Republic of China: Ace Pilot

Chapter 94, Section 93: The Great Theft Begins, Gold Leaves the City
One night in late October 1932, a huge fire broke out in a Japanese military camp in Shenyang.

The fire descended from the sky with overwhelming force; it could not be extinguished by water or buried by sand, and it burned the entire general's camp to the ground.

A fire broke out overnight, causing hundreds of casualties, the vast majority of whom suffered burns.

At the same time the fire broke out, an unidentified army appeared outside the city and launched an attack on Shenyang.

The Japanese soldiers on the city wall inexplicably fainted, and the gate was blown open by explosives.

Subsequently, the unit launched a direct attack on the puppet army's garrison and arms depot in the city.

Some of the puppet troops went to the fire site of the military camp to provide assistance, but the rest were unable to resist and were killed or scattered.

The unit transported a large amount of military supplies out of the city from the munitions depot, and the rest were prepared to be destroyed.

The city of Shenyang is bustling with activity at night.

People of all ages in the city went out to watch the lively firelight in the distance.

If there's no curfew tonight, the Japanese will be in big trouble; everyone loves to see that happen.

The situation was just as busy at the north gate.

The volunteer army was rushing into the city, while the treasure-hunting gang was running out of the city.

Sun Debiao met with the opposing team leader: "You can't take Shenyang City, so leave after the fight."

The other person replied, "And what about you?"

"We have other missions."

"Do you need any assistance?"

"The more chaotic the city becomes tonight, the easier it will be for us to complete our mission."

"Alright, watch us then."

The two groups passed each other, each going about their own business.

Soon after, bursts of gunfire rang out from inside the city.

Outside the city, Sun Debiao and his men ran five miles, pulled out two mule carts, and loaded all the fake gold boxes from their hiding place onto the carts.

They quickly turned back and, taking advantage of the chaos in the city and the fact that no one was paying attention, drove the two mule carts into the city.

However, instead of heading to Anping Pawnshop, they unloaded the goods in a secluded, dilapidated courtyard near the city wall.

This is the only route through the tunnel that will allow the real gold to leave the city in the latter half of the plan.

The three Liu brothers will dig a tunnel through here to leave the city and take the real gold away.

Subsequently, the two empty mule carts were driven out of the city, and all members of the treasure-hunting gang returned to Anping Pawnshop to change clothes and rest, as if nothing had happened.

Meanwhile, the battle in the city was nearing its end.

With a deafening roar, the armory was destroyed, and the volunteer army quickly left the city with their spoils.

Half an hour after they left the city, Japanese reinforcements from nearby areas arrived.

However, the situation inside the city prevented them from pursuing the volunteer army, so they transferred a large number of burned Japanese soldiers for treatment.

The events that occurred in Shenyang quietly spread to the outside world.

Within a day, many intelligence agencies received this message via radio waves.

The Shanghai International Settlement was a hub for intelligence trading in the Far East; it was there that people were the first to know about such things.

This type of intelligence has a high time sensitivity but no value in maintaining secrecy, so some intelligence officers chose to cash in the intelligence immediately.

Immediately, some well-informed newspapers in Shanghai printed temporary supplements.

Newsboys had a new slogan when selling newspapers on the street.

"Newspapers for sale! Breaking news! The Japanese army in Shenyang has been bombed and suffered heavy losses. If you want to know the details, read today's special edition for five copper coins."

Passersby were drawn to the headline, and the newspaper boy's newspapers quickly sold out.

It quickly spread even to areas near Shanghai.

Fang Wen piloted the Shrike back to Jinan, rested for a day, and then refueled at night before returning to Shanghai Airport.

Torches lit up the runway at Shanghai Airport at night to guide the way, and Fang Wen landed smoothly and skillfully on the runway.

He drove the plane into the hangar, and as soon as he got off the plane, he heard Fang Shouxin's report.

"Young master, it's in the newspaper."

"oh."

Fang Wen took a few newspapers and read them under the dim light of a low-wattage electric lamp.

Apart from the bombing being true, everything else in the newspapers was speculation.

Some believe it was the bombing carried out by the National Air Force.

Some say it was an air raid launched by the communist countries in the north, after all, the Russo-Japanese War more than 20 years ago had already caused deep hatred between the two sides.

Some newspapers even believed that this was not an air raid, but divine punishment, that even the gods disapproved of the Japanese behavior and sent down fire and lightning.

However, some more rational people discuss the issue from the perspective of aircraft performance, arguing that currently no aircraft can launch airstrikes from outside the Great Wall or Siberia, unless there is some mysterious air force in Northeast China.

But this conjecture is also unreliable. The more than 200 planes owned by the Zhang family in Northeast China became spoils of war for the Japanese. Where would the planes have come from for bombing? Besides, the entire Northeast was already under the control of the Japanese army. How could such a large landmark as an airport not have been discovered?

