Watanabe Yoshio, a sergeant in the Woguo garrison troops stationed in Beiping City, was ordered to lead a squad of soldiers and a platoon of puppet troops to collect the corpses of Woguo patrolmen throughout the city.
Five squads of patrolmen had been wiped out, leaving sixty or seventy bodies scattered about. They were either decapitated or severed at the waist; not a single one remained intact. Seeing the horrific state of their comrades, the soldiers in Watanabe’s squad turned pale with terror. Several of them could not bear it and began retching violently on the side of the road.
The puppet soldiers also vomited as they lifted the bodies. The headless corpses were manageable enough to pick up and load onto flatbed carts, but the ones severed at the waist—their colorful entrails spilling out—were nauseating to handle.
Chapter 74