Twentieth Century Chronicle

Page 3

Therefore, when asked by Ito, he fearlessly expressed his views: "First of all, we have always believed that the Qing Dynasty was China, but in reality, the Manchus themselves did not see it that way. The reason why the Qing Dynasty surrendered so quickly in the First Sino-Japanese War was because its Manchurian homeland was occupied by our Imperial Army. If it were a Han Chinese dynasty, it would have inevitably migrated south, or even to Sichuan, to escape foreign enemies. Didn't Emperor Xuanzong of Tang abandon Chang'an in the same way? If the Qing government had made such a decision, we would have had no way to force the Qing government to sign a favorable treaty that ceded territory and paid reparations."

With just this one sentence, Ogawa silenced everyone present. The fact that Qing China had agreed to Japan's exorbitant demands without even a struggle during the First Sino-Japanese War was astonishing, even to the Japanese themselves. Therefore, Ogawa's deduction seemed perfectly reasonable to them. Ito, too, abandoned his nonchalant expression and began to listen attentively.

"It is precisely because the Manchus did not regard China as the Qing Dynasty that they were willing to pay huge indemnities to end the war, because a China that lost Manchuria could not be called the Qing Dynasty. If Japan lost the Japanese mainland and only had the Korean Peninsula left, would it still be Japan? No matter how huge the indemnity was, it was the Han people who paid it, while the interests of the Manchus were not harmed."

Conversely, if Manchuria were lost, Beijing was abandoned, and the Manchus fled to the Han Chinese settlements in the south, could the country still be the same Qing Dynasty? Could the Manchu rule over China be maintained? Therefore, for the Manchus, as long as Manchuria was not lost and their rule over China did not collapse, everything else was just a trivial matter.

The land occupied by the various foreign powers in China, and the number of Chinese killed, did not even equal the land seized by the Manchus after their conquest of China, nor the number of Chinese massacred by them. Therefore, why would they fear the invasion of China by the foreign powers?

Ogawa paused here, and by then the room was completely silent. Everyone had quieted down, enjoying the attention he was receiving. Ogawa was still quite excited. He stated his final conclusion, "Therefore, the one thing the Manchu upper class did everything they could to maintain their rule was to preserve it."

Although the Hundred Days' Reform benefited China, it was detrimental to Manchu rule and was naturally blocked by the Manchus. When peasant uprisings threatened Manchu rule, the risk of foreign invasion of China was ignored. In Chinese parlance, to avoid dying of thirst, they would drink even poison to quench their thirst.

Therefore, a rational Chinese government would not challenge the interests of foreign powers in China, but a foreign regime under the threat of peasant uprisings would not be so rational. Furthermore, the Qing Empress Dowager was already sixty-five years old; she was a dictator who misappropriated naval funds to build gardens and enjoy her later years. How could she possibly care what China would become after her death?

Miyo Ito carefully examined Heikichi Ogawa before clapping her hands and praising, "As expected of an elite from the Faculty of Law at the University of Tokyo, Mr. Ogawa's insights are truly refreshing..."

With Ito Miyoji's comment, everyone present agreed with Ogawa's view. This is probably a characteristic of the Japanese: no matter how absurd the opinions of those below may be, once they are recognized by those in power, they become wise insights and a consensus.

Of course, this is also because everyone present was a legal professional, and Ogawa put forward a unique perspective on Qing Dynasty politics, which was unrelated to their stance or interests. Therefore, no one would contradict Ito Miyoji in such an unfamiliar area; otherwise, they would always have to struggle.

This was ultimately just casual conversation at a party. Their concern for the political changes in distant Qing China was far less important than the changes in the political landscape of Japan. Ito Miyoji had no intention of deviating from the theme of the party, so after noting down Ogawa Heikichi's name, he brought the conversation back to the main topic: the attack on the Kuomintang.

