The War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression Begins in Songhu

Chapter 543 Bitter Struggle (Two Chapters Combined)

So, after running out of magazines in his submachine gun, and unable to change magazines on the undulating horseback, and forced to lie prone on the horse to avoid bullets, how far was the old horse from those Japanese soldiers?
How long will it take to get through this period of suffering where one can only be beaten but cannot fight back?

The answer is that the distance is only over 80 meters, and the time required is just five seconds.

But even those mere five seconds felt like an eternity to Lao Ma, as long as a year, or even a century.

During this process, the old horse, who was lying on its back, only glanced back twice and saw scenes that tore his heart apart:

Yang Wei, a sixteen-year-old boy, was given this name by Lao Ma.

When the boy first joined the army, he was called Yang Gousheng. After saying it twice, he found it particularly difficult to pronounce. Based on the quirky sense of humor of modern people, Lao Ma gave him this name.

But it was just out of a wicked sense of humor; Old Ma really had no other bad intentions and didn't want anything bad to happen to the other party.

But just as Lao Ma turned around and glanced back, he saw a burst of blood erupt from Yang Wei's chest.

Then, the sixteen-year-old boy's body went limp, collapsing onto the packhorse beneath him; his eyes, fixed on the old horse, were rapidly losing their luster, yet they clearly conveyed a message to the horse:
Battalion Commander, save me! I don't want to die...

Li Fei, a young man who had just turned nineteen, had no riding skills other than riding his family's water buffalo, but he was determined to join the cavalry.

He pestered Lao Ma for two days in a row, and Lao Ma finally softened and agreed to take him in.

After joining, this kid lived up to expectations. Even though the insides of his legs were rubbed raw on the first day, he still gritted his teeth and continued to train on horseback the next day.

He managed to improve his riding skills to a decent level within a week.

As a result, in that one glance back, Old Ma witnessed firsthand how the mule he was riding was hit by a burst of brutal machine gun fire.

The mule's legs buckled and it fell to the ground, and Li Fei was thrown off the mule's back.

After flying several meters, Li Fei landed heavily on his back.

At this point, Li Fei still tried to struggle to get up, but a galloping blue donkey was too late to dodge and trampled over his chest and abdomen.

After spitting out a mouthful of blood, the young man, who had just turned nineteen, was clearly not going to survive...

Similar to Yang Wei and Li Fei, Lao Ma saw several other cases; in the mere five seconds it took to rush forward, more than a dozen of his men were killed or wounded.

Although Old Ma knew in his heart that this was the price that cavalry had to pay when charging.

Having commanded cavalry in numerous battles in northwestern Shanxi and southern Guangxi, this was not the first time he had encountered such a situation.

But almost every one of these people was a brother he had trained from scratch, someone who only had a little bit of riding experience; every injury or death caused him great heartache.

Thankfully, those long five seconds finally passed, and this ordeal was finally over.

After suffering considerable losses, the next second, Old Ma, who was leading the charge, was about to reach the Japanese soldiers.

To avoid friendly fire, the Japanese light machine guns and grenade launchers positioned a little behind stopped firing, finally giving them the opportunity to unleash their fury.

Even during the charge, Old Ma had his eye on that Japanese lieutenant.

For the time before, he had been standing at the very front, constantly shouting for fire and firing a Mauser pistol.

When the cavalry battalion got close, it was unclear whether his pistol had run out of bullets or the broken thing had jammed.

Anyway, the Japanese lieutenant threw away his pistol, and as he squatted down, he reached for the hilt of his military knife at his waist.

He was actually about to draw his sword and crouch down to chop off the horse's leg.

Faced with the Japanese lieutenant's naive idea, Old Ma simply slapped his heels against the horse's belly, increasing the horse's speed even further, and it charged straight at the Japanese lieutenant.

With a heavy thud, the Japanese lieutenant's sword was knocked away halfway through its draw.

