Chapter 208: Cotton Mill Inferno
“Mr. Nakamura, there’s a situation here!” a secret agent suddenly shouted in a low voice.
The sound rang out, the beam focusing on the warehouse corner.
A human figure with a black cloth bag over its head was suspended under the beam, with only its toes barely touching the ground, and a note was posted on the pillar beside it.
Nakamura cautiously approached, pistol aimed at the suspended figure, signaling his subordinates to stay alert around the area.
He tore off the note, which had a sentence written in Chinese: “The fate of a traitor.”
“Check that person.” Nakamura ordered.
A secret agent stepped forward, carefully lifting the corner of the cloth bag, shining a flashlight on it, then stepping back: “Mr. Nakamura, the person is still alive!”
The person inside the cloth bag heard the sound and immediately began to twist violently, emitting muffled whimpers.
“Who are you?” Nakamura pressed his pistol against the other’s head; this person shouldn’t be the Communist Party special commissioner Lü Yan mentioned in the intelligence.
The other shook his head like a rattle drum, continuously emitting whimpering sounds from his mouth.
Only then did Nakamura Yong notice that his mouth had long been stuffed with a rag; he reached out to pull out the rag from the other’s mouth and asked coldly: “Are you Lü Yan?”
“Taijun, Taijun, I’m one of your own,” the man hurriedly said: “My name is Wu Fu, my contact is Director Zuo Mingquan of the Nanjing Special Affairs Committee.”
“Zuo Mingquan?” Nakamura seemed to remember something: “You’re the needle that Zuo Mingquan planted inside the Communist Party.”
“Who tied you here?”
Wu Fu said with a bitter face: “I don’t know; that person knocked me out from behind, and when I woke up, I was tied here.”
“Cut the rope and let him down.” Nakamura instructed the secret agent beside him, while he himself alertly scanned the surroundings.
For someone who dealt with intelligence work year-round, all of this was too obvious, like it had been deliberately arranged.
At the instant the rope was cut, Nakamura suddenly noticed an unnatural bulge on the ground, and the textile waste piled around it was too neatly arranged, as if carefully sorted by someone; could it be
“Bad, retreat, it’s a trap!” Nakamura suddenly roared.
The words came out, but it was already too late.
A hundred meters away, Lin Xueli observed through the reflection in the warehouse glass window that the Japanese secret agents had all entered the predetermined area, and calmly pressed down the detonator.
The first explosion was not intense but precisely destroyed the warehouse’s main exit.
Chaos erupted inside the warehouse as the secret agents panicked and rushed toward the only remaining side door.
“Stay calm! Be careful, there might be a bomb at the door; find cover first!” Nakamura Yong shouted orders while dragging the just-rescued Wu Fu to hide behind machine wreckage.
At that moment, a neat sound of footsteps came from outside.
The action team led by Zuo Mingquan had been outside the warehouse; hearing the explosion inside, they hurriedly rushed in.
Flashlight beams flashed chaotically; Zuo Mingquan held a flashlight in his left hand and a gun in his right, firing two shots into the air at the door.
While rushing inside, he shouted loudly: “Nobody move, we’re from the Nanjing Special Affairs Committee; you’ve been surrounded.”
Nakamura Yong shouted loudly from behind the machine: “Director Zuo, I’m Nakamura Yong from the Special Higher Police Affairs; be careful, there are explosives at the door.”
“Explosives?” Zuo Mingquan jolted at the words and immediately shone his flashlight on the ground.
Sure enough, at the door position, two wires extended far into the distance, unknown where the other end was.
“There’s, there’s a bomb,” Zuo Mingquan broke out in cold sweat, hurriedly shouting: “Retreat, retreat, get out quickly.”
No sooner had the words fallen than the explosives at the door detonated violently, boom boom boom, three blasts rang out, and the side door instantly collapsed.
Now both front and back doors were blocked; they wanted to leave but couldn’t.
“All the fish are in the net.” On the third floor of a building next to the abandoned warehouse, Lin Xueli observed through binoculars, his stern face expressionless.
Sun Yong nodded, hand on the main detonator: “Nakamura brought six, Zuo Mingquan at least fifteen; today we’ll give them a chest of roasted chestnuts, heh, wipe them all out.”
With that, Sun Yong was about to press the detonator in his hand, but Lin Xueli raised his hand to stop him. “Wait a bit longer, let them go deeper.”
Inside the warehouse, Zuo Mingquan had joined Nakamura Yong; the two groups huddled together in panic.
“Baka! It’s a trap!” Nakamura roared angrily at Zuo Mingquan.
“What’s the use of saying that now! How do we get out?” Zuo Mingquan roared back, while kicking Wu Fu: “It’s all this waste’s fault!”
Wu Fu shrank trembling on the ground, quivering.
“Director Zuo, are you familiar with the terrain here? Besides the front and back doors, is there any other way out?”
Nakamura Yong quickly calmed down.
Zuo Mingquan frowned and thought: “All the ground floor doors and windows are sealed; we can only try to climb out through the second floor windows.”
Nakamura Yong nodded: “Then we’ll go from the second floor; where are the stairs?”
