After some discussion, Wu Zijian decided to let Wei Xin, the commander of the second battalion, take a squad of soldiers to the Black Rock Cliff to "visit" his sister. Come and not be rude, the last time the female bandit leader Liu Wumei once gave Wei Xin a ninety percent new German mirror box (the bandits' usual nickname for Mauser *), this return visit, the Eighth Route Army can not lack courtesy: from the newly captured Japanese army 38 covers, picked two new colors, tied with red satin flowers, and attached eight *, together with Wei Xin to the Black Stone Cliff cottage.

"Two poles and three eight big covers, will it be more polite?" The new commander of the 2nd Battalion stared at the colorful guns, and his heart ached - his reintegrated 2nd Battalion currently has a lot of Type 38 rifles.

"In addition, the detachment leader, you have to think of a little bit," Wei Xinmo said with two shiny guns: "The caliber of this gun is inconsistent with our domestic rifles, and we can only get bullets from the Japanese, I'm afraid the bandits don't have this ability, right?" ”

Captain Wu smiled and patted the second battalion commander on the shoulder: "I am very happy that you have a very clear mind when you think about the problem." However, this is exactly what I intended, and I only gave them forty rounds of ammunition for the two guns, and when they were gone, they became burning sticks; They will either go and steal from the Japanese again, or they will come to join our Eighth Route Army. As long as they are willing to accept the adaptation, there will be as many bullets as they want. ”

This time, it was Wei Xin's turn to smile, and he sincerely admired his detachment elder for his deep calculation.

After arranging for the commander of the second battalion to set off, Wu Zijian specially asked Li Tianlin, chief of staff, to find the three chief officers of the third battalion: battalion commander Lu Dajiang, battalion instructor and deputy battalion commander, to implement the territory of the defense area.

According to his and Li Tianlin's deployment, the entire third battalion was divided into three and was responsible for the defense of the current three base areas. Battalion commander Lu Dajiang led the 7th Company to defend Hekou Village, Deputy Battalion Commander Qi Biao led the 8th Company to defend Xiping Village, and the battalion instructor led the 9th Company to stay in Hongxingxia.

Among them, the defensive pressure of the Red Star Gorge is the smallest, and unless the bandits of the Black Stone Cliff make trouble, they will not face much danger.

The defensive pressure on Hekou Village was the greatest, as it was located in an outpost of friend and foe, and was heavily garrisoned by Japanese troops in Fengdian County and Xiaoyushu Mountain, both to the north and northwest of it.

After giving an important explanation to Lu Dajiang, the new chief of staff Li Tianlin will personally go to Hekou Village to sit in the town and guide the fortification of the 7th Company of the 3rd Battalion. Wu Zijian was very relieved about this - Li Tianlin, as the former commander of the 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade, had been guarding there all the time, and the time and place were under control.

Together with Lu Dajiang's third battalion and 7th company, there was also Wei Xin's second battalion, who would be stationed in the newly built camp in the Guanmen Mountain Pass, which relied on the topography of the mountain pass and extended to the Guanmen Mountain Mountain.

The defense of Xiping Village, which was under the command of the 8th Company, under the command of Qi Biao, deputy commander of the 3rd Battalion, was not a light burden. After all, Xiping Village is much larger than Hekou Village. Fortunately, Wu Zijian placed the headquarters of the detachment and the most elite Wang Shuanglong 1st Battalion (formed on the basis of the 5th Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Xu Brigade) in Xiping Village, and the various units directly under the detachment were also in place in the village.

In the process of implementing the defense plan for the three base areas, the only accident that occurred was that Liu Shu, the political commissar, was supposed to personally go to the Hongxing Gorge in Guanmen Mountain to take charge, but in the end it was resolutely opposed by Liu himself. The new political commissar of the detachment must not only stay in Xiping Village together with the detachment headquarters, but also set up the "Guanmenshan Area Field Mobilization Committee," which has just been put on the list, in the village, and the office will be the original village office.

