Chapter 2527: Taking Office
Splash... Steam rose in white curtains through the large bathhouse, obscuring the naked bodies within while water sounds and voices mingled in a ceaseless murmur. This public bathhouse was newly built to serve East Gate Market's growing prosperity. No one had expected that the decontamination showers of the Port Purification Camp would evolve into a social fashion in Lingao.
Chen Wuren leaned against the tiled wall, his rough hands tracing the scars on his body one by one as hot water cascaded over him from the showerhead—as if he could wash away a lifetime of misfortune. He had lost his father in childhood and his mother when he came of age. Dependent on others from his earliest years, he had scraped by on the charity of his clan after relatives nearly swindled him out of the few mu of good farmland his family owned. Though destitute, he fancied himself a man of principle. When the eldest branch tried to "eat the extinct household"—seizing the property of a relative who had died without a male heir—he stood in their way. For his trouble, they framed him in a lawsuit. Then came further disaster: the Li family, under the pretext of reclaiming new sandbar flats to pay military rations, seized his remaining land outright. His ancestors shared a bloodline with the renowned Chen Zizhuang, though the connection had grown distant over generations. In desperation, he could only throw himself on the mercy of that famous Master Qiutao, hoping the shared surname might count for something.
But the doorman at the Chen residence drove him away like a beggar. He squatted near the compound for half a month, never once catching sight of Chen Zizhuang. Later he learned that both father and sons were away serving as officials. Then his youngest caught smallpox, and with no money for treatment, he could only watch helplessly as his son's body ulcerated and gave out. After that, he and his wife and daughter wandered the streets. When hunger grew desperate, he thought of selling them—but could never harden his heart to do it.
Then he encountered a group of strange men recruiting hands for land reclamation in Qiongzhou, promising food and shelter. He took his wife and daughter to follow them to Lingao. Starting as a farmhand, he learned to read under the Australians, later became a worker, and slowly rose through the ranks. Life improved day by day. Just when he thought the road ahead would finally be smooth, he succeeded the unlucky former manager of the Ice Cream Factory—and presided over the first large-scale collective food poisoning incident in Lingao under Senate rule.
After they imprisoned him, his heart turned to ash. He convinced himself that his fate had offended some malevolent star and that this was simply his destiny. When his wife brought their daughter to visit him in prison, he urged her to remarry and stop waiting.
That imprisonment lasted four years.
Reflecting on all this, Chen Wuren sighed deeply. The world was truly unpredictable. Just yesterday he had been a prisoner in the labor reform camp; now he had escaped that cage.
The Chief was surnamed Zhang—young, handsome, that was Chen Wuren's impression. In his office, Chief Zhang stood gazing out the window with his back turned. "Why do you think this disaster befell you?"
Chen Wuren thought for a long time. A thousand words crowded his mind with nowhere to begin. After struggling in silence, he finally managed: "It's just fate."
"What resignation!" Zhang Xiao shook his head and turned around. "Wuren, Wuren—'Five Benevolences.' You really do live up to your name. But there's a saying: mercy cannot command soldiers, and righteousness cannot manage wealth. Your downfall, my friend, lies in that very 'benevolence.' The Australian sages have a saying: 'Character determines destiny...'"
Chen Wuren lowered his head, listening quietly to the Australian wisdom from Zhang Xiao's lips, scarcely daring to breathe.
"Do you still have family?" Zhang Xiao asked.
"Replying to the Chief, this humble one's parents died early. I have no siblings. I persuaded my wife to remarry after my conviction. There is also a daughter—by my count, she should be fifteen now, of age to be betrothed."
"Do you know why I pulled you out?"
"I truly do not know!" Chen Wuren considered the ruler's will unfathomable and dared not speculate.
"Mn." Zhang Xiao nodded. "You're an old cadre of the Senate. Do you have any idea how many resources the Senate invests to train a cadre? These are times when we need every capable person. You should be taking on important work in an effective post, not wasting your years in there."
"This humble one has neither virtue nor ability and has failed the Senate's trust—" Chen Wuren answered hurriedly, voice heavy with self-reproach.
"Enough. You know the Senate's rules—no more 'Great Person' and 'Humble One.'" Zhang Xiao cut him off. "I'm giving you three days to handle personal affairs. Then you'll follow me north to Guangzhou. Whatever you need to arrange, see to it yourself." He placed a Delong note and an elaborately patterned boat ticket on the table.
"Your wife and child are waiting for you at home. Hurry back and see them."
Light kindled in Chen Wuren's eyes. In an instant, tears streamed down his face. He dropped to his knees with a thud, pressing his forehead to the floor. "Thank you, Chief, for this great mercy. I will live up to your trust—through fire and water without hesitation. Whatever direction you point, I will follow without question!"
"Stop washing already! Any more and you'll scrub your skin off!" The bathhouse attendant's impatient bark yanked him back to reality. The man was annoyed at how long he had been under the water, wasting the hot supply.
Blind Zhang's fortune-telling really was accurate, Chen Wuren thought. If only he knew where that old man was now—he would give him a generous red packet.
Three days later. Bopu Military Port. The pier swarmed with people seeing loved ones off.
