War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 1584 Zhao Jinyu

The cold wind was howling and the snow was drifting. In the pine tree canopy that was swaying slightly with the wind, Wei Ran, who was wrapped tightly up like a polar sloth, hugged the tree trunk and quietly observed the direction of the grave mound. He and Hu Bazhi, who was hiding somewhere, were patiently waiting for the wild dogs to appear.

I don’t know how long it was after, but just when Wei Ran was about to take out the biscuit in his arms and take a bite, he could faintly hear the barking of dogs from the upwind direction in the distance.

He subconsciously looked in the direction where the barking sound came from, but unfortunately, he couldn't see anything because of the mountain and tree canopy.

Even so, he gently pulled the bolt to move it around, then wiped the frost off the front sight.

  However, what he and Hu Bazhi who was lying in ambush elsewhere did not expect was that as the barking sounds got closer, coming from the end of the dirt road, in addition to a hundred fat and strong wild dogs and a mule cart surrounded by the wild dogs, there were actually two Japanese trucks following at the back!

There were no Type 99 light machine guns mounted on the cabs of the two trucks as seen in the anti-Japanese dramas of later generations, and there were no puppet soldiers or traitors on bicycles following behind the trucks.

However, the mule cart in the front that was pulling the corpses had a puppet soldier sitting on the other side in addition to the driver.

  What kind of configuration is this?

Wei Ran couldn't help but mutter something.

Before he could see clearly, two trucks stopped one after another.

Under his gaze, a dozen or so Japanese soldiers jumped out of the truck at the back first.

Following closely, the dozen or so Japanese soldiers walked to the rear of the first truck. One of them roughly smashed the tailgate of the truck with the butt of his gun, and then made a gesture inside.

Soon, one hunched-over person after another jumped out of the cargo bed of the first truck.

Even though he was some distance away and even though it was not yet bright, Wei Ran could still clearly see the tattered clothes on those people fluttering in the cold wind.

Almost subconsciously, he once again took out the Robert camera equipped with a telephoto lens and wound it up in advance.

In the photos he pressed from time to time, the Japanese gave each of the dozen or twenty people who were driven off the car a wooden stick.

But what happened next was beyond Wei Ran's expectations.

As he watched in astonishment, the puppet soldiers and the driver on the mule cart unloaded all the bodies from the cart.

Before the driver could drive the mule cart aside, the wild dogs wagging their tails surrounded the fresh corpses that had been stripped of their clothes.

At this moment, urged by the gun-wielding devils, the people who had just been driven off the bus also held up wooden sticks and walked towards the wild dogs tremblingly. The devils stood in the distance with their guns, seemingly ready to open fire at any time.

A moment later, the swung wooden sticks hit the waists and bodies of the wild dogs. Amid the faint howling and screaming and the devils' wanton laughter, those holding the wooden sticks were forced to start a life-and-death fight with the wild dogs.

Those wild dogs were smart. They subconsciously stayed away from the driver who "raised" them, and also subconsciously stayed away from the two trucks and the Japanese soldiers with weapons around the trucks.

But they are also ferocious. In the melee where the number of enemies is greatly disparated, people with wooden sticks are often knocked down by wild dogs and surrounded and bitten by more dogs. Occasionally, a few dogs are knocked to the ground and wailing.

Before Wei Ran could finish shooting the film in his camera, the fight between man and dog came to an end with a volley of gunfire.

At this time, only three or four of the people holding the sticks were left alive, and the rest were lying on the blood-stained snow. Also lying there were less than ten wild dogs that they had killed with their own hands, and even more wild dogs that had been killed by bullets.

"Bang bang bang bang!"

After the second round of gunfire, more than a dozen wild dogs that had not had time to run far fell to the ground.

"Bang bang bang bang!"

After the third round of volleys of gunfire, the puppet soldier first nodded and said something to the leading Japanese soldier, and then said something in a domineering manner to the survivors.

