Rise From Eight Hundred

After splitting up with Lei Xiong again, Tang Dao led the main force to leave the main road and advance along the narrow mountain road to Shentouling, 12 kilometers away.

Through the information that the 108th Division began to gather, Tang Dao instinctively raised his vigilance!

In this battle, the Japanese army, which suffered heavy damage, may not just send out infantry!

Most of the anti-aircraft heavy machine guns of the 2nd Artillery Company were deployed around Licheng. At this time, the Four-Line Regiment had no air defense capabilities at all and would rather stay away from the main road to avoid unnecessary losses.

Tang Dao also sent a telegram to Brigade Commander Cheng, who was still far away, to remind him of this.

Facts have proved that Tang Dao was not worrying too much.

At nearly 9 o'clock, a Japanese reconnaissance plane flew over Licheng.

Lei Xiong, who had been prepared for a long time, set up sentries on the hilltop five kilometers away. When he saw the Japanese plane, he immediately lit a bonfire filled with a large amount of wet firewood, which was enough to form a column of smoke that could be seen several kilometers away.

The soldiers in charge of observation immediately fired signal flares, and the civilians who were being relocated immediately hid in the ravines. In Licheng, houses were set on fire everywhere in the city. Many soldiers in Japanese military uniforms fired into the sky in the fortifications, creating the illusion that there was still a fierce battle in the city!

The Japanese reconnaissance plane wanted to lower its altitude for a closer look, but several anti-aircraft machine guns on the ground began to fire, forcing the reconnaissance plane to stay only 1,000 meters above the ground.

Although holding a telescope, the houses on the ground were only the size of a matchbox at a distance of thousands of meters, not to mention people. The occasional rumbling explosions and the burning city told the reconnaissance plane pilot who had been circling over Licheng for several weeks that Licheng had not yet fallen and the Imperial Army was still fighting bravely.

This was also what Lei Xiong wanted him to know. As long as it was judged that the battle was still going on, the Japanese bombers would not target Licheng!

Lei Xiong's tactical deception was successful. 30 minutes later, a bomber formation consisting of six Type 96 fighters flew over the mountains five kilometers outside Licheng and headed straight for the Shentouling area.

Knowing that China did not have much anti-aircraft firepower, the Japanese bomber formation did not fly at a high altitude, less than 800 meters from the ground. At such an altitude, even with anti-aircraft machine guns, they were not a big threat to them.

With the help of telescopes, Japanese pilots could barely see the ground situation.

After flying over one barren mountain after another, the Japanese pilots saw an unbelievable scene through the telescope.

Just under their wings, on the road exposed on the bare ridge, there were several black objects that were unrecognizable and still emitting thick smoke, and there were human and horse corpses lying everywhere!

"Baga! Lieutenant Sasaki, lower the altitude and go see what's going on!" An angry and terrified order came from the radio.

That's right, as the super 'mascot' of the Japanese North China Front Army Aviation Brigade, Lieutenant Sasaki was ordered to go out again!

Faced with their colleagues' vitality comparable to that of cockroaches, the officers of the Japanese North China Front Army Aviation Brigade all expressed envy, but they would never indulge them.

So, he came again.

Even as his colleagues, the other five Japanese pilots all expressed a little panic!

Lieutenant Sasaki had been on several expeditions, and the death rate of his fellow comrades was as high as 60%, which was too scary.

But there were also benefits to having him with them, as all these dangerous jobs could be given to him.

"Damn it, a bunch of bastards!" Sasaki complained angrily in his heart.

He said no, but his body was very honest. Sasaki, who did not dare to disobey military orders, turned in front and lowered the altitude of the fighter plane to 600 meters, a height that was enough for him to see the ground clearly.

So, rows of neatly arranged "shit-yellow" corpses came into his sight. Those black and smoke-emitting empty shells, what else could they be if not Type 94 light tanks?

"It's over! It's over! It's all over!" Sasaki, who was cold all over, muttered to himself in the cockpit.

"Lieutenant Sasaki, what did you see?" The captain of the aviation team looked very ugly.

"The ground is full of the remains of the Imperial Infantry. What is burning is the Type 94 light tank. The Imperial Infantry who asked us for help are all finished!" Sasaki's face was not sad, but more of fear.

He remembered that before boarding the fighter plane, the message told him that they were going to help the Imperial Infantry with 1,500 troops. How long has it been since the battle ended? 500 people! Not 1,500 pigs? It's over like this? If it weren't for the facts in front of him, Sasaki really couldn't believe it.

There was silence on the radio!

Obviously, this also made the other five Japanese pilots unbelievable.

