Seventeen

  Fang Lan saw Yan Wei walking over and threw down the work in her hands, clapping them together as she stood up to greet him. Seeing Yan Wei, she asked: "Have you taken care of those Japanese soldiers?"

  Yan smiled and said: "You should come over quickly to see if he's injured anywhere."

  Fang Lan smiled and said: "You're a National Army lieutenant colonel. If you can't even handle a few Japanese soldiers, what did they send you here for?"

  Yan Wei thought for a moment, and indeed it's better for a woman to have confidence in herself than to look down on herself. She put her arm around Fang Lan's shoulder and sat down beside the bonfire, picking up a branch from the ground and stirring the ashes in the fire pit, looking at the pot of hot water hanging above the fire: "How are the kids?"

  "Look at that broken hut over there, old Li's place. How can it be good? There are over ten kids cramped inside, most of them sleep on the wild land! They don't even have quilts or mats to cover themselves. It was those soldiers from Wu's unit who took off their uniforms and used them as makeshift beds for the children to sleep on. Watching our country fall step by step, I always thought you soldiers were just a bunch of rascals who didn't care about the lives of ordinary people! But today, I finally understand that soldiers are actually willing to protect ordinary people." After speaking, she became emotional and leaned her head into Yan Wei's arms.

  "It's not that we don't want to take care of the people, it's just that sometimes it's really hard to do so! Let's say our 32nd Army Corps, if we resolutely refuse to retreat and defend Wuhan city with just one army corps' strength, at least we can still hold out for another week against the Japanese army. But what's the use? With one order from the Chairman, the entire Hubei province and the 9th War Zone would be completely evacuated! What can we soldiers do to protect the people then?! The Chairman has his own considerations, we soldiers have our own difficulties, but no one thinks about the life and death of the ordinary people!" He said, then pulled out a cigarette, lit it with the branch he used to stir the fire earlier, and threw the branch back into the flames. Watching the branch being completely ignited in an instant, from that moment on, the fiercely jumping flames seemed to be speculating about the fate of this entire group of people.

  Fang Lan raised her head, under the flickering light of the fire, and looked at Yan Wei's determined face, asking softly: "Hey, are you sure you can safely take us all to Chongqing?"

  "I'm confident I can get you safely to Chongqing." Yan Wei said calmly as he turned his head back to look at Fang Lan.

  Actually, for a woman, that's almost enough! We can't expect all our men to be Dong Hanzi or Yang Ju of the Republic of China! As long as he is a man who can give himself a promise in times of crisis, it's enough.

  Huang Ran.

  Huang Ran, who had been standing far away and hesitating to come forward to disturb Yan Wei, saw that Yan Wei had already seen him and was summoning him to come over. He immediately ran over and said: "Reporting to the captain, this is what I brought for you from the cooking squad at the battalion headquarters when I left this afternoon. If you're hungry now, eat it first." As he spoke, he opened his military bag and took out a package wrapped tightly in oil paper.

  As soon as the thing came out of the package, Yan Wei smelled it and knew that it was Old Jia's roast chicken! This old Jia is from Dezhou, Shandong Province. According to him, the famous Dezhou roast chicken is a family heirloom passed down through his relatives. He himself has also mastered the secret recipe! He even told himself that after the war is over and peace is restored, he will retire and open a restaurant in his hometown of Dezhou specializing in roast chicken! Since Yan Wei tried his signature dish, Old Jia has been busy making it for him every few days. Even on the battlefield, where the two armies are facing off, Yan Wei can still enjoy Old Jia's specialty! It's really unknown how Old Jia managed to arrange this for the team leader.

  At this time, Yan Wei, who had been tired all day, immediately came to his senses as soon as he saw the good thing. He hurriedly unwrapped the oiled paper and said to Fang Lan: "You're lucky, I was thinking of taking you back to my unit to open your eyes when we got back, but unexpectedly Huang Ran has a heart, now it's all settled for you!" After that, he said to Huang Ran: "Well done! Equivalent to successfully annihilating a large Japanese army squad! When we get back, I'll reward you personally!"

