Chapter 528 The Crimson Dawn of the Taishi River

The White Terror in Britannia lasted for a whole month.

The agents of the Western Depot, like hounds in the night, sniffed out the slightest scent of resistance and launched a merciless purge.

The Duke of York and the "Thorn Society" he led vanished into thin air overnight.

The official explanation was that the Duke's family had gone to the American continent to "investigate new investment opportunities."

But the citizens of London discovered the next morning that the waters of the Thames were tinged with an unnatural, dark red.

Fear, like a thick fog, shrouded every corner of the city.

In public, people sang praises of the Governor's wisdom and the Empire's benevolence.

But in private, the seeds of hatred were taking root and sprouting wildly in deeper soil.

A new resistance organization was quietly born from the ruins.

They learned from the lessons of the "Thorn Society," becoming more cautious, more secretive, and more extreme.

They called themselves the "Sons of Vengeance."

Unlike the naive ideas of the old nobility who tried to incite urban riots, the goals of the "Sons of Vengeance" were more clear and lethal.

They intended to use terrorist attacks to shake the foundations of the Great Han Empire's rule.

Their first target was the "Han-British Friendship Hospital," which had been completed not long ago in London's East End.

This hospital was funded by the Great Han Empire and introduced advanced Eastern traditional medicine and surgical techniques, providing free medical services to the common people of London.

In the Governor's Office's propaganda, this was a symbol of "Imperial Grace."

But in the eyes of the "Sons of Vengeance," it was the most hypocritical form of cultural aggression.

They would use blood and fire to tear apart this thin veil of tenderness.

The leader of the operation was a young man named "William."

He had once been a top student at the Royal Medical College, and his father, a respected doctor, had "accidentally" fallen to his death the day after complaining about the Han Army's discipline in a tavern.

Hatred had changed this young man who once had a bright future.

He abandoned the scalpel and picked up explosives.

The operation was scheduled for dawn.

That was the moment when the city was quietest and people's defenses were at their lowest.

William and his four companions, disguised as farmers delivering vegetables, drove a carriage loaded with explosives and quietly approached the hospital.

At the hospital entrance, only two drowsy local policemen were on guard.

They were members of the "Security Force" recently recruited by the Great Han Governor's Office; the pay was high, but their enthusiasm for work was very low.

Seeing the carriage approach, one policeman lazily raised his hand.

"Stop. Routine inspection."

William's heart jumped into his throat.

He gripped the pistol hidden in his coat.

One of his companions jumped off the carriage, a fawning smile on his face, and handed over a pack of cigarettes and a small bag of han yuan.

"Hard work, Officer. A small token of appreciation, buy the brothers a drink."

The policeman weighed the money bag, and the expression on his face softened.

He waved his hand. "Go on through."

The carriage slowly drove into the hospital courtyard.

In the center of the courtyard stood a newly erected stone tablet, engraved in Han clerical script with four large characters personally inscribed by His Majesty the Emperor: "Benevolent Heart, Benevolent Art."

William stared at those four characters, his eyes spitting fire.

He parked the carriage at the entrance of the main hospital building.

This was where the load-bearing structure of the entire building was located.

"Light it," he commanded in a low voice.

"We only have five minutes."

A companion struck a match and lit the long fuse.

The fuse made a "hissing" sound, like a burning viper, and burrowed into the wooden crate filled with explosives inside the carriage.

The five men quickly jumped off the carriage and sprinted away in different directions.

William did not run.

He stood in the shadows of the courtyard, watching the carriage silently, staring at the "Benevolent Heart, Benevolent Art" tablet.

A sickly, gratified smile appeared on his face.

He wanted to see with his own eyes how this hypocritical symbol would turn to ashes in the flames.

Time seemed to slow down at this moment.

One second, two seconds, three seconds...

The earth-shattering explosion he expected did not happen.

The burning fuse, just as it was about to enter the wooden crate, suddenly went out.

A foot wearing a black soap boot emerged from the darkness and stepped precisely onto the fuse.

The smile on William's face froze.

He felt a chill shoot from the soles of his feet straight to his scalp.

He turned around abruptly.

He didn't know when it happened, but behind him, the place was filled with people.

A group of people dressed in black tight-fitting clothes, their faces masked.

Like a group of lifeless shadows, they had silently surrounded the entire courtyard.

The person leading them was not masked.

He was tall and thin, with a face so handsome it was almost demonic, but his complexion was deathly pale.

He wore a gorgeous brocade robe embroidered with flying fish patterns, and in his hand, he toyed with a small, glinting scalpel.

He looked at William, a playful smile curling the corners of his lips.

"Sons of Vengeance? What an interesting name."

His voice was light and soft, yet carried a bone-chilling coldness.

"Unfortunately, your vengeance ends here."

William's heart sank to the bottom.

He knew they had fallen into a trap.

"You... how did you know?"

He asked, trembling.

"The Western Depot."

The handsome man, who was none other than Superintendent Yu Huatian of the Western Depot, used his scalpel to gently scrape his fingernails.

"If you want to play such little tricks on Great Han soil, you are still too naive."

He glanced at the policeman who had been bought off with money.

"For example, you might not know that every squad leader of the London Security Force is a peripheral operative of my Western Depot."

He then pointed to the companion of William's who had handed over the money.

"And for another example, this 'most trusted brother' of yours traded your operation plan for a ticket to the New World and a gold bar from me a week ago."

The identified companion turned pale, his legs went weak, and he knelt on the ground.

"I... I don't want to die..."

William closed his eyes in despair.

He thought he was the hunter, but he never expected that, from the very beginning, he was the prey.

Superintendent Yu Huatian walked over to the carriage and kicked the wooden crate filled with explosives with the toe of his boot.

"Such a good thing, using it to blow up a hospital is too wasteful."

He turned back and flashed a brilliant yet incredibly cruel smile at William.

"How about I send you off to experience its power with your own bodies?"

At dawn.

A violent explosion came from an abandoned quarry on the outskirts of London.

The force of the explosion was not great, and the sound quickly dissipated.

The next day, a small, inconspicuous news item was published in the Governor's Office gazette.

"Yesterday, a gas explosion occurred at the quarry outside the city; five vagrants unfortunately perished, leaving no remains."

The waters of the Thames continued to flow quietly.

Only that tinge of dark red seemed to have grown a little deeper.