Upon seeing this, Fang Wen's relaxed mood turned somber again.

The heist isn't over yet; there are still three final hurdles to overcome.

They promptly replaced the fake gold with genuine gold, transported the gold out of the city, and then established a temporary aircraft landing point on the outskirts of Shenyang.

Only when these three things are done well can this treasure raid in Northeast China be successfully completed.

Shenyang City.

The entire city was under martial law, and Japanese soldiers guarded every corner.

A convoy of military vehicles stopped at the Young Marshal's Mansion, and a large number of soldiers surrounded the mansion, with guards every three steps and sentries every five steps.

Clearly, they valued this place highly and were afraid that the wealth inside might be lost.

At the same time, a Japanese military officer came to inspect the area.

The current Japanese army is divided into four ranks: officers, sergeants, soldiers, and professional soldiers.

This is a lieutenant officer. Although his rank is not high, he is of the highest class, so the garrison officers of the Young Marshal's Mansion have great respect for him.

The two inspected the young marshal's residence.

Finally, the two arrived at Warehouse C2, which was filled with gold. This was the safest place in the Young Marshal's Mansion, and they communicated in Japanese.

"Fujiwara-kun, is the inventory here finished?"

"Not yet, I will urge them to finish it as soon as possible."

"It must be done quickly. Last night's airstrikes have shown that this place is no longer safe, and we need to move these assets to a better location."

"Hi, I'll step up my efforts."

"It's not about speeding up, it's about making it a necessity. The higher-ups have decided to move everything ahead of schedule. In three days, regardless of whether the inventory is complete, everything will be moved immediately, and the inventory personnel will be taken along with it."

After finishing their business, the two turned their attention to the air raids of the previous night.

"Fujiwara-kun, I have another mission here: to investigate last night's air raid."

"Any results? I've never seen this kind of attack before, especially at night. If our enemy has this secret weapon, how should we respond?"

"This bizarre attack method is not recorded in any current global military operations data. It should be a special attack method, and I don't think it is possible to use it on a large scale. If the attack intensity were ten times that of last night, our brigade-level units would not be able to resist. If the power were increased fifty times, our divisions would also be in chaos."

"That's right. It's indeed impossible to use it on a large scale. If the Chinese army had such weapons, we wouldn't be able to occupy the Northeast."

The two thought they were having a very private conversation, after all, this was the most heavily guarded gold vault. But they didn't realize that not far from where they were standing, a vertical pit had been dug under a floorboard.

They hadn't even dug through the first meter of soil, but they had inserted a bamboo tube, and they could hear people talking above.

Among the treasure-hunting gang, Manager Liu is fluent in Japanese, after all, he has dealt with the Japanese quite a bit during his many years in Northeast China.

As he listened, Manager Liu took notes.

After the people above left, he immediately returned through the tunnel with the three Liu brothers.

Back at Anping Pawnshop, Chief Wang read the notes recorded by Manager Liu.

"Gentlemen, we must act quickly. The gold price will change in three days. The opening ceremony tomorrow must be a grand affair to buy enough time for the warehouse to be stocked with treasures."

Others started discussing it.

"The Japanese were bombed last night, will they still agree to tomorrow's plan?"

“We asked through the translator and said that we were also praying for the wounded Japanese soldiers. They thought it was okay and agreed.”

The next day, Anping Pawnshop and Consignment Shop was decorated with lanterns and colorful decorations.

They also hired people to play drums and gongs, perform lion dances, and spread out long strings of firecrackers on the ground.

Many Japanese soldiers came over to watch, while the locals pointed and whispered from a distance.

When the time came, the firecrackers were lit.

The crackling sounds echoed throughout the space.

Meanwhile, underground, the three Liu brothers, looking at the pocket watches in their hands, precisely broke through the last meter of soil.

A hole was found in the floor of C2.

Five members of the treasure-hunting gang climbed out.

They then brought up the boxes containing fake gold, pried them open one by one, took out the fake gold bars, and put in the real gold bars.

The whole process was very tense, I was afraid of making mistakes or mixing things up.

Therefore, they deliberately kept a three-meter distance from the pile of gold. It's real, and fake is fake.

The 267 fake gold bar boxes must all be switched within this timeframe.

Furthermore, the fake gold barcode must be restored to its original appearance.

To this end, the members of the treasure-hunting team practiced for a long time and had a clear division of labor.

Five people switched the gold in Warehouse C2, and seven people moved the fake gold box from the dilapidated houses near the city wall to the basement of the Young Marshal's Mansion in the underground passage.

The remaining seven, including Wang, the guild leader, Liu, and Sun Debiao, who were pretending to be the owners of the consignment shop, were organizing a celebration outside the consignment shop.

In order to avoid attracting the attention of outsiders.

Every so often, they would change shifts, emerge from the tunnel, change into clean clothes, and disguise themselves as pawnshop clerks to appear in public.

Time passed slowly, and beneath the festive atmosphere lay a palpable tension.

