Chapter 1 This Night, the Wind Was Light and the Clouds Were Pale

The weather after the autumn equinox was extremely hot during the day, but at night the temperature dropped, making it very suitable for a sound sleep.

This Japanese reinforcement team, which had set out from Xuzhou during the day and marched under the scorching sun, could finally get a good night's sleep.

Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro was one such soldier; he had already fainted once in the blazing sun during the day.

After a night's rest, although he still felt a little tired, his spirit had completely recovered.

He listened to the squad leader constantly whistling, urging all the Japanese soldiers to get up and prepare to depart.

Kitakaze Jiro looked at the sky, still a vast black curtain, with stars and the moon only just beginning to drift westward.

Squad Leader Endo Taiyu was shouting loudly at his subordinates, "The company commander has ordered us to get up at 3:30 a.m. and quickly eat our dry rations.

We will depart at 4:00 a.m. We'll find some shade to rest in around noon today and continue until 4:00 p.m."

The Japanese soldiers, awakened by the shrill whistles, were initially very nervous, thinking they were under attack.

Now, hearing that they were being roused to eat dry rations and prepare to depart, they felt a bit resentful.

But after the squad leader explained that they would be able to hide in the shade when the sun was at its peak, no longer having to walk all day under the sun like yesterday, the resentment in the Japanese soldiers' hearts dissipated considerably.

Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro finally sat up, first hastily gulping down two mouthfuls of water from his canteen to soothe his parched throat.

Then, he took out a small piece of biscuit from his ration bag and began to chew it slowly.

A bite of biscuit followed by a sip of cool water, in such a night, with a gentle breeze, was very refreshing.

Just sitting there for a while, his spirits slowly lifted.

Following Squad Leader Endo Taiyu's orders, Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro joined the ranks, and today's march began once more.

Captain Yamada Kininosuke watched his troops marching in the not-so-dark night, carrying torches.

The long fiery dragon had no beginning or end in sight. It was very imposing, winding like a snake, and this mixed force of Japanese and puppet soldiers set off in this manner.

The early morning air was cool, and these Japanese and puppet soldiers initially marched very quickly.

This made the supervising team dispatched by Captain Yamada Kininosuke completely useless.

This also made Captain Yamada Kininosuke feel a little gratified: marching in the early morning was indeed effective. Without the sun shining down, the Japanese soldiers' spirits were quite good.

Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro walked in the fields of southern Shandong. Although the marching speed was a bit fast, the Japanese soldiers were sweating profusely. However, the early morning temperature was already quite low, and coupled with the constant gentle breeze, it made them increasingly energetic.

They marched in the early morning, and it gradually became brighter. These Japanese soldiers initially marched in the dark. After an hour, the sky was already slightly brighter.

In the long line, many soldiers threw away their lit torches. Now, they could roughly see the road even without torches.

Thus, the long fiery dragon now had only a few scattered sparks shining in the middle of the line.

By the time the sky began to turn pale, no one in the Japanese and puppet soldier队伍 was holding a torch anymore.

The队伍 had been marching for two and a half hours, and there was a small stream ahead. Captain Yamada Kininosuke ordered, "The entire army will rest for fifteen minutes."

He personally went to the stream, scooped up the cool water, and washed his face, immediately feeling much refreshed.

The Japanese and puppet soldiers rushed to the stream, only wanting to cool off. At this time, even if their clothes and pants got wet, it didn't matter much. There was still a long way to march today. Rather than letting them be soaked in sweat, it was better to wet them with stream water first, so they could stay cooler while walking later.

When the Japanese soldiers began marching again, the sun had only risen three bamboo poles high from the ground.

That night, the First Regiment of the Lu Nan Detachment and the three Security Regiments also had a good night's rest after arranging their sentries.

Yesterday, both the First Regiment and the First Security Regiment of Sishui, which participated in the battle, were quite exhausted. The Second Security Regiment of Fei County and the Second Security Regiment of Sishui, which had rushed over from afar, were also not relaxed.

They had marched forty kilometers under the scorching sun. After arriving here, they didn't rest and instead focused on scraping the ground to restore the battlefield.

However, all this labor was worthwhile. They still carried out assassination training as usual in the morning before eating.

Each company took its place, just waiting for the Japanese to come and die.

