team knows us. You'd better... don't report our number."
"They will know us, too," he said meaningfully.
…
At two o'clock in the morning, a team of 51 puppet soldiers left Niujia Village, carrying their own Eighth Route Army uniforms, a dozen helmets, more than 40 rifles and other captured items, and headed straight for the northwest.
At 3:30 in the morning, they stopped at a dry high ground somewhere on the way, dug, and then buried, leaving a mark. At the same time, a mark also appeared on the map illuminated by the flashlight.
The sky was hazy, foggy, dewy, windless, and filled with autumn chill.
A puppet army was marching in the fog, appearing and disappearing.
"We're not far ahead, each squad please bring up the stretchers." Hu Yi gave the order.
The little girl quickly took out a bloody bandage from her pocket, wrapped it around her leg, and then lay down on the stretcher, covered with her ragged blanket and began to sleep. Luo Fugui and Wu Shitou lifted her up one after the other, but it was the same as if they hadn't lifted her at all. The girl and the stretcher together weighed less than a bag of grain, and they were like nothing in the hands of these two guys. This unique combination was so infuriating that it almost killed everyone.
I walked all the way to the east entrance of the village before I saw a vigilant Japanese sentry.
After getting a clear look at the team, the Japanese sentry's bayonet was pointed vertically. No one in the puppet army spoke as they walked towards the village. The Japanese sentry didn't speak either, but his expression was a little confused. He looked carefully at each puppet soldier who walked past him, and he couldn't tell what he was not used to.
A puppet soldier stopped when passing by the Japanese sentry. He looked young and clean. He took out a cigarette and handed it to the Japanese sentry, smiling kindly and saying, "Thank you for your hard work, Madam." He then took out a match and lit it.
A puff of cigarette wafted out, and stiff Chinese came out: "Why are you coming from this side?"
"We came to transport food, but we were shot by a few snipers on the way. We never thought there were still some Eighth Route Army soldiers who had escaped behind us."
"East? There are Eighth Route Army?" The Japanese seemed to understand and began to be surprised. The day before yesterday, a large army just swept over here, and this place has become a no-man's land. There are still Eighth Route Army
The young and clean puppet soldier wanted to say something, but suddenly a dirty puppet soldier walked out of the team, pushed him away, and muttered in dissatisfaction: "So much nonsense! Get out of the way!" He pulled out a bayonet in front of the Japanese soldier, grabbed the Japanese soldier by the collar and stabbed him.
Ma Liang stumbled and stood firm again, and then looked back. The Japanese soldier had been stabbed three times, and his hand holding the knife was full of blood. He pulled out his bayonet and stabbed the fourth time. The puppet army behind him turned their heads to look at him, and continued to walk towards the village without stopping.
"You're crazy! He's already in my hands, do you need to show off your strength?" Ma Liang was angry.
After the fourth time of pulling out the bayonet, Liu Jianqiang did not continue to stab. He wiped the blood on his hands on the Japanese soldier's clothes and said, "Then why are you still arguing with him?"
"What's wrong with chatting? Knowing yourself and your enemy will ensure victory in every battle, don't you understand?"
"You don't have the courage to do it, but you still praise yourself!" Liu Jianqiang left the body behind, stood up, walked into the team and continued to enter the village.
"You... Xiaowu, come here and clean this up! This set is yours."
A puppet soldier heard Ma Liang calling him, and ran out of the team excitedly and went straight to the corpse of the Japanese.
…
This village was not burned down by the Japanese. Perhaps it was because of its geographical location, the transport teams coming and going, and the transfer of wounded soldiers that it did not become a ruin for the time being. However, it would have been difficult to escape the disaster once the Japanese completed their raid and evacuated.
The village was very quiet, not only because it was just daybreak, but also because there was no human presence in the village, Hu Yi concluded. Striding forward in the mist, the platoon leader said that the Japanese only had a few medical soldiers and sentries, and the rest were wounded, so there was no need to be sneaky and they could be completely brazen.
Amid the sound of the troops' footsteps, the door of a house in front opened, and a Japanese soldier came out with sleepy eyes and buttoned his shirt. He stood by the road and looked at the puppet army that had just entered the village in confusion: "What kind of work?"
Hu Yi walked towards him and answered: "Some of our people are injured."
The Japanese soldier then noticed that there were several stretchers in the puppet army and raised his hand in dissatisfaction: "Carry it over there."
After looking around the houses nearby and not seeing anyone, Hu Yi walked straight towards the Japanese soldier.
"Carry it over there. Understand?" The Japanese soldier couldn't help but raise his hand and point to a room in the distance. As soon as he finished speaking, the puppet soldier with broad eyebrows and narrow eyes had arrived in front of him. A big hand suddenly grabbed the Japanese soldier's throat, and a fierce force pushed his neck heavily against the earth wall behind him, and a sound of broken larynx was heard.
