When night falls, the whole of Tokyo is lit up under the deep and bright starry sky – and even though the war is over, many people are still living in the glamour.

Especially in the public concession, the colorful neon signs are so bright, and the bars and dance halls are full of local chaebol children and Europeans holding their female companions, who talk about the Ming army's arrival in the city, but they don't care about it.

At a dance hall called Robyne, a blonde woman looks sideways at the man next to her.

She asked worriedly, "Philip, there are a lot of explosions on the coast today, what should we do?" ”

The latter looked indifferent, shrugged his shoulders, and replied: "This is the concession, and the Chinese will not disturb us." ”

Since the Ming officials only said that they would take over the areas of influence of the great powers in Japan and would not revoke the concessions, then the war had nothing to do with them.

The Tokyo Public Concession has its own power plant, waterworks, hospitals, and various types of warehouses, and is self-sufficient for a month.

"Hey, hasn't the wine been mixed yet? Why are you so slow? ”

"Alright, ma'am, I'm sorry to keep you waiting."

The bartender at the front desk had mixed two glasses of whiskey and liqueur, and a skinny Japanese girl in a waitress uniform walked over with a plate and served the pair a drink.

Philip reached for two glasses, then looked at the waiter and asked, "What's your name?" How old is it? ”

The latter lowered his head and whispered back: "Komatsu Jasmine, there will be seventeen in a week." ”

"Still in school?"

"I didn't go to school after graduating from Santa Maria Maggiore's primary school......"

Philip was already surprised by this, and he used his index and middle fingers to pull a pound bill from the pocket of his suit jacket and handed it to her.

Today, the US dollar is not a global currency, and the pound and gold are hard currencies, but in the Asia-Pacific region, the banknotes of the Ming Dynasty can also be used. A pound could be worth four dollars or sixteen yuan, which was an unheard of tip for a low-status ballroom waiter.

Komatsu Jasmine opened her mouth slightly in surprise, but her eyes still showed hesitation, "Sir, this is too much......"

"I'm in a good mood today." Philip casually said, "Take it." ”

Emily, the female companion on the side, took out a lighter and lit a thin lady's cigarette, reminding, "Hide it, be careful of being snatched." ”

Philip was a pretentious man from a privileged family, and his father's machine shop in Seattle was revived, after surviving the dark economic crisis. Dissatisfied with his strict father, Philip chose to cross the ocean to Hangzhou in the Ming Dynasty to do business, but failed.

But he didn't want to return to Seattle in disgrace, so he sold his remaining assets, came to Tokyo with the rest of the money, and did the work of reselling materials with ingenuity.

The garrisons of the major powers in the concession were corrupt and sloppy because of the lack of supervision - the Russian garrisons were always drunk, and in order to pay for the alcohol, the officers took the lead in selling military supplies; The British, French, and American garrisons often took the girl to hang out and play, and the soldiers couldn't make ends meet, so they took all kinds of supplies in the barracks out to exchange money; The Ming garrison was also very different.

Doing serious business ended in a fiasco, but doing gray work is like a fish in water, it can be said that Philip is also a strange talent.

As for Emily, his girlfriend, whom he had recently been close to, was a Junker nobleman who had fled the country eighteen years ago, and had a fief in Batelar in northern Germany, but because he was adamantly opposed to that and feared that he would be settled by the Queen, he fled his family through Belgium, crossed the ocean, and finally settled in Tokyo.

However, Emily's father died of illness not long after, and her mother spent money like water because of the nature of the aristocratic lady, and after the family wealth was squandered, she was not willing to give up the extravagant life, and the salary of a violin teacher was too low, so she put down her position and sold herself as a prostitute. With such a family situation, Emily's growth can be imagined.

"Bastard, how much did that guy tip you? Hand it over! ”

Emily's previous reminder was a good word, and the heart sticks hired by the dance hall (Japanese bodyguards and guards) were the ruffians around them, and they didn't have the slightest pity for the weak who bullied men and women.

Jasmine Komatsu trembled in front of a few vicious sticks, and had to cry while honestly handing over the one-pound bill.

At least in the almost semi-colonial concessions, although they are superficially civilized, they are still essentially governed by the law of the jungle, and this is not uncommon.

The concession is like a paradise isolated from the rest of the world, and the people in it are not surprised by what happens.

In fact, even the majority of Tokyoites in urban areas are insensitive, believing that resistance is pointless and even harmful.

