At sunrise and sunset, when the Seventh Division arrived at Hangzhou City, it was already the early morning of the next day, six hours later than the scheduled time, and the whole Hangzhou City was empty, with withered yellow leaves swirling in the cold wind, slowly falling, and all kinds of discarded books and newspapers and other sundries were spread all over the streets and alleys.

There were no lights, no roosters barking, no hustle and bustle, and the whole city was as calm as a pool of stagnant water.

"Baga, it's too late, the people of China have already escaped to Yu Jingjing This is the shame of the Imperial Japanese Army" After receiving a report from the troops below that several streets were empty, Kazuichiro Sonobe was so angry that he stomped his feet and scolded loudly.

Chief of Staff Fujimoto breathed a long sigh of relief, he was most worried that the new Second Division would take the initiative to meet the Seventh Division in Hangzhou, and with the combat effectiveness shown by the Chinese army when it was attacked last night, and then looking at the current state of the Seventh Division's fatigue, I am afraid that a major defeat will be inevitable.

Even if the most successful second division was successfully dragged and annihilated, what was the point of the failed seventh division?

Just as he was about to give the order to continue the pursuit, Sonobe and Ichiro saw the staff officers and guards around him, their eyes were bloodshot, their faces were full of tiredness, and they kept yawning, and Sonobe's heart sank. Remembering the huge losses suffered on the march last night, the garden finally lowered its head high.

Hearing the order from the commanders at all levels to rest in Hangzhou City for one night, the Seventh Division was relieved at the same time, but no one cheered, exhausted they casually circled the territory in the city, found their favorite target and broke in, unlucky to put together tables and chairs, lucky enough to have beds and bedding, lay down and fell asleep.

Kazuichiro Sonobe arranged for the field hospital to belong to the division to be admitted to the compound of the Zhejiang Provincial Government, and assigned a brigade as a garrison to occupy Hangzhou and protect the wounded soldiers.

At this time, the guards had chosen the Chenglu villa located by the West Lake as the headquarters of the division, and after determining that all dangers were eliminated, the arrogant Yuan Department and Ichiro rode into Chenglu, but at this time he had no interest in showing off, and hurriedly lived in the room that was said to be the bedroom of Chiang Kai-shek and Song Meiling.

In order to avoid the Japanese army from retaliating against the citizens of Hangzhou, and at the same time protect the ancient buildings of Hangzhou, Wu Ming did not arrange a sabotage battle in the urban area of Hangzhou, and the night was unexpectedly quiet.

The night passed quickly, the sky and the earth gradually became brighter, the morning fog cast a light veil on the city of Hangzhou, and with the whistle sounding to get up, the devil soldiers scattered all over the city of Hangzhou opened their eyes, and soon their eyes returned to clarity - four or five hours of sleep made the Seventh Division rejuvenate from top to bottom.

Sonobe and Ichiro rushed out of Chenglu neatly dressed, came to the outside of the courtyard, and shouted at the staff officers who surrounded them: "Quick, gather the team, and prepare to hurry"

Hearing this unreasonable order from the garden department, Chief of Staff Fujimoto had a sad face and persuaded in a low voice: "General, the fog is heavy in the morning, I think we should wait for the fog to clear before we go on the road."

"What?"

Sonobe Kazuichiro's eyes widened, and he snorted angrily: "The new second division of Shina has gone a long way, if we don't catch up, I'm afraid we won't be able to catch up again." Order, except for the remaining troops, the rest of the troops to be ready within half an hour, and then hit the road, and must catch up with them as soon as possible"

"This ...... General, our 7th Division is already the fastest among the units participating in the encirclement and annihilation of the new 2nd Division, and now the 18th Division has just arrived in Yuhang, and there is still almost half a day's journey from Hangzhou City, and the 7th Brigade is busy consolidating the harvest on the south bank of the Qiantang River, clearing the remnants of the Chinese army in Xiaoshan County and the surrounding areas, and it is estimated that it will not choose to go north until Fuyang is captured...... We really can't go it alone."

