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“The deaths of the Manchus are not a pity, but there are still many Han people and Han Eight Banners in the city. Are they all going to be killed?” As a civil official, Zhang Mingqi truly could not bear to see such a cruel thing happen. If this were to be done, it would be going too far and there would be no turning back.
Zhao Yan curled his lip, revealing his white teeth, and said slowly and deliberately, "I have said that revolution is not rebellion, but I have also said that revolution is never a dinner party, but represents bloodshed and sacrifice."
The city is full of people who suck the people's blood and sweat, fulfilling no obligations but enjoying endless rights; they are the targets of the revolution!
"I even have to thank the person who invented the city-wide system. We don't even need the tedious screening process anymore; we can just storm in."
"Today I grant special leniency: all revolutionary soldiers who have immediate family members living in Manchuria are to be pardoned; all others shall be executed without mercy!"
Zhang Mingqi murmured, "Why be so intense?"
Zhao Yan looked at the menacing soldiers behind him and pointed at them, saying, "Lord Zhang, look at those soldiers behind you who are burning with endless rage. I have said before that revolution is not a dinner party; revolution is a purposeful act of violence."
Violence needs a target to be unleashed; that target could be you, it could be me, but it could also be all those parasites in the city!
Zhao Yan's words, "Lord Zhang," chilled Zhang Mingqi to the bone, and the next two sentences silenced him completely. He glanced back at the soldiers, their faces filled with murderous intent.
Zhao Yan's words silenced all the officials present who were reluctant to speak. This murderous intent was not something Zhao Yan had just unleashed in the last two days, but rather the culmination of nearly three hundred years of forbearance, the shame of the Han people being oppressed and slaughtered for three hundred years.
This is a volcano that could erupt at any moment. Anyone who dares to stop it will be among the first sacrifices to the eruption. When the Manchus slaughtered the Han people, they did not treat them as human beings at all. They even treated the Han people as less than pigs and dogs.
At least the Manchus treated their livestock with some care, but they treated the Han people with utter indifference, slaughtering anyone who resisted.
Zhao Yan is only targeting the Manchus in the city and has not expanded the scope of the massacre. If you still want to stop those soldiers, believe me, they will kill you on the spot and replace you with a leader to continue the revolution.
Zhao Yan had a deeper purpose: to use this massacre of the Manchus to force all revolutionaries to submit a pledge of allegiance that they could never turn back from and could never compromise upon.
He didn't want to be like Sun Yat-sen, who turned a perfectly good revolution into a mess, and in the end even allowed something like the "Regulations for the Preferential Treatment of the Qing Imperial Family" to exist.
Brother, this is a revolution against the Qing Dynasty! And in the end, you actually put together a legal agreement to protect the dignity and treatment of the Qing imperial family. What kind of revolution is this?
If a revolution is not thorough, then it is not a revolution at all. Either don't do it at all, or do it thoroughly. Our ancestors understood this principle perfectly well when they rebelled, but later generations have failed to see it.
If you accept the Manchus now, and they surrender on the battlefield, the revolutionary army will immediately collapse in morale. How passionate and enthusiastic you were back then will be just as disappointing and disheartening to everyone now.
Even the Manchus who once rode on our heads, bullied and oppressed us, have become our comrades and have infiltrated the revolutionary class. What kind of revolution is this? Why not just continue to maintain the rule of the Qing Dynasty? Why bother with all this unnecessary trouble?
If you're a revolutionary and you don't even know who you're violently overthrowing, then who are you directing your revolutionary violence towards? Yourselves?
Nearly three hundred years of blood feud! The number of Han people slaughtered by the Manchus is easily in the tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions. With such a huge blood feud, you say that now that they have become better, you will let them go and repay evil with kindness. How will you repay kindness?
Zhao Yan's attitude was clear, and the revolutionary army's murderous aura was boiling over; anyone who dared to stop them would die!