Before he could finish his words, one of the men holding a wooden stick rushed towards the man dressed as a puppet soldier.

"boom!"

Before he could run to the puppet soldier, a gunshot rang out and the man holding the wooden stick fell to the ground.

Although the puppet soldier was startled, he soon started shouting again. Wei Ran also vaguely heard phrases like "If you don't accept my toast, you will be punished."

After a moment, the remaining three men dropped the sticks in their hands, carried the bodies of the wild dogs onto the mule cart, waited for the driver to skin them, and then threw the skinned bodies far away.

As the three men were busy, more and more dog skins were piled up on the mule cart. The three survivors walked farther and farther in order to carry the dogs back.

  They're going to run

When Wei Ran realized this, he immediately put away the camera as quickly as possible and untied the belt of the Golden Hook rifle tied to the tree branch.

Almost at the same time he raised his gun again, the three men suddenly accelerated and ran towards the dense forest beside the graveyard.

  Wanna shoot?

Wei Ran hesitated for a moment, which was like a tram track multiple-choice question.

Shooting might give the three people who were escaping a chance to survive, but it would also most likely put Hu Bazhi, who was not far from Luanfenggang and whose hiding place he had no idea of, into a desperate situation.

  Can't save.

"boom!"

During this brief hesitation, he also heard the peculiar dull sound of the iron sand gun when it was fired, and saw the smoke rising from behind a pine tree not far away, as well as the puppet soldier who was screaming with his face covered in iron sand, and the mule that seemed to have been hit by the iron sand and was pulling the cart and the handlebar on the cart at a galloping speed.

There he is? Why isn't he in the tree?

Wei Ran didn't have time to think. He raised his gun and pointed it at the Japanese soldier he had been eyeing. The soldier had his machine gun mounted on the front bumper of his car and was about to fire in the direction of Hu Ba's finger, and then he pulled the trigger!

"boom!"

Amid the crisp sound of gunfire, the Japanese soldier in charge of the machine gun tilted his body and fell into the snow. The tire of the car next to him was also blown up by the gun. The airflow from the explosion not only blew the assistant machine gunner to the ground, but also pushed away the snow around him.

But after all, he only had a bolt-action rifle. If he was lucky and the angle was right, he might be able to kill two or even three people with one shot, but it was impossible to kill all the Japanese.

Almost at the same time he opened fire, the Japanese soldiers pulled the trigger in the direction where the three men were fleeing and in the direction Hu Ba pointed.

  There was no time to extract the shell and reload the bullet. Wei Ran pulled the noose on the rope around his waist and jumped down from the tree. He also heard gunshots coming from another direction, which might be the gunshots from the Berdan Type II rifle!

"boom!"

Along with the gunshots, a cloud of blood exploded on the chest of the assistant gunner who had just climbed up and was about to hold the machine gun, and then he fell on the grass with his head raised. For a moment, the dozen or so Japanese soldiers dispersed their firepower again and assigned several people to fire at the location where the latest gunshots were heard.

Amid the wood chips and snow that were thrown up by the bullets hitting the tree trunks, Wei Ran rolled sideways as his feet touched the ground, holding his gun and hiding in the cold snow on the other side of the ridge.

By the time he crouched and moved a few dozen meters away and carefully looked out, the Japanese had already hidden themselves in two cars.

"Boom!"

Just at this moment, a dull explosion came from another direction, and the Japanese soldiers subconsciously shrank their necks.

Wei Ran couldn't help but laugh, as he had already heard that the sound just now was definitely from Ma Leizi.

But he knew that the Japs might not know it, or even if they knew, what was the use?

At that time in the Baishan and Heishui regions, not only hunters used homemade black powder and iron sand guns, but also gangs of bandits, anti-Japanese fighters, and even gentry who guarded the houses, had many homemade guns and even homemade cannons.

In other words, before the iron sand burst all over the face, no one dared to bet whether it was a gunshot or a bomb explosion in the distance.

