Chapter 22

  That night, the director of the Public Security Administration, Li Yulin, came to visit everyone. Li Yulin was the adopted son of General Li Du of the Northeast Anti-Japanese Volunteer Army. When Li Du, Ma Zhanshan, Sun Bingwen and others passed through Xinjiang on their way back to the interior, they handed over their troops to Sheng Shicai, who in turn entrusted Li Yulin with the heavy responsibility of the Public Security Administration. Li Yulin told everyone that he was representing Director Sheng to visit them, and that all of you have made great contributions to the creation of a new Xinjiang, without your bloody battles, there would be no good situation today.

  General Liu Bin said: "Send me to the front line, I want to fight against Ma Zhongying." Liu Bin once drove an armored vehicle with one hand and fired a machine gun with the other.

  They killed more than 200 cavalrymen of the 36th Division, shaking the heavens north and south of Tian Shan. His armored detachment went straight from Korla to Kashgar. Sheng Shicai praised him with a poem by Tang Dynasty General Xue Rengui: The general's three arrows determined Tian Shan, the brave warrior wielded his saber into the Han Pass.

  Li Yulin said: "Ma Zhongying died of illness in the Soviet Union, and the 36th Division's rebellion led by Ma Hu-shan was also completely eliminated by the Soviet Red Army."

  It was already winter 1939, and everyone in prison felt dull and numb, unaware of the passage of time.

  Li Yu-lin said: "Old Liu, what are you thinking? You're a modern soldier, how can you yearn for these cold weapons?"

  "Those riders were knocked down when they charged at me, their battle knives chopped on the steel plate, if the knife was a little longer I would have been beheaded. They swung their knives at me because of the command knife hanging from my waist, I didn't have the courage to fight back with knives, I dared not look into their bloodshot eyes."

  Yin Qingbo said: "Hui people all yearn for martyrdom, bleeding and death are a kind of glory."

  Liu Bin said: "So cold weapons can best reflect a soldier's bravery. I admire those cavalrymen, they have war knives and horses."

  Li Yu-lin said: "But you defeated them, history only acknowledges the winners."

  "They defeated us with courage, they did not fail."

  Li Yu-lin said: "Liu Shizhang has said too much."

  "When a man is about to die, his words are good."

  Li Yu-lin said: "You are very clever, I won't say much. Everyone can make their requests."

  Liu Shizhang said: "We oppose Jin Shirong's dark rule and participate in the April 12 Revolution. We cannot die in the dark night."

  Li Yu Lin agreed to pull the light bulb for them.

  "We don't want electric lights, we want fire."

  Li Yu-lin agreed to the prisoners' request. The prisoners dug out a lot of wooden sticks from the snowy ground, and the guards did not expect that there would be so many things hidden in the yard. The prisoners used wooden sticks to rebel, which was unbearable. Li Yu-lin kept touching his pistol. Later, he found that the prisoners piled up the wooden sticks and had no intention of resisting.

  Those wooden sticks match their identities, piled up in size according to military rank. From the beginning, they knew their own ending. The stacked wooden sticks are a pile of good firewood.

  Liu Shizhang is at the very top.

  Liu Shizhang said: "Dry firewood meets fierce fire, it ignites with a touch, thank you Director Sheng for his support."

  A platoon leader of the Northeast Army threw a torch onto the woodpile, and those wooden sticks began to crackle, with flames spouting out from the cracks.

  Firewood grows in the forest relying on mud and snow water, they never thought that they have flames hidden inside.

  The Soviet adviser asked Li Yurong: "What's the point of igniting?"

  Li Yu-lin said: "The wooden stick is their substitute, they let the soul die first, and it's not painful when they are punished."

  The Soviet adviser said: "You Chinese people are very strange."

  The prisoners were disheartened and gazed at their own destruction.

  The materials were all processed by the laborers in No. 2 Prison. The high-ranking intellectuals locked up in No. 2 Prison processed the materials with impeccable craftsmanship, and the prisoners signed their names with flair. The prisoners were drunk on the bonfire, lost their minds, and quickly signed their own names.

  Liu Shizhang was the first to be burned, Liu Shizhang walked into the black room, the executioner used a rope to strangle him for five seconds, and then hung him on the iron hook on the back wall. Every time a stick of incense was burned, one person would be strangled. After being strangled, they would be hanged up to die slowly.

  That night, more than 400 wooden sticks piled up into a bonfire, burning until the sun came out, and even the sun was burned flat.

