The fortifications and heavy firepower of the Japanese troops ahead made Xiao Dongbei realize:

In the current situation, without support or heavy weapons, two platoons simply couldn't break through.

Now, all he could do was have his men quickly deploy directional mines and bury landmines, preparing to deal with a Japanese counterattack.

Unlike Xiao Dongbei's group, Liu Laopao and Ye Dadan's attack in the other direction was progressing very smoothly.

Colonel Sasaki Doichi, in the courtyard, listened as the sounds of gunfire from two directions rapidly approached the center of the town.

He had no choice but to issue a retreat order.

People were alive, but the courtyard was dead.

He could only retreat in two directions: either south or toward the artillery position.

Sasaki Doichi chose to retreat towards the artillery position, and he also issued an order for all troops to converge there.

In less than an hour, several teams from the Special Company had met up around the artillery of the Ogihara Yūki Battalion.

Battalion Commander Ogihara Yūki had never imagined that his heavy artillery battalion would be surrounded by the Chinese army.

But in the current situation, these artillerymen were helpless.

His artillery battalion had brought eighteen 150mm howitzers, all intended for long-range fire, making them useless against the Special Company, which had advanced to within 300 meters.

Chen Sichuan's first squad was ordered to hold the southern road of Nan Zha Town to block any possible reinforcements from the Japanese.

The remaining squads immediately attacked the Japanese artillery position.

All the Special Company's mortars were concentrated to bombard the fortifications in front of the Japanese artillery position.

Colonel Sasaki Doichi had already made a distress call while retreating.

Nearly three thousand Japanese soldiers were now gathered here, roughly the strength of a regiment.

All the Japanese soldiers knew that this was their last stand, and if the Chinese army broke through, everyone would die here.

And regardless, although they had consolidated their forces here, they had reinforcements on the outside and so many soldiers within.

These Japanese soldiers were not actually panicked.

Colonel Sasaki Doichi, however, began to regret his decision amidst the Special Company's artillery bombardment:

He shouldn't have concentrated the troops in such a narrow area.

The narrower the area, the greater the damage caused by enemy artillery.

And in such a confined space, a force of over three thousand had very little strategic depth.

Realizing the problem, Colonel Sasaki Doichi immediately ordered, "The Gotō Yūki Battalion, organize a detachment and push out five hundred meters to the due north.

Establish a defensive position."

Five hundred meters to the north, there were several houses that could be used as fortifications.

Another reason was that the north connected to the direction from which Japanese reinforcements would arrive. If things truly became irreversible, Colonel Sasaki Doichi would have no choice but to abandon the artillery position.

And lead his troops to break out to the north.

Of course, another reason was that the firepower in the northern direction was weak.

Sasaki Doichi had just realized that, among the troops surrounding the artillery position, only the southern force had the strongest firepower.

The firepower from other directions posed little threat to his troops.

Upon receiving the order, Battalion Commander Gotō Yūki immediately dispatched the Kamahara Asahi Company, following behind two tanks, to charge towards the direction indicated by the colonel.

In this situation, the two tanks would naturally take the lead.

The Kamahara Asahi Company now had only one hundred and ten men. The originally full-strength unit had lost dozens of excellent soldiers during the recent retreat.

Now, these soldiers nervously followed behind the two tanks, charging forward.

Fortunately, most of the bullets fired by the enemy hit the tanks, clanging loudly.

The infantrymen behind them suffered little damage and were able to hold on.

Nishirendera Kōsuke was one of these soldiers charging forward.

Now, he timidly followed behind the tank, walking in the center, so that even if something happened,

There was a tank in front, and comrades on both sides to take the bullets, and even soldiers behind him to shield him.

Five hundred meters was neither near nor far.

The first hundred meters of the advance were taken very carefully, with few casualties.

This gave Company Commander Kamahara great confidence.

By the two hundred meter mark, all the soldiers were even more cautious. They had now left the protection of the main force behind.

