Chapter Forty-Six

  "Blood debt, blood repayment" ultimately became a mere slogan. The superiors discussed how to pursue the Vietnamese army's special forces who had come to take revenge, but the Vietnamese special forces dispersed and hid in the deep mountains. After careful consideration, the superiors believed that our army was not familiar with the terrain and was not good at jungle warfare, so searching for the well-trained special forces in the jungle would be equivalent to using one's weakness to attack the enemy's strength. In the end, they could only give up.

  When we got back to the camp, it was already evening.

  The warriors crouched one by one in front of the tent, silent. Some hung their heads in despair, some quietly wiped their guns, and others leaned against their backpacks like dead men, staring blankly...

  I know what's going on with the warriors, and in fact I have a kind of guilty feeling.

  Actually, I also know that the decision made by our superiors is correct. In war, what matters are strategic objectives and interests; we can't just let soldiers die in vain simply to vent our anger. It's just that my heart still feels a bit resentful about it.

  Isn't that the case? Our total strength in the old street and nearby areas is almost a division, but we let a reinforced company of Vietnamese devils walk in with ease and took away our artillery battalion in the heart of our position. What's even more infuriating is that we have so many people and so many guns, yet we can't do anything to them...

  Of course, our troops can be said to have achieved some small victories, but these small victories compared to this great defeat are still far from enough, so this directly affected the morale of the soldiers.

  What's more... for our side, most of the sacrificed soldiers were from our own regiment. Didn't the company commander force them to go up? As a result, out of over 30 people in that company, only seven came back alive, and it's said that the company commander was seriously injured... Many of them were new recruits who had just been added, they hadn't even gotten used to their positions yet before they sacrificed themselves.

  This will undoubtedly be a great blow to the new recruits, won't it? Every one of them has a hint of fear and war-weariness in their eyes.

  I think this is another effect of the Viet Minh's "special warfare" - affecting the enemy's morale.

  Of course, there are exceptions, and Chen Yiyang is one of them. While other warriors were carrying their heads, she was rummaging through my backpack like nothing was wrong...

  "What's up?" I asked.

  "Let's find something to eat!" Chen Yiyiy took out two compressed biscuits from my backpack and waved them in front of me: "These two are mine now!"

  "What about yours?" I found it a bit strange, didn't Old Classmate just give out five bucks yesterday?

  "I've eaten!" Chen Yiyang replied casually.

  "Have you finished all five dishes?" I curiously sized up Chen Yiyang, her figure didn't seem like she could eat that much.

  "What's so strange about that!" Chen Yiyin's face turned red, and she quickly found a place to grab some cookies and a water bottle, gobbling them down hastily.

  Later I found out that the Japanese devils were originally so poor they couldn't fill their bellies, and on top of that, being trapped in the tunnels by us made them malnourished. So Chen Yiyang also went hungry for a long time... People who have been starving for a long time will naturally eat as much as possible once they have enough food!

  "Class Monitor..." At this time, Xiaoshi came out of nowhere and slowly walked up to me, saying: "Class Monitor, there's something... I don't know if I should tell you or not..."

  "Let it out quickly!" I'm getting a bit impatient, and this thing is making me feel uncomfortable today.

  "That... class monitor!" Xiaoshi said with some difficulty: "I have a fellow villager... who is serving as a guard next to the battalion commander, and just now I heard him say... he said that the platoon leader was seriously injured, and the higher-ups originally wanted you to be the platoon leader, but... the company commander wouldn't let it happen, saying that you're too stubborn, don't listen to orders and act on your own!"

  "What?!" I hadn't even reacted yet, but the several soldiers under my command didn't respond. The scholar suddenly stood up and asked: "Xiao Shitou, are you telling the truth? Didn't mishear?"

  "A thousand truths!" Xiaoshi said, raising his hand: "My fellow villager Liang Shangxing told me personally, he also said... He also stood up for our monitor, the whole army knows that the monitor has made merits!"

  "Damn it!" I cursed loudly, although I didn't care about being a squad leader or class leader, these were all life-or-death jobs to me, but being stabbed in the back like this still made my blood boil.

  "Captain, we can't just swallow this anger, let's go... We'll accompany you to reason with the company commander!"

  "Right! Go find Lian Zhang and reason with him!"

  "If it doesn't work out, we'll find the squad leader! Everyone in our class and platoon can be a witness!"

  ……

  "Huh?..." At this time, Knife Scar suddenly appeared from somewhere and said: "I'm saying, Stabbing Knife, is this your first time being a soldier or what? You're still an old soldier... We were just fighting the Vietcong, and now you want to find the company commander to reason with him?"

  "Still a bookworm! Aren't you the most cultured one? Have you read books all the way to your crotch? Still want to find the squad leader? If everyone were like you, what's the point of fighting?"

