War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 1884 The Survivors

On the battlefield filled with the strong stench of corpses, Wei Ran followed Old Man He in searching for survivors.

"Stretcher! There's someone alive here!"

Not far away, someone called out, and Old Man He immediately stumbled over.

"Not a plague cow cub"

Teacher He muttered something with a mixture of relief and disappointment, then he and Wei Ran moved the wounded man onto their stretcher and walked back.

This wounded soldier was able to stay conscious, which was rare. Judging from his injuries, it seemed that he had broken his hands and feet due to the fall, and a large scar on his forehead. However, it was inevitable that there was still a bayonet penetration wound on his shoulder - it seemed that maggots had grown on it.

"Do you recognize He Wenniu? He's the cook, about twenty years old, not very tall, with two buck teeth, and he looks very eye-catching when he smiles!" Old man He, who was walking in front, asked before lifting the stretcher.

Hearing this, the wounded soldier with chapped lips shook his head weakly, then raised his unbroken hand with difficulty and pointed in a direction - the direction where He Wenniu and Cheng Bingquan fell.

"Don't move, I'll take you to the hospital right away."

Old Man He just glanced in the direction of the injured man's finger, then retracted his gaze, bent down and lifted the stretcher.

"Don't you want to go take a look?"

After Wei Ran tied the rope to the stretcher, he raised his camera and took a picture of the limp wounded man on the stretcher.

"Next time," Old Man He replied without turning his head, but he inevitably quickened his pace.

Shaking his head slightly, Wei Ran walked along the way, looking for opportunities to raise his camera from time to time and press the shutter again and again, capturing the high price paid for victory on the battlefield which was less than 200 meters wide.

Under the leadership of Old Man He, Wei Ran and he carried the wounded away from the battlefield shrouded in the stench of corpses and came to the field hospital along the rugged mountain road.

The conditions in this so-called field hospital are far worse than imagined.

There were wounded soldiers all over the ground, a few tents with patches on patches, and not many medical workers, and even less medicines than the medical workers. That was all there was.

"Put it here"

A female nurse who was doing something similar to triage greeted them with a hoarse voice.

Following the other party's instructions, the wounded on the stretcher was placed on a spread straw mat. Without taking a rest, Old Man He walked back carrying the stretcher.

He hurriedly raised his camera and took a few photos of the open-air field hospital filled with wounded soldiers. Wei Ran caught up with Old Man He while winding up the camera.

The two men stumbled back to the battlefield. Before Old Man He could walk towards the direction the wounded soldier had pointed, someone called them to hurry over and carried a seriously injured soldier with a bayonet stuck in his leg and whose stomach seemed to have been pierced by a bayonet.

"Hi!"

Old Man He took a look at the direction he failed to go, then hurried towards the field hospital carrying the stretcher.

For the following afternoon, Old Man He was like a diligent old ox, carrying Wei Ran and the stretcher between them, going back and forth between the battlefield and the field hospital again and again.

In the midst of this busyness, the sun gradually sank into the horizon, and the position where they lifted the wounded was getting farther and farther away from the place where He Wenniu died.

Finally, as the sun was about to be completely blocked by the mountains, the soldier in charge of directing the rescue work blew the whistle, and all the civilians walked silently to the field kitchen to ask for a bowl of wild vegetable and brown rice porridge to fill their stomachs.

But Old Man He did not walk in that direction. Instead, he pushed the stretcher to Wei Ran, picked up a piece of rag torn off the Japanese soldier and wrapped it around the pine stick that he had used as a walking stick. Then he lit a fire that had been ignited by the battle but had never been extinguished, and staggered back to the battlefield.

Seeing this, Wei Ran folded the stretcher and carried it on his shoulder, then walked over with one foot deep and one foot shallow.

After walking a few steps, he noticed that the man with the whistle stopped Old Man He, and he also saw Old Man He kneel down and kowtow and beg over and over again.

I also saw the young man with the slanting belt helping Old Man He up, and after a brief hesitation, he took out a square flashlight from his pocket and handed it to Old Man He.

