Chapter Three Hundred and Sixty-Five: Everyone Must Pass the Test

Wu Mu saw his chance, walked to the front of the stage, and said loudly, “‘Good people shouldn’t be so miserable.’ Are you good people? Are your families good people?”

The crowd fell silent. Wu Mu knew that everyone was deep in thought and quickly seized the opportunity to use the Socratic method: “The world of the Ming Dynasty is just like this, where right and wrong are reversed, and black and white are indistinguishable. Good people suffer injustice, and it’s not even easy to live a stable life. Which one of you doesn’t have a story of blood and tears? Think about it, why is this so?!”

The trainees below didn’t know why the supreme Chief Wu suddenly jumped out to ask this question. They hesitated and dared not speak.

At this moment, someone whispered, “The officials are too bad—”

“The officials are bad because the common people are too easy to bully!” Wu Mu said loudly. “Just like in the play, if the villagers had resolutely rejected the ‘amnesty,’ defended their own village, and not betrayed their own leaders, would they have ended up like this?”

The crowd began to understand. Someone shouted, “No!” and immediately others echoed, “Even if we fight to the death, it’s better than being bullied to death like this. We can’t die so disgracefully!”

“But the government’s power is great. If they are defeated once, they will mobilize a large army again. The common people are weak and will always be defeated—”

Just as Wu Mu was about to continue his enlightenment, a sharp, crisp voice suddenly interjected, “As long as we follow the chiefs, we are not afraid of anything!”

Wu Mu was overjoyed. Who was so cooperative? It was Ke Yun. As soon as she spoke, the other members of the ten-person group also began to shout:

“It’s not wrong to follow the chiefs!”

“With the chiefs here, we are not afraid of the government or the Tartars!”

“The chiefs are the great benefactors of our common people! Even if it costs me my life, I will not hesitate!”

…

The other trainees were infected by this atmosphere and also began to shout. For a time, the atmosphere was very enthusiastic. Wu Mu struck while the iron was hot and announced that each student team would hold a themed class meeting that evening to have an in-depth discussion on this topic.

After the trainees dispersed, Wu Mu’s excitement had not yet dissipated—who wrote this play? Although it had a strong smell of political preaching, it was really useful for educating the still very innocent masses in this time and space!

He went backstage. There were several large boxes backstage, with the puppets neatly arranged in rows. The costumes and wigs were hanging on a rope, and the various props were dazzling and exquisitely made, a bit like static scale models.

The actors were packing up their things. Seeing a chief coming, the actors all stopped what they were doing and stood respectfully to one side. The director of the troupe, named Tian Mao, hurried to greet him. Tian Mao was a poor scholar—so-called scholar meant that he had studied in a private school for a few years and made a living by writing letters for others before coming to Lingao. Although most of the actors in the puppet troupe were from Lingao, they were all from peasant backgrounds and illiterate. Ding Ding appointed Tian Mao as the director. This Tian Mao was also very eager to please. He was very diligent in learning Mandarin, learning to write plays, and managing the troupe. His greatest achievement was teaching the actors, who could only speak the local dialect of Lingao, to speak Mandarin that was roughly understandable in less than three months.

This made Ding Ding look at his ability with new eyes. It should be known that if the troupe could not pass the language barrier, the propaganda effect would be greatly reduced. So he valued him more and more. Moreover, Tian Mao was one of the few natives in the propaganda department who could understand the spirit of “propaganda.” In the Propaganda and Culture Department, he and Ji Denggao were the two native cadres that Ding Ding relied on most.

“What are the chief’s instructions?” Tian Mao’s attitude was very respectful.

“The performance was excellent!” Wu Mu praised him repeatedly. Tian Mao humbly said that this was just a small achievement made under the correct guidance of the Executive Committee and the Senate, under the wise leadership of Chief Ding, and with the support of Chief Wu, and it was not worth mentioning.

“What’s the name of this play?” Wu Mu asked.

“It doesn’t have an official name yet. It’s temporarily called ‘Greenstone Village’,” Tian Mao said. “The play was rehearsed in a hurry these few days, and it’s very rough.”

It turned out that this play was a new play recently rehearsed by the puppet troupe. However, at the request of Zhao Manxiong, Ding Ding had made a rush adaptation of the script, adding a lot of content that was not originally there. The originally not-so-sharp anti-court tendency was deliberately highlighted in this play. Zhao Manxiongski believed that there was no need to be evasive on this issue with the “sword and shield of the Transmigrator Group.” A lack of clear purpose would only make the staff feel at a loss.

“This name lacks boldness. I think we should call it ‘The Test’!” Wu Mu waved his hand with passion. “The revolutionary tide is mighty. Those who cannot stand the test will be eliminated.”

Thus, “The Test,” one of the “twelve classic works” that would be performed for a long time in the future transmigrator country and adapted into countless different art forms, was born.

