Bright Sword: The Flowers of War

Chapter 236 Collapse
Squad Leader Kameda's inhuman screams were like a rusty saw, tearing at the eardrums and nerves of everyone in the trench, sending chills down their spines.

He gripped the severed leg, bleeding profusely, with both hands, trying to stop the bleeding, but the warm, viscous liquid stubbornly gushed out from between his fingers, staining the ground beneath him even deeper red.

"Medic! Medic!"

He screamed with all his might, his voice distorted by extreme pain and fear, and then he yelled to the soldiers around him, "Help me... come and help me! I'm your squad leader!"

However, a strange thing happened: no one around him offered him a helping hand.

Katsuhiko Nakata leaned against the mud wall, quietly watching everything. He found that his heart was unusually calm, without a single ripple.

There was no fear, no sympathy, not even schadenfreude.

It's like watching a boring silent play that has nothing to do with you.

Perhaps Takeuchi Takashi's tragic death had exhausted all his emotions, or perhaps witnessing too much death and dismemberment in the past few days had completely numbed his senses.

He just watched calmly.

What's even stranger is that the soldiers around him, those men under Captain Kameda, reacted in exactly the same way.

There were clearly seven or eight soldiers still alive in the trench. Some were leaning against the breastwork, some were crouching beside ammunition boxes, and some were just recovering from the shock of the explosion. All their eyes were fixed on the man groaning in the pool of blood.

But their eyes were empty.

Like a group of indifferent spectators enjoying a performance whose ending they already knew.

No one moved.

No one went forward to bandage him.

No one helped him up.

No one even uttered a single word.

They just watched silently. They watched their commander, the usually imposing and abusive squad leader named Kameda, howling in despair in the mud like a dying wild dog.

Kameda was known for his strictness, but to describe him as "strict" would be too mild.

In his squad, "brutal" would be a more accurate description.

If a movement is not performed correctly during training, it's two slaps; if the blankets are not folded to your liking while tidying up, it's two slaps; if you make noise while eating, it's two slaps; even if it's just because he's in a bad mood that day and doesn't like someone, it's two slaps.

In this squad, not a single soldier's cheek had escaped being slapped hard by his rough hands.

The searing pain and the bone-deep humiliation had already sown the seeds of resentment in everyone's heart.

Bushido? Comradeship?

These things have long been crushed in the face of absolute, day-to-day violence and humiliation.

Now, things are changing.

The man who once held a high position and trampled on their dignity was now lying naked in the mud, crying helplessly like a baby.

But no one around came forward to help.

This is not surprising at all.

A soldier silently lowered his head and began checking the bullets in his rifle.

Another soldier pulled a crumpled cigarette from his pocket, struck a match with trembling hands, lit it, took a deep drag, and exhaled smoke that mingled with the gunpowder of the battlefield, blurring the indifferent expression on his face.

Kameda's screams gradually subsided, replaced by heavy breathing and intermittent groans. The madness and pleading in his eyes were slowly replaced by the ashen despair and hopelessness of excessive blood loss.

He finally realized that no one would come to save him.

He gave up wailing and struggling, and loosened his grip on his thighs, lying there in the mud, quietly awaiting death...

Just as Captain Kameda's groans were about to be completely drowned out by the clamor of the battlefield, another death descended from the sky.

"boom--!"

A MKII grenade landed precisely in the middle of the trench.

A sudden flash of orange-red light, followed by a violent shockwave and countless high-speed, serrated fragments, unleashed a bloody, indiscriminate attack within the confined space.

A Japanese soldier, who was squatting next to an ammunition box, stared blankly at Kameda, not even having time to react.

A hot, irregular piece of shrapnel, like a high-speed spinning razor, slashed viciously into the side of his neck.

"Uh!"

A short, painful groan escaped his throat.

He instinctively reached out to cover his neck, but when his palm touched the wound, a warm, surging, and highly pressurized liquid suddenly gushed out from between his fingers!

It's the carotid artery!

