Chapter 130: Consolidating Villages and Settlements

“Is it him?”

“It is,” the laborer whispered.

“Carry this body into the village and throw it on the threshing ground,” he commanded. “Let everyone see the fate of a traitor!”

Under the fearful gazes of the villagers, the Fubo Army marched into the village and immediately began to dismantle the liaison’s house. In less than fifteen minutes, the entire house was razed to the ground. Everything dismantled was carried outside the village and put to the torch, leaving only a single, exceptionally thick bamboo pole that had served as the main beam.

The soldiers brought in an ox, hitched to an iron plow, and deeply turned the earth on the now-barren homestead. Then, a sack of sea salt was poured into the furrows and buried.

Finally, the bamboo pole was erected on the homestead, and the body of the liaison who had betrayed the work team was hung from it.

“It is not to be taken down until it becomes bones!” Lin Shenhe commanded.

A new work team was dispatched from Danzhou. Lin Shenhe temporarily served as its leader. Soon after, Liu Yixiao and Yu Zhiqian also arrived in Zhaopu Village with the work team. For a time, the center of power in Danzhou shifted to this desolate little hamlet.

Liu Yixiao expressed his concern, “Is it appropriate for you to be here too?”

“It’s not like there are no other Transmigrators in Danzhou city,” Yu Zhiqian said. “I also need to inspect the battlefield. Besides, with such a major incident, if the leadership isn’t seen on the front lines, what will the Senate think?”

The entire village then underwent a large-scale cleanup and rectification. The new work team no longer talked about developing the mountainsides or cultivating cash crops; even the original conscription work was halted.

Both Lin Shenhe and Liu Yixiao suspected there were other individuals in the village with ties to the bandits. Furthermore, Liu Yixiao believed it was impossible for the villagers to be completely ignorant of which bandit gang had come.

These issues had to be thoroughly investigated. They couldn’t peacefully proceed with construction until the dangerous roots were dug out.

Under the supervision of the soldiers, the village men erected a bamboo fence around the settlement, dug a trench, and built a watchtower. Villagers had to get permission from the work team’s resident personnel to leave for work. The village began to register its permanent population and establish a household registration system.

Several work team members with blue collar tabs began to conduct “back-to-back” individual interviews with the villagers. From the eighty-year-olds down to the eight-year-olds, everyone was spoken to, and every person was scrutinized.

This investigation turned every person’s history inside out. Eventually, someone confessed that a villager named Chen Lianjian had secret ties to the bandits.

This man had been a bandit for many years before returning to farming after an injury left him with a lame leg. He had a wife and several daughters at home. Without strong labor, his family lived a hand-to-mouth existence.

Chen Lianjian admitted that he had indeed been a bandit, but he was not part of the gang that had attacked.

“They are Hu Lanyan’s men! They have nothing to do with me, and I absolutely did not lure them here!” Chen Lianjian repeatedly proclaimed his innocence. “Hu Lanyan’s gang came from Lingao!”

Chen Lianjian knew little about Hu Lanyan’s gang, only that they had come from Lingao last year, had many men, and had become the largest bandit force in the area upon their arrival in Danzhou.

Lin Shenhe slammed his hand on the table. “Tell me everything you know about the local bandits, and be honest!”

Chen Lianjian was illiterate and had only been a low-ranking member of his former gang. He didn’t know much of substance, but he still provided a good deal of information, including the names, sizes, and methods of operation of local bandit gangs, as well as their slang. Lin Shenhe realized this man was quite useful to them. If handed over to professional interrogators, he could yield even more “material.”

“Men, take him away and lock him up separately,” Lin Shenhe instructed. “Guard him well!”

“Yes, sir!” The guard was about to leave when Lin Shenhe called him back. “And arrest his wife and daughters and hold them in separate custody too!”

“This humble one is already a cripple! I can no longer live that life and dare not have such ambitions again! Please, Your Excellency, see the truth!” Chen Lianjian pleaded tearfully. He thought the Australians would likely make an example of him and his family, treating them the same way as the liaison.

“Should we kill a few people to establish our authority?” Lin Shenhe asked Liu Yixiao. “We could kill the former bandit, Chen Lianjian.”

Liu Yixiao shook his head. “It’s not appropriate. Chen Lianjian wasn’t involved in the attack on the work team. The vast majority of the villagers were neither perpetrators nor accomplices; at most, they failed to act righteously. Killing people under these circumstances would be unjust.”

“It’s a real shame not to kill a few,” Yu Zhiqian said, greatly disappointed. “This won’t intimidate the locals!”

“The common people have lived in hardship for a long time; it’s inevitable that their thinking is numb and ignorant. They only know how to protect themselves,” said Fang Jinghan, who was in charge of the political investigation and social survey. “This is a typical submissive mindset. They’ll accept anyone who comes to rule—as long as they are given a way to live. They are dirt poor anyway and have nothing to lose.”

