"Little Biandan, why are you so stupid? Why do you want me to say you're good? There is no more accurate sledgehammer in your hand, Lao Tzu instigated you to have a big ear scraper, go, go! ”

An Yi, who was so tired that he was not sincere and benevolent, straightened up on the muddy mountain bend and used the Henan dialect he had just learned for a few days to teach the young soldier named Bian Guangda next to him, and the broken Henan dialect caused a burst of laughter from the brothers.

The honest Bian Guangda also smiled embarrassedly, this new brother who played the light machine gun very smoothly didn't know why he couldn't play with the sapper's sledgehammer, and almost broke the hand of the brother holding the stake several times, so that no one wanted to be in a group with him, An Yi saw this and volunteered to make up for it, who knew that when he was about to finish, he was almost hit with a sledgehammer by this guy who was not sure of his head.

For two days in a row, the engineer battalion remained hidden behind the right-wing position 3.5 kilometers away from the Tingsi Bridge, using dense arbor forests and patches of tall reeds as cover, and worked hard to open up a way for the field artillery march of the 36th Regiment of the Fourth Army.

In the past two days, the construction has been working day and night, although it is a little tiring, but it is still safe. The Seventh Army and the Fourth Army on the front position, as well as the more than 10,000 elites of the direct army Song Dapei and Dong Zhengguo, fought to the death, and after paying a great price, they finally drove all the enemy troops who stubbornly held on to the south bank of the Tingsi Bridge to the north bank.

Prior to this, Huang Qixiang, who was bold and careful and prepared for a rainy day, issued an order to let the reserve An Yi Battalion, which he had managed to get his hands on, sneak out and open the way, and after planning to occupy the position on the south bank, he would quietly move the artillery position forward to the mound around Luogang, which was only 2.9 kilometers away from the Tingsi Bridge, and then give a surprise blow to the enemy artillery position in Sunjialing on the north bank when the general attack was launched, and make every effort to suppress the enemy's superior artillery fire and reduce the difficulty of the main infantry of the Seventh and Fourth armies in launching a strong attack.

However, the An Yi battalion was indeed very lucky, and in the past two days, they have been able to secretly carve out a 2.8-kilometer solid road on the dense position of the water network.

An Yi used all his active brains, quietly cut down bamboo and wood to harvest weeds when he encountered a swamp, laid a solid wooden stake, and paved the ground layer by layer, and built a solid road in a complex area that could make a ton of multiple field artillery drag forward, and in the fierce battle on the whole line for two consecutive days, he was not discovered by the enemy, nor was he hit by a single shell, which surprised the commanders of the Seventh Army Li Zongren, the deputy commanders of the Fourth Army Chen Keyu and Zhang Fakui who were in command in the command headquarters.

After receiving the news at 9:40 p.m. on the evening of 25 June that the road had been built and that Huang Qixiang's 36 th Regiment had successfully dragged 26 field artillery pieces to the predetermined position, the generals and commanders in the command headquarters were very happy and immediately began preparations for launching a general attack at 5 a.m. on 26 July.

After a half-hour burst of lightning and thunder, it rained heavily, and the rain fell until four o'clock in the morning, and the swelling of the river washed away most of the boats that were ready to cross the river.

As soon as the morning dawned, the enemy's three artillery positions in Sunjialing once again launched a fierce artillery attack on the shore and the positions of the revolutionary army, and the remaining 20 or so wooden boats on the south bank were instantly wiped out under the bombardment of artillery shells.

The gloomy canopy shrouded the concealed Luogang artillery position, which had been successfully constructed using a soil hill more than 300 meters long and more than 20 meters high as a barrier, and if it could be successfully used, it would bring great damage to the enemy's artillery position, but due to the cancellation of the general attack, the artillery position that had missed the opportunity was quiet.

The officers and men of the An Yi Battalion, who were tired and tired, were invited by the grateful artillerymen to the rear of the hill on the right flank, more than 200 meters away from the artillery position.

Although An Yi and the others knew this, they still generously led the five hundred brothers who were soaked like mud monkeys to leave quietly.

