After two hours and 20 minutes of rapid marching, the whole army arrived at Zhangpan Village, and the first platoon immediately dispersed to expand the warning area, and the second platoon arranged sentry posts and set up a cordon with wood and stones.

Under the leadership of Captain Chen Zhibiao, the commander of the Third Company, Captain Lu Guang, the deputy commander of the company, and Sergeant Han Yaoxian, the instructor, the brothers of the Third Company put down their bags and immediately waved their tools to tear down the rotten wooden bridge decks.

The second company commander Cai Guangqing and the company deputy Mu recalled that the captain had not wiped the sweat, and immediately summoned the platoon leaders of each platoon to survey the dry riverbed more than 40 meters wide and the surrounding forests, and quickly calculated the workload and assigned tasks. Instructor Warrant Officer Qian Bojun led two Jiangxi brothers into the village to do his work of visiting and pacifying the people and other work to close the military-civilian relations.

Hu Zi and An Yi looked around in the small courtyard of the ancestral hall in the northwest of the village, listening to Hu Zi's report as they walked, and learned that Xia Jian's police platoon had been divided into five groups to carry out investigations in all directions in the front, An Yi was very satisfied.

After speaking, Hu Zi pointed to the empty ancestral hall and said that it was just used as a temporary camp headquarters, and the big camphor in the small courtyard covered the sky and said, the tree was at least three hundred years old, which was very rare.

An Yi echoed casually, but both of them were very strange, and they couldn't figure out why there was nothing in this ancestral hall? In addition to the couplet engraved on the pillar of the ancestral hall with the words "Descendants of the Clouds and Clouds", the shadows of other things such as tablets cannot be found, and the entire ancestral hall seems to have been relocated.

Half an hour later, Qian Bojun, the instructor of the second company, came to report that An Yi and the others had figured out that the village peasant association had held several criticism meetings in the past few months, and the ancestral hall belonged to feudal ideology and could not exist, and was ready to be changed into a peasant association training center.

Hu Zi was surprised by this, An Yi smiled knowing that he didn't say anything, and ordered Lao Chang to arrange for a few brothers who had not recovered from their injuries to come in to rest.

After hurriedly finishing the belated lunch, An Yi asked Xiao Langzhong to change the medicine and led Dong Lingzi to the second and third companies, and Hu Zi also went to inspect the battalion headquarters of the machine gun platoon.

It was 5 o'clock in the afternoon when An Yi came to the third company from the construction site of the second company, and the brothers of the third company finished lunch and rested for an hour before they got up to work, all the construction preparations had been completed, and the logs needed for the construction of the bridge had been cut down and were waiting for transportation.

After listening to the report of the company commander Chen Zhibiao, An Yi and Yin Jinan inspected the 11 bucket-thick bridge pillars retained in the water together, and praised the officers and soldiers of the 3rd Company who made their fortune, and praised the brothers on the spot for being good at summarizing and becoming more and more brainy, so that the workload was reduced by at least one-third, and only 18 columns needed to be added to strengthen and support the nearshore bridge.

The bridge deck is the simplest part of the whole project, only need to cut out a one-third plane of logs with a diameter of more than 25 centimeters, fix it on the load-bearing body of the building, and then use a thick iron chain to tightly connect and strengthen the eight groups of steel fasteners under the beam, which is enough for the completed bridge to bear a total weight of eight tons of trucks to pass safely.

At this time, there was a commotion from the highway guard post 100 meters away on the west bank, and An Yi on the east bank looked up and found that the beautiful woman named Yang Suzhen was chasing after her, and was negotiating with Huang Yingwu, who was in front of the crowd with a hippie smile.

An Yi shook his head helplessly: "Ji Nan, you go over and take a look, these hundreds of people from the peasant association are here to help us, it seems that they have brought a lot of tools, let them come in and build a bridge with us, it will be much faster with their help, but they can't be involved in the key construction of beams and columns and supporting at both ends, otherwise they will be more and more helped, let them go to felling, prefabricate and lay logs on the bridge deck, if you want to see the excitement, just let me see, and when the main body is completed, you will immediately transfer the two platoons to the second company camp together with the cooking squad, Leaving a platoon to continue the work of sweeping the tail, and after finishing it, they quietly withdrew to the camp of the second company, and they could not accept the things of the common people, and it was not easy for them. The bridge defense work was handed over to the platoon, and they will catch up with us when the division headquarters special agent company comes over and handed us over. After working together, we will open the bridge in the east at any time, otherwise if the head of the local peasant association or even a higher-level party group comes over tomorrow, we will not see it, and we will not see it. ”

Yin Jinan nodded: "Understood!" Now each platoon of the three companies is about 70 people, the construction speed will be about one-third faster, the work of erecting load-bearing beams and columns is about to begin, the foundation at both ends has been excavated, it is estimated that the main body can be completed in four to five hours, and the next bridge deck construction has a platoon, not to mention that there are so many people to help. However, the task of the second company is heavy, although the riverbed is dry and the construction is good, but the construction of the beam and column support is very difficult, you go and watch the second company. ”

Yin Jinan jumped on a simple bamboo raft to cross the river, An Yi rode on a big black horse and didn't go back to the second camp in the east of the village, heard a dull blasting sound along the way, arrived at the second battalion guard post, dismounted and walked down the dry riverbed, and saw Cai Guangqing They had used blasting technology to blow up a five-meter small stone mountain raised in the riverbed twenty meters upstream.