Six Japanese bombers circled on the top of the hill for several times until they could see the color of the uniforms worn by the corpses lying on the ground. Except for the dirt road, there were such corpses everywhere on the hill, and the number was at least more than 1,000.

"Nagatomo, let's go back!" Sasaki exhaled heavily, but felt a sense of relief that he couldn't explain.

At least, he didn't have to face the terrible Chinese anymore, even in this extremely barren mountain.

"Baga! The Chinese can't go far, find them and kill them!" The leading Army Aviation Captain angrily rejected Sasaki's proposal.

Six fighter planes were hovering in the sky, unaware that in the mountains less than 1 kilometer away from them, there were nearly 2,000 Chinese soldiers in gray uniforms.

After receiving the alarm from Licheng, the 863rd Brigade Supplementary Regiment, which was still in Shentouling to clean up the battlefield, hid in the mountains. The gray uniforms and sufficient camouflage allowed them to completely avoid the search from the high altitude.

After searching for several rounds and failing to find Chinese soldiers, the six Japanese bombers flew along the road towards Lucheng!

This was certainly not because their battlefield sense was so sensitive, but purely a blind cat catching a dead mouse!

But this time, they were lucky and actually saw a Chinese army moving on the mountain road five kilometers away from the Shentouling battlefield.

Those were not the two main regiments under the 683rd Brigade, but the 769th Regiment under the 583rd Brigade, which was heading for the scheduled blocking battlefield.

Perhaps because the mountains blocked the radio signal, they did not receive the warning from the 683rd Brigade, and when they found the Japanese planes rushing over, it was a little late. The Japanese plane that finally found the target of revenge dived and dropped bombs on the Chinese army that was like a long dragon on the mountain road.

The terrible heavy bombs raised terrible clouds of gunpowder in the mountains. One of the heavy bombs even hit the mountain road on the mountain wall, destroying the mountain road of more than ten meters, forming a terrible cliff. No one could continue to move forward from here unless they turned around and found another way.

According to statistics after the war, in this sudden bombing by Japanese planes, the 769th Regiment, which had not yet been put into battle, lost 122 people and seriously injured 48 people, completely losing the strength of an infantry company. This was even greater than the loss of the supplementary regiment of the 683rd Brigade as the main force in the Battle of Shentouling!

It is said that after hearing about the losses, the famous general who had led the death squad to surprise attack Yangmingbao Airport, who was still five miles away from the regiment headquarters, angrily threw his military cap!

This should be the first battle in this melee where the Chinese army had no military merits but only losses!

But there was no way. The 2nd Battalion of the 769th Regiment on the mountain road had actually resisted. The 6 Japanese planes that had dropped bombs seemed to feel unsatisfied and swooped down to shoot with machine guns. The 2nd Battalion gathered all the 8 light machine guns it could gather to shoot at the sky. More than a dozen machine gunners were killed, but no Japanese plane was shot down or damaged.

In the face of absolute strength, courage can only make up for it, but it cannot necessarily compete!

And what's more deadly is not just the battle losses! The 69th Regiment was divided into two routes. Its main force, the first battalion, went around the left wing to Beiganling, the battlefield selected by Brigade Commander Cheng, while the regiment led the second and third battalions to the front position.

What they had to do was to block the incoming Japanese army first, and wait for the 772nd and 771st Regiments, which were still running on the other two mountain roads, to arrive at the battlefield from the left and right wings to encircle the Japanese army!

Because in order to implement this tactic, both infantry regiments had to abandon the main road and detour the narrow mountain road, and the arrival time was expected to be one and a half hours later!

But the problem now is that the mountain road that takes more than half an hour to reach the battlefield was bombed by Japanese planes. It will take two hours for them to go around. The Japanese army may have arrived. The advantageous terrain of Beiganling Village can only be abandoned, but the greater crisis is not just that.

Because, according to the time estimate, the main force of the 769th Regiment, the First Battalion, should have arrived at the battlefield. If they want to notify them, the entire 769th Regiment has only one field radio.

That means that in nearly an hour and a half, perhaps one infantry battalion will face two thousand Japanese troops!

"Order the entire regiment, leave a platoon and a medical staff to take care of the wounded, and all the rest, throw away all the baggage, except bullets, guns and grenades, and run for me. Even if you are tired to crawl, you must crawl to the battlefield for me!" The young commander of the 769th Regiment quickly threw away his sadness and anger and issued a military order to the entire regiment.

If they didn't reach the battlefield quickly, the 460 most elite battalions under his command would face 2,000 Japanese troops armed to the teeth. The consequences were chilling to think about.

The final battle also proved how correct the choice of the young colonel was. He ordered the whole regiment to march lightly and at all costs, shortening the time to reach the battlefield by half an hour!

