Chapter 1136 - Arrival in Kaohsiung

In Wei Bachi's secret diary, he had sketched a grander vision. His imagination ran toward the All-Union People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs. In those private pages, his ideal General Administration Bureau was itself an empire: possessing its own armed forces, its own legal code, its own factories, farms, and social organizations. And he, Wei Bachi—Empire Senator—would serve as its chief architect, builder, manager, maintainer, and guardian of order. A cold, ruthless decision-making machine. A strict administrator.

Since the Organization Department showed no intention of creating such a prominent position, and since his self-statement had bubbled rather too obviously with the lust for power, Wei Bachi remained a foreman in the Lingao Construction Corporation. Yet when projects required "forced labor," Wei Bachi was more often than not appointed as organizer. At the start of Operation Engine, the combination of his skills and foreman experience led to his appointment as Mayor of Kaohsiung, tasked with organizing the development of the entire region.

Appointing such a person as mayor reflected Headquarters' current priorities for Kaohsiung. The base's primary purpose was population purification and transshipment. The massive waves of refugees transported from Shandong, Northern Jiangsu, and Northern Zhejiang would be concentrated here for purification and quarantine, then most would be transshipped onward to Hainan to fill the Committee's schools, farms, factories, and construction sites.

Wei Bachi's primary task, beyond managing the refugee camps, was to fully exploit the refugees' labor during their quarantine stay—the Planning Committee had no tolerance for idle mouths. So during the days refugees awaited quarantine clearance and transshipment, Wei Bachi had to put them to work developing the Tainan plain. The Committee had high expectations for agriculture in this region.

The task was brutally difficult. First, refugee mortality was alarmingly high. Amid the chaos of the late Ming, plagues were endemic: smallpox, cholera, typhoid—every imaginable infectious disease could be found in the refugee camps. Smallpox was especially virulent, transmitted through the respiratory tract with terrifying mortality rates. As the weather warmed, various epidemics entered their outbreak seasons. For this reason, the Ministry of Health mandated that refugees at collection points undergo twelve days of preliminary quarantine locally before being permitted to board ships. Even so, transmission could not be entirely prevented.

Second, arriving refugees were mostly exhausted and malnourished; regaining the capacity for work required considerable recuperation. And just when refugees finally passed quarantine safely and recovered some physical strength, it was often time to leave Taiwan.

Thus, while the total population under Wei Bachi's jurisdiction was substantial, his actual usable labor force remained modest. Those capable of heavy manual labor were especially few. Relatively speaking, only refugees transshipped from Jeju Island camps arrived in decent physical condition and could be fully utilized. This caused severe delays in the many Tainan development projects Wei Bachi wished to undertake.

Standing on the Fengshan observation platform, Wei Bachi could survey magnificent rows of wooden buildings extending from the coastline inland. They looked quite imposing. According to the precise population tables updated daily, the resident count rarely dropped below forty thousand.

But Wei Bachi knew these people's current contribution to the Committee was pitifully small, while the attrition rate in the camps remained alarming.

Every day, more than a dozen people were transferred from quarantine camps to the isolation zone. Once sent to isolation, they were divided into different wards by disease. The wards for the most terrifying, highly infectious diseases were built separately on sandbars. Those who died in isolation were cremated on a designated desolate sandbar. The isolation wards themselves were periodically burned down and rebuilt from scratch.

Epidemics were a ticking bomb that never ceased to weigh on Wei Bachi's mind. And the land reclamation and water conservancy statistics delivered by the Planning Committee made him frown even more.

What proved deadliest, however, was that every ship from Lingao brought files, notices, and statistical forms from various ministries and commissions. Wei Bachi found himself drowning in a terrifying sea of paperwork.

He was no longer jubilant about being "Governor of Taiwan." Though he commanded the largest population and the strongest military force, he also faced the most complex situation. Thinking of the stack of documents on his desk—and the locked "confidential dispatch box" on the incoming ship, stuffed with even more papers—Wei Bachi groaned in despair. He had not summoned the interest to invite his life secretary into the bedroom for many days.

