Bright Sword: The Flowers of War

Chapter 75 The wounded won't be able to take it.
"Fire...fire..."

All the officers on the position were shouting at the top of their lungs.

Whether it was the M1917 heavy machine gun, the BAR light machine gun, or the Garand rifle, they were all firing desperately, and countless bullets were pouring down on the Japanese troops.

Caught off guard, a large number of Japanese soldiers fell instantly.

But this time the attack was launched by the newly appointed 6th Division, a division known as one of the two pillars of the Japanese Army, which was extremely strong in both combat power and fighting spirit.

Despite the sudden attack, the soldiers reacted extremely quickly, launching a counterattack within seconds.

A young machine gunner gripped a BAR light machine gun and kept pulling the trigger. Smoke and the smell of blood billowed above the trench, and the BAR barrel was glowing red-hot.

The machine gunner's Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed the rusty-tasting saliva. His knuckles were numb from the recoil of the constant firing.

The fire net woven from the trajectories of twenty tracer rounds was reaping the lives of several tan figures crawling in front of the position.

As he prepared to reload, a Type 91 grenade launched from a grenade launcher exploded on his left flank, sending flying mud and bone fragments crashing against the breastwork.

"Damn it!"

His thumb slammed heavily on the magazine catch, the metallic clanging drowned out by the roar of the Type 92 heavy machine gun.

The blood-stained magazine remained motionless, and the blood seeping from under the fingernails stretched into a dark red thread on the release button.

In his anger, the muscles in his right cheek twitched, and he suddenly gripped the hot magazine base with his thumb and forefinger, his blackened fingernails scratching a mark on the metal surface.

After finally managing to pull out the old magazine, the moment he slid the new magazine into the slot, the distinctive whistling sound of the Type 38 rifle whistled past his ears.

The young machine gunner stumbled and leaned against a pile of broken bricks behind him. He suddenly felt an awful lightness in his right shoulder, and at the same time, a sharp pain shot through his hand.

He raised his hand, and there it was—the bar's handguard had split in two, with a splinter stuck in his palm.

He looked down again and saw two bloodstains spreading across his chest through his gas mask. The helmet that had been placed on the breastplate was now knocked over and clanging in the trench.

He fell heavily into the trench, the last thing he saw on his retina was the orange trail left by a heavy machine gun firing tracer rounds not far away, much like the fireflies on a midsummer night back home...

While firing, Lao Cao noticed that the light machine gun on his left had suddenly gone silent. He turned around and saw that his young fellow villager had fallen into a pool of blood.

"Xiao Xia... Xiao Xia..."

"I'll curse your Japanese devils' ancestors for eighteen generations!"

Old Cao felt a rush of heat to his head, and he pressed the trigger with both thumbs.

The moment the trigger was pulled, the water-cooled machine gun roared like tearing fabric.

The ammunition belt convulsed wildly as it entered the gun barrel, the brass bullets chasing and biting the Japanese soldiers' ankles, tearing three Japanese soldiers who had jumped out of the trenches to pieces in the waist.

The splattered blood, mixed with the black blood from the previous waves of corpses, splashed onto the scorched, yellowish-brown soil, forming a sticky swamp in the crater.

The muzzle flash illuminated Lao Cao's black gas mask, making him look like a demon from hell. The scalding coolant vapor made the gas mask extremely hot, but he was completely unaware of it.

As the last two bullets pinned the crawling Japanese soldier to the ground, the bolt engage sounded, the barrel glowing a dark red from the heat. He flung aside the scorching ejector, his burned hand tearing open a new ammunition belt. The crisp sound of the belt clip striking the hot feed muzzle accompanied a muffled, guttural growl emanating from his mask: "Come on! You bastard!"

At his feet, several twisted ammunition boxes trembled, and the distant roar of mortars tore through the thick smoke, while his bloodshot eyes never left the sights.

The boiling water-cooling jacket was still emitting a boiling roar, and steam mixed with the smell of blood seeped in through the gas mask filter, hitting his cracked lips and making him look particularly ferocious.

A storm of bullets raged across the battlefield, sweeping the unsuspecting Japanese soldiers to the ground.

The smoke of gunpowder, mixed with the bitter scent of mustard and almonds, rolled through the trenches, and Japanese soldiers wearing pig-snout masks fell in droves like stalks of wheat swept by a sickle.

The lens of a Japanese soldier's gas mask, shattered by a bullet to the head, suddenly shattered. He clutched his festering eye and collapsed to his knees, letting out incoherent roars. Blood and foam splattered from the exhaust valve of his gas mask, condensing into tiny coral beads in the yellowish-green toxic fumes.

Opposite him, the barrels of Chinese soldiers' guns glowed red-hot behind their bunkers, making the twisted rubber pig snouts in the sights look particularly comical.

The spent cartridges fell onto the bluestone slabs at our feet with a clanging sound.

In just a few minutes, hundreds of men from the 2nd Battalion of the 45th Infantry Regiment, which was part of the first wave of the attack, fell on the gas-filled ground.

Regimental Commander Takeshita Yoshiharu, who was directing operations from the rear, could hardly believe his eyes as he witnessed the scene before him.

In his mind, Chinese soldiers couldn't even guarantee that each of them had a gun, so how could they have such high-end items as gas masks, and their firepower was so fierce?

Watching the Japanese soldiers fall one after another, his face, hidden behind his gas mask, looked particularly grim, and his breathing was as rough as a bellows.

"Baka... What's going on? How could the Chinese have gas masks?"

"Colonel, what do we do now? Should we order the Second Battalion to withdraw?" The regimental staff officer standing to the side was clearly frightened by the scene before him, his voice trembling.

"We can't retreat! Don't forget, the division commander is still watching us! Have the first and third battalions follow." Takeshita Yoshiharu steeled his resolve and gave the order to continue the attack.

"Hai!" The staff officer nodded emphatically and immediately gave the order to continue the attack.

Inside the church, after a brief period of chaos, everyone, including the wounded, put on gas masks.

Looking at the poisonous gas that filled the surroundings, Su Yaoyang's eyes turned red, and he felt an inexplicable anger rush to his head.

How could he have imagined that the Japanese would dare to defy the world and openly release poison gas in the capital of a country?

He had indeed seen records of the Japanese army releasing poison gas everywhere when he was researching historical materials, but materials are just materials, and he did not connect this history with reality. But now, when he saw the living poison gas permeating his surroundings, he finally understood the despair and helplessness of the anti-Japanese soldiers when they faced the Japanese army's chemical weapons attacks.

These war criminals escaped prosecution after the war because they provided the research materials to the Americans.

For a moment, he felt a throbbing sensation in his forehead; without even measuring it, he could tell that his blood pressure had definitely exceeded the critical value.

At this moment, a slender figure ran over from not far away. Although she was covered by a gas mask, judging from her figure and the size of her chest, it could only be Song Mei.

Song Mei grabbed his arm and said urgently, "Su Yaoyang... Although everyone is wearing gas masks, those seriously injured people can't wear them for long. They won't be able to stand it if they wear them for too long."

Furthermore, the wounds of the injured cannot be exposed to poison gas for extended periods; if infection occurs through the wounds, the consequences would be unimaginable.

(End of this chapter)