This topic immediately resonated with these legal professionals. Of the top graduates from the Faculty of Law at Tokyo Imperial University, aside from a few who, like Ogawa, chose the path of lawyers, the rest ultimately entered the government as bureaucrats. Bureaucrats are inherently averse to so-called parliamentary oversight power, and the Democratic Party is the main force behind parliamentary oversight, which inevitably aroused the resentment of these Japanese bureaucrats.

As one of them said, "The construction of a country should be left to the elite to formulate and manage. But now a group of people who are just trying to please the public are using the slogans of freedom and democracy to mislead the people and have put themselves in the seats of parliament. They are starting to criticize the national policies formulated by the elites. How can the country be built step by step if this continues? They are just dragging the country down."

Immediately, someone angrily chimed in: "That's right! Itagaki and Ōkuma's bid for Minister of Home Affairs ended in failure. They then created trouble for the government, blocking the budget and the proposed increase in land taxes. Isn't this prioritizing personal gain over public interest? These members of the Democratic Party claim to be protecting the people's interests, but in reality, they're just using their own desires to blackmail the government. The cabinet's mass resignation last year was entirely due to the Democratic Party's disregard for the greater good..."

When discussing issues involving their own interests, the bureaucrats present made no secret of their dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party, arguing that democratic politics was completely unsuitable for Japan because the Japanese people's nature was not suited to democracy. They believed that as long as sound laws were established to regulate the behavior of the Japanese people, the country would move forward step by step.

Seeing that the time was ripe, Ito Miyoji finally brought up the main topic for the evening: Haruto Kou hoped to form a new party to counter these lawless Democratic Parties. In this atmosphere, such a proposal naturally gained the approval of everyone.

The following day, Ito Miyoji visited Ito Hirobumi in the morning as usual. When he entered Ito Hirobumi's study, he saw Ito, dressed in a yukata, sitting in a chair flipping through an old photo album.

Ito glanced at the contents of the photo album and couldn't help but joke, "Master Chunmu seems to be in quite a good mood today. Is he reminiscing about his dashing youth?"

Ito glanced at the old photos of himself and Takasugi and the others, sighed and said, "I just saw off Liang Qichao of the Qing Dynasty. When we talked about the failure of the Qing Dynasty's reform movement, I couldn't help but feel a little sad."

It was truly remarkable that Japan had come this far; so many reformers perished under the swords of the Shogunate. Seeing the arduous path Qing China took, I couldn't help but think of people from the past, and that's why I dug out my old photo album to look at them.

Ito was silent for a moment, then suddenly remembered what Ogawa had said last night, so he changed the subject and said, "I heard something very interesting last night: although the Qing Dynasty's reform movement failed, the political situation in Qing China will not return to calm."

Ito finally looked away from the photo album and asked his confidant curiously, "Oh, how turbulent is the political situation in Qing China?"

Ito repeated Ogawa's words, then added his own opinion, saying, "I think what Ogawa said might indeed be plausible, but would the Empress Dowager of Qing really lose her mind like that? It's really questionable..."

Chapter Eight: Different Eras

At this moment, Ito Hirobumi abruptly closed the photo album, his gentle expression vanishing. He looked at Ito and gently reprimanded him, his voice tinged with reproach: "How can someone involved in politics only consider possibilities? You should be considering how to deal with those possibilities. If such a situation were to actually occur, what should Japan do? That's what we should be thinking about."

Faced with Ito's sudden shift to a superior mindset, Ito immediately changed his attitude and said, "If such a situation occurs, Qing China will be in chaos, because no country can tolerate Qing China playing such petty tricks to humiliate them. Qing China may be completely partitioned, and our country may be able to get a share of the spoils."

After pondering for a few seconds, Ito Hirobumi said, "We don't need to speculate on the mindset of the Qing Dynasty's upper class. We have people here who understand the mindset of the Qing Dynasty's upper class. You can visit Liang Qichao and learn from him whether the Qing Dynasty's Empress Dowager would issue such a foolish order."