At the same time, Wei Ran also walked behind Old Man He and stood in front of the man with the diagonal leather belt.

"Take good care of the old man," the man with the slanted belt instructed, "I'll ask the cook to save some food for you."

"Thank you"

Wei Ran bowed seriously, and the man with the belt raised his hand to salute.

Walking around the officer, Old Man He held a square flashlight with a dim light in one hand and the cane that he had briefly used as a torch in the other. He muttered "Sick cowboy" over and over again and returned step by step to the steep battlefield.

Behind him, Wei Ran sighed and took out a flashlight to help the other person illuminate the corpses around him, some fresh and some smelly, while also looking for Cheng Bingquan, whom he had not found at the beginning.

"The plague cow, the plague cow? What plague cow?"

Old man He shouted in a hoarse voice, and he gradually squatted down, even kneeling down and moving little by little.

Wei Ran knew that the old man might have night blindness, but even so, he still did not give up looking.

"Ugh"

Wei Ran sighed, walked over to help Old Man He up, leaned the stretcher against a stone, and then carried the man on his back.

"Tell me what your son looks like."

Wei Ran walked away and asked, "I'll help you find it."

"My son, the plague cow, is not very big, has two buck teeth, and looks very eye-catching when he smiles!"

Old Man He repeated it almost subconsciously, and Wei Ran even wondered how many times he had repeated this sentence.

"I'll help you find it"

Wei Ran held the other person's light body tighter on his back.

"Don't worry about it! I haven't made any progress yet!"

Old man He spoke in Sichuan dialect, which Wei Ran didn't quite understand, but it made him walk faster.

Just as Old Man He was struggling to get down, Wei Ran also stopped and said, pretending to be out of breath, "I can't walk anymore, take a rest, take a rest."

"You idiot, you idiot, you idiot! You idiot!"

Old man He, who was put down by Wei Ran, was about to blame Wei Ran, but he saw the corpse that Wei Ran "accidentally" illuminated with the flashlight.

Due to the hot weather, the corpse had begun to turn black, and the grass that Wei Ran had pulled off to cover his eyes had also turned dry and wilted.

But even so, Old Man He recognized his son at a glance.

Amid the old father's grief-stricken cries, Wei Ran sighed, found a stone to sit on, pulled over a fresh-looking Japanese corpse, searched his body for a while, and took out half a pack of cigarettes and a box of matches.

Taking out a cigarette that still had the stench of corpse in it, Wei Ran put it between his lips and lit it. Amid the smoke, he silently looked at the father and son, and watched Old Man He hold his son in his arms.

"Wash his body and bury him." Wei Ran said after finishing a cigarette, "I'll help you."

Old man He nodded and let Wei Ran leave. He took the stretcher from the way they came, and together with Wei Ran, they carried He Wenniu's body onto the stretcher, and together they carried it to the river bank at the foot of the mountain.

As the night grew darker, Old Man He resolutely refused Wei Ran's help and undressed He Wenniu's dirty clothes by himself.

Amid the sound of rushing water, Old Man He carefully washed He Wenniu's body and washed away the maggots that had grown in his mouth.

Then, he carefully scrubbed the clothes he had taken off, and after wringing them dry, he helped He Wenniu put them back on with great difficulty.

After everything was done, the two men lifted He Wenniu back onto the stretcher, but Old Man He didn't know where to carry his son He Wenniu.

"Do you want to go home?" Wei Ran asked.

"Forget it! Get up here, save the people first, come back to pick up the bones the next day!"

As Old Man He was speaking, he asked Wei Ran to put down the stretcher, bent down to pick up a big knife that belonged to someone unknown, looked around, walked to a big tree, chopped the trunk a few times to leave a conspicuous mark, and then began to dig a grave under the tree.

"Let me help you"

As Wei Ran spoke, he had already taken out the engineer shovel from the metal notebook, and searched around with a flashlight. He picked up a sharp engineer shovel that belonged to someone unknown and handed it to the other party. Then, together with the other party, they started digging a grave under the tree.