The five hundred brothers were all exhausted, and sat on their backs behind the weedy and shrub-covered right flank, eating raw and cold rice buns, and swallowing some pitiful pickles into their stomachs, wondering when they would be able to leave this fearful place.

In the past two days, the screaming shells have swept through the sky over the area where the brothers are working countless times, and the continuous explosions from hundreds of meters away have frightened the brothers' slender nerves a lot, but everyone is still frightened, because everyone heard the terrifying screams and terrifying explosions of the huge shells fired from the armored train, and witnessed a powerful bomb blowing up a lonely ten-meter earthen hill in the rear into the ground, the deafening sound of shaking the mountain. The more than 100 veterans who had experienced nine deaths were so frightened that they closed their beaks tightly, not daring to be awesome anymore, not to mention most of the engineer brothers who had never really been on the battlefield before.

An Yi, who was calm and calm on the surface, had been beating the drum in his heart - he was so annoyed at this time, since the construction was completed, he should have left this dangerous place a long time ago, you must know that if you stay for one more minute, it will be more dangerous, but the military order is like a mountain, and he can't leave at all without receiving the evacuation order, so he had no choice but to make a suggestion to Hu Zi angrily: I have a pair of large magnification binoculars captured from the mountains a while ago, let's quietly climb up to the top of the slope behind us to see what the situation on the other side is? If you stay like this, you can't stand it!

As soon as Hu Zi heard that he was in the right place, he cautiously summoned the platoon commanders of each company to a small meeting, once again sternly emphasized the discipline of covering, and instructed the deputy and platoon commanders of each company to strictly control their subordinates under the command of Yin Jinan, and not to make any abnormal movements.

"Grandma's! Chen Jiamo's grandson is worthy of being a direct famous general, the ** kilometer-long battle line north of the bridge makes this grandson arrange it tightly, and the construction and selection of each firepower point are very ingenious, no wonder the Seventh Army rushed to the shore twice and was beaten by him. ”

Beard held up the delicate binoculars and looked at it, and finally nodded in sincere admiration.

An Yi also admired Chen Jiamo, who was the overseer of Hubei Province and the commander of the enemy's 25th Division: "Indeed, this grandson really has a fucking set, this person is not like Ye Kaixin's group of fools who can only defend passively, but on the basis of defense, he can always choose a favorable time to take the initiative to attack, in the past three days, the Seventh Army and the Fourth Army have suffered a lot, and they have been suppressed by Chen Jiamo by taking advantage of the advantageous terrain on the north bank to erect mountain artillery and field artillery of various calibers, and he was also beaten by the two divisions he arranged on the south bank early to wait for work.

If it weren't for General Li Zongren's decisive change of strategy, commanding the follow-up troops who came quickly to launch a fierce attack from both flanks, and implementing the rescue method of encircling Wei and saving Zhao, not only could they not save the two brigades of Xia Wei who were rapidly defeated in the middle of the road, I am afraid that Chen Jiamo's two divisions would not have returned to the north bank now.

Due to the stubborn attack of these two divisions, Chen Jiamo gained two precious days for gathering troops on the north bank, and finally withdrew to the north bank almost in an organized way to participate in the fortification, which greatly depleted the strength of our army and blocked the momentum of our army's victorious attack...... It's remarkable, it seems that the direct family has indeed had the capital to dominate the north for so many years. ”

Hu Zi put down the binoculars in his hand, turned his head to look at An Yi, and asked with some surprise: "Hey, haven't you been at the construction site, how can you know so much?" ”

"When I went to the division headquarters the night before yesterday to resign, the division seat and the chief of staff were studying the battle situation, so I watched it for an hour......"