Chief of Staff Fujimoto persuaded with great difficulty.

Sonobe Kazuichiro's eyes shot out of a gleam, and his face was gloomy: "Fujimoto-kun, you have to disobey military orders."

The Japanese army is subordinate to the German military system, and the chief of staff has a great say in commanding operations, but in the face of strong military commanders such as Okamura Ninji, Sonobe and Ichiro, the chief of staff can only work as a staff officer.

"Hay—"

Seeing the garden's hair, Fujimoto Osa couldn't hard-top, so he had to salute the garden, and replied loudly: "Fujimoto must obey the orders of the division commander"

Kazuichiro Sonobe breathed a sigh of relief.

If Fujimoto Yoshio were an ordinary person, Sonobe Kazuichiro would definitely suppress him to death, just like Okamura Ninji treated his chief of staff, but the Fujimoto in front of him is not a good type, he has a deep background in the military department, and he has a very good personal relationship with the commander of the Kwantung Army, General Ueda Kenkichi, if there is a stalemate, Sonobe can certainly drive him out of the Seventh Division, but it will also cast a shadow on his future promotion.

Chief of Staff Fujimoto passed down the order, and under the supervision of officers at all levels, the Japanese soldiers who had just woken up hurriedly finished their personal hygiene, and then took a sip of cold water into food, and when they were satisfied, they followed the instructions of the junior officers and non-commissioned officers to assemble, and then stepped on the morning dew, broke through the thick fog, and embarked on the road of pursuit again.

At half past eleven o'clock in the afternoon, the morning fog completely dissipated, and when the 7th Division, which had been forcibly marching all the way, chased it to the foot of Beauty Mountain, it could no longer walk.

Although Kazuichiro Sonobe was full of displeasure, under the repeated requests of the brigade commander and wing commander below, he had to announce that the whole division would rest for half an hour.

The Japanese soldiers sat on the ground, took out the grain in their pockets, and filled the kettle with water in the ancient well of Hangzhou, and quickly filled their stomachs.

I have to admit that the Oriental nations are all extremely patient nations, and this is the case for the Chinese nation, and the same is true for the Japanese Yamato nation, which is completely a contest of will and perseverance.

Time passed, and the Japanese army hit the road again.

In terms of the speed of the march, the Japanese army, which did not have any baggage, was much faster than the new 2nd Division, but no one expected that an hour later, with a violent explosion suddenly heard at the front of the ranks, the marching ranks stopped again.

Sonobe and Ichiro were a little anxious, and with their own guards, they whipped the car captain and rushed forward.

Coming to the front of the team, the garden department asked loudly at the captain of the 27th wing, Hirata Kinichi Nakasa, "What's the matter?" Why stop for what? ”

Captain Hirata ran down breathlessly, and after saluting, he pointed to several broken trucks in the middle of the highway bridge across the Hejia River in front of him, and said loudly:

"General, the Chinese army is so despicable, they put those trucks in the middle of the road bridge and blocked the marching procession"

"Baga"

Kazuichiro Sonobe turned over and dismounted, extremely angry in his heart.

Since Deqing went south to force Hangzhou, it was attacked and harassed by the new second division one after another, and the losses of the troops were very large.

But if you look around, there is only this bridge to walk.

After the founding of the Republic of China, there were endless wars for a long time, and the warlords on one side of the separatist side wantonly plundered the people and expanded their armies and fought for territory, where did they have the time and energy to build roads. The current Hangyu Automobile Road is still built on the basis of the provincial highway of the Qing Dynasty after Chiang Kai-shek took power, and only this road leads to Yuhang and Lin'an from Hangzhou.

At this time, it is the middle of winter, the Hejia River is gentle, and the infantry should be able to swim easily, but there is a lot of silt on the riverbed, and the weather is cold, people wearing wet clothes are easy to catch a cold and fever, and the combat effectiveness cannot be guaranteed.