"boom!"

Wei Ran aimed at a Japanese soldier with half of his butt exposed and pulled the trigger. Then he changed his position again and shouted in Japanese, "Quickly surrender! We have surrounded you! We will liberate you. Our Northeast Anti-Japanese Allied Forces will treat prisoners well! You will not be killed if you surrender your weapons!"

As soon as he said this, a second bomb exploded in another direction.

"Ta-ta-ta-ta!"

In response to Wei Ran, apart from the screams of the Japanese soldier who was shot in the buttocks, the fierce roar of the Type 99 light machine gun was also heard.

Obviously, those devils had enough confidence to hold out longer until the nearby forest farm sent people to support them.

Seeing that the two sides were in a stalemate and the Japanese soldiers were hiding under the cars, a large, smoking garlic hammer suddenly flew out from a pine tree in the distance.

It's that grenade!

A look of joy immediately appeared on Wei Ran's face. Without even waiting for the grenade to fall to the ground, he aimed at the machine gunner who was shooting at the surrounding mountains and forests and pulled the trigger again!

"boom!"

After the gunshots, the sound of machine gun fire stopped abruptly. Under the cover of the gunshots, the grenade hit the tarpaulin of the truck bed, then rolled out and hit the snow beside the car.

"boom!"

The dull explosion was followed by a scream, and then, amid the roar, the remaining Japanese soldiers began to shoot wildly, covering a soldier who climbed into the cab of another vehicle.

Amid the roar of the engine, the remaining seven or eight Japanese soldiers and the truck covered each other and fled, leaving behind only four or five bodies of their companions and the puppet soldier who had iron sand all over his face but still had the strength to scream.

"Tom!"

Another sound of a fire bomb exploding was heard in the surrounding woods. This time, Wei Ran could see clearly that it was an arrow, an arrow with a fire bomb tied to it.

A cloud-piercing arrow?

Wei Ran muttered something subconsciously, while at the same time raising his gun and aiming at the rear of the truck, he pulled the trigger towards the cargo bed.

After seeing off the fleeing enemy, he immediately stepped on his skis, put his gun on his back, pushed hard with his ski poles, and rushed towards the mass grave a hundred meters away.

However, Hu Bazhi, who should have been closer, disappeared somewhere unknown.

Time is running out and Wei Ran will not waste it as he still has the mission of returning with 20 kilograms of seized weapons.

He first stomped on the neck of the puppet soldier who was breathing more than breathing. After searching his body for a while, Wei Ran unexpectedly found a police-type Mauser pistol nicknamed "Three Boxes" and three spare bullets in the magazine, in addition to two packs of cigarettes.

This was a real pleasant surprise. Wei Ran immediately took off the three boxes, the matching wooden gun boxes, and spare bullets.

Finally, he took out six or seven silver dollars from the still warm corpse and put them in his pocket. He stood up and quickly moved to the side of the suspected squad leader who was killed by him and continued to search. In addition to a turtle box that he was not interested in at all, he also unexpectedly found a brass Japanese peacock hand warmer that was still releasing heat.

Continuing to search his body, I found that this suspected Japanese squad leader was wearing more than a dozen gold rings on the rope hanging with his identity card. Obviously, most of these things were stolen.

After taking down all the valuables and putting them in his pocket, he also noticed that Hu Bazhi was skiing down from not far away. Behind him was a man who looked to be about 1.7 meters tall, as thin as a stick, and with unkempt hair and a dirty face.

"He was the only one who fell into the snow and survived. The other two died."

Hu Bazhi said to the man who was stumbling down behind him, "Hurry up and put on a set of clothes. The Japanese from the forest farm will be here in two packs of cigarettes at most."

Before he finished speaking, Hu Bazhi had already stepped on his skis and started to "lick the bag" with familiarity.

