Chapter 317: Reduced To Dust
The second F4U Corsair fighter cut in at an even trickier angle, the pilot clearly having learned from his lead aircraft’s attack.
He ignored the truck that had already been riddled with bullets like a sieve, instead targeting another Type 95 tank that was trying to turn and futilely resisting with its hull-mounted anti-aircraft machine gun.
The piercing shriek descended once again.
This time, the hail of bullets was even more concentrated. The 12.7mm bullets precisely poured into the tank’s relatively weaker side and top.
The armor plate was torn apart like paper, sparks flying everywhere.
The anti-aircraft machine gunner on the roof, along with his weapon, was instantly turned into a mass of blurred bloody flesh and fragments. Immediately after, an armor-piercing incendiary round drilled into the vehicle’s interior, detonating the ammunition.
“Boom…”
A dull and violent explosion lifted the entire armored vehicle into the air like a tin can kicked by a naughty child, tumbling through the air while spewing orange-red flames and thick black smoke, before crashing heavily to the ground and turning into a pile of burning scrap metal.
This explosion, right at hand, became the final straw that broke Yoshio Shizuka’s spirit.
“Aaaahhh…”
He let out a non-human, shrill scream, his body curled in the corner convulsing violently.
A warm liquid spread from beneath him, the pungent smell of urine instantly filling the narrow, stuffy compartment.
This dignified Army Lieutenant General, commander of the Japanese Army’s First Army, completely lost control of his bladder in the face of absolute terror, his mental defenses collapsing.
He even started raving incoherently, calling out for mommy.
“Shut up!”
Kazuki Yamamoto’s face was splattered with dust seeping in through the observation slit. Looking at the commander who had turned into a puddle of mud beneath him, a flash of disbelief and disappointment crossed his eyes.
All his plans, all his efforts, became a joke in the face of this unreasonable, absolute air superiority.
“Break out… to the west… ram through!” He suddenly kicked the driver’s back, roaring madly at the terrified driver.
The armored vehicle lunged forward like a headless fly, crashing through the factory wall and charging onto the rubble-filled street.
But where could it run to?
High in the sky, Cheng Rufeng easily leveled his plane, looking at the only armored vehicle on the ground fleeing in panic like a hairless rat.
“Well done, Corsair Eight.”
He laughed into the radio, “Since the appetizers are cleared, now… time for the main course.”
He no longer chose to strafe with machine guns.
That playstyle was already tiresome. He wanted to end this hunt in a more ceremonial way.
He skillfully switched weapon selection, locking onto the 500-pound aerial bomb mounted under the fuselage.
“Listen up, rat on the ground—Grandpa’s sending you to the Western Paradise!”
Cheng Rufeng pushed the control stick forward, and the F4U Corsair fighter let out a delighted roar as the nose dipped slightly, beginning the final and most lethal death dive on the tank fleeing madly.
The iconic shriek of the F4U Corsair fighter, like the horn of the Grim Reaper, was pulled to its extreme over the western skies of Taiyuan.
For those on the ground, the sound didn’t come from one direction but seemed to pour into their minds from all sides, every corner of the sky, tearing at their nerves.
Inside the compartment, Kazuki Yamamoto had given up all actions.
He sat quietly on the floor, eyes bloodshot, staring fixedly at the compartment ceiling. He didn’t even bother with the commander who had completely turned into a puddle of mud, foaming at the mouth.
As an experienced special operations expert, he knew everything was over the moment he heard the plane’s howl overhead.
He could even imagine the bomb’s trajectory.
The last thought flashing in his mind wasn’t the Emperor, not the Empire, not family, but an absurdly dark humor—he had meticulously planned special operations his whole life: raids, infiltrations, assassinations, and yet today, he would die in the most conventional, brutal, and unstoppable way, smashed by an iron lump from the sky.
High in the sky, Cheng Rufeng’s gaze was focused and icy, like a surgeon at the operating table. The sight’s reticle had the fleeing armored vehicle firmly locked.
In his world, there was only the engine’s roar and the iron coffin steadily growing larger before his eyes.
His right thumb gently, with near-tender resolve, pressed the bomb release button.
“Click.”
A faint mechanical sound, almost inaudible in his cockpit.
Under the fuselage, a 500-pound aerial bomb detached from the rack, carrying initial inertia on its brief and deadly journey.