"My youngest son, Plague Ox, got rid of all the troubles planted by the Japanese devils."

Old Man He said proudly while vigorously digging the soil mixed with a lot of stones, "I have no shame on my face!"

"He's a hero," Wei Ran said to himself, "He killed a lot of devils."

"Crack!"

The engineer shovel in Old Man He's hand hit a rock with such force that some sparks flew.

Wei Ran opened his mouth and said nothing more. He continued to dig the grave with the other party in silence until the grave was big enough for He Wenniu to sleep in.

This time, Old Man He once again refused Wei Ran's help. He picked up his son He Wenniu with difficulty while roaring, and carefully placed him into the grave which was barely half a meter deep. He then covered the young body with handfuls of soil.

At the same time, Wei Ran also carved the words "Tomb of Anti-Japanese Warrior He Wenniu" on the side of the big tree with the tip of the engineer shovel.

While he waited patiently, Old Man He scooped up soil mixed with gravel, shell casings and even mortar fragments again and again to cover He Wenniu and built a small grave.

Finally, he tremblingly took out the tobacco pouch from his pocket, rolled up a cigarette, lit it, and gently placed it on the small, simple grave.

"Let's go, let's go back."

Finally, Old Man He patted the small grave mound gently and gave some instructions. Then he stood up shakily, holding the square flashlight given to him by the officer with the slanted belt, and walked silently to the other end of the battlefield.

Behind him, Wei Ran took a last look at He Wenniu's grave, bent down, picked up the stretcher and put it on his shoulder, also holding a flashlight, and followed the old man He in the direction they came from.

When they returned to the open space that served as the field kitchen, the officer with the slanted belt had indeed left dinner for them - two large bowls of brown rice porridge mixed with wild vegetables and leaves.

After finishing the bowl of dinner that seemed to be mixed with the stench of corpse with his eyes closed, Wei Ran found a nearby sheltered trench to accommodate the absent-minded old man He, while he himself walked in the dark towards the direction of the field hospital not far away.

After randomly asking a military doctor, Wei Ran found out that this place was actually some distance away from the field hospital.

But this distance is particularly cruel. Only those who survive after first aid and emergency treatment will be sent to the field hospital, and those who cannot survive will be sent to the field hospital.
After asking the other party where those who could not be saved would be sent, Wei Ran held up a flashlight and walked towards the collective cemetery which was also not far away.

However, he didn’t know whether he was “too late” or not. There were already many corpses neatly lying in the graves, and he did not find Cheng Bingquan nearby.

Not giving up, he searched among the wounded again, but still did not find Cheng Bingquan. However, he unexpectedly found Cheng Bingquan's big knife - it was also full of gaps.

"Do you know where the soldier who used this big knife went?" Wei Ran stopped a night patroller and asked.

“I have no impression”

The nurse seemed to see Wei Ran's anxiety, shook his head and said, "You can come and ask during the day."

"Okay." Wei Ran nodded, put the big knife on his back, returned to the trench, sat down against the wall and closed his eyes.

That night, he did not sleep well because of the moisture coming up from the ground. The old man He next to him tossed and turned all night long, and only fell asleep with difficulty when it was almost dawn.

Finally, with the sound of a sharp whistle, everyone got up one after another, scratching the red and swollen parts of their bodies caused by bites, yawning and going to get breakfast. After breakfast, they once again devoted themselves to the work of cleaning up the battlefield.

"You two"

The officer with the oblique belt who lent the flashlight to Old Man He yesterday stopped the two of them and said expressionlessly, "You two, help transport the wounded."

"Thank you"

Wei Ran thanked him in a low voice, and the latter nodded slightly.

Pushing Old Man He to the field hospital, Wei Ran, who had a big knife on his back, had no time to ask where Cheng Bingquan, the owner of the knife, had gone, before he was urged to carry a wounded soldier who had just been rescued overnight and sent him to a field hospital farther away.