An Yi laughed happily: "Well done, brothers! Lao Tzu couldn't think of such a good idea, this bombing blew up a four-meter square natural solid bridge pier, and divided the forty-meter-long bridge into two twenty meters to construct, just blow up a few large rooting stones on both sides of the east and west, and let the road be rerouted to the bridge for dozens of meters, good idea! Guangqing, after finishing this bridge, Lao Tzu will reward you with two thousand oceans, plus two war horses! ”

The brothers of the Second Company cheered, Cai Guangqing happily looked at the two assistants, and after a little discussion, he set a military order to An Yi: It must be completed within eight hours!

After asking Cai Guangqing how to move back more than 30 buckets of nearly four-meter-long supporting logs, An Yi easily returned to the big camphor tree in the ancestral hall, sat on a comfortable bamboo chair and asked Dong Yanzi to make a pot of good tea, and called Xiao Langzhong to ask about the recovery of the wounded.

Xiao Langzhong is also a talent, don't look at this kid is only twenty-two years old, but he can recite the four books and five classics, be familiar with the compendium of materia medica, know hundreds of Chinese herbal medicines, master more than 200 Chinese medicine formulas, and know a little bit about everything, especially a few ancestral anti-inflammatory and poison-pulling medical skills, so that the injured brothers benefit immensely, if it weren't for his father being occupied by the local tyrants in the countryside and finally being beaten and seriously injured to death, this guy with unlimited "money" will never leave his hometown Changde in a fit of anger, and rushed to Changsha overnight to sign up as a soldier.

On the morning before leaving Wuchang, Xiao Langzhong grabbed a handful of all kinds of weeds out of nowhere, smashed them into a dark paste, stubbornly smeared An Yi's head and left shoulder wounds, and then bandaged them with gauze. At that time, An Yi was scared enough, but seeing the incomparably confident brilliance in Xiao Langzhong's eyes, An Yi shut up and endured it, thinking that as long as it didn't feel right, he would immediately ask someone to pick it up and wash it, who knew that after applying the medicine, it was cool for a while, and the pain was doubled, and in just two days, more than an inch on the head was sealed and scabbed, and the injury on his shoulder healed quickly, making An Yi happy as if he had picked up a treasure, and he had already rewarded Xiao Langzhong with a half-new and old shell gun, and secretly decided to use the opportunity of the next promotion to give him a warrant officer, and get the rank of warrant officer Xiao Langzhong is considered a real medical officer.

The two were chatting energetically, the beard came in a hurry, and without sitting down, he waved his hand to let all the people next to An Yi retreat, picked up An Yi's teacup and drank it dry, and then poured a cup and held it in his hand:

Xia Jian reported that the three groups had dived to Qibao Mountain, 16 kilometers to the southeast, four hours ago, and found a group of dozens of unknown armed forces coming from the east valley mouth, and inspected the mountainside north of Suozi Valley and the two east and west valleys about 1.5 kilometers apart for a while, gathered together to discuss and then quickly left.

The three groups of brothers felt strange and quietly went in, and as soon as they approached the valley mouth and failed to come out, they found that more than 30 armed men with bird guns and shuttle darts entered from the west side of the valley, and several of them had long and short guns.

Xia Jian said that it seems that the two groups of people are not all the way, the Suozi Valley is the only way for Yangxi Town to lead to the Tonggu Mabang Road, after arriving at Yangxi by water and land, if you want to go to Tonggu in addition to the north road where we are now building the bridge, you can only take the Suozi Valley, and the Suozi Valley is surrounded by high mountains and cliffs on both sides, and the gentle slope of seventy or eighty meters below the mountainside is densely wooded, which is definitely a good place to ambush. ”

An Yi's spirits were greatly lifted, shouting "Dong Lingzi bring the map", Hu Zi drank a cup of tea and lit a cigarette, took the map that Dong Lingzi hurriedly took and spread it out, pointing to Qibaoshan South Road and Suozi Valley, and then pointing to Yangxi more than 20 kilometers to the southwest. An Yi suddenly understood: "You mean, this group of people wants to ambush a certain team or a certain batch of goods in the direction of Yangxi?" ”

"Yes, and I estimate that it is likely to be a caravan transporting opium tobacco, otherwise it is difficult to explain, because everyone knows that our revolutionary army has begun to conquer Jiangxi, from Lixian in the middle of eastern Hunan to the south of Pingxiang in western Jiangxi, almost all areas are occupied by the middle of the three armies of our revolutionary army and the right flank of the fifth army, small and medium-sized battles are fought every day, which caravan dares to enter easily at this time? Only our left flank in northeastern Hunan has not yet been engaged, and the Sixth Army and the 1st Division are advancing to the south of us, and the distance between them and us is relatively large, nearly 100 kilometers, and this gap of nearly 100 kilometers is enough for opium dealers to take risks. ”

