Everyone who sees it gets a share.
With triangular eyes, he saw the army coming from the east and finally realized that he was in a desperate situation. But as he turned around, a bullet pierced his throat.
When Tan Yuanbo jumped off his horse and rushed into Huayuelou, the fire had already been extinguished.
He found Aunt Rong's body in the pile of charred wood on the second floor. She was still clutching half a piece of unburnt cloth tightly in her arms, on which was embroidered a half-open plum blossom.
In the attic, the bodies of five wounded soldiers remained in their fighting postures, and the boy soldier's finger was still on the trigger.
The three surviving girls emerged from the hidden door, embracing Aunt Rong's body and weeping uncontrollably.
Tan Yuanbo took off his military cap and slowly bowed to the mess—the people in Huayuelou had used their lives to preserve the last vestiges of Zaozhuang's spirit.
From then on, no one dared to look down on Huayuelou.
As dawn broke, the reinforcements finally recaptured Zaozhuang.
Someone found a silver hairpin in the ruins of Huayue Tower. The plum blossom on the hairpin was blackened by smoke, but it still stood upright with its unyielding edges.
*
Meanwhile, in Shanghai, at Shanghai University of Chinese Literature.
Mid-June is graduation season, which is inescapable no matter the era. As a vocal music teacher at Shanghai Chinese Literature University, Jiang Xiaoxiao was required by the school to go back to the school every day when she didn't have classes to take graduation photos with the classes she had taught.
That day was June 20, 1937. Jiang Xiaoxiao accompanied the last class of that year to take their graduation photos.
The weather in Shanghai that day was pleasant, with a gentle breeze, mild sunshine, and quiet, peaceful cicada chirping – a perfect day for reunions and farewells.
When she left home in the morning, she ran into Jiang Yuanxing. Jiang Yuanxing said that there was nothing to do at home today, so she could stay out a little longer before going back.
After taking her graduation photos, she didn't rush to leave. She stood in the Boxue Square of Shanghai University of Chinese Literature, taking one graduation photo after another with those vibrant young future pillars of the nation.
After the group photo was taken, students kept coming up to her with cameras and flowers, shyly asking, "Teacher Jiang, can we take a picture together?"
"Okay!" Jiang Xiaoxiao was never the strict teacher her students perceived her to be; she could always easily become friends with them. "Come on, take the flowers, and let's make a peace sign together!"
Once the individual photos started, no one could leave the place for the rest of the afternoon. A group of students would swarm around, ignoring the scorching sun, lining up in small groups to take photos with her.
Two students stood on the outskirts of Boxue Square, looking this way from a distance. "Want to go over and take a picture together?"
Someone asked in a tone that was half serious and half joking.
"No, thank you."
Some people refused in their usual calm tone.
Yan Jiangshang watched her laughing and playing with a group of students from a great distance. After a while, he wondered if he could stay by her side forever if the world were at peace.
Are you willing to accept this?
Suddenly someone spoke up, and Yan Jiangshang turned to look. It was Xu Wenwan—his professor and Jiang Xiaoxiao's best friend—standing beside him at some point, while the boy he had just been chatting with was nowhere to be found.
He liked Jiang Xiaoxiao so much that everyone knew it, and his pursuit of her was also common knowledge. When everyone accepted it and thought it was the right thing to do, Yan Jiangshang turned around and chose another path. Jiang Xiaoxiao never said anything, but everyone knew that after today's parting, there might never be a chance for them in this lifetime.
Yan Jiangshang chose social sciences as his major in college, as he was a realist who wanted to dedicate his life to the revolution and the people.
Jiang Xiaoxiao loved art all her life and bore the weight of the Jiang family's future glory and decline for decades to come. She was the most loyal romantic.
For the two of them, even meeting each other was the most extravagant fate.
“What is there to be unwilling about?” Yan Jiangshang seemed to smile, the loneliness in his eyes vanishing in an instant, so fast that even Xu Wenwan couldn’t catch it. He said, “She should have been the most pampered rose in this peaceful and prosperous world.”
He was destined never to be by her side in this life; in the chaos of war, someone had to stand in front.
After saying this, Yan Jiangshang said nothing more, but his gaze returned to Jiang Xiaoxiao in the distance, each glance filled with the resolute determination of a final look.
Xu Wenwan glanced at him sideways. Yan Jiangshang was outstanding, with top grades and handsome looks. His family was in business, and his grandfather was the richest man in the Guangdong and Guangxi regions... Any one of these qualities would make him the envy of many, yet he was the one showered with love and affection.
In the years that followed, Xu Wenwan thought countless times that if it weren't for the chaotic times, Yan Jiangshang and Jiang Xiaoxiao would have been each other's best partners and lovers.
Unfortunately, there are no "what ifs".
Two hours later, after Jiang Xiaoxiao and her students finished taking photos, she saw Xu Wenwan and Yan Jiangshang standing there, carrying several bouquets of flowers as they walked over. "What are you doing standing here?"
"Look at someone so popular with students taking photos with them," Xu Wenwan joked with a smile. "You really are popular with students."
Jiang Xiaoxiao smiled and handed a bouquet of flowers to Xu Wenwan and another to Yan Jiangshang, saying repeatedly, "Everyone who sees this gets a share, everyone who sees this gets a share."
The three chatted for a while, and before leaving, Jiang Xiaoxiao suddenly asked Yan Jiangshang, "When are you leaving?"
"Tonight."
Yan Jiangshang looked at her with an open and honest gaze, a hint of a smile in his eyes, and his gaze flickered.
"You're leaving so soon? Aren't you going to stay in Shanghai for a few more days?" Jiang Xiaoxiao asked with a smile, as if she were talking to an old friend she had known for many, many years.
