Bright Sword: From Northwest Shanxi to Changjin Lake, a Hundred Battles, a Hundred Victories

Chapter 187 Li Yunlong: Fire! Fire! Fire!
Therefore, under Li Yunlong's orders, the main force of the Independent Regiment immediately launched an attack on Lingshou County.

Li Yunlong is quite arrogant now, with seven battalions and two artillery companies under his command.

All the directly subordinate units under my command exceeded six thousand people.

Lingshou County, being a county of average importance, had only about 200 Japanese soldiers plus another 200 Japanese soldiers who had withdrawn from the outer strongholds, totaling about 500 Japanese soldiers and 1,500 puppet troops.

The troop strength ratio has reached 8 to 1!

Yes, Li Yunlong didn't really treat the puppet troops as human beings, counting five puppet troops as one Japanese soldier.

With such a large troop advantage, plus the three infantry guns, twelve mortars, and ten flying thunder cannons in Li Yunlong's hands.

An absolute gap in strength has already formed.

However, even with such a great advantage, Li Yunlong did not launch a full-scale attack from all sides as he had done when he attacked Ping'an County.

Instead, they focused their main attack on the west, while launching feint attacks on the north and south, and refrained from attacking the east.

Using a tactic of surrounding three sides while leaving one open, they captured Lingshou County as quickly as possible.

As soon as the battle began, the soldiers of the Independent Regiment quickly advanced and reached the outskirts of the Japanese county town.

Li Yunlong was very skilled at leading troops, and the troops he trained had a unique spirit and morale.

Even when facing enemies stronger than themselves, these warriors would not show the slightest fear.

At Li Yunlong's command, these soldiers would charge forward with a roar, ready to fight the enemy to the death.

"Zhu Zi, fire the cannon! Bomb those Japanese devils on the city wall to death!"

Disregarding his own safety, Li Yunlong personally went to the front line and ordered the artillery company to destroy the Japanese firing positions.

Zhu Zi survived the Battle of Cangyunling and did not die from the Japanese bullets.

It was precisely because of Zhu Zi, such an excellent artilleryman, that Li Yunlong was able to build up his troops so quickly.

After all, having a skilled gunner on the battlefield can sometimes turn the tide of battle.

Gunners paired with artillery can destroy enemy strongpoints from a distance, reducing troop casualties and increasing the success rate of attacks.

Speaking of which, Zhu Zi and Chen Ming have some connection; Zhu Zi could be considered Chen Ming's student.

Zhu Zi attended a talent training class organized by Chen Ming and systematically learned about artillery.

After all, he came from a self-taught background and relied on God's favor to make a living, so he lacked a lot of knowledge about artillery.

Let him play with a mortar; he'll be adept at striking enemies he can see.

But once it's replaced by long-range artillery, without any reference points, it's not something that can be learned just by talent.

After Zhu Zi went to the talent training class established by Chen Ming, he not only gained a lot of practical experience, but also systematically learned artillery knowledge.

As things stand, give Zhu Zi a mountain gun, and he can handle it perfectly well.

After receiving Li Yunlong's order, Zhu Zi immediately ordered the artillery to adjust their angle and aim at the Japanese machine gun positions.

"put!"

"Bang bang bang!"

Three shells were fired from the cannon barrel and landed on the Japanese firing positions.

"Bang bang bang!"

Three fireballs appeared, destroying the machine gun emplacements on the Japanese city wall and immediately reducing the firepower density.

100% hit rate!
His own talent, coupled with systematic learning, and the added advantage of Chen Ming's badge group.

If even pillars can't destroy fixed firing points within line of sight, then he can forget about being an outstanding student in Chen Ming's artillery department when he goes out into the world.

"Haha, well done! When we get back, I'll reward you with half a pound of sweet potato liquor!"

Li Yunlong said happily.

"Commander, can we have something else? We're tired of sweet potato liquor." Zhu Zi said with a grin.

“What do you want? Tell me.” Li Yunlong asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Commander, could I have a couple of sips of the Fenjiu in your cabinet?" Zhu Zi said, rubbing his hands together and licking his lips.

"You little bastard, you even know where I hide my Fenjiu liquor."

"You want to drink Fenjiu? No way! I'll just give you half a jin of sweet potato liquor. Do you want some?"

Li Yunlong said with a stern face.

"Yes, I want it, sweet potato fritters it is," Zhu Zi quickly said.

Sweet potato liquor is fine; it's good enough to have something to drink.

If it were anyone else, they wouldn't even be able to smell the alcohol, let alone the sweet potato liquor.

"Hehe, it's also my fault for not giving you a chance. If you can take down ten Japanese machine gun positions, I'll make an exception and give you a bowl of my Fenjiu liquor," Li Yunlong said.

"Really?" Zhu Zi's eyes lit up.

When have I ever told a lie?

"Yes, you said you'd reward me with half a pound of sweet potato liquor, but in the end you only gave me two roasted sweet potatoes," Zhu Zi said in a low voice.

"Huh?" Li Yunlong's eyes widened.

Is this never going to end? That's all ancient history, why are you bringing it up again?

