Chapter 33 Chapter Thirteen

Heifengjian dropped the first shell, and Liu Zongkui was sitting on the slope outside the shelter of the battalion headquarters, just picking up his rice bowl to eat.The battalion originally joined forces with the Eighth Company, but the Seventh Company was the first to serve meals, and Hu Zhigao, the commander of the Seventh Company, asked the chief secretary to deliver a meal to a dozen people in the battalion first.Liu Zongkui asked Xiao Bin and the others to eat first, which was an old habit for him. Once on the battlefield, he would not move his chopsticks if his subordinates did not eat.As for why he had to do this, he didn't really think about it. Maybe he could find some clear explanations. If they fight with him, it seems that they should be fed first.

Xiao Bin knew his temper, so he didn't push back and ordered everyone to eat first.Ten minutes later, when everyone was eating enough, Liu Zongkui snuffed out the cigarette butt in his hand, took the rice handed over by Wei Xi, and randomly took a bite into his mouth. The cannonball flew in at this moment, and exploded outside the nine-company three-row camp. Liu Zongkui swallowed the meal anyway, then stood up, stood on tiptoes and looked towards the point where the shells landed, where a gray-brown cloud of smoke was already rising into the sky.In the first moment, Liu Zongkui also thought that our artillery had hit the wrong target. Since the Second Battalion of the A Regiment easily occupied the 342 Heights at dawn, and did not encounter enemy counter-fire, he believed that the opponent was like the border in the spring of that year. There is also not enough artillery fire in the war, especially there is no heavy artillery that can pose a serious threat to our army, and what was dropped just now was a 122-cannon shell or a 152-gallon howitzer;-but in a blink of an eye, the second shell was fired again. It was flying, and this time he clearly heard the sound of it flying, so he identified the direction it was flying from - not the northern mountains where our artillery group is distributed, but the Tianzi Mountain area in the south of Qipanling!

"The enemy has started to counter-fire!... Hurry up and tell the companies to hide!" He yelled at Xiao Bin and Chen Guoqing who were behind him, his face changed suddenly, and his cheek muscles visibly twitched.Suddenly he realized that he was still holding the rice bowl in his hand, and he threw it seven or eight feet away with a wave of his hand! Another shell exploded in the woods near the battalion command post, and Liu Zongkui instinctively fell to the ground.A metasequoia tree as thick as a teacup rim fell over a dozen meters in front of him, and the dust it raised blinded his eyes.He had difficulty breathing, and his consciousness also crossed a line at this moment: after the 342 Heights battle, he had a feeling that the war was not over, and the A regiment's easy victory over Qipanling was by no means the end of the war. Confirmed - the real war hasn't started yet, it just kicked off!

There was another idea that came to my mind more urgently and more clearly: the enemy not only had artillery, but also large-caliber artillery that had not been used in the border war a few years ago.In the enemy's firearms organization table, only divisional artillery is equipped with 122 cannons and 152 howitzers!That is to say, what they are facing today is not the enemy of a battalion in the Qipanling and No. 001 highland areas, but the enemy of a division including the direction of Tianzishan! —— Another premonition he had when he left Mao'erling yesterday afternoon was confirmed again: the enemy doesn't care about the national border that stretches in the canyon between Gongmu Mountain and Tianzi Mountain. It will not be separated from its entire border defense system!

Things are going to be troublesome today! Another batch of shells exploded in the woods around him as the last conclusive thought occurred to his mind.When the smoke fell, two people quickly emerged from the shelter, dragging him in, one on the left and one on the right.It was only after he was able to distinguish faces in the dim light that he recognized them as Xiao Bin and his guard Wei Xi.The shelter was not big, and a dozen or so people squeezed in, so they had to squat side by side, so that they could hear each other's breathing and see other people's gazes.Liu Zongkui calmed down, and felt that the sound of breathing was not right, nervous, flustered, hasty, and horrified; Liu Zongkui became angry with himself—he is the supreme commander here, it must be because of his restless expression and Make a move, otherwise the atmosphere in the concealment department would not be like this!

Another shell exploded not far away.The whole shelter was shaken, and the soil fell from between the cross-bars on the top floor.Liu Zongkui ordered himself to be calm, and unconsciously took out a cigarette from the pocket of his military uniform, lit it and smoked it. It was this cigarette that significantly eased the tension in the bunker!This cigarette also calmed Liu Zongkui's mind a lot. He began to think about what this sudden change in the enemy's situation would bring to the Third Battalion of Regiment C, and what fate this unit would have today! ——The enemy bombarded Heifengjian on such a large scale, and they would definitely bombard the 164, 342, and 631 highlands that the A regiment just occupied on Qipanling, and even the B regiment is attacking the troops on the 001 highland!It is impossible for the enemy to have other purposes. On the 001 highland, it will be to block the attack of the B group. In the Qipanling area, it is very likely to be the prelude to the counterattack to the 164, 342, and 631 highlands!