Because the route of the Japanese was clear, ground reconnaissance had been extended to twenty kilometers away.

Aerial reconnaissance also began after dawn. Judging from the reported situation, Gu Xiuming was obviously a little disappointed: the Japanese soldiers besieging Huangtu Ridge were only being rescued by Japanese soldiers from the direction of Xuzhou.

This made Gu Xiuming feel that the North China Area Army didn't value the group of Japanese soldiers on Huangtu Ridge enough.

Since there weren't many Japanese soldiers coming to reinforce, Gu Xiuming had to cherish them even more and send this batch of Japanese soldiers off properly.

Otherwise, he didn't know where the next batch of Japanese soldiers would be.

Jiang Liming, the platoon leader of the reconnaissance platoon that was sent out to scout the enemy's situation, finally sent back reliable information: the Japanese appeared twenty *li* away. There were more than a thousand Japanese soldiers and more than three thousand puppet soldiers.

It was already 9:00 a.m., and the Japanese had only just appeared. Gu Xiuming was dissatisfied with the Japanese soldiers' slow marching speed.

Captain Yamada Kininosuke was also very dissatisfied with the marching speed of his subordinates.

The Japanese soldiers under his command were really like ghosts. When the sun wasn't out, each of them marched at a speed that could satisfy him.

But once the sunlight shone on these Japanese soldiers' bodies, they were like ghosts afraid of sunlight, and their marching speed suddenly slowed down.

When the Japanese soldiers at the front slowed down, the puppet soldiers behind them also slowed down.

This allowed the supervising team dispatched by Captain Yamada Kininosuke to finally put their skills to use.

They brandished their whips, lashing down hard on the heads and faces of the walking Japanese and puppet soldiers.

At first, the Japanese and puppet soldiers who were whipped silently endured it.

Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro had suffered heatstroke yesterday and fainted once. Although he had recovered some spirit last night,

he had been marching continuously for four hours today and was really unable to walk any further.

This Japanese soldier, who was dragging his feet, had clearly become a drag on the entire队伍 and had become a key target of the supervising team's attention.

The Japanese soldiers in the supervising team rode their warhorses back and forth along the long队伍. Every time they passed by, they couldn't resist giving Kitakaze Jiro, who had already fallen behind to the puppet soldier队伍, two lashes of the whip.

If they didn't see that Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro was a Japanese soldier, he would have been the first one dragged out of the队伍 and shot.

Captain Yamada Kininosuke was thinking of finding a chicken to give the entire battalion a shot in the arm.

He understood the principle of killing the chicken to scare the monkey very well.

It's just that Kitakaze Jiro was a Japanese soldier, so it wasn't good to use him as the chicken.

Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro obviously didn't appreciate the company commander's good intentions. This morning, he had been whipped no less than twenty times. The clothes on his back had long been torn apart, and even deep bloody welts could be seen on his shoulders through the torn fabric.

Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro, who originally didn't have much strength, felt the deep malice of the whole world towards him.

His steps became heavier and heavier. Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro now understood that he would either be whipped to death or walked to death here.

Death! Was certain!

"Even if I die, I'll drag someone down with me!" Kitakaze Jiro decided to take a few Japanese soldiers with him on the road to the afterlife. Anything was better than walking like this.

Once he had made up his mind, another Japanese soldier from the supervising team trotted over on a large horse. Before he even arrived, the whip in his hand was already raised high.

The target was, of course, Kitakaze Jiro. Kitakaze Jiro was an experienced soldier.

He quickly fixed the bayonet on his Type 38 rifle. At this moment, a burst of strength suddenly welled up from nowhere, and he thrust the rifle in his hand forward fiercely.

Ueno Iuo, who had raised his whip but hadn't yet struck, looked at the bayonet that suddenly appeared in front of his chest.

The hand that had raised the whip suddenly lost its strength, and the whip fell to the ground.

His body was carried by the warhorse, pushing Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro back two steps, causing him to fall to the ground.

Kitakaze Jiro gripped his Type 38 rifle tightly, as if he were holding onto his own life.

After he pulled his rifle back, Ueno Iuo's body immediately fell off the horse's back.

The puppet soldiers walking beside them all shouted, "Murder! Murder!"