"Gentlemen, the time for revenge has come. The Manchus have been slaughtering and oppressing us Han people. Starting from the first year of the Tianqi reign of the Ming Dynasty, which is 1621 AD, they began to massacre the Han people in Liaodong, wiping out millions of Han people in the Northeast."
They then repeatedly invaded, plundering and massacring countless Han people. Their magnificent palaces, their wealth and glory, their luxurious lives were all built on the foundation of mountains of corpses of us Han people.
Even after the Manchus seized control of China at the end of the Ming Dynasty, they still retained their barbaric nature. The three massacres of Jiading, the ten-day Yangzhou Massacre, the eighty-one-day Jiangyin Massacre, and the later migration of people from Huguang to Sichuan—they emptied an entire province!
Countless ancestors of ours perished at the hands of the Manchus. If we do not avenge this, how can we face our ancestors? How can we call ourselves revolutionaries who shattered the old world?
Gentlemen, I don't want to talk about repaying evil with kindness or governing the world with benevolence and righteousness. We are revolutionaries, and revolution is violent subversion, a violent reshuffling from the bottom up!
I have said that though the night of revolution was short, its glory will last forever! I will never keep this glory to myself! But I will bear all the blame!
Go and seek revenge! Go and fight! Let us wash away centuries of shame with the blood of our enemies, let us use their heads as stepping stones to tell everyone that we have stood up, and we will never kneel again!
All the officers and soldiers raised their weapons and torches, shouting wildly: "Revenge! Revenge!"
Squads of heavily armed soldiers began to pour into the city. The veterans with guns were followed by new recruits with knives. Everyone was organized into squads and platoons, and they immediately dispersed after entering the city.
Each combat unit was responsible for clearing a specific area. The Revolutionary Army Headquarters had prepared a detailed plan in advance, all of which were requested by Zhao Yan.
Even Wang Chongshan, the division commander, believed that such a thing was unnecessary. For the army in the late Qing Dynasty, massacring cities was simply a professional skill.
However, Zhao Yan took their professional talents and made them even more scientific and efficient. He believed that if you're going to do something, you have to do it thoroughly.
Manchuria's four city gates were controlled on the night of the uprising, and the next day, the revolutionary army's elite troops immediately blocked the entry and exit of people from the main roads of Manchuria.
The people inside had no chance to escape or seek help. They even clung to a sliver of unrealistic hope that the revolution was about overthrowing the Beijing government and had nothing to do with them.
But they have no idea that everything they have now was bought with the blood and bones of the Han people by their ancestors.
It wasn't until the revolutionary army stormed into Manchuria and gunfire erupted within the city that the Manchu bannermen realized their end was nigh.
But everything happened too fast. Every day, every step the revolutionary army took hit the key points, and the Manchu bannermen simply couldn't organize a resistance.
Tonight, Changsha is destined to be a bloody night, a night of shattered dreams for the Manchu people, a dream that has lasted for nearly three hundred years, a dream they thought could continue forever.
Until a man named Zhao Yan arrived with his revolutionary army.
Chapter 28 Crystal Night (2)
"Everyone remember, revolution is no crime. We are not massacring cities, but seeking revenge!"
"The CEO said: An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth! How the Manchus treated us back then, we will treat them the same way we treat them today!"
"But we are a revolutionary army, and we forbid torture and killing. We must give quick and efficient results!"
"The president said: Glory will not be enjoyed alone, and he will bear all the blame!"
"Those who participate in the operation tonight will all receive a year's salary as a bonus, and 30% of the spoils after the battle will be divided equally among everyone!"
The higher-ups have clearly defined the originally heinous massacre as a righteous act of revenge, and Zhao Yan has publicly taken full responsibility for the crime. With such a leader, no one has anything to say.
But Zhao Yan also publicly promised that everyone would receive a year's salary as a bonus immediately after completing the work, and that 30% of the spoils after the war would be divided equally among all participants. This was simply adding fuel to the fire.