They were vulnerable to attack from all sides.

Fortunately, the situation wasn't as bad as they had imagined. Looking at the distance to the target, only half remained; one charge would be enough to reach it.

The northern direction was originally guarded by Chen Sichuan's troops, but they had gone outside Nan Zha Town to establish a defensive position.

This direction was now jointly guarded by Liu Laopao's second squad and Jia Shusheng's third squad.

When they saw the Japanese tanks advancing menacingly, both squads simultaneously laid landmines and directional mines in place.

Then, they quietly retreated fifty meters.

Firing sparsely at the Japanese from a distance.

They had learned a few things from fighting every day recently.

From the direction of the Japanese advance and the surrounding situation, both squad leaders pointed to the houses not far away.

The Japanese were obviously heading for that location.

Therefore, the mines laid by the two squads were on the Japanese's only route.

In order to prevent the charging Japanese from becoming suspicious, Liu Laopao also had a dozen soldiers fire sporadically at the Japanese from a distance.

He led the main force to separate and ambush on both sides of the mined area under the cover of darkness.

There was no way they would let this group of charging Japanese return.

Although the area within a hundred meters in all directions was illuminated by flares,

Walking on such a road, Nishirendera Kōsuke was truly uneasy, very uneasy.

He always felt that countless eyes were staring at him in the darkness, and that they all wanted to harm him!

But as a member of the Kamahara Company, Nishirendera Kōsuke did not dare to run away, and in the current situation, running away would probably lead to an even faster death.

Just as he was thinking wildly, he seemed to simultaneously feel the ground shaking, and heard a loud noise in his ears. At the same time, his body felt as if it had been shot through by countless arrows, and everything hurt.

With a loud bang, the tank at the front was blown up.

The Japanese soldiers behind it were also hit by the iron pellets ejected from the enhanced explosive packs.

Nishirendera Kōsuke was one of them. These soldiers closest to the tank bore the brunt of the attack.

A dozen soldiers helplessly closed their eyes.

The soldiers still behind this tank reflexively lay down, firing vigilantly in all directions.

Only the second tank, twenty meters behind, continued to advance as if nothing had happened.

The soldiers behind this second tank were now lying down nervously, carefully checking in all directions.

Twenty meters was a short distance, and the tank soon passed it.

Safe!

Peaceful!

No loud explosion was heard as the tank passed this stretch of road.

This made the surviving soldiers of the Kamahara Company, who were crawling on the ground, feel a little more at ease.

They finally stood up, bent over, and followed the tank from a distance.

Liu Laopao slammed the ground hatefully: "Damn it! They didn't follow the original route."

The second tank avoided the landmines they had just laid, so they could only use the second plan.

Seeing that the Japanese infantry and the tank were nearly thirty meters apart, Liu Laopao smiled sinisterly.

This was a situation he had not anticipated. Company Commander Kamahara urged the soldiers to hang far behind the last tank.

He also occasionally fired a few flares to make himself feel safer.

In reality, in this dark night, this team walking in the light of the flares had become the best target.

It wasn't just Liu Laopao who was regretting, Jia Shusheng was also regretting.

They had missed the opportunity to blow up the Japanese tank, and now they could only eliminate the infantry behind the tank first.

Fortunately, no matter how these infantry changed direction, they would fall into the pre-arranged traps.

The Kamahara Company, with less than a hundred men left, entered the kill zone of the directional mines laid by Liu Laopao and Jia Shusheng.

Four mines detonated simultaneously.

Under the pale light of the flares, the Kamahara Company, which was cautiously advancing, suddenly suffered such a devastating blow.

As soon as the explosions stopped, Liu Laopao had already ordered his troops to blow up the Japanese tank first.

He especially reminded them, "Make sure to wait until it enters the darkness before acting, and only blow up the tracks."

Although the company commander didn't say anything about capturing equipment when assigning tasks today, Liu Laopao knew that the company commander liked advanced, high-powered equipment the most.