It traced a small arc in the air, then smashed toward its fate with ever-increasing speed and precision.
Time seemed stretched in this moment.
The bomb’s fuze triggered the instant it touched the armored vehicle’s roof.
No earth-shattering roar—at least not at first.
The first phase was pure physical destruction. The sturdy armored roof, before that terrifying kinetic energy, caved inward like an eggshell smashed by a hammer, tearing and disintegrating instantly.
Only then came the explosion.
A blinding white light, impossible to look at directly, erupted violently with the armored vehicle at its center!
In that 0.01 second, Kazuki Yamamoto and Yoshio Shizuka inside the vehicle, along with the equally desperate driver, along with all their glory, shame, fear, and memories—even a scream—were instantly vaporized in temperatures over 3,000 degrees Celsius, not even a tiny DNA fragment left.
Following immediately was the devastating shockwave.
Centered on the blast point, a visible ring-shaped shockwave mixed with flames and dust expanded violently outward.
The tank’s hull shattered into countless glowing red, twisted metal fragments, shooting outward at high speed in all directions.
The surrounding ruins were further pulverized, the ground blasted into a charred crater over 50 meters in diameter.
Seconds later, the deafening roar that seemed to tear the entire world apart…
“Boom…”
Finally spread out, sweeping the entire battlefield.
Cheng Rufeng flew his F4U Corsair fighter in a neat loop, easily dodging the explosion’s shockwave.
He glanced back at the mushroom cloud rising from the ground, mixed with black smoke and fierce flames, a satisfied smile curling his lips.
“Corsair One calling Eagle Nest.”
He said casually into the radio, “Main course finished, plate licked clean as a bonus… over.”
………..
Ten-plus minutes later, John’s lead elements of Armor Group One finally arrived at this industrial zone freshly baptized by death.
The three lead Sherman tanks crunched over the debris with grating squeaks, stopping before the huge crater still emitting wisps of black smoke.
John poked half his body out of the lead tank’s turret, a rolling heatwave carrying the stench of gunpowder, scorched earth, and some burnt protein hitting him full in the face, making him grimace involuntarily.
The scene before him made even this battle-hardened veteran who had seen life and death draw in a sharp breath.
Was this what a 500-pound bomb could do?
Centered on that charred crater, within a 50-meter radius, the ground looked like it had been smashed down by an invisible giant hand—all buildings leveled flat.
The explosion’s power was so concentrated and terrifying that not a single piece worthy of being called “wreckage” could be found.
The so-called tank had become countless large and small, twisted and charred metal fragments, embedded in the surrounding ruins and ground like scattered flowers from the heavens, some fragments coated with a eerie, oily black substance.
“Group Leader…”
A tank commander who had also poked his head out from his tank said with a pale face and dry voice, “This… this is the big shot they said was preparing to escape?”
John didn’t answer, just staring at the crater in silence for a long time.
He knew that forget a person—even a raw iron block thrown into this pit fresh from hellfire wouldn’t be found now.
“Pass the word down!” he said helplessly. “Search outward 100 meters from the crater center! Everyone keep your eyes peeled.
Dig three feet deep if you have to—find me something that proves that old devil’s identity! A shoulder epaulet, a collar insignia, even a gold-capped tooth!”
“Yes!”
Many soldiers jumped down from tanks and armored personnel carriers, holding their noses against the stench and visual shock, beginning to carry out the orders.
They carefully avoided the still-hot metal fragments, using bayonets and engineer shovels to dig through the scorched earth and rubble.
A young soldier pried open a blasted, deformed armor plate with his bayonet and found underneath a small, burnt-to-the-frame telescope.
On the telescope’s body, a faint, blackened imprint of the Japanese army’s chrysanthemum emblem could still be made out.
On the other side, a veteran found under a pile of rubble a small, charred and carbonized… thing.
From the remaining shape, it could barely be identified as the heel of an officer’s riding boot, with a melted and deformed spur still nailed to it.
John took the two items, weighed them in his hand, then reported via walkie-talkie to the headquarters outside the city.
“Report to Command, this is John Miller.
Arrived at target location… confirmed target completely destroyed. Repeat, target confirmed completely destroyed. Scene… no survivors found, no intact… remains.
Preliminary judgment: this fleeing convoy belonged to Japanese First Army Commander Yoshio Shizuka, now bombed to oblivion.
Over.