Because the detachment commander had a word in advance, and political training matters were decided by Political Commissar Liu alone, and he would never interfere in any way, as soon as the other party showed the banner of "General War Mobilization Committee", Wu Zijian was speechless, and could only let Liu Shu make his own arrangements.

The garrison units and garrison units in the three defense zones were drawn out one after another, and the three companies of the third battalion were all changed and entered the defense posts, and the new detachment commander finally breathed a sigh of relief. However, at this moment, Xia Lianshan, the commander of the cavalry company, suddenly came to report a special situation to Wu Zijian.

After the joint attack with the Central Army on Tongpulu ended, this cavalry company of the Eighth Route Army was expanded on a considerable scale. The horse equipment came from the capture of this battle, and the 391st Regiment simply generously donated all the more than ten military horses collected from the battlefield to the Eighth Route Army because it had no cavalry formation. Among the recruits brought by political commissar Liu Shu from Liao County, there were many soldiers who could ride horses. In this way, Xia Lianshan received a powerful supplement from equipment to personnel, and the cavalry company was re-expanded to two platoons, each platoon of thirty horses, horses, rifles, and sabers.

Long before the joint attack of the two armies, Xia Lianshan's cavalry company was assigned a task by Wu Zijian: to cruise to a number of villages along the lower reaches of the Qinglong River, to cover and cooperate with the personnel of the "Xiping Village War General Mobilization Committee" led by Zhang Xiu to carry out propaganda work in that area and expand the army and collect food.

Among them, in the Lihuapu where the battle had taken place, the cavalry company even assisted Zhang Xiu and successfully established the "Lihuapu Village War General Mobilization Committee", with the task force of the Eighth Route Army sending someone as the director, and a squire surnamed Guo in the village who enthusiastically supported the anti-Japanese war served as the deputy director.

That is, this squire surnamed Guo reported to the Eighth Route Army task force a strange incident that had just happened, and the matter was quickly reported to the company commander Xia Lianshan, who was leading the cavalry company to cruise along the Qinglong River.

Here's the thing: The squire surnamed Guo has lived in Lihuapu for many years, and he has a relative in Gaomiao Village in the northern suburbs of Lingshi County, who is his cousin, and almost every month, Squire Guo has to go to Gaomiao Village to visit his cousin's family. Unexpectedly, when he went to Gaomiao Village again a few days ago, he was horrified to find that this small village of only about 20 families was strewn with corpses all over the place, and the houses had collapsed and collapsed, and it had become a lifeless scorched earth. Squire Guo's cousin has a family of six, five of whom died in the family, and one of them is missing.

At that time, the county maintenance committee had already sent people to investigate the scene of the tragedy, and came to the conclusion that a few days ago, the remnants of the Kuomintang army attacked Lingshi County and the Nantongpu Railway, and after the attack on the county seat failed, they burned and looted in the suburbs of the city; Gaomiao Village is north of the north gate of Lingshi County, so it was looted. According to the survivors of the only two survivors in the village, in addition to the villagers who were brutally killed, five other women are missing. Among them is the twenty-year-old daughter of the cousin of the squire surnamed Guo - the cousin and brother-in-law have a son and a daughter, the son has married a wife and has children, and the daughter will be married within the year. I don't want to suffer such a catastrophe.

As one of the leading figures of the anti-Japanese grassroots regime in Lihuapu Village, the squire surnamed Guo knew about the operation jointly launched by the Second Battalion of the Xu Brigade of the Eighth Route Army and the 391st Regiment of the Central Army. After burying his cousin's family, the squire surnamed Guo, who returned to Ewhapo, immediately told the director of the village's "General War Mobilization Committee" about the tragedy, and denounced the criminal acts of a small group of black sheep in the national army for mutilating the people. At this time, the cavalry led by Xia Lianshan patrolled here, and the people of the Eighth Route Army team reported the situation to him.

The first reaction of the cavalry company commander of the Eighth Route Army was that perhaps a small number of stragglers of the Chinese army had sacked Gaomiao Village, but he resolutely did not believe that it would be the Eighth Route Army, and he also did not believe that it would be the 391st Regiment of the Central Army: he was wounded in the last anti-night attack and was rescued by the 391st Regiment.