The crimson column of blood, like a water pipe punctured by a mischievous child, gushed upwards with astonishing force, drawing a tragic yet alluring arc in the air before raining down on the surrounding mud walls and onto his comrades.

His eyes widened instantly, filled with extreme fear and disbelief.

He desperately pressed his hands against the fatal wound, trying to stop the flow of blood from taking his life, but the surging blood was so ruthless that no matter how hard he tried, he could not stop the blood, carrying his body's warmth and strength, from flowing out madly.

His body began to convulse violently, his legs kicked weakly in the mud, and his mouth opened and closed, but no sound came out.

A few seconds later, the light in his eyes quickly dimmed, his body went limp, and he collapsed heavily to the ground, soon ceasing his final struggle in the pool of blood he had gushed out.

The explosion was like a signal.

Immediately afterwards, more "pineapples" rained down from the sky.

Boom! Boom! Boom...

The sounds of explosions rising and falling in the trenches created a symphony of death.

Each explosion was accompanied by the muffled thud of a body being torn apart and piercing screams. Shrapnel flew everywhere, and blood and flesh splattered. In just a dozen seconds, this once relatively intact trench was transformed into a veritable trench of blood and flesh, piled high with severed limbs and fragments of internal organs.

Any experienced commander understands what it means when the enemy can throw grenades into your position with such precision and in such large numbers.

The enemy is already right in front of us.

The position can no longer be held.

The only option to survive is to retreat.

Unfortunately, Squad Leader Kameda was now a slowly cooling corpse lying in a pool of blood, unable to issue any more orders. The remaining sergeant in the squad had likely already been reduced to an unrecognizable pile of minced meat in one of the earlier explosions.

With no leader and the organization collapsing, the remaining Japanese soldiers, under the dual pressure of the threat of death and the broken chain of command, descended into complete chaos.

Some people ran around the trenches like headless flies, some knelt on the ground praying in despair, and others fired wildly at the outside.

No one noticed.

Amidst this hellish chaos, a figure quietly moved.

Katsuhiko Nakata.

A glimmer of light finally flickered in his numb, empty eyes when he saw the soldier, whose carotid artery had been severed, spitting blood and falling to the ground.

That is the most primal desire of living beings to survive.

Screw Bushido.

Screw the empire.

When you die, there is nothing.

Senior Takeuchi is dead, Captain Kameda is dead, everyone is about to die.

He doesn't want to die.

Once the thought appeared, it spread like wildfire, instantly taking over his entire brain.

He no longer hesitated. Like a gecko, he pressed his body tightly against the inner wall of the trench, using the smoke and dust from the explosion and the chaos of the crowd as cover, silently and step by step retreating towards the rear of the trench. His movements were light and slow, but every step was exceptionally firm.

He bypassed a corpse whose body was half blown apart, stepped over a slippery trail of intestines (whose remains were unknown), and finally reached a corner of the trench. He cautiously peeked out, and after confirming that there were no Chinese soldiers behind him for the time being, he gritted his teeth and crawled out of the trench that had swallowed countless lives.

He didn't even look back once more...

…………

The headquarters of the Japanese 24th Division in Xinxian County.

The air here seemed to have solidified into lead, making it hard for everyone to breathe.

The beeping of the radio and the hoarse calls of the communications staff mingled together.

A young communications officer, his lips cracked and his eyes bloodshot, had been calling out into the microphone for hours on end those numbers that would never be answered, his voice hoarse like a broken bellows.

Division Commander Lieutenant General Yoshikatsu Kuroiwa stood motionless before the enormous battle map, like a stone statue.

On the map, the red arrows representing his troops have been divided and surrounded by countless blue arrows representing the "Shanxi Militia," like moths trapped in a spider web.

The huge, shocking gap in the flank, like an unhealable scar, was mercilessly mocking his incompetence.

Chief of Staff Colonel Toshio Miyake walked heavily to his side, and a silent sorrow filled the air.

"Has the 20th Division replied yet?"

Yoshikatsu Kuroiwa's voice was unusually calm, a calmness that was chilling. He didn't turn around; his gaze remained fixed on the fatal gap in the map.

