An Yi led his troops through the burning houses and rushed to the Wenchang bridgehead, but before he could get close to the command post of Li Yannian, the commander of the Fifth Regiment, he was suppressed in the dry drainage ditch of the alley by a burst of flying mortar shells.

After the violent explosion, An Yi looked up and saw that all the buildings outside the alley to the two hundred meters of the bridgehead had been razed to the ground by artillery fire, and the corpses of the brothers of the Second Division were overlapping and full of eyes, and a pool of blood and water was gathering wider and wider, flowing everywhere, and the hot air was filled with the suffocating smell of burnt corpses and blood.

Under the cover of the thick smoke raised by the shells, An Yi flew up, quickly rushed to the temporary command post in the northeast corner, entered the courtyard full of rubble and broken bricks, and quickly climbed the collapsed land temple platform, found Li Yannian, who was lying behind the broken wall to observe the command, and immediately lay beside him and took out the binoculars: "Senior brother, quickly retreat, I can't stand it!" ”

"Xiao Yi? What are you doing here? ”

Li Yannian turned his head in surprise, and the chief officials on both sides looked at An Yi who suddenly arrived, very surprised and very moved, when everyone wanted to escape as soon as possible, An Yi came at the risk of death, this righteousness and courage, how could it not make Li Yannian and his deputies feel a lot of emotion?

An Yi kept holding the telescope and pointed ahead: "His uncle's!" If you don't retreat, you can't do it, the black pressure on the other side is all enemies, it seems that they are playing ruthlessly, you see...... Under the cover of powerful machine-gun fire, the enemy has begun to force the crossing from the narrow section of the river that is several kilometers long, and we have not set up a blocking position in the southeast direction of two kilometers ahead, and the fishing boats that go back and forth are full of enemy troops who are desperately rowing to the west bank, and if we don't go, we are all dumplings made by the enemy from south to north, unless we can jump down the Qujiang River along the mouth of the Lingshan River and swim across the other bank, otherwise there is only a dead end, but in such a cold weather, what is the difference between going into the water and committing suicide? There's no way out, get out of here! ”

"I also want to retreat, but if I can't block the pursuit of the enemy on the other side of the bridge, those of us who can still move will run away, and the more than 500 injured brothers behind us can only wait to be slaughtered!" Li Yannian explained bitterly.

An Yi glanced back at the piles of wounded soldiers a hundred meters away, gritted his teeth and said loudly to Gu Changfeng, who came behind him: "Tiger head, do you see the ancient tree at the head of the bridge that has been blown away without a leaf...... The one on the shore that is hugged by at least five people, the trunk is tilted towards the bridge deck, and the middle of the trunk above the root is empty, try to put a few explosives in it, as long as it is successfully detonated, it is very likely to fall sideways on the bridge deck, how can it also block the enemy's pursuit speed. ”

"Got it!" Gu Lao Er turned around and left.

"Come back...... Take all your men with you, turn around the dilapidated houses in front of you, and then pounce on the abandoned positions on the shore, and you must suppress the enemy fire on the opposite bank with all the machine-gun fire, go ahead. ”

An Yi said, witnessed Gu Changfeng leaving, and said a few words to Li Yannian beside him, and then turned to Li Fuqiang, who was half-kneeling behind him and had been calmly observing with a telescope: "Lao Li, we have to go together to help the tiger head and kill the machine gunners on the other side as much as possible, I have to follow you." ”

"Let's go."

Li Fuqiang put away the binoculars, untied the rifle on his back, pulled the bolt to load, and quickly jumped off the high platform.

An Yi bent down with a rifle to follow, and the two rushed out of the courtyard one after the other, turning into the alley with thick smoke and flames in the west, and a few detours immediately disappeared, seeing Li Yannian and three subordinates on the high platform with a sad face.

Li Yannian turned over and sat up and ordered loudly: "All of them are there, immediately escort the wounded to the west, walk along the broken walls and alleys in the north as much as possible, and withdraw quickly!" ”

"Yes—"

After Li Yannian gave the order, he leaned on the low broken wall again, raised his binoculars and nervously observed the Wenchang bridgehead, and did not respond to the urging of the guards and adjutants behind him.

