While Song Zheyuan, leader of the 29th Army, still hesitated and watched from Shandong, the expansionist faction in Japan ultimately prevailed over the moderates. Seeking a swift resolution to the Beiping-Tianjin Incident, the Japanese military urgently dispatched the Korea-based 20th Division along with the main forces of the Kwantung Army's 1st and 11th Independent Mixed Brigades to reinforce Beiping and Tianjin, while deploying three Class-A divisions from the Japanese homeland to reinforce the China theater.
"Battalion Commander Xiang, take a squad of men up to the second floor over there."
His boots crunching against the gravel-strewn village lane, Zhu Shiqing pointed toward several dilapidated, roofless tile houses near the railway at the eastern entrance to the village. Amid the rubble lay decent firing positions.
At the front, utilizing the village's existing cover, Zhu Shiqing positioned two light machine guns in a staggered formation—one forward left, the other back right. Along the outer walls of the civilian houses, he ordered loopholes knocked out, with sandbags piled on either side of the walls for reinforcement.
After completing a round of inspections to oversee the setup, Zhu Shiqing returned to Fang Wenjian's side.
"Still just standing here watching? You couldn't share a bit of the burden? Every single time it's me laying out the positions. You're an academy graduate yourself, yet you wander around with nothing to do. Who'd ever take you for a staff officer?"
Zhu Shiqing was speaking to Fang Wenjian, but Fang Wenjian showed no offense. Instead, he chuckled quietly.
"Shiqing, with you around, why would I bother placing positions? Everyone knows that's your specialty. As for me, I'm better off just sticking faithfully to reconnaissance."
Zhu Shiqing nodded. "Fair enough. Keeps that mouth of yours from causing trouble."
Fang Wenjian was indeed an intriguing character. After joining the regular army, he had taken an entirely different path from Zhu Shiqing. In name, he was Zhu Shiqing's adjutant, but mostly he just drifted about outside. Whenever Zhu Shiqing was present, he offered no tactical advice or decisions.
Over time, Zhu Shiqing had become Sun Yi's close confidant, while Fang had turned into an external scout, gathering intelligence from beyond.
Once the deployment was complete, aside from the guard platoon protecting the regimental headquarters, every soldier had been sent to the battle line. Of the more than one thousand troops Sun's regiment had originally commanded, fewer than four hundred remained after fighting from the Battle of Lijiatun to this day.
And an even grimmer battle was quietly drawing near as the Watanabe Battalion rushed forward along the railway.
At four-forty in the afternoon, a column emerged at the horizon's edge, clad in dung-yellow uniforms. After watching closely for a moment, the men spotted the rising sun flag. The devils were here!
A mere half hour had passed since Sun's regiment arrived at Shagang Village, and the Watanabe Battalion was already bearing down on them. It was clear the Japanese intended to strike Wanping's flank before nightfall.
"Stay down! Hold your fire until they get closer!"
Zhu Shiqing and Tan Hai oversaw the frontal defense. Xiang Chengyu held the second floors of the flanking houses, while Fang Wenjian and Gu Chuanning led the battered 2nd Company to cover the village road.
Approaching from the front appeared to be a Japanese platoon, spread out relatively thin, moving at a run along both sides of the tracks. They seemingly hadn't anticipated that Sun's regiment had withdrawn into this long-abandoned village.
"Tricky bastards. Those dogs sent a platoon to scout the way," Tan Hai muttered under his breath, staring at the advancing Japanese soldiers.
At a gap in the brickwork, Zhu Shiqing peered through the opening with his binoculars at the platoon.
Only one man among them wore a dark-yellow officer's uniform. Though moving in a hurry, they were in combat formation.
"Battalion Commander Tan, I'm afraid the devils suspect we're here," Zhu Shiqing said, holding the binoculars.
Tan Hai blinked twice and turned his head, puzzled. "Then why run so fast? Isn't that just throwing their lives away?"
"Look. Fast as they're moving, their bodies are hunched low, carrying their rifles in their right hands balanced by the center. That's not a forced march—that's an assault posture." As Zhu Shiqing spoke, he passed the binoculars to Tan Hai.
