Chapter 9 Chapter 9: To Live Is a Hero

In the first battle in Wuhan, the national army in the Jiang'an salient suffered heavy casualties, and each company of the 2nd Battalion suffered more than half of the casualties. The 3rd company and the 2nd company where Lao Dan was located were especially dilapidated, and those lying in the hospital could no longer form a platoon.Commander Mazi led the 3rd Battalion up and held on for two days and two nights. The deputy battalion commander and two company commanders died in battle one after another.The last company commander did not survive, because he left his position and ran away with his brothers, and ran into head-to-head Mazi, who was bringing the last reserve team up.

The brothers are miserable, there is nowhere to hide under the enemy's naval guns.It seems that the devils have also issued a military order, no matter how many people die, they will not retreat, and they will fall on the beach and continue to climb up.The head of the pockmarked pockmark had more pockmarks on his face after eating it. Just as he went up to kill with a machine gun, a gendarmerie unit sent by the military department arrived.This company with less than 200 people quickly spread out on the ground, repelling the attack of a group of Japanese troops that had just landed within ten minutes.Each of them carried three guns, a German submachine gun, an American sniper rifle, and a Russian pistol.Commander Mazi was surprised to see them shooting one by one in a leisurely manner. None of the devils could get closer to fifty meters. After several officers were knocked out, the escaped devils were also killed by them with sniper rifles.They guarded a position tens of meters wide by themselves, and none of the more than 300 Japanese soldiers who went ashore returned.The gendarmerie also suffered casualties, either from stray bullets or from naval artillery.The protruding part was bleeding like a river, and it was impossible to save it, thanks to this group of magic soldiers.It took Lao Dan more than ten days to know these things, and it was the second son who told him.

Thousands of wounded soldiers crowded in the Group Army Wounded Soldiers Hospital on the outskirts of the city, crying and screaming in pain day and night.Air battles continued over Wuhan, and enemy planes continued to bomb the outer positions. In the past two days, they began to bomb the urban area.There are two anti-aircraft machine guns next to the hospital, but the defense forces try to cover them and use them as much as possible. Don't get angry, the devils insist on throwing bombs at the hospital with obvious signs.The devils seemed to have dispatched all the planes, the air defense sirens came one after another, and the searchlight posts at night were as dense as corn swaying in the field.All kinds of anti-aircraft weapons streaked and exploded in the night sky, and it was often as bright as day in the middle of the night.

When Lao Dan was carried in in a mess, the doctor wiped his bloody eyes and said to throw them outside, and save the survivors first.Wang Lijiang, the deputy head of the regiment, went into a rage and wanted to drag down the doctor's second child.After explaining about Lao Dan, he ran back to the battlefield, and was brought back with injuries not long after.He had suffered this injury for Captain Mazi, when an air-bomb bomb fell, and he fell on Captain Mazi, with more than a dozen small shrapnel studded on his back and buttocks.Lao Dan and the second son were placed in the same ward, and the second son looked scary, with scorched outside and tender inside.Lao Dan turned into a meat skewer, burnt and fried, the skin of half of his body was scorched black, and there were several holes pierced through. Three bullets pierced through the chest, waist, ribs and thighs, and the outside was like a layer of skin peeled off. The bloody mess.The doctor dug out a dozen pieces of shrapnel, large and small, from his body, took care of this tough guy day and night, and brought him back to the world time and time again.A few days ago, the thigh wound was infected, it was burning hot, and the fetid smell was suffocating.Lao Dan gave priority to using the antibiotics that had just been shipped, and after a few injections, his fever finally subsided.The bandages that the doctors took off on his body could almost be used as a quilt. The heart of this guy who survived no matter how hard he tossed was beating loudly again, his cough was like thunder again, and his farts were extremely stinky.The nurses were betting on the first words that the stinking immortal immortal said when he woke up. Some guessed that he wanted to kill a devil, some guessed that he wanted to drink water, and some guessed whether he was dead.But Lao Dan disappointed them all, trembling, he said, "Tweety, is your belly big?"