He was in a special situation at the time, and he accidentally drank too much at a gathering with his old comrades.

If it were true, would Li Yunlong go back on his word?

Seeing Li Yunlong's expression, Zhu Zi immediately ran away.

The battle continues, and the soldiers of the Independent Regiment are indeed good soldiers.

Braving the hail of bullets from the Japanese invaders, they launched wave after wave of attacks. As the soldiers in front fell, even more soldiers took their place.

Finally, at 11:23 a.m., they successfully advanced the battle line to about 200 meters outside the city wall.

At this distance, the Flying Thunder Cannon can truly shine!
"Quickly, bring up my Flying Thunder Cannon and blast these damn bastards to death."

Li Yunlong shouted the order.

One by one, the soldiers fell to the muzzle of the Japanese guns. Li Yunlong felt sorry for them, but now he finally had a chance to make the Japanese taste the pain of being crushed to pieces.

Upon receiving the order, the soldiers of the Independent Regiment pushed wheelbarrows covered with sandbags for cover and installed the flying thunder cannons under the cover of Japanese bullets.

Zhu Zi was in control of the mortar, ready to use the shells to kill the Japanese grenade launcher soldiers and prevent the Japanese from using the grenade launchers to attack the Flying Thunder Cannon.

At 11:43 a.m., all the flying thunder cannons were in place and ready to fire explosive charges at any time.

Li Yunlong went directly to the cover behind the Flying Thunder Cannon.

"Pass on my order: Fire!"

"Bang bang bang!"

The explosive charge shot out and flew towards the Japanese soldiers on the city wall.

"Boom boom boom!"

"fire!"

"fire!"

Li Yunlong shouted three times, and all ten flying thunder cannons of the Independent Regiment fired a volley.

The effect was very gratifying. The huge fireball, carrying a heat wave, killed swathes of Japanese soldiers on the city wall, and brought their firepower to a standstill.

"Quickly, assault platoon, charge up and blow up the Japanese city wall!" Li Yunlong immediately gave the order.

While the Japanese city walls are currently undefended, we should hurry and blow them open so we can enter the county town. Once inside, the Independent Regiment will have overwhelming numerical superiority, and the Japanese will be finished.

"Boom!"

The soldiers of the Independent Regiment's assault platoon successfully blew up the Japanese city wall.

After all, it wasn't an important county town, and the city walls weren't that thick, so blowing up the city walls wouldn't be too difficult.

If it were the city walls of Shimen or Datong, it would be very difficult to breach them with explosives.

After all, given the current gunpowder power of the Independent Regiment, facing a city wall more than ten meters thick, it was almost an insurmountable obstacle.

"Hurry, hurry, hurry! Charge in and take the county town!" Li Yunlong said excitedly.

His independent regiment captured the Japanese city wall before noon, while Kong Jiedu had not yet launched an attack.

This time he won, successfully saving face in front of his old comrade-in-arms.

The soldiers of the Independent Regiment poured into the county town through the breach created by the blast, and engaged in fierce fighting with the Japanese soldiers inside.

As for the puppet troops, are they really going to fight against the main force of the "Independent Detachment"?
After the city fell, the puppet troops inside began to collapse.

The Japanese were powerless to do anything about it. They now only had a little over two hundred soldiers left, and they were overwhelmed by the offensive of the Independent Regiment.

There were simply no extra troops to control the puppet army.

As for the Japanese soldiers supervising the puppet troops, they had long been shot to death.

"Hmph, those little devils want our brothers to die? Dream on! I'm here to make money, not to die!" said a battalion commander of the puppet army.

It can only be said that the combat effectiveness of the puppet army has always been a mystery. Before a real battle, you can never know how effective a puppet army is.

However, most of the puppet troops are fine if they fight a winning battle, but if you ask them to charge into battle like the Japanese, forget about it.

"Quickly, the Seventh Battalion, block the Japanese and puppet troops at the East Gate, and the cavalry company, pursue the puppet troops who run out of the East Gate," Li Yunlong immediately ordered.

He surrounded the city on three sides but left one side open to reduce the puppet army's determination to fight to the death and to make the siege easier.

But now that the county town has fallen, the puppet troops have no chance to resist.

Upon receiving the order, the 7th Battalion of the Independent Regiment, which served as the reserve force, also began to emerge from their hiding places outside the east gate of Lingshou County.

The puppet troops who were preparing to run back to Shimen from the East Gate were terrified when they saw this. They fired a few symbolic shots and then surrendered.

The fighting in the county town was also nearing its end.

Without the city walls for defense, more than two hundred Japanese soldiers had to face a righteous mob attack from several times, or even more than ten times, the number of soldiers from the Independent Regiment.

Even if the Japanese soldiers were incredibly fierce and fearless, launching a suicide charge would be futile.

After all, no matter how strong one's fighting spirit is, it can't be stronger than bullets and shells.

A few bullets or a shell would be enough to make even the toughest Japanese soldiers back down.

At 2 p.m., Li Yunlong stood inside the Japanese military police headquarters in Lingshou County, unable to stop smiling.

