The railway line, which was full of artillery fire just now, has suddenly become silent, so that both sides of the battle can't help but have an illusion: Is there really a fierce battle here?! Only the thick smell of * that permeates the night sky reminds people that this is the battlefield.

The men of the special service company of the 391st Regiment of the Central Army stared at the railway line opposite with wide eyes, and Deng Shoushan, the deputy company commander, whispered from time to time while inspecting, reminding these subordinates holding Bergman*: Once they find someone coming from the opposite side, they don't need to ask for instructions and open fire directly. Now, he led a platoon of more than 30 people in the special service company, but he was guarding the wide main position left by the main force of a regiment.

"Company Vice, when will the Eighth Route Army come over to change guards?" A squad leader asked Deng Shoushan, who walked behind him: "Let's wait here stupidly, but don't let the Japanese touch the Eighth Route Army without waiting!" ” ？

The deputy company commander of the spy company glared: "What are you talking about!" We are carrying out the orders of the regimental seat, whether the Eighth Route Army will come or not is their own business, if they really do not come, we must hold on here until the main force of the regiment retreats safely! ”

Several soldiers of the nearby spy company heard the conversation between their squad leader and the company deputy clearly, and they couldn't help muttering in their hearts: Is this Eighth Route Army coming or not?

The suspense was unfolded at this moment - a soldier came running from the far left of the main position and reported to Deng Shoushan: The 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade of the Eighth Route Army had just sent a liaison officer to discuss with our department to change the guard.

Deng Shoushan secretly said "hey" in his heart, and couldn't help but begin to admire the wise decision of the group lord. Unexpectedly, the Eighth Route Army was true and trustworthy, and was willing to serve the Central Army.

"Please!"

The deputy commander of the spy company subconsciously straightened his belt, and at the same time inserted the Mauser* back into the gun magazine, which had been holding it in his hand with the nose wide open. This was the first time he had officially dealt with the Eighth Route Army, and he was also very curious about what the 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade was doing when the front of the railway line was in a pot of porridge just now!

On this night, more than 200 officers and men of the 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade listened to the earth-shattering gunfire from the direction of Lingshi County, and their eyes kept their eyes on the unusually quiet railway line in the south.

Unusually quiet – the occasional moonlight that emerges from the clouds briefly illuminates the icy Dongpu Road tracks, creating a more and more deserted and quiet atmosphere. This atmosphere is too incompatible with the blazing war that broke out in the north.

The blocking position of the 5th Company was temporarily erected with the help of wood and stone transported by a convoy of horses, and it was diagonally opposite the Tongpu Railway across the road of Tongpu Road. Closest to the side of the road were infantry positions, followed by Maxim heavy machine gun positions and mortar artillery positions.

Li Tianlin's 5th Company is now the strongest main company in the 2nd Battalion of the entire Xu Brigade, and the whole company still maintains the huge formation of six infantry platoons when it crossed the Yellow River from Shaanxi - at that time, the Red Army had just accepted the reorganization of the Nationalist Government into the Eighth Route Army, and the whole army was only given the number of three divisions, resulting in a large excess of the number of soldiers in each division from brigade to regiment and from battalion to company - the company now has a Makqin heavy machine gun, three Czech light machine guns, and a grenadier canister; Nearly sixty percent of the infantry's individual weapons were Type 38 rifles captured from the Japanese, and the rest were Qing Yishui Zhongcheng, with one or two hundred rounds of ammunition each, or nearly six per capita. In order to cooperate with tonight's Tongpu railway blocking operation, Wu Zijian also personally led an artillery platoon directly under the battalion headquarters to join in.

Li Tianlin, the ambitious commander of the 5th Company, is indeed ready to show his skills tonight. In the interdiction operation plan jointly formulated by him and the deputy battalion commander, no matter whether the Japanese troops who came to the rescue from the south took the road or the railway, they would suffer the first round of attacks from the three mortars of the artillery platoon, and the shelling would cause stagnation or even paralysis of the Japanese train or automobile fleet; Immediately, the Maxim heavy machine gun and the Czech light machine gun were to fire heavily at the Japanese infantry who jumped out of the car; After forming a confrontation with the Japanese reinforcements, the infantry then chose whether to block the position or charge the Japanese reinforcements.

In short, according to the results of the agreement between Wu Zijian, deputy commander of the second battalion, and Qin Zhongxiao, a colonel of the Central Army, the blocking position of the 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade will not let go of the Japanese reinforcements and advance to Lingshi County.

And, of course, a cavalry company. In addition to the men and horses temporarily assigned to the various units for communication and liaison tonight, Xia Lianshan's cavalry company personally led 40 cavalry to the more southerly Tongpu railway line, which was still five or six miles away from the blocking position of the 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade, to monitor the Japanese reinforcements that might come from the direction of Han Xinling at any time, and as soon as the enemy situation was discovered, they would send people to report to Wu Zijian as soon as they discovered the enemy's situation.

Before the war, on the issue of the use of cavalry companies, Xia Lianshan once had different views with Wu Zijian and Li Tianlin. The commander of the cavalry company advocated that once Japanese reinforcements were found, the company could immediately carry out an attack while sending a signal corps to report the news, just as it had done when it had recently attacked a fleet of trucks on the banks of the Qinglong River that had come to sweep the Japanese army. However, Li Tianlin immediately objected, believing that the cavalry opened fire too early, which would make the Japanese troops who came to the rescue vigilant, and when they entered the ambush position, the effect of the 5th Company's attack at that time would be weakened. The two company commanders were at loggerheads.