In an instant, he rolled a long way like a gourd, and although he didn't die after lying on the ground, he was unable to struggle to get up for a while.

In the impact, the old horse's body swayed, and its speed naturally slowed down.

Upon seeing this, a Japanese sergeant immediately thrust the bayonet from his rifle at Old Ma's side with lightning speed.

The DIY bulletproof plates on Lao Ma's body could only protect his chest and abdomen, but they were completely useless for protecting his waist.

If Old Ma were stabbed by this knife, one of his kidneys would be ripped apart.

In such a critical moment, relying on his current strong physique, Old Ma performed a bridge-like maneuver on horseback.

That is, he quickly leaned back, lay flat on the horse's back, and let the bayonet pierce past his lower abdomen, tearing through his woolen military uniform.

Just as they were about to cross the iron bridge, Old Ma swung his saber fiercely.

Suddenly, a bright, white blade flashed across the moonlit night.

On the right side of the warhorse, a Japanese sergeant, who was only 1.55 meters tall, had a horrific wound on his neck; his blood vessels and trachea were all cut open, down to the cervical vertebrae.

The Japanese sergeant collapsed on the spot due to his horrific injuries, dying before he even hit the ground.

Old Ma didn't even glance at this scene twice.

Using his waist strength to straighten his body back on the horse, his first action was to use the back of his sword to whip the horse's rump hard.

This caused the warhorses, which had slowed down, to gallop once again.

Old Ma actually had two purposes in doing this.

Firstly, not far in front of him, the Japanese lieutenant was still struggling to get up; Old Ma could have easily killed him with a single slash, but he had no intention of doing so.

Kill him? Wouldn't that be too easy on him?

With that thought in mind, Old Ma steed his warhorse across the Japanese lieutenant's chest; the faint cracking sound of ribs breaking was so pleasant to hear.

Secondly, once they successfully got close, the galloping cavalry faced off against the infantry who were stationary with rifles and bayonets, resulting in a completely crushing defeat for the cavalry.

Amidst the screams of the Japanese soldiers, in a short period of time...

The forty or so Japanese soldiers at this location were almost completely wiped out by Lao Ma and his men, while our side only suffered a few more casualties.

However, behind this seemingly effortless victory lies a huge hidden worry.

Just fifty or sixty meters away, there were three Japanese light machine guns and two grenade launchers.

They had only temporarily ceased fire to avoid friendly fire; now that their own personnel had been wiped out, they were naturally going to open fire again.

If we hadn't rushed up and killed them so quickly, who knows how many more brothers would have been killed or wounded.

Indeed, that was the case. The gunner of a Japanese Type 96 light machine gun, positioned to the right front, had just changed the magazine and was about to pull the trigger.

And the gun barrel had been adjusted to point directly at Old Ma.

Who told this guy to ride a proper warhorse, and it was always charging at the very front, even trampling their lieutenant squad leader to death.

Thanks to his good eyesight, Old Ma clearly noticed this crisis.

But the only thing he could do was quickly duck down and hide his body on the left side of the warhorse.

As for whether the warhorse will be hit by machine gun bullets in this way, whether it will be seriously injured after being hit and falling to the ground, or whether it will be crushed by the warhorse.

To be honest, Lao Ma is too busy and has no way to solve the problem; he's even prepared to be fired.

Unexpectedly, at the very moment the Japanese machine gunner opened fire on him, a guard, whose horse's rump was riddled with bullets and covered in blood, stood to the left of the old horse.

Amidst the roar of machine gun fire, the guard and his horse were brought down to the ground.

Two or three seconds later, Old Ma, who had killed the Japanese machine gunner, turned around and glanced at the guard who had been with him for only half a month.

His emotions were fluctuating wildly, and he was about to say something, something like, "Brother, rest in peace. I, Old Ma, will definitely take care of your family to the end."

But when the final words arrived, they turned into a loud shout: "Cavalry Battalion!"

