Not enough Japanese devils to kill? 1.4 billion people volunteer for the Battle of Shanghai.

"Report! A call from the front lines!"

The voice of the communications soldier rang out in the command post.

Fujita Susumu sat in the armchair, without moving.

He simply waved his hand.

"read."

The communications soldier looked at the telegram.

He was shaking as he held the telegram.

"The 23rd Infantry Regiment has been attacked by an unidentified weapon, suffering heavy casualties. Requesting assistance..."

He paused.

His Adam's apple bobbed.

With difficulty, he squeezed out the second half of the sentence:

"Requesting a retreat..."

Fujita Susumu suddenly stood up.

That movement was like a spring.

"No refunds allowed!"

His voice exploded.

Wandering around the command post.

The staff officers were so shocked that their shoulders trembled.

Tell them to keep the attack!

"Even if we die, we'll die on the front lines!"

The communications soldier was trembling.

"Ha...hai!"

The communications soldier turned and ran out.

Chief of Staff Tanaka stood to the side.

Looking at Fujita Susumu.

His eyes were complicated.

He thought that if the fighting continued like this, the Third Division would really be wiped out.

But in the end.

They didn't say anything.

He simply lowered his head.

Look at your toes.

Because he knew it too.

The fighting has continued on the north bank of Luodian until now.

It's because they saw the Chinese couldn't hold out first.

The Japanese 3rd Division was wiped out first.

There is no third way.

far away.

On the position north of Luodian.

"The Japanese will continue to regroup," the embroiderer said softly.

The sound of the anvil carried a kind of irritation, like the thought, "Why aren't these bastards all dead yet?"

"So eager to get themselves killed?"

"It's not proactive," the embroiderer shook her head.

"Someone is forcing them."

"Who?"

"Fujita Susumu".

She paused:

"That old Japanese devil is using the lives of Japanese soldiers to exchange for our ammunition."

The embroiderer continued.

"He doesn't know how much ammunition we have left."

"But he knew that our ammunition was limited."

"He's gambling."

"I'll bet we'll run out of ammunition first."

"We'll run out of ammunition before his men all die."

The sound of an anvil rang out.

With a slightly hoarse voice.

"So...how many do we have left?"

The embroiderer did not answer immediately.

She looked at the ammunition levels displayed on the screen.

Looked for a long time.

Then, she whispered:

"Not many left."

"There really aren't many left."

Just then.

A voice rang out.

Low-pitched.

But it's very powerful.

"We're running low on ammunition."

The embroiderer turned her head.

Chen Dashan, the company commander of the 7th Company of the 3rd Battalion, stood next to the Qilin tank.

Very close.

They were so close that they could see every bloodstain on his face.

His hand gripped the large, blunt-bladed sword.

They held it very tightly.

The knuckles are turning white.

He stepped forward.

He walked up to the embroiderer.

That single eye shone brilliantly in the morning light.

It shone as brightly as red-hot iron.

"Comrade Embroiderer," he said.

Hoarseness.

Like sandpaper grinding an iron:

"Today, we may all perish here."

The embroiderer looked at him.

Looking at this one-eyed company commander.

Look at this face covered in blood.

Look at those eyes that are burning with fire.

"Company Commander Chen."

She asked:

"There are over 20,000 Japanese soldiers on the other side, are you afraid?"

Chen Dashan was stunned for a moment.

then.

He grinned.

"What's there to be afraid of!"

He spoke each word clearly:

"To be able to fight alongside you heroes of later generations—"

He paused.

Take a deep breath.

"It would be worth dying for!"

At this moment, the embroiderer suddenly asked:

"Company Commander Chen, where are you from?"

Chen Dashan was stunned for a moment.

This iron-willed soldier has been charging forward, killing, and risking his life ever since the start of the war.

He never imagined that someone would ask him this question at a time like this.

But he still answered.

No hesitation.

"Sichuanese".

Just two words.

As simple as his knife.

The embroiderer nodded:

"The brave warriors marched out of Sichuan and arrived in Shanghai."

Chen Dashan did not respond.

He simply stood there, gripping the blunt-bladed tiger-head broadsword, gazing in one direction.

That direction wasn't the direction the Japanese army came from.

It's in the southwest.

The far, far southwest.

That was his home.

Sichuan.

A small village called Chenjia'ao.

Surrounded by mountains on all sides, the village has a flat area in the middle where rice and corn are grown. At the entrance of the village stands an old banyan tree, three hundred years old, whose canopy covers half an acre of land. In the summer, the whole village gathers under the tree to cool off and chat.

His home was at the east end of the village, a three-room mud-brick house with a courtyard. There was a well in the courtyard, and the well water was warm in winter and cool in summer.

His father's name was Chen Luotou. He farmed all his life, and his back was hunched over, and his hands were as rough as tree bark.

His mother's surname was Zhou, and she didn't have a given name; everyone called her Chen Zhoushi. She never left the village in her entire life; the farthest she ever went was to town, when she was young and selling eggs.

He had a wife named Cuihua, from the next village. She had a round face, loved to laugh, and had two dimples when she smiled. The year they got married, he was twenty-two and she was nineteen.

He has a child, a son named Gou Dan (Dog Egg) – a humble name that's easy to raise. He should be five years old this year; I wonder how tall he's grown, and whether he still remembers his father.

He remembered the day he left home.

In July 1937, news of the Marco Polo Bridge Incident reached Sichuan.

People from the township government came and said they needed to conscript men to fight the Japanese.

He was the first to sign up.

His father didn't say anything, he just sat on the doorstep and smoked a pipe all night.

His mother cried, cried all night, and the next day her eyes were swollen like peaches.

Cuihua didn't cry.

She simply packed him a few changes of clothes, boiled ten eggs, and stuffed them into the bundle.

Dog Egg tugged at his clothes and asked in a childish voice, "Daddy, where are you going?"

He squatted down and looked at his son's face.

That little face, round, like Cuihua's.

"Dad's going to fight the bad guys," he said. "He'll be back when he's done."

Dog Egg asked, "How long will it last?"

He thought for a moment and said, "Soon."

Dog Egg laughed: "Then Dad should come back soon and play with me."

He nodded.

Then he stood up, slung his bundle over his shoulder, and walked out of the courtyard.

He dared not turn around.

I'm afraid that if I turn around, I won't be able to walk anymore.

He walked for three days through the mountains before finally reaching the county town.

Then we took a car, a boat, and a train, heading east.

The further we go, the more unfamiliar we become.

He had never seen such big mountains, such wide rivers, or so many people.

He had never seen Shanghai before.

Such a big city, such tall buildings, so many foreigners.

But he didn't have time to look.

Because the Japanese devils came.

They were Sichuan soldiers, and they were sent to the front lines.

Luodian.

He led his soldiers and guarded the ruins.

One day, two days, three days.

His brothers, many of whom were like him and came from Sichuan, fell one by one before him.

He recognized some of them; they were from the next village.

Some of them he didn't recognize, but they spoke the same Sichuan dialect as him.

When they fell, some called out for their mother, some for their father, some for their wife's name, and some didn't call out at all, just staring at the gray sky with their eyes open.

He couldn't bury them.

There was no time, and no place.

We can only leave them lying there, on the land they risked their lives to defend.

Sometimes he wondered, what is Gou Dan doing now?

Were they playing with other kids under the banyan tree at the village entrance?

Did you chase chickens and dogs in the yard and get covered in mud?

Do you ask Cuihua before going to bed at night, "Why isn't Dad back yet?"

he does not know.

He dared not think.

All he knew was that...

He can't go home anymore...