Chapter 63: First Battle Victory

  "Huh......" Deputy Commander Wang Hongsheng was suddenly scolded by the regiment commander and didn't know what to say.

  "Report to the team leader." Qu Mingjun happened to be beside him and said: "Deputy Company Commander Wang just got on the bus at the parking platform a while ago."

  "Huh?" The captain was suddenly at a loss for what it meant.

  "King Deputy Regimental Commander just got off another train on the opposite side and then boarded our train. I heard from Little Mao that King Deputy Regimental Commander was back home for his honeymoon, looks like he just came back." Qu Mingjun inferred and explained.

  "What's going on with you, Little Wang?" The battalion commander felt that he had probably misunderstood and quickly asked the deputy regimental commander.

  "Hong Sheng? How did you come back? How did you get on this car?" Just then, Lian Zhang and the others happened to return to the carriage after finishing their meeting. At a glance, they saw Deputy Commander Wang wearing a crumpled suit, and against the backdrop of soldiers in camouflage uniforms in the carriage, he couldn't help but stand out.

  "Hey, wasn't it just perfect that I found out our team was departing for flood relief on the day of my wedding? I wanted to leave right away, but there was still a banquet at noon, so I had to wait until it was over before rushing to the train station. I managed to catch a passing car and rushed back, worried that I wouldn't make it in time. But as luck would have it, we didn't need to hurry, haha! We just happened to run into our train at that small station earlier, and luckily I saw Little Mao. So I came over right away."

  "You, isn't this just abandoning the bride at home and making her guard the bridal chamber alone?" Lian Zhang felt a bit like laughing, but more so moved. Originally, Lian's unit was busy with flood relief efforts and gathering personnel, knowing that Deputy Commander Lian's home was far away, they didn't expect him to make it back in time. After sending a telegram according to the team's regulations, they reported his name on the list as having stayed behind, who would have thought that he himself encountered his family's military train halfway?

  "Reporting to the company commander, deputy company commander, he still jumped out of the window of that train just now with a high wall vaulting tactic, haha." Xiaomao saw the good atmosphere and inserted a sentence boldly.

  "Hmm, Little Wang is not bad, seems like my soldier. But next time, don't jump out of the train window, the train conductor will have something to say about it." The squad leader also laughed, "Go find a camouflage uniform, don't wear this tattered western suit, and that apple pin looks fake to me."

  "Hahaha......" The carriage was filled with laughter.

  "Heh heh, Captain smokes." Deputy Commander Wang took out a pack of "Red Double Happiness" cigarettes from his bag and began to offer them around.

  "Ah, I'll take this one, it's a celebratory cigarette!" The squad leader smiled and gestured for everyone to pick some up.

  Qu Mingjun smiled and declined the cigarette offered by Deputy Commander Jing, but in his heart he was very respectful of this deputy commander. As soon as he heard that the troops had a mission, he threw down his wedding ceremony and new wife and rushed back, knowing that the mission was very dangerous, knowing that he didn't have to go, but still day and night rushing back, afraid of not being able to catch up. What kind of awareness is this? Compared with his own initial idea of returning home, it's really embarrassing.

  ……

  After another long day of marching, the train finally arrived at its destination. The cadres and soldiers of Team A quickly and effectively boarded various vehicles summoned by the command center and rushed towards the Yangtze River embankment.

  Qu Mingjun stood inside the compartment of a truck, with soldiers sitting and standing beside him. At their feet were iron shovels, hoes, sacks and other flood-fighting materials. Soon, they saw a long dike appearing before their eyes, stretching east and west, seemingly endless.

  Qiu Mingjun wiped away the raindrops that were blown by the wind, this damn weather didn't know what it was doing, the rain was neither big nor small, it was just annoying.

  At this time, a burst of cheers suddenly came from the dam, and the warriors stood up one after another to look at the dam, only to see many old people rushing towards their convoy cheering.

  Qiu Mingjun listened carefully and made out that what the common people were shouting was: "The Liberation Army has arrived, we are saved!"

  The convoy screeched to a halt in front of the dam, and the soldiers jumped down from the cars and lined up. At this time, the captain of the A team led several people to rush towards the local leaders who were walking over.

  "Thanks to the army, thanks to the army." Local leaders thanked them repeatedly.

  "No need to thank me, we're all one family. Commander A's temper was urgent, and he interrupted the small talk as soon as he opened his mouth, "Hurry up and tell me, what's the situation?""

  "Alright. According to the report from our superiors, tomorrow there will be an even bigger flood peak passing through this section of the embankment. Unfortunately, this section of the embankment has been neglected for years and has withstood several smaller floods, resulting in many dangerous situations emerging on the embankment. If we can't withstand the new flood peak tomorrow, the chemical plants, smelters and dozens of other enterprises inside the embankment, as well as hundreds of thousands of people, will be threatened by the floodwaters. Now I hope our troops can build a secondary embankment before 8 am tomorrow to reinforce and raise this section of the main embankment. Our engineers will provide specific standards. Let's go take a look at the embankment now." The local leader finished speaking and led the regiment commander up onto the embankment.

  After the team leader gave the order, Qu Mingjun and others divided into several groups to fetch soil, build a small dam on the big dam, and transport sandbags.

