Chapter 682 The stiffer the waist, the harder it is to do farm work (thanks to ‘Shangshangqian5480’ for the reward)
As the afterglow of the setting sun shone on the sweat beads on Xu Chaoyang’s forehead, a breeze blew through the fields, and the beautiful scenery of the swaying waves in the valley appeared before his eyes.

In the fields, people were busy harvesting crops. Even when it was getting dark, no one mentioned going home to rest. However, Xu Chaoyang’s waist was so bad that he could hardly straighten it from working in the fields.

Autumn harvest is completely different from training in the army. Training in the army at least has rules and you can change the movements, but autumn harvest requires you to stick to the same posture until the end. When you get to the field, you have to do it again. The energy is beyond words.

“Chaoyang, is it okay?”

Yang Jingyu was half a ridge behind him, and the harvested crops were placed next to the ridge furrows along the stubble. Not only did it look good, but it was also easier to collect when the time came. It was completely different on Xu Chaoyang’s side. He swept the crops everywhere with a broom. The places he walked by looked as if they had been bombarded by the Japanese with large-caliber artillery. The battle was extremely brutal. In Northeastern dialect, it was called “wolves”, but they couldn’t catch up with Yang Jingyu.

It’s not that he hasn’t worked before, but he is far behind Yang Jingyu, who is tall and has long arms. And it’s not just Yang Jingyu. The big guy, Wang Tianhao, and even those young men in the army are all half a ridge behind Xu Chaoyang. Even Man Guangzhi, who is the most agile, has started to go back… Just talking about working in the fields, the farmers’ rules of Henan and Hebei are unmatched. Even though Xu Chaoyang is from Northeast China, he has to say that people from Northeast China are not as good as people from Henan when it comes to farm work. There is no need to be stubborn about this.

“Who can I blame?” But he couldn’t admit it.

Just as Xu Chaoyang was about to bend down, he heard—bang!
There was a crisp sound coming from the lower back, and then the entire upper body felt like it had been anesthetized. It had to stay as stiff as a rock, and it would hurt if it bent even a little bit…

“Rising Sun!!!”

At this time, a shout was heard from a distance, and Chang Zhan, leading a group of young people, rushed towards this side waving their arms under the setting sun.

Xu Chaoyang finally found the key point. He dropped the sickle in his hand and quickly walked out of the field, holding his lower back: “Lao Chang, you are back. You are going to miss me to death!”

He shouted and looked back, as if afraid of being discovered as he walked forward.

At this moment, Old Chang had become a completely different person. The beastly aura on his body had completely disappeared, and the calm Xu Chaoyang was almost unrecognizable. When the two old comrades met, they did not immediately embrace each other warmly. Instead, Old Chang politely extended his hand to him.

Xu Chaoyang was stunned for a moment: “What? You want to shake hands with me? Get lost now!”

As he spoke, he slapped Lao Chang’s hand away, opened his arms and hugged him.

Old Chang didn’t think too much about it. When he felt Xu Chaoyang putting all the weight of 170 to 180 kilograms on him, he quickly took a step back to support himself, and said with a smile on his face, “You’ve gained weight.”

This is what they had between old brothers. It was a relationship that had been forged through life and death. Let alone hugging each other, what was wrong with just sleeping in the same bed?
Xu Chaoyang then let go of Lao Chang. He looked at the man who had grown a beard to cover the scar on his chin and his increasingly strong body. He asked curiously, “Are you feeling better now?”

He was also puzzled. In the novels he had read before, no matter how injured the people around the protagonist were, they would still participate in the second battle as usual. But why was it that in his case, it often took him half a year to recuperate from an injury?
Old Chang nodded heavily: “All right.” Then he stepped aside and said: “Look, who did I bring it back for!”

At first Xu Chaoyang didn’t pay attention to it, but now, he couldn’t help but pay attention to it.

“Fuck?” He used the most common exclamation of people in Northeast China to express his joy and surprise, and looked at Lao Chang with an incredible face: “Is this still the same group of brats who were thinking about stealing food in the cafeteria at midnight when I was in Dagu Factory?”

These kids have grown up, and now they have beard-like hair on their mouths. They used to be so tall, but now they have become adult men. Those who are 1.7 meters tall are considered top-notch, and the average height is between 1.6 and 1.7 meters, with not much difference…

“stand at attention!”