——The front line of Qipanling is easy to attack and difficult to defend. This is true for our army and it is also true for the enemy. Regiment A may start a fairly fierce offensive and defensive battle with the enemy on Qipanling today.The ridge line of Qipanling is six kilometers long. When a regiment A regiment attacks the 164, 342, and 631 highlands, it has more than enough troops, but if it is used to guard the hundreds of highlands and protrusions up and down Qipanling, the strength is not enough to allocate That's right, the 3rd Battalion of Regiment C, which is the reserve team, will almost certainly be dragged into the battlefield by Jiang Tao!

The shells were still exploding around the bunker one after another, and he couldn't sit still in the bunker! After the battle on Heights 342, his troops have been in a state of half-alarm. The cadres and soldiers were not well concealed, let alone prepared for a big battle. Moreover, it was a completely inexperienced force. We must go to the companies immediately, among the soldiers! "Battle Commander Xiao, you and Instructor Chen are waiting for the call from the Command Post of Regiment A. I'll go and have a look at each company!" He threw most of the cigarettes in his hand outside the shelter, and said to Xiao Bin stiffly, Drilling out of the cover, Xiao Bin and Chen Guoqing didn't have time to react.Jiang Tao would think of them from the beginning of the enemy's counter-bombardment. This is a very clear intuition of his. As for letting Chen Guoqing stay, it is because the trainer also has no battlefield experience, and he can't let him go out to be bombarded!

When he walked out of the shelter, all he had in his mind was the army, which might be messed up when suddenly encountering enemy shelling; and the shells that fell in the forest, front, back, left, and right from time to time added a more realistic and intense sense of crisis in his heart: any A shell could fly towards him and tear him to pieces.Liu Zongkui didn't let this kind of simple terror fill his life consciousness, but the latter still held him tightly for a while.He ran out of the woods in the tenacious struggle with it, and ran northward along the forest path, but he was still forced to fall into the crater in front of him by the howling sound of a shell before it hit the ground.The shell exploded, he raised his head suddenly, and saw Liang Pengfei, the instructor of the Ninth Company, behind a big tree by the forest on the slope!

The anger that overflowed Liu Zongkui's face and eyes rose from the bottom of his heart at this moment: also facing a shell that was about to hit the ground, Liang Pengfei did not lie down but fell down himself, and his actions were seen by the former , A shameful thought immediately came to mind, "What's the matter with you? Are you afraid of death?... If you are afraid of death, what are you going to do when you come out, just hide in the shelter!..." So at this moment, Liang Pengfei saw the deputy The brief panic on the long face was completely replaced by anger! After talking to Liang Pengfei for a few words, he continued to walk forward; in any case, at this moment he felt that he was much calmer than before. "Cannonballs don't have eyes, so they won't hit you so accurately, so you don't need to lie down at any time." He said angrily to himself, determined not to lie down casually; now he can also concentrate on the two sides of the ravine. side view.He came out of the shelter for this reason: there was no one on the beach and in the stream in the valley, and there was no one who was not hiding in the woods on both sides, so he was a little relieved; the entire Heifengjian was under enemy fire. During the looting, balls of fireworks were rising from the bottom of the stream, from the forest, and straight up into the clear sky. From time to time, a thick water column shot up straight in the stream, and then fell slowly, like a slow motion in a movie. The sun was still shining and bright on the water where no shells fell, and the green grass and bushes on both sides were still green and vibrant.Liu Zongkui suddenly thought: Although his troops did not mess up in the enemy's shelling, the casualties caused by the shelling were not insignificant; once casualties occurred, morale would inevitably be hit.As the supreme commander of this army, now he needs to let all the commanders and fighters see a calm, calm, calm image of himself!

