Chapter 38 Hunger

(......In every failure of a large-scale battle, the mechanized troops of the Japanese will quickly occupy the main road, and the defeated soldiers can only walk on the mountains and swamps; a slight injury on the battlefield may be infected and kill your life. In addition to hunger and various accidents, we will not die on the road than on the battlefield... Excerpted from "Grandpa's Anti-Japanese War Diary")

"Two, this is what we want to sell, but I'm not a stupid soldier. A few pieces of ocean can sell the gun." Cao Xiaomin acted like the unscrupulous merchants on movies and TV: "At least this number!" He raised a finger.

"This... boss, this is too expensive. Look, we farmers can't pay that money..." The short man among the two gun dealers looked at the Czech light machine gun, his eyes shining, but he was bargaining in his mouth.

"What? Can't afford it? Then don't say anything. We will carry this gun to the rear, and a large army will take it!" Cao Xiaomin said to the short man who claimed his own name Sun: "This gun can cost four or five hundred even during the Taiping period. Now when the cannon fires, there is no thousand yuan, so don't talk. Please..."

"Ah!... One thousand!..." Those two people looked at me and I looked at you. They probably thought Cao Xiaomin offered a price of 100 yuan!

"This..." The short man swallowed: "I said, boss, even if you sell us this thousand, it's not worth the money..."

"I said, stop pretending, the bachelor's eyes can't rub the sand in his eyes... I dare not say your brother, you guys are like Henan when you open your mouth; your village is in Jiangsu?!" Cao Xiaomin said to the short man: "I'm right, you two are gun dealers. You have picked up a lot of cheaper along the way, right? Have you ever seen such a good product? Humph, I took back this gun with money. As long as I get to Zhejiang and Anhui, I can't sell two thousand to you..."

No wonder this group of scattered soldiers had more than twenty original Czech machine guns. It turned out that this commander was usually a military rat! The two suddenly realized.

"Ha, since the commander is so good, I'll be stingy if I keep pretending..." The short man said: "If this gun can pass through Taihu Lake, I believe it can be sold for 2,000 yuan! But now the Japanese are moving westward, and this road is not easy to walk..."

"Why should I sell you for one thousand?" Cao Xiaomin actually didn't know the price of guns in the black market at all, but he believed that these people who secretly damaged the Kuomintang army by buying and selling guns would never let go when they saw more than 20 original Czech light machine guns! Now he felt a little regretful, why didn't they call two thousand directly? If the other party could accept any price, then they would definitely not be simple buyer gun dealers.

"It's just that our brothers don't have that much cash. If the superiors are interested, what about us going to Suzhou to trade?" The dwarf proposed the plan.

Suzhou? It's just the way! Cao Xiaomin originally planned to take everyone to Suzhou and cross Taihu Lake instead of going north to Nanjing.

"Brothers! Let's go to Suzhou together, and there is heaven and Suhang! We'll sell the guns in heaven, so everyone can have fun!" Cao Xiaomin's arrogance of a military oil man, and his subordinates responded. Everyone knew what the company commander was going to do, and they pretended to be extremely excited, and the group headed towards Suzhou.

Walking from the western suburbs of Shanghai to Suzhou is not too far from Cao Xiaomin's concept. In the original time and space, he took a train and took a few tractors. However, there was no train in this time and space, and the Japanese pursuers had already arrived. The Kuomintang soldiers who had two legs had to walk on those mountain roads and wilderness. The road was easy to recognize. The defeated troops and refugees who had passed in front had already stepped on the wilderness and mountains and a new road to Suzhou. As long as you follow it, you won't be wrong.

There were no Japanese planes on their heads, but there were many corpses underground, mainly civilians; most of them looked like they had scars of fighting, and they should have been beaten to death, and no one was buried. It seemed that there were many chaos along the way. The ragged corpses fell from time to time and became even more chilling. Everyone was walking on the road with a look of sadness, and they were completely gone, even though the war was flying, they were full of fighting spirit.

Because the entire army had less than 400 kilograms of fried rice as military rations, this was the night before that a gentry asked his family to fry the rice overnight. For this reason, Cao Xiaomin ordered that each person could only give him a small handful of food per meal. If this food enters the stomach and walks for less than five miles, it will be digested. The feeling of the belly sticking to the spine makes people bend down and feel very tired if they can't walk for ten miles. So many troops and refugees pass by, it is completely impossible to find wild vegetables or wild fruits on the road. Everyone can only hold a grass root in their mouths - it's not just chewing, it's really chewing and swallowing it in their stomachs!