But after all, this matter is very important, and the impact on the local area is extremely bad, Xia Lianshan felt that it was necessary to report to the detachment leader immediately.

Wu Zijian, who received the report, was shocked, but after careful consideration, he also came to a negative conclusion. Regardless of whether the military discipline of Qin Zhongxiao's troops was strict, just looking at the fact that it was the traitorous puppet maintenance society under Japanese rule that spread this conclusion, its authenticity should be greatly reduced.

"Detachment leader, according to Squire Guo, the corpses he saw at the scene were indeed killed by bullets, and some were killed by * explosions, which should have been done by the regular army. The key is that the timing of the accident is also appropriate, that is, the night when we and the 391st Regiment attacked Lingshi County. Xia Lianshan said worriedly.

Wu Zijian replied angrily: If it was done by the regular army, it was also the regular army of the Japanese - it is clear that even if the Chinese army is a small group of routs and brave soldiers, forced to harass the people for their livelihood, there is no reason for such a vicious and heavy-handed hand. This kind of slaughter with hatred can only be done by alien invaders!

A word to wake up the dreamer. The cavalry company commander immediately felt that the detachment commander was reasonable, and his thinking was also inspired by it:

"Another point, the detachment leader, the missing women in the whole village, are very young, and it is obvious that the evil troops deliberately looted them, which is also in line with the Japanese army's usual habit of adultery."

Discussing this, Wu Zijian's heart suddenly moved, and he asked his cavalry company commander about the specific location of Gaomiao Village. Xia Lianshan scratched his head and couldn't say clearly, but according to the squire surnamed Guo, it should be not far from the north gate of Lingshi County.

When the commander of the Eighth Route Army heard this, his face began to become solemn: At the review and summary meeting after the joint operation battle, he clearly remembered that Qin Zhongxiao had said that the first battalion of the 391st Regiment, which was ambushed on the west side of the Tongpu Road railway line, was ordered to cross the railway line and withdraw to the main position in the east when the Japanese army could not be attacked for a long time. And this retreat, the first battalion of the 391st Regiment passed through the north city of Lingshi County!

Could it really be a handful of black sheep in the first battalion of the 391st Regiment, who did it by the way?!

In front of Xia Lianshan, Wu Zijian did not say this question in his heart. But he immediately sent the cavalry company commander back to Lihuapu and brought the squire surnamed Guo to the detachment headquarters of the family involved, and he wanted to meet with him for detailed inquiries. Immediately afterwards, he summarized the Gaomiao Village tragedy in a short language, wrote it on the paper used for the flying pigeon biography, and asked the colonel of the Central Army to conduct a self-examination of the participating troops. Immediately ordered the carrier pigeon soldier in the communication platoon to immediately sort out and send away!

However, according to past experience and experience, violent sexual assault of women by Japanese soldiers often occurred at the scene. However, the direct disappearance of five young women in Gaomiao Village this time does not seem to be in line with the habits of Japanese soldiers, but is somewhat similar to the behavior of bandits who raided homes and robbed houses and plundered women.

Brigand?!

Could it be the work of the Blackstone Cliff Gang?! The detachment leader immediately remembered the scene of the small leader under the female bandit leader Liu Wumei, who had kidnapped the female hygienist of the second battalion of Hongxingxia, if it weren't for the main force of the 8th Company of the second battalion at that time to desperately track and rescue, I am afraid that the female hygienist named Juanzi has been tragically ravaged by the bandits.

Could it be that this time it was Liu Wumei's subordinates who took advantage of the fire to rob and bloody Gaomiao Village near the war zone?

In any case, the Lingshi County Puppet Maintenance Association, which was raised by the Japanese, had already blamed the tragedy in Gaomiao Village on the Kuomintang and Communist armies that jointly attacked Lingshi County at night. The commander of the Eighth Route Army made up his mind that he must thoroughly investigate it!