What Li Ziyuan can do at the moment is to give these martyrs a standard military salute: "I'm sorry, it's my incompetence as the head of the regiment." You have even sacrificed your lives, and I, as the head of the regiment, have no way to prepare a coffin for you, not even a new military uniform. ”

"I am here to promise you that when the Anti-Japanese War is won, a martyr's tomb will be built for you. Let our descendants always remember that you have made such a great sacrifice for this land. Please rest assured, as long as I am alive, I will often come to visit your grave. ”

After putting down his right hand, Li Ziyuan said to the old squad leader beside him: "Old squad leader, there is no way to bury it now." It's too hot, so you have to think of a way to keep the bodies of the martyrs from ruining before the battle is over. Also, after the battle, it is necessary to find a good place around this Qiaokou to bury these martyrs. ”

Li Ziyuan's voice fell, and the old squad leader nodded heavily: "Regiment leader, please rest assured, I will definitely do it." Also, I try to wrap each martyr in a three-foot white cloth. Before the war, I had already entrusted the straw mat to Secretary Liu. He also promised to get us a batch of straw mats after the battle. I can't get a coffin, but I still have to have a straw mat and a white cloth. ”

The experienced old squad leader had a certain amount of mental preparation before this battle. Therefore, in the preparation stage of Li Ziyuan, he entrusted Liu Yanlai and Chang Juan to prepare a batch of white clay cloth and more than 200 straw mats. Of course, although there is not much wood in this Taihang Mountain, it is impossible to make so many coffins at once. Therefore, the old squad leader could only try to raise a batch of homespun cloth and straw mats.

The old squad leader replied, Li Ziyuan didn't say anything, just patted him on the shoulder, turned around and left the small courtyard. And looking at Li Ziyuan's young but somewhat vicissitudes of life, the old squad leader shook his head and said nothing. Just turned around and went to arrange for the corpses of the martyrs to be disposed of.

The price of this counterattack is very high, but Li Ziyuan knows that this is the price he must pay. Without some price, it is impossible to get the cunning fox to fully devote himself. This is a battle that will determine the future direction of the Ludong region, and no one can get the initiative without paying any price.

Returning to the regiment, Li Ziyuan saw Qian Peng with more than a hundred prisoners, waiting for him there. Seeing Li Ziyuan come back, Qian Peng pointed to the more than 100 captives behind him and said, "Regiment leader, I won these people over." They don't want to go back, continue to be two devils, and want to stay with us. ”

"They were all officers and soldiers of the former war zone who were captured when they were fighting in central Henan. was replenished by the Japanese army into the puppet army, which was not willing. Captured by us this time, they all want to stay. The rest of the people, although they don't want to go back to the puppet army, still want to go back there. ”

Seeing the more than 100 captives in front of him, Li Ziyuan nodded and said in a deep voice: "If you want to stay, we will welcome with both hands." If you don't want to stay, we'll say goodbye when this battle is over. I'm not very particular about my background, as long as I follow me to fight devils sincerely, we all sincerely welcome you. Moreover, we promise that there will be no discrimination against you. ”

"I have never been a prisoner of the captured Chinese soldiers, but we know it. We have seen more than once that the Chinese soldiers massacred by them were taken prisoner. You're in a prisoner of war camp, and I think you've had enough. When you are a puppet army, you are also persecuted. ”

"Now that you have been liberated, it is time to repay the blood debt from the devil. Give all the suffering you have suffered since your captivity to those who have brought you shame and suffering. Now let's see if you still have real Chinese male blood in you. ”

"I'll give you guns right away, mules and horses, let's go to the battlefield and see. Dig out the fangs that you thought you didn't have anymore, or forgot that you once had, and completely tore these devils and two dogs in front of you to pieces. A tooth for a tooth and an eye for an eye, this is my military style. In short, it is a sentence, kill devils, the more you kill, the better. ”

Li Ziyuan's words stimulated the blood of these captives in front of him. One by one, they screamed, eager to pick up their guns and go to the battlefield now. to wash away the shame of being captured and once being a puppet army. All the pain that the devil inflicted on them after they were captured will be returned to those who started it.

Seeing these captives, there is now a lot of excitement. Li Ziyuan said to He Sanliang: "Old He, give them guns, and then fifty rounds of ammunition and two each*." You will see these people replenished to the companies as appropriate in accordance with the current shortages in the units. ”

Also, after the decentralization, let the instructors do some detailed ideological work. Let them recall what happened in the Devil's prisoner of war camp, and then do some detailed targeted ideological work. Also, count their household registration locations and names in detail. If any of them die on the battlefield, we will have to give an account to their families in the future. ”

After listening to Li Ziyuan's order, He Sanliang wanted to say something, but in the end he chose to remain silent. He took all these captives away and distributed weapons and ammunition according to Li Ziyuan's words. A lot of weapons have been seized in the past few days, and now Li Ziyuan has enough weapons at hand, so he doesn't have to worry about not having enough weapons.

