Chapter 72: Beyond Expectations

Sending Liang Wanyu away brought Hu Hao a massive sense of relief. Bringing a woman onto a battlefield was a recipe for disaster. Hu Hao hadn’t done it in his past life, and he certainly didn’t trust himself to handle it well in this one. Sending her back to the rear was unequivocally the right choice.

Watching her vehicle speed away from the trench line, Hu Hao turned his attention back to the opposite bank.

“Hao-ge, you really just sent the beauty away like that?” Huan Xingtao joked, walking over with the rest of the squad.

“I sent her away. Wait, what are those expressions on your faces?” Hu Hao asked, seeing their shit-eating grins.

“Hao-ge, a girl like that shows up, and you just send her packing? Are you even a man? The brothers were just discussing emptying out an APC for the two of you!” He Jizhong laughed, nudging Hu Hao playfully.

“Piss off!” Hu Hao laughed, kicking at him.

“Seriously though, that girl is stunning. Why were you in such a rush to get rid of her? It’s not every day we get some scenery out here; why let her slip away so easily?” Huan Xingtao pressed, still grinning.

“Are you all blind? Did you see the escort? The Zone Commander’s personal staff officer brought her here, and her security detail was a full platoon of the Commander’s elite guard! Do you really think she’s just a regular officer like us?

I’m telling you, my classmate has insane political connections. I don’t even know exactly how powerful her family background is!” Hu Hao explained, shaking his head at their ignorance.

“No way. You guys were classmates and you don’t even know her background?” Huan Xingtao asked, genuinely surprised.

“What did you think? That everyone flaunts their wealth at the academy? Anyway, is the food here yet?” Hu Hao deflected, looking up at the sky.

He noticed a massive swarm of Imperial fighter jets roaring overhead. They were clearly mobilizing to blockade the Allied transport routes and contest the airspace against the Allied air force.

“Not yet, we’re still waiting. But Hao-ge, look! The engineers are here! They’re getting ready to deploy the pontoon bridges!” He Jizhong pointed toward the river.

Hu Hao saw them. The Imperial combat engineers were moving massive bridge sections toward the water. Surprisingly, the Allied artillery remained completely silent. It seemed the enemy was either paralyzed by indecision or, more likely, they had virtually no artillery shells left to fire.

“Alright. Once we finish eating, mount the heavy machine guns onto the APCs. Make sure everyone has full combat loads. Today, we are going to devour the Allied forces across the river! They won’t be able to run!” Hu Hao declared, his eyes locked on the far bank.

“Understood!” the veterans nodded firmly.

“Where’s Sima Xuankong? What’s he doing? I haven’t seen him,” Hu Hao asked, looking around the trench.

“Oh, he went to get his bandages changed. Since he caught that shrapnel yesterday, he’s at the rear medical station getting the dressing swapped,” He Jizhong replied.

“If it’s bad, tell him to get on an evacuation truck to the hospital,” Hu Hao ordered.

“He can’t. The triage doctors said his wound isn’t severe enough to warrant hospital evacuation. Motherfucker, I tried arguing with them this morning, but the doctor absolutely refused to sign the transfer slip!” Huan Xingtao complained.

“Mmh. Forget it then. Tell him he stays back during the assault. He can guard our gear and vehicles on this side of the river. The rest of us will push across,” Hu Hao decided.

The veterans nodded in agreement. On the frontline, the triage doctors held absolute authority over medical evacuations. If a doctor deemed a wound non-critical, the soldier wasn’t getting on a transport truck, period.

Hu Hao watched the preparations for a few more minutes before sitting down to wait for the rations.

Meanwhile, on the opposite bank, inside the captured city of Nanlin, Full General Wenkeduo and Supreme Commander Mushaqi stood in silence, watching their staff officers frantically packing up the command headquarters.

Intelligence confirmed that the Eastern Spirit forces were massing for a massive counter-offensive. The most critical issue the Allied forces currently faced was a severe lack of ammunition. To make matters worse, the Allied transport planes couldn’t execute their emergency airdrops because a massive dogfight had erupted overhead; the Imperial fighters were fiercely contesting air superiority and blocking the transport corridors.

“We severely underestimated the Eastern Spirit Generals. I never expected them to actually possess the courage to counter-attack,” Mushaqi said, his expression dark and stormy.

“Indeed. Our assault this morning suffered catastrophic casualties. It appears the Imperial forces have finally established a coherent defensive doctrine; we took a bloody nose trying to push them.

However… I truly did not anticipate that they would dare to launch a proactive offensive across the river. It seems we must completely re-evaluate this ‘Jiang Kai’ we are facing,” Wenkeduo nodded grimly. This development had caught them entirely off guard.

“The fault lies with us,” Mushaqi sighed. “We had grown too accustomed to easy victories. The Imperial forces we faced previously were undeniably weak and disorganized. I never imagined that Jiang Kai would instantly seize upon our single moment of overextension. He is a formidable opponent; we must study him carefully moving forward.”

“Report! Commander, General! The evacuation preparations are complete. We can relocate to the airport command bunker immediately!” a Major General staff officer hurried over and saluted.

“Mmh. Then let’s move. Damn it all!” Mushaqi cursed as he issued the order.

He hadn’t anticipated that within a matter of hours, he would be forced to abandon his frontline troops and flee this small city. Their immediate plan was to relocate to the heavily fortified captured airport and command the defense from there.

If the situation deteriorated further, he would board a plane and evacuate the province entirely. Being captured by the Eastern Spirit forces would be an unforgivable, humiliating disgrace for the Allied coalition.