Under the ruins more than 100 meters away from the river to the west of Wenchang Bridge, Gu Laoer, who was sneaking in place, and more than 100 brothers were clinging to the ground, and the above of his head was full of bullet whistling...... Ready-to-fight! ”

The rumbling explosion sounded in the sky, and the thick smoke shrouded the space tens of meters wide in front of him, Gu Lao Er jumped up with a loud shout, and led the brothers to rush forward more than 30 meters to the back of a 50-meter-long bunker temporarily constructed by the four regiments, Gu Lao Er's voice sounded like a tiger's throat again: "Pile up all the corpses, put all the machine guns on it, and you must suppress the fire on the opposite bank!" ”

More than 100 brothers laid down their weapons, picked up the corpses that were readily available around them, piled them up on the bunkers in front of them, and did not care about the sins of the dead brothers, set up light machine guns and flower machine guns and aimed them at the enemy's fire on the west bank.

This sudden and fierce blow worked instantly, and the enemy launched a fierce charge and moved forward to the six machine-gun fire points about 300 meters on the opposite bank, and suddenly fell silent. Picking up the explosives bag and yelling, he led the two brothers to rush frantically towards the big tree seventy meters to the northeast.

The enemy on the other side reacted, thinking that Gu Lao Er and the three were trying to blow up the stone bridge to cut off the main road, and they shot a rain of bullets at the three people who rushed to the bridge, and for a while they didn't care to greet more than 100 brothers of the guard company directly opposite, and the pressure of the guard company brothers suddenly decreased, and they immediately changed the barrel of their guns and launched fierce fire again.

"Smack-"

"Seventh, next target, eleven o'clock direction, ruler three, wind two."

An Yi lay in the pile of dead people and used a telescope to observe nervously and report the number loudly, Li Fuqiang, who was crawling behind a layer of corpses three meters away, pulled the trigger with him, and the head of the colonel, who was brandishing a saber and shouting next to the enemy's heavy machine gun, spewed out a scarlet blood mist, and planted his head on the back of the machine gunner, pressing the head of the gun high, and shooting wildly into the sky with "sudden bursts".

"Ten and a half direction, ruler four, wind two."

"Smack-"

The heavy machine gunner, who had just finished changing the cartridge belt, fell in response, and the distance of 370 meters was too simple for Li Fuqiang. After firing five bullets, the two of them rolled backwards at the same time, rolled into the dirty drainage ditch on the side of the road, bent over and scurried, shifted their positions, moved more than 30 meters and then stopped again, and squeezed between two stone piers of 1.5 meters wide to load the guns and pick the enemy commander and machine gunners to attack.

"Dada-da-"

The last brother who followed behind Gu Lao Er stumbled, fell to the ground and did not move again, and the explosive bag in his hand flew four meters away from the left front.

Gu Lao Er, who was lying down urgently, was panting against the ground, not moving, and after a burst of mortar shells exploded around, he jumped up quickly, rushed to the dynamite bag thrown by the dead brother in two steps, leaned over and picked it up, and rushed to the root of the big tree at high speed with three explosive bags tied to support sticks, and jumped with both legs, accurately drilling into the middle of the hollow tree trunk, and immediately attracted a dense rain of bullets, and the sturdy old bark was splashed by pieces of machine gun bullets, making a "tuk-tuk" sound like fried beans.

After a burst of blows, there was no movement, the enemy quickly transferred firepower, beckoning the guard company position in front, Gu Lao Er took advantage of this rare opportunity, stuffed three explosive bags into the tree hole above his head, pulled out the dagger and pierced the last support rod and fixed it firmly on the inner wall of the tree hole.

Gu Lao Er stopped for a little breath, and after hearing the sound of gunshots, he decisively pulled the fuse, watched for three seconds, and then flew out of the tree hole, and after a few ups and downs had fled to the broken wall more than 30 meters away to the west, he rushed straight to the west without looking back.

"Boom-"

An earth-shattering loud bang overshadowed all the gunfire on the battlefield, and the 40-meter-high tree that had been blown up half of the trunk shook violently, and the cracking sound of "quack---ka-" pierced the eardrums, and the bare canopy of dozens of meters was thrown to the northwest, crumbling, and finally under the strong blowing of the wind, it was suddenly thrown to the southeast by the force of the rebound.