Zuo Mingquan pointed toward the northwest of the warehouse: “Should be around there.”
The group gathered together, assuming defensive postures, and slowly moved toward the stairs using the flashlight beams.
Little did they know, it was these flashlight beams that completely exposed their positions to Lin Xueli’s gaze.
“Prepare,” Lin Xueli raised his right hand, carefully calculating their distance from the explosion points.
The two had spent two full days and nights without sleep to deliver this big gift to the Special Higher Police Affairs and Nanjing Special Affairs Committee people.
From installing the explosives to laying the wires, both had done it personally, so Lin Xueli knew exactly what they would experience next.
“Press.” With the order given, Sun Yong heavily pressed the main detonator.
“Boom, boom, boom.” Deafening explosions rang out one after another; support pillars snapped, the roof began to collapse, flames erupting from all directions.
The massive shockwave hurled bodies into the air like dolls, thick smoke quickly engulfing the entire space.
“Well done.” Lin Xueli admired the abandoned warehouse billowing with thick smoke.
“Team Leader, time to withdraw.” Sun Yong yanked out the wires connected to the detonator, took out a package, put the three detonators— one large and two small—inside, then skillfully slung it on his back.
These things weren’t easy to get; throwing them away after one use would be too wasteful.
“Same old rules: after leaving, you go east, I go west; any messages through the dead letter box.”
“Got it, Team Leader.” Sun Yong smiled and replied.
The two quickly descended from the iron stairs on the other side of the house, which was exactly the back of the exploded warehouse.
The people Zuo Mingquan brought heard the explosions inside and were already rushing in yelling from the door.
What they didn’t notice was that on the side of the abandoned warehouse, against the perimeter wall, two figures quickly found a spot with a hanging rope ladder, then easily scaled the wall and vanished into the vast night.
Several dozen minutes later, on the street outside the warehouse, the sirens of the French Concession police station approached from far to near.
By the time Nantian Yangzi from the Special Higher Police Affairs and others, along with Director Chen Yang of the Special Affairs Office, arrived at the Da Rong Cotton Mill, it had long been engulfed in flames.
The next day, Special Higher Police Affairs Commander’s Office.
“Section Chief Chen, don’t you owe us an explanation?” Matsui Koji angrily said to Chen Yang beside him: “If it weren’t for your Special Affairs Committee passing on wrong intelligence, how could we lose six good agents?”
“Do you know how much it costs us to train one agent?”
“Cost? What right do you have to talk to me about cost?” Chen Yang glanced sideways at Matsui Koji: “I haven’t even started on you.”
“You jinx; all our Special Affairs Committee brothers dying is your fault.”
“We handed the intelligence to you, and you didn’t even do basic screening before starting to plan the action.”
“Director Zuo is still lying in the hospital to assist you with the capture plan.”
“The doctor said his injuries this time are very serious; he won’t be out of bed for three months.”
“With Director Zuo injured, who handles all our Special Affairs Committee matters? You gonna do it?”
Matsui Koji said bluntly: “Zuo Mingquan deserves to be injured.”
“If he hadn’t found some inside contact, the Empire’s six warriors wouldn’t have sacrificed in vain.”
“This mess was caused by your Special Affairs Committee; you must take primary responsibility.”
“Section Chief Matsui, I advise you to think before you speak.” Chen Yang retorted sarcastically: “True, the intelligence came from us, but the final decision was yours, not ours.”
“When Director Zuo provided intelligence to help you catch Xue Lian and Old Zhong, why didn’t you jump out saying we should take the blame?”
“You take the credit, we take the blame; what do you take our Special Affairs Committee for?”
“It’s clearly your incompetence that caused us heavy losses, and now you turn around to blame us?”
“Section Chief Matsui, if you’re no good, practice more; our Special Affairs Committee has only so few people, can’t carry such a big black pot.”
“Baka, you’re insulting me,” Matsui Koji spat roughly: “I challenge you to a duel.”
Chen Yang sneered: “Duel? Sure, but don’t go crying to your daddy when you lose.”
“Bang.” General Doihara behind the desk could no longer hold back seeing the two getting more and more outrageous.
“Do you two think I’m dead?”
“What is this place? You two think you can shout about fighting and killing here?”
As soon as General Doihara got angry, the two immediately fell silent.
“Matsui-kun, you go down first and write a report on this action’s process to hand in.”
“Hai.” Matsui Koji bowed slightly and unwillingly exited the office.
General Doihara’s expression softened slightly toward Chen Yang: “Section Chief Chen, strictly speaking, the failure of this action shouldn’t be blamed on you.”
“After all, you were just following orders to assist.”
Chen Yang bowed slightly: “Thank you, General Doihara, for your understanding.”
“Understanding is understanding, but the responsibility you should bear can’t be shirked.” General Doihara said gravely: “The intelligence came through your hands after all; you can’t just stay out of it when something goes wrong.”
“Section Chief Chen, there’s still one way to make amends now: Old Zhong and Xue Lian are still in our hands.”
Chen Yang’s expression showed slight surprise: “General Doihara, what are you saying?”