  For each prisoner, the prison above emitted a buzzing noise like wind blowing through electric wires. Those sounds were like birds landing in the depths of the sky. Because the prisoners came one after another, after dawn, people found that those birds were neatly arranged in the blue sky, like a large flock of geese in formation, forming a huge human character.

  Director Yin's wooden stick was the last to burn, and according to military rank, he was after Liu Shuai Zhang and Zheng Lu Zhang... but that wooden stick of his was really something, burning all the way until dawn. Yin Qingbo said: "I came over from Ma Zhongying's troops." The sunlight poured down, like autumn leaves on a poplar tree, cold and heavy, falling to the ground without bouncing up at all - it's said that gold falls to the ground just like this. Director Sheng turned them into gold.

  After the bonfire went out, the ashes were blown into the snow by the wind, leaving only a faint mark. The truck pulled their bodies to Liu Dao Wan, where there was a large pit, like an open wound on the earth; the wound did not bleed, and the dark bodies filled the pit, followed by sand and gravel. The sand and gravel healed the earth's wound. After finishing all this, it wasn't even noon yet. In the winter of Central Asia, the icy cold does not reject the sun, and large patches of sunlight fall down, turning everything white, including the sun itself, which is a dull white. The people from the Public Security Management Office didn't have the heart to warm themselves by the fire, so they climbed back into their cars and left.

  Li Yulin and the Soviet adviser went to the office in a small car. The Soviet adviser said he admired the cleverness of the Chinese people, who did everything seamlessly.

  Li Yu-lin said: "Sheng Du-ban is wise and great."

  The Soviet adviser said: "Stalin is even wiser and greater."

  Li Bolin said: "Of course. You are our teachers after all." In his heart, he cursed: "Damn it, I admire that my nose is not as big as yours."

  The Soviet adviser said: "Do you know about the Moscow Trials?"

  Li Yu-lin said: "That's the credit of your Ministry of Internal Affairs for uncovering so many conspirators."

  The Soviet adviser said: "We didn't do some work well, for example, Kamenev and Zinoviev were very stubborn, we tried our best but it didn't work. The Central Secretary Yezhov had to take a detour, in the name of politics, asking the two men to help the party destroy Trotsky and his gang. Finally, even Stalin was invited out, Stalin had face-to-face negotiations with Kamenev and Zinoviev. Only then did they agree to abandon their resistance for the sake of the party's interests and accept the charges."

  The great trial that took place in Moscow in the 1930s, where old Bolsheviks like Bukharin, Kamenev and Zinoviev abandoned their right to defend themselves, actively cooperated with the court, and engaged in self-accusations, had a strong stage effect that moved countless kind-hearted people, including the American president's envoy who was present at the trial. Yezhov had already killed the souls of Bukharin and others before physically killing them.

  Li Yu-lin said: "That bonfire of theirs has destroyed their souls, when they were strangled, they all stretched out their necks."

  The Soviet adviser said: "You are better than us, and you can get everything done without even showing up."

  Li Yu-lin said: "I'm worried that they will shout and yell, Chinese bandits sing opera when they are on the execution ground, but they only set off a pile of fire."

  Li Yu-lin often watched beheadings in his hometown of Guandong when he was young. He liked the atmosphere of excitement and tension. In this big massacre, more than 400 soldiers who were ready to die didn't even have time to yawn before they were all killed off. From the slaughterhouse to the graveyard, a gloomy and suffocating atmosphere hung in the air.

  Li Yu-lin said: "Mama, one generation is not as good as the next. In the Qing dynasty, they used knives to chop, ah! Blood splattered two zhang away. During the Republic of China era, they used guns to shoot and explosives to blow up, blowing off the top of their heads, but it's still not as good as setting off firecrackers."

  Li Yu Lin spat out saliva, "Not making a sound or noise with a rope around his neck, it's meaningless."

  Sheng Duoban praised Li Yulin.

  Li Yu-lin said: "Liu Shuai-zhang is very interesting, he admires Ma Zhongying's cavalry, riding a big horse with a big knife is more powerful than tanks and planes."

  Sheng Du said: "He has been fighting with the 36th Division, and was deeply influenced by Ma's bandits. This governor is dealing with him in a timely manner, precisely to prevent him from becoming another Ma Zhongying."

  "Didn't he defeat the 36th Division?"

  "The 36th Division are real soldiers, Commander Liu has fought battles with them, this is what they call 'no fight no friendship'."

  "Is Ma Zhongying also considered a hero?"

  "What do you think?"

  "I didn't study when I was young, I'd rather be beaten than recognize characters, my adoptive father said I'm useless."

  "You're very capable."

  "Dry wood meets fierce fire, it ignites with a single touch, thank you for your guidance and cultivation."