Chapter 25: Desperate Flight

  "Feng Laoshi is over there, I'm going to find him." Zhou Xianzhang grabbed his gun and ran.

  The captain drank and said: "He left the school before dawn, it was specially approved by Li Zhongtang."

  Zhou Xuanzhang suddenly remembered that last night, Feng Guozhang had said he was going to the Yalu River.

  Zhou Xuzhang grasped the Type 88 rifle committee, and his anger towards Feng Guozhang vanished, replaced by infinite nostalgia.

  Everything is fate, and elder brother also has his own difficulties!

  Zhou Xuechang thoroughly forgave Feng Guozhang.

  "Stop standing there like fools! Hurry up and eat! Li Zhongtang has already arrived at the martial arts hall, and the directors are all waiting on him carefully. You'd better get your spirits up for me! We'll have a good test later!"

  Half an hour later, all the students entered the classroom and sat down. Before long, the teacher walked into the classroom with a stack of test papers in his arms and distributed them to each student.

  Zhou Xianzhang opened the test paper and found it was a drawing homework.

  The bay shown on the map, with one side facing the sea and three sides surrounded by mountains, has five gun emplacements at high points along the mountain range, labeled 1-5 from north to south. The gun emplacements are situated in a commanding position, equipped with 30cm and 15cm large-caliber cannons, with their muzzles pointing out to sea. The gun emplacements face the sea direction, with breastworks and fortifications constructed in front of them, equipped with Gatling machine guns and various long- and short-barreled firearms. Below the breastworks is a minefield stretching 500 meters wide. The firepower points of the forts are set up very reasonably, with the five gun emplacements supporting each other's firepower, forming a firepower coverage area two kilometers wide from the beach to the mountains.

  Red flags were inserted all over the gun emplacement, indicating it was the Red Army.

  There were several warships in the bay, also flying red flags.

  Outside the bay is a fleet with blue flags, and the direction of attack by the blue fleet is towards the northernmost No. 1 battery.

  Obviously, this is an exercise of red defense and blue attack on the map.

  The diagram shows that the Blue Army is coming across the sea with a fleet of heavy cruisers and gunboats, equipped with various landing equipment, mountain guns, field guns, with a total strength of 30,000 men. The Red Army is waiting for labor, with a total strength of 20,000 men, distributed among five artillery positions.

  This tactical map looks very familiar, as if I've seen it somewhere before.

  However, Zhou Xuanzhang's mind was completely not in the classroom, and his brain was all over the place. With his head spinning, how could he have the energy to do his homework?

  All around were the rustling sounds of writing, the students were all buried in answering papers, Zhou Xianzhang furrowed his brow, thinking deeply.

  Now, all the students are in the classroom answering questions, and the instructors are all standing outside the classroom. The principal, vice-principal, and supervisor are accompanying Li Hongzhang and Weng Tonghe in the martial arts hall. These two are high-ranking officials of the imperial court, so the school must have strengthened its guard at the martial arts hall, and the patrol of the city gate and wall must be lax. If we don't run now, when will we?

  The plan was set, Zhou Xuanzhang picked up his pen and roughly glanced at the test paper before starting to write.

  Zhou Xuanzhang had to hand in his paper before others did, and he didn't study the diagram carefully, but just wrote according to his usual thinking, writing wherever he thought of it, finishing the test in less than thirty minutes. He stood up with the test paper, walked to the door, and handed it over to the invigilator Ai De.

  "Mr. Zhou so soon?" Ed's face was full of surprise, the test stipulated time is one and a half hours, Zhou Xianzhang only used one-third of the time.

  "Mr. Ai, that's enough, I don't want a perfect score," said Zhou Xianzhang as he walked out of the classroom.

  Just after walking five or six steps, I heard a loud shout from behind: "Wait!"

  Zhou Xuanzhang was shocked and stumbled backward, turning his head to see Ai De holding the test paper and chasing after him, pointing at the test paper with an incredulous expression: "Mr. Zhou, are these your answers?"

  "Of course, of course, my name is on it, in black and white. No fake stuff." Zhou Xianzhang said as he walked away.