Chang Zhan suddenly shouted.

Snapped!
This group of children who had just arrived in Xinzhou stood at attention at the same time.

The forty or fifty children standing at attention caused dust to rise all around, but what Chang Zhan shouted next, “Salute!” made Xu Chaoyang completely see the image of soldiers in these children.

They saluted Xu Chaoyang in unison, as if the blood in 217’s body functions had been recreated for him.

Xu Chaoyang returned the salute and turned to look at Lao Chang: “You have a big surprise for us!”

“After the two major battles at Tuanchengkou and Xinkou, plus your expansion of the army in Xinzhou, there is almost no one left at the grassroots level, right?”

Chang Zhan knows 217 too well. Even though he has been recuperating from his injuries for most of the past six months, he is still thinking about you. So, he has brought all the grassroots cadres back to you, Xu Chaoyang, from 217.

Perhaps these little 217s do not have the most combat experience, but they were all raised by you, 217, and have undergone ideological education in Yan’an, so their loyalty is beyond doubt.

“Okay, okay!”

Xu Chaoyang walked past these former little kids one by one, stroking their hair in a rather unruly manner. There were still a lot of kids like this in 217, and when they grew up, they would be able to fully support the entire 217 system – the 217 system!
Xu Chaoyang, who had never thought of establishing his own mountaintop, had already established it inadvertently, and established it so firmly.

“The higher-ups have approved your proposal and allowed the available resources in northern Shaanxi and Xinzhou to be used for 217 production first, so as to expand the production speed of our arsenal, and…” Chang Zhan held Xu Chaoyang’s arm and said, “Before I came back, several senior leaders specifically asked me to bring you a message, saying that if the time is right, we can use troops in Shanxi, but we must not rush for success, and must do so when we are sure enough.”

Xu Chaoyang recently submitted a report in which he applied to use all the mineral resources in northern Shaanxi and Shanxi in Xinzhou to expand production. He wanted to accumulate enough basic combat power before winter and completely wipe out the entire Fifth Division in Shanxi before the Spring Festival of 1938, thereby taking over the entire northern Shanxi and opening up the marching route to North China and Chahar.

Aren’t you little Japs willing to fight in Wuhan?

Then you guys fight yours, and I fight mine, and let’s not hinder each other.

This was the key to Xu Chaoyang letting the Sichuan Army occupy Ekou. With Ekou, they could take Ru Yuekou to the north and advance to Tuanchengkou to the east. After taking Tuanchengkou, Lingqiu would be right in front of them, and further north was Tianzhen Datong.

The entire Shanxi Province has been on Xu Chaoyang’s mind since the great victory at Tuanchengkou, and now it is finally time to mobilize the troops…

Now, he is just waiting for the autumn harvest to be completed.

“Chaoyang…you need to quickly draw up a detailed battle plan and send someone back to Yan’an as soon as possible…”

Xu Chaoyang looked at Chang Zhan in confusion: “What do you mean, someone in my hometown is dissatisfied with our 217?”

“That’s not the case.” Chang Zhan quickly shook his head and said, “But shouldn’t you let your family know your movements in advance? Is it okay to keep people guessing? Asking for instructions in the morning and reporting in the evening, who are you telling to?”

“We are different now than before. We are a regular army…”

Xu Chaoyang almost grinned from ear to ear as he looked at Chang Zhan. Chang had changed so much. He had only been in Yan’an for half a year…

“I say, Lao Chang, didn’t you go back to lead the teaching team? When did you become the political commissar?”

“Go, go, go…” Lao Chang was still embarrassed. As he spoke, Lao Chang muttered in a low voice: “Chaoyang, give me some money.”

“Why, Yan’an won’t pay us?”

“Can the border area tickets issued by Yan’an be used outside?”

Border area tickets first appeared in 1937 and are now in large-scale circulation in northern Shaanxi.

There is a very interesting phenomenon here, that is, when other governments issue currency, they need to have sufficient gold reserves, energy reserves, silver reserves and other foundations in order to gain the trust of the people, even the National Government is like this; only in history, northern Shaanxi was different, it had nothing, and it was useless!
What’s even more amazing is that not only can it be done by hand, but it can also be done successfully.

