Chapter 160: Sunlit Lashu

In the camp of the 200th Division, many soldiers and officers, sharing the same thoughts as Division Commander Dai Anlan, stepped out of the tents one after another.

Feeling the only sunlight before the rainy season.

The past several days, even months, truly felt like a long nightmare.

Rapid marches, flanking, enemy contact, bloody battles, redeployments… their nerves were like a fully drawn bowstring, constantly taut, never knowing where Japanese Army guns might appear, especially as Dongzhi fell back to Corner Mei, where the Japanese Army placed snipers to chase the 200th Division.

As elite troops of the Expeditionary Force, they were already accustomed to falling asleep to the sound of gunfire, keeping vigilant eyes open in the night.

However, since retreating into this crucial hub of the Dian-Mian Highway, Lashu.

The suffocating tension faded, replaced by a strange, almost surreal calm. Many hoped that this battle, this nightmare, could finally end.

Relaxation was silent, yet spread to every corner of the camp.

The soldiers sat in small groups on the open ground; some carefully cleaned the weapons that had accompanied them across thousands of miles, their motions no longer bearing the pre‑battle harshness; others simply lay on their backs, squinting at the blue sky above, letting the sunlight fall on their dark faces.

There was no gunfire in their ears, no need to be ready to charge or ambush at any moment.

Because of the shift in the front line and the Japanese Army's temporary retreat, they truly had a chance to catch their breath, about to enter a valuable period of rest.

More tangible changes followed one after another.

Since stepping into Lashu during the latter half of the Myanmar Campaign, almost all units had fallen into a shortage of supplies.

Now that the 200th Division entered Lashu, the supply of provisions received an unexpected boost.

Brand‑new uniforms were distributed, replacing those already stained beyond recognition by sweat, blood, and jungle mud.

A steaming bowl of rice paired with solid meat made many men nearly tear up as they swallowed.

In addition, each person received a thin yet clean and tidy cotton blanket, as well as a towel, soap and other basic toiletries.

Even as elite troops, some items could not be supplied casually; supplies were simply too scarce.

Division Commander Dai Anlan stood quietly aside, watching the scene before him. He knew the value of the troops' morale and also understood how hard this calm had been won. As a commander who had emerged from seas of corpses and blood, he was more aware than anyone of the battlefield's ever‑shifting treachery; this peace might only be a brief lull in the eye of the storm.

Nevertheless, he still felt a slight relief that his subordinates could enjoy this moment of ease. He too needed the sunlight, a temporary escape from endless tactical simulations and life‑or‑death pressure.

While pondering, he instinctively lifted his head.

The sunlight was a bit glaring.

At that moment, several swift black shadows streaked across the sky, accompanied by deep, powerful engine roars that grew louder. Dai Anlan's heart tightened instinctively, his fingers nearly forming a habitual command gesture: enemy air raid! The thought flashed through his mind like lightning.

But the next second he realized his misjudgment.

This was a relatively safe rear area, not a front line where Japanese Army aviators could freely strike. The whizzing aircraft was not a death‑god painted with a crimson sun emblem, but… as he stared, the bright blue‑and‑white sun emblem on the wings was clearly visible in the sunlight.

It was our own aircraft!

But the surprise did not fade; it turned into deeper puzzlement. Dai Anlan was not especially familiar with European theater aircraft models, yet the sleek fuselages, distinctive shapes, and powerful roar of these fighters clearly revealed a level of advancement beyond his prior knowledge.

What model is this? Where did they come from? When did our forces acquire such refined air‑superiority capability? A series of questions surged in his mind.

One after another, BF‑109 fighter aircraft shot upward, flexibly forming neat three‑three formations in the sky, their posture elegant and confident. They lingered only briefly over Lashu, as if a golden eagle had surveyed a safe airspace before instantly adjusting course and flying straight toward the southern horizon.

There, there were targets they needed to hunt!

Dai Anlan remained where he stood, watching those steel eagles vanish into the southern sky's clouds. The shock and doubts in his heart were still unsettled when a familiar figure stepped out of a nearby medical tent.

"Doctor Li Qing," Dai Anlan called the military doctor, raising his hand toward the sky, "What model of fighter just flew by? When did our forces obtain such equipment?"

Besides the P‑40, the previous aircraft we had were Hawk III fighters, I‑15, and I‑16.

Li Qing halted at the sound, closing the patient record book he was leafing through. He looked in the direction Dai Anlan indicated, though the formation had already vanished.

"Division Commander," he replied calmly, "The aircraft ahead are BF‑109 fighters; those behind are Stuka dive bombers. Both are German‑made planes."

Dai Anlan nodded, remaining silent. He had occasionally heard the names of these two aircraft in scattered foreign war reports, but information about the distant European front that reached the Asian theater was inevitably fragmented.

Their enemy had always been clear: Japan.

To resist this invader, Huaxia's lands have been bloodily fighting for such a long time.

"Truly… advanced aircraft," Dai Anlan mused, his voice tinged with complex emotions. He had initially thought this air force was limited in size, after all, before the Xibu Campaign, when the air fleet commanded by Song Yunfei carried out pre‑emptive bombing, the number of aircraft deployed seemed not large.

However, when the BF‑109s and Stukas calmly assembled and formed over Lashu just now, Dai Anlan, with a professional soldier's eye, carefully tallied them.

He silently counted in his mind; the total exceeded thirty aircraft.

Even on any domestic front, that number would suffice to support a large‑scale, campaign‑level air operation.

Beyond the shock, the gates of memory were suddenly flung open.

Dai Anlan's thoughts involuntarily flew back to the blood‑stained mountains of Kunlun Pass. At that time, although there were some fighter aircraft and tanks in support, the main force was still the old I‑type biplanes, along with a handful of Hawk fighters sent to aid Huaxia; their performance lagged far behind the Japanese mainstay aircraft.

"Having them is better than none,"

That had been the helpless yet honest consensus then. Yet now, witnessing these high‑performance German aircraft, if back then the skies over Kunlun Pass had been patrolled by such iron wings, perhaps the pass would not have required so many young lives to be poured into it.

The Kunlun Pass blood battle, the word "blood" was no exaggeration. It was a true sea of corpses and blood, where brothers of entire companies and battalions used their flesh and bone, inch by inch, to offset the enemy's firepower, repeatedly fighting for every hill and position. The victory flag was eventually raised at the pass, but it was a grim triumph soaked in blood and tears, each survivor's heart etched with indelible scars.