"Empty the kettle"

As Wei Ran spoke, he had already picked up the gun and pulled the trigger to shoot a bullet hole into the fuel tank of the enemy truck next to him. "Fill the canteen with oil, it will be needed!"

Hearing this, Hu Bazhi immediately pulled a kettle off the corpse, emptied the water inside and went to the side of the fuel tank, saying, "Hurry up and change your clothes and shoes, we don't need you here!"

Hearing this, the disheveled man gave up the idea of ​​coming over to help, and quickly stripped off the puppet soldier's cotton coat and trousers and put them on. Then he took off a pair of knitted boots from the Japanese soldier's corpse and tried them on. Seeing that they did not fit, he immediately changed for another pair.

While he was busy looking for suitable shoes, Wei Ran had already opened the truck door and climbed in.

There was an unexpected discovery in the truck, a Showa 5-style backpack made of cowhide.

Wei Ran picked up the backpack and weighed it, then threw it over his shoulder with satisfaction, not caring what was inside.

When he got off the car, the disheveled man had just put on his shoes. Hu Bazhi had just filled the last kettle with gasoline and was using a Japanese lunch box to collect the oil. At the same time, he did not forget to direct the man who had put on his shoes to collect the Japanese's rifles and ammunition into the sacks that were originally intended to hold dog skins.

"Take him away first"

While Wei Ran was speaking, he had already handed the three boxes he had just found from the puppet soldiers to Hu Bazhi, and took the lunch box he was using to collect gasoline.

"you"

"I'll catch up with you guys soon"

Wei Ran said as he turned to look at the man he had saved, "Skiing. Can you use a fast horse?"

"meeting!"

The disheveled man spoke immediately. His voice was much more childish than Wei Ran had expected. Perhaps he was even younger than Hu Bazhi.

"Then go quickly"

Wei Ran said this without question, and at the same time poured the gasoline he had just filled up onto the cab and tires of the truck.

"go!"

Hu Bazhi was straightforward. He didn't even give the rescued young man a chance to speak. He picked up some of the spoils and climbed up the ridge.

After a moment of hesitation, the young man hurriedly tied on his skis, put on the gloves handed to him by Wei Ran, hung the seized ammunition and other items around his neck, and caught up with Hu Bazhi with his ski poles.

Looking around, Wei Ran calmly took out a silver lighter from the metal notebook, opened the fuel tank and filled it with fuel, then ignited the truck's cab and the tires that were also doused with gasoline.

Without waiting for the fire to burn out completely, he went around to the other side of the truck, took out the German skis and ski poles he got in Murmansk from the metal book and put them on his feet. Then he took out the bearskin gloves and put them on, and followed the marks to climb to the highest point of the ridge.

Following the ski tracks left by the two people ahead, Wei Ran sped through the woods. Soon after, he saw Hu Bazhi and the other man who seemed to be waiting for him.

“I can’t go back to my den for now.”

Hu Bazhi said, "While it's snowing, let's take the Japanese soldiers behind us and go around the mountains to find a chance to sneak back."

"You are familiar with this place. I will listen to you." Wei Ran nodded. "Is there somewhere to go?"

"Yes," Hu Bazhi said confidently.

"The mighty Bodhidharma shook the heavens"

The man who was rescued, however, clasped his hands together and raised them over his left shoulder, shaking them. "We are all one family. We were rescued by our partners. Thank you for your hard work."

"People may not be close to the handle of the gun, but they are; if people are not close to the handle of the gun, the mountain people are."

Hu Bazhi also clasped his fists and raised them over his left shoulder, shaking them. "My bottom pillar can't be opened, my friend, let's be frank."

Looking at Wei Ran in surprise, the dishevelled young man said, "Should we find a place to burn the Xiangzi kiln first?"

"He said, should we hide the gun before running away?" Hu Bazhi helped "translate".

"Can't you understand this?"

The disheveled young man muttered to himself and looked at Wei Ran with more and more surprise.