An Yi heard the sound of grass and trees chattering behind him, looked back, and found that Huang Qixiang led two deputies to quietly touch him, and immediately put down the binoculars and smiled slightly: "Brother Xiang, why did you get here?" ”

Huang Qixiang nodded as a greeting, happily crawled to An Yi's side, raised the binoculars and replied in a low voice while observing the north shore:

"I've come to thank you, and I'll come up when your lieutenant says you're on the mountain...... His mother! Yesterday there were only more than 30,000 troops, but today it is estimated that the formation has increased to 50,000 people, and looking at those fluttering flags, there are two or three more troops than yesterday, and the firepower points are becoming more and more dense. ”

After hearing this, An Yi raised his binoculars to observe carefully, looked at it for a moment and sighed in frustration: "Brother Xiang, this river is surging, the water is deep and wide, and there are no boats to cross the river, what should I do?" Can't thousands of people rush onto the iron bridge to make live targets for people, right? ”

"Yes, look at this formation, I'm afraid there will be nothing to do for a while, the river is as wide as a moat, and the left and right sides of the battlefield are densely covered with water and can't be stretched, it's really difficult to do! Look at the gang of hangers on the north shore, who dare to walk around, drink and eat meat unscrupulously, it is estimated that they are so arrogant because they see that we cannot threaten them in a short time. ”

Huang Qixiang sighed: "If you can find dozens of wooden boats at this time, and you can sneak over a regiment at night to catch him off guard, our army will use all the artillery fire on the south bank to bombard, and at the same time mobilize three or four divisions and brigades to take the opportunity to forcibly rush across the iron bridge, maybe you can break the enemy's iron barrel formation by surprise in one fell swoop, and annihilate the defending enemy in one go, and at worst, you can drive these tens of thousands of enemy troops back to the north of Xianning, if the impact is enough, maybe you can fight all the way to the bridgehead of Hesheng Bridge." ”

An Yi looked at Huang Qixiang in surprise: "Is one group enough?" ”

Huang Qixiang smiled confidently: "As long as it's my group, it's definitely enough!" ”

An Yi struggled for a long time in his heart, he originally wanted to take advantage of this good opportunity to ask Huang Qixiang to transfer him and his brothers back to the rear, but under the infection of Huang Qixiang's strong confidence and indomitable fearless spirit, after painful thinking and choice, in the end, it was the brotherly feelings that overcame the cowardice in his heart, and he decided to say the idea that had been hidden in his heart:

"Brother Xiang, you look at the lake 2.5 kilometers southeast of where we are now...... See? There is a small fishing village, and under the row of willow trees in the east, there are more than 20 ten-meter-long sand and wooden boats, see? There are reeds all around, and there is a water lane in the northeast that leads directly to the fork about four kilometers upstream of Tingsi Bridge, if it is not for the fact that we are in this condescending position now, it is difficult to see...... Those boats are good, if you don't carry heavy weapons, each boat can fit a platoon of brothers, the younger brother also went back last night to carry food, and took the wrong way in the reeds before occasionally discovered, the boatmen in the village are good, told me that they have not dared to move the boats for more than ten days because they are afraid of war, and they are afraid that the army on the other side will take away and we are afraid of requisitioning, and I comforted them with a good voice before returning. ”

Huang Qixiang was so excited that his hand holding the telescope trembled slightly, and after looking at it for a long time, he handed the telescope to the regimental deputy beside him, and hugged An Yi's shoulder and thanked him repeatedly:

"Xiao Yi, thank you so much! Big brother really doesn't know how to thank you...... God help me! I'll go back and report to the headquarters, and strive to act tonight, and I want to see how long Chen Jiamo's decrepit boy can get away! ”

"Slow down, Brother Xiang, have you paid attention to the current?"

An Yi grabbed Huang Qixiang, thinking that since he had talked about this, it was better to say all his worries, and have a good explanation for his brother, and his conscience would be better:

"You see, such a turbulent flow speed, such a wide river, it is estimated that it is difficult to achieve the overall safe crossing, the younger brother has trained his subordinates in the eastern suburbs of Zhuxikou in the third company, where the water flow is due to showers and groundwater gushing abnormalities, sometimes rapid and slow, at the beginning the younger brother is also very headache, worried that the brothers will be washed down the Pearl River estuary, after many attempts to basically grasp the law, the width of the Zhuxi Estuary is only thirty or forty meters are so complicated, not to mention the big river in front of us? What are you going to do if a bad boat gets swept downstream by a rapid, or doesn't land accurately? ”

