Chapter 1068 Subsequent Impact
In the early summer of the seventh year of Chongzhen's reign, a strange thing happened in Hangzhou. According to rumors, the first person to discover the situation was the family of Zhejiang Dusi Commander Yu Pingfeng, because Mr. Yu did not come home from work on time as usual that day. If he had any entertainment, he did not tell his family in advance. greet. The housekeeper sent someone to Dusi Yamen to ask, and he said that Mr. Yu left at noon and never came back. After further inquiring, it was said that someone from Jinyiwei came at noon and took Yu Pingfeng out of Dusi Yamen.
People in the Yu family also knew that Yu Pingfeng was familiar with Liao Xun of Jinyiwei. They immediately went to the Jinyiwei Yamen to ask for news, but the answer they received was that Liao Baihu had not been to the Yamen at all that whole day. However, many of the affairs that Jinyiwei is responsible for need to be handled in the field, and they often miss the Yamen for a day or two, so no one is surprised by this. Moreover, Liao Xun took more than a dozen people out of the city to perform a secret mission the night before, and he did not mention to the people in the Yamen when he would come back.
Although Liao Xun was not found in the Yamen, the Yu family did not give up. They turned around and went to the Liao Mansion. However, after taking pictures for a long time, no one answered the door, and it seemed like an empty house. The Yu family had no choice but to continue to guard Liao's house while sending people to ask for help. Yu Pingfeng's brother-in-law was a captain in the garrison in the city. After hearing the news, he rushed over and ordered people to climb over the wall and enter Liao's house. However, they found that the house was completely empty, and there was really no one alive.
Now the people in the Yu family knew that something serious was going on, and they quickly sent someone to report it to the officials. Yu Pingfeng's close friend Guo Zheng was a member of the Procuratorate, so the Yu family specially sent people to the Guo Mansion to ask Guo Zheng to come forward so that people could be sent to investigate the disappearance of Yu Pingfeng and Liao Xun as soon as possible. Unexpectedly, Guo Zheng was not in the mansion either. He usually had a lot of social activities, so his family thought he was away on business and didn't notice anything was wrong. It wasn't until they heard that the other two people had disappeared that they quickly sent someone to the Yamen. When asked, it turned out that Guo Zheng, like Yu Pingfeng, was picked up by the Jin Yiwei people that afternoon, and before leaving, he also did not explain his whereabouts to his colleagues.
The last whereabouts of Yu Pingfeng and Guo Zheng seemed to be inseparable from Liao Xun. However, since Liao Xun's entire family had disappeared, it was not possible to find the person involved for confirmation. Within one day, three imperial officials disappeared without any reason, and they disappeared in such strange and unexplainable circumstances. This was a situation that had never happened in Hangzhou. Of course, the most bizarre thing among them is the disappearance of Liao Xun, because almost at the same time, more than ten members of his family and more than a dozen of his subordinates who followed him out of the city disappeared at the same time.
It was already night when the situation was discovered, and the city gates in Hangzhou were closed, so there was no need to apply for a city closure ban. At that moment, the city defense troops and police officers in the city were mobilized to search everywhere in the city, hoping to find some clues. Of course, there was no actual gain from this night's toil. These twenty or so people just disappeared into the air without leaving any traces.
After dawn, the search scope expanded to the outside of the city, and card checks began to be set up on the main roads entering and exiting Hangzhou. Officials and soldiers began to appear even on various rivers and lakes, and all water and land transportation routes began to be controlled.
It has to be said that the response of the Hangzhou government is relatively quick and the measures taken are on the right track. If the missing person is still near Hangzhou City, there will indeed be a greater chance of finding his whereabouts through these measures. However, all the missing persons, including three court officials, were not found alive or dead. The government mobilized thousands of people to search within a thirty-mile radius of Hangzhou for several days, but still no trace of them was found. .
At the same time, a fire incident outside Fengshan Gate in the south of the city attracted much less attention. At midnight on the night when Liao Xun and others disappeared, a fire suddenly broke out in a store outside the city. Probably because there were too many flammable items stored in the store recently, the fire quickly got out of control and completely burned the entire courtyard. , and no one in the inn escaped from the fire, perhaps because they were sleeping. When people were cleaning up the ruins the next day, nine corpses were found among them. Judging from the location and appearance of the room, the shopkeeper Wan Mou should also be among them, and the rest may be shopkeepers and people living here. guest.