“It really has to be hidden”

Wei Ran was too lazy to think about what the two had said in secret before. It was useless to say anything now. The important thing to do was to run away quickly.

"Follow me"

As Hu Bazhi said this, he pushed hard on his ski poles and rushed out first.

At this time, the truck separated by two mountain ridges behind him had completely ignited and was emitting black smoke.

Wei Ran and the disheveled young man immediately chased after him on their skis, and they followed Hu Bazhi and sped through the woods for about an hour before stopping next to a huge tree lying on the ground, which was so thick that three or four people could hug it.

At the root of this big tree, a hole has been formed that is big enough for a person to crawl into without any problem.

"Pick one, bro."

As Hu Bazhi spoke, he told Wei Ran to put all the captured weapons, as well as his own iron sand gun, Berdan Type II rifle, and the golden hook rifle, against the horizontal tree.

“That’s it”

The disheveled young man picked up the box behind him, looked at it, and put it on his belt. Then he picked up a Type 38 rifle and took the Japanese ammunition box.

"Eight Fingers"

Hu Bazhi patted his chest, then pointed at Wei Ran, "This is Brother Wei."

"My last name is Zhao," said the dishevelled young man, "Zhao Jinyu."

"It's really you!"

Wei Ran muttered something secretly and took the initiative to shake hands with the other party.

Hu Bazhi glanced at Wei Ran inconspicuously, without pointing out the things he knew. He also followed Wei Ran's example and shook hands with Zhao Jinyu. He also asked about the other party's zodiac sign and reported his age.

Soon, Zhao Jinyu, who was just 20 years old, respectfully called out "Brother Wei, Brother Hu".

Without any further delay, the three of them hid all the extra weapons and ammunition in the tree hole. Hu Bazhi also ran to the front again on his skis and led them to cross one ridge after another in the heavy snow.

Near noon, Hu Bazhi finally stopped, took off his skis, and asked the two to follow him into the crown of a dead pine tree.

Behind the snow-covered treetops, there is a not-so-big stone cave.

Just by looking at the feces and bones everywhere, and even the pine needles in the corners, you can tell that this place was most likely a bear den.

"Let's take a break here"

Hu Bazhi took off the sack that served as his backpack and spread it on the pine needles. He was the first to sit on it, and then he slowly lit his pipe. "With such heavy snow, our footprints will be wiped out in the time it takes to smoke a pack of cigarettes. Don't worry, if we can't find them, we'll go back after dark."

After saying that, Hu Bazhi took a puff of his pipe, took out a bag of food from his pocket and handed it to Zhao Jinyu.

Zhao Jinyu was obviously very hungry. He took the biscuits and dried meat and began to eat them voraciously.

"Drink some wine to warm yourself up"

Hu Bazhi took out the not-so-big wine gourd and handed it to Zhao Jinyu again, just like he did when he rescued Wei Ran.

While he was eating and drinking, Wei Ran took off the cowhide Zhaowu backpack he had been carrying on his shoulders and opened it. Hu Bazhi slowly took out a homemade pine oil candle from the corner of the bear's den, lit it and placed it between the three of them, watching Wei Ran curiously fiddling with the square little backpack.

To put it simply, this backpack is just a cowhide bag with a wooden frame. As the leather buckles are opened one by one, the contents inside are gradually revealed.

“This is a good thing”

Hu Bazhi picked up the first item that Wei Ran took out and looked at it curiously. It was a metal flashlight that could hold four batteries. Perhaps to resist the low temperature here, the outside of the flashlight was wrapped with a layer of furry rabbit skin.

"I'll give it to you if you need it."

Wei Ran said nonchalantly, and then took out the second thing from his bag, a tube of assault ingots.

“This stuff is poisonous”

Wei Ran said this and put it aside. However, Hu Bazhi reached out and picked up the tea-can-shaped tin can and opened it, only to find that there were no assault ingots inside, but only sugar cubes produced by the devils.