Kazuichiro Sonobe snorted coldly, looked at Captain Hirata angrily, and asked loudly: "Since there is a truck in the way, you should assign people to push it into the river, what are you doing here?" ”

Hirata Nakasa was extremely embarrassed, pointed to the more than forty devil soldiers who had fallen in front of the truck, and said aggrievedly: "General Sonobe, the Shina people have planted mines on the bridgehead and bridge, and all the soldiers who went to the cart have been blown up After sacrificing the officers and soldiers of the three detachments in succession, the others are not willing to make unnecessary sacrifices, and we are waiting for the arrival of the sappers." ”

The sappers of the New Second Division laid a thick layer of earth on the stone bridge, and the dirt was blown up in several places, revealing the original face of the stone bridge.

Looking at all this in front of him, Kazuichiro Sonobe bared his teeth, his face was hideous, and he was almost crazy with anger. These mechanisms set up by his opponent made the fire in his heart burn more and more.

"Don't hurry up and let the sappers clear the mines," Lieutenant General Sonobe roared.

The captain of the Hirata co-owner said timidly: "I have already sent someone to urge"

Kazuichiro Sonobe picked up the binoculars and looked carefully, as a tributary of Xixi, the Hejia River, originates from the North Peak and Zhoujia Mountain in the south, and the riverbed is about 30 meters wide, and now the water surface is less than 10 meters in the dry season. Building a pontoon bridge in a small river full of silt requires sappers to consume materials that are already very tight, and it takes a lot of time, so it is not as easy and quick as clearing the trucks stuck on the bridge.

The 7th Engineer Wing soon sent a squadron to arrive, and they took out special detection instruments and walked towards the bridgehead to carefully inspect the bridge deck in front of the trucks.

After about a quarter of an hour, the sappers came with the news that people couldn't laugh or cry - the mines had long been detonated by the Japanese army's bodies, and there was no need for sappers at all.

When the captain of the Hirata United heard this, he blushed with shame.

However, the relatively more professional sappers began to carry out the wrecker clearance operation, but as soon as they pushed the truck, they heard the sound of the "boom" explosion, with the truck as the center, the fireball burst into the sky, the huge smoke formed a huge mushroom cloud, the broken stone and steel fragments shot out in all directions, the earth trembled violently, and the explosion blew everything to pieces.

A squadron of sappers was all reimbursed to minced meat, and more than 100 Japanese soldiers on the side of the bridge were also affected, either killed or wounded, and at the same time, the stone bridge almost disappeared out of thin air, and all five trucks were broken into parts.

"Eight Grid Tooth Road"

Kazuichiro Sonobe was almost going crazy, and he wanted to arrest the sappers of the new 2nd Division who had set up such a sinister mechanism. As a result, the 7th Engineer Regiment had to urgently send materials for building the bridge from the rear, and it took more than three hours to erect a pontoon bridge over the Hejia River.

The sky gradually darkened, and Kazuichiro Sonobe, who had long been stimulated by the new second division, issued an order to march overnight, but who knew that the Ludao troops had to stop for two hours before they resumed their advance, and it turned out that Xixi, which was wider than the Hejia River, blocked their way forward - the highway bridge on Xixi was blown up by the engineers of the New Second Division, and the bridge over this river was more difficult, and it was estimated that the large team would continue to move forward tomorrow morning.

Jiangnan was originally the land of fish and rice, the water network is dense, there are many streams, from Deqing County to the south, along the way to build bridges consumed a large number of materials of the Seventh Division Engineer Wing, until now it is difficult to continue, have to find materials on the spot, so the bridge building time is getting longer and longer.

Sonobe and Ichiro had no choice but to order the Hirata Wing to be lightly armed and obedient, seize the time to cross the river on a raft, and bite the tail of the new 2nd Division, while the rest of the troops went south to station in the town of Liu, rested for the night, and waited for the sappers to build a bridge before hitting the road.