There was panic in their voices, but more than that, there was glee: these Japanese soldiers from the supervising team hadn't whipped them any less.

It was only because Kitakaze Jiro had fallen behind to their side that all the whipping was taken care of by Kitakaze Jiro, and these puppet soldiers were whipped much less.

Now, they saw the Japanese soldiers fighting among themselves, and they just shouted from the sidelines, not going up to stop them.

This was a matter between *Taijun* (high-ranking Japanese soldiers), not something they, the puppet soldiers, could interfere with.

The gunshots in the队伍 startled Huan Anran, the puppet soldier regiment commander who was marching numbly, and also startled Yamada Kininosuke at the front. They both sent people to inquire about the situation.

Kitakaze Jiro suddenly understood at this moment that he had caused a great disaster.

He simply decided to go all the way and do it thoroughly, raising his rifle but not firing at the nearby puppet soldiers: these puppet soldiers weren't worth him firing at.

Kitakaze Jiro aimed his gun at the supervising team that was rushing towards him: "Bang!" With a gunshot, a Japanese soldier riding a warhorse fell down.

"Bang!" This was already the third supervising team Japanese soldier that Kitakaze Jiro had killed.

When Kitakaze Jiro had just stabbed the Japanese soldier, the puppet soldiers had screamed and ran away. At this time, the puppet soldiers had already run thirty meters away.

Hearing the gunshots, these puppet soldiers quickly prostrated themselves on the ground, crawling rapidly into the distance.

This was a dog-eat-dog battlefield, and they didn't dare to get involved.

Kitakaze Jiro was a crack shot. Within a distance of a dozen meters, he could hit whatever he aimed at. The supervising team Japanese soldiers didn't dare to continue charging towards him on horseback.

They dismounted far away, prostrated themselves on the ground, and fired randomly in Kitakaze Jiro's direction.

Hearing that a Japanese soldier under his command had suddenly stabbed a supervising team member to death during the march, and now had shot two more Japanese soldiers dead,

and that the two sides were confronting each other, with neither able to do anything to the other,

Captain Yamada Kininosuke almost spat out a mouthful of blood: He had never imagined that there would be soldiers staging a mutiny in his队伍.

What could he do at this moment? Of course, he had to suppress the mutiny first.

Wasn't he very, very helpless? Captain Yamada Kininosuke felt aggrieved and wanted to vomit blood.

"I just wanted to maintain the marching speed of the entire队伍. How did I ignite a firecracker today, which exploded with just one hit!"

No matter what the situation was today: first of all, Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro definitely couldn't be allowed to live.

That was the bottom line! With this bottom line in mind, Captain Yamada Kininosuke immediately conveyed his orders.

He shouted loudly to the more than ten Japanese soldiers in the supervising team, "Kitakaze Jiro has repeatedly violated military discipline and shot his comrades. Execute him on the spot."

Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro had a bellyful of grievances that he wanted to pour out to the company commander: "He had always been an excellent sharpshooter in the squad, brave in battle, and with a tenacious style.

Yesterday, he marched with the队伍 and suffered heatstroke. His body hadn't fully recovered, and he was deliberately targeted by his comrades in the supervising team.

He was wronged! He was unjustly accused!"

But he didn't wait for Captain Yamada Kininosuke to come and reason things out. All he heard was the Japanese soldiers from the supervising team shouting from a distance, "The company commander has ordered that Kitakaze Jiro violated military discipline and is to be executed on the spot!"

Executed on the spot! This was his death sentence. Although he knew he was doomed, Kitakaze Jiro decided not to die too easily.

He wanted to make Captain Yamada Kininosuke and all the Japanese soldiers in the battalion regret it.

The supervising team originally had thirteen Japanese soldiers. After three were shot dead, only ten remained.

These ten Japanese soldiers surrounded Sergeant Kitakaze Jiro. Unexpectedly, just as they conveyed Yamada Kininosuke's order,

"Bang! Bang!" Two more gunshots rang out, sending two more heads to the afterlife.

This time, Captain Yamada Kininosuke was furious: These Japanese soldiers from the supervising team were truly incompetent!

Ten people fighting one, and even against a sick person, and they had already lost five heads and hadn't even injured the other person.

