On the eve of the fall of Liaodong, he led his troops in a remonstrance against the young marshal.

Lushun, the headquarters of the Kwantung Army.

Seishiro Itagaki stood in front of the large-scale map in the operations room, his hands behind his back, his fingers unconsciously rubbing against each other.

He wasn't wearing a coat; the sleeves of his white shirt were rolled up to his forearms, and two buttons on the collar were undone.

On the mahogany table in front of him lay a pile of documents: battle plans, troop deployment tables, and maps of garrison distribution along the railway line, each stamped with a red "Top Secret" seal.

His chief of staff, Kanji Ishihara, sat at the other end of the table, sharpening a pencil with a knife.

The sawdust rolled up from under the blade and landed next to the ashtray on the table, mixing with the cigarette butts.

The clock in the corner struck 10:30.

"It's time."

Ishihara didn't look up; he simply placed the sharpened pencil next to the drawing.

As soon as he finished speaking, the door to the operations room was pushed open, and a staff officer strode in, holding a telegram in both hands.

"Lord Itagaki, a call from Lieutenant Kawamoto!"

Seishiro Itagaki turned around, took three steps in two, and snatched the telegram.

He glanced at the telegram, his pupils contracted sharply, and then a slow smile spread across his lips.

"The Northeast Army blew up the Liutiaohu section of the South Manchurian Railway and launched an attack on our garrison."

He handed the telegram to Ishihara, his voice trembling slightly with suppressed excitement.

"Ishihara-kun, the war has begun."

Ishihara took the telegram, read it through, then laid it flat on the table and used the freshly sharpened pencil to underline several keywords in the telegram.

Northeast Army, bombing, attacking, retaliating...

After he finished drawing, he put down his pencil and slammed the telegram on the table.

"Let's get started."

Seishiro Itagaki had already reached the doorway.

He opened the door and, addressing the staff officers waiting in the corridor outside, uttered the order he had prepared for six months:

"Commander-in-Chief of the Kwantung Army, Shigehiro Honjo, has ordered the immediate issuance of a full-scale operational order!"

"The 2nd Independent Garrison Battalion is to immediately attack Beidaying."

"The 29th Regiment is heading straight for the inner city of Fengtian."

"The Lushun heavy artillery unit is to immediately bombard the Beidaying barracks!"

"The main force of the 2nd Division shall immediately advance towards Fengtian City."

"The Kwantung Army air force will launch an attack after dawn to bomb all military targets in Fengtian, Beidaying, and Yingkou."

"The above-mentioned units do not need to wait for further instructions and should determine the timing of firing on their own."

The corridor erupted in chaos.

The staff officers stood at attention and saluted, their boots clicking loudly on the wooden floor.

Some people ran to the radio transmitter, some pushed open the ammunition depot door and began distributing weapons, and some opened the safe to take out the battle map and codebook.

The entire Kwantung Army headquarters was like a war machine that had been started, with all its gears spinning at high speed simultaneously.

Seishiro Itagaki did not return to the operations room.

He stood at the end of the corridor, facing the direction of Fengtian.

The moon outside the window had risen to halfway up the sky, and the cool moonlight stretched his shadow long, casting it on the floor like a straightened bayonet.

Ishihara walked up to him and offered him a cigarette.

Itagaki took it, put it in his mouth, and his hands trembled wildly with excitement until he lit the cigarette after striking three matches.

"Itagaki-kun, have you thought about this?"

Ishihara lit a cigarette, took a drag, and slowly exhaled a cloud of smoke. "If headquarters finds out we bombed the railway ourselves, what will become of us?"

Itagaki Seishiro did not answer.

He took the cigarette out of his mouth; the butt was already deformed from being bitten.

"The fate of the nation rests on this gamble."

He ultimately only said these five words.

Ishihara nodded. That's right. A nation's destiny is something to be gambled for. If they can take over the Northeast, then they will all be heroes of the empire.

...........

Outside Fengtian City, at the Beidaying Camp.

Captain Masahiro Kawashima rode on a gray Mongolian horse, his saber hanging on the left side of the saddle, the scabbard tapping against the stirrups with each jolt of the horse's hooves.

Behind him, 180 soldiers from the 4th Company of the 2nd Independent Garrison Battalion were running forward in the night.

Their leggings were soaked with dew, and their military boots made a rhythmic, dull thud as they stepped on the frozen dirt road.