Even when the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region Bank was established in northern Shaanxi, its capital was only 100,000!
A bank with a capital of only 1943 yuan, a border area note issued by a government that only had ruling power in northern Shaanxi, in history, by , even some Japanese devils were using it. From this point alone, we can see who will rule the world in the future.

Of course, during this period, the border area tickets were not just “issued randomly”. At least they had a full “five million American sons” brought back from America as a reserve. Xu Chaoyang did not touch any of this money and gave it all to Yan’an. Otherwise, how could he exchange it for the resources of the entire northern Shaanxi?

“How much money do you want?” Xu Chaoyang was not short of money, he just couldn’t understand why Lao Chang, who hadn’t spoken to him for a long time, suddenly asked for money.

Old Chang was still a little embarrassed, he lowered his head and said with a smile: “I want to take it over to that woman in Tianjin…”

“A few days ago, before I returned to Xinzhou, I received a dozen letters from that woman… Originally, I thought we were just having a good time with each other and didn’t plan to make it public, but after the news of my injury in the Tuanchengkou battle spread, this tiger thing asked someone to write more than a dozen letters in a row!”

“It took so long for these letters to reach me.”

Xu Chaoyang complained, “Old Chang, when we were trying to get the family members in Tianjin to come here, why didn’t you let her come with you? That’s ridiculous!”

“Hey, it’s not me who doesn’t allow it, it’s them who don’t want to.”

“People asked us at that time, if you can’t stay in Tianjin anymore, you have to leave Tianjin. What if you can’t stay there either? Are we women going to follow you around the world?”

“I thought about it and decided, forget it, since she wants to stay in Tianjin, then let her stay in Tianjin.”

Xu Chaoyang asked again: “Are you writing this letter to ask you for money?”

Lao Chang shook his head: “It is because she did not mention the word ‘money’ that I want to bring her here. Don’t we know what life is like in the enemy-occupied areas? We are from the Northeast.”

At this point, Lao Chang sighed and said, “Stop talking nonsense and give it to me or not!”

Xu Chaoyang was righteous for once: “Give me as much as you want!”

“Two hundred silver dollars.”

“Okay.”

“How about giving me two hundred and four? A poor family but a rich road…”

“Row.”

Chang Zhan turned his head and looked at Xu Chaoyang: “What about three hundred?”

“no problem.”

“I said Chaoyang? Why did you agree so readily?”

Chang Zhan still regarded three hundred silver dollars as big money. How could he know that Xu Chaoyang no longer regarded money as money…

But what Xu Chaoyang said next had nothing to do with money: “If someone else asked me this, I might have an idea in my mind, but you keep asking me… I, Xu Chaoyang, would risk my life.” Xu Chaoyang raised his hand and put his arm on Chang Zhan’s shoulder: “No, you have to hold me up, my waist hurts.”

“What’s wrong with your waist? Xu Chaoyang, you can’t be so stubborn that you took advantage of Fuzhen’s trip to America to get a little girl, right?”

“Get lost, I strained my waist doing farm work…”

Chang Zhan was not happy at the time, and he shouted at the group of people in military uniforms in front of him: “Who among you came up with the idea of ​​letting the top leader of the military region do farm work?”

“Don’t shout!” The little thing that Xu Chaoyang tried so hard to conceal was finally revealed by Old Chang…

Hahahahaha…that makes Yang Jingyu and the others happy…

“Hey, did my second sister give birth to a girl or a boy?”

Xu Chaoyang really had no other choice but to cover his face with other words, which made him blush.

“Bald boy… Ever since he was born, the couple has only been fighting. His father wanted him to study literature, saying that there were so many experts in northern Shaanxi who could give him the best education since childhood; his mother wanted him to learn martial arts, saying that as long as he became a soldier, even if it was just a waste of money, the 217th Military Division couldn’t just watch her son starve.”

“What do you think?”

“Me? I think, from Za.”

“What the hell?”

“The kid has just been born, why think so much? He is still spitting up milk. Will he read a book if you give him one, or will he play with a gun if you give him one? At present, he will only hold a hairpin in his mouth, and everything else is nonsense.”

Xu Chaoyang smiled and shook Chang Zhan’s shoulders vigorously: “This is our old Chang!”

“Why, didn’t I say that just now?”

“That’s really different…hahahaha…oh my, my waist…”

(End of this chapter)