Hu Zi pointed to the road from Xiangxi to Hengyang, and then to the road from Xiangxi to Changsha: "According to the report of Xia Jian and his brothers, opium dealers in the whole of Hunan usually take these two roads, one south and one north, and the south is now impassable, leaving only our north road, which is sold to Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai by Tonggu to Jiujiang." Xia Jian even boldly speculated that if it was an opium caravan, it would probably be related to the Sixth Army of Cheng Qian, the Hunan army, otherwise no one would have the courage to do so. ”

An Yi carefully looked at the map, thought calmly, raised his head and asked Hu Zi in a low voice, "Do you have any suggestions?" ”

Hu Zi smiled slightly: "No matter who it is, let's go and join in the fun, first stare in the dark, if it works, let's come to the black and eat the black, these people who want to ambush are either bandits or local armed forces, if they fight well, they can get prisoners, take the opportunity to expand our team, it doesn't matter if we don't fight well, anyway, we will keep fighting to the east in the future, and no one will come back after the fight." Taking a step back, even if a friendly army sells opium in private, we can't let the friendly army suffer! If we can help our allies, maybe we can take the opportunity to build a relationship with them in the future and make the business bigger with them, just like you often say: open up financial routes and common prosperity. ”

An Yi laughed: "Let's think together...... What is the news for the brothers in the fifth group? ”

"Not yet, I have already sent four groups to assist the five groups that are reconnoitring to the southwest, equipped with four fast horses, and Xia Jian has also personally led a group returning from the northwest to eight kilometers southwest to pick up, as soon as there is news, the horses will come quickly, it will not take forty minutes. But according to my calculations, even if the two groups were to ambush, it would be tomorrow morning. At this time, it was already dark, and no matter how many people and horses the caravan had, they would not dare to walk on the mountain carriage road leading to Qibao Mountain, and it was very likely that they would pass through tomorrow at dawn or tomorrow morning, or even at noon tomorrow. "The arrangement and consideration of the beard is very detailed.

An Yi thought about it and put away the map, and asked Dong Yanzi to bring the food and finish it together, and then wait, without further news, he could only wait patiently.

Sure enough, at nine o'clock in the evening, Xia Jian returned to report: "A caravan of more than 120 pack horses camped in Manfangwan, eight kilometers south of Qibao Mountain, with more than 300 people all in the same configuration of long and short guns, as well as two light machine guns. Because of the heavy security of the other side, his brothers did not dare to approach and scrutinize, so they could only quietly inspect it with binoculars two or three kilometers away, and judging from the appearance and shape of the goods on horseback, it was certain that opium was certain. At present, the brothers of the fourth group are monitoring the direction of Manfangwan, and the brothers of the fifth group are monitoring the direction of the Shuttle Valley, and they can report back at any time if there is a situation. ”

Hu Zi smiled slightly: "Sure enough, it is estimated that it is the men and horses of the Sixth Army, only they are the closest to us, and they belong to the Middle Route Army under the command of the commander-in-chief with us, know the direction we are traveling and the location we have reached, so they dare to come over at this time." ”

"Not bad! These people have been following this path all year round, and I even suspect that they are secretly colluding with the 15th Regiment of Fang Fengxiang's division of Deng Ruzhuo's division in the direction of Tonggu, or have cooperated with a certain powerful person in Tonggu for a long time, so they dare to be so bold. Let's think about it, more than 120 pack horses, even ordinary Yungui tobacco soil is at least 25,000 catties, and the lowest market price is about 750,000 yuan! God, it's enough for a regular army to spend a year......" An Yi sighed.

Xia Jian took a step forward: "The two eldest brothers, the younger brother has such a guess, if it is really the people of the Sixth Army, they must think that our engineer battalion will not be able to repair these two bridges in a day or two, so they want to rush ahead of us for a day or two, and quickly pass through Zhangfang Town, which is thirty-four kilometers to the east. ”

Hu Zi and An Yi walked to the map at the same time, looked at it for a moment and nodded one after another.

An Yi turned to Xia Jian: "If the final intelligence can be further confirmed, can you estimate how long will our sixty-five brothers in a company plus the machine gun platoon be able to bypass the thirteen-kilometer sheep intestine trail north of Qibao Mountain and rush to the valley mouth east of Suozi Valley?" ”

Xia Jian estimated for a moment: "If the old brothers of the first company and the machine gun platoon of the battalion headquarters are enough for three and a half hours at most, the sky is not dark tonight, and the moon is just right, this kind of night road is very easy to walk." ”

An Yi discussed with Hu Zi for a moment and immediately made a decision: "Let's fuck it!" Hu Zi went to mobilize men and horses to get ready, as long as one of the two groups of people drove into the Shuttle Valley to ambush during the day, we would take enough firepower and set off immediately, Lao Tzu would not believe in more than two hundred well-known brothers, and he would not be able to block a small valley entrance! ”

(To be continued)