Along the way, Wei Ran still took out his camera and pressed the shutter from time to time, but the old man He who was traveling with him remained silent all the way, and no one knew what he was thinking.

Along the rugged mountain road, the two followed the stretcher team and carried the wounded to the hospital.

Taking this opportunity, Wei Ran also searched the ward, but once again failed to find any trace of Cheng Bingquan.

Where did he go?

Wei Ran thought secretly as he followed Old Man He and carried the medicines on a stretcher back to the front-line field hospital. He then carried the second wounded soldier and ran to the field hospital.

As the two of them went back and forth again and again, and Wei Ran couldn't remember how many times they had sent the wounded to the field hospital, Old Man He finally staggered, his knees bent, and he was about to fall to the ground.

"Are you ok?"

Wei Ran grabbed the stretcher and used the straps to pull the man from falling to the ground, then called for help from a stretcher-bearer passing by.

"What happened to him?" asked a young stretcher-bearer.

“Tired and fainted”

Wei Ran responded hurriedly, and together with the other party, he put Old Man He on a stretcher and ran towards the field hospital they had just left.

Fortunately, after some observation and treatment, it was found that Old Man He was just fainted from exhaustion.

"Send him to the village over there to recuperate. There are no extra beds in the hospital."

The doctor raised his hand and pointed in a direction, then hurried to treat the other injured people who were sent there.

After thanking the stretcher bearer for his help, Wei Ran took off the big knife from his back, then carried Old Man He on his back again, took Cheng Bingquan's big knife in his hand and walked towards the direction the doctor pointed.

Gradually, they were getting farther and farther away from the battlefield, and the small village that was requisitioned in front of them was getting closer and closer.

"Here! Bring the shuttle over here!"

As soon as he entered the village, a woman who looked about the same age as Old Man He immediately greeted him.

Seeing this, Wei Ran didn't hesitate and carried Old Man He on his back and followed him into a low wooden house.

At this time, there was an old doctor who looked to be over 60 years old in the wooden house, treating the wounded and changing the dressings for the room full of wounded people.

Next to the old doctor, there was a little boy who looked no more than seven or eight years old, who was helping him.

Before he could put Old Man He down, Wei Ran was stunned. He saw Cheng Bingquan!
At this time, Cheng Bingquan was lying unconscious on a low bed against the wall, his body wrapped in gauze.

"Why is he here?" Wei Ran pointed at Cheng Bingquan and asked in surprise.

"He was brought in the other day. The doctor said he was badly injured and couldn't be saved."

The doctor answered in a loud voice while busying himself, "My son-in-law couldn't bear to see such evil, so he came here to pick him up. Do you recognize this man?"

"Can he survive?" Wei Ran asked.

"Let's see what the Bodhisattva will do."

The doctor sighed and said, "What a waste of medical treatment!"

"Please try to save him."

Wei Ran bowed solemnly to the old doctor, and then placed the big knife in his hand next to Cheng Bingquan.

Turning his head to look at Wei Ran, and then at the old man He who was sent by Wei Ran, the old doctor gently waved his hand, "I'll do it all over again!"

"thank you"

As Wei Ran spoke, he raised his camera and took a picture of the unconscious Cheng Bingquan.

"Click"

Amid the overly crisp shutter sounds, white light rushed towards him, and Wei Ran also breathed a sigh of relief. No matter what, at least Cheng Bingquan was still alive at this moment, so the next one should be Cheng Guanyin, right?
As he waited, the white light gradually dissipated and he smelled the blood again.

When everything around him gradually became clear, he found that he was sitting on a wooden boat.

This small wooden boat was not very big, and the people sitting on it seemed to be some tired laborers. Even including Wei Ran and the boatman, there were only five people in total.

However, among these five people, there is no Old Man He, and naturally there is no Cheng Bingquan.

With the oars gently hitting the water, the boat drifted downstream, but never strayed too far from the river bank.

"Is there a dead person hiding on that river bank?"

At this moment, a man dressed as a civilian on the boat pointed at the river bank and said loudly, "Boat boss, come over and have a look! It might be one of our brothers."