The second son jumped up with a "huh" and hurriedly called a nurse who was a big and a rough nurse.Excitedly, the nurse first asked him what he said, and then checked his condition in disappointment. After a while, he said happily, "What a man, he won't die!" Lao Dan opened his eyes and was dizzy. He didn't know what was hanging on it frighteningly. A vague white shadow floated back and forth, like someone in the village had died.He finally opened his mouth wide to say something, but couldn't find his tongue, so he bit it with his teeth.The mouth is as dry and hard as if it had been salted, the throat is like an overheated chimney, the eyelids are as dry and hard as cowhide, the eyeballs are hard to see, and it hurts to turn them around.He heard a strange sound, like a ghost crying, and it took a while to realize that it was a person laughing.The laughter slowly scratched his body and eardrums until his eyes became clear, and the laughter became real.The dirty electric fan on the roof let him know that he was once again a deserter from Lord Yama.But he was not excited, but panicked, not knowing what was missing from his pile of meat.Faces dangled in front of their eyes, their eyeballs popped out as if they were looking at something rare.There is also a man with a bandage on his eyes, isn't this a joke?So he focused his attention, tried to shake his body, and looked for his limbs. He quickly realized that all four ends were there, and he couldn't feel the other one because he couldn't move at all. It was like being put in the eye of a stove, his whole body was insanely itchy, and accompanied by excruciating pain, the stench from the top almost made him faint.He coughed twice, and coughed out the strange thing in his nasal cavity, it was a tube, and the strong smell of medicine came in, this smell made him shut up, those annoying faces made him upset, so he took a deep breath Turning his head around, Erzi had one eye bandaged, squatting on the stool like a monkey, grinning at him.

"Brother Dan, you are alive, and someone wants to carry you outside several times!" Lao Dan pouted hard, which was his answer.There was a soldier missing half a leg on the opposite bunk, a bullet pierced his cheek, grunted half of his tongue and said: "Old company commander, brothers all think you are honored, I just found out the day before yesterday It's you, you're covered in bandages, you can't even recognize it." "Brothers...how are you?" Lao Dan asked muttering.The words of the brothers cruelly dragged back the thought that he was about to cry out for pain, and he immediately knew how lucky he was to be alive.

"The living ones are piled up here... Fortunately, the position is not lost, but the people have changed a few times!" said the second son. A tall doctor came over, pulled out a small tube inserted obliquely in his mouth for him, put a thermometer on him, and scolded the surroundings: "He just woke up, let him rest well, don't talk to him." Nonsense, wait until the blood pressure is stabilized, you guys can talk... Don’t rush to move, move again in a few days, do you hear me? Your name is Lao Dan, right? Your team leader told me to see you come back to life and let him know. Your life is really hard, kid, there must be good luck in the future!"

"How is Head Gao?" Lao Dan asked eagerly. "Commander Gao was slightly injured—it's fine, but there were more pockmarks, and he went back to the front line... Your name is so easy to remember. Many people asked me to ask about this and that, but I couldn't remember it at all. "The doctor hung up his stethoscope and left. He was wearing two different leather shoes, and his walking was bumpy. "Although our artillery can't keep up, fortunately there are still planes to help, and those military police brothers are really helpful, but they are all gone, and those gold and expensive guys must go to do more difficult things... A few days ago, the head of the regiment took us a group of brothers and swam to the devils in the middle of the night, blowing up one of their boats, hehe, it is said that it was all devils! When I got up in the morning, I saw pieces floating in the river. But the devils yesterday We started to storm a fortification on the south side of the salient, which was guarded by a group of Guizhou soldiers, so it is not quite right." The second son touched the gauze around his neck and said.

Lao Dan was only in good spirits for a moment, and then he was faintly exhausted, and the pain everywhere declared his fragility.He tried his best to recall the origin of every injury on his body, and after thinking about it, he didn't even know when he was shot so many times. He was obviously blown away by the bomb in front of him, so why did there still be seven or eight pieces of shrapnel in his back?There was no devil hitting him in the face, so how did those two teeth disappear?He vaguely remembers what he said to Captain Mazi, and also vaguely remembers the bitterness and tragedy of leaving the battlefield, but he doesn't remember the cruelty of the battle at all. The death of those brothers did not make him sad, just like a young man who became a Macker in the village, it is a very normal thing.Who is this second son in front of him?Why did he squat on the stool and tell himself stories?Why is this bastard who hates gods and ghosts in Banzi village so reluctant to give up with him?The flood of questions that didn't need answers choked him hard to breathe.The irritability caused a severe cough, which affected the ubiquitous pain, passing through the body and the bed board, and ignited him like a fire.

