"Is there anything else?" Zhang Yunhe asked when he saw that the combat staff had not left yet.

The combat staff hesitated for a moment before saying, "Second Regiment Commander Zhou Yaodong also reported something. Something bad happened in the new district... It was caused by the arrival of the Japanese invaders."

Zhang Yunhe guessed something after hearing this and asked, "How many civilians died?"

"Four villages in the new district were massacred. Many civilians were killed by the Japanese using various cruel methods. Babies were even thrown to death by the Japanese. Over two hundred women were raped by the Japanese... Thirty-six of them committed suicide afterward because they could not bear the humiliation..."

Having said this, the combat staff officer choked up and could not continue, crying and gritting his teeth.

Zhang Yunhe said expressionlessly, "Notify Zhou Yaodong, I need to go check out the scene. Notify the guards and prepare the car!"

"Yes, sir!"

Half an hour later, Zhang Yunhe's convoy arrived at a remote coastal village in the new district. The village was already surrounded by soldier sentries and patrols. The commander of the Second Regiment, Zhou Yaodong, and several officers from the regiment headquarters were standing at the entrance of the village waiting. More than a hundred Japanese soldiers with their hands on their heads were squatting on an open space next to them. Dozens of fully armed soldiers from the Merchant Corps, holding rifles, were guarding and staring at them.

"The regiment is here!" a major officer reminded Zhou Yaodong.

Zhou Yaodong turned his head to look at the road leading to the village. At the end of the road, a convoy appeared and was driving quickly towards the village entrance. A lot of dust was raised on the road after the convoy passed by.

"Hurry up, chopsticks, line up!"

"Look to the right—stand at attention, at ease."

The convoy slowly stopped at the entrance of the village, the doors opened, and the guards quickly jumped off the trucks to stand guard. The accompanying officers and staff got off the cars one after another. The rear door of the third car was opened by a combat staff officer, and Zhang Yunhe got out of the car wearing a military uniform without rank.

"Commander, stand at attention - salute"

The officers and soldiers standing at the entrance of the village, including the regiment commander Zhou Yaodong, all stood at attention and saluted Zhang Yunhe.

Zhang Yunhe walked over to return the greetings to the officers and soldiers, and shook hands with each officer in turn.

"What's the situation in the village? No one has moved at the scene, right?" Zhang Yunhe shook hands with the officers and asked Zhou Yaodong.

"No action was taken. After our men captured the Japanese soldiers who had massacred the village, we simply sent people in to check if there were any survivors. But after searching around, we didn't find a single living person. Of the 427 people in the village, 402 were killed. The remaining 25 were all young women. Four of them couldn't bear the humiliation and hanged themselves after being rescued!" Zhou Yaodong replied.

Zhang Yunhe raised his hand and pointed to the village and said, "Let's talk while we walk."

"Yes!" Zhou Yaodong agreed to follow Zhang Yunhe and walk sideways into the village. The other officers and entourage followed behind according to their positions.

As they entered the village, Zhang Yunhe turned around and saw hundreds of Japanese soldiers squatting on the ground with their heads in their hands, under guard. He asked, "Are these the Japanese who massacred the village?"

"It was them. They were originally a squadron of nearly 200 people. We killed nearly 70 of them, and the rest were surrounded by us. After they ran out of ammunition, they rushed out and wanted to fight us with bayonets, but we shot and killed more than a dozen of them. The others were scared and chose to surrender," said Zhou Yaodong.

As soon as he reached the entrance of the village, Zhang Yunhe saw the naked bodies of several young villagers hanging on the thick branches of a large banyan tree beside the village entrance. The abdomen of each body had been cut open, and there were piles of bloody internal organs on the ground.

Seeing this scene, Zhang Yunhe gritted his teeth, clenched his fists, and veins bulged on his forehead.

"Take photos to keep evidence, put the bodies down and bury them properly. After the photos are developed, select a few and send them to the newspaper to publish, so that the citizens can see how inhumane and cruel the Japanese are," said Zhang Yunhe.

Zhou Yaodong said: "When fighting these devils, the military staff took pictures of the battle scenes and the devils' evil deeds!"

"Very good!" Zhang Yunhe nodded and walked into the village.

An officer at the back immediately waved to the soldiers nearby and shouted, "Hurry and put the body down. See if you can find a coffin. If you can, bury the body. If not, wrap it in some straw mats and bury it. And erect a tombstone!"

"Yes, sir!"

After entering the village, the roads were full of potholes caused by grenades and mortar shells, and there were clearly visible bullet holes on the walls of each house.

Dozens of bodies of villagers of different ages were lying in disorder on the road leading deep into the village.

Zhang Yunhe turned his head and saw the body of an old man lying at the door of a house on the left.

He walked over and came to the front door of the house. He saw the bloody body of an old woman and a baby less than two years old lying in the main room.

"Sir, there is a young female corpse in the room on the left. After we rescued her from the Japanese, she returned home and hanged herself with her belt when she saw that her family and children were dead," said a lieutenant company commander from behind.

Zhang Yunhe walked to the door and looked out. A woman in flowered clothes was hanging from the beam, with her eyes open.

"Where's her man?"

"One of the people hanged by the Japanese on the banyan tree at the entrance of the village was her husband. We have confirmed this with other surviving women," replied the lieutenant company commander.

Zhang Yunhe looked at each house one by one, and all he saw was blood and corpses. Some villagers were stabbed to death with bayonets, some were shot to death, some were hanged, and some had their heads chopped off, their stomachs cut open, and they were beheaded.

In a small open space next to a house, four rows of adult male corpses were lying, each with a bloody hole on the head.

"Sir, these adult villagers were probably captured by the Japanese and then lined up. Then they pointed their rifles at the back of the last villager's head and shot him. The bullets penetrated the heads of several villagers in succession. They killed them cruelly in this way, and they killed 42 people with just a few bullets."

"Beast!" Zhang Yunhe was already furious when he saw this scene.

At this time, the lieutenant commander said again: "Sir, there is a forest in the northwest corner of the village. There are more than 150 villagers who were tied to tree trunks by the Japanese and stabbed to death one by one with bayonets. Almost every body has more than a dozen bayonet wounds. It is judged that the Japanese used the villagers to train in stabbing techniques before."

When Zhang Yunhe, led by the company lieutenant, arrived at the edge of the woods in the northwest corner of the village, he saw a bloody corpse of a villager tied to each tree trunk. He could no longer hold back and shouted, "Come here, bring all those devils here!"

"Yes, sir!"

Tap the screen to use advanced tools Tip: You can use left and right keyboard keys to browse between chapters.

You'll Also Like