What is the use of resistance? Anyway, it can't be beaten, but in the end, it will make the Ming people angry, so it's better to kneel down and welcome the king.

Under the soft moonlight cast by the first quarter moon, the Aziji 107 Special Service Fleet anchored in the bay could be faintly seen.

In order to avoid a surprise attack by possible torpedo boats or frogmen, the fleet strictly followed the rules and regulations to implement light control, and only a few searchlighted destroyers cruised back and forth on the perimeter.

The officers and men of the 1st Marine Regiment on the beachhead had already dug one skirmish after another, wrapped in blankets, and were napping against the pit walls.

And in the front guard position, in the sparsely scattered double foxholes, the soldiers on guard duty stared at the dark front, rifles, bullets, and grenades were placed beside them.

Several directional mines were also placed at an angle of 30 meters, each facing an angle, to achieve full coverage of 180° directly ahead, with partial overlap of the killing angles to maximize the effectiveness of the killing.

Most people inevitably become distrustful of new things, and the same is true of the soldiers, who do not set up triplines, but use electronically controlled detonators to take these directional mines into their own hands.

In the midst of fear, time seemed to pass very slowly in the night.

In the second half of the night, those who were ready to rest in their shifts were drowsy, and those who had just been woken up were dazed.

At this time, someone heard some slight movement, and following the sound, there seemed to be a dark shadow moving in the vast night, and the distance was already very close, less than fifty meters.

"Look, is there something moving?"

"Where?"

One of the sergeants, quick with his eyes, picked up a flare gun and fired a flare into the air.

Under the reflection of the bright white light, the soldiers in the alert position subconsciously stretched out their hands to cover the light, but their eyes widened in the next second.

I saw more than 100 figures with guns scattered in the field, divided into six or seven shares, each with a dozen people.

"Enemy Attack !!"

I don't know if the first shot was fired by our own side or the enemy, and in an instant, the dense gunfire tore apart the quiet night.

"To withdraw or not to withdraw?!" Someone asked aloud to the second lieutenant in the foxhole next door.

The latter waved his hand and replied, "Not for the time being!" ”

Several flares fired from 80mm mortars from the beachhead illuminated the area, and visibility was no less than a clear day.

Someone pressed down the lever of the detonator, and several explosion points instantly appeared in front of the guard position, and the roar of the violent explosion spread throughout the entire landing area.

Thousands of short steel rods and steel balls swept across the front of the guard position, and the massive amount of prefabricated fragments that were shot out set off a bloody storm among the night raiding resistance, and the terrible screams became the afterglow of the explosion.

Caught off guard, the two squads involved in the night attack were killed or wounded at the beginning.

But their 81mm mortars began to bombard the positions of the Ming army, and the Jin Gui's 75mm mountain guns were also put into use, and shells constantly fell on the beachhead.

From the view of the battleship anchored on the sea, such a scene can definitely leave a deep memory—the sea and the sky are all black, only the reflection of the moon, and the distant land is flickering with small points of light, which are muzzle flames, and larger clusters of light are the flames of cannonball explosions.

The tracer bullets fired from the machine gun were like red-hot knives scorched by flames, cutting through the black curtain that enveloped the heavens and the earth; And the large flares fired by the destroyer's 128mm naval guns were as bright as a small sun, as if they had directly lifted off the entire black curtain.

Neither side went any further, and the exchange continued until dawn.

Dozens of Resistance corpses were scattered in a radius of several hundred metres in front of the pickup positions, the most horrific of which were killed by a large number of prefabricated fragments of directional mines.

"Report, 17 people were slightly injured, 8 were seriously injured, 4 were killed, and one was killed." A staff officer clenched his fists and reported.

Zhou Changfeng was squatting next to a bonfire pit, with two branches horizontally and a few canned braised pork and soybeans on top of it.

He reached out and touched it, but it felt quite hot, so he quickly picked it up and put it on the ground, "Change the time, act according to the original plan at seven o'clock, and let the fleet get ready." ”

Because of the precautions, last night's night attack did not cause much damage to the landing force.

All units of the 1st Marine Regiment have been disembarked, the mountain artillery team equipped with 80mm mountain guns and the mortar battalion with 112mm heavy mortars have been deployed in formation, and the field hospital has been set up.

According to the plan previously drawn up, the 3rd Battalion, in coordination with the convoy, accompanied by two platoons of engineers, carried the equipment for crossing the river, and advanced along the road towards the city of Tokyo.

