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

The river water flowed down Yuan Man's combat uniform with a rushing sound.

He pointed at Xu Le, who was also standing in the river, his fingers trembling with anger and coldness:

"Company Commander Xu! Are you fucking serious?!"

His voice was hoarse and cracked.

"This is a selection process, not a battlefield. Why the hell did you personally go into the water to block me?!"

Xu Le didn't move.

The water reached his chest, and the muzzle of his QBZ-191 rifle was still dripping water. Black droplets slid down the barrel and splashed into the river, creating ripples.

The scar on his face gleamed a dark red in the morning light, like a wound that would never heal.

He didn't speak.

He just looked at Yuan Man.

His gaze was as calm as a frozen lake, its surface sealed, but beneath which turbulent undercurrents surged.

"Speak up!" Yuan Man rushed forward, splashing water up to half her height.

"You're a top soldier too! You know what this selection means! I've waited twelve years! Just for this one chance!"

"I'm not trying to prove anything; I just wanted to go to 1937 to fight the Japanese. But now, the opportunity is gone, and I can't go anymore."

As he spoke, this tough guy, who had never uttered a sound of pain no matter how badly he was injured, suddenly burst into tears.

Xu Le finally moved his lips:

"I know."

Three words.

Then he paused, and added:

"That's why I can't let you go so easily."

He raised his hand, pointed to the mudflats behind him, then to Sheshan Mountain further away, and finally to the dense forest to the south.

The voice was low, but each word was like a stone hitting water:

"The Battle of Shanghai in 1937 was ten thousand times more difficult than this."

"The river water is colder than this, the bullets are real, the mines are real, and the machine guns on the mudflats can wipe out an entire squad with a single long burst."

"When it hits you, it's not just a simulated smoke; it will actually cut you in two."

He paused, the scar contorting as the corner of his mouth twitched:

"You can't even get past me—"

"Why should we save our brothers from 1937?"

"By what right do you stand before them and say, 'People of the future are coming'?"

"Yuan Man, you are not Lu Bei, you are not the first soldier to see Bian Yun."

"So, you didn't have that luck."

Yuan Man opened his mouth, his lips moved, but he couldn't utter a single word.

Because he saw something in Xu Le's eyes that he had never seen before.

It wasn't anger, it wasn't mockery, it wasn't a task-oriented indifference.

It was a kind of...almost tragic seriousness.

Yuan Man fell silent.

He lowered his head, looking at the murky river water and his reflection in it—disheveled, resentful, but undeniably defeated.

He didn't look at Xu Le again, turned around, and dragged his heavy steps toward the shore.

The water splashed.

His back was hunched.

Behind Yuan Man, the other five members of Team Seven had just surfaced.

They were swimming underwater, holding their breath to try and make it through the last fifty meters, and didn't see the captain being "killed" at all.

Now, surfacing for air, I saw a devastating sight—

The captain stood in waist-deep water, soaked to the bone, head drooping, like a soulless sculpture.

In front of him, Xu Le held a gun, the muzzle still dripping water.

"Damn it, the captain's dead." One of the team members blurted out.

"What the hell do we do now?"

"Who knew these defenders would be so ruthless!"

"It's all over, it's all over."

Five people were struggling in the water, their voices filled with fear and regret.

On the shore, in the tide, Xu Le looked at the five panicked "newbies," grinned, and smiled.

Then, he raised his gun.

Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang.

Five gunshots rang out, exploding on the water's surface.

It wasn't continuous sweeping fire, but rather precise bursts of fire with even intervals, each shot half a second apart.

With each gunshot, a team member froze, then slumped to a halt, floating motionless on the surface.

"Newbies."

Goodbye!

After wiping out 7 teams, Xu Le plunged back into the river.

He disappeared into the murky water like a shark that had caught the scent of blood.

The referee's voice, blaring through the loudspeakers on the river, was cold and unforgiving:

"Team Seven, all members eliminated."

The sound echoed on the river, scattered by the river breeze, and swallowed up by the sound of the waves.

But every word was like a nail, driven into the ears of everyone still crossing the river.

Other teams witnessed this.

They now finally understood just how much resentment these special forces members, who had failed to participate in the selection process and were instead sent to serve as "enemy troops," harbored towards them.

"If the Evil Sword Immortal took a breath, he could ascend to immortality." An army soldier who was swimming surfaced, wiped the water off his face, and muttered.