  "And you, this little stone!" The scar-faced man finally pointed at Wang Shi Ke and scolded: "You haven't accomplished anything significant, but every day you're busy spreading rumors. Are you a traitor or what? You can't bear to see the troops in order?"

  "I..." Little Stone's face was full of grievance.

  "Mind your own business!" I stood up and said: "If there's a problem, I'll settle it with the platoon leader myself!"

  "Alright!" Scar said, patting my shoulder: "Comrades all know you're capable, so it's normal for the company commander to feel uneasy... isn't that right? The soldiers under your command only listen to you and don't take the company commander seriously! How can he lead the troops if you let him be the company commander? Your decisions in battle are correct, but there are also rules in the army. If everyone acts on their own without going through their superiors like you do, who knows what kind of chaos the army would become!"

  "I'm not arguing about who's the squad leader!" I still had a grudge in my heart: "To be honest, I don't want to be the squad leader either. Whoever wants it can go for it! But we soldiers are also risking our lives, how can he take all the credit with just a few words and leave us with all the blame?"

  "Shh!" At this time, Knife Scar gave me a wink and told me not to speak.

  It was then that I noticed Lian Zhang had returned to the camp with a proud and triumphant air, and without thinking, I knew he must have received praise from his superiors.

  The soldiers under me looked at his complacent appearance and were angry, but with a knife scar on him, they didn't dare say anything. However, there was one who didn't believe in evil. This person was Li Zhaolong, who had not spoken all along.

  He saw Lian Zhang walking over, intentionally opening the bayonet on his rifle. With a loud clang, he shouted without naming names: "I don't know what some people rely on to become cadres, they have no skills, but they know how to secretly manipulate and be petty..."

  "Sit down!" Scarface shouted angrily.

  Li Zhaolong looked at me and saw that I also had an angry expression, so he sat down with a dissatisfied face.

  However, Lian Chang was enraged. He took a step forward and asked in an angry tone: "What did you just say? Who said that someone has no skills and knows how to be a villain? If you have the ability, point out their name!"

  "That's you!" At this time, a soldier covered in blood stood up, but surprisingly, it was not one of my soldiers who got up, but one from the opposite row.

  "Right! I'm talking about you!" Another soldier stood up, also covered in blood. He clicked open his bayonet: "I'm telling you, Commander Li, today under your command, our squad lost twenty-seven men, and our squad leader just...".

  "Damn it!" Lian Zhang cursed without waiting for him to finish: "Is there a battle where no one dies? If you want to hate, hate the Japanese devils! What's the point of charging at me?"

  Lian Chang's words seemed to have enraged the few remaining soldiers in the row. One by one, they stood up and said:

  "If it weren't for your reckless decisions, we wouldn't have suffered such a huge loss."

  "Right! The second squad leader fought very well and wiped out all the Vietnamese devils without sacrificing a few men!"

  "But some people say the second monitor is disobedient!"

  "If we really obey your orders, can we still have a way out?"

  ……

  The last sentence made everyone in the whole chain stand up one after another.

  "What are you trying to do?" The company commander's eyes had already shown fear, but his mouth still refused to relax: "Want to rebel? Everyone sit down... This is an order!"

  But the angry warriors would no longer listen to his orders, each standing with eyes wide open and staring at the company commander.

  Lian Chang saw that things were going badly and turned around wanting to leave... but was blocked by several soldiers.

  Nor did I know who shouted: "Hit his mother!"

  The scene suddenly lost control, the warriors shouted and surrounded them in groups, all of them rushed to punch or kick, I was stunned for a long time!

  How did it develop into this situation? It seems that the warriors had many dissatisfactions with Lianzhang in their hearts, and these dissatisfactions accumulated in their hearts over time to become a timed bomb. This matter of mine was just a fuse, a fuse that detonated the timed bomb in their hearts...

  The scene was chaotic for a moment until a gunshot rang out and brought all the warriors to a standstill.

  "Stop it, all of you!" The one who fired the shot was Dāo Bā (Knife Scar), he held his pistol and shouted viciously at those soldiers who were fighting: "Is there no more organization or discipline? Fighting with the company commander... what a feat! Do you know what you're doing? Whoever moves again, I'll shoot him dead!"

  No one doubted Scar's words because everyone knew he was a man of his word.

  It's neither here nor there.

  To put it mildly, that's a fight, to put it severely... that's a mutiny! The scar had every reason to fire his gun.

  "What's going on?" Just then, the battalion commander rushed over with a team of soldiers, his face extremely ugly as he shouted at us: "Speak up! Why isn't anyone talking?"

  No one dared to speak up because everyone knew... this basket had stirred up big trouble!