“I still think we should kill a batch of them,” Yu Zhiqian said, feeling very unwilling to let the villagers off so easily. “Without killing people, we cannot establish our authority in Danzhou! It will seriously affect the security of the region!”

Liu Yixiao firmly objected. “The indiscriminate killing of innocents is a meaningless act! These villagers are detestable, but there is no reason they must be killed. Senseless killing only exposes our own inner weakness.”

Although Liu Yixiao was resolutely against massacring the village or killing people, he was still unsure how to handle the matter.

The report he submitted to Lingao about the Zhaopu Village incident caused a huge uproar in the Senate. The news from Liu Muzhou was not good. The Transmigrators were extremely dissatisfied with his work. It was very likely that his position as the leader of the Danzhou work team would be revoked.

Once that position was gone, his hopes of becoming the first county magistrate of Danzhou would be completely dashed. Moreover, this political stain would be very difficult to wash away. He was both dejected and anxious. His only option was to try to earn as many points as possible in the subsequent handling of the affair.

If he was too lenient with the local villagers, it would inevitably provoke greater dissatisfaction in the Senate—according to his communication with Liu Muzhou, some Transmigrators were even demanding the village be massacred.

But being too cruel would likewise be met with disgust from another faction of Transmigrators. He found it very difficult to strike the right balance between leniency and severity.

After much deliberation, it was Fang Jinghan who proposed a “collective punishment” plan.

The plan was to confiscate all the property of the Zhaopu villagers as punishment for the annihilation of the work team.

“Hah, what property do they have?”

“The land here, though not much, is property.”

“Alright, but what do we want with this land?” Danzhou had no shortage of land; what it lacked was people.

“The focus is not on the land. By depriving them of their land, we also deprive them of the resources to continue living here,” Fang Jinghan said. “All the labor in the village will become a population under our direct control. If you like, you could even call them ‘state-owned slaves’.”

“Similar to how the immigrants are indentured servants…”

“Exactly. Move the entire village, relocate them to a place with better conditions to consolidate villages and settlements, and turn the villagers into our direct population. Make it the first commune in Danzhou!”

“A commune of about thirty households? That’s too small.”

“We can consolidate villages and settlements. We’ll gradually relocate and merge these small villages. This will make it easier to manage and control the population and also facilitate development.”

After the population was relocated, the original location could be completely abandoned. It had little development value anyway. If they needed to develop the mountain resources in the future, they could always bring in new immigrants.

As for the relocated villagers, Fang Jinghan suggested putting them to use immediately. First, all able-bodied men between the ages of 18 and 25 would be conscripted into the army.

“The army is a great melting pot,” Fang Jinghan said. “Let them be fed some of Wei Aiwen’s ‘rice soup’ in the army’s great melting pot, march in formation for three years to instill discipline, and they’ll come back as qualified ‘new people.’ For adults, only such compulsory measures will work.”

All children under 18 would be sent to Lingao for compulsory education. The younger ones would attend the national school, and the older ones would go to apprentice training classes. The remaining people would be used as laborers. No manpower would be wasted.

“Let’s proceed with this line of thinking,” Liu Yixiao said, nodding in agreement with the plan. “We’re short on people for road construction right now. After this group is moved to their new location, they’ll start by building roads for three months.”

“Let’s have them build the commune first,” Yu Zhiqian quickly added. “I think the foundation of the Zhonghe Guard Post city is good. There are many empty houses, enough to accommodate the immigrants. Let’s make the Zhonghe Guard Post the site of the first commune in Danzhou.”

The following week, more work team members and a second infantry company were dispatched from Danzhou. The village was tightly surrounded by soldiers. Then, the work team entered the village in batches and ordered each household to pack their belongings and prepare for relocation.

The villagers were very poor. Their only possessions worth mentioning were a few rags, some farming tools, and the most basic daily necessities. The best-off families had an ox.

“You don’t need to bring anything except your clothes, personal valuables, and livestock!” the native work team members shouted continuously through megaphones. “There will be everything you need in the new village. You’ll be supplied with food and drink on the way!”

By the Transmigration group’s standards, apart from themselves and their livestock, the villagers possessed nothing that the Transmigrators would consider valuable property. The local farming tools were of such poor quality that they were better off being melted down for scrap. Even their most precious iron pots were considered a waste of iron by the Transmigrators. Not to mention the hygiene issues with their utensils. All things considered, everyone agreed that a comprehensive supply system would be less trouble.

The items left behind in the village were inspected. Usable materials—ironware, metal objects, cotton and linen textiles, etc.—were disinfected and recycled. Anything without value was destroyed on the spot. This included the houses, which were all demolished to completely extinguish any thoughts the immigrants might have of returning.

The only thing left in the village was the severely decomposed body hanging from the bamboo pole, swarming with flies.

As the people set off with their belongings on their backs, the demolition work in the village had already begun. The rumbling collapse of the houses and the rising dust brought expressions of sorrow and bewilderment to the faces of the immigrants.