"Let me get up!" Lao Dan yelled, startling the second son who was about to light a cigarette. "What are you doing? You're a corpse? I want you to get up. You're as tangled up as a rice dumpling. You can't even poke it out. You can only stand up like a coffin lid. If you're not afraid of pain, let's try. Try..." Er Zi lit a cigarette, with a gloating tone. "Your mother forced me, you don't feel sorry for me, what if I can't move?" Lao Dan gasped for breath after finishing speaking, and the bullet hole in his chest hurt terribly. "If you can't move, you won't be able to move. You don't have to fight any more. Maybe you'll just ask for it and go home. Can you shut up? You see that hole in your waist is bleeding, and it will burst if you yell. ..." Er Zi pointed to his waist.

"Is mine still there?" Lao Dan asked with a blushing face. "What?" Er Zi didn't understand. "I... there, that ball!" Lao Dan growled in a low voice holding back his energy. "Hey, what are you worried about? It's all there, but it's so tightly wrapped, I don't know if it's rotten inside... It should be fine, that ugly nurse wiped it for you a few times, frowning, Hold a small cotton ball with tweezers, and while wiping it, scolding, 'It's so fucking big! It's so fucking big!' I guess it's okay..." Erzi wanted to understand that he was worried about this, so he didn't take his losing his temper seriously. Only then did Lao Dan feel relieved, and felt as grateful as if he had recovered his life.Fortunately, this reminded him of Tweety, and his heart and place became hot.He saw the cigarette pot hanging by the second son's bed, and wanted him to light it up for a smoke, but this must be a luxury, and the red-eyed doctors and nurses in the room would give it away.He suddenly felt that he would have to deal with this cigarette pot for the rest of his life. He was no longer an old lady in Banzi Village, but a horse smoke pot who went to Banzi Village to catch him. The wounded soldiers were brought in one after another, crying and laughing like crazy, all in a mess.Every time Lao Dan heard someone running heavily, he knew he was carrying something that he couldn't bear.Many people died screaming in pain. Last night, a guy who was blinded by blowing up his eyes committed suicide. I don’t know why he hid a fruit knife on his body. He cut off the carotid artery silently. Not a word was said.The doctors were all exhausted, and it was like taking a bath with blood every day.The day before yesterday there was a man who was being reattached to a leg on the operating table. He passed out while holding a broken leg. He was stuck on the ground and never woke up. When another doctor came to save him, he took a look and said that he was not sick, he was exhausted. Lao Dan's neck was tied, and his hearing was developed like a dog's.Things in the hospital got into his ears, and those who couldn't get in were mostly passed on by the second son.There are more than a thousand people lying in this hospital, and one or two hundred people die every day, but more people come in. There are not enough beds and doctors. The hospital is thinking about transferring those who cannot die to a nearby sewer.The devil's plane often visits, although it does not lay eggs, it often flies low to scare people.One machine gun position around the camp was found, and two bombs were blown up to nothing.Doctors and nurses nervously moved the wounded as soon as they heard the air-raid sirens, and jumped on them when they saw enemy planes approaching.Some veterans knew from the sound that the enemy plane was not here to drop bombs, and even if they threw them, they couldn't land on their heads, but they still wanted to yell and let the female nurses jump on them to feel their warm chests. and sweet breath.Lao Dan didn't see it in his eyes, and he laughed happily in bed.The two sons saw each other and scolded the other. His injury healed too quickly, and he had already lost the possibility of pretending.The conscientious and selfless medical staff are admirable. Lao Dan thinks of the medical soldier who stabbed the devil with a needle. He is only in his early twenties and looks like a student. Healing an injury is different from recuperating an illness. Watching life and death every day, Lao Dan is in a very good mood, eats and drinks deliciously, and farts hard and loudly.After more than a month, although weak, the wounds have healed, and Lao Dan can finally be driven around by the second son.He found the brothers in his company, chatted with them, smoked and talked about women, and occasionally exercised his atrophied muscles.Lao Dan in the mirror is hideous and terrifying, with mottled patches. From the front, he looks like a life-threatening ghost in a Henan opera, and from the side, he looks like a tree lump scorched by children at the entrance of the village.No nurse was afraid