Squads of soldiers began pouring into the city through its four gates, and, according to the operational zones assigned to each regiment and battalion, began to "purge" their assigned areas.
Squads of heavily armed soldiers stormed into the Manchu mansion. The Manchu city, which was once sacred and inviolable, and where Han people would be whipped if they entered, had now become naked beauties in front of their revolutionary army. At this moment, no one could stop them.
They didn't know that from the moment the knife was swung down, there was no turning back; they could only follow Zhao Yan's revolutionary path.
"All men will be executed. As for women, we'll decide based on our mood. If we find one we like, we'll tie her up, write her name on it, and send her to be held in a centralized custody on the street. Each person is only allowed to choose one!"
"No one may keep any property for themselves. After the war, a body search will be conducted immediately, and everyone will be supervised. Anyone who dares to keep anything will be infringing on everyone's interests. I won't say what the consequences will be; you all know the answer!"
"Use knives if you can, don't use guns. Arson is strictly prohibited. This place will belong to everyone in the future, and the CEO will never let down any supporter!"
The party representatives were supervising and participating in combat operations for the first time, and they never expected that it would involve wiping out the entire city. This battle, which was like adults fighting children, made the party representatives feel right at home in their first combat experience.
Even if you're a battlefield newbie, just follow along. It's low-risk and high-reward. After a battle, the party representative and the unit will be completely integrated.
What kind of relationship is the strongest? Fighting alongside each other isn't the strongest, but fighting together and carrying out a massacre of an entire city—that's the strongest relationship imaginable.
More than 13,000 officers and soldiers of the First Division of the Revolutionary Army participated in this nighttime cleanup operation. Apart from those who stayed behind to guard the camp and key locations in the city, all the other available manpower came, and even the cooks in the kitchen took up their cleavers and went into battle.
Thanks to a meticulous scientific plan and deployment in advance, all participating units cleared the area piece by piece according to their assigned task areas.
Some people were responsible for taking action, some for cleaning up the battlefield, and others for collecting and transporting the spoils of war. Finally, the party representative was responsible for sealing off the cleaned house, signifying that it had been purified.
Everyone performed their duties efficiently, just like workers on an assembly line, each responsible for a specific process and doing their own job.
Even the new recruits who had just joined the army were slashed six times per second, each slash killing them instantly, without holding back or showing any mercy.
The soldiers were amazed by the Manchus' magnificent mansions, their expensive furnishings, the granaries overflowing with grain, and the dazzling gold and silver jewels in their treasuries.
Everyone completely believed Zhao Yan's words: the Han people at the bottom of society were so hungry that they couldn't even afford to eat, while the powerful and wealthy people in the city were so rich.
Even the lowest-ranking Manchu people had full rice bins and oil in their dishes! Cash could be found in any household, something that was simply unimaginable for the lower-class Han people.
The Manchu concept of poverty meant not being able to afford meat, and wiping their mouths with pigskin to pretend they had oil and fat – this is what left the deepest impression on everyone.
But what does this mean? It proves the Manchus' concept of poverty: even if they were extremely poor, they could still afford to wipe their mouths with a piece of pigskin. This was the poorest state the Manchus could imagine.
The Han people are different. Their poorest are those who can't even afford to eat tree bark, let alone pigskin. They don't even have a bowl of sweet potatoes and can only starve to death!
"They are already so wealthy, why do they still oppress us? We are starving to death, why do they still want to take away our last grain of food?"
Every soldier who rushed into a Manchu household would have this question: these Manchus could have enough to eat and money to spend, so why were they still eyeing their last grain of rice and last copper coin?
There are private schools here every now and then, and every three or five households have a wet nurse. Manchu children not only have books to read, but they also have milk to drink. Han wet nurses not only have to drink milk with the children, but also with the adults.
Their children can read, eat their fill, and drink human milk, while Han children often go hungry or even die young, and baby girls are often forced to be thrown into the river.
