Chapter 78: Horrific Scene
In the Japanese 13th Infantry Regiment camp two li away from the church, the embers of the campfire glowed with a dark red faint light.
Soldiers from Kumamoto lay sprawled in their tents, their mud-caked military boots still in marching position.
Some Japanese soldiers clutched their Type 38 rifles, curled up in a ball, their cracked lips twitching from time to time, as if still chewing on rice balls from their homeland in their dreams.
Even the night sentries leaned on their rifle butts dozing off, their steel helmets askew covering half their faces.
It was not laziness on the sentries’ part, but the daytime battle had been truly exhausting.
Just as the soldiers of the Kumamoto Regiment were deep in slumber, they were suddenly awakened by a whistling sound from the sky.
Over a dozen gas shells tore through the sky, accompanied by a wailing whistle, smashing viciously into the ground with a deafening explosion, emitting a dull boom, followed by clouds of semi-transparent greenish gas surging out.
Gel-like colorless gas spewed from cracks in the shell casings, carrying the sweet, fermented apple scent as it began to drift everywhere.
The winter night wind accelerated the spread of the gas, and soon this nearly colorless gas spread rapidly, affecting even insects and small animals hiding in various corners wherever it passed, causing them to flip over belly up one after another.
The sentries were the first to notice something wrong. When they saw that the sudden shell explosions produced not deadly shrapnel and shockwaves, but some kind of gas, they were momentarily stunned, but soon associated it with what they had done that day, their faces changing instantly.
“It’s poison gas!” A sentry’s face turned pale in an instant, shouting hoarsely: “Bad… it’s poison gas… the Chinese are firing special shells!”
Only then were the Japanese soldiers in their sleep awakened by the clamor, but they woke too late.
Due to the long-standing smooth progress of the war against China, and China’s weak industrial foundation, neither the high-level officers nor the rank-and-file soldiers of the Japanese army had ever imagined that one day the Chinese army would launch a chemical attack against them.
This left all Japanese troops essentially defenseless when the gas shells struck.
Most importantly, the gas shells fired by Su Yaoyang this time were not mustard gas, phosgene, tear gas, or vomiting gas chemical weapons, but a nerve agent that in this timeline should not be invented until next year.
Its official name is isopropyl methylphosphonofluoridate, a name perhaps many have not heard of, but its other name is world-famous in later generations: it is sarin gas.
Sarin gas attacks via the respiratory tract, skin, or eye conjunctiva, blocking specific enzyme activity and thereby damaging the nervous system.
Victims exhibit constricted pupils, difficulty breathing, bronchial constriction, and violent convulsions; without timely treatment, death by suffocation can occur in just minutes.
The unprepared Japanese troops instantly fell into chaos, countless people frantically searching for gas masks, but unable to find them in the moment.
The night wind carried the sweet apple-scented gas into the trenches.
Within just tens of seconds of inhaling the gas, these soldiers from Kumamoto felt their throats burning like fire, unbearably itchy, many starting to claw at their throats with their nails, emitting a bellows-like rasp from their windpipes.
The camp was filled with panicked figures of poisoned Japanese soldiers; some shouted and yelled, some lay on the ground desperately clawing at their throats, others in desperation fired wildly.
Of course, more people were busy searching for gas masks.
Due to China’s weak industrial foundation, the Chinese army had no conditions for chemical warfare with the Japanese army, so from top to bottom in the Japanese army, no one believed the Chinese army had the capability to launch a chemical attack against them.
As a result, Japanese high command and rank-and-file paid no attention to anti-chemical training, many Japanese soldiers too lazy even to carry gas masks, leading to extreme chaos when suffering gas attacks.
Countless soldiers of the 6th Division struggled in agony amid the poison mist, screams rising and falling everywhere.
Even the moonlight was swallowed by dark clouds, the entire land suddenly shrouded in darkness, as if even the moon could not bear to witness this tragic scene.
A few minutes after the bombardment, the chaos quickly subsided, and a team all wearing gas masks and protective suits began quietly appearing outside the Japanese defensive line.