His teammates smiled wryly: "We're just full of resentment."

Stop complaining.

A calm voice interrupted their conversation.

The speaker was Li Yue, a company commander in a special operations brigade of a certain group army, and also the captain of this squad.

He was in his early thirties, with little expression on his face, but his eyes shone like the sharp edge of a tempered blade.

"The garrison troops were also doing their duty."

While observing the machine gun positions on the opposite bank, Li Yue said, "I know Xu Le. Three years ago, during the 71st Army's martial arts competition, he lost to me by half a move in the hand-to-hand combat event. The kind of person he is, he either doesn't participate, or when he does, he's serious."

He paused:

"What we need to do now is not complain and blame others, but to land on the other side."

"Even so—"

Li Yue glanced at the colorful smoke rising from the river, and his voice deepened:

"That's a bit difficult."

But no matter how difficult this battle to cross the river was, there were always people who remained calm.

North bank, riverside.

Zhou Zhenhai put down his binoculars, a cold smile curving his lips:

"Xu Le has gone into the water."

"really."

Zhao Meng, the squad leader of the Marine Corps Amphibious Reconnaissance Battalion standing next to him, couldn't help but spit out his food and said:

"That bastard... he's really risking his life. It's just a selection process, is it really necessary to go to such lengths?"

Zhou Zhenhai raised the binoculars again, adjusted the focus, and spoke calmly:

"He should risk his life."

"He wasn't selected, so he can only be an 'enemy.' If it were me—I would also make everyone who wanted to join me suffer."

He paused, then added:

"Because only those who are ruthless enough are qualified to be selected by even more ruthless people."

"Only those with the ability can log in!"

After saying that, Zhou Zhenhai waved his hand and said, "Now, it's our turn to go on stage."

Upon receiving the order, the eight Marines moved simultaneously, like eight ghostly figures disappearing into the river without a sound.

Unlike other teams that splashed around wildly, they adopted the most energy-efficient sidestroke, with most of their bodies submerged in the water, only occasionally lifting their heads to breathe, their movements so small as to be almost invisible.

Eight people, moving in perfect unison.

The rhythm of paddling, the frequency of breathing, and even the timing of turning the head to observe all seem to be controlled by the same brain.

Most importantly, the point they chose to enter the water was not within the direct firing range of the machine gun position.

"Ten o'clock, in the depression of the mudflats." Zhou Zhenhai's voice rang in the team members' ears:

"That's a blind spot for machine guns, and the shore is sheltered by rocks, making it a natural landing point."

One of the team members couldn't help but ask:

"Captain, how did you know? We were so far away on the shore just now..."

Zhou Zhenhai pointed to the binoculars hanging around his neck, which was an extra item they had chosen.

"You think I was admiring the scenery for the twenty minutes before we left?"

He said it simply, with a hint of self-assurance in his tone:

"There are three machine gun positions, located here, here, and here," he gestured in the water. Although the team members couldn't see him, they could understand him.

"The shooting sectors overlap, but there are also gaps. That indentation is the gap."

"Furthermore—" Zhou Zhenhai added, "Based on the length of the rock's shadow and the angle of the sun, I can determine that the location was in shadow before 10 a.m. A sniper looking down from a high vantage point would be in backlight, affecting their visibility."

On the observation platform, General Wang Kangmei stared at the images transmitted back by the drone.

On the screen, Zhou Zhenhai's team looked like eight silent fish, moving forward quickly and steadily in the river.

Their trajectory was a straight diagonal line, pointing directly to the depression in the mudflats on the opposite bank.

In that area, the firing sector of the three machine guns was indeed not completely covered.

"Zhou Zhenhai is not bad." Wang Kangmei spoke slowly, his voice carrying a hint of teasing. "He used binoculars to discover the blind spot in the machine gun company's defenses."

He paused, then looked at the several naval officers beside him:

"It seems I don't know enough about this Marine Corps captain."

"He is not a physically strong but mentally weak person."

A rear admiral chuckled and replied, "Sir, anyone who can become the captain of a Marine Corps amphibious reconnaissance battalion must have some brains."

Meanwhile, people continued to "die" on the Yangtze River.

Xu Le, along with his reinforced company, formed a mobile Great Wall, blocking all paths for those attempting to dive ashore.

They would even lay "booby traps" on the river – mines simulated by buoys and smoke generators, which would result in immediate "death" if triggered.

