Chapter 1 Liu Family Village

Liu Family Village was a small village on the very edge of Changzhou.

So close to Jiangyin that it was practically the outermost village of Jiangyin as well.

It was also the closest village to Zhenjiang.

And a good five kilometers from the Yangtze River.

This little village had always been a "three-no-touch" zone, immune to the ever-changing world outside.

They always managed to live peacefully here.

A few days ago, some villagers who had gone out to buy goods returned.

They spoke of the chaos and turmoil gripping the outside world once more.

Those outsiders were always spreading rumors of war again.

But this was nothing new.

For the past few decades, news of fighting had been constant.

The country was always being attacked by Westerners or Japanese.

And when outsiders weren't attacking, the people were fighting amongst themselves.

They just didn't want to live in peace.

But this had no impact on the people of Liu Family Village.

They were in such a remote location that even the Taiping Rebellion decades ago hadn't affected them.

Legend had it that their first ancestor had chosen this place precisely to avoid worldly affairs.

Though not a true Shangri-La, it was a haven of peace and non-contention.

They lived their simple lives in their small village, perfectly content.

Today, December 3rd, 1937,

a group of outsiders came to the village, which had been undisturbed for centuries.

They were armed and spoke a language that the villagers couldn't understand.

Colonel Noda Kengo, commander of the 33rd Regiment of the 16th Division, gazed upon the idyllic village.

He couldn't help but exclaim, "This place truly resembles a paradise!"

He pointed his command sword forward. "We'll set up camp here for today."

His unit had just witnessed the power of the Special Forces' heavy artillery and had retreated without firing a single shot.

To avoid being targeted by the Special Forces, they had avoided the main roads and detoured towards Changzhou.

And by chance, they had found Liu Family Village.

Now, with Colonel Noda Kengo's order to encamp, the remaining nearly three thousand Japanese soldiers of the regiment immediately surrounded the village.

Liu Family Village had been quietly developing for so many years, and the entire village had a population of over a thousand, making it a fairly large village.

There were more than three hundred able-bodied men.

Faced with this suddenly intruding force, the most respected village elder of Liu Family Village came forward to greet them.

Colonel Noda Kengo demanded that the village slaughter ten pigs and a hundred chickens and ducks to prepare food for three thousand men.

After these demands were met one by one,

the Colonel, very satisfied, made his final request: "Bring out one hundred pretty girls!"

This demand stunned the village elder.

While the village was still reeling, the soldiers of Noda Kengo's regiment began smashing their cooking pots after finishing their meal.

They quickly rushed into the village, shouting for everyone to gather at the village entrance, bayonets ready for anyone who resisted.

The men of Liu Family Village had no choice but to walk out of their homes in humiliation.

When they reached the village entrance, the Japanese soldiers began dragging young girls and wives out from among the villagers.

They immediately opened fire on anyone who tried to stop them.

Those men who had been willing to endure humiliation could no longer bear it.

Many of them rushed forward, now charging with their bare hands,

only to fall under the machine gun fire.

While the people of Liu Family Village were being gunned down by the Japanese soldiers,

the main force of the Special Forces had already finished cleaning up the battlefield and was preparing a meal.

The more than one thousand men of the 103rd Division had finally taken one thousand horse legs and a considerable amount of weapons and ammunition from the Special Forces.

Lin Fan's initial outrageous demands to Dai Zhigi had been completely met.

Li Xian said with some concern, "Will these people take the guns back and then run away when fighting the Japanese next time,

leaving the guns behind?"

Lin Fan smiled and said, "Like officers, like soldiers.

This Division Commander Dai doesn't seem like a coward to me. With him there, these soldiers won't dare to run away and abandon their guns."

Zhenjiang was still under the defense of the National Revolutionary Army. After the Special Forces had inflicted pain on the 16th Division,

they advanced towards Zhenjiang again and finally encountered no further resistance.

Even minor issues like difficult roads along the way were nothing to the Special Forces.

The Special Forces and the 103rd Division arrived in Zhenjiang at the same time. As soon as they arrived,

an order from the Nanjing Garrison Headquarters was delivered to the 103rd Division, ordering them to immediately return to Nanjing to defend the city.

Regimental Commander Wan Shi-jiong said goodbye to Lin Fan, repeatedly urging him to visit him in Nanjing.

He wanted to treat Lin Fan to a drink!

Lin Fan smiled and readily agreed.

Ships had already arrived at the Zhenjiang docks to pick up the 103rd Division.