of him, saying that it would turn white after a long time, and the color would turn back to bacon. Healing an injury is like plastering a wall with mud in the village. It is always two colors when it is just pasted. Lao Dan was always in awe of that face. Compared with those brothers who lost their eyes, ears, nose, and even their dick, this ugly face was already a gift from God.The hospital was full of death and tears. The people who came in were bloody and bloody, the limbs of those who were carried away were stiff, and those who stayed were numb and speechless.Everyone is facing a common destiny, so there is no need to lament too much for a bad luck, and there is no need to be elated by a good luck.He fell asleep amidst the wailing and crying of others, watching the beds in the barracks changing people, thinking about whether he could find a way to go home after the battle was over. Although Lao Dan is highly respected, he doesn't want to be deceived by this feeling. Among the more than one million troops, he is just an inconspicuous deputy company commander, and the battles he has experienced are not too tragic. After all, there are still many brothers alive. down.Across a tent were wounded soldiers from Jiujiang. They said that a brigade on the eastern front fell into a tight siege when it raided the enemy's airport and failed to break through.The devil's persuasion to surrender was rejected by the brigade commander. More than 2,000 soldiers, including three regimental commanders and two staff officers, fought for seven days and ran out of ammunition and food.The devils were in awe, and sent back the bodies of the officers and soldiers in a carriage.I heard that Generalissimo Jiang personally sent them couplets, and the whole city was filled with black veils for three days of commemoration. These ubiquitous solemn stories poured into his ears, and often made Lao Dan feel ashamed when he wanted to run home. He was terrified of the visit from Commander Mazi who did not know when he would come, and the military medal he would inevitably bring was like a A coffin nail will firmly nail him to this road.The second son has committed evil these days, so if he has nothing to do, talk to him about what chapter and how many oceans he can get this time, and compare his heroism with Lao Dan several times.Lao Dan is too lazy to talk to him, but he also knows that only if he eats and sleeps like the second son, he may be able to go further in the future.His short-lived happiness began to give him more worries, and the scar that was getting better was as frightening as the red handprint he pressed on the registration book. This thought began to make it difficult for him to sleep, and he often looked at the starry sky outside the gap in the tent in a daze , Watching the mosquitoes scrambling to get in and fly to the lamp and under the lamp.He knew that he was just such a mayfly, flying ignorantly, and might have lost his life on some hot lamp. The students have long since suspended classes, and they like to come here the most.They often steal cigarettes, food and drink behind the doctor's back, and occasionally wine. Lao Dan and Er Zi shared a jug and drank happily. The female nurse pinched her nose to find the wine bottle. Alcohol bottle.The students surrounded this group of soldiers who were born and died, their hands and feet trembling with excitement, they grabbed someone who could talk and formed a big circle, pestering him to tell stories on the battlefield.The scent of the female students was more compelling than the bayonet, which made the soldiers distracted, their eyes straightened, their tongues hardened, and their words became incoherent. Lao Dan's scars are prominent, and the smoking pot and saber are hung together in a mysterious way. Soon, a girl finds out and greets a dozen of them.Lao Dan was not afraid, at first he didn't say anything, to whet the baby's appetite, then he got excited, and after taking a sip of the hot wine handed by the girl, he started from the Yellow River.He tried his best to describe every battle clearly, every dead brother and friend described the stalwart, and described the ferocity of the devils. He slowly unfolded those terrible stories until he was admitted to this stinking hospital.But he concealed the fact of how he was arrested, which should not be said.Lao Dan's eyelids are drooping, his left arm is tied with a splint and hangs on the shelf, his right hand holds a long smoke pot, and after he speaks a few words, he spits out a puff of heavy smoke.This eloquent charm made the students burst into tears. The female nurse who came to snatch the cigarette pot shed tears, wiped his sweating forehead with gauze, and then pushed him down. Needle. In the eyes of the students, Lao Dan is an immortal hero, and every scar shows the charm of a hero.Many students recognized the