The Procuratorate of Punishment, Jinyiwei, Hangzhou Government Office, and Qiantang County Government Office all specially sent people to carefully check and examine the remains of the deceased to determine whether any of the victims included the officials the government was looking for. . However, the results of the joint inspection by several police officers made them very disappointed. There was no target person they were looking for among these corpses, and the corpse itself was not suspicious. The autopsy results confirmed that these people did die in the fire. There were no signs of trauma other than burns. The detectives found no obvious signs of arson in the fire scene, and everything showed that this seemed to be just an accident.
Since the government's main focus was on locating the three missing officials, although several people died in the burning store, it did not attract much attention. Although there is uncertain information that Liao Xun seemed to have appeared near the fire site on the day of his disappearance, investigators have difficulty in linking the two incidents together due to a lack of evidence. Because at almost the same time, the government received sighting information that the missing officials seemed to have appeared in other places, and every piece of such information must be followed up and verified, so it was quickly completed here investigation work and leave the remaining cleanup matters to the neighbors.
Of course Wan Fa was not burned to death in Chengfengxing. That night when Chengfengxing burst into flames, he was already on the boat to Zhoushan Island. At this time, traveling to Zhoushan with him on the same boat were three Ming officials who were captured. According to the instructions sent by Zhoushan Island, Gong Shiqi did not execute them on the spot, but used Liao Xun's men as scapegoats to burn all the possible loopholes in Cheng Fengxing.
Gong Shiqi did not return to Zhoushan with the ship. He stayed in Hangzhou and continued his activities. Taking advantage of his position in the dark, he continued to spread various false news throughout Hangzhou to disrupt the government's investigation of the disappearance of officials. Since the missing persons are currently under the control of Haihan, it is not difficult for Gong Qiqi to fabricate some decent fake news, which will easily put all the government investigators into a state of exhaustion.
Under the influence of many disturbing news, Gong Shiqi was convinced that it would be difficult for the Hangzhou government to find out the true whereabouts of these three people in a short period of time. Cheng Fenghang had been burned into ruins, and all relevant evidence had also been destroyed. The flying ashes were annihilated. Even if someone familiar with the situation of these three people would suspect that Haihan was involved in this matter, without any evidence, it would be difficult to substantiate this speculation and send people to Zhoushan, four hundred miles away, to conduct a search. , this is an even more impossible task. Therefore, at the current stage of development of this matter, it is almost certain that no decent investigation results will be obtained.
Fortunately, Gong Shiqi had bought a house in Hangzhou in advance. Although Chengfengxing was gone, there was a new stronghold in the city. He could still sit in Hangzhou with peace of mind and handle the subsequent cleanup matters.
The person responsible for escorting the prisoners back to Sanya was naturally Gao Qiaonan. He led the people from the special operations battalion to evacuate Hangzhou first. As a supporting role in this operation, Takahashi Minami was only responsible for commanding the final stage of the operation in the city. He captured Liao Xun's family almost effortlessly and transported them in batches to outside the city for shipment. He was relatively busy. Gong Shiqi is a little more relaxed. However, this operation also allowed Takahashi Nan to see the strength of the field team of the Ministry of Security. The Ministry of Security is indeed better than the military in carrying out such special tasks in non-Haihan controlled areas.
Moreover, Gong Qiaoqiao was almost responsible for formulating and adjusting the action plan during his stay in Hangzhou, which also gave Gao Qiaonan a new understanding of his personal abilities. When the joint action team first arrived in Hangzhou, they could hardly think of an effective way to complete the task, and they were almost exposed when Jin Yiwei came to the door. However, Gong Shiqi cleverly took advantage of what seemed to be a very dangerous situation and used his strength to fight. , all three targets were captured alive in two days and one night, and all traces were wiped clean. Apart from the loss of one storehouse, our side did not suffer any losses in terms of personnel. The completion of the mission was already terrible. Called perfect. The boat Gao Qiaonan took did not make any stops along the way. It went straight out of Hangzhou Bay along the Qiantang River and sailed eastward to Zhoushan. It only took a day and a half to sail to Zhoushan Dinghai Port. Hao Wanqing and Qian Tiandun, who had learned the news in advance through the radio, also came to the dock in person to greet the victorious team.