As for Lin Fan's Special Forces unit, no one paid them any attention.

The Special Forces didn't mind.

Li Xian traded horse legs for fish in Zhenjiang, hoping to vary the Special Forces' diet a bit.

Lin Fan also agreed to let the Special Forces rest in Zhenjiang for a day.

Every day, they saw numerous planes flying overhead, all heading towards Nanjing.

Li Xian asked with some concern, "Lin Fan! What are we going to Nanjing for?"

Lin Fan said, "To fight the Japanese!"

"But we're not well-received by the National Revolutionary Army! We only had light weapons before, but now our equipment is much stronger than that of the regular army.

Will our weapons be confiscated in Nanjing?"

"No! If they want some machine guns and rifles, I can give them some.

Even artillery can be given, as long as they are willing to fight the Japanese," Lin Fan said with a smile.

"Are you really not worried about killing two National Revolutionary Army officers in Jiangyin?"

"There's nothing to worry about. We'll deal with it when the time comes," Lin Fan said nonchalantly.

Seeing that Lin Fan always had a "fight the Japanese to the end" attitude, Li Xian finally asked the question he was most worried about: "Can Nanjing be defended?"

"No!"

"Then are we still going?"

"As members of the nation, even if we can't defend it, we still have to do our best!"

"What about the people sent by the organization? Each of them is a treasure to the organization!" Li Xian finally made his point clear.

Lin Fan understood at this point.

He thought for a moment, "Alright! Going to Nanjing this time is truly very dangerous.

Their training period in the Special Forces is almost up, too.

Contact them and let those who came for training return to their units after arriving in Nanjing!

Give each of them ten machine guns and ninety rifles, along with ten thousand rounds of ammunition.

This matter is my oversight. I apologize!

Discuss it tonight and come up with a plan."

Li Xian was finally relieved.

He said with a smile, "Among this group, twenty came to learn and train,

and twenty came to strengthen the Special Forces.

Letting those who came to learn go back will add twenty new seeds of the Special Forces.

Our team will become stronger in the future."

Lin Fan said with a smile, "I have no doubt about that, and that time will come soon."

He didn't speak of the suffering that the nation would endure before victory.

Let the facts tell everyone about these hardships!

After all, even with countless written and photographic evidence, with the cries of those survivors, many people in later generations still questioned it.

If Lin Fan dared to say that the Japanese would massacre the city now, even the people of Nanjing would spit on him, not to mention anyone else.

After all, at this time, the Japanese had a very good reputation in the world.

All the uninformed masses believed that the Japanese represented advanced Western civilization.

And that's what the Japanese propaganda said too, portraying themselves as victims.

I'm sending troops to your country to attack you for your own good.

It's to help you.

Of course, if the Japanese way of thinking had no market, they wouldn't be able to enter the country.

Their way of thinking still has a market internationally, and it also has a market domestically.

Some people in the Nanjing government believe this, and some ordinary people also believe this.

After the National Revolutionary Army's 103rd Division returned to Nanjing, they were immediately assigned defensive positions.

This Battle of Nanjing was an extremely difficult choice: everyone knew the fact that Nanjing could not be defended.

Looking at the history of Nanjing, whether the opponent came from the Yangtze River or from anywhere else,

Nanjing had never been held.

But the current Nanjing was the capital of the government, and its political significance was particularly important. From this point of view, it had to be defended!

This was difficult!

What was even more difficult was that even though they knew they couldn't hold it, they couldn't let the uninformed masses see that the government was just putting on a show of defense.

So the number of people in this Nanjing Defense War couldn't be too large, but they had to make the soldiers and civilians believe that the government had done its best: it wasn't that the National Revolutionary Army wasn't working hard, it was just that the Japanese were too powerful.

This was the message that the government wanted to convey to the people of the whole country, but there was another problem: they couldn't let the ordinary people be afraid of the Japanese.

Because a completely invincible Japanese army would affect the entire country's will to resist.

This was really a very difficult task.

This task was taken on by Tang Shengzhi at his own initiative.

He was also quite a figure. He had once established the Wuhan government and had been the number one man in the country.

It was just that he was easily defeated by Chiang Kai-shek in a few rounds, and he also lost his military power. In recent years, he had only been able to hold a powerless, idle position.

Crisis!

In a crisis, there is danger and opportunity! When Tang Shengzhi accepted this task, he knew that it would be difficult.

But accepting the task of defending Nanjing would immediately make him a well-known political figure in the eyes of the world.