"Squad three goes to find the sentry, the rest of you search as units of your squad, and squad nine stays behind." After Hu Yi gave the order to the team, he pushed open the door through which the Japanese had walked out.
The room was a little dark. On the table was a Japanese soldier's medical kit and a few scattered empty cans. In the corner was a marching blanket, which should be where the Japanese soldier slept. He continued walking through the door. Just as he was about to enter the inner room, Hu Yi stopped at the door.
A woman was hung and tied up in a huge white letter "字" (a character on a letter) in the air. Her face was covered with wet and sticky hair. She was naked except for her wrists and ankles which were tied with ropes. The messy scene and the dry filth between her legs fully explained everything.
Maybe she was a captured female soldier, or maybe she was a villager who failed to escape. Hu Yi hesitated for a few seconds and finally gave up the idea of going out to find the girl. He drew out his bayonet and walked over, cut the rope, then turned back to the outer room and picked up the Japanese's marching blanket. Before he reached the door of the inner room, he heard a heavy bang coming from inside, which was the sound of a skull breaking.
I wanted to just leave the blanket behind and leave, but after thinking it over I went back into the inner room and covered the naked body.
…
There was a sentry in the east of the village, but he was poked by Runny Nose when entering the village. There was a sentry in the west of the village, but he was suppressed by Ma Liang and his third squad. There were no sentries in the north and south at all, because there were only a few sentries who needed to change shifts, and they didn't think it was dangerous here, so there were only two open sentries.
After the soldiers tied up the Japanese, they dragged them back to the village. Ma Liang stood alone at the west end of the village and tried to see far away, but unfortunately the fog had not yet dispersed, and he could not see anything in the hazy west. He turned back into the village and noticed a large house next to it. He pushed open the door, pulled out his Mauser pistol, and walked through the yard.
With the strange creaking sound of the door hinges, a room full of corpses came into view, dozens of them piled up, old and young, with a foul stench all over the floor.
After going out of the gate, Ma Liang, with his stomach churning and no interest at all, leaned against the courtyard wall, took out the cigarettes seized from the puppet soldiers from his pocket, held the match and tried to light one.
A pungent smell rushed into his lungs, choking him and making him cry and sneeze. He was dizzy and hadn't straightened up yet when he heard a creaking sound from the west. He turned his head and saw a mule cart just entering the village from the west. The puppet soldier driving the cart was looking at him with a clear mocking expression on his face. The cart was fully loaded with freshly harvested grain. Then the second cart also came out of the fog, followed by the third one.
“Stop! Stop! Cough cough... cough…” Ma Liang stopped three grain carts that had just entered the west entrance of the village, as well as a dozen puppet soldiers escorting the carts.
The grain escorts mistook Ma Liang for a sentry. The one in front couldn't help but say, "A good dog doesn't block the road. We're here so early hoping to finish the work tonight. Can you please not disturb our brothers?"
Ma Liang looked at the three carts of newly harvested grain bundles and asked casually, "Where are we sending them?"
The puppet squad leader in charge jumped off the car and looked Ma Liang up and down: "Why do you look so strange to me?"
"I... what's wrong with that?"
"Type 38 rifle, bullet box, box gun, are you good at it?" With such a good level of equipment, the puppet army really couldn't figure out which unit the guy in front of them was from.
"I'm... standing guard for Taijun. The box gun is mine."
"Oh?" This explanation doesn't make sense. The Imperial Army actually handed the gun to you? This is a bit unscientific, right? But I can't rule it out. God knows if the Imperial Army was drunk.
At this moment, a puppet soldier walked out of a house not far away. He looked like a potato, holding an engineer shovel in his hand. The shovel was covered in blood, and the blood was still dripping onto the ground. He accidentally looked towards the grain cart, standing there stupidly without moving.
"What's going on?" asked the puppet army squad leader who was escorting the grain.
Ma Liang smacked his lips helplessly: "He is... helping the imperial army treat the wounded."
"With a shovel?"
"Use the shovel... to press on the wound! Otherwise, blood will spray all over your face."
At this moment, a bandaged imperial soldier rushed out of the house in fear, stumbled and fell on the road, and continued to crawl. Then a dirty puppet soldier chased out of the house with a bloody bayonet, kicked the imperial soldier to the ground, and then raised his hand and fell with the knife, poof - how gorgeous!
“This—he… that… fuck…” The dozen or so puppet soldiers escorting the grain were so scared by this scene.
The puppet squad leader, with his jaw dropped, shouted in horror: "What did you say?"
Ma Liang looked back at Runny Nose who was still busy finishing off the enemy, and pulled out his revolver helplessly: "Well - all right... put your hands up!"
As a result... a dozen puppet soldiers not only raised their hands, but also knelt on the spot...