It was dark!

Tai Da Hinohara, the captain, finally breathed a sigh of relief as the planes that had been circling overhead for more than an hour were all gone.

He could finally sit down and relax.

Where exactly was the main force?

Captain Tai Da Hinohara didn't know, but he knew one thing: the main force was retreating north along the Baishui River.

Captain Hisato Kubo, who had retreated with the captain, was currently leading a few Japanese soldiers, scattered around blowing whistles, summoning the soldiers who had run off.

It took a full hour for Captain Tai Da Hinohara to gather a force of more than one hundred and fifty Japanese soldiers.

Most importantly, more than sixty men from the reserve team led by Captain Takumi Tanaka had returned as a unit.

Most of this force was infantry. The engineers and supply soldiers were nowhere to be found.

Captain Hino ordered the entire battalion to rest in place for half an hour, eating some dry rations by the river.

He ordered Captain Takumi Tanaka to send out a detachment to scout ahead, his orders were very clear: find a village, and the entire battalion would stay in this village tonight.

This was not a good assignment! The Noguchi Ryota detachment accepted the mission.

Detachment leader Ryota Noguchi knew that if it were daytime, such a mission would be very easy to complete.

But now it was night, and even if there was a village, it would be impossible to spot it from more than three hundred meters away.

"It's so dark tonight!" Yang Laoshi said inside the house.

His wife grumbled dissatisfiedly, "Anyway, we don't light the lamp! What does it matter if it's dark!"

This was true, country folks stopped working when it got dark, ate in the dark, and went to bed.

Things like lamp oil really had to be saved.

Lying on the bed, Yang Laoshi was not honest at all, but he soon stopped:

"The dogs are barking so fiercely tonight, should we go take a look?"

His wife grabbed him, "Don't go, Laoshi! I'm scared! Could it be bandits?"

"There's a war going on outside these days! Bandits wouldn't dare come!" Yang Laoshi had just finished speaking.

The barking of the guard dogs slowly stopped.

"Those passing by, they've already left!" Yang Laoshi finally felt relieved and continued what he was doing.

When the guard dogs barked again, everyone in Yang Family Village heard gunshots, followed by the mournful cries of the dying guard dogs.

Immediately afterward, many shouts rang out in the village, mixed with broken Mandarin: "Come out! Everyone come out!"

Even though they had been driven into the woodshed, they were ultimately being cornered and killed by the Japanese soldiers. Unarmed and unprepared, these civilians had no way to escape the Japanese soldiers' bayonets.

Those guard dogs who saw their masters being killed bravely rushed up to bite the Japanese soldiers, but were also stabbed to death one by one.

Fang Yingben, the first platoon leader of the Eighth Regiment, who was chasing at the front, led his team to Yang Village first. Before even entering the village, they smelled a bloody scent.

When they entered the village, the doors of every house were wide open, but there was no sound. Many courtyards had the bodies of guard dogs lying in them, and the blood on the ground had not yet congealed.

The soldiers found the bodies of the homeowners in the woodshed, and the blood had not yet congealed.

Seeing this scene, the soldiers of the first platoon were filled with indignation. Most of them had only heard that the Japanese soldiers liked to massacre villages, and had also seen it in the newspapers.

This was the first time they had truly seen it with their own eyes. Only the veterans in the team had long witnessed the brutality of the Japanese soldiers.

The entire village had died in the woodshed, and they could still see traces of them sleeping in the woodshed.

Platoon Leader Fang could guess from the remains of these people: last night they must have given their beds to the Japanese soldiers, and then the Japanese soldiers killed all these people before leaving.

Platoon Leader Fang reported the situation in Yang Village to the company commander. They wanted to chase after them to avenge these villagers and could not bury these villagers.

When Lin Fan heard the report from the Eighth Regiment that the Japanese soldiers who had escaped last night were actually massacring villages while fleeing.

He ordered the Eighth Regiment to speed up their advance, and he would arrange for the handling of the villagers' funerals.

Li Zhongren, commander of the Fifth War Zone, received Lin Fan's report and immediately stated that he would contact the magistrate of Xinye County and would definitely send someone to properly bury the people of Yang Village.

He ordered Lin Fan: "No matter what, you must catch up with those Japanese soldiers who massacred the village."

Su Ruifeng, the head of the Eighth Regiment, informed the entire regiment that the Japanese soldiers who had escaped last night were massacring villages just ahead, and all the soldiers of the Eighth Regiment quickened their pace to chase forward.

Zhu Qingmao led the fighter plane group and finally spotted a team of Japanese soldiers in Xuying.

These Japanese soldiers were only about five miles ahead of the Eighth Regiment. With accurate intelligence from the fighter planes, the speed of the reconnaissance platoon at the front was even faster.

Miao Cangqiong, the company commander of the first company, ordered the team to march quickly, taking a shortcut to get ahead of the Japanese troops. This time, he could not let any Japanese soldiers escape.

Regiment Commander Su had the same idea. To avoid alarming the enemy, the fighter planes in the air did not launch an attack on this Japanese force.

The Japanese soldiers of the Tai Da Hinohara battalion were originally a little afraid of the planes in the air, but these planes just flew over their heads and that was it.

They felt that their luck was really good today, and they had escaped another disaster.

They set off before dawn and had been running until now, and were already a little tired. Captain Tai Da Hinohara did not find any pursuers behind him, so he didn't need to rush so much.

He ordered the entire battalion to stop and rest for ten minutes. While the Japanese soldiers were resting, the three regiments of the Special Operations Brigade did not dare to rest.

The Seventh and Eighth Regiments were chasing the Japanese soldiers in front, and the Sixth Regiment had already set off from Xinye City to join the two regiments in front.

An hour later, the Japanese soldiers of the Tai Da Hinohara battalion arrived at Yueyuan, and now their mood was much more relaxed.

After all, it was already past ten in the morning, and there were no pursuers behind them. The entire battalion had gathered dozens more Japanese soldiers, increasing the size of the force to more than three hundred.

This was something that Captain Tai Da Hinohara had not expected. Thinking that yesterday the entire battalion had more than a thousand Japanese soldiers, now there were only more than three hundred left.

A wave of sadness arose in his heart, and tears could not stop falling.

At this time, the first company was already waiting for these Japanese soldiers in front of them. Lei Guangji felt very nervous as he watched the Japanese soldiers slowly approach.

Looking at the rope beside him, this was the task the platoon leader had given him: wait until all the Japanese soldiers entered the ambush circle, and then immediately pull the bomb.

The platoon leader was afraid that he would be nervous and accidentally detonate the bomb, so he told him a method: put the rope beside him, and only pull it when he was about to act.

These Japanese soldiers looked disheveled, and each of them had no energy to walk, looking weak, and they could not see at all that they were the ones who had massacred more than a hundred people in the entire village.

Captain Tai Da Hinohara had just shed tears, and now his mood was finally a little relieved.

Company Commander Miao gave the order after seeing that all the Japanese soldiers had entered the trap: "Detonate!"

"Rumble! Rumble!"