Now that there were no Japanese soldiers in front or behind the Japanese tank,

It was completely a piece of meat on the chopping board, and he could stew it or braise it as he pleased.

Just blowing up its tracks would make it unable to move, and it would also be easy for the company commander to repair.

How clever he was!

Liu Laopao gave his wisdom a big thumbs up.

Jia Shusheng saw that more than a dozen people from Liu Laopao's team had rushed towards the tank.

He cursed with a smile, "The old man is too wicked!"

He directed his soldiers to rush towards the fortifications they had just retreated to, to block any troops that might come to rescue these Japanese soldiers.

Some of the soldiers quickly rushed towards the Japanese troops who were still lying on the ground.

This was a complete procedure: first stab, then seize.

The Special Company's weapons and ammunition were all captured from the Japanese.

Recently, with the sudden addition of more than a thousand Gan troops, the average firepower of the weapons configuration was not as strong as before.

Now, they needed the Japanese to send more equipment over.

Colonel Sasaki Doichi, who had been paying attention to the progress of this team, watched with a livid face as the team he had sent out was completely wiped out.

He hatefully ordered, "Bombard them!"

He had mortars, grenade launchers, and Type 92 battalion guns here.

He could attack in this direction.

When the first shell landed in this direction, the Special Company soldiers immediately retreated and disappeared into the darkness.

Now, they didn't need to fight under Japanese fire.

Looking at the tank in the distance gradually disappearing into the darkness, Sasaki Doichi was ultimately unable to make up his mind to have it bombarded:

After all, when he saw it, that tank was still being driven by his own people.

The nervously retreating Liu Laopao and Jia Shusheng heard a small explosion in front of them.

It came from the location of the Japanese tank. Those second squad soldiers who had been staring at it had acted as soon as it entered the darkness.

The two squads in this direction saw the solitary tank in the front tremble in the red light of the explosion, stubbornly moving forward a few meters before stopping.

Everything in that direction fell into darkness.

Even the surroundings of the two squads fell into darkness. Only when the Japanese shells exploded in the area where the Kamahara Company was ambushed did some light flash out.

The corpses on the ground could be clearly seen being thrown up, tumbling in the air in pieces.

Five soldiers had climbed onto the top of the tank and were trying to pry open the hatch.

Ashikaga Kazuma desperately held onto the tank hatch, roaring at the other two people crouching in the tank with their heads in their hands: "Come and help!

We won't survive if they open this hatch."

Furukogawa Shinichi was kicked, and stood up trembling.

Trying to control his emotions, he reached out and grabbed the handle of the tank hatch, holding on tightly.

Wei Haoqi put his gun aside angrily, stood on both sides of the tank hatch, grabbed it tightly with both hands, and tried his best to open the hatch.

There was a piece of iron inside the hatch that could be fastened.

To open it from the outside, the force needed was enough to break the iron piece.

This was clearly impossible.

Yu Anxiang pulled the pin of a grenade and threw it into the tank through the vent. Not finished, he quickly threw in a second grenade.

Furukogawa Shinichi only had time to shout "Ah!" when he saw the grenade fall in.

The first grenade exploded.

With two muffled sounds in a row, the people who were trying to lift the hatch all opened it.

A puff of smoke came out of the tank.

Wei Haoqi quickly jumped into the tank. The Japanese inside were all dead.

Mission accomplished!

Sasaki Doichi watched the blasted positions with a gloomy expression, not knowing what he was thinking.

The Chinese army, with its strongest firepower, had launched an attack from the north.

They didn't charge directly towards the center.

Lin Fan commanded ten homemade armored vehicles, pushing them to two hundred meters in front of the Japanese position, and then continuing to push them forward.

Directly cutting out a small piece of the Japanese defensive position.

Like cutting a piece of cake.

The Japanese soldiers in this small piece of the position were surrounded by soldiers from the Special Company.

This was a team of more than four hundred people.