Tan Hai took a look, and it was just as Zhu Shiqing had described. "So they're testing the waters to see if an ambush is waiting. Do we engage?"
"Engage," Zhu Shiqing said firmly. "We'll be exposed sooner or later. If we let them push past along the tracks and flank us, or slip into the village to maneuver, we lose the initiative."
As the thumping thud of boots grew closer, the soldiers behind cover held their breath, gripping their rifles tight. The village fell so dead quiet that not even a bird's chirp could be heard.
The Japanese platoon reached the flank of Shagang along the tracks. Tan Hai roared, "Fire!"
The soldiers crouched behind the walls sprang up, raising their weapons and firing!
Several rifle cracks rang out, and the foremost Japanese soldiers dropped instantly. The rest reacted immediately, spreading out in three-man fireteams and shooting back.
Bullets slammed into the earthen walls of Shagang Village, kicking up black soil and dust that filled the air. Bringing up the rear, several Japanese soldiers whipped out grenade dischargers and loaded shells!
With a tremendous boom, a section of earthen wall not far to Zhu Shiqing's right collapsed. Earthen bricks were ripped into flying fragments, raining through the air. Three soldiers behind the wall were hurled off their feet by the blast and slammed heavily to the ground.
The dust kicked up by the explosion caked the faces of Tan Hai and Zhu Shiqing. They had thrown themselves over each other beneath the remaining wall; when they lifted their heads, they both looked like charcoal figurines.
"Motherfucker! Just one damned platoon, and they've battered us like this?"
Tan Hai scrambled up cursing, snatched a Czech light machine gun from the soldier to his left, propped it atop the earthen wall, and pulled the trigger.
*Rat-tat-tat-tat!*
A dense stream of bullets tore forward. At the same moment, Xiang Chengyu found an angle from the second floor on the left and opened fire with his men. Overwhelmed by sheer firepower, most of the Japanese platoon collapsed in pools of blood. Their platoon commander was killed instantly. The remaining two Japanese soldiers sprinted eastward in desperate flight.
Those two veteran bastards bolted remarkably fast—the hail of stray bullets somehow failed to clip either of them!
"Hold up, stop firing!" Tan Hai raised his arm. "Conserve your ammunition! Shore up the fortifications—the devils will be back soon!"
Zhu Shiqing hurried over to the collapsed stretch of wall. Crouching, he shoveled aside the fallen bricks and stones, tossing them out of the way until he could reach under the sandbags and collapsed mud to drag out two soldiers. Tragically, both had already stopped breathing.
"Damn them..." Zhu Shiqing muttered beneath his breath. Suddenly, a shrill whistling shriek ripped across the sky. Realizing what it was, he sprang to his feet, waving his arms frantically and bellowing at the top of his lungs, "Get down! Everyone get down! Incoming artillery! Take cover!"
Before the men of Sun's regiment could react, searing shells fired by Japanese Type 92 infantry guns and mountain guns slammed directly down upon Shagang Village!
Colossal explosions roared at the village entrance. The very first Japanese shell sheared through the support beam of a house; the already dilapidated structure crashed down, throwing wood splinters across the sky.
As more shells rained down, brick and rubble from the earthen walls flew in every direction, and several soldiers stationed alongside them were buried alive!
Amid the relentless rumbling, the position at the village entrance was blasted beyond recognition. Wooden beams burst into flames, and the jagged, weathered houses could hold out no longer, collapsing into dust with deafening crashes.
Several of Xiang Chengyu's soldiers were unable to pull back in time and fell with the crumbling buildings, their fates unknown.
Zhu Shiqing dashed through the explosions, shouting for everyone to stay down and shoving soldiers along his path flat against the dirt. A tremendous shockwave struck his head like a lead weight, sending him stumbling sideways into a hard fall.
His vision blurred, washing out into a field of crimson. A deafening roar buzzed in his ears, and his breathing grew rapid and shallow.
His eyes refused to focus, his limbs ceased to obey him, and the world seemed to fall dead silent. At last, Zhu Shiqing sank into darkness, his eyes closing heavily.
Chapter 57