The bayonets were all fixed to the rifles, gleaming coldly in the moonlight, like a flowing river of knives.

Behind the column, four Type 92 infantry guns were being pulled by mules, their wheels crunching over the gravel on the road.

Kawashima was looking ahead through his binoculars.

The outline of Beidaying was already visible under the moonlight.

It was a military camp covering nearly a thousand acres, with walls about three meters high and a guard tower at each of the four corners.

The lights in the camp were scattered, and most of the barracks had already turned off their lights.

According to intelligence, the 7th Independent Brigade of the Northeast Army was stationed at Beidaying. It had a full strength of more than 8,000 men and was well-equipped, making it one of the most elite units in the Northeast Army.

But Kawashima Masashi wasn't worried at all.

Because behind him was the Empire's most elite 2nd Division, a full ten thousand men, taking Beidaying would be no problem at all.

Moreover, the Northeast Army was leaderless tonight, with Zhang Zuoxiang in Jinzhou and Zhang Xueliang in Beiping, making it impossible for them to arrive in time.

So what if there are eight thousand elite troops? A tiger without claws and teeth can't even kill a dog.

"Speed ​​up."

Kawashima took his sword off his saddle and hung it on his belt. "Once the shelling begins, the infantry will immediately rush in through the main gate, giving them no time to react."

"Your Excellency, Captain..."

The adjutant spurred his horse forward and lowered his voice, asking, "Don't we need to wait for official operational orders from headquarters?"

"The orders are on their way."

Kawashima flicked the hilt of his sword with his finger, making a crisp clinking sound. "Opportunities are fleeting. Lord Itagaki said that each unit should determine the timing of firing on its own."

"Now is the perfect time. The garrison at Beidaying has not received any orders to be on alert; they are all asleep right now."

"Do you think they'll continue sleeping after dawn?"

The adjutant fell silent.

The troop stopped in a sorghum field less than 800 meters from the main gate of Beidaying.

The sorghum had already been harvested, leaving only knee-high stubble in the field, which crunched underfoot.

The four infantry guns were advanced to their designated positions. The gunners knelt on the frozen ground, cranking the elevation and azimuth mechanisms, and the muzzles slowly rose, aiming at the camp gate and walls of the Beidaying camp.

Kawashima stood on horseback beside the sorghum field, raising his binoculars to observe the Beidaying camp one last time.

In the footage, a sentry stands on the watchtower at the camp gate, dozing off while leaning against the railing wrapped in a military overcoat.

A few more lights went out in the camp. Everything was going as he had predicted. The defenders were caught off guard, and the battle would be over in twenty minutes.

He put down his binoculars, placed his right hand on the hilt of his military knife, and used his thumb to release the scabbard's spring, allowing the blade to slide slightly out of the sheath, revealing the cold, sharp gleam of its back.

"Ducks, here you go, artilleryman..."

"Bang!"

He took a deep breath, about to shout "Fire!"

Suddenly, a piercing gunshot ripped through the night sky from the north.

The first shot was short and sharp, rang out less than 300 meters north of the sorghum field, followed by a second and a third, and then a dense barrage of gunfire that was impossible to count.

"Bang!"

"Bang bang bang!"

Kawashima Masashi's neck snapped to the north, and his saber nearly popped out of its sheath.

His pupils contracted sharply in the moonlight:

"Baka yarou!"

"Where did you fire?!"

His answer was a line of fire bursting forth from the darkness, followed by a series of shrill battle cries that exploded simultaneously from the north, east, and west, like three invisible walls closing in on them.

"kill!!"

"kill!!"

On the north side of the sorghum field, a flag of the Republic of China suddenly stood up from behind the stubble, its surface unfurling in the night wind to reveal a face riddled with bullet holes.

Beneath the flag, hundreds of gray-blue figures leaped up from the trenches, from behind the field ridges, and from the frozen pits, their bayonets gleaming in the moonlight.

Kawashima Masashi froze on the horse's back.

His brain pieced together all the information in a fraction of a second.

The shouts of battle came from three directions. The enemy was not hastily responding; they had already dug trenches and set up an ambush, waiting for them to walk right in.

This is a trap.

He abruptly drew his military knife, the blade tracing an arc in the moonlight, the tip pointing towards the surging gray-blue tide to the north, his voice strained to its limit:

"Enemy attack!! All units, prepare for battle!!"

"Kill the chicken!"