"Send a telegram to headquarters: My Independent Regiment successfully annihilated the Japanese and puppet troops in Lingshou County at 2 PM and captured Lingshou County," Li Yunlong said triumphantly.

"Yes!"

Zhang Dabiao immediately ordered someone to send a telegram, reporting the situation to the brigade commander's headquarters.

The brigade commander looked at the battle report of Li Yunlong's Independent Regiment with a smile on his face.

As for Li Yunlong's troops launching an attack ahead of schedule, as long as they win the battle, it will be attributed to the frontline commanders' flexible response and keen grasp of the opportunity.

"Send a telegram to Li Yunlong's unit, instructing them to advance on Huolu County immediately after they have finished their rest and reorganization," the brigade commander said.

Meanwhile, Li Yunlong, who was in Lingshou County, had arrived at the Japanese warehouse and was taking inventory of the supplies in the Japanese county town.

"We still have to take the county town, all the good stuff is in the county town," Li Yunlong said with emotion.

Last time, they obtained supplies from Luyang, which led to a major development for the Independent Regiment.

Having captured another county town, Li Yunlong could easily muster at least two more battalions.

The Independent Regiment made such a fortune simply by capturing two county towns.

Li Yunlong couldn't even believe how wealthy the independent detachment that had raided so many counties in northern Shanxi was.

Chen Ming, on the other hand, followed the elite force route and consciously controlled the size of his troops.

If Chen Ming were to lead a team like Li Yunlong, the number of members could easily reach 70,000 or 80,000.

"Hurry up, hurry up, take all these good things away, don't leave a single bullet for the Japanese!" Li Yunlong said happily.

"Yes."

"Commander, orders from headquarters." Zhang Dabiao ran over and handed the telegram to Li Yunlong.

Li Yunlong took a look and said with a smile, "I told you, opportunities on the battlefield are fleeting. As long as we can win, the brigade commander won't hold these trivial matters against me."

Listening to Li Yunlong's words, Zhang Dabiao thought to himself, "If you really didn't care, you wouldn't have gone through so many ups and downs as a regimental commander, and you'd still be a regimental commander now."

However, Zhang Dabiao dared not say this directly, otherwise he would be scolded.

"Commander, what do we do now?" Zhang Dabiao asked.

"What else can we do? Follow orders and advance into Huolu County!" Li Yunlong said with dissatisfaction.

Zhang Dabiao, what's wrong with you? How could you ask such a question?

Li Yunlong didn't really like to disobey orders; he was still a good boy, Li Yunlong thought to himself.

"Yes."

Meanwhile, Kong Jie's troops made very good progress in attacking Pingshan County.

In order to create the illusion that this was the main force of the independent detachment, Chen Ming transferred four mountain guns from the detachment's directly subordinate mountain artillery battalion to Kong Jie.

With mountain guns and Kong Jie's artillery battalion, taking down the Japanese in the county town would be a piece of cake.
After all, Kong Jie's unit is one of the three main forces of the independent detachment, and their combat effectiveness is top-notch.

According to the four levels on Chen Ming's map: rabble, newly trained, battle-hardened, and elite troops.

A significant portion of Kong Jie's troops were seasoned veterans, while a smaller number were battle-hardened elites.

After so many years of fighting, the proportion of elite veterans in the Japanese army has greatly decreased, and a considerable number of soldiers are only at the level of rudimentary training.

The quality of our troops was far superior, and our firepower was also stronger than that of the Japanese. Our numerical advantage negated the Japanese's advantage of holding the city.

Whether measured by data on paper or by actual performance on the battlefield, the main force of the Independent Detachment was able to hold its own against the Japanese Class A divisions.

Taking down some county garrison troops and puppet troops is not difficult at all.

It's just that not all of Kong Jie's main force came this time; otherwise, Li Yunlong wouldn't have had a chance, as Kong Jie's single unit could have taken care of everything.

Around 3 p.m., after more than three hours of fighting, a part of Kong Jie's troops successfully entered Pingshan County and began to clear out the remaining resistance forces.

At 5 p.m., Kong Jie's entire unit was in Jingping Mountain.

After capturing Pingshan, Kong Jie did not linger. After reporting to the command headquarters, he immediately advanced into Huolu County according to orders.

Huolu County is the western gateway to Shimen. Once Huolu is captured, an attack on Shimen can be launched directly.

This was also the focus of the struggle between the brigade commander and the Japanese soldiers.

Huolu was a county through which the Zhengtai Railway passed, and the Japanese built a large number of machine gun bunkers and pillboxes there.

The garrison here consists of more than a regiment, plus a puppet brigade.

Meanwhile, artillery from Shimen can be deployed to reinforce the Huolu battlefield at any time.

It's fair to say that this is a very tough nut to crack; if you try to break it, you'll likely be smashed to pieces.

However, the brigade commander's unit was just a feint; they didn't really intend to fight the Japanese to the death. The bigger ones were in Datong!
Once the Japanese soldiers' attention is drawn to them, the strategic objective will be achieved.

P.S.: Didn't go fishing today. Another 10,000 words a day! Please give me some votes!
(End of this chapter)