  At this time, the people and militia who had been busy on the embankment all along withdrew, saying that they had fought continuously for more than a dozen hours to barely maintain the safety of the embankment.

  "Come, load the soil!" Qu Mingjun opened a burlap sack with both hands.

  "Pack it in! Pack it in!" The company commander was shouting loudly on one side to the soldiers who were taking earth.

  Qū Míng Jùn, with the help of two soldiers beside him, lifted a hundred-jin sack onto his shoulder. Instantly, his knees buckled under the weight. Good grief, it's really heavy!

  At this time, the warriors who had loaded the gunny sacks had already set off, and Qu Mingjun also carried a bag of sand towards the dam.

  As soon as he climbed up to the top of the dike, Qu Mingjun was startled by what he saw. The river water was almost at his feet, just a few meters away, and the yellowish water was rolling eastward with branches and garbage. Looking back inside the dike, the ground was much higher than the distance between the water surface and the top of the dike. Is this really the mother river of the descendants of Yan and Huang? Now it has become a sharp sword pressing on people's heads.

  Qū Míng Jùn had only heard of the hanging river in books before, but this time it was truly eye-opening. If the dam were to burst, the water would really be a boundless ocean, and there would be no way to salvage it.

  Feng Shaojun and Guo Xiangyang, one stayed on the dam to be responsible for building a subsidiary dam, and the other followed the team's risk prevention team to check if there were any hidden dangers such as pipe bursts, seepage, or overtopping of the dam and eliminate them.

  Qu Mingjun was carrying heavy bags of sand back and forth between the soil collection point and the dam.

  The weather cleared up unknowingly, and the scorching sun shone on their bodies, making the soldiers who had wetted their shirts very uncomfortable. Many soldiers simply threw away their hats and camouflage jackets, baring their arms to dry off.

  Qiu Mingjun still had a camouflage vest on, damn it was tiring, the mechanical loading and unloading of sacks, soon his shoulders and back went from pain to numbness, finally losing all sensation, his waist felt like it was almost broken, he could hardly stand up straight, his legs were like they were filled with lead, he couldn't even run a little, only able to move forward one step at a time.

  The team leader on the dam soon discovered that the physical strength of the warriors began to decline. He calculated that there were about 1500 meters of dams that needed to be built, and the place where the soil was taken was not too far from the dam. So he simply commanded the troops to form two transportation lines, one after another, sending sandbags to the top of the dam, and then having the warriors on the dam build the sub-dam, which could save some personnel to rest in shifts.

  Qu Mingjun couldn't tell how many times he had come down to rest temporarily, his whole body was already covered with mud, the whole person looked like just coming out of the soil, except for the black eyes, opening mouth could still see white teeth, there was no other color on his body.

  I'm really tired, but I can't rest yet. If this 1,500-meter-long dam isn't completed by tomorrow at 8 am, it will be the hundreds of thousands of people behind me who will suffer.

  The night grew darker, and the local flood control headquarters had arranged for many high-powered light bulbs to be brought over, illuminating the top and bottom of the dam brightly. The soldiers only had time to hastily drink a mouthful of water and nibble on two mouthfuls of bread during their shift breaks; at other times, they didn't have time to take care of anything else.

  At 4:00 in the morning, the 1500-meter-long and 1-meter-high dam was finally completed. The warriors' energy seemed to be exhausted all at once, and they collapsed to the ground. They had been working for nearly twenty hours and finished their task four hours ahead of schedule.

  Qiu Mingjun leaned against the big dike, watching Guo Xiangyang walking towards him with water and a boxed meal made by the villagers overnight. He opened his mouth to smile, but couldn't support his body's fatigue and drowsiness, and fell asleep leaning against the dike. Beside him, many soldiers slept in various postures on the dike, sleeping very soundly.

  At 7:00 the next day, after only three hours of sleep, all the warriors were woken up one by one. Looking at Guo Xiangyang's bright red eyes, Qu Mingjun knew that his old squad leader hadn't slept all night.

  As expected, after a brief conversation, Qu Mingjun learned that Guo Xiangyang had joined the patrol team within the group, responsible for patrolling the dam back and forth, vigilant about potential dangers that might reappear on the dam. They patrolled all night, but no one could bear to wake up their comrades to replace themselves, despite the rotation being an order issued by the group.

  For safety reasons, after a team finished building this section of the dam, they did not leave the scene but instead waited until 8 am when the flood peak passed before leaving to ensure their safety.

  At eight o'clock, the brutal flood peak roared down from upstream, hitting the embankment built by the soldiers with a loud crash. The sound was deafening and the ground shook slightly. Seeing the terrifying power of the floodwaters, the soldiers' faces turned pale. Fortunately, they had built the embankment in advance and eliminated all dangers.

  At 8:30, after the leader's phone confirmation, Hongfeng had left this place, and the soldiers' twenty hours of hard work were not in vain. The embankment withstood the test, and the dam was ensured to be safe. Suddenly, a burst of cheers erupted from the top of the dam, and the raised arms of the soldiers were like a dense forest, so tall and so solid.

  "Report to the team leader!" A staff officer holding a piece of paper rushed towards the dam at high speed.

  A group of warriors stopped cheering and looked over quietly. The team leader, who was still on the top of the dam receiving thanks from local leaders, hastily walked out a few big steps and asked loudly: "What's going on?"