Courtyard House: Home Alone

Shi Tou responded and turned to call several trusted men to begin unpacking and distributing the items. The ten 40mm guns were quickly emptied, their dark barrels passed from hand to hand like a pack of hungry wolves finally seizing their prey by the throat. Sun Dazhu was temporarily appointed as the archery instructor, and with his right hand missing a finger, he corrected everyone's lifting posture one by one.

"Let the elbow sink! Do you think you're carrying a hoe?"

"The exhaust nozzle is facing backwards! Trying to roast their own people?"

Lin Yifan retreated to a high point on the earthen slope, observing coldly. The ten groups gradually revealed their strengths and weaknesses: the third group consisted entirely of young men in their early twenties, who were the fastest, but as impetuous as sparrows just released from their cages; the seventh group had several men in their thirties who learned slowly, but each time they practiced thoroughly, and their disassembly and reassembly were flawless; the tenth group, personally led by Sun Dazhu, consisted of five former members of the Northwest Army, who understood the techniques of cross-cover without being taught.

"Young master," Stone said, appearing out of nowhere and offering a roasted sweet potato. "Have something to eat; there's plenty tonight."

Lin Yifan took the sweet potato; it was so hot it made his fingertips numb. He broke it in half and handed it to Shi Tou: "You eat some too. After you're done, take some men and bring over the weapons and ammunition. Tonight you'll be in my group, leading the charge."

Shi Tou nodded, swallowed the sweet potato in a few bites, and wiped his mouth.

As the sun began to set, the long shadows cast by the withered trees on the mass grave resembled countless thin arms reaching towards the gray sky. Lin Yifan glanced at his pocket watch; it was 4:30. He rose and walked towards the center of the depression, his boots crushing a thin layer of frost.

"gather!"

A hundred people suddenly gathered, their breaths mingling with the white mist. Some had sweat on their foreheads, some had purple lips, but without exception, their eyes shone with an alarming light.

"You ten marksmen will undergo a live-fire test, two shots each. Stone, you're in charge of the machine gun teams, thirty rounds for each machine gun team. Begin now!"

Stone turned around at the sound of his voice, his rough voice booming through the hollow: "Machine gun team! Follow me up the embankment!"

Ten groups of more than fifty people crouched low and ran toward their designated positions, their footsteps barely audible, yet conveying a tense sense of readiness to strike.

Lin Yifan watched as Sun Dazhu and ten other archers lined up in the center of the depression. Each of them had a makeshift wooden target a hundred meters in front of them—made from broken coffin boards from a mass grave, simulating the width of the firing ports of a Japanese pillbox.

"First shot, prone position, stationary target!" Lin Yifan raised his right hand. "On my command—"

Ten 40mm guns fell simultaneously, the metal striking the frozen ground with a dull thud. The archers braced their right shoulders against the protective plates, their left arms outstretched to support the handguards; their posture was still stiff, but they were beginning to take shape.

Sun Dazhu was on the far right. His right hand, missing a finger, was more steady than the others. His left eye opened and closed and he had already put the notch in the sights to the bullseye.

"put!"

Ten plumes of white smoke rose almost simultaneously, their exhaust flames instantly melting the thin frost in the center of the depression. The rockets whistled as they hurtled toward their targets, half hitting their mark, the explosions of the shattered wooden targets mingling with the spray of mud and snow.

Three shots missed, carving deep furrows in the frozen soil beside the target; the farthest shot even flew over the target, exploding into a cloud of black smoke at the edge of the wild forest.

"Number five in group three, missed the target!" Lin Yifan's voice was cold and hard. "Step forward!"

A young man in his early twenties scrambled to his feet, his face flushed, his right shoulder bruised from the impact. He opened his mouth to explain, but Lin Yifan had already walked up to him, his dark eyes staring at him for two seconds.

"Your shoulder wasn't properly braced, and the shot went awry the moment it was fired." Lin Yifan reached out and pressed the bruise on his right shoulder. "Second shot, crouching position, fire again. If you miss again, you're going back to the grain store to carry sacks."

The young man nodded emphatically and bowed his head again.

"The rest of you, inspect the targets and stand by!"

Shi Tou peeked out from the other side of the earthen slope, and the sporadic test firing of the machine gun crew could be heard. He shouted at the top of his lungs, "Damn it! The light machine gun is fine, it's just that one of the bastards put the magazine in backwards, and it jammed!"

"Let him take it apart himself. If he can't, he's not eating dinner tonight!"

Lin Yifan turned and walked towards the target, checking the impact points one by one. Sun Dazhu hit the target with both shots, the second shot even passing through the hole of the first shot, blasting a bowl-sized hole in the center of the wooden target. The carpenter in the seventh group, who was in his thirties, shot both shots that went astray to the upper right, but the dispersion was only half a foot, obviously because he did not master the wind drift correction.

"You," Lin Yifan pointed at the carpenter, "adjust the angle by half a point, with a level three northwest wind, and the ball will deflect two inches to the right."

The carpenter paused for a moment, then suddenly realized and nodded vigorously.

The second round of test firings unfolded as dusk fell. This time, only two people missed the target. The young man finally managed to send the rocket into the bullseye, and in his excitement, he almost threw the 40mm rocket into the air, only to be slapped on the back of the head by Sun Dazhu: "Be careful! This is a weapon of mass destruction, not a firecracker!"

Lin Yifan glanced at his pocket watch; it was 5:15. The daylight was rapidly receding, and the withered trees in the mass grave were gradually turning into grotesque silhouettes.

He walked toward the weapons pile behind the earthen mound. The ammunition boxes had already been opened, and the golden rockets gleamed with a cold, eerie light in the dim light.

"Each group receives sixteen live rounds." His voice wasn't loud, but it cut clearly through the cold wind. "Before loading the live rounds, lock the safety—if anyone accidentally fires, I'll personally bury them."

Everyone fell silent.

Stone led his machine gun team down the slope, each carrying a gleaming Czech-made or Type 91 light machine gun. He leaned close to Lin Yifan, his breath reeking of gunpowder: "Young master, we've calibrated the sights. Within 300 meters, you can hit anything you point at."

"Is the truck arranged?"

"All arranged, five vehicles, all covered with tarpaulins. Young master, where do we begin?" Stone asked.

"I heard that the 47th Division, which came from Shicheng, is closest to Beiping, so we'll start by attacking them. We'll advance south from Zhengyangmen and Fengtai, pushing straight out. You all know the locations of the Japanese strongholds and pillboxes over there, right?"

Shi Tou nodded emphatically and pulled out a crumpled sketch from his pocket: "I've figured it all out. There are Japanese pillboxes three miles south of Fengtai Railway Station, and they extend to both sides, one every three to five hundred meters."

Beyond that is Nanyuan Airport. Although the airport is no longer in use, they used it as the brigade's command post... He pointed down the map with his rough fingers.

"We won't attack Huangcun tonight."

Lin Yifan folded the sketch and stuffed it into his pocket. "First, we'll take care of the checkpoints and outposts, make our brothers bleed, and throw the Japanese into chaos. Once the 47th Division sends reinforcements—" A slight smile played on his lips, revealing a cold, stern expression beyond his years, "then we'll pick on the weaker targets."

"A feint?" Sun Dazhu approached unnoticed, his missing right hand unconsciously rubbing the 40-fire protective wood.

"It's like stirring up the grass to alert the snake," Lin Yifan corrected. "Only when the snake is in disarray can we find its vital point."

He turned to the crowd, a hundred eyes fixed on him in the twilight. The cold wind swept across the hollow, swirling withered leaves with a mournful sound, but it couldn't drown out the heavy breathing of the crowd.