After the firecrackers were set off, the drums and gongs sounded, and the lion dance performance began.

This commotion continued to attract the attention of nearby Japanese troops.

Meanwhile, in warehouse C2, the real and fake gold were continuously swapped.

The exchange of 64000 gold bars was completed.

The real ones were packed into wooden boxes, while the fake ones were displayed like a mountain of gold.

When the last two boxes of gold bars were placed into the vertical pit, the entire theft was finally completed.

Five replacement workers climbed into the vertical pit, quietly lifted the floorboards, and covered them.

Then the three Liu brothers reburied, repaired, and restored the site.

The gold chests were moved from the tunnel to a dilapidated house near the city wall.

After the drumming stopped, Chief Wang announced with a big smile: "Thank you all for coming. Our pawnshop is officially open for business. I would also like to take this opportunity to send my blessings to the Imperial Army."

The onlookers didn't say anything about the first half of the sentence, but the second half drew disdainful looks from the locals.

The translator, Zhao, was quite satisfied. He translated the words to the Japanese officer who came to watch, and was rewarded with a thumbs-up.

Despite feeling nauseous, Chief Wang responded with a smile and even treated Translator Zhao and the officers to a meal at a restaurant.

The whole thing was done perfectly, and the switch was carried out without anyone noticing.

After the switcheroo, preparations for evacuation and relocation must be made.

Meanwhile, Manager Liu went to the Marshal's Mansion to take inventory, just like any other day.

He inspected the second room thoroughly and confirmed that there was no problem. Even the Japanese officers who inspected the room every day did not notice anything different when they looked at the glittering little mountain of gold.

Meanwhile, others also participated in the work of digging tunnels leading out of the city.

A large amount of tunnel soil was transported to two residences and hidden on site. The tunnel had already crossed the city wall. If they dug a few dozen meters further, they could escape the sight of the guards on the city wall and safely transfer the gold.

Three days later, Manager Liu suddenly disappeared.

People from Anping Pawnshop and Consignment Shop also disappeared along with him.

The Japanese even conducted a city-wide search, but found nothing.

At first, people didn't understand what was going on.

Until those who participated in the inventory with Manager Liu were forcibly taken away from their homes by the Japanese.

Everyone then realized that Manager Liu had fled because he was afraid of being arrested by the Japanese, and that the people from Anping Pawnshop and Consignment Shop had also fled Shenyang City together to avoid taking responsibility.

No one in Shenyang sympathized with this group of people who fawned over the Japanese but gained nothing from it.

Meanwhile, after a fruitless search, the Japanese prevented the inventory personnel from approaching the Young Marshal's Mansion's treasures. Subsequently, military vehicles drove up to the mansion, packed everything up, and took it away.

The entire process went without incident. The Japanese never imagined that someone would switch the two-ton gold bars with fakes right under their noses.

While the Japanese troops were loading and transferring treasures inside the city, a group of people were driving a mule cart south of the city.

The treasure-hunting gang transported the gold from the north of the city, but to avoid being discovered and pursued, they deliberately took a long detour and arrived at the south of the city.

The area south of Shenyang is a forested region, ideal for concealment. Even if the Japanese discovered it, they could hide the gold in the forest and find it very difficult to locate.

But the real purpose of the treasure raiding group was not to hide gold here, but to find a place where the plane could land.

The group drove a mule cart to a village.

Sun Debiao glanced at it and spoke up.

"This is Shijiazhai. During the Qing Dynasty, a tiger came down from the mountain and was killed by the locals. The tiger was handed over to the government and they were even rewarded with silver. The locals gave it a nickname: Tiger-Fighting Village. After Shijiazhai, there is a large forest. The logging camp we are going to is still quite a distance away."

Chief Wang asked, "Is there really a flat road there where I can park my plane?"

"Yes, the road surface for transporting large logs can be used once it's compacted and leveled. We'll cut down the trees on both sides of the road, light torches, and that will guide the planes to land." Sun Debiao had witnessed Fang Wen landing a transport plane on the road, so he spoke with great confidence.

With a serious expression, Chief Wang halted the ranks and shouted:

"After all the hardships, there is only one last step left, so everyone must not be careless."

The others nodded in strong agreement. They had participated in something they could be proud of for a lifetime, so how could they let the operation be ruined at the last step?

Chief Wang continued, "Time is of the essence. There are no Japanese troops here yet, but we can't guarantee that passing Japanese troops won't discover us. Therefore, we must cut down trees and clear a path within two days to build an airport runway. No matter how hard or tiring these two days are, we have to persevere. As long as the gold is transported back, everyone's good days will begin."

This sentence gave everyone boundless fighting spirit. For the sake of the wealth they could enjoy in their later years, they rallied their spirits and continued their journey.

Without information about Shenyang, it's impossible to create a route map for the "Heaven and Earth Swap" operation.

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(End of this chapter)