Go and see the mothers who starved to death on the streets in the late Qing Dynasty, and the fathers who died from exhaustion in the fields. Go and see the babies thrown into the baby-abandoning tower and the girls who drowned. Then you will understand why Zhao Yan insisted on doing this.
People always say that people in the late Qing Dynasty were ignorant, that they favored sons over daughters, and that they couldn't even support their own children, but no one bothers to investigate why.
Adult Han Chinese face the constant threat of starvation and death from disease. Any war or famine would turn the world into a living hell, where even the most basic survival needs cannot be met. How can you expect these people to awaken?
Inside the city, however, the scene was quite different. Children were carefree, and even the adults took pride in drinking human milk, as a sign of their status and wealth. The most common Han Chinese captured by the revolutionary army were Han wet nurses, who would take care of the children and then the adults. When asked why they did this, they would simply say that it was to ensure they had enough to eat each month.
The extravagance of the Manchus completely shocked the revolutionary army. It turned out that the Manchu city, which had always prevented them, the Han people, from entering, was actually the closest paradise to them, a paradise built on their suffering.
Now the revolutionary army showed no mercy, and their actions became faster and more ruthless, sparing no one, from Manchu princes to Han Eight Banners members and even their henchmen Han Chinese.
The veterans complained that the bolt-action mechanism of the rifles was too slow, especially those carrying Hanyang rifles. The barrels were almost burning hot, and if a bullet jammed, they couldn't push it up, which would lead to a direct bayonet fight. Being even a second slower was considered a disservice to the president and a betrayal of his kindness!
The explosive force of three hundred years of hatred was astonishing even to the high command of the revolutionary army. They themselves were unaware that the hatred between the two sides was so profound.
High-ranking military officers and officials live well; at least they won't starve or die of illness at any time. They have enough to eat, money for medical care, and money for education. Their only worry is the future of their families.
But people at the bottom of society are always worried about how to survive. If everyone is suffering like this, then so be it.
But if some people live too comfortably, that's a mistake. It's not scarcity that's the problem, but inequality. And inequality is one thing, but if everything you have was earned with the blood and sweat of me and my ancestors, then don't blame me for being ruthless.
Life always finds a way out. When you're poor, you think of change. If you think of change when you're poor, what about when you're hungry? When you're starving or dying from illness, should you change? And where should you change from?
Previously, the higher-ups were unaware of these answers, but now they all understand.
No wonder Zhao Yan was so determined to purge the Manchus. Now, looking at the soldiers under his command, their lust is running high. Everyone is thankful that the president chose the Manchus as his target. Otherwise, if they had become the target, they would have been truly thankful.
"Why do you think the president chose such a code name for the operation? A massacre is just a massacre, why use such a fancy code name?" Lu Zhaoxuan wondered.
Zhang Mingqi murmured, "Crystal Night? Crystal symbolizes purification, right? The president probably wants to use this to declare that everything we do is for the purpose of purifying our country. That must be it, no doubt about it!"
Lu Zhaoxuan exclaimed with admiration, "Premier's insight is brilliant!"
Zhang Mingqi stroked his long beard, touched his bald head, and said proudly, "That's natural. Otherwise, why would I be the Premier and you only be the Vice Premier?"
"Luckily, the CEO is wise enough to know that his subordinates have such a vengeful spirit, and let them vent it on the Manchus. Otherwise, if they had found us, we would have been doomed!"
Lu Zhaoxuan stammered, "According to the president, this is a class revolution, a struggle of the oppressed class to rise up and eliminate the exploiting class. That makes so much sense! I must listen to the president's instructions more and make more progress!"
Zhang Mingqi raised an eyebrow: "You think you can improve? I don't need to improve? If you improve any further, you'll be in my position!"
"Go back and shave your head a bit, put on some oil, make it as shiny as mine, otherwise the soldiers will be blinded by rage at night and might mistake you for someone else, which would be terrible!"
