The Forty-Ninth Chapter: Bloody Battle at Pingli

  When the commander of the French camp, Ralph Monlac, looked at his troops being surrounded by tanks and infantry, he was deeply desperate. He had been a seasoned soldier, the inspector general of the French Foreign Legion, and had already held the rank of Major General, but for his own love of fighting, he had demoted himself to Lieutenant Colonel. Now, facing this hopeless situation, this iron-hearted man also felt deeply despairing. So, with the soldiers of the Foreign Legion wearing red headscarves and shouting "Camoroni!", they charged into our advancing troops with bayonets fixed on their rifles and engaged in hand-to-hand combat. Our army's stabbing skills had been honed through battles against the Japanese, so the enemy was quickly defeated and annihilated. A crippled old soldier, holding a bayonet, faced off against a group of volunteer soldiers who surrounded him with over a dozen bayonets. He shouted in French and English, asking to fight us one-on-one. Fong Wei, wielding a large scimitar used for cutting grass for the horses, charged out and, with an incredible move, cut the old man's rifle in two. Then, he threw the scimitar into the ground, where it stuck deeply. Monlac was stunned, looking at this incredible display of Chinese martial arts. He thought to himself that this must be the profound and subtle Chinese martial art. After a moment, he took off his beloved Moroccan curved dagger, made from Damascus steel, and bowed deeply to Fong Wei. He then handed the dagger to Fong Wei and asked him to teach him Chinese martial arts, offering to serve in the Chinese army. Fong Wei only vaguely agreed, but later, when the old general heard that Monlac was actually a Major General of the French army, he became his teacher. By 3 or 4 am, the gunfire from the five surrounding highlands had completely stopped. Freeman lowered his head in pain, and over 2,200 people were gone, including a French Major General!

  As the sun rose on the 14th, the overjoyed enemy emerged from their shelters one after another. Colonel Freeman looked at the deep tank tracks left by our retreating tanks, looked at the deep scars left by the stopped artillery fire on the earth's surface, and looked at the various destroyed weapons and fortifications on his own position. He took a deep breath of the air still mixed with the smell of burning and gunpowder, feeling how wonderful it was to be alive! However, not far away, the enemy's precise bullets shot from their position, exposing several heads, and the enemy ducked down again, lying flat on the ground. But the mortars on the high ground around us didn't intend to let the enemy off, so a dense barrage of shells added another large area of shattered flesh and blood to the enemy's position. The enemy, who had just been overjoyed for a while, scurried back into their shelters. However, the artillery joined in, and the dull thunder again destroyed many exposed enemy shelters, adding 300-400 more casualties to Freeman's list, leaving only 2,800 men, including the lightly wounded. It was truly heartbreaking.

  At this time, the sky transmitted a buzzing sound, and more than 100 enemy planes were densely packed in the sky. Wang Jue's high artillery battalion quickly removed the cover of the 90mm high cannon and the Soviet 85mm high cannon, then aimed at the dense enemy aircraft cluster, "Elevation 5000, near-fuse fuze 15 rounds, fire!" After a burst of loud explosions, hundreds of explosion clouds exploded in the midst of the enemy planes. The poor enemy planes, because our army had never used heavy anti-aircraft guns in battle before, were arranged in dense formations at high altitudes, and this time they fell into the trap set by our army. The enemy planes loaded with bombs and incendiary shells exploded in the sky, forming huge fireballs. In an instant, the fragments of the exploding shells destroyed more than 20 enemy fighter planes. However, as the enemy planes dispersed, the attack stopped, but there were still more than 40 planes that were heavily damaged and didn't know if they could fly back to the airport. Adding to the more than 20 planes already lost, it was a total of 71 planes!!! The enemy planes dropped their bombs in disarray and fled (who wanted to stay behind as targets!). Excited Wang Jue watched his commander approach, thinking to himself "Reincarnation of the God of War?" "What are you waiting for? Waiting for the enemy to come and bomb us? Quickly move the high artillery away! Don't think that just because headquarters has strengthened our defenses with 16 additional 85mm high cannons we can be complacent. If it weren't for the American planes not being prepared, you'd be in trouble!" The high artillery commander said seriously, with a hint of a smile. Wang Jue hastily directed his men to tow the high artillery into hidden fortifications.

  Freeman informed Lieutenant Colonel Lee in the telegram about everything that had happened on the battlefield. Lieutenant Colonel Lee, who was also helpless, could only comfort him by saying "Reinforcements are almost here, just 10 kilometers away from you, and the air force will send another batch of planes to support you immediately." Freeman, who knew his own fate, sighed and said "Yes, sir, I will hold on until the last moment! God bless America!"

  The US military retaliated quickly, with planes arriving in batches of up to nine aircraft, repeatedly bombing the five highlands and our army's trench network far from the enemy's main position. The Wild Mules used the six heavy machine guns on the plane and the rockets hung under the wings to repeatedly sweep and attack our fortifications with 130mm rockets, but after all, they were fighter jets, and no matter how strong the rockets were, they couldn't compare to 1000-pound bombs. Only the soldiers who were still digging tunnels suffered, with non-stop falling dust getting into their eyes, ears, and mouths.

  The enemy's counter-attacking troops soon charged over under the intense artillery fire of the mortar that was airdropped with ammunition, and the enemy was pushed back again under the sniper fire of our army's light machine guns and automatic rifles. However, the enemy was like they didn't care about their lives, despite having already lost more than 200 corpses, but still repeatedly charged forward. Soon, because the tunnels and communication trenches behind were completely destroyed, our army's ammunition supply was cut off, and the enemy had already occupied several lines of front-line trenches. If this continued, our army would be driven out of its positions by the enemy.

  In the face of a desperate situation, Gao Quan gave the order to detonate, and the tons of explosives and 100 fuel-air bombs that had been transported to the underground tunnels beneath the enemy's fortifications were ignited. The original plan was to wait until tonight when the tunnel reached the middle of the enemy's position and then let them take a ride on a "earthquake". However, Shen Feihu, who was in despair, could only give the order to execute, and thus a raging inferno and massive explosion erupted among the enemy, with a huge heat wave that had already run far underground, solidifying the explosive chamber and setting up multiple blocking zones. But the scattered fuel-air bombs turned the surface of the position into a sea of flames, causing havoc among the enemy!