Toshio Miyake shook his head with difficulty, feeling as if a wad of cotton was stuck in his throat, unable to utter a single word.

"Is that so..." Yoshikatsu Kuroiwa's lips curled into an almost self-deprecating smile. "No, then forget it."

He finally turned around, his once sharp eyes now only showing a stagnant, lifeless grayness.

He glanced around at the equally ashen-faced staff officers in the command post, and issued his final order in an unquestionable tone, tinged with a hint of madness.

"Pass down the order! Command all units to hold their positions! Anyone who dares to leave their posts without authorization..." A savage glint flashed in his eyes, "...will be killed without mercy!"

The command post was deathly silent, with only the static crackling from the radio.

Yoshikatsu Kuroiwa paused, as if he had exhausted all his strength. He leaned wearily against the edge of the map table, his voice low but carrying a resolute determination to destroy everything.

"Also... send a farewell telegram to Commander Yoshio Shinotsuka and Commander Hisaichi Terauchi of the North China Area Army."

He raised his head, his eyes filled with endless sorrow and resentment.

"I, Yoshikatsu Kuroiwa, do not want to die here without knowing why. At the very least, I want General Headquarters to know how our 24th Division fought to the last moment."

"Your Excellency, Division Commander..."

Miyake Toshio could no longer control his emotions. His eyes instantly reddened, and hot tears slid down the wrinkles on his face. He suddenly stood at attention and lowered his proud head.

"Hai!"

……

Several tens of minutes later, in Taiyuan, at the headquarters of the First Army.

When the telegraph operator delivered the ominous telegram to Lieutenant General Yoshio Shinotsuka, the atmosphere in the entire headquarters instantly plummeted to freezing point.

As Yoshio Shinotsuka looked at the words "a final farewell" on the telegram, his face first turned ashen, then flushed a deep liver color. His white-gloved hand trembled violently with extreme anger.

"Snapped!"

He slammed his hand on the table and threw the thin telegram onto the ground.

"Useless! A bunch of useless trash!" His roar shook the windows. "That stupid pig Heiyan! The elite 24th Division of more than 10,000 men was defeated by a local militia to the point of having to send a farewell telegram!"
He's utterly disgraced the Empire! What is that bastard Shichita Ichiro doing? His 20th Division has been ashore for a day now, why hasn't it reached Xinxian to provide relief?

His anger was directed not only at Yoshikatsu Kuroiwa's incompetence, but also at the inaction of his allies. In his view, this was a humiliating disgrace and a major failure of coordinated operations within the Imperial Army.

Meanwhile, in Beiping, at the headquarters of the North China Area Army.

Commander-in-Chief General Hisaichi Terauchi displayed a completely different level of anger upon seeing the same telegram.

He didn't roar; he just sat quietly in his chair, his face so dark it seemed to drip water. The conductor's baton in his hand creaked as he gripped it tightly.

He slowly stood up, walked to the map, and his gaze swept across the battlefield situation in Shanxi before finally settling on the breach that had been torn open in Xin County.

“Baka…” he squeezed out the two words through clenched teeth, his voice icy and chilling.

His anger stemmed not only from the defeat of the 24th Division, but also from the disappointment he felt towards Yoshio Shinotsuka's command abilities and the terrifying fighting prowess displayed by the unit known as the "Shanxi Militia."

Powerful artillery fire, swift infiltration, and sophisticated equipment... this was simply not the strength a local armed force could possess! This suddenly appearing force, like a poisonous thorn, pierced the heart of the North China Front Army, completely disrupting all its strategic plans.

"Send a message to headquarters!" Terauchi Hisaichi's voice was filled with murderous intent. "Demand an immediate reassessment of the threat level of Su Yaoyang and his troops."

This scoundrel...if not eliminated, will surely become a major threat to the empire!

His anger stemmed from a deeper fear of the future, or rather, a collapse of his belief in the future and in the inevitability of victory in the war—a collapse more terrifying than any defeat.

(End of this chapter)