Since the landing site was southeast of the Tokyo metropolitan area, the Arakawa River became a natural barrier against the Marines.

The main task of the 3rd Battalion was to break through the enemy's defensive line, build a solid bridgehead after forcibly crossing the Arakawa, and build a pontoon bridge for the follow-up troops to cross the river.

Ordered to hold off the 1st Marine Regiment was the Fujiwara detachment, which blasted several bridges over the Arakawa River, then set up a defensive line and waited for the arrival of the Ming army.

Last night's tentative night raid had no effect, and only a third of the two squads involved in the battle withdrew.

In the field headquarters behind a bridge that had been blown up, the adjutant bowed: "The search squadron reports that the advance force of the Ming army is approaching, about fifteen combat vehicles and a thousand people. ”

Fujiwara Yoshiharu Nakasa glanced at the map and said calmly: "Be prepared, unless the attack is blocked, they will not retreat, this is the best place to cross the river." ”

As the matter is, Zhou Changfeng did not want to take a long detour temporarily, so he asked for priority action on this.

The eighteen Type 35 floating combat vehicles of the amphibious convoy marched in staggered columns, followed closely by infantry and engineers.

After Arakawa came into view, the chariots were turned into horizontal formations under the order of the captain Li Bin, and lined up along the river beach to ensure that the whole team could meet the opposite bank with maximum firepower.

Fan Qijin observed with the telescope for a long time, and said: "Consistent with the conclusion of aerial reconnaissance, it is clear that there are two main lines of defense, and it is difficult to say whether there is a third one." ”

The orderly offensive began quickly, with the battalion's 80mm mortars attacking the observed enemy positions, followed by the 80mm mountain guns of the regiment's mountain artillery corps.

The "Yan" squadron that took off from the Tenichi Zuoyuan was responsible for carrying out close support, and nine Type 37 carrier-based dive bombers flew in a zigzag formation over the Arakawa and then strafed and bombed.

In addition to a few duds, more than 30 100kg aerial bombs exploded one after another, and the movement of dozens of kilograms of TNT being detonated can be described as earth-shattering.

Under the tremendous power of intensive artillery fire and air raids, most of the field fortifications that the Resistance had painstakingly built in the past two days were destroyed. The shelter that was directly hit by the aerial bomb collapsed and buried more than a dozen people alive, becoming a grave they dug for themselves.

During the preparation of the fire, which lasted about an hour, the mountain artillery team fired two and a half base shells, and the battalion mortar platoon was slightly less.

The long period of continuous fire gave the roots of the barrel a dull red, and the exhausted artillerymen took out their cigarettes and touched them, and the cigarettes were ignited.

Zhou Changfeng deliberately asked the fleet's artillery support to be placed last, and it should be separated by three minutes, so as to achieve the goal of killing and wounding the enemy as much as possible.

"Whoa—whoa—"

A red and a yellow flare burst into the sky.

The artillery fire in the sky looked spectacular at first, but after a long time it became boring, and the excited charioteers moved quickly, and eighteen amphibious tanks lined up on the bank of the river slowly drove into the river.

This situation was the beginning of a formal attack in the eyes of the enemy forces on the other side, and the surviving sentries immediately called for a large force to enter the dilapidated positions and prepare to meet the attacking Ming army.

The feint of the convoy was a great success, and the bewildered enemy troops, bombarded by the previous shelling, left their shelters.

In Tokyo Bay, the main guns of the two battleships, Showa and Yongpei, were already slightly diagonally pointed in the direction of the target.

The two main gunners were staring at their respective watches, and the requested interval of three minutes was now only a dozen seconds left.

Four, three, two, one...... It's time, fire!

The calm bay was set off by a strong storm of salvos from the battleship's main guns, and more than a dozen 844kg 400mm high-explosive shells flew out of the guns at a speed of 812m/s!

Although they were both twelve and a half inches, the twin guns of the two battleships were of the old type, slightly inferior to the new model of the Longshuo, but it was difficult to distinguish between high and low when shelling from the opposite shore.

The high-explosive bomb filled with 75kg of TNT and aluminum powder mixed explosives was terrifying, and the violent explosion seemed to overturn the entire land.

Severed limbs and broken fragments blown away by the shock wave flew all over the sky, some of which landed in the Arakawa, splashing in circles.

(End of chapter)