Yan Jiangshang's answer was also very frank, so frank that Xu Wenwan, an outsider, often recalled it in the years that followed.
He left Shanghai and returned to the Guangdong and Guangxi regions, while Jiang Xiaoxiao remained in Shanghai. Several years passed in the blink of an eye.
*
In mid-July, the air in Taierzhuang was unbearably humid and hot, with a strange smell of heat mixed with gunpowder smoke, making it difficult to even breathe.
Tan Yuanbo stood on the earthen slope of the temporary command post, the lens of his binoculars damp with sweat. Through the lens were the densely packed tents of the Japanese Fifth Division, like a dark swarm of locusts gnawing at the Lunan Plain.
"Thirty thousand against fifty thousand, it's a battle of wills." Tan Yuanbo put down his binoculars, his Adam's apple bobbing, his voice hoarse from days of sleeplessness.
Zhang Chenglin was marking Japanese firing positions on a map with a charcoal pencil next to him. Charcoal ash stuck to his fingertips, and he seemed a little disgusted. He casually picked up a leaf from the ground and swept it away.
Ji Yuxing squatted down to inspect the rifle. The barrel was hot from the sun. He rubbed some lard into the bolt, his movements as practiced as if he were polishing a precious piece of porcelain.
Ji Yuxing brought people from Handan to support Zaozhuang half a month ago. He always believed that he and Zhang Chenglin were the most invincible when they fought side by side - this was the tacit understanding that the two had known each other since childhood and had worked together for many years.
"When will the reinforcements from Sichuan and Chongqing arrive?" When he looked up, beads of sweat dripped from his forehead onto his military uniform, spreading out in a small dark patch.
"At the earliest, three days." Zhang Chenglin pointed to a point on the map. "The Japanese want to cut off our supply line, and they will definitely launch a surprise attack on the ammunition depot on the west side tonight."
“I’ll lead some men to set up an ambush first,” Zhang Chenglin turned to Tan Yuanbo, his tone calm, “and have Ji Yuxing be ready to provide support at any time.”
As night fell, the roar of Japanese artillery fire, just as Zhang Chenglin had predicted, began in the west.
The shells, trailing red tails, crashed into the streets and alleys of Taierzhuang. The blue brick houses were like crushed biscuits, with crumbs flying everywhere amidst screams.
Zhang Chenglin led a team to guard the north gate, while Ji Yuxing assisted at the south gate. The two communicated across the smoke-filled city using signal flares—three green flares meant they were running out of ammunition, and two red flares meant they were requesting backup.
At dawn the next day, the fighting in the west temporarily ceased, and Zhang Chenglin had a complete advantage, but the gunfire at the south gate was unexpectedly sparse.
Zhang Chenglin's heart tightened, and he led a third of his men toward the south gate.
The alley was piled with corpses, some of them Japanese soldiers, but most of them were their own people wearing gray military uniforms.
Zhang Chenglin found Ji Yuxing next to a collapsed house. At that time, Ji Yuxing was leaning against the broken wall, his left trouser leg was soaked with blood, and he was still tightly clutching the last grenade in his hand.
“Ah Lin…” Ji Yuxing grinned, blood seeping from the corner of his mouth, “I think… I can’t hold on anymore.”
"Shut up." Zhang Chenglin ripped open his shirt, tore off the lining, and pressed it against the wound. Blood instantly stained the cloth red. "Old Tan said long ago that if Taierzhuang is lost, Shandong is finished. If you dare to die, you can go to hell."
The bugle call of the Japanese army sounded again from not far away, as if it were a matter of life and death.
Zhang Chenglin dragged Ji Yuxing to a hidden spot in the corner. As soon as he turned around, he saw more than a dozen Japanese soldiers charging straight at him with bayonets.
Zhang Chenglin hesitated for a moment, turned to look at Ji Yuxing, pulled the pin on the grenade, and was about to throw it when a familiar voice suddenly came from behind him: "You little bastards, Grandpa's here!"
The Sichuan and Chongqing reinforcements have arrived.
As far as the eye could see, a dark mass of troops, carrying the banners of the "Sichuan Army," surged into Taierzhuang like a tide, the sound of machine guns shaking the ground.
Zhang Chenglin glanced back at Ji Yuxing, who was leaning against the broken wall, unconscious, with bloodstains still on his eyelashes. Zhang Chenglin raised his hand to wipe his face, which was wet with sweat and tears, and grabbed the gun on the ground, rushing back into the battlefield.
Three days later, the chilling gunfire at Taierzhuang finally ceased. The Japanese army fled in disarray, leaving behind tens of thousands of corpses. Sunlight shone through the smoke onto the city walls, and the three large stone characters "Taierzhuang" gleamed in blood.
Tan Yuanbo stood on the city wall, watching the soldiers of the Sichuan and Shandong armies help each other clear the battlefield. Suddenly, he saluted in the southwest direction—the direction from which the Sichuan and Chongqing reinforcements had come.
Huo Shangzhi, the person in charge of the Sichuan-Chongqing region, stood to his side and behind him. Seeing his action, he suddenly grinned without making a sound.
Zhang Chenglin stood guard outside the makeshift medical station and heard the doctor's voice from inside: "He has lost too much blood. Whether he can make it through the night depends on his own fate."
He slid down against the earthen wall and sat on the ground, taking out the half-eaten piece of dry rations that Ji Yuxing had given him earlier. He took a bite, and it was so dry it hurt his throat...
"Don't worry, you're tough as nails." Tan Yuanbo had walked over at some point and stood next to Zhang Chenglin, reassuring him in a rough tone: "If you weren't tough, Mr. Sheng would never have sent you to my side."
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