Liang Jian: Commander, save some for me

Destroying the radio and codebooks was the only thing Hisao Tani could do now; all that remained was to fight the enemy to the death.

"Yes, sir!" The Japanese regimental commander immediately sent someone to relay the order, and then left the command post with Tani Hisao. They crouched down and walked in the trenches.

Gunfire continued unabated. Hisao Tani's face was grave. He held a pistol in his hand and peered down the mountain.

Hundreds of enemy soldiers in camouflage uniforms were seen attacking up the mountain. Their attack was fierce, and although their formation was scattered, they were able to coordinate with each other, a feat only seasoned soldiers could accomplish.

Only by going through many battles together with comrades can one achieve tacit cooperation.

"Division Commander, the enemy's marksmanship is incredibly accurate, and they fire at an extremely fast pace, as if they don't even need to aim," a Japanese lieutenant colonel said from the side.

The key point is that the enemy can fire so accurately and hit the target, while also dodging their soldiers' attacks, as if they misjudged their soldiers' firing. This is quite terrifying.

"No matter how strong the enemy is, we must kill as many enemies as possible today to lighten the burden on the troops behind us!" Tani Hisao said. He could now understand why Itagaki Seishiro was so afraid of this army, because the gap between them was simply too great.

It's fair to say that, apart from Yamamoto's special attack force, he couldn't think of any other unit that could defeat this force with the same number of soldiers!
Boom boom boom...

Da da da………

Under the command of the observers, the artillerymen at the artillery positions constantly adjusted the muzzles of their guns to ensure accurate hits on the enemy. This caused the Japanese soldiers great suffering, as if the shells had eyes and no matter where they ran, shells would fall on them.

Seeing this, Tani Hisao was also terrified, not understanding how the enemy could command artillery to carry out precise strikes in such a short time.

"Division Commander, the enemy's artillery fire is too accurate. It's as if they have a pair of eyes watching us while also being able to quickly relay messages to the artillery positions. I suspect they might also have walkie-talkies, which is why they can issue orders so quickly!" The Japanese regimental commander began to speculate.

Unless the enemy's artillery observers have walkie-talkies, it is impossible to transmit messages quickly.

“That’s not surprising. Their walkie-talkies were probably captured from us,” Tani Hisao said. Walkie-talkies were only issued to the battalion level, and they would be destroyed immediately if danger arose. However, it was also possible that they could not be destroyed so quickly and thus were captured by the enemy.

As a result, the enemy used their walkie-talkies to make their artillery positions fire more accurately.

"Damn it, these enemies are already powerful, but I didn't expect their artillery to be so formidable!" the Japanese regimental commander cursed. He felt that these enemies were far too powerful and terrifying, and could not be trained by ordinary people.

"Sigh... I'm a little worried about whether we can still wipe out this force." Tani Hisao sighed helplessly.

The enemy's current combat capability far exceeds that of their Class A divisions, and the enemy is also cooperating with the Eighth Route Army and the Jin-Sui Army, bringing their forces to 20,000.

Although the Eighth Route Army and the Jin-Sui Army were not to be feared, they were commanded by Mu Jin, and Mu Jin's troops were also cooperating with them, which made the enemy even stronger.

He felt that to inflict heavy casualties on Mu Jin, at least five brigades, totaling more than 50,000 men, would be needed to severely damage Mu Jin; otherwise, it would be virtually impossible.

“As soon as something happens here, Division Commander Itagaki will definitely know that four brigades are no match for Mujin, and they will definitely send more people over!” the Japanese regimental commander said. Itagaki Seishiro was, after all, a commander, and he couldn’t possibly be unaware of the situation.

"That's what they say, but the main force of the Eighth Route Army is probably also eyeing us covetously; they have quite a few men."

"I estimate that we'll need to transfer several more divisions from other war zones, and they'll have to be top-tier divisions," Tani Hisao said gravely. He felt that more troops needed to be transferred to resolve the problems here.

"I never expected that Mu Jin's group would be so troublesome. If the Yamamoto Special Attack Corps were still around, there would still be hope of dealing with them." The Japanese regimental commander sighed, and couldn't help but think of the Yamamoto Special Attack Corps.

Having witnessed the fighting prowess of Yamamoto's special attack force, they felt that the gap between the two sides was not significant.