His reputation would soar!

And there was one more thing that he wanted most: military power!

If he wanted to defend Nanjing, he had to have an army in his hands! This way, he could get a great deal of military power from Chiang Kai-shek and be able to command a large number of troops.

As for failure?

Anyway, he had nothing to lose!

How should Nanjing be defended specifically? This could be figured out with some brainstorming.

In order to make everyone believe that the government would defend Nanjing to the death, Chiang Kai-shek's "Iron Guard" Central Teaching Corps was entirely left in Nanjing.

The Central Teaching Corps was the most elite unit in the National Revolutionary Army. Both its equipment and personnel were top-notch.

Having such a unit defending Nanjing was enough to make the world believe that the government would defend Nanjing to the death.

But the rest of the troops were all remnants and defeated soldiers from the Battle of Shanghai.

The morale of these troops, who had just returned from the battlefield after suffering defeats, was definitely not as high as it had been in Shanghai.

After all, in war, courage is key. A single drumbeat inspires courage; a second weakens it; a third exhausts it.

This was said in Cao Gui's discussion of war.

These words of the ancients had been spoken for more than two thousand years, and it wasn't that no one knew them.

It was just that no one dared to bring them up.

Although the Japanese had already reached the front lines of the Nanjing Garrison's defense,

the entire city of Nanjing was still a scene of revelry and entertainment.

People were still singing, dancing, shops were still open, and factories were still operating.

It was truly a picture of prosperity.

Regarding this situation, a poet more than a thousand years ago wrote a poem at the Qinhuai River docks in Jinling that was very fitting for the occasion:

Misty waters veil the cold, moonlight blurs the sands,
Moored at Qinhuai near wine houses, night expands.
Singing girls know not a nation's dying sighs,
Across the river, "Courtyard Flowers" still rise.

Jinling is now called Nanjing, and the Qinhuai River is still the Qinhuai River. The singing girls have now become the new women of the Republic of China.

The Nanjing Garrison Headquarters never publicized what the ordinary people of this metropolis should do in wartime.

The only thing they promoted a lot was asking these ordinary people to donate money and shout slogans.

So when two hundred thousand Japanese soldiers arrived with their sturdy ships and heavy artillery from three directions, the people of Nanjing remained emotionally stable!

It was already December 6th when the Special Forces returned to Nanjing.

Before that, on December 4th, a Japanese advance party in disguise was discovered forty kilometers east of Jurong.

The Japanese soldiers retreated as soon as they made contact.

Division Commander Ushijima Sadayoshi of the 18th Division received word that there were National Revolutionary Army soldiers defending the area and ordered the troops to advance overnight.

On December 5th, the advance party of the 18th Division launched an attack directly on Jurong.

The 55th Regiment of the 18th Division had suffered heavy casualties in Jiaxing after being attacked by the 128th Division.

They had just been replenished with troops a few days ago and had now regained some of their strength.

Colonel Yamazaki Shiro, the regimental commander, learned from his previous experiences. This time, he fought a brief skirmish with the two regiments of the 66th Army defending Jurong.

Upon discovering that the defending soldiers did not immediately collapse, he was unwilling to continue fighting the two regiments of the 66th Army.

The 55th Regiment retreated.

In the afternoon, the 66th Army discovered that the Japanese were active in the towns of Tuqiao and Mumachang around Jurong.

They were trying to encircle them from both flanks.

Division Commander Ushijima Sadayoshi was not flustered at all now. He was confident and waiting for a defense map of the opposing National Revolutionary Army.

In the afternoon, Ushijima Sadayoshi finally obtained a detailed map of the 66th Army's defensive positions in Jurong.

He immediately discovered a flaw in the 66th Army's defenses.

He immediately sent a force to march towards the flank of Xintang Town.

The Japanese completely avoided the 66th Army's pre-set positions and went straight through the gaps in the positions.

They were preparing to cut off the 66th Army's retreat first and then attack from both the front and rear.

This made the 66th Army very uncomfortable and forced them to send out the soldiers stationed in the pre-built fortifications and bunkers.

They attacked the 1st Battalion of the 55th Regiment in the open field.

Captain Imotani Haruki looked at a regiment of the defending army coming out of the positions.

A smug smile appeared on his face.

Tan Sui, the commander of the 159th Division of the 66th Army, sent this regiment to stop the Japanese from continuing to penetrate behind the 66th Army.

Regimental Commander Xie Kangbo immediately led his troops to attack.