Along the way, we will encounter many lost defeated soldiers and refugees, some dying with injuries, some with quick legs and feet, all of whom were full of fear and confusion. The joining of these scattered soldiers made them even more difficult to eat, but they were all Kuomintang troops. Can you not reach out to help when you see your brothers in trouble? How can you not help your compatriots? After walking for a long time, Cao Xiaomin's army actually reached more than 600, and the refugees followed them were even more than a thousand!

Except for the soldiers who were weak and left behind, most of the refugees who followed their troops were women, children, elderly and weak, and several were still breastfeeding women. The joining of these people made them move faster... Maybe I was not a good soldier by nature! Cao Xiaomin thought to himself, but every time he wanted to order the soldiers to abandon the people, he would think of the help of the citizens of Shanghai and the look of expectation. When he saw the scene of the child still breastfeeding but his mother was hungry and not feeding the child milk, the child was tired from sleeping and woke up from hunger, he finally decided to take them with him - they still had at least half a bag of fried rice!

Whenever we go to a place with water, we will stop and rest. Once, after drinking the water, we found that there was a corpse soaking in a puddle upstream of the spring! Some people spit out on the spot... The group of people was bleak and the clouds were gloomy!

...In the failure of every large-scale battle, the mechanized troops of the Japanese will quickly occupy the main road, and the defeated soldiers can only walk on the mountains and swamps; a slight injury on the battlefield may cause you to be infected and kill you. In addition to hunger and various accidents, we will not die on the road than on the battlefield... This passage in Grandpa's memoir just appeared in Cao Xiaomin's mind, and soldiers came to report that the wounded were completely unable to walk, and more than half of them were having a fever!

"After walking about five miles, there is a small road turning into the mountain nest. There will be a small village where we can rest." The tall man came over and said to Cao Xiaomin. The gun dealers were very familiar with the road that was stepped on by refugees. It would not be easy to get to Suzhou without them!

The mountains on the plains of the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River are actually some mounds. These small hills with gentle curves from a distance are so difficult to walk. Cao Xiaomin calculated that they had been walking for most of the day and had almost gone black before walking more than twenty miles! Their mouth was lightly sweet and astringent, and they were not thirsty, but every breath was heavy, and the air inhaled was as bitter as grass roots. He felt that he could not lift every step, and his shoes were almost dragged on the ground. When he turned into the path mentioned by the gun dealers, it was even more difficult to walk. Many ups and downs had to be stepped on the mud nests stepped out by his predecessors to use their hands and feet before they could go up. People would fall from time to time while walking, and some would have to be lifted if they were injured; most of the falls were wounded and those old and weak refugees.

When soldiers with weak bodies helped the wounded to go up and down, they often had to stand six or seven people standing on both sides of the road and slowly pass it on. Cao Xiaomin felt sweat constantly on his body, and the sweat marinated the wound very painfully. He wiped the sweat beads on his forehead and found that his forehead was hot!

Oh no, the wound must be inflamed! Suddenly a wave of dizziness came, and he almost didn't fall; he grabbed the mud nest in front of him with both hands, and he pretended to be calm, and finally waited for the dizziness; but he used excessive force to touch his ribs, which made him moan secretly in pain.

Fortunately, no one noticed it, because everyone's throat will pant like moans when they move forward.

They were all soldiers and were trained. The soldiers from the Gui and Sichuan troops walked on the mountain roads like flat ground; everyone was hungry because they joined many people and the food was about to come to an end!

"When will you tell me that village be there?" Cao Xiaomin asked the gun dealers weakly.

The short man smiled bitterly: "It was originally turned in and walked in half an hour, but I think you have to walk until midnight..."

Cao Xiaomin was speechless. They were really walking too slowly.

"Everyone stop, let's go all out of the food, and then add it to the village!" Cao Xiaomin bet!

Half a bag of fried rice was distributed to everyone, including soldiers and refugees. The soldiers chewed the fried rice voraciously, and they swallowed it into their stomachs before they could chew them all. The same was true for refugees, except for a few women with children. A few women chewed the fried rice carefully and fed it to their children... Cao Xiaomin really wanted to send one of his own to the women, but he knew that this bite of fried rice might determine whether he could go to the village that the gun dealers mentioned.

It was already dark. When the last food of the whole team entered their stomachs and after a while of rest, everyone continued to grop in the darkness; the slim legendary village seemed to never be able to walk...
Chapter completed!