“Beep beep…”
Several minutes later, a piercing attack whistle sounded outside the defensive line, the shrill whistle instantly tearing through the battlefield shrouded in cannon fire, clearly reaching everyone’s ears.
“Rustle rustle…”
With the whistle, five or six hundred officers and men of the 1st Battalion, fully equipped in anti-chemical gear, charged toward the Japanese positions under the officers’ lead.
December in Nanjing was exceptionally cold, with temperatures reaching minus seven or eight degrees, but the charging 1st Battalion soldiers noticed none of it.
For the running soldiers, charging with rubber gas masks was unpleasant; the air from the filter canisters felt extremely thin, making lungs feel like they would explode, the soldiers with gas masks on opening their mouths wide to gasp for air, as high-speed running requires more oxygen.
High tension, desperate sprinting, and thin air made the soldiers sweat profusely; though cursing the damned gas masks inwardly, no one dared remove them, instead praying inwardly to Buddha for the gas masks and protective suits not to leak.
The several hundred meters distance was covered by the 1st Battalion soldiers in just three or four minutes.
Yet even as the 1st Battalion soldiers reached the trench edge, not a single gunshot rang out; the Japanese positions showed unprecedented silence.
“Sir… look!” A soldier who reached the trench shouted suddenly, pointing at his feet, his tone full of horror.
Under the faint moonlight, a rising sun flag was slanted in the trench, its surface seemingly corroded into honeycomb holes by some viscous liquid.
And in the trench, Japanese soldiers were piled up everywhere, their bodies convulsing nonstop, white foam at their mouths, no weapons in hand; through the gas mask lenses, eerie sweat could even be seen surging on their faces and bodies, all looking as if fished from water.
Of course, there were even more corpses in various poses, their postures still in final struggles; through the gas mask lenses, the soldiers could see the fear and pain on their faces at the moment of death.
And in the camp behind the trench lay even more corpses, all in death poses; the soldiers could even feel the pain they endured before dying, the place looking as if swept by demons…
A young soldier in the team suddenly staggered back, stepping on a supine corpse.
Moonlight happened to shine on that bluish-purple face, mouth torn to the ear root, as if laughing maniacally at death’s end. A veteran grabbed the recruit’s trembling shoulder, a muffled gasp coming from inside the mask.
“Report to the regiment commander quickly, we have broken into the Japanese 13th Regiment camp, no resistance encountered, no resistance at all!”
In the assault team, Li Gaoyuan, wearing a gas mask, shouted loudly to the messenger beside him, the vibrating steel plate inside the mask transmitting his excited roar.
Compared to the soldiers’ fear, this officer accustomed to life and death was unprecedentedly excited; he had thought that even after special shells, the Japanese would offer some resistance, and the 1st Battalion would have to fight a tough battle to take the camp, but now he realized he was wrong—this was no battle, it was practically a march.
Then he suddenly remembered something and ordered: “Press on quickly, absolutely do not give the Japanese time to react.”
“Right, see if you can find the little devils’ regimental flag, that’s good stuff.
The regiment commander said whoever finds it gets a thousand silver dollars!”
“Ding ling ling…”
An urgent telephone bell rang in Gu Shoufu’s room.
“Moshi moshi… this is Gu Shoufu… Nani… what did you say?”
“Division commander sir, the Chinese fired special shells at our army, front-line troops suffered heavy losses!” A panicked voice rang from the receiver.
Gu Shoufu’s fingers suddenly tightened on the phone handset, knuckles turning bluish-white.
Intermittent static crackled from the line, mixed with distant muffled shell blasts.
Though the voice continued, Gu Shoufu’s heart had instantly sunk to the bottom.
As a general, he knew all too well the consequences for an army caught sleeping and utterly unprepared suddenly hit by special shells.
“Baka!” The crisp sound of a porcelain cup smashing against the wall startled the crows under the eaves, shards bouncing on the tatami, forming a eerie duet with the staff officer’s trembling report on the phone.
“Order all units to assemble immediately, must block those Chinese troops, absolutely do not let them past our defensive line!”