He ordered Captain Miki Juichiro, "Kitakaze Jiro is from your battalion, isn't he! You have taught him well!"

Captain Miki Juichiro definitely didn't want to hear such praise at this time. He quickly stood at attention: "Hai! This subordinate requests that the Miki Company execute Kitakaze Jiro, this traitor."

Captain Yamada Kininosuke nodded slightly.

The entire battalion's march was temporarily halted. The puppet soldiers ran to the shade of the trees, watching the excitement from a distance.

They were the melon-eating masses with the least pressure: the *Taijun*'s affairs were to be resolved by the *Taijun*. Captain Yamada Kininosuke resolutely forbade the puppet soldiers from intervening in this embarrassing matter.

If he wasn't afraid of causing new riots, he wouldn't even allow the puppet soldiers to watch.

Squad Leader Endo Taiyu was heartbroken: he never thought that such a weirdo as Kitakaze Jiro would appear in his squad.

At the same time, he also had a little bit of regret: if he had helped Kitakaze Jiro a little bit during the march, would this kind of thing not have happened?

Perhaps helping Kitakaze Jiro carry his gun, helping him carry his backpack, or pulling him along, so that he could keep up with the entire squad.

Squad Leader Endo Taiyu understood that as long as Kitakaze Jiro was in his squad, the Japanese soldiers in the supervising team wouldn't dare to whip him with their whips either.

At most, they could only yell a few words. These thoughts only flashed through his mind. What he was thinking about now was: how could he kill Kitakaze Jiro?

This man, who had once been the squad's sharpshooter, was really a bit difficult to kill now.

Captain Miki Juichiro accepted the task and immediately gave the task of frontal attack to the Endo Taiyu Squad.

He himself led the other two squads to feel their way to Kitakaze Jiro from the left and right flanks.

Perhaps knowing that this was the last moment of his life, Kitakaze Jiro shone brightly.

Relying only on one gun, and through constant movement, he actually managed to suppress the Miki Juichiro Company.

In the Endo Taiyu Squad, four Japanese soldiers who had a good relationship with Kitakaze Jiro were injured, and five Japanese soldiers who didn't have a good relationship with him died.

In the other two squads, six Japanese soldiers died in each. Now, Kitakaze Jiro had already killed twenty-two Japanese soldiers.

Such casualties made Yamada Kininosuke so angry that he really vomited blood. He stared fixedly at the supervising team Captain Fujieda Yuta.

He said fiercely, "Look at what you have done! You, the supervising team, will immediately launch a suicide charge."

He wanted to end the battle here as soon as possible. Even if Kitakaze Jiro was the god of the north wind, when the remaining seven Japanese soldiers of the supervising team stood up and charged towards the position where he was hiding,

and with the cooperation of the hundreds of Japanese soldiers in the Miki Juichiro Company, they would definitely be able to kill Kitakaze Jiro at the least cost.

In reality, if the twenty-two Japanese soldiers who had already died had lined up and charged directly, they wouldn't have died so many.

"Hai!" Captain Fujieda Yuta could only accept this task of sending himself to death.

The supervising team had an advantage. They had warhorses. Seven warhorses suddenly charged towards Kitakaze Jiro.

The seven Japanese soldiers on the warhorses shouted as they launched their charge. All of Kitakaze Jiro's energy was attracted to them.

The Japanese soldiers of the Miki Juichiro Company quickly cooperated and launched their charge.

This time, Kitakaze Jiro only killed Captain Fujieda Yuta, who was charging, and was then hacked down by the other six Japanese soldiers from the supervising team who had rushed up.

Then, he was trampled into mincemeat by the warhorses. This Japanese soldier, who had brought so much harm to the supervising team, was too hateful.

He had used his own strength to cripple the entire supervising team.

The rest of the Japanese soldiers finally heard the gunshots behind them stop. Captain Yamada Kininosuke ordered the队伍 to continue moving forward.

It was easy to deal with the Japanese soldiers who had been killed by Kitakaze Jiro. These Japanese soldiers had one of their hands chopped off and taken away, and their bodies were buried on the spot.

But what about the four Japanese soldiers who had been injured by Kitakaze Jiro? Should they be carried forward, or should Japanese soldiers be sent back to carry them back?

This was a dilemma!

