The Qing Dynasty is about to end

Chapter 912 Luo Xinzhong's First Battle!

April 1, 1883, Denver West, Osaka Fourth Brigade headquarters.

The training ground reeked of choking dust. Luo Xinzhong crouched behind a ditch, watching the absurd "war" unfold before him with a blank expression. A "steam tank" made of pine wood rumbled forward, its body a good three meters long, its wheels covered in sheet metal, its surface meticulously painted gray, and adorned with the Stars and Stripes of the Eastern United States in scarlet paint. More than twenty soldiers, chanting "Godfather, protect us!" and carrying simulated Molotov cocktails stuffed with cotton, leaped from the trenches in a charge. The soldiers in the front row had barely smashed their cocktails onto the wooden tank when they were poked down with sticks by their comrades playing the enemy—"Gatling gun fire! All wiped out!" The supervising officer waved a small flag, and the fallen retreated, cursing and swearing.

The wooden tanks continued their advance, crushing the concrete blocks studded with spikes ("dragon tooth piles"), their tracks getting stuck in the gaps between the blocks. At this moment, an engineering corps began digging pits behind their first line of defense, burying "anti-tank mines" disguised as clay pots—reportedly because they didn't have enough "anti-tank mines," they had to lay them hastily after determining the enemy tanks' breakthrough direction, unsure if they could even manage it in time. The wooden tanks quickly broke free and charged towards a two-meter-deep sloping trench. Suddenly, three soldiers leaned out from the bottom of the trench, using long bamboo poles to carry five bundled grenade models ("sky-falling mines"), and rammed them hard into the tank chassis.

"The tracks have blown off!" The inspector had barely announced when another wooden tank suddenly accelerated, plunged into the trench, and then sped out again using the slope. Soldiers at the bottom of the trench were "brutally crushed," howling and rolling to avoid the writhing debris, shouting "They're dead! They're dead!"

"Stop!" Luo Xinzhong abruptly stood up, and the training ground fell silent instantly. He walked to the wooden tank, his fingertips tracing the rough Stars and Stripes pattern, and suddenly kicked it hard. With a loud crash, the wooden turret tilted to one side—this was the third simulated tank to be damaged this month.

“Brigade Commander,” Yumi Daidouji jogged over and handed him the training manual, “according to the ‘Guide to Anti-Tank Operations of Infantry Combined Arms Units,’ our army has achieved its jamming objective…”

"Delay?" Luo Xinzhong interrupted with a sneer, pointing to the "corpses" scattered on the ground. "The enemy's tanks are intact, while our troops have suffered heavy casualties. Is this what you call delay?" He grabbed the manual and threw it into the ground. "Have those old men in the Tianjing General Staff ever seen a tank themselves?"

Yu Mei picked up the manual, dusted off the cover, and said with a smile, "Brigade Commander, this 'Guide to Anti-Tank Operations for Infantry Combined Arms Units' was personally written by His Highness Prince Wu and was just distributed to the troops last year. There won't be any problems!"

Luo Xinzhong stamped his foot: "He must be senile."

“There’s more! Look—” Yumi dared not join in speaking ill of Luo Yaoguo, so she pointed into the distance. A group of female priestesses beat drums, the rumbling sound simulating artillery fire. The short battalion commander of the artillery regiment, Yamamotoji Ichiro, closed his eyes and clasped his hands together, shouting in a shrine-like tone, “Howitzer group, aim… Boom! Boom! Boom!… Hit!”

Yumi explained from the side: "The purpose of firing the howitzer group at this time is to block the infantry behind the enemy tank group so that our rapid-fire artillery units can calmly carry out anti-tank fire!" As she spoke, Yumi pointed to a group of soldiers who were scrambling to organize the artillery four or five hundred meters away.

The soldiers quickly assembled a cannon with a long, thin barrel. From a distance, the barrel looked almost as thin as a chopstick, which made Luo Xin's heart tighten.

This artillery piece was also a newly commissioned product, called the "Tianli 31st Year 45mm Rapid-Fire Gun." Because it used a slender 45mm barrel with a 50-caliber length, it was extremely expensive. One 45mm gun was equivalent to six 75mm mountain guns. The parameter report stated that it could penetrate 30mm of homogeneous steel at 500 meters (75-degree angle of impact, 95% penetration), which was truly impressive! However, the number of live-fire tests conducted by the entire brigade could be counted on one hand—the barrel life was only about three hundred rounds. Who would dare to waste it?
Moreover, live-fire shooting targets fixed targets, while tanks on the battlefield are moving!
As for actual combat, I haven't experienced it yet!

He bent down to pick up the manual, opened to the chapter on "Anti-Tank Gun Firing Specifications," and wanted to study it again. As the pages rustled, the sound of rapid hoofbeats came from afar. A female officer, blessed by the gods, rode into the training ground, her horse rearing up as she pulled on the reins: "Brigade Commander! General Zeng Ke urgently summons you!"

Inside the Denver Garrison Command bunker, kerosene lamps cast shadows on the cracked stone walls. Zenk O'Hara's dark face, sculpted like a cast-iron sculpture under the light, pointed heavily at the Bellevue-Weldburg intersection on the map: "MacArthur's First Armored Corps vanguard has broken through the first line of defense of the 'Zhao Si Line' northeast of Denver. Twelve steam tanks appeared here yesterday."

Luo Xinzhong stared at the arrows drawn in pencil on the map: "What is the mission of the Fourth Brigade?"