On the landing beach, machine guns were like three fire-breathing dragons, spraying bullets onto the river like water.

Rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat—! ! !

"Turn left!"

"To the right!"

"Dodge the bullets."

"Spin!"

"jump!"

"Don't stop."

An army unit was thrown into chaos in the middle of the river.

Ten people, ten opinions.

The end result was that they ended up going around in circles in the middle of the river.

The machine gunner found the perfect target.

The gun barrel was turned around.

A hail of bullets rained down.

Colored smoke rose one after another from the river surface—a sign that someone had been struck by a landmine or "killed."

"Team 11, all eliminated!" The referee's voice echoed across the river like a death knell.

"Damn it! Let's fight this reinforced version!"

On the river, finally some teams couldn't hold back any longer.

An army squad of seven, who had chosen pistols as an extra item, was currently submerged in the river, holding QBZ-191 pistols (blank cartridge version) and returning fire at a machine gun position on the opposite bank.

Bang Bang Bang!

Gunshots rang out on the river, faint yet dense.

Although the weapons on both sides were vastly different—pistols against machine guns, blanks against blanks.

But there were too many people.

One team opened fire, and the other teams that had chosen pistols followed suit.

Gunfire erupted on the river in an instant.

Although most of the bullets hit the water or the air, the sheer force and sound actually suppressed the machine gun position for a moment.

Further away, Jiang Xingchen's team remained motionless.

Six people, six pairs of sunglasses, like six sculptures, stood on the rocks on the north shore.

The hands on the compass in Jiang Xingchen's hand were wobbling slightly.

It wasn't a tremor in my hand; it was a subtle deflection caused by the combined effects of the Earth's magnetic field and the direction of the river's flow.

He is waiting.

Waiting for the right opportunity.

Time passed second by second.

The gunshots, shouts, and splashes on the river seemed to have nothing to do with him.

He seemed to stand outside the river of time, observing calmly and calculating precisely.

7:03 AM.

The second hand skips to the last tick.

Jiang Xingchen's eyes suddenly lit up behind his sunglasses.

"Now."

He spoke in a low voice, looking at the compass in his hand.

From due north, slightly northwest.

The amplitude was very small, only three degrees.

Most people wouldn't even notice it.

But Jiang Xingchen noticed it.

Because he was waiting for this change.

"The tides have changed."

He raised his head and looked at the river.

The murky river water shimmered with a dark yellow light in the morning sun, and its surface looked no different from before.

But Jiang Xingchen knew that things were different down there.

"The water flow is starting to change direction," he said. "Now it's downstream. From southeast to northwest, the flow rate is 3.2 meters per second, which is 0.4 meters faster than before."

He put away his compass and stretched his wrists:

"Brothers, prepare to go into the water."

The team members quickly checked their equipment.

Jiang Xingchen pointed to the river and drew a diagonal line with his finger:

"Route—not directly across from the shore. At a 45-degree angle, enter the water from here, use the current to drift ashore."

One of the team members asked, his tone tinged with worry:

"Captain, that machine gun company... if we drift diagonally, we'll stay in their field of fire for longer."

Jiang Xingchen pushed up his sunglasses:

"The machine gun company's ammunition is not unlimited."

He paused, then added:

"Based on the frequency of gunfire, reload time, and the amount of ammunition they were carrying, it is estimated that they have now used up 68 percent of their ammunition."

"We drifted diagonally, and by the time we reached machine gun range, they had almost run out of bullets."

Another team member asked, "What if the estimate is wrong? What if they still have bullets?"

Jiang Xingchen turned her head, a very faint smile curving her lips behind her sunglasses:

"I'm not afraid. The landing position I chose is at the edge of the machine gun company's firing range."

"Even if they still have bullets, their accuracy will drop significantly at that angle."

After saying that, he took off his sunglasses with one hand.

The wind on the Yangtze River lifted Jiang Xingchen's collar and made it flutter.

Those eyes, long hidden behind lenses, were now fully exposed between the backlight and the water's hue, shining with an astonishing brightness, like the sharp edge of a quenched blade.

All the meticulous calculations and risky decisions are transformed into the most naked confidence in this one gaze.

The teammate next to her subconsciously held his breath and looked at Jiang Xingchen.

Jiang Xingchen suddenly raised his arms, his voice like a nail, piercing through the wind and waves—

"Follow me, don't be afraid."

"The bigger the waves, the more expensive the fish!"