eldest brother, and the girls pinned flowers on his hospital gown.The pollen got into Lao Dan's nose, and after several sneezes and sneezes, he farted and cursed at people, and then he developed hypoglycemia, became dizzy, and fell down in response. When the second son saw that Lao Dan had won the jackpot again, he would always interject next to him: "Why did you get blown up? You rolled into a ditch. You rolled in the ditch more than a dozen times before I was flying in the sky." After a dozen laps..." But everyone didn't believe this guy who could walk around with his hands behind his back, so they didn't let him interrupt, and the girls became even more angry, saying that if you make trouble again, they will tell your officers to send you back.The second son was terrified, and hurriedly sat down cross-legged and smoked a cigarette with the other brothers. Girls miss this hero and see him every time they come. A girl named Yingzi brought a basket with a big bowl of mutton stewed noodles that Lao Dan often mentioned. Lao Dan was still humming, smelling it Immediately, the son got up cross-legged like the second son.The aroma made the brothers salivate.Lao Dan was sensible, although he wanted to swallow it all, he still ate it generously with his brothers, and even saved a mouthful for the second son who went to the toilet.Lao Dan happily watched the brothers share this delicious meal, as satisfied as being a general.The second son was also happy, he licked the bowl clean, and went out to fetch water for the girls. "Old company commander? Were you homesick when you were fighting devils?" Yingzi came the most frequently, whenever she came to the hospital, she would visit Lao Dan.Although this child went to school in the city, he came from the countryside. Although he looked ordinary, he was popular, and he was very quick to fight the nurses, so he was deeply loved by everyone.She was adding tobacco to Lao Dan and asked a series of interesting things. "Oh, I usually have weird thoughts. When I started fighting, I wanted to kill devils. What else do I want?" Lao Dan said insincerely, but felt quite happy, "Where are you from, girl?" "My hometown is in Henan, but I have always lived in the suburbs of Beiping. After the devils took over there, my parents sent me to Wuhan." "Oh, then you must miss them. Do you have brothers and sisters?" "There is only one younger brother, who is still young, not as tall as your gun!" "Don't worry too much. I heard that the devils in Peking are quite respectable, and they didn't kill ordinary people indiscriminately." Lao Dan said nonsense, he didn't even know that Peking was there. Knowing that Yingzi was going to find a way to get mutton stewed noodles for Lao Dan, the wounded soldiers were greedy and coveted Yingzi, and someone said: "Brother, are you going to see the cook or Yingzi? Go and bring us all, or we will sue the doctor!" "That's right, brother, why are you so blessed? You have food, drink, and big sisters to light cigarettes. I have to urinate for a long time before someone comes here, and my pee bubbles are about to explode. , Alas...why is there such a big difference?" "Yingzi, don't listen to my brother's stories all the time. There are many more stories in the trenches of our 2nd company than in his side! You send me a few bowls of noodles, and I will tell you every day! Is it okay?" "Hmph, you're not from Hexi, and the cook at our school doesn't have that much mutton. You can tell stories, and I can hear them here too." Yingzi was not fooled, what a clever answer, Lao Dan thought . "That's different. It's different when you sit in front of my brother and listen to it than in front of me. Why don't you just sit here?" The soldier got excited. "Hehe, big brother, you are so funny...Okay, I will come over tomorrow to listen to your speech, and I will bring a few classmates. If you can't speak well then, I won't give you a cigarette." Yingzi turned her face away, no ignore him. "No, no, I just talked about it for three days and three nights, and the story didn't repeat itself... Unlike my brother, Che Jilu kept talking back and forth, and I even killed a devil leader... Don't worry , I guarantee you are satisfied, remember to bring more girls here!" Wang Lijiang recovered quickly, and within a few days he had to go back to report for work, and Lao Dan bid farewell to him.Wang Lijiang said that he knew from the day he was arrested that you were destined to die, and that he won't die this time, and it will be difficult for him to die in the future. Although the battle was tight, the chief officers still came to inspect and condolence from time to time to boost morale.After the great retreat, the hearts of the people were gloomy, but this unprecedented decisive battle was exhilarating and unprecedentedly determined.Although the hospital is overcrowded, there