Unfortunately, Yamamoto's special operations team was wiped out by the enemy before they could play a significant role, leaving them without a powerful ally.

The most heartbroken person must be Commander Shinotsuka. After all, he had spent a lot of resources training this unit, but no results were achieved. All the resources he had spent were essentially wasted.

At this moment, the enemy below the mountain had already breached the second line of defense and occupied the trenches of the second line of defense, and was now advancing towards the third line of defense.

The enemy's offensive was almost unstoppable, incredibly fierce.

Hisao Tani was already somewhat numb. In just over ten minutes, their two lines of defense had been breached and occupied by the enemy. The key point was that, so far, he hadn't seen many enemies killed.

You have to understand, this is the enemy attacking the mountain. The enemy has absolutely no geographical advantage, yet they've managed to defeat them like this.

Da da da………

Bang bang bang…

The special operations soldiers kept attacking the Japanese soldiers on the mountain, while the machine gunners maintained intense firepower suppression.

In contrast, the Japanese side fared much worse. Their machine guns were unable to operate, preventing them from providing effective fire suppression, which allowed the special operations soldiers to easily advance.

As time went on, the number of Japanese soldiers dwindled, and their attacks from several directions proceeded extremely smoothly.

Lu Changgong's attack had even reached the Japanese third line of defense, where soldiers from the reconnaissance battalion were engaged in bayonet fighting. With their superior strength, the Japanese soldiers in the trenches were no match for them.

"Quickly eliminate the Japanese soldiers here and go support the others. Remember, capture the Japanese division commander alive. Don't let the Japanese division commander die!" Lu Changgong shouted the order.

Lu Changgong had already given the order to capture Tani Hisao alive before the attack, but to avoid any unforeseen circumstances, he wanted to remind him again.

Hisao Tani, as the division commander, would never allow the enemy to die so easily, otherwise he would be letting down the civilians who died in the massacre.

When the Japanese troops in one direction were wiped out, the Japanese troops in the other three directions were almost wiped out as well. In less than half an hour, the Japanese troops on the mountain were almost completely annihilated.

As for Tani Hisao, seeing that the situation was not good, he planned to shoot himself, but a soldier discovered him and shot him in the hand holding the gun. At the same time, the soldier quickly stepped forward and subdued Tani Hisao, which made Tani Hisao furious.

"Baka! Do you have any sense of samurai spirit at all?!" Tani Hisao was pinned to the ground, cursing in Chinese. Cold sweat poured down his forehead, and his hand, which had been shot, throbbed with burning pain. "Who the hell talks to you about samurai spirit? You culprit, you think you can just die like this? No way!" the soldier holding Tani Hisao retorted.

The thought of Tani Hisao killing so many ordinary people made him furious.

"Don't worry, you won't die easily. You'll be executed by slow slicing like that Nakajima Kesago!" the soldier said with a smile.

He also slashed Nakajima Kesago back then, and now he has another chance to do it.

"What?! What did you say?!" Tani Hisao asked, his eyes wide with shock. He remembered that Nakajima Kesago had been killed on the spot by the enemy! How could he be executed by slow slicing?

"You probably don't know yet, but what you thought was a corpse was actually the corpse of an ordinary soldier. The reason for doing this was to prevent your people from chasing us. Don't worry, you'll have a double in a little while!" the soldier said cheerfully.

"No! You can't do this to me! I'm a division commander, a high-ranking officer! You should give me a proper death!" Tani Hisao panicked completely. He couldn't even imagine the scene of the enemy cutting pieces of his flesh off his body. How painful that would be!

"Heh, what's it to me!" the soldier sneered. He gagged Tani Hisao with something, not wanting to listen to him anymore, and tied Tani Hisao up tightly with rope.

They then ordered their men to strip Tani Hisao of his uniform and search for Japanese corpses that were similar in build to Tani Hisao but had disfigured faces.

Lü Changgong arrived at this time as well.

"This is the Japanese division commander?! Are you sure you haven't arrested the wrong person?!" Lu Changgong glanced at Tani Hisao in front of him, then looked at the soldier beside him and asked. He had never seen Tani Hisao before.

"There's no doubt about it. He was accompanied by Japanese officers, and those officers all died protecting him. He even tried to commit suicide just now, but I stopped him."
"So he must be the Japanese division commander." The soldier replied, adding that he had personally witnessed Japanese colonels and lieutenant colonels taking bullets for this Japanese division commander.