“Hold this crossroads—Bellview-Fort Welsh.” Zeng Ke slapped a piece of intelligence onto his chest. “This is the most important crossroads northeast of Denver, where two highways intersect. Ten kilometers to the west is the Denver-West Dakota railroad line, but further west is mountainous terrain, unsuitable for tanks. To the west is the Arkansas River Valley, which is currently experiencing spring flooding, making it difficult to pass through, and there are no paved roads to travel on. Therefore, you must hold Bellview-Fort Welsh. Once Commander-in-Chief Hong’s main force of ‘Black, Red, and Yellow’ has wiped out the US Eastern Army on the northern front, they will return to reinforce.”

Luo Xinzhong's hand trembled slightly as he unfolded the intelligence report. On the aerial reconnaissance sketch, dozens of steel monsters were winding westward along Highway 65, each tank followed by a swarm of infantry. At the bottom was a line of small print: Intelligence indicates the tank has a combat weight of 12 tons, 25mm frontal armor, and a speed of 8-12 kilometers per hour. "My men… have never seen a real tank before," he said, his voice hoarse.

Zeng Ke took an old photograph of the Battle of Vicksburg from his drawer and slapped it on the table: "This is a photo of me fighting Union tanks at Vicksburg with General Zhao Si back then—" He stared into Luo Xinzhong's eyes, "These iron turtles are nothing special, slow and fragile, they'll fall apart with one hit! Your Fourth Brigade is elite, you can definitely defeat them!"

The conditions inside the Luoxin Center are terrible; those are steam tanks from the 1860s. Now, over 20 years later, can they be compared?

Denver Railway Station was swallowed by steam and twilight at dusk. Luo Xinzhong stood on the platform, his hand on his sword, watching his "merchant army" pour into the metal carriages. First to board were the artillery regiments—soldiers carried and pushed, stuffing disassembled 45mm rapid-fire cannons into the boxcars. The barrels were tied with straw ropes, like bundles of sugarcane ready for sale. Next came the 150mm short-barreled howitzers of the 20th year of the Tianli reign (1661), short and thick, not very heavy, and could be disassembled for transport, but with a pitifully short effective range of only five or six kilometers. Finally came the 75mm mountain guns of the 22nd year of the Tianli reign (1663), with an effective range of only 4300 meters. Also a lightweight artillery piece, weighing less than 400 kilograms, it could be carried uphill when disassembled. Although these cannons were somewhat "light," the quantity was quite substantial: one regiment with three battalions, totaling 12 150mm cannons, 18 75mm cannons, and 18 45mm cannons—a total of 48 cannons!
Next up on the trucks were the engineering corps, their shovels and picks clanging as they clattered together. On the flatbed trucks loaded with cement and steel bars, the molds for the "dragon tooth piles" were piled up like small mountains.

Then came the supply corps. Besides a large amount of ammunition and supplies, what caught Luo Xinzhong's attention the most were hundreds of pried-open and modified sake crates, revealing many strips of cloth soaked in kerosene—and countless Molotov cocktails emitting a pungent odor.

Next came the cavalry battalion—Mongolian horses transported from the Far East trotting restlessly, sabers and rifles hanging beside their saddles, led into the boxcars by short Japanese cavalrymen.

The officers of the Divine Blessing Squadron traveled in a specially modified bus. The female officers were adjusting the antenna of the radio station, with copper wires wrapped around prayer wheels, resembling some kind of mysterious religious instrument.

Colonel Masayoshi Kusunoki, the deputy brigade commander, strode over—this middle-aged officer in his forties was one of Kusunoki Inako's many adopted sons. His family was originally wealthy merchants in Osaka, and they had sponsored the Shin-Yo Shinto Shrine with an unknown amount of silver to obtain the "Kusuki surname," becoming a member of the Kusunoki family. At this moment, he respectfully saluted his superior, who was younger and lower in rank than him: "Statistics complete! The entire brigade has 12100 men, 18 rapid-fire guns, 12 howitzers, and 18 mountain guns..." He suddenly lowered his voice, "Just received a secret report that Commander-in-Chief Hong seems to have suffered a defeat on the northern front."

Luo Xinzhong suddenly turned around. In the twilight, the last carriage was being locked in place by its coupling, the clanging sound like a death knell.

At the same moment, dust billowed along Highway 65, obscuring the setting sun. Lieutenant General Arthur MacArthur, commander of the First Armored Corps, puffed on his corncob pipe, his sunglasses reflecting the advancing torrent of steel. His armored corps exuded a suffocating oppression in the twilight—countless MK-IV steam tanks lined up along the road, their 25mm riveted armor appearing impenetrable in the sunlight, the scarlet Stars and Stripes fluttering atop their machine gun turrets.

Alongside the tank column were "steam infantry," wearing domed steel helmets, carrying lever-action rifles, with packs of bitter acid explosives hanging from their waists, riding in steam trucks towing howitzers.

"General, the vanguard has broken through the first line of defense of Zhao Si." The adjutant handed over the military report. MacArthur glanced at it and a cold smile appeared on his lips: "Tell the lads, see you at Bellevue-Weldburg."

On the flanks of the armored column, two cavalry brigades belonging to two armored cavalry divisions were deployed in textbook formation. Nearly 100 cavalrymen galloped on horseback, each carrying a rifle and wearing a steel helmet.

"Report! Airship reconnaissance has detected enemy reinforcements gathering in Bellevue." A mounted communications soldier galloped up and tossed MacArthur's adjutant a tin can containing a report that the airship had just dropped from the sky.

MacArthur rose from the open carriage and raised his binoculars.

The distant hills and plains stretched out before him, and he could vaguely see the white smoke billowing from trains speeding along the tracks. He squinted, the embers of his corn pipe drifting in the wind: "Order the entire army to accelerate! The vanguard must reach the outskirts of Belview-Weldburg by dawn tomorrow!"

(End of this chapter)