"Thank you for reminding me, sir!" Lu Zhaoxuan looked up and noticed that Zhang Mingqi's head was reflecting light in the torchlight. It turned out that the guy had applied oil to it.
Zhang Mingqi instructed, "The shinier the head, the more revolutionary; the longer the braid, the more reactionary. Remind all officials to pay attention to the details of revolution!"
"Yes, my lord!"
On the city wall, the men looked down at the gunfire and wailing below, but no one felt uncomfortable, and not a single person felt any pity. It was a case of "better to die for your friends than for yourselves."
Chapter 29 The Telegram Shocks the World!
Zhao Yan had no interest in observing the specific details. Although he was the instigator, what could we do? Our Master Zhao was kind-hearted and couldn't bear to see anyone get shot.
So Zhao Yan returned to his residence last night and had a good night's sleep. He didn't have much time left to rest.
After being woken up by a maid in the early morning, Zhao Yan stood up and was helped to change his clothes by the servants. This was not because Zhao Yan had become corrupt, but because his arm was injured and he could not lift it, so he needed someone to help him change his clothes.
As a revolutionary leader, he had to maintain a noble and righteous image, especially when appearing in public. Even if Zhao Yan's arms and legs were to be broken the next second, he had to keep his sleeves and trouser legs perfectly straight for this moment!
The maids of the governor's yamen, who had dared to joke with Zhao Yan a couple of days ago, were now silent as cicadas in winter, none of them daring to utter a sound, all keeping their heads down and obediently doing their work.
Last night, the city was filled with gunfire and screams for four or five hours. Everyone in the city heard it. Now everyone knows that this revolutionary in front of them is not only good with words, but also ruthless when it comes to taking action.
Raising his wrist and glancing at his watch, Zhao Yan realized it was already 11 a.m. Hearing sporadic gunfire still emanating from the direction of the city, Zhao Yan immediately frowned.
All the servants were startled, wondering what they had done to displease the master.
"Pass on my order: Operation Clear must be completed before midnight!"
"Yes, President!"
Zhao Yan finished dressing, polished his shoes, and complained as he walked out the door, "This efficiency is too low. There's still a lot of room for improvement. The revolution is not yet complete. Gentlemen, we still need to work harder!"
Zhao Yan's complaints reached the entire city in less than five minutes. Upon hearing the leader's supreme instruction that "the revolution has not yet succeeded and everyone still needs to work hard," the revolutionary officers and soldiers felt extremely ashamed. They had been busy with a purge all night and had not yet finished their work, which was truly shameful for all the soldiers.
The massacre of a city was criticized for being inefficient, which was an utter disgrace for the army in the late Qing Dynasty, even more humiliating than defeat.
Soon, Gatling guns and infantry guns were pushed into the city, and the efficiency of the cleanup increased dramatically.
At noon, Zhao Yan arrived at the city wall of Mancheng and saw that Mancheng had fallen into peace. The bloodstains and corpses on the streets had been cleaned up before he arrived.
A one-stop service: slaughtering and killing on the spot, then immediately loading the bodies onto carts, washing them thoroughly on one side and hauling them to the mass graves outside the city on the other.
"What did you all gain from last night's purge?" Zhao Yan asked as soon as he came up.
Zhang Mingqi immediately stepped forward: "Reporting to the President, the specific details of the acquisition are still being tallied, but it is roughly estimated that a total of 4.37 million taels of silver, 184,000 taels of gold, 5,600 private residences, 120 mansions, 18 official residences, 1.4 million mu of land deeds, 1.5 million taels of IOUs, jewelry, antiques, and calligraphy and paintings were also acquired."
"Who asked you about these gains?" Zhao Yan immediately interrupted. In broad daylight, under the watchful eyes of everyone, you are giving me such a blatant report on the spoils of the massacre.
What if people misunderstand and think I ordered the massacre for these gold and silver treasures, for these low-yield fields? I, Zhao Yan, am a revolutionary, a person who has transcended base desires!