Sword of Light: Humanoid Self-Propelled Artillery

Chapter 23: If you are a man, you should be an Eighth Route Army soldier

Wang Gensheng heard Li Xiu's thanks and quickly waved his hands:

"No need to thank me, the traitors can be killed by everyone!"

As Wang Gensheng spoke, he thought of Li Xiu's decisiveness in killing just now, so he admired Li Xiu very much. In Wang Gensheng's view, fighting the Japanese required such decisive people, so he immediately spoke again:

"I see that you hate the Japs too, brother, so why don't you join me and the Eighth Route Army to fight them together! We, the Eighth Route Army, are a team that specializes in fighting Japs and never bully ordinary people!"

"Okay! I'm going to be an Eighth Route Army soldier!"

Li Xiu's answer was very straightforward, and Wang Gensheng saw that everyone in Lijia Village was present, so he took this opportunity to say to the villagers of Wangjia Village:

"My fellow countrymen, you've all seen the beastly behavior of the Japs. If you're a man, come out and join us as Eighth Route Army soldiers to fight the Japs! Of course, if you're a coward, willing to let your wife be insulted by the Japs, or willing to be enslaved by the Japs, then we, the Eighth Route Army, won't force you to join us!"

As Wang Gensheng spoke, he promoted the Eighth Route Army's discipline and style to hundreds of people in Lijia Village.

"Soldier! I've joined the Eighth Route Army. I want to fight the Japs. My pregnant wife died at their hands! I want revenge for her!"

A villager in Lijia Village whose wife was raped to death by the Japanese decided to join the Eighth Route Army and fight the Japanese together.

Wang Gensheng immediately said happily:
"Good! You have guts, but don't call me 'General'. I'm Wang Gensheng, the battalion commander of the 3rd Battalion of the 2nd Regiment of the 386th Corps of the Eighth Route Army. You can call me Comrade Wang Gensheng or Battalion Commander Wang. Everyone in the Eighth Route Army is equal, so titles like 'superior' are not popular!"

After the first person volunteered to join the Eighth Route Army, more than 30 people signed up one after another to join the Eighth Route Army.

Of course, Wang Gensheng didn't need so many people. After all, he only had twelve Type 38 rifles and a light machine gun.

So including Li Xiu, Wang Gensheng only wanted thirteen people. However, just when Wang Gensheng was about to leave Lijia Village and return to Wangjia Village with these thirteen newly recruited people.

Suddenly an old man in the village did speak:

"Well, comrades from the Eighth Route Army, aren't you stationed in our Lijia Village? If you don't, if the Japanese suddenly come and find that the chairman of the maintenance association has been killed, they will definitely massacre the whole village!"

As expected, as soon as the old man said this, there was silence at the scene. The dozen or so people who had originally joined the Eighth Route Army also whispered and became hesitant.

Because their parents and family members are all in Lijia Village!
Wang Gensheng quickly said:

"Although we are no longer stationed in Lijia Village, we are stationed in Wangjia Village, which is only a dozen miles away from here. That is where our New Second Regiment is stationed."

When Wang Gensheng said this, he thought of the county brigade, the district squad, and the militia, and immediately said:

"But we can help Lijia Village train militia. The Japanese are very powerful now, so we, the Eighth Route Army, will adopt guerrilla warfare and not confront the Japanese head-on."

So after Wang Gensheng's explanation, Lijia Village finally accepted Wang Gensheng's method.

This is also the purpose of establishing the New Second Regiment in this area, in order to organize the people who were oppressed by the Japanese devils.

An unorganized war of resistance would be nothing more than a scattered guerrilla war, while an organized war of resistance could achieve greater victory.

However, the incident at Lijia Village had convinced Wang Gensheng that a reinforcement could be in order. Even though the bunker near Lijia Village only housed a small squad of Japanese soldiers, it still had ammunition to consume and required regular inspections. Indeed, the bunker near Lijia Village lacked a generator and even a telephone. It was clearly uneconomical to run over ten kilometers of telephone lines just for a bunker housing only a dozen or so Japanese soldiers.

What's more, as long as there is no one guarding it, not to mention the telephone line, even the electrical wires can be cut.

As for how to call for help when the bunker was attacked, it was simple, either through the sound of gunfire or by lighting a beacon and using smoke to send out a distress signal, similar to the beacon towers on the Great Wall. As for radio stations, they really didn't have any. You have to know that the Japanese electronics industry was not developed, so radio stations were only equipped to combat units at the battalion level.

So how could a bunker be equipped with a radio?

So Wang Gensheng asked Li Xiu, who was still saying goodbye to her sister Li Xue,

"By the way, Li Xiu, do you know when the Japanese will come to inspect the Japanese bunker next to your Lijia Village or deliver ammunition and supplies?"

Having said that, Wang Gensheng took a look and thought she was pretty good. At least in this era without makeup technology, beauty filters, and medical beauty, Li Xiu's sister Li Xue could be considered quite pretty, even not inferior to Tian Yu. Her figure was even better than Bai Lu's, and she could be called a beautiful woman.

However, in this precarious war era, especially those fighting on the front line like Wang Gensheng, naturally did not dare to talk about feelings, for fear that others would eat their wedding banquet today and their funeral banquet tomorrow. Of course, it was precisely because of this that the Eighth Route Army had such marriage regulations as the 258th Regiment.

Therefore, although Wang Gensheng admired Li Xue's beauty very much, he did not dare to have any thoughts or ideas about pursuing Li Xue.

When Li Xiu heard Wang Gensheng's question, he thought that Wang Gensheng wanted to attack the Japanese bunker!

So I immediately replied:

"Every two weeks, we conduct an inspection and deliver some supplies. The next inspection should be tomorrow! So, Captain Wang, I suggest we wait until after this inspection before attacking the Japanese bunkers."

Wang Gensheng smiled and said:
"We're not going to attack the bunker. The bunker next to your Lijia Village has already been captured by us!"

Li Xiu was surprised when he heard this:
"We took it down, but why didn't we hear any gunshots?"

Li Xiu's difference was not surprising. After all, the bunker was less than five miles away from Lijia Village. Therefore, if a battle broke out, the people in Lijia Village would naturally not be unaware of it.

However, the two grenades thrown by Wang Gensheng exploded inside the bunker.

Therefore, the shock wave and sound of the explosion were suppressed inside the bunker, so it was normal that no gunshots or explosions could be heard in Lijia Village.

So Wang Gensheng explained:

"I threw two grenades into the bunker through the firing port, so it's normal that you couldn't hear the explosion inside. By the way, do you know how many Japanese soldiers usually come on patrol?"

"There are quite a lot of people, probably more than a hundred!"

Li Xiu thought for a while before answering. When Wang Gensheng heard that there were more than a hundred people, he immediately gave up the idea of ​​relying on the strength of his own platoon to fight.

Originally, Wang Gensheng thought that if there was only a small team of Japanese soldiers, he might be able to fight an annihilation battle with the help of a platoon of people and his grenade throwing skills.

But now, after hearing that there was actually a squadron of Japanese devils, he immediately gave up this idea.

(End of this chapter)