"Are these our three guests?" Hao Wanqing asked him proactively when he saw the three ashen-looking men being escorted off the ship by Gao Qiaonan's men.
Gao Qiaonan responded: "Commander Mingjian, the short one is Liao Xun, the tall and dark one is Yu Pingfeng, and the one with the goatee is Guo Zheng."
Hao Wanqing nodded repeatedly and said: "These people are much more valuable alive than dead. You have done a good job!"
In order to dismantle the anti-Haihan forces in Zhejiang official circles, the Ministry of Security jointly planned this operation with the military. Hao Wanqing's initial plan was to assassinate these three people, because it was too difficult to capture them alive, and he did not want to take advantage of his subordinates. Risk your life, but there are too many uncontrollable objective factors in the assassination operation, so it is difficult to guarantee the success rate. Secondly, even if it succeeds, the possibility of your own whereabouts being exposed is very high. The action team brought the three people back to Zhoushan unscathed, which far exceeded Hao Wanqing's original expectations.
These three people can be said to be the main representatives of anti-Hai Han in Zhejiang official circles. If they can be captured, Hao Wanqing will be sure to get more information from them. Their comrades will be the next targets of Haihan's attacks, and the voices of resistance to Haihan in Zhejiang official circles will also subside a little. Moreover, the intelligence security issue that Haihan has always attached great importance to will get a more complete answer from Liao Xun. Although the group of people sent by Jinyiwei has been successfully intercepted before, it is not yet certain whether there was any other problem before that. Jin Yiwei personnel have sneaked onto the island, and Liao Xun is the insider the Ministry of Security has been waiting for.
"I want to start interrogating them as soon as possible." Hao Wanqing said to Qian Tiandun eagerly: "While the Zhejiang officialdom has not made a clear response to their disappearance, we should make corresponding arrangements and pull out the nails that need to be Take advantage of this moment to pull it out!”
Hao Wanqing took away these three officials on the spot, but he had no interest in the remaining prisoners and gave full power to the military to handle them on his behalf. These people, including Liao Xun's family, servants, subordinates, and an aide of Yu Pingfeng, were quickly taken to a prison on the island for isolation and detention. Regarding the identities and origins of these people, Haihan must keep it a secret for a while, otherwise once the news spreads to Zhejiang official circles, conflicts will inevitably break out between the two parties.
After the interrogation of the three people by the Ministry of Security is over, these people will probably be sent to the south separately, either as hard labor or as immigrants, settling in places they have never heard of. As for Liao Xun and the other three, whether they can save their lives in Zhoushan depends on their level of cooperation.
Qian Tiandun also generously praised Gao Qiaonan's performance this time. He and Gao Qiaonan conducted remote control this time, but their actual effect was very limited. In most cases, Gong Qiaonan had to do it. He Gaoqiaonan interpreted and judged the situation on his own, and made adjustments to the already rough action plan. Although they had been worried about whether the plan could proceed smoothly, in the end the joint action team did not disappoint the base camp, and the results even greatly exceeded expectations.
During this period, Qian Tiandun also specially assembled a company of troops and deployed them in Hangzhou Bay as a quick reaction force. Once the operation in Hangzhou requires military reinforcements, this fleet of three ships will immediately head west to Hangzhou. , cooperate with the arrangements of Gong Qiqiao and Gao Qiaonan to launch operations. Of course, this force was not put into use in the end. The action team solved all difficulties and successfully completed the task in Hangzhou with an extremely clever plan.
This matter does not end here. For the sake of safety, Gong Shiqi will send the latest status of Hangzhou City back to Zhoushan through the radio every day to ensure that the follow-up of the matter does not cause substantial trouble to Haihan. The rapid reaction force will continue to be deployed in Hangzhou Bay for a period of time until the action team headed by Gong Shiqi withdraws to Zhoushan.
"After settling the matter in Hangzhou, we can start arranging the plan to go north." Qian Tiandun said to Gao Qiaonan: "This time we spent more than ten days less time than expected, which is enough for us to Completed the preparations before heading north.”
(End of chapter)