"That's good. Our operation can be considered a complete success!" Lü Changgong smiled. Capturing Gu Shoufu alive was their mission. Of course, it would be fine if he died, but it would be a pity.

"Send a telegram to the regimental commander immediately, telling him that we have taken down the 6th Division's command post and captured the division commander, Hisao Tani, alive. Request further instructions!" Lü Changgong immediately gave the order, as this good news naturally had to be told to the regimental commander as soon as possible.

"Woo woo~~" Tani Hisao made a wooing sound, as if he had something to say.

"Quiet down, you little devils." A soldier next to him raised his hand and slapped Tani Hisao on the head.

“Take the contents out of his mouth. I want to hear what he has to say,” Lü Changgong said.

"Yes." The soldier quickly removed the cloth from Tani Hisao's mouth.

"Are you the commander?!" Tani Hisao asked.

"Is there a problem?!" Lu Changgong looked at the other party coldly.

"Do you dare to have a samurai duel with me?!" Tani Hisao said.

"You don't deserve it!" Lu Changgong couldn't help but laugh after hearing this. If it were any other Japanese soldier, he would have really made a move, but this Japanese soldier happened to be Tani Hisao, and he didn't want to kill Tani Hisao directly.

"What?! You don't dare?! You're so strong, yet you're afraid of someone like me with an injured hand. It seems your strength is nothing special! If you're really afraid, you might as well kneel down and kowtow three times, and I'll spare you!" Gu Shoufu said, his tone full of sarcasm. He was trying to provoke Lü Changgong and force him to duel with him.

He knew he was no match for Lü Changgong, but dying in a duel would at least leave him with some dignity, which was better than being executed by the enemy by a thousand cuts and dying without any dignity.

"You little devil, are you trying to provoke me?! Sorry, I don't fall for that. Gag him! Keep an eye on him, don't let him commit suicide!" Lü Changgong naturally knew that this was Gu Hisao's provocation, and ordered the soldiers to gag Gu Hisao again.

This infuriated Tani Hisao, who struggled incessantly, but to no avail. The soldiers holding him were simply too strong, and he couldn't break free.

.........

Taiyuan, Japanese military camp, command post!

Seishiro Itagata was still thinking that if Hisao Tani could be used as bait and succeeded, their mission would be complete, and he wouldn't have to commit seppuku anymore.

"Division Commander, something terrible has happened!" The Japanese brigade commander rushed in, pushing open the door in a panic.

"Baka! What's the rush?! What happened?!" Seishiro Itagaki said irritably!
"Division Commander, Division Commander Tani Hisao has been attacked by the enemy!" the Japanese brigade commander hurriedly reported.

"What?! What's going on?!" Seishiro Itagata jumped to his feet, clearly shocked by what he had just witnessed.

"Tani Hisao just sent a telegram saying that they were attacked by the enemy, and the enemy that attacked them is that Northeast Army!" the Japanese brigade commander said.

"Impossible! Didn't they just ambush Yamamoto's special forces?! How did they suddenly run to Tani Hisao's side?!" said Itagaki Seishiro.

"Is it possible that the enemy is actually attacking us from three directions?" the Japanese brigade commander said.

As soon as he said that, Seishiro Itagaki fell silent. That's how it is now, given the current situation.

"So, in other words, the enemy not only dealt with the 33rd Brigade and Yamamoto's special attack force, but can also deal with Tani Hisao?!" Seishiro Itaga said.

"Yes, yes!" the Japanese brigade commander replied, swallowing hard.

"How many people are there?! Shouldn't they only have five or six thousand?! To deal with the 33rd Brigade, they should send at least half of them, right?! So the rest of them are for dealing with Yamamoto's special attack team?! How come there's another unit here?!" Itagaki Seishiro really wanted to curse.

I thought that all of Mu Jin's forces were being used to deal with the 33rd Brigade and Yamamoto's special attack force, but now it seems that this is not the case.

Moreover, the enemy attacked very close together, indicating that the enemy had given the order long ago, but because it was daytime, the enemy was some distance from the commander, which caused the delay.

"Division Commander, we've completely lost contact with Division Commander Tani Hisao now. What should we do?!" the Japanese brigade commander retorted. (End of Chapter)