At the same time, the 154th Division also sent a regiment to assist in the battle.

Captain Imotani Haruki sent his unit to attack, but they were firmly pinned down by Xie Kangbo's regiment and were unable to continue advancing.

At this time, Captain Imotani Haruki led his entire battalion to attack.

He immediately entangled Xie Kangbo's regiment.

That wasn't all: Yamazaki Shiro, the commander of the 55th Regiment behind him, sent the Mitake Kikuchi Kai Battalion to support him.

Xie Kangbo's regiment only had a total of over one thousand two hundred men.

They were already struggling to cope with being entangled by a battalion of the 18th Division, and now they were being attacked by two Japanese battalions.

Their decline was immediately apparent.

This unit, which had just engaged the Japanese, was immediately caught in a bitter battle. Now they were no longer trying to intercept the Japanese.

They were trying to break through!

The regiment of the 154th Division arrived quickly, and with the combined efforts from inside and outside, Xie Kangbo's regiment finally broke through after paying the price of nearly half their casualties.

A unit of the 18th Division infiltrated Mengtang from the north of Mount Jiuhua without any interception.

After the National Revolutionary Army received the news, they quickly sent a regiment to intercept them. The 56th Regiment did not get entangled with the National Revolutionary Army.

They continued to advance towards Nanjing City!

They didn't seem to be afraid of the National Revolutionary Army cutting off their retreat.

At this time, Tang Shengzhi suddenly realized that if this unit of the Japanese army was allowed to continue advancing, the highway between Nanjing and Tangshan and the 66th Division's retreat would be cut off by this Japanese unit.

Faced with this suddenly appearing defensive loophole, the Garrison Headquarters immediately transferred a regiment from the 16th Division, the 41st Division, the 66th Army, the 71st Army, and the 156th Division to annihilate this advancing Japanese unit.

It was under these circumstances that Lin Fan finally led his company of more than one thousand five hundred men to report to Sun Yuanliang, who was now the commander of the 72nd Army.

The Special Forces had finally arrived in Nanjing.

Sun Yuanliang looked at the company commander he had heard so much about: a young man of one meter eighty, a standard strong man.

He had a sturdy body, bright eyes, fair skin, and looked very energetic.

Commander Sun reached out his hand. "I've heard so much about you! Everyone has always said that I have a company commander under my command who is the most capable fighter in the entire army, and that there is a company that is the best fighter in the entire army.

But I myself have never seen them.

It is only today that I am able to see you, and it is true that seeing is believing!"

Lin Fan looked at the person in front of him, who had thick eyebrows, large eyes, a straight nose, and a square face.

He looked like the kind of person who played upright characters.

He was quite a talent!

Lin Fan didn't care about the gossip of the entertainment industry, so he didn't know that this person was the father of Qin Han, the most famous male actor in Taiwan later on.

Lin Fan only knew that the person in front of him was a first-term graduate of Whampoa Military Academy and had attended the 21st class of the artillery department of the Japanese Army Academy.

Judging from his appearance, this person had a peaceful mindset.

Lin Fan also knew one thing: Sun Yuanliang was one of the longest-lived of those first-term Whampoa graduates, living to be one hundred and three years old.

Sun Yuanliang asked in detail about the Special Forces' journey back from Jiangyin.

He was shocked and delighted to learn that Lin Fan had led a unit of more than one thousand five hundred men, carrying twenty 150mm heavy artillery pieces, as well as eight 88mm anti-aircraft guns, and dozens of mortars and Type 92 infantry guns, breaking through the Japanese's multiple blockades all the way from Jiangyin.

He had studied artillery and had also served as an artillery commander.

When he heard Lin Fan say that he had brought back twenty 150mm artillery pieces, he immediately wanted to see them in person.

When he saw the Special Forces' entire company of one hundred and eleven vehicles,

he said enviously, "Your company has more vehicles than an entire division of mine.

What's loaded on the vehicles?"

He had noticed that the Special Forces' vehicles were all covered up.

Lin Fan said with a smile, "They are all spoils of war captured along the way.

There are Japanese uniforms, equipment, weapons, and ammunition."

"Are there any machine guns?" Sun Yuanliang walked along the convoy,

gently stroking the German-imported 150mm howitzer in front of him.

Lin Fan nodded. "Yes!"

Sun Yuanliang didn't continue. He continued walking along the convoy, touching the 88mm anti-aircraft gun. "Is this also imported from Germany?"

"Yes!"