are frequent reports of good news from the front line. It may be a good thing that a certain national army has held its ground and killed thousands of devils.The gossip said that a small unit of the gendarmerie got into the devil's divisional headquarters, and killed more than a dozen senior officers with a single explosive package.There is also news that a devil touched Hualiu Lane and ruined the girl, but he also contracted syphilis, and every penis rotted away.Lao Dan couldn't distinguish whether the news was true or not, but he understood the fact that the Japanese army was struggling a bit. The fleet was huddled around the Yangtze River port, and the planes seemed to hesitate a bit. Their momentum of continuing westward was obviously stopped by the whole line. Head Mazi came twice, Lao Dan fell asleep once, and was caught bragging to college students the second time.The leader of the pockmarks really had more pockmarks. When Lao Dan saw that face, he thought of a pot of noodles with a lot of peppercorns.Head Mazi didn't bring medals to him and Erzi, he just touched him and looked at him, punched him lightly, and went away with his hands behind his back.Lao Dan was flustered by him, numb from the outside to the inside, not knowing what the pockmark was thinking. In order to fight against the Russian planes that helped in the war, the Japanese army brought in new planes, which flew fast and had thick bullets. They gradually gained the upper hand in the sky of Wuhan.There were many casualties among the people, and the building was gradually reduced to rubble.Fortunately, the national army's anti-aircraft artillery fire is still very intensive, and important military facilities are still intact. Every day, new and energetic troops march to the front line amidst the cheers of the citizens.Citizens desperately flocked to the streets, waving colorful flags and red flowers to send off these fearless warriors. Lao Dan learned from the newspapers read by college students that the outside battle was tough, and the Poyang Lake defense line and the northern Dabie Mountain defense line changed hands several times, causing blood to flow.The Japanese army increased its troops several times and concentrated its firepower to break through many fortresses. After paying a huge price, the armored forces wedged into the defense line of the national army and established fortresses with the support of paratroopers and air.The national army's outer defense line was breached by the sunrise, and the whole line was facing collapse, so it finally retreated in pain.Aircraft of the national army are becoming scarce day by day, the devils have taken over the air, and the precise bombing has left nowhere for the firepower in the defense line to hide.Air Force pilots of the United States and the Soviet Union fought side by side with the national army, but the strength was too different.The soldiers and civilians in Wuhan often saw the heroic pilots who fought more with less, were bullied, and were shot down one by one by the nimble little Japanese fighter jets.They didn't even spare the skydivers, and most of the pilots hanging in the air were smashed into sieves or fell off like weights.The citizens stared at it, wishing they could eat those devil pilots alive. Without the cover of the air force, the troops can only go to the position at night, and try to get entangled with the enemy as much as possible during the battle.After another month of bloody fighting, the national army used the hilly area in the east of the river bank as a mobile defense. Although they retreated steadily, the enemy died every step forward.Although the Japanese army had the superiority in the sea and air, they suffered losses on the ground.If you suffer a loss, you will be timid.After wedged into the Hukou defense line, the armored troops flinched a bit and held their positions for rest.The national army was able to keep the front line and put the reserve team that had arrived in time into the counter-offensive. They actively broke through the Japanese army's transportation line, fighting more and eating less.The Japanese army often had to pay a price of one to two to occupy some fortresses and positions. Their delicate little tanks did not get cheap in the positional warfare in the river basin.The Russians taught the national army how to fight tanks. They have been able to jump into the anti-tank trenches to attach explosives to the thing, or pour gasoline on it, and when the smoking devils emerge from the tank, they will shoot randomly and throw it away. Go in with a grenade, and fry a turtle in an urn. After hearing so much news, Lao Dan secretly concluded that in the past few months, although the national army suffered heavy casualties, the casualties were not as good as the Japanese army, and the Yangtze River defense line seemed to be able to hold.