The roar of "No retreat!" echoed once more from the remaining brothers, still as loud as ever, now imbued with a strong sense of bloodshed and unwavering resolve. Under these circumstances, the remaining cavalry continued their advance.

To put it bluntly, this ambush is only just beginning. Countless similar battles will be repeated, and countless more people will die in the process.

This is also the biggest reason why Lao Ma swallowed back his promise to take care of the guard's family.

Damn it! He himself couldn't guarantee whether he would survive, or how long he would live. He'd have to wait and see if he could survive...

******
At the same time, just as Old Ma's cavalry battalion had wiped out the Japanese vanguard and was charging toward the second wave of Japanese soldiers.

The newbie elephant wielder who had just participated in the time travel was barefoot.

Holding an M1 Garand rifle, he trudged forward through the muddy rice paddies, his steps uneven.

Among transmigrators, he was undoubtedly a rare artillery talent, a natural-born military commander capable of strengthening artillery companies.

We shouldn't act like infantrymen, charging at the Japanese with rifles.

The crux of the matter is that the Northern Jiangsu Independent Regiment and the Hunan Provincial Supplementary Regiment also need to have proper artillery under his command.
With the DIY rocket launchers currently equipped in the artillery company, whose accuracy is so terrible that it's hard to describe, even if he has a strong ability to calculate the trajectory, he can't improve the accuracy by even a little bit no matter how hard he tries.

Therefore, when Hu Biao intended to appoint him as the commander of the artillery company to command artillery operations, Zhi Xiang refused.

However, he also made a promise: if Hu Biao were to acquire some proper cannons in the future, he would definitely help train a group of qualified artillerymen and personally command the artillery in combat.

Before that, it would be better to let him utilize his experience and expertise in firepower assault by sending him to a company to lead troops.

After some thought, Hu Biao and the other veterans agreed to Zhi Xiang's request, making him the battalion commander of the replenishment battalion, while another newbie, Ji Shouxing, became the deputy battalion commander.

To be honest, Zhixiang now deeply regrets this decision; he's so regretful he could die.

It's not because he now needs to go barefoot, wading through the rice paddies, leading the replenishment battalion through a hail of bullets.

The number of field ridges is limited and their width is narrow. If the entire regiment of 6000 men were to attack along the field ridges...

This not only severely limited their speed of advance, but also, given the astonishing penetrating power of the Japanese 6.5mm Arisaka bullet, a single shot could potentially injure several of them.

Therefore, he could understand why it was a better choice for everyone to take off their shoes and charge barefoot through the rice paddies.

The key reason is that the supplementary battalion he and Ji Shouxing lead currently assumes the role of a supervisory team.

Those at the very back of the charging column, apart from Uncle Bo and his snipers, would be spurred on with a rifle butt if anyone else dawdled during the charge.

If repeated warnings have no effect, or if a soldier turns and runs away, then after the warnings have proven ineffective, he will be shot and killed as a warning to others.

He and Ji Shouxing each led two companies of men, and were responsible for supervising the battle in one direction.

Overall, the vast majority of the brothers in the group are excellent.

As they rushed down from the hills on both sides, along the ridges of the fields or through the rice paddies, they reached a point about 300 meters from the dirt road.

Although it didn't take long, some of the Japanese soldiers had already recovered from the initial panic.

They lay prone on the road and in the roadside ditches, firing continuously at the charging crowd.

Just as rumored, the Japanese soldiers' marksmanship was terrifying; even on this night when there was only a crescent moon in the sky and the moonlight was not bright.

Even at a distance of 300 meters, the Japanese soldiers still maintained considerable accuracy after opening fire.

Brothers kept getting shot, their bodies swaying as they fell into the rice paddies, never to get up again.

Faced with the Japanese firing, the brothers in the charge instinctively retaliated, quickly stopping and pulling the triggers as they raised their guns.

Unfortunately, most of the bullets fired in this way simply disappeared without a trace, and very few actually hit their targets.

