Shan Zi and Zhao Danian carried shell guns and advanced hand in hand with the vanguard soldiers.
After walking for five or six minutes at a stretch, a ditch about one meter wide stood in front of me.
Jumping over the ditch in one step, Shanzi whispered: "Ready the machine gun."
It turned out that based on visual inspection during the day, the trench was about 500 meters away from the Western Front encirclement, and was completely within the effective range of light and heavy machine guns.
After receiving Shanzi's command, the machine gunner quickly raised the machine gun.
At this time, the enemies on the opposite side still didn't notice any movement. Some were chatting in low voices, and some were burying their heads in sleep. Only the sentry was paying full attention, his eyes scanning back and forth in the dark night.
In less than two minutes, the sentry ran into the tent in the dark and reported to the commander that someone was moving about three hundred meters ahead.
The commander hurriedly rushed out of the tent, listened for a while, and felt the footsteps getting closer and closer.
To prevent accidental injury, the commander shouted at the top of his voice: "The command."
As soon as he finished speaking, Shanzi waved his hand and fired a shot. As the gunfire rang out, the soldiers in the vanguard fell to the ground one after another.
Shanzi's move was not accidental, but a strategy drawn up in the plan, intended to lure the enemy into firing earlier and find out where their heavy firepower would be deployed.
Sure enough, the Japanese commander gave the order, and the light and heavy machine guns fired quickly, and the three grenade launchers also made an earth-shaking roar.
After a moment of observation, each of the six heavy machine guns aimed at the target and launched a fierce counterattack.
Under the suppression of our heavy machine guns, the enemy's firepower was significantly weakened and even interrupted for a time.
At this moment, Shanzi stood up suddenly and gave a stern command to charge.
In an instant, fourteen light machine guns were firing and charging, and the following men and horses were like a surging wave, rolling forward.
During the charge, the enemy's light and heavy weapons once again showed their power, and the enemies on both sides quickly launched a siege.
In just a few dozen seconds, nine of our soldiers were killed, including two machine gunners, and three other soldiers were seriously injured.
Shanzi's eyes were bloodshot at this time, and he suddenly grabbed the light machine gun and aimed the enemy's heavy machine gun at him, hitting him all over the face.
Zhao Danian and Xiaohu also picked up light machine guns from the dead and fired at the enemy's grenade launchers together.
After finishing the bullets in the gun in one breath, Shanzi led the team to advance several dozen meters. While the deputy shooter was loading bullets, he grabbed another light machine gun and continued the charge.
The first shot was fired from Shanzi. In only three minutes, the troops approached the blockade less than 100 meters away.
In contrast, the enemies on the left and right wings also entered the effective range, forming an encirclement.
Braving artillery fire from all directions, the Independent Battalion finally opened a breakthrough from the front at the cost of dozens of casualties, and almost all the enemies in the front were wiped out.
When the second company and the ambulance crew finally broke out of the encirclement, Shanzi still held the machine gun and fought with the machine gunner while retreating, covering the safe retreat of the large troops.
When Shiro Ishikawa saw that the situation was over, he simply ordered to stop the pursuit.
In order to prevent the plainclothes team from continuing to follow and monitor, Shanzi had already made a U-turn three kilometers west of Yukou Mountain and headed south.
Because their backs were carrying the bodies of martyrs and stretchers for transporting seriously injured people, the troops moved very slowly and did not enter northern Jiangsu until about ten o'clock.
After settling down under a forest hill, Shanzi asked Xiaohu if there was any village nearby. Xiaohu said that about five miles east from here is the town of Yugou in Yu County.
Under Shanzi's instructions, Zhao Danian and Xiaohu led a platoon and rushed to Yugou Town to contact the local residents and borrow donkey carts to transport martyrs and the sick and wounded.
About two hours later, all forty-three donkey carts arrived.
It was about seventy miles from the resting place to Circle Ridge. Shanzi ordered that we must return to the base camp before dawn.
So they marched quickly all night, and the troops successfully arrived at the camp at about 4 o'clock in the morning.