Huang Qixiang nodded heavily, and smiled gratefully at An Yi: "Thank you for reminding me, otherwise I really ignored this point, and it would be troublesome to think of it when I got to the river!" I want to think about it...... If we had hired the boatmen in the village, we might have solved the problem. ”

An Yi smiled, nodded and said: "Yes, but in order to achieve the overall safe crossing, it is also necessary to require the boatmen to use their usual fleet connection method, when they transport river sand, they often connect more than ten or twenty boat cables together, which not only facilitates transportation but also reduces the intensity of boating, and can also free up a lot of manpower to do other things, so as long as they are moved to take this method, they will have it!" ”

"Great! Xiao Yi, why don't you go with the eldest brother, with a skilled hand like you in command, the eldest brother will be more at ease! Huang Qixiang's glittering eyes were full of blazing anticipation.

An Yi was startled, and he was bitter in his heart, eager to give himself two slaps immediately, resenting his last two extra sentences.

Just when An Yi opened his mouth and Ai Ai was speechless, a burst of artillery rumbled, and the enemy artillery on the north bank was carrying out a tentative artillery bombardment again.

The terrible thing is that the clamor of the cannonballs seems to be getting closer and closer, getting louder and louder, and the startled Huang Qixiang shouted "not good", hugged An Yi and suddenly rolled down the hillside, the two adjutants and the beard were also frightened and rolled down quickly, and several cannonballs fell on the mountain bag more than 20 meters on the left side like lightning and made a violent explosion sound, splashing a large area of dirt and grass flying all over the sky.

Rolling to the foot of the slope of more than 30 meters, An Yi was knocked into the eyes of gold stars, but Huang Qixiang quickly jumped up and rushed to the artillery position on the left flank and shouted: "Don't open fire!" The enemy is a test of fire, don't fire—"

Unfortunately, the sound of the explosion drowned out Huang Qixiang's shouts, and the brothers of the 12th Division's artillery company, who had just entered the position, thought that they had been discovered, and all rushed to the gun position in panic and launched a counterattack under the anxious command of the captain and company commander.

In less than a minute, the enemy's shells on the north bank flew like locusts, and the screams that pierced the sky pierced the eardrums of more than 1,000 officers and men on the position, and Huang Qixiang and the two adjutants, who had run halfway through, lay on the ground in despair and howled in pain.

"Dig bunkers! Dig up—"

An Yi, who was distraught, shouted nervously, at this moment he no longer remembered to hide, he didn't remember lying down, rushing from one end to the other like a wounded beast. His gaffe immediately infected Hu Zi and Yin Jinan and the others, and the five hundred terrified brothers clinged to the foot of the mountain amid the cries of several commanders, frantically digging bunkers with shovels, pickaxes and everything else they could find, screaming and wailing in the dense patches of dirt and broken branches and broken trees that fell from the sky.

Almost all of them lost their minds in the sound of explosions and the overwhelming smoke and flames of gunpowder, and only knew how to dig mechanically, digging and digging, and the brethren who had no tools dug with their hands and guns to dig the earth, like a group of poor moles who dodged a sudden disaster, and only tried their best to burrow and forget everything in the world.

The violent continuous explosion shook An Yi to the ground, a ball of soft mud from the shot hit his abdomen hard, knocking him down in an instant and making him almost lose his breath, and he got up to see that the artillery position 100 meters away had been unrecognizable, the heavy field artillery was bombarded into the sky by the powerful explosive force of the large-caliber bomb and shattered, steel fragments mixed with stumps and broken arms flew high and scattered in all directions, blood and flesh mixed with mud sprinkled like rain, and the curved barrel and broken shield flew everywhere with the sound of the wind breaking through the air.

It was like the tragic situation of hell on earth, so frightened that An Yi was paralyzed on the ground and vomited, not knowing that the brothers around him were hit by the flying shrapnel one after another, and the blood flowed like a corpse on the spot, and he didn't see the numb and temporarily deaf brothers whose hands were still digging frantically, and when they didn't see that the narrow mound was being flattened by the non-stop flying shells, the entire two-kilometer position was blazing with flames and gunsmoke......

(To be continued)