The broken trunk can no longer bear the weight and habitual surname of the crown trunk of twenty or thirty tons above, the "pop" burst suddenly broken, and fell down in the west section of the Wenchang Bridge, smashing the stone fence on the side of the bridge inch by inch, flying everywhere, shaking the earth violently twice, the giant tree bounced high with surging momentum, and fell again, and finally completely blocked the bridge deck of more than 20 meters connecting the embankment in the west section of the Wenchang Bridge.

The enemy on the other side watched in horror at the spectacle of the giant trees toppling dozens of meters above the hustle and bustle, and it was only after all the past that they finally understood that the only bridge on the way forward had been blocked, and looked up at the west bank, where the revolutionary army was frantically withdrawing and fleeing in confusion.

The dark curtain fell, the heavy snow came again, the fierce exchange of fire in front of the Hutaling position finally stopped, and the two sides who had been fighting fiercely for a day were all exhausted and unable to fight again.

Meng Zhaoyue, the commander of the Zhejiang army, who rushed to the battlefield, had already arrived at the front-line headquarters set up in Youbu Town, and after listening to the report, he looked up at the heavy snow falling in the sky, and had to order the attack to be stopped, and the whole army withdrew to the original position in the west of Longyou City.

"Which of you told me, why did such a good victory turn into an endgame with half the effort and the loss of troops?"

Meng Zhaoyue, who was sturdy and had three long literati beards, half-closed a pair of deep Danfeng eyes, leaned on the tall handsome chair and coldly glanced at the generals in the hall.

There was silence in the hall, and Wu Ming, the commander of the Guards Brigade under Meng Zhaoyue, stepped forward and clenched his fists and stated: "Zhao Shuai, my subordinates think that all the departments have done their best, but I didn't expect the revolutionary army to react so quickly and block so well. The unit of the model battalion's banner is very strong and strange, the unit is called a battalion, but in fact it has the light and heavy firepower of a reinforced regiment, the number of officers and men is no longer less than 700, and it is accompanied by more than 12 mortars to bombard our machine gun positions indiscriminately, the unit is flexible in tactics, full of tenacity, and constantly builds positions in every exchange of fire, and seems to never tire of it, which is terrifying.

At noon, his subordinate Zeng personally led the officers and men of the two regiments to launch a decisive charge, and several times they rushed to the position of the unit, but they were repelled by their suicide-like grenades; what is even more surprising is that the officers and men of the unit have extremely accurate marksmanship, and they have specially selected the commander of our unit to shoot, and the subordinate generals and colonels have gone through this battle, and the various units have suffered heavy losses in the afternoon, more than half of the three main regiments have been killed and wounded, and the commanders of the 17 regiments have all died in battle, and there is no way to organize an effective attack.

This is the first tough battle encountered by his subordinates since joining the army, although they are full of anger and anger, but they are helpless. ”

Yang Shijun and Situ Wei even speculated that the unit to which the model battalion belonged might not be just a reading regiment, but probably the same as other departments of the rapidly expanding revolutionary army, a full-strength main division, otherwise it would never have had such powerful firepower and such well-trained officers and men.

"Model battalion? Ah, I remember, a while ago, the Kuomintang newspapers blew this unit into the sky, and all major newspapers and periodicals across the country reprinted it, saying that he was a meritorious unit in the Battle of Fengxin and the Battle of Nanchang, and that he was a strong force in the Northern Expedition that invented the new law of joint training of infantry workers...... It seems that Lao Chiang's revolutionary army is talented. ”

Meng Zhaoyue did not reprimand his subordinates for this, but nodded generously and summarized the battle:

"The battle from Youbu to Longyou is the best battle that our army has fought so far, although the remnants of the opponent finally broke through, but basically achieved the purpose expected before the war, our army resisted step by step, and retreated step by step, and several small cities in exchange for the revolutionary army lost nearly 10,000 and returned with the results of the feathers, which won at least 20 precious days for our army's strategic adjustment, which is very worthy of ......."

(To be continued)