Of course, Wu Zijian understood the intentions of the cavalry company commanders under his command, and they were obviously unwilling to just run around on horseback as communication soldiers to deliver messages, and the cavalry company was a combat unit, not a communications unit! But Li Tianlin's analysis is also very reasonable, after all, the blocking position set up by the 5th Company and the artillery platoon is the main battlefield for intercepting the Japanese army's southern reinforcements, and this main battlefield should be allowed to exert the greatest striking effect at the very beginning of the outbreak of the battle.

After weighing it, the deputy commander of the 2nd Battalion finally agreed with the 5th Company Commander's opinion, but at the same time left the cavalry company with a combat mission, that is, once the main position of the 5th Company had been opened, the cavalry company could launch an attack from the rear of the Japanese reinforcement team; The premise is that the attack must be carried out on foot, and the horses must remain in a sheltered place away from the railway line. When the 2nd Battalion crossed the Zhengtai Road railway line in the past, Wu Zijian had witnessed the Japanese train passing on the tracks, and heavy machine guns were erected in the wagons, and the muzzles of the guns were pointed at both sides of the railway, apparently to prevent attacks from the roadside.

"Lianshan, you have to be clear, there is nothing more powerful than a heavy machine gun that strafes on both sides on a high wagon! If the cavalry approaches on horseback, they will be thrown down on the wasteland like wheat being cut, so you must attack on foot, otherwise you will honestly stand to the side and watch how Li Tianlin and the others clean up the Japanese! Wu Zijian was afraid that the cavalry company commander would be able to kill him after arriving at the battlefield, so he confessed to him bitterly for a long time, and did not give up until Xia Lianshan was full of promises.

However, tonight, the railway line blocking battle that a deputy battalion commander and two company commanders of the Eighth Route Army longed for and planned for did not happen in the end. Compared with the scene of guns roaring in the direction of Lingshi County in the north, the direction of Han Xinling in the south is maddeningly quiet. Wu Zijian, who was so lonely that he couldn't bear to wait, sent the cavalry messengers around him to Xia Lianshan to find out the news from the place where they had set up an ambush, but in the end he got nothing.

Later, unable to withstand Li Tianlin's hard work, Wu Zijian broke the routine and sent a signal corpsman to the position of the Central Army on his right, inquired about the battle situation and tentatively asked for troops to help in the battle, but he was hit by the colonel of the Central Army.

"Cow what cow! Have the ability to take down the Japanese in a sparse way! What kind of tantrum at Lao Tzu? After learning of Qin Zhongxiao's attitude, the commander of the 5th Company of the Eighth Route Army shouted indignantly in the direction of the main battlefield where the war was raging. In his opinion, the 391st Regiment dispatched two main battalions, an artillery company, and a special service company with a total of 7,800 people, four cannons, plus grenadiers, and light and heavy machine guns.

Wu Zijian on the side did not say anything, he still quite agreed with the combat effectiveness of the 391 regiment, and after strengthening a batch of heavy equipment, Qin Zhongxiao's team should be stronger than before. But tonight, they did not complete the siege of the city as quickly as they had in the joint operation plan. Listening to the incessant exchange of fire, the deputy battalion commander of the Eighth Route Army could almost conclude that the colonel of the Central Army had encountered difficulties beyond what had been anticipated in the battle plan.

If you can't win, quit. As time passed, such a thought appeared in Wu Zijian's heart, he didn't want Qin Zhongxiao, who had been unable to attack for a long time, to be hot-headed and lose his mind. In the final analysis, this was a railway and highway raid with surprise attacks as the main feature, and it was enough to be satisfied with the purpose of demolishing the railway lines and destroying their communication lines to cooperate with the front-line operations of the Jinnan Wei Lihuang Division. As for the siege and reinforcements, it should belong to the second goal, and if it can be fought, it should be fought, otherwise it should never be in love.

As if in order to aggravate Wu Zijian's worries, the 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade, which had been waiting for the barrage position until his hair was almost gray, had not been able to wait for the Japanese reinforcements, but suddenly waited for the communication cavalry to come from Guanmen Mountain, and informed the 7th Company led by Wei Xin of the emergency situation of discovering the Japanese reinforcements in the direction of Fengdian and exchanging fire with them, and had already notified the Central Army at the same time.

For a while, Wu Zijian and Li Tianlin both realized the imminent danger. They all felt that this battle could not be fought any further. Sure enough, it didn't take long for the retreat order on the position of the Central Army to arrive: the Japanese reinforcements continued to increase, and the 391st Regiment, which was the main attacker, was about to implement a general retreat.

However, the 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade could not be withdrawn, and according to the joint operation plan, the 5th Company would be transferred to the frontal position of the 391st Regiment to cover the safe withdrawal of the regiment.

"His grandmother's! It's all in vain after being busy for half a night," Li Tianlin looked at the blocking fortifications under his feet, and scolded in distress: "I used so many people and carts, and I didn't fire a single shot in the position I set up, so I just raised my butt and left!" ”

"Company commander, we not only have to lift our butts, but we also have to wipe our butts for the Central Army! Cover them after the break. ”

The soldiers around Li Tianlin also spoke cool words and vented. Until this moment, the commanders and fighters of the 5th Company still did not realize how tragic the next battle would be!