"There are dead bodies everywhere!" said the boatman, but he still moved closer.

However, as the small wooden boat gradually approached, Wei Ran's heart trembled. It was Cheng Guanyin!

At this time, Cheng Guanyin's upper body was blocked by a tree growing by the river. As the water flowed, his body kept rising and falling, and he might break away from the tree and float downstream at any time.

"Official seal! Official seal of Cheng!" Wei Ran shouted at the other party.

"Do you recognize him?" asked a civilian on the boat.

"I know him, he's my friend!" Wei Ran replied.

"Brothers, please help pull him onto the boat!" The civilian shouted immediately, and everyone on the boat responded immediately.

Soon, the small wooden boat came closer thanks to the boatman's efforts, and Cheng Guanyin was pulled onto the boat by everyone.

"He's still standing there talking!"

One of the civilians stretched out his hand to feel Cheng Guanyin's breath and said, "Boat boss, row for your life! He's still breathing!"

Following this urging, the boat owner responded with something, and the speed of rowing the boat indeed increased a lot.

At the same time, Wei Ran also checked the condition of Cheng Guanyin.

The wound on his leg caused by the bayonet was tied up with the "diagonal leather belt" he was wearing, and even the big knife that was originally tied to his hand was now carried on his back.

In addition, he had a box gun on him and even a camera belonging to Yang Qizhi hanging around his neck.

Could it be that.
While Wei Ran was secretly guessing, he also untied the belt on the other person's leg. Immediately, blood slowly flowed out from his wound.

Fortunately, judging from the speed of the bleeding, the knife did not injure the artery.

"Don't untie it, it will..."

"If you don't untie it to circulate his blood, his legs will be useless!"

Another porter on the boat said, "Captain, head for Shau Kei Wan ahead. There might be someone there who can save us!"

"I know this road very well!" the boatman responded loudly while rowing even harder.

"Is your friend a slanted official?"

The civilian who had just made the proposal looked at Cheng Guanyin and the rare items on him curiously.

"He's a communications soldier, a communications soldier of the 33rd Regiment. His name is Cheng Guanyin." Wei Ran spoke as detailed as possible. He hoped that these people could remember his identity.

"military power."

Just at this moment, Cheng Guanyin uttered a muttering, and Wei Ran immediately tightened the belt around his legs.

Unfortunately, after such a short while, Cheng Guanyin fell into coma again.

With the urging and even rotation of the porters on this boat, the wooden boat, which was already drifting downstream, was getting faster and faster.

Finally, the boat docked at a slightly busy pier. The laborers on the boat helped Wei Ran carry Cheng Guanyin and ran with him to a small village not far away.

Under the guidance of these enthusiastic laborers, Cheng Guanyin was sent to a two-story wooden house.

Unfortunately.
Wei Ran sighed secretly. This was not the village where Cheng Bingquan was treated, and there were not even any wounded people here.

As he watched, an old man who looked to be around seventy years old walked out from the inner room of the herbal medicine shop that was filled with the aroma of medicine.

He just took a look at Cheng Guanyin's wound, then asked everyone to help take off his uniform and even weapons and put them in a bamboo basket, and then began to treat the external injuries on his leg.

"Drifting down from upstream?" asked the old man.

"It was fished out halfway," the laborers and boatmen who were driven aside said in unison.

The old man nodded, but then said nothing more.

While he was busy, medicine was applied to Cheng Guanyin's wound. After taking his pulse slowly, the old man walked to the chest of drawers not far away and started to prepare medicine.

Seeing this, the laborers and boatmen looked at each other, said hello to Wei Ran, and then dispersed, leaving him alone to guard Cheng Guanyin who was lying on the rattan bed.

"Did we win?" Cheng Guanyin, who had woken up at some point, asked weakly, "Did we win or lose?"

"I won," Wei Ran replied after coming back to his senses.

Hearing this, Cheng Guanyin breathed a sigh of relief, and then fainted again.