But at that time, his main battalion had been fighting with the Japanese army, which had far more troops than them, for an hour.

Back to the Japanese bomber formation, they vented their anger with bombs and machine guns. The anger of watching their own infantry corpses spread all over the field was finally vented, and they returned with shaking wings.

Perhaps it was because they just saw that the Chinese machine gunners' futile concentrated fire resistance only left harmless bullet holes on the wings of the fighter planes, which made the Japanese pilots' confidence unprecedentedly burst. When the fighter planes were about to fly over the top of the mountain, they saw the houses of Chinese mountain people and dived over them at high speed.

The terrible airflow lifted the roofs of the simple houses of the mountain people, and even swept the panicked Chinese mountain people and blew them into the grass more than ten meters away...

If their fighter planes had not even run out of machine gun bullets, it would be obvious that they would continue to vent their anger on those innocent people.

"Haha! Lowly Chinese, when the imperial army occupies this country, all those who dare to resist will die!" The leading Japanese Army Aviation Captain laughed.

"If you don't resist, you will die too!"

"They are only worthy of kneeling on the ground and licking our boots!"

...

The radio was filled with the unbridled laughter of Japanese pilots.

Perhaps only Sasaki did not participate in the game of venting anger with his colleagues, leaving the fighter plane at an altitude of 700 meters, looking vigilantly at the gray and bald mountains, even though his colleagues laughed at his timidity and caution from time to time!

This is a battlefield, not an amusement park! He avoided the call of the god of death again and again, luck played a big role, but caution was also necessary. Sasaki, who had been watching the ground carefully, did not remind these idiots!

He was not their father, so he had no obligation to do so!

Lieutenant Sasaki's caution was correct.

On the route of the six Japanese fighter planes returning home, there were 8 anti-aircraft heavy machine guns and 2 machine guns waiting in full battle array. Although the Japanese planes spared the county town of Licheng, there were still trucks, carriages and people moving on the simple road.

No one dared to be careless, even if there were sentinels on the surrounding hills looking out, once there was danger, they would immediately light the signal smoke to give the soldiers and civilians on the road enough time to hide.

Mo Songzi, the platoon leader of the machine gun platoon, sat on the gun position of the Su Luotong machine gun. The entire machine gun was wrapped in bushes, and the surrounding fortifications built with wood and stones were also covered with dry grass and bushes. From a distance, it looked no different from a bush.

Just 200 meters from his position, there was another area similar to his position. That was another machine gun of Mo Songzi's machine gun platoon. In addition, there were two anti-aircraft machine guns that were also camouflaged!

This was an air defense position with the machine gun platoon as the core. Not far from them was a road where trucks and carriages kept passing by.

In the distance, a straight line of smoke rose!

"Order everyone to be on guard, the Japanese planes are coming!" Mo Songzi held the handle of the machine gun with both hands.

Cheng Tieshou's military order was very simple. If the Japanese planes bombed, they would beat the hell out of them. If they did not find any personnel or vehicles, they would hide first.

The dull roar of the aircraft engine first came into the ears. Everyone on the road had already hidden. After a minute, six black dots appeared more and more clearly in Mo Songzi's field of vision.

Mo Songzi was slightly stunned!

The Japanese planes coming from the direction of Shentouling did not mean to dive, or they did not need to dive at all.

Because the altitude was really too low!

Although the telescope does not have an altimeter, Mo Songzi, who has shot down planes countless times, can completely sense the flight altitude of Japanese planes through visual observation.

The highest one is less than 700 meters, and the lowest one is even only 300 meters...

Do the Japanese want to see the scenery of Taihang Mountain?

Should they fight or not? This is a difficult problem that suddenly appeared in front of Mo Songzi, the second lieutenant platoon leader.

The Japanese planes had no intention of dive bombing. According to military orders, he had to hide well and watch them leave.

But the Japanese were already lying down and straightening their butts. If he didn't shoot them, he would be punished by God. 500 meters, 1200 meters, 1000 meters, 800 meters, the Japanese planes were getting closer and closer!

To use an old saying of the future commentator to explain the Chinese football team: There is not much time left for the Chinese football team.

"Fight for me!" Mo Songzi finally made a decision.

"Bang, bang, bang!" As the Su Luotong machine gun opened fire at full force.

Another machine gun also fired at least five shells, and the two anti-aircraft machine guns that had been prepared for a long time also sprayed a barrage of bullets! The straight-line distance of 100 meters and the height of 300 meters, for the anti-aircraft guns that had already prepared everything, was just like a newspaper office issuing a call to all correspondents---welcome to join!