“Report! All our frontline combat units have successfully withdrawn into the city and are currently establishing defensive barricades for urban combat!” another senior staff officer reported.

“Excellent. Order them to fortify every street and building. Once our air force defeats the Imperial fighters, the emergency ammo drop will commence immediately. Instruct the Corps Commanders to strictly enforce fire discipline among the men; they must conserve every single bullet until the resupply arrives,” Mushaqi ordered smoothly.

“Yes, sir!” the staff officer saluted and sprinted away to relay the commands.

“Commander… what do we do about our wounded?” Wenkeduo asked, turning to Mushaqi with a heavy sigh. “We have over a hundred thousand casualties currently sheltered in the city. We only have roughly 120,000 combat-capable troops left to defend them, and we have no idea how massive the Imperial counter-offensive will be.

If they breach our urban defenses, those wounded soldiers are doomed. We made a severe tactical error by not evacuating the casualties to the rear earlier. Now that we are effectively besieged, they are in extreme danger.”

“Do you have a viable solution?” Mushaqi asked, looking at Wenkeduo evenly.

“I do not. The transport planes can only evacuate a small fraction of them. Furthermore, we cannot dedicate those transports entirely to the wounded, as we must reserve space to evacuate our senior officer corps if the city falls. Therefore… the situation for the wounded is exceedingly grim.

However, if our garrison can hold the city for at least 3 days, I believe our rear echelons will repair the supply lines and push reinforcements through to break the siege. If that happens, we might be able to save them,” Wenkeduo analyzed, shaking his head slowly.

“Then they must wait. We have over a hundred thousand combat troops entrenched in a city. It is impossible for the Eastern Spirit forces to annihilate an army of that size in urban combat within 3 days!” Mushaqi stated confidently.

“But Commander, you are forgetting our critical lack of ammunition,” Wenkeduo pressed, his eyes narrowing slightly. “If the Eastern Spirit forces launch an absolutely furious assault, our garrison is in severe peril. I guarantee you the Imperial commanders know we are out of ammo; otherwise, they never would have found the courage to attack us!”

Mushaqi stared at Wenkeduo in silence for a long moment.

“Yes. We can no longer concern ourselves with the wounded. We must simply order the garrison to fight to the death,” Wenkeduo continued, seemingly uncomfortable under Mushaqi’s gaze. “I truly never imagined that the Allied coalition’s very first major defeat would occur under our joint command.”

“Correction,” Mushaqi stated coldly. “The defeat will occur under my command. Not yours. If we fail here today, your reputation will remain completely untarnished.”

“Commander, you jest! I am equally responsible for this campaign!” Wenkeduo immediately protested, his tone dripping with false humility.

Mushaqi didn’t reply. He simply turned and strode out of the command center.

Watching his back, the corners of Wenkeduo’s mouth twitched upward into a brief, subtle smirk before he quickly schooled his features and hurried after the Supreme Commander.

…

“Brothers! Eat quickly! But do not stuff yourselves!”

On the Imperial side of the river, Hu Hao was shouting instructions to his men as the logistics trucks finally rolled up.

“Keep a few steamed buns in your pockets so you can eat when you get hungry during the fight! Once we finish eating, we are pushing straight into urban combat! Urban warfare is incredibly physically demanding; if you eat too much now, you’ll just end up vomiting it all back up when the adrenaline hits!”

The “logistics units” delivering the food were essentially just local civilian volunteers from the rear who had cooked massive batches of steamed buns and driven them to the front. The civilian population near the front lines was currently fleeing en masse toward Qicheng, while the Imperial citizens trapped in the Allied-occupied territories across the river were desperately trying to cross to safety.

“Hao-ge! Get over here! We’re having a command briefing to coordinate the offensive vectors!” Li Jingsong yelled from a distance.

Hu Hao grabbed a handful of steamed buns and a bottle of water, slung his rifle over his shoulder, and jogged over to Li Jingsong’s position. With an offensive of this scale, coordinating attack routes and assigning specific sectors was paramount.

Because such macro-level coordination was typically handled at the Division level, Li Jingsong had summoned all the commanders under his umbrella. Over a dozen officers gathered around him.

Due to the overnight reorganization, the 87th Division currently boasted an unusually high number of surviving Colonels and Lieutenant Colonels. Li Jingsong now commanded 15 temporary regiments. With each officer leading roughly 1,000 men, Li Jingsong’s total command strength was approximately 15,000 troops—ironically, more than the 12,000 men he had commanded when the 87th Division was at full strength before the war began.

“Hao-ge, look here. Zone Command just delivered the tactical sector maps,” Li Jingsong said as Hu Hao approached. “Our Division is tasked with assaulting the northwest corner of Nanlin City. Our designated sector has a horizontal frontage of 2 kilometers and a vertical depth of 4 to 5 kilometers.

Look at this map. This is the city’s pre-war municipal zoning blueprint. It’s relatively recent; it was updated just last year. Take a look, Hao-ge.”

Li Jingsong unrolled the large blueprint on the ground. Hu Hao and the other officers crouched down around it.

“Right here?” Hu Hao asked, pointing to the heavily marked area on the map.

“Correct. That’s our sector,” Li Jingsong nodded.

“These are all residential zones,” Hu Hao noted, studying the tightly packed grids.

“Mmh. But God only knows what it actually looks like right now,” Li Jingsong replied. “And very shortly, our heavy artillery is going to commence a massive preparatory bombardment of that exact area.”