  "Wait a minute, you don't know that Old Jia's specialty is the Five Spice Deboned Chicken, it's especially tender! Be careful or it'll all fall apart and scatter on the floor!"

  As soon as the words fell, Fang Lan saw that she was about to grab the whole chicken tray in her hand and pulled out a big leg. The whole chicken immediately scattered! Yan Wei's hands moved quickly and caught the roast chicken with paper just before it hit the ground. He then hurriedly held it with both hands and said: "Look, look, this girl is more anxious than me, almost wasted." After that, he looked at Huang Ran standing aside and said: "Huang Ran, sit down and eat together."

  "No way! Captain, I was saying we still have wine here!" Huang Ran said and handed over the military canteen he had already taken off and held in his hand.

  Yan Wei looked at Huang Ran with extremely appreciative eyes and said: "Encore!" But then added another sentence: "My private matters, let's talk about it when we get back."

  Fang Lan, who had been completely won over by Lao Jia's skillful performance, was so excited that she forgot to swallow the large piece of chicken in her mouth and, without wiping her oily hands, tried to stand up and dig into her pocket, saying: "The rewards you gave are all fake, I have real ones here! They're made of genuine gold and silver!"

  Yan Wei hastily said, "You quickly sit down and eat, don't wait a moment or it'll be wasted! I'm not even sure if there's enough for one person here!" After speaking, he took the military canteen from Huang Ran and with his right hand holding the canteen, he made a sweeping motion towards him. Huang Ran immediately understood and turned to leave.

  With a wave of his hand, Yan Wei was overjoyed! Ah! Good fellow, a full water jug! Now, being frugal might just make it to Chongqing! Just hope they don't find out, or else it won't be easy to keep it safe!

  The next two days were very smooth, one was due to the limited military strength, and the other was that the Japanese army was not stupid enough to launch a large-scale search in this continuous mountain range. And these poor but admirable children also used their tender bodies and tenacious willpower to make every soldier express heartfelt admiration for them!

  Two days of walking nearly eighty miles of mountain roads! It's hard to imagine that these eighty miles of rugged mountain roads were conquered by these innocent and lovely children! In two days, not a single child complained of being tired or lazy, not a single child was naughty or caused trouble for the team, nor did any child cry or refuse to listen, slowing down the entire team. It seems that in their young hearts, they already understand what is happening to their country and what it is going through.

  There were several times when Yan Wei looked at those innocent and lovely little faces, which were red with effort, their not yet fully shed baby teeth tightly biting their tender small mouths, emitting a childlike gaze that stared intently at the rugged mountain road below. Their small hands would occasionally stretch out to grab onto the disorderly growing tree branches. Yan Wei, this old iron-blooded soldier who had been through many battles and had lost all feeling, was not only once but several times moved to emotion! He also went forward several times to carry those lovely little bodies on his back, but each time it was at the request of those lovely and respectable children that he put them down.

  What is most touching? Some people say that the strength of life is the most touching, some people say that the greatness of true feelings is the most touching, some people say that the sincerity of love is the most touching, and some people say that the warmth of family is the most touching. If you had seen the tragic scene of the large-scale transfer of war orphans in Hubei Province in 1938, you would know what is most touching in this world!

  All the humiliation and hardship an adult suffers must have its own factors, but what ability do these children have to control their own destiny? Who are they suffering for today as a result of whose actions?

  What's even more precious is that some older and stronger boys can still use their frail bodies, which have been severely overdrawn physically, to help some younger and weaker companions! Their eyes, emitting innocence yet firm determination, seem to be telling the world that they are fully prepared to face the hardships of this life! They don't care about these things and can bear with them.

  But by the third day morning, the situation took a drastic turn for the worse!