After He Sanliang took the captives away, Li Ziyuan turned his head and said to Qian Peng: "Old Qian, you are really a charcoal in the snow this time." However, this number is still somewhat insufficient. But time is so short, it's not easy to drag over a hundred. Doing the ideological work of the captives is a careful and patient work. ”

"These people have suffered a lot of abuse in the devil's prisoner of war camp. I don't think it's starting from this aspect. Let's have a grievance education, let them talk about their own suffering, and then we are making a positive summary to stimulate their desire to kill the enemy. ”

"Including what kind of situation they have in the army and family over there, whether the military salary over there has been deducted, whether it is a strong man who has been arrested, I think they can start it? Well, I think the organization waits until the battle is over and organizes a grievance education. It is also good to let them vent out the bitter water in their hearts at the meeting of the cadres and soldiers of the whole regiment. ”

Li Ziyuan's thought made Ma Yongcheng and Qian Peng's eyes light up. After Ma Yongcheng listened, he dragged Qian Peng aside and muttered. But Li Ziyuan ignored his two political work partners, what was muttering at this time. He still put his mind on the battle the next day.

After the counterattack ended, Li Ziyuan clearly knew that tonight would be a Christmas Eve. But by tomorrow, when Wang Tieshi casts his last axe, he will be under tremendous pressure. But as long as you survive tomorrow morning, everything will change completely. The grievances between myself and the traitor in the past few years will also be completely liquidated and resolved.

After Li Ziyuan's counterattack ended, the entire battlefield seemed unusually calm. Both sides of the standoff seem to be gathering strength for the final showdown of the next day. On the battlefield in the second half of the night, there was not even a single gunshot, and both sides waited quietly for the dawn to come.

When the first rays of sunlight shone down the next morning, the battlefield had calmed down for most of the night, and once again a dense burst of gunfire rang out. Under the cover of artillery fire, the Japanese puppet army launched an attack on all fronts. South, east, and north, all of them rang out in a dense burst of gunfire.

In this attack, the Japanese puppet army did not focus on the direction of attack at all. Instead, they adopted the tactics of attacking on all fronts, regardless of priority and priority, and launched assaults in turn in the three directions of Qiaokou. One wave was repulsed, and another followed. Under the persecution of Wang Tieshi's reorganized supervision team and boxes of Lianyin coupons, the puppet soldiers launched round after round of charges.

After learning that the Eighth Route had appeared in Ludong and was exchanging fire with the Japanese army. In order to make a drum * Before the Eighth Route reinforcements arrived, Li Ziyuan's department was completely solved. At the request of the captain of the Japanese army, Wang Tieshi transferred the last force from Luoma and Pingchuan.

And Li Ziyuan's department also changed the tactics of completely giving up after losing it before. On the outskirts of Qiaokou, there is hardly a single point that is being fought over and over again. And he never skimps on the consumption of ammunition, and all light and heavy machine guns are put into battle. Every time the puppet army attacks, it has to face a dense baptism of bullets.

The artillery company deployed in Qiaokou Village also continued to open artillery cover. Wherever there is a danger in either direction, the shells will explode there. It was not until 10 a.m. that the artillery support in the village gradually stopped. The emergence of this situation made Wang Tieshi intuitively think that the cannonballs of the Eighth Route had been consumed.

Stimulated by this thought, Wang Tieshi launched the biggest attack of the day. The offensive lasted from 10 o'clock to 12 o'clock. The 579 Heights, which Li Ziyuan had recaptured at a heavy cost the night before, was once again lost in this attack. The artillery fire of the Japanese puppet army has almost razed the entire Qiaokou to the ground.

In the fierce battle in the morning, although Li Ziyuan basically held most of his positions except for the 579 Heights, he also consumed the last bit of reserves in his hands. At twelve o'clock in the battle, perhaps the previous bit of sharpness had been consumed, and the attack momentum of the Japanese puppet army finally gradually fell.

Looking at the strength of the Japanese puppet army's attack in the telescope, it decreased more and more each time. By one o'clock in the afternoon, the attack had become weak, and another group of puppet troops had arrived from the direction of Pingchuan. Li Ziyuan knew that Wang Tieshi's three-plate axe had been used up. Now it's time to smoke this guy to death.

When Li Ziyuan, who knew that the fighter plane was a little inferior, sent a coded telegram through the radio that there would be heavy rain this afternoon. The commander of the military region, who was at the junction of Hubei and Ludong, and the political commissar of the sub-district who was acting as the temporary commander, immediately gave the order to attack. As telegrams were sent, the cavalry messengers departed one by one.

The entire Ludong area takes Qiaokou as the core and makes a pot of porridge. The main force of the military region launched an attack on Hubei County and cut off the connection between Hubei County and Pingchuan. The 14th Regiment of the 3rd Division, with the rapid interspersed speed, with the cooperation of the Changzhi Independent Battalion and a large number of local militias, launched a large-scale sabotage battle between Changzhi and Hubei County.

The 14th Regiment, which moved very quickly, pulled out several of the most important strongholds of the Japanese puppet army around Changzhi one after another. And with a force of a surprise attack on the Changzhi Japanese airfield, and even a part of the troops attacked Changzhi City, hitting a distance of only a few hundred meters from the headquarters of the 14th Independent Brigade. The puppet army of Changzhi Japan was almost shocked three times a day, and they closed the city gate and did not dare to go out of the city to support.