"You used this kind of gun to shoot down hundreds of Japanese planes?"

Lin Fan was shocked by this statement. "How would Nanjing know?"

Sun Yuanliang smiled. "There are no airtight walls. Jiangyin Fortress is an important location for the party and the country.

Any disturbance, even the slightest, is known here."

Lin Fan's expression became somewhat unpleasant.

Sun Yuanliang said with a smile, "You don't have to worry for the time being. Liu Xing is now the Deputy Commander of the Nanjing Garrison Headquarters.

He is considered to be second only to one person, and above all others.

What he said in the Jiangyin Defense Command is still valid.

Moreover, the people of the Military Intelligence Bureau are too busy to worry about these things now."

Lin Fan asked, "Is the situation very serious?"

Sun Yuanliang said with a wry smile, "The Japanese have already reached the outskirts of Nanjing City.

Your company's return now is of no use to the overall situation.

Our army is now defending Yuhuatai.

Let your company be a reserve force!"

This was considered accepting Lin Fan's company.

Knowing that the situation was urgent, Lin Fan immediately had Li Xian quickly send the twenty guerrilla captains who had been following the Special Forces to operate out of Nanjing.

There were still ships that could go up the Yangtze River.

As agreed, each person was given ninety rifles, ten machine guns, and ten thousand rounds of ammunition.

As for the captured Japanese leather shoes and clothing, everyone was given one hundred sets.

Li Xian was responsible for these matters.

Li Xian also had to pick up the wounded who the Special Forces had sent to Nanjing earlier, as well as the soldiers who had escorted supplies to Nanjing.

Lin Fan was going to meet an important person: Qian Youcai.

Now that the Special Forces had so many artillery pieces, they had to get more shells from this God of Wealth.

If they missed this chance, they would never get another one.

Section Chief Qian of the Nanjing Comprehensive Support Office never expected that Lin Fan, whom he had only met once, would actually come to Nanjing.

He came to drink with him.

"True friend! True brother!" Qian Youcai kept saying during the banquet.

Lin Fan simply told him in detail about every battle that the Special Forces had fought after separating from Section Chief Qian.

This was the only time Lin Fan had told an outsider about all the battles his unit had fought.

And sometimes, he had to exaggerate a little.

It had to be said that Qian Youcai was the best listener.

He was only amazed by every battle of the Special Forces.

The look in his eyes was as if he wished he had been there at the time.

When he heard that the Special Forces had snatched eighteen Type 96 150mm howitzers from the Japanese heavy artillery battalion,

his worship of Lin Fan was so great that he almost knelt down and kowtowed to him.

He said to Lin Fan, "Brother Lin! Let's not rush to drink. Let's go see the artillery first."

Lin Fan, of course, immediately agreed to his request.

Qian Youcai said to his waiter, "Leave the dishes. We'll be back in two hours."

As they walked, he kept saying, "I've seen the Japanese Type 96 howitzers.

Those were all bought from the Japanese.

I've never seen any that were snatched from the Japanese.

I have to see them."

As they walked through the city of Nanjing, Qian Youcai pointed to the people in the city and said, "Among these people, it would definitely be an exaggeration to say that five out of ten are spies.

But among ten, at least three are Japanese sympathizers, and one is a spy."

Lin Fan was shocked. "That many?"

Qian Youcai said, "How else would we be defeated so quickly?"

"Look! What is that?" Qian Youcai pointed to two people on the side of the street and said.

Lin Fan looked in the direction he was pointing, and his eyes widened a lot.

This was a situation that Lin Fan had never imagined:

The two people had set up a table on the street and were sending a message!

"They're sending a message! Who are they sending it to? Is no one taking care of it?"

Qian Youcai said, "If you walk around the entire city of Nanjing, you'll find that there are at least twenty people sending messages on the street, if not a hundred."

"Is no one taking care of it?" Lin Fan asked again.

"Some of them are reporters from Western countries who are sending articles directly to the outside world.

Some are domestic, and there are definitely Japanese people among them." But no one ever dared to investigate.

"Not even Chiang Kai-shek's sword?" Lin Fan asked.

"He doesn't dare either! Because the forces behind those people may not be smaller than Chiang Kai-shek's," Qian Youcai said.

Lin Fan's face suddenly changed. "Let's go back quickly."

"What's wrong?" Qian Youcai asked.

"We just came in and drove back with more than a hundred vehicles. If there are so many spies in the city of Nanjing, I'm afraid the Japanese planes will come and bomb us."