  "Mr. Zhou, are you sure what you wrote?" Eddie shouted loudly.

  "I'm sure of what I wrote myself!" Zhou Xianzhang had already walked more than ten meters: "Mr. Ai, nice to meet you, goodbye."

  Zhou Xuanzhang suddenly found this foreign teacher to be quite lovely. After being together for more than half a year, today's farewell was truly somewhat hard to bear.

  Zhou Xuan Zhang walked out about ten meters in the direction of the dormitory, saw that Ai De had not followed up, and there was no one around. The officials of the school were all waiting for Li Hongzhang and Weng Tonghe, and the students' instructors were still in the classroom. It was estimated that they would not be able to come out within an hour, and time was pressing. Zhou Xuan Zhang crouched down and slipped into a shaded path, heading south.

  Before long, I saw the Wu Sheng Temple.

  The Tianjin Military Academy is surrounded by a three-zhang-high city wall, with two gates. The main gate is the west gate, and the north gate is the side gate. There are no gates on the east and south sides.

  Zhou Xuan Zhang did not go to the west gate or the north gate, but ran to the south side.

  There are gates on the west and north sides, but they are not for deserters. If you want to be a deserter, you should make up your mind on the east and south sides.

  To the east is a pond, with an open view below, and steep city walls. Even if Zhou Xuan Zhang had the skill of flying eaves and walking on walls, he would still be exposed to the eyes of the sentries if he climbed up the city wall.

  The south side is the Wu Sheng Temple, which was originally built by the people of Tianjin City. The surrounding area was originally a residential area. When the school was built, the city wall passed through the residential area and included this Wu Sheng Temple and several civilian houses. These several civilian houses were rebuilt into the reception room of the school, used to accommodate officials who came to inspect.

  However, the conditions of the guest house are limited, and eating and living are all the same as the students' dormitory standards. This is really too shabby for the officials of the Qing Dynasty. Moreover, there are many rules in the school, no mahjong can be played, and no brothels can be visited. No official can stand it, so over the years, not a single official has been willing to live here. Everyone would rather pay out of their own pocket to stay in an inn outside the school. This guest house is basically empty.

  The roof of the hostel is almost as high as the city wall of the school. Outside the city wall, it is a residential area in Tianjin City, with dense houses and crisscrossing streets.

  Zhou Xuan Zhang planned to climb up from the roof of the inn, cross over the city wall and jump into a civilian house.

  Zhou Xuan Zhang had thought of this plan when he first entered school, but it was dismissed by himself.

  Because, although it is possible to climb up the city wall from the dormitory, because this place is connected with civilian houses, it has become a focus of vigilance. There are fixed sentry posts on the city wall and patrol teams patrolling the city. The school is not worried that students will escape from here, but mainly to prevent lawless elements outside from sneaking into the school.

  Zhou Xuan Zhang wants to escape from here successfully, there are two prerequisites. First, the patrol team must have at least a five-minute gap. Zhou Xuan Zhang first needs to climb onto the roof of the reception building and then jump from the roof of the reception building to the city wall, which takes about five minutes. Second, the fixed sentry is asleep and can't see him.

  The second condition is purely a fairy tale, this is broad daylight, not the middle of the night, there's no reason for the sentry to be asleep.

  However, the first condition is possible to achieve. In peacetime, there are four teams of sentries on the city wall, each with five people, patrolling in the east, south, west and north directions respectively, so the time interval between patrols is very tight, leaving almost no blank space.

  However, today Li Hongzhang and Weng Tonghe, two high-ranking officials of the imperial court, came to the school's martial arts hall. The school may withdraw the sentries from the city wall to strengthen the security of the martial arts hall. As a result, the number of sentries on the city wall will decrease. If it decreases from four teams to two teams, there is a possibility that there will be gaps in the patrol. If the sentry team's actions are delayed for a bit, it may leave five minutes for Zhou Xuanzhang.

  Two preconditions, only one of which has a possibility of being met, and Zhou Xuan Zhang's chances of success are extremely slim.

  However, at this point, the knife had reached his neck, and Zhou Xuan Zhang could only make a desperate move.