As the steam whistle sounded—woo, woo—the Senate Special Ship Nemesis pulled slowly away from port. The buildings and figures on shore shrank steadily into the distance. Though Zhang Xiao had traveled to Guangzhou on business from time to time in recent years, this was his first long departure from Lingao. He glanced at his old comrades, workers, and students gathered behind him—then suddenly remembered something. He sprinted to the stern, cupped his hands around his mouth like a megaphone, and shouted:
"Comrades! The scale of the penicillin and streptomycin production lines is sufficient—focus on reducing contamination during fermentation! Sweet wormwood must be harvested in July for best results! Sulfonamide is a basic variety; concentrate on energy savings and consumption reduction to lower costs! For chemical engineering fundamentals, you must read BSL's Transport Phenomena! Our reaction engineering is still very weak—start with elementary reactions to get the reactor running! For electrochemistry, Bard is enough! John Newman's book is on the third shelf of my bookcase—read the starred chapters first!"
Halfway through, Zhang Xiao's nose stung and tears welled in his eyes. His voice caught in a sob, and for a moment he couldn't speak. Finally he managed: "Goodbye! Comrades—I'll miss you!"
Lin Motian, traveling with him, silently patted Zhang Xiao's shoulder and handed him a tissue. "I've always seen you calm, rational, vigorous. Didn't expect you to be a man of sentiment too."
"Carl Jung believed that everyone wears different personas, protecting both the self and society." Zhang Xiao's defense came out half-heartedly.
"Your team is really something." Lin Motian began to joke. "Look at who you've brought. Some fished out of labor camps, some disgraced over epidemic prevention failures, some who caused hospital accidents. Practically a Suicide Squad. If you raise the pirate flag and sail into the city singing the 'Song of Pests,' I expect every snake, insect, rat, and ant will flee..."
Zhang Xiao pulled two books from his backpack and spoke seriously. "Zheng Mingjiang and I once inspected various state-owned food factories. Man, Machine, Material, Method, Environment—the five factors. Compared horizontally, the Ice Cream Factory was actually decent. So why did accidents keep happening? The biggest risk point is always 'Man.' Chen Wuren's only real failure was lax supervision of subordinates. And Wu Shuyi, who handled quarantine in Guangzhou—do you have any idea how much cargo clears customs daily in the Number One City South of the Sky? Given our conditions, even you, Old Lin, would slip up eventually. Besides, Lei En personally recommended him. Can I refuse that face? There's no trash in the world—only misplaced resources. I'll say it plainly: these people are qualified within the Senate's cadre ranks."
Lin Motian nodded and glanced at the book titles in Zhang Xiao's hands: The Dictator's Handbook and Research on Mulberry Dike Fish Pond Agriculture in Xiqiao. "You're really going to promote Mulberry Dike Fish Ponds?"
Zhang Xiao explained, "The great tide of the world is inexorable—those who follow it prosper; those who resist it perish. The Mulberry Dike Fish Pond was an important agricultural form that developed in the Pearl River Delta during the late Ming. For us to accelerate this advanced production method is to ride with the tide of the times. We must not only pursue it—we must pursue it aggressively. I've also heard about Li Yao'er's work. Speaking privately between us: her experiment in Xiangshan does not bode well."
"Oh?" Lin Motian was skeptical. After all, Li Yao'er had trained in sericulture under Zhao Yingong in Hangzhou and possessed rich firsthand experience. Zhang Xiao worked neither in agriculture nor had he ever raised silkworms.
"I knew you wouldn't believe me." Zhang Xiao smiled. "What is our most precious asset? Not the Minié rifle, not the steam engine—it's four hundred years of historical experience. The great stock market casualty Isaac Newton once said: 'If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.' Innovation matters, certainly—but ignoring the wisdom of predecessors and working in isolation may prove counterproductive."
"You mean..."
"Precisely. The answer is right here." Zhang Xiao waved the book in his hand. This was a collection of materials he had copied from the Grand Library. Through his connections there, he had managed to take quite a few documents with him this time.
"What's the problem, then?"
"The emergence of any production system inevitably follows unique economic laws, and those laws depend on the interplay of labor, land, capital, policy, and other factors. Simply put: historically, the Mulberry Dike Fish Pond developed with Jiujiang, south of Xiqiao Mountain, as its first ring. The second ring expanded outward from Jiujiang to the surrounding areas of Xiqiao. The third ring, during the Daoguang reign, shifted the sericulture center southward to Rongqi and Guizhou in Shunde—still within Xiqiao's sphere. And even that expansion only broke the original pattern after more than a century of continuous stimulus from international silk trade, creating the fever of 'abandoning rice to plant mulberries, destroying fields to form ponds' across the Pearl River Delta. Jiancun Fort in Xiqiao, where Chen Qiyuan founded the Jichanglong Filature, was itself a newly opened area in that wave. According to land survey data from the Wanli reign, Nanhai County had 48,000 mu of taxed fish ponds while Xiangshan County had only 711 mu. For her to attempt this in Xiangshan is to abandon the root in pursuit of the branches—the objective conditions there are simply too poor."
(End of Chapter)