Captain Yamada Kininosuke finally made a decision to carry these four Japanese soldiers while marching.

This kind of march was so difficult! He really didn't want to continue walking like this.

The continuous gunshots in the Japanese soldiers队伍 puzzled Jiang Liming, the platoon leader of the reconnaissance platoon who was lurking in the distance.

He didn't understand why the Japanese soldiers had stopped in place and were constantly shooting. Originally, weren't these Japanese soldiers walking along just fine?

Could it be that while walking, they encountered someone ambushing them?

But he had just passed by that position! If someone was really ambushing there, even if he hadn't discovered them,

they would have discovered him!

He couldn't figure it out! Platoon Leader Jiang Liming didn't dare to sneak over to reconnoiter and find out what was going on.

He could only suppress his curiosity and watch the puppet soldiers in the distance sitting relaxedly in the shade of the trees, enjoying the cool.

There were also many Japanese soldiers who were equally relaxed, but the gunshots were not far from their position.

In order to prevent the ambushing troops in the rear from misjudging the situation, Platoon Leader Jiang Liming once again sent someone back to inform them: Gunshots had been heard in the Japanese soldiers队伍, and the entire队伍 was resting.

This notification was incomprehensible even to Regiment Commander Gu Xiuming. Fortunately, the communicator was also a spectator in the distance.

He described the situation on the scene in detail, including the position where the Japanese and puppet soldiers were currently firing their guns, which was less than ten minutes away from where they had just left.

Hearing that the Japanese and puppet soldiers were very relaxed, Regiment Commander Gu could only order all the troops to continue to patiently lie in ambush, waiting for the Japanese soldiers to come forward themselves.

This wait lasted for two hours. After Captain Yamada Kininosuke executed Kitakaze Jiro,

in order to prevent the entire队伍 from being sentimental and something bad from happening again,

he ordered the队伍 to continue moving forward. From the map, he knew that the Yi River was ahead.

Captain Yamada Kininosuke ordered, "Everyone, speed up and rest on the banks of the Yi River until 4:00 p.m. before continuing the march."

This order was like a shot in the arm, giving all the Japanese soldiers the greatest motivation.

The supervising team was quietly disbanded. All the Japanese soldiers were imagining taking a bath in the Yi River. How cool would that be?

Anyway, they wouldn't continue marching until 4:00 p.m., so they had plenty of time to play in the river.

This time, the marching speed of the Japanese and puppet soldiers really picked up.

The soldiers of the First and Second Security Regiments of Sishui watched the Japanese soldiers running past them in a hurry, and then saw the puppet soldiers running past them in a hurry.

Although they had buried directional mines, they didn't dare to launch an attack without Gu Xiuming's order.

Yesterday, they had cleared the ground so thoroughly that not a single one of the Japanese and puppet soldiers who passed by had any doubts.

But Gu Xiuming had miscalculated one thing: The Japanese and puppet soldiers had actually stopped on the left bank of the Yi River.

They were no longer continuing forward and were starting to rest and recuperate here.

At first, the four regiments of the Lu Nan Detachment here thought that they would only rest here for ten minutes or so before continuing on their way.

As long as these Japanese soldiers moved forward another five hundred meters, they would enter the ambush set up by the First Regiment.

But this group of Japanese soldiers obviously didn't follow Regiment Commander Gu's plan. The Japanese soldiers were playing, bathing, and swimming in the Yi River. They simply didn't think about leaving.

Captain Yamada Kininosuke watched the Japanese soldiers on the shore and in the water, one by one, being nourished by the river water. They were all like small grass that had been meeting with rain after a long drought, and they had all regained their vitality.

The internal strife that had just occurred in the队伍 seemed to have been forgotten by these Japanese soldiers.

The face that had been gloomy all along finally had a little bit of a smile: As long as the Japanese soldiers could maintain this state, that would be good.

The way they were now was much better than the way they had been yesterday when they had been marching all the time.

Captain Yamada Kininosuke also swam in the river, experiencing a long-lost coolness, before taking a nap in the shade of the trees.

The Japanese soldiers rested here for nearly five hours.

In order not to be discovered by the Japanese soldiers, Gu Xiuming ordered everyone in the队伍, except for the scouts, not to leave their concealed positions, not to move, and not to expose their targets.