Subsequently, he secretly met with the members of the ten-person groups one by one, affirmed and praised their performance, and at the same time gave instructions on how to hold the class meeting in the evening: “Get the atmosphere going and expose the cowards.”

When he met with Ke Yun, Wu Mu highly praised Ke Yun’s timely response.

“You react quickly and have a good grasp of everyone’s emotions,” Wu Mu looked at the thin and small girl. “I will give you a good evaluation.”

“Thank you, chief,” Ke Yun stood up straight. “Everything I said came from the bottom of my heart.” She said very seriously, “I will go wherever the chief goes, and I will do whatever the chief wants me to do!”

Wu Mu was not psychologically prepared for such a fanatic. He was startled by her fanatical eyes.

“You are willing to do anything?” Wu Mu suddenly had a malicious thought. It was not suitable for a girl to say “I can do whatever you want me to do.” He looked the girl up and down for a while—she was really too thin and small.

“Yes!” Ke Yun answered without hesitation.

“You can go first.”

That evening, a major discussion on “The Test” was held. In each themed class meeting, everyone spoke freely. Under the encouragement of the ten-person groups and Wu Mu’s patient guidance, the trainees expressed their determination to resolutely follow the Transmigrator Group and protect the transmigrator country, and stated that they would wage the “most cruel and merciless struggle” against “all enemies.”

Zhao Manxiongski did not specify the method of study, but he indicated that Wu Mu could do it freely. Wu Mu instructed that one hour should be set aside for political study every evening to ensure that “everyone passes the test.”

For a time, all the political security training classes—according to Zhao Manxiongski’s instructions, all training units within the political security system used the names “training class” or “training course,” not “study class,” which was for the unreliable elements of the empire—whether it was the “short-term training class” established by Zhao Manxiong after he came to power, or the “non-commissioned officer student training class” left over from Ran Yao’s time, all launched an ideological and political movement of “swearing to defend the Transmigrator Group to the death and deeply digging out cowardly and surrendering thoughts.” All trainees had to write their thoughts after watching “The Test” and read them out in the class meeting.

Each thought had to be read out in the class meeting and then discussed by the whole class. If the discussion did not pass, it was not over—it was sent back to be rewritten. Finally, all the manuscripts had to be sent to Wu Mu’s desk, and he had to pass them one by one.

At first, Lu Cheng didn’t know how to write her thoughts, but Chief Wu came to the class meeting to guide them: write whatever you think of after watching it! So she wrote down all the experiences of her family before coming to Lingao that she could think of.

The class meeting for reading out thoughts actually became a “grievance meeting.” Every time in the class meeting, someone would cry, and one person crying would make the whole team cry. It caused the other students in the Fangcaodi Education Park to wonder: did some important person in the political security class die? Everyone was in mourning.

“These few thoughts are too superficial. They only know to go and punish the rich and officials who have harmed them. Their thinking is too backward!” Wu Mu sternly threw a few thoughts into the middle of the table at the meeting of the student team leaders. “Is there no concept of the overall situation?”

The student team leaders were all silent.

“We must make everyone realize that their painful experiences are not because someone did something bad, but we must dig out the root—why can this rich man do bad things? Because he has money? Then why does he have money?” Wu Mu patiently guided the student team leaders.

…

After the student team leaders left, Wu Mu wiped the sweat from his forehead, “This job is really not easy. I’m not from a political work background—”

But in this frenzy, Wu Mu became more and more proficient. He followed Zhao Manxiongski’s instructions and continuously amplified the trainees’ sense of fear and hatred, from hatred of individuals to hatred of the Ming government and the entire old social system.

One day, he had a sudden idea and called the Great Library, asking to speak to the history advisory group.

“I would like you to compile a book on the history of the Ming Dynasty,” Wu Mu said on the phone.

He asked the history advisors of the Great Library to compile “A Record of the Atrocities of the Usurping Ming,” to collect all the historical materials from historical events hundreds of years ago, such as the drowning of the Little Prince of Ming, to the recent various natural and man-made disasters, and then to describe them with embellishments.

“I don’t want historical materials,” Wu Mu said to Yu E’shui. “I want propaganda materials based on historical materials—they must be able to arouse disgust, terror, and hatred at a glance, so the details don’t matter, and embellishments are fine.” Then he added, “It would be best if it could be done in three or four days.”

“The workload is too large to collect everything. It’s too late according to your schedule,” Yu E’shui said after hearing this. “Let’s make a selection first, and we can add to it gradually in the future.”

“I want those that are particularly outrageous, as well as all kinds of life scandals, of the emperor, of the ministers, all of them!”

“Alright, alright, I know what you mean. You just want a black material book of the Ming court.”

“That’s exactly what I mean.”

“Wait a week,” Yu E’shui said after hanging up the phone. He commented, “It’s a pity that this person didn’t go to the Propaganda and Culture Department.”