He had just thought of this, when a person jumped out of the woods on the west side of the stream, running obliquely all the way to the bottom of the stream, wading through the stream with splashes, and ran towards this side as if dying! "Who is that?!...Where are you going?!" Liu Zongkui was furious.He had already recognized that person as the deputy company commander of the Eighth Company, and he became even more angry because the person who was frightened by the artillery fire was a cadre. "You fucking stop-" The deputy company commander of the eighth company was stopped by his shout and stopped on the grass under the slope.He lost his hat, his right cheek was cut with a long bloody gash by a branch, his face was as white as a piece of paper, and there was nothing in his eyes except the light of bewilderment and terror.Looking at Liu Zongkui, the young man opened his mouth and yelled out a sentence like weeping: "Deputy...deputy commander, someone was killed over there!" "Where's your army?!" Liu Zongkui yelled at him loudly, the corners of his mouth twitching with anger, "You are a cadre, why did you leave the soldiers and run around alone! ... You are dereliction of duty! ... You hurry back and let me take care of you force!" The young man seemed to wake up suddenly, his eyes lit up, with a look of fear and panic on his face, he answered "yes", and hurriedly followed the original road to the west side of the ravine, and when he crossed the ravine, he once again waded through a large stretch of water. The water splashes are as bright as pearls under the sunlight. Liu Zongkui watched the deputy commander of the eighth company disappear before moving his feet forward.The cannonballs were still raining down around him, making fireworks, but not only did he not fall down, he didn't even care about them anymore.What he cared about was whether there would be any other people who panicked like the deputy commander of the eighth company, which would cause panic and frantic rush in the whole battalion.This scenario must not be allowed to happen! He had already heard the sound of our artillery group's massive counterattack against the enemy's artillery.At dawn, the rocket shells that he and many people in the whole battalion had seen with their own eyes roared and pierced the clear sky again, flying farther south than Height 342.The enemy's artillery group was hit, and the artillery fire immediately became sparse! This morning, many soldiers of the 3rd Battalion of the C Regiment saw a person on the slope east of Jiangu through their cat ear holes!He stood under the enemy's artillery fire, motionless, for twenty minutes!Shells exploded all around him, and it was like a miracle that he was still alive!It is precisely because of such a person that many of them have safely passed the most terrifying moment since joining the war! Liu Zongkui didn't leave the place where he was standing until he was sure that there would be no more troubles in the troops, and went back to the battalion command post.There are many things for him to do now: seize the time before Regiment A has not issued specific combat missions to hold a meeting of officers above the company to clarify the situation, mobilize the commanders and fighters of the entire battalion, and prepare for fighting big and evil battles; let the deputy instructor quickly organize The ambulance team and the migrant labor stretcher team transported the wounded and martyrs; try to minimize the psychological trauma caused by the enemy's shelling to the troops.The war is imminent, restoring and maintaining high morale is the most important thing! He didn't dodge the human leg lying on the grass in the forest near the nine-company three-row campsite.Because he wanted to avoid two crackling and burning bomb craters, on the way back to the battalion shelter, he walked into the forest on the slope, where he saw what Cheng Ming had already seen and what Liang Pengfei would also see later.The cannonball that was destined to set the grass on fire hadn't come yet, so Liu Zongkui not only saw the human leg, but also saw a pink-white wild flower stuck to the sole of the infantry's stab-proof shoe, every petal of it It is as thin as a cicada's wing, pierced by the sun, showing a breathtaking charm.This human leg that suddenly came into view did not bring him deep horror, but it made him suddenly realize: the war has begun, and death has also begun! War is no ordinary war once the death begins! After walking out of the woods, he looked up to the south, and saw the 342 Heights shrouded in a huge cloud of dark brown smoke.Another group of black and red flames rose and extinguished in the smoke.Obviously, the enemy's shelling of Heifengjian seems to be over, and the indiscriminate bombing of Height 342 is still going on.Liu Zongkui's thoughts went back to guessing the enemy's combat operations: With such a powerful artillery as the backing, it is normal for the opponent to try to recapture the 342 Heights, and it is also normal to shell Heifengjian where our army's reserve team may be hidden.There are indications that the scale of today's war will be bigger than he imagined! When he returned to the shelter of the battalion headquarters, Xiao Bin had counted the casualties over the phone: 17 casualties in the battalion, of which 4 were killed and 13 were injured. Among the seriously injured was the deputy instructor of the Seventh Company.Liu Zongkui ordered the chief officers of each company to spend ten minutes dealing with the wounded martyrs, and then went to the battalion headquarters for a meeting. In less than ten minutes, the enemy fired a fourth batch of shells at Heifengjian.Amidst the violent explosion, Liu Zongkui finally had a feeling: all these shellings, casualties, human legs lying on the grass in the forest, a pink and white wild flower on the sole of the infantry's stab-resistant shoes... are what should happen in war and then there are operational orders, movement to theater, and combat.This is all he is familiar with, so he shouldn't be surprised and frustrated! But he was still a little surprised and frustrated, deep down in his heart; after the battle on Heights 342, he had secretly thought that this small team would have a better fate today, and at this moment, this fluke has disappeared.A dark and unpredictable premonition weighed heavily on his mind: He and his troops would never easily survive today's war. He was too familiar with Jiang Tao and what a war was all about! ... The field phone in the corner of the bunker suddenly rang.Instructor Chen Guoqing picked up the phone receiver. "Deputy regiment leader, the chief of staff of regiment A is looking for you!" Looking at Chen Guoqing's face that quickly changed color, only one thought flashed in Liu Zongkui's mind: it came too fast!He stood still, frowned in disgust, and said to Xiao Bin: "Go pick it up!"