Chapter 1411 - Testimony
It was a gloomy basement. Apart from a heavy wooden door covered in leather, the entire room had not a single window—sealed tight as a can. No sound from outside could penetrate; those inside could hear only the ventilation opening's faint hum. Lights blazed day and night, blindingly bright, making it impossible to distinguish day from night. This was the underground prison interrogation room of the Political Security General Administration.
The walls and floor were tiled for easy cleaning of blood and excrement. The room was empty except for a table for interrogators; in the center stood only a hardwood chair reinforced with iron bars and bolted firmly to the floor. Several professional enforcers from the Security Bureau stood to the side, smoking cigarettes and watching the person in the chair.
A completely naked woman was shackled to it with handcuffs and leg irons. Her head drooped to her chest, long black hair falling loose, her body convulsing as she cried. Purple whip marks covered her body. Black electrodes were fastened to her [CENSORED] and [CENSORED], with wires running from her body to the hand-crank telephone on the table.
Zhou Dongtian stood before her, coat removed, the sleeves of his white shirt rolled high.
"Have you really told us everything Hao Yuan said?"
"Really... really..." The woman shook her head uncontrollably, crying and wailing. "I've told you everything I know..."
"You are being very dishonest," Zhou Dongtian said sternly. "You should know you're not the only one we've captured. There were other people present at that meeting besides you."
"Sob, sob, sob..." Jia Le burst into tears. From her capture to her transfer to Lingao, she had lost all sense of time. Since disembarking and being brought here for interrogation, nearly every moment had felt like hell. Day-and-night interrogation and torture had pushed her to the brink of mental collapse.
In truth, she had no way of knowing how much time had actually passed. She had lost consciousness and come to again several times; each time she awoke felt like crawling out of hell, as if she had been reborn. But when she opened her eyes, everything remained dark and chaotic.
Her clothes had long since been stripped off, yet she no longer felt any sense of shame. She felt only a burning pain all over her body—especially where the tape-attached black cords were connected to her [CENSORED] and [CENSORED]. Apart from her head, face, and hands and feet, there were wounds almost everywhere.
These people took turns pressing her about two things. First, Hao Yuan's organization: what was its structure? How many people were in it? Who were the key members? What were their usual activities? What theory had Hao Yuan instilled in them? Second, Hao Yuan himself: what did he often say? How did he behave day to day? Had he ever spoken of his own life, his parents, relatives, friends...?
These questions were asked over and over. Even when she told them everything she knew, it was no use. The enforcers seemed unconvinced of her memory, and repeated torture forced her to keep "remembering." Any scrap of a clue would be pursued relentlessly.
The person presiding over this coercive interrogation was Zhou Dongtian himself. Besides his own protégés, there were also several yamen runners retained from the various government offices.
"Director, there's a phone call for you." Just as Zhou Dongtian was pressing her, someone came to report.
Zhou Dongtian left the interrogation room, picked up the phone, and glanced at his watch. Just past seven in the morning.
The call was from Zhao Manxiong, asking about new progress. Zhou Dongtian reported on the latest interrogation results.
"Very good. Press harder and see if you can get any new information. There's an Internal Security meeting at nine this morning. This case will be discussed. The more detailed the materials, the better."
Zhou Dongtian hung up, wiped the sweat from his forehead, drank a big glass of cold tea, stuffed a few pastries in his mouth, and returned to the interrogation room.
"Think again carefully. About that meeting Hao Yuan held—what else do you remember?" Zhou Dongtian softened his tone. His gaze fell again on the telephone on the table. A worker moved closer to it.
"No, no, don't—" Jia Le screamed, struggling and writhing. "I'll talk, I'll talk, I'll say anything..."
The weekly Internal Security Meeting was held as usual in the secure conference room of the Executive Committee compound. This was a joint working meeting of the Council of Elders' security agencies, attended by representatives from eight departments: the Political Security General Administration, the Arbitration Tribunal Investigation and Enforcement Bureau, the Army, the Navy, the Foreign Intelligence Bureau, the National Police, Customs, and the Cheka. The main purposes were for each department to exchange the past week's intelligence, share views on the current security situation, and report on upcoming work. When cooperation was needed, it was also coordinated here. When "major security issues" required discussion, representatives from the Executive Committee and the Council of Elders' Standing Committee would attend as well.
Today was such an occasion, so when the meeting adjourned, particularly many people emerged from the conference room.
Jiang Shan walked briskly out, mixed in with the crowd. Unlike the others who quietly discussed the meeting's contents, he greeted no one. He walked straight through and hurried toward Wu Mu, who was almost at the main gate.