"A blade unused soon rusts," he muttered, watching the convoy enter the harbor. Several days earlier, a telegram from the General Office had notified him that Committee members were coming to Kaohsiung for various projects.

"And building a lighthouse too. As if I don't have enough to do." Wei Bachi's mood darkened further.

White smoke puffed from the Kaohsiung Harbor battery, followed by the boom of cannons—the ceremonial salute for arriving Committee members. Wei Bachi rose, adjusted his cotton-linen blend tropical uniform, donned his pith helmet, and strode briskly toward the pier where the "Spanish Whore" was docking. Behind him trailed life secretaries and attendants.

Wei Bachi and Liu Zheng's group had crossed paths only a few times at annual meetings and Committee assemblies, with little professional interaction. By contrast, he knew Zhong Lishi quite well—the Taibai Observatory had been constructed by convicts under Wei Bachi's command.

The Committee members exchanged pleasantries on the pier. Dr. Zhong reiterated his instructions about handling the cargo with extreme care. Then, surrounded by attendants, they climbed into Wei Bachi's "official vehicle." Thanks to the Jeju Island campaign, over a hundred horses had been shipped from Jeju. Li Chiqi and Minister Hong had immediately reported to the General Office to allocate from this stock for "official use" carriages in various locations. Because Wei Bachi dealt with diplomatic matters involving Dutch and other foreigners, he had been allocated two.

Before stepping into the carriage, Dr. Zhong glanced at the newly constructed Kaohsiung Customs Building. The two-story red brick structure predictably featured a clock tower—this time, it would not stand empty.

The carriage started and sped along the cinder-paved road. As a naval port and coaling station, Kaohsiung had abundant cinders and ash from warships, making road hardening straightforward. New telegraph poles lined the main road, and workers wearing "Lingao Telecom" insignia on their backs were climbing poles to string telegraph lines.

The carriage rolled along the newly paved Senate Avenue toward City Hall—which doubled as Wei Bachi's mayoral residence. The building was the work of Zhang Xingpei from the Lingao Construction Corporation. It would not have looked out of place in a small American or European town in the old timeline. Zhang Xingpei specialized in prefabricated wooden structures—quick to assemble and aesthetically practical—widely used in new zone development. From Kaohsiung City Hall down to refugee dormitory longhouses, all employed this architecture.

City Hall rose from a stone foundation half a person high, its exterior coated in white lime that gleamed handsomely in the sunlight. Even by Committee members' standards, this official residence was quite respectable. And of course, it too featured a clock tower.

Before City Hall lay Kaohsiung Civic Square. Half the square's ground was paved with crushed stone. A deep trench bisected it, and workers were laying bricks at the bottom. Around the perimeter, plots had been staked out with bamboo poles and white lime lines, awaiting the construction of various public and commercial buildings. Some plots already sported temporary bamboo sheds; on others, construction had begun. Gravel, cement, yellow sand, and lime were heaped everywhere. Professional construction crews and labor teams from Lingao bustled back and forth; the rhythmic thud of steam pile drivers mingled with the work chanteys.

"This is the main drainage canal. A new city must be built solid from underground up." Wei Bachi had been in low spirits, but since he had created all of this, he could not resist a measure of pride before his fellow Committee members. He pointed at construction sites as they passed. "Heavy rainfall here—if drainage isn't done properly, there will be problems." He then indicated the surrounding buildings, introducing their intended functions. The two largest plots were reserved for the Agricultural Committee and the Navy, both of which had established offices here. Currently, local construction in Kaohsiung revolved largely around these two departments.

On these plots, temporary bamboo sheds had been erected and "Office" signs posted. Naturalized officers and cadres streamed in and out; couriers bearing documents arrived constantly. The scene radiated frenetic activity.

(End of Chapter)