Chapter 68: Whale

...Many people often ask: Since the flying-torpedo mortar was so devastating and relatively simple to manufacture, why did it completely vanish from our army's inventory after the Korean War?

It is quite simple. Given a sufficient supply of proper artillery, who would want to use that contraption?

Its range was far too short, and the enemy was hardly brain-dead; would they easily allow you to set one up right under their noses? Its accuracy was also notoriously difficult to control, amounting to little more than a rough estimation.

At any rate, while that thing was barely acceptable for knocking out enemy blockhouses, using it against the enemy on the main battlefield was very much a last resort...

...Excerpts from Hu Biao's diary collection, "Absurdities"...

Thanks to all the preparations made at all costs by Hu Biao and his men prior to this major battle.

Given the current dire circumstances—with poison gas drifting across the trenches, a squad of the enemy properly protected, and on the verge of overrunning the position—Hu Biao still had a few trump cards up his sleeve that could be used to handle the situation.

Somewhat unfortunately, he was not entirely certain whether this particular method would work.

Moreover, with poison gas permeating the entire trench network, executing such a tactic was bound to be exceptionally difficult.

However, to hold the position, any amount of difficulty had to be overcome in order to deploy this measure.

Specifically, Hu Biao, with one hand pressing a wet towel over his mouth and nose, cast a quick glance to his left and right. He spotted AT, who, despite adopting the same precaution, was still coughing loudly.

Hurrying over in a desperate rush, Hu Biao yelled at the top of his lungs:

"Quick, quick, use the flying-torpedo mortar on the little Japanese bastards!"

That was right! The trump card Hu Biao spoke of was the flying-torpedo mortar upon which he had pinned such high hopes. Even during the most intense fighting earlier, he had not shouted out such an order.

His intention was to unleash it at this critical juncture to deal the enemy a devastating blow.

When Hu Biao's order, somewhat distorted by the towel muffling his mouth, reached his ears, AT's nerves instantly tightened.

He knew that whether the position could be held against the enemy's current charge depended entirely on his own performance.

Realizing this, the fair-faced young man felt a mountain-like, crushing pressure. Yet, because of the lingering poison gas, he could not even take a deep breath to steady his nerves.

Clenching his teeth and pinching his own thigh hard, using the instantaneous surge of sharp pain to clear his head somewhat—

This modern-office-worker-turned-soldier gritted his teeth and sprang into action.

First, widening his stinging eyes, he peered through the dense poison gas hanging before him, sizing up the advancing enemy ranks in the distance.

From among them, he selected the leading group of the most densely packed enemy soldiers as his target.

Next, using hand signals, he summoned the three remaining members of his mortar squad to move out immediately.

It must be noted that this mortar squad originally had as many as ten members, capable of operating two mortars simultaneously.

However, by this point in the battle, including AT himself, only four men remained, leaving them barely enough manpower to operate a single mortar.

AT took the lead, rushing forward a few paces to drag an iron drum fitted with reinforcing hoops out of a bomb shelter.

Dragging the heavy oil drum single-handedly and with great effort, he ran toward a pre-dug, suitably positioned pit a short distance to the rear.

As previously explained, digging an inclined trench was necessary to absorb the tremendous recoil pressure upon firing; otherwise, a direct vertical placement risked a catastrophic barrel explosion.

Assuming such a thin iron drum could even be dignified with the term "barrel."

Upon reaching the selected pit, had his mouth not been muffled by a towel, AT would have cursed aloud on the spot.

Although no artillery shell had scored a direct hit to collapse the pit during the previous bombardment, the violent tremors had caused a significant amount of dirt and sand to slide down, making it impossible to shove the iron drum inside.

What could be done? Dig it out by hand, of course.

AT dropped to his knees, leaning his upper body forward as he frantically clawed at the mud with one hand. After just a few scrapes, his fingers—accustomed only to computer mice and keyboards—were rubbed raw.

After spending fifteen or sixteen seconds clearing out enough space in the pit,

AT shoved and kicked the iron drum until it was finally wedged into position.

Looking back over his shoulder once more, applying a level of mental calculation he had never even reached during his college entrance examinations, he rapidly estimated the distance, trajectory, landing point, and the enemy's advancing speed.

Without lingering over whether his calculations were correct or if he had made any errors, he exchanged a glance with the three accompanying brothers.

It conveyed a simple order: execute the firing procedure immediately according to drill.