Before they could fire a second shot, the veterans and officers, who were veterans of the Battle of Guinan, were already shouting at the top of their lungs:

"Don't fire, keep charging forward!"

"Whether it's a submachine gun or a rifle, no one is allowed to fire beyond a hundred paces; for pistols, no one is allowed to fire beyond thirty paces."

"Charge! Those who don't want to die, charge forward! Charge up and kill these Japanese devils, only then can everyone survive!"

Under such orders, the brothers had no choice but to grit their teeth and charge forward; and as they moved forward, more Japanese soldiers also realized what was happening.

Especially after the Japanese successfully set up and opened fire their light and heavy machine guns and grenade launchers, the casualties became even more appalling.

Even if they had only been firing for a short while, they were often stopped by their own snipers who had scopes mounted on their rifles.

Or perhaps it was a combination of light and heavy machine guns mounted on a hilltop, which were destroyed by concentrated fire from several of them.

However, in the brief, frenzied barrage of machine gun fire from the Japanese soldiers, many of the brothers, whose speed was limited as they charged through the rice paddies, were also shot down.

The explosion of the high-explosive grenades unleashed by the Japanese grenade launchers, amidst the splashing mud and water, caused a group of comrades around them to fall.

If that were all, it would be fine, but the key issue is that more and more Japanese soldiers are realizing what's happening.

They either set up new machine guns and grenade launchers, or even Type 92 infantry guns, and joined in the frenzied firing on the charging crowd.

They either moved to cover the positions of machine guns and grenade launchers that were still intact, even though the operators were being shot dead.

As a result, even the snipers like Uncle Bo, along with the suppressive fire from the machine guns atop the hill, could no longer keep up.

As the Japanese fire intensified, the casualties among the brothers increased, leading to the very thing that Zhixiang had feared and least wanted to see.

Fifty or sixty meters in front of him, a grenade from a grenade launcher fell and exploded immediately.

Luckily, there was no one within seven or eight meters of the impact point, and the grenade did not cause any casualties.

Unfortunately, a recruit in his early twenties, a dozen meters away, was so frightened by the explosion that he stumbled and collapsed to his knees in the muddy paddy field.

It was only then that he noticed the water in the field had turned blood red under the moonlight.

This discovery utterly terrified him.

They completely forgot all about following Commander Hu to secure a better life for their families and to protect their country; all that remained was the instinct for survival.

Leave this place, leave this dangerous place, the farther away the better.

Aside from these thoughts, his mind was blank; he didn't want to think about anything, and he couldn't care less about or hear anything around him.

He threw down his rifle, the bullet pouch, and the goose-feather saber on his back, and stumbled and ran straight towards where Zhixiang was.

"Stop! Go back and pick up your guns to fight, or we'll open fire."

Zhi Xiang and his brothers shouted at the deserter, their voices filled with anxiety.

They had already realized that the recruit was terrified and no matter how much he shouted, it was no use, so they had to shoot him.

Otherwise, with their shouts, many new recruits in front would have already turned around and looked back.

Although they haven't joined the escape, their pace has clearly slowed down, and it's unclear when they might impulsively decide to join the escape.

Although Zhi Xiang and the others had their fingers on the trigger, no one dared to pull it.

Why? Perhaps amidst the chorus of "Stop" and "Go back," a voice trembled with tears.

The voice belonged to the terrified recruit, who uttered some hurtful words: "Shuya, stop, don't do anything foolish."

Think of your blind mother and your pregnant wife. What will happen to them if you kill them in a military-style execution?

Just a few days ago you told me that after receiving your military pay, you asked someone to take it back to buy rice for them.

Many of the new recruits this time joined the army because their families could no longer make ends meet due to the continuous drought in Xinning, hoping to earn a living for their families.

Without a doubt! This tree sprout is in this situation.

Humans are made of flesh and blood; in such a situation, who could bring themselves to fire a gun?
(End of this chapter)