"Comrade Wu Mu!" he called out in a low voice. "I'd like to speak with you."
Wu Mu blinked. The Foreign Intelligence Bureau and the Political Security General Administration had some overlap in their work, but their contacts were infrequent—let alone a direct request to "speak."
He immediately realized Jiang Shan wanted to discuss the Hao Yuan case.
This matter had already been classified as the Political Security General Administration's number-one case for investigation. At today's meeting, the introduction and discussion of this case had taken up more than half the time.
"I need to go back to my office to take care of something. Why don't you ride back with me in my carriage?"
The Foreign Intelligence Bureau headquarters compound was a good fifteen-minute walk from the Political Security General Administration headquarters compound, but Jiang Shan felt the trip would be worthwhile.
He nodded. After leaving the compound gate, he spoke quietly to his guard-secretary and sent them and his own carriage ahead. The two boarded Wu Mu's Dongfeng carriage together.
The carriage traveled along the cinder road. For a moment, neither spoke. Jiang Shan was well aware that the unremarkable-looking man beside him—with the air of a minor clerk who had spent ten years in an office—was the number-two figure of the Political Security General Administration and the highest-ranking head of that agency most Elders could come into contact with.
"Don't you have a certain feeling," Jiang Shan said slowly, "that Hao Yuan and Hale have some kind of connection?"
Wu Mu was cautiously silent for a moment, then said: "You mean, they both have certain characteristics that only transmigrators would have?"
"Yes." Jiang Shan nodded.
"But the autopsy report leans toward the judgment that Hao Yuan is a native of this time-space."
"Precisely because Hao Yuan is physiologically a native, yet his thinking is that of a transmigrator—that's why I say Hale and Hao Yuan have some kind of connection."
"You mean: Hao Yuan's thinking comes from Hale?"
"Exactly. Unless you believe in soul transmigration in our time-space."
"Your inference is quite reasonable. But even so, it doesn't fully prove that Hao Yuan ever had direct contact with Hale—bear in mind that Hale is in Manila, while Hao Yuan was a Chinese person."
"Hao Yuan was a Chinese person, but he wasn't a native of Hangzhou. According to intelligence, he only appeared in Hangzhou city after the summer of 1632. Based on information from interrogating prisoners: Hale visited the Chinese coast multiple times in 1631 during negotiations with the Zheng clan. That was when he could have first obtained firsthand intelligence about the mainland. If he learned about Zhao Yingong at that time, then whether he dispatched Hao Yuan from Manila or recruited him locally, the timing works."
"But there's no direct evidence."
"No, not yet. Hao Yuan is dead, but there are still prisoners." Jiang Shan said. "Mr. Lando has written a compilation of Hale's statements. If we can collect enough of Hao Yuan's statements and compare the two, we can determine where Hao Yuan's modern thinking came from and whether there's a teacher-student relationship between them."
Including Xihua, Jia Le, and several other captured Hangzhou natives, all had already been sent to Lingao and were currently held in the Political Security General Administration's secret prison undergoing interrogation.
Wu Mu fully understood his meaning: "You want to obtain those interrogation records and secret reports."
"Yes."
"Are you doing this for Mr. Lando's sake?"
"For our operations in Manila. I'm very concerned right now: our opponent may be an unprecedentedly formidable figure." Jiang Shan spoke solemnly. "Hao Yuan's emergence has shown me a dangerous signal."
Not cannons, not firearms, not reflector furnaces—from the fragments about Hale and Hao Yuan that had emerged in the meeting report, he realized that Hale was very possibly systematically transmitting his ideas. In his view, these ideas were far more dangerous than any technological innovations Hale was making in Manila. To the Council of Elders, no army, fleet, or empire in this time-space truly mattered. Even if Hale had three heads and six arms and could set up a new artillery factory and cast a few era-transcending cannons—so what? He would still be crushed all the same. But if that little spark was not extinguished in time, sooner or later it would become a conflagration that would consume the Council of Elders.
Therefore he was urgently eager to know whether Hao Yuan was indeed Hale's student—and to what extent they had disseminated these ideas.
"Very well," Wu Mu said. "Let us agree as follows: we will give you a copy of the Hao Yuan case file. I guarantee that all future interrogation and report materials related to this case will also be copied for the Intelligence Bureau. But how much is copied and what is copied must remain under our control. On the principle of reciprocity, you must also give us Lando's materials from Manila."
"OK."