Thus, following previous training protocols, one brother placed the smaller starting charge—designed to generate the propellant thrust—at the bottom of the oil drum, with the fuse side facing upward.

Because the flying-torpedo mortar fabricated by AT utilized ignition fuses rather than pull-lanyards for both the launch charge and the main explosive package,

As soon as the launch charge was dropped in, AT produced a box of matches and signaled the brother who had loaded the charge:

They needed to coordinate. He would hold the matchbox while his comrade struck a match to ignite the small starting charge.

While this sounded simple to describe, executing it smoothly under such atrocious environmental conditions was entirely another matter.

Working together, the two men tried three times in succession over several seconds, but failed to strike a spark, while the enemy's advance was proceeding at a terrifying speed.

If they hesitated any longer, AT's calculated window for the strike would be missed.

Consumed by frantic anxiety, his eyes bloodshot, AT abandoned all hesitation.

First, he raised his sleeve to wipe his itchy, smarting eyes, which were brimming with tears from the gas. Then, performing a reckless maneuver, he pulled away the left hand holding the towel over his mouth and nose.

Holding his breath, he picked up the matchbox and operated the matches with both hands.

Operating with both hands proved effective; a match flared instantly, igniting the fuse of the starting charge.

The other two brothers wasted no time either. The moment AT ignited the fuse, one of them dropped a circular wooden block down the barrel—designed to fit snugly against the iron drum, generate greater chamber pressure, and send the main explosive package flying further.

He even gave it a firm stomp with his boot to ensure a tight seal.

The final brother then dropped in the oversized main explosive package.

This larger explosive package was intended to inflict maximum casualties on the enemy; hence, to guarantee its lethality, AT had packed it with a full twenty kilograms of black powder.

After these charges of black powder were tightly bound in burlap, their outer layer was wrapped with approximately ten kilograms of stones, ceramic shards, and iron nails.

The ignition of this final explosive package went relatively smoothly.

Thus, a few seconds after ignition, accompanied by a deafening roar, a smoking explosive package traced a graceful arc through the air and soared away.

Yet at that moment, AT had no leisure to admire any graceful arcs.

He could not even care whether this single mortar round—lobbed after overcoming countless obstacles—would actually kill those enemy soldiers.

This was entirely because, during the process of igniting the two explosive charges back-to-back, even though he had moved at top speed and held his breath for as long as possible,

And even though he had immediately used his left hand to press the towel back over his mouth and nose the instant ignition was achieved,

He still could not avoid inhaling a certain amount of mustard gas.

Instantly, his oral cavity, throat, entire respiratory tract, and even his lungs began to burn with an agonizing fire. The torment surpassed even that of being scorched by flames.

Under such conditions, he could no longer worry about anything else.

As for whether that airborne explosive package successfully landed on the spot AT had calculated?

It most certainly did not; it missed its mark by a good twenty-odd meters. The primary reason was simply that far too many variables affected the trajectory of a flying-torpedo mortar.

Achieving pinpoint accuracy would probably require a mainframe computer to simulate and calculate numerous variables such as propellant weight, wind direction, and the enemy's charging speed—a task that practically qualified as an advanced mathematical problem.

Relying on AT's hasty mental arithmetic fell far short, even if his high school mathematics scores had been quite respectable.

Fortunately, AT's efforts were not in vain. Through sheer blind luck, the explosive package landed a mere dozen meters or so away from the enemy formation.

Coupled with the explosive package's formidable destructive power, it still achieved the desired effect.

Following a violent detonation, the ferocious shockwave propelled a dense cloud of stones, iron nails, and ceramic shards outward in all directions, knocking down roughly half an enemy squad.

This terrifying strike immediately convinced the remaining enemy soldiers that the Nationalist army had deployed ultra-heavy artillery of massive caliber.

Having never experienced such devastation before, they instantly lost their courage to press the attack and retreated in disarray.

Even more fortuitously, a sudden gust of wind swept away the dense black clouds that had blanketed the sky since early morning, and a torrential downpour finally broke out with a pattering roar.

The gale swept away the lingering poison gas across the trenches, and the heavy rain washed the mustard gas from Hu Biao and his men, preventing any further sustained injuries.

Meanwhile, AT managed to roll over and lie flat on his back, opening his mouth wide to catch the falling rainwater.

When his mouth was full of water, instead of swallowing it directly, he swished it around vigorously before spitting it out with force.

Viewed from a distance, the posture bore an uncanny resemblance to a whale surfacing to exhale—humorous, yet profoundly heartbreaking...