On the streets of Shenghai, newsboys ran about waving stacks of newspapers and shouting, "The Eastern Isles army has brazenly invaded the Four Eastern Provinces! Governor Zhang Pingyang fled without a fight!"
A clamor swept through the streets.
Every passerby was in an uproar.
"Give me a paper!"
"One for me too!"
People fought over the papers. Those who could not buy one hurried over to read someone else's. One man read aloud, "That night, the Second Battalion of the Eastern Isles Independent Garrison used a missing soldier as a pretext to launch a brazen attack on the Seventh Brigade's barracks. The battalion numbered only seven hundred men against the brigade's eight thousand, nearly eleven to one. Yet on Zhang Pingyang's orders, the Seventh Brigade offered no resistance. They let the enemy advance, then retreated in panic, abandoning every round of ammunition and every piece of equipment without firing a shot—
"Shenzhou City fell overnight, leaving soldiers and civilians alike in terror.
"More galling still, the provincial capital's arsenal fell intact into enemy hands, its machines undamaged and its stores full of ammunition. After entering the factory, Eastern Isles troops loaded shells by the crate onto vehicles and shipped them out to bombard Dayi forces elsewhere—
"As of this paper's publication, Zhang Pingyang has fled south by plane. The hundreds of thousands of troops under his command have retreated again and again, all but handing over the Four Eastern Provinces. A disgrace and an outrage—"
By the time he finished reading, everyone around him was burning with anger.
"Those damned Eastern Isles bastards! They've got wolves' hearts and savage ambitions. Every last one deserves to die!"
"I knew they'd set their sights on Dayi after they seized Korea. I just never thought the day would come so soon."
"Zhang Pingyang