  The camping trip ended, and Yan Wei and Wu Han Hua were counting the number of people in their respective teams. Fang Lan found Yan Wei with a somewhat anxious expression: "The kids are having problems! I felt something was wrong last night, and this morning when we got up, more than ten kids had runny noses and coughs, and some even had high fevers! They all have varying degrees of colds and fever!"

  Yan Wei immediately understood what it meant for the children to fall ill and have a fever collectively in such an environment, so he immediately called out for medical soldiers.

  Upon hearing Yan Wei's urgent loud call for medical soldiers, Wu Hanhuai immediately ran over and asked: "What? Is there a problem?" Yan Wei replied anxiously: "The children have collectively shown symptoms of fever and cold."

  "How is Huayuan? Is he ill too?" Wu Huanhui's first reaction upon hearing that the children were ill was to worry about Huayuan's safety.

  Yan Wei thought for a moment and also made sense, so he immediately asked Fang Lan about Hua Yuan's situation.

  Upon learning that Huayuan was fine, he immediately said to Wu Hanhui: "Wu Creek brother, temporarily let your people take care of Huayuan alone and separate him from the other children."

  After watching two medical soldiers nervously examine all the sick children, Yan Wei immediately asked the medical soldier who was still squatting on the ground busy with the children: "How is it?"

  "In the case of the return team, it's not very serious overall, but two of the children are burning with fever! The sick children should be isolated from the others immediately." A medical soldier named Tian Yi immediately stood up to report back to Yan Wei.

  "Do we have medicine? How long will it take to cure the children?" Yan Wei obviously understood that if they stopped here in this crisis-ridden mountain, what kind of military face would they have.

  "If I go back empty-handed, it's a dereliction of duty. We don't have any medicine to treat colds here." Tian Yi looked guilty.

  "How did you become a medic? Why don't you have any medicine?" Yan Wei immediately got angry when he heard that the medic didn't have any medicine.

  Another medic, Tan Guang, who had been taking care of Yan Wei day and night after he contracted acute enteritis, stood up and said to Yan Wei: "Don't get angry, Team Leader. This can't be blamed on Tian Yun. I'm also guilty of neglecting to prepare medicine for this kind of illness. When we received the urgent order from Deputy Team Leader, we thought it was a military operation against the Japanese army, not escorting a large group of children. We were prepared for a bloody battle, not thinking that we would be doing this for so long. So, this time, we only thought about encountering wounded soldiers and had all the bandages, medicine, and medical supplies ready, but didn't prepare any medicine to treat fever and colds." He looked at the sick children with a heavy heart, shaking his head in dismay.

  "We can use herbal medicine, can't we? There are so many herbs in the mountains that can cure illnesses. In the past, where did our ancestors get Western medicine from? When adults and children fell ill, didn't they all go to the mountains to find herbs?" Wu Huanhui suggested.

  After listening to Wu Han's words, Yan Wei looked at the two of them and saw that they both had a difficult expression on their faces. He knew that neither of them was familiar with wild medicinal herbs.

  At this time, Old Li walked over and said: "It's not that serious. When my son Xiaoshan was young, he often got sick too. Which time wasn't I able to cure him with some herbs from the mountain? Director Wu is right, these mountains are full of herbs that can treat fever. I'll go pick some northern angelica and bring it back for the kids. It's just that time is pressing, there's no time to dry them out before using them as medicine, so the effect might be discounted."

  Yan Wei was overjoyed and thought it was fortunate to have made friends with Old Li. He excitedly looked at Old Li and said, "Old Brother Li, I owe you another favor. Let's go back and talk about it later, we'll find a big restaurant and I'll treat you to a good meal!" After that, he immediately told Tian Di and Tan Guang, "You two take good care of the kids. Jiang Chen, Yu Tian, come with me to help Old Li find herbs." Then he followed Old Li into the depths of the forest.

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