Japan was a small country. Even though we won the Sino-Japanese War and gained recognition from the great powers, we were still the weakest among them. At that time, Qing China was in turmoil, and we were powerless to help, because we hadn't yet integrated Korea and Taiwan; how could we possibly seize new interests?

For us, maintaining the status quo in Qing China is the most suitable course of action. If we allow other countries to carve up Qing China at this time, we will at best only get scraps. Moreover, after the fall of Qing China, how can Japan remain unscathed surrounded by a group of white-dominated powers?

Ito's initial schadenfreude vanished instantly. Indeed, although the Qing Dynasty was old and incompetent and regarded by the Japanese as a corrupt and decadent empire, as long as the Qing Dynasty existed, Japan would not have to worry about becoming a target of the great powers. No matter how you compared them, China seemed to be more lucrative and easier to conquer than Japan.

With such a target disappearing, Japan was exposed to the gaze of the great powers. Even though the Japanese upper class had been actively promoting the opening-up policy since the Meiji Restoration, attempting to completely transform Japan into a European country, they could not ultimately change their skin color. Even a white country like Russia was seen as barbaric white-skinned Tatars by Western European countries, let alone yellow-skinned Asians like Japan.

Just as Ito was adjusting his mindset, Ito Hirobumi asked him again, "What kind of person is Ogawa Heikichi?"

Ito quickly told Ito what he knew, and after thinking for a moment, Ito said, "Arrange a time for him to visit me. I would like to hear his views on Qing politics and even international relations."

Ito agreed and then began to report on the progress of forming the new party. Ito Hirobumi, however, seemed to be preoccupied with something else. After listening to Ito's report, he simply made two "uh-huh" sounds, effectively ending the meeting.

Liang Qichao came to Tokyo while his teacher Kang Youwei was away in Canada forming the Royalist Party. He actually had two purposes: first, to meet with Sun Yat-sen and other revolutionaries in an attempt to unite revolutionary forces for the reformists; and second, to contact Japanese political figures in the hope of persuading the Japanese government to rescue the Guangxu Emperor, who was under house arrest.

However, neither of these matters progressed smoothly. The revolutionaries only wanted to get the reformists to support the revolution, not to support the reformists' monarchist stance, since the reformists still had more influence in the country at that time than the revolutionaries.

Although the Hundred Days' Reform was only a top-down reform movement, it still caused a great stir in various places. In contrast, the revolutionaries could only launch some small-scale uprisings in coastal areas, which were quickly suppressed by local governments.

However, the revolutionaries were mainly composed of students who had studied abroad, so they had more influence overseas than the reformists. Liang Qichao hoped to use the revolutionaries' influence overseas to put pressure on the country and eventually force the Empress Dowager to release Emperor Guangxu.

Regarding contacts with Japanese political figures, although these figures expressed sympathy for Emperor Guangxu's plight, none were willing to offer a concrete promise. Clearly, these Japanese were unwilling to provoke the anger of a foreign government for the sake of a foreign monarch's freedom.

Just as Liang Qichao was feeling lost and uncertain about the future in the hotel, he suddenly heard the hotel waiter report that he had a guest visiting. When he opened the door, he recognized the visitor as Ito Miyoji, a trusted confidant of Ito Hirobumi. He immediately welcomed the guest into the room with great enthusiasm.

Liang Qichao originally thought he had ushered in a turning point, that Ito Hirobumi might have changed his mind and was willing to intervene to help rescue Emperor Guangxu. However, Ito avoided talking about the rescue of Emperor Guangxu, and only talked to him about the character of some die-hards in the upper echelons of the Qing Dynasty.

Liang Qichao thought this was just some small talk before getting to the main point, so he went on to tell Ito about the character and actions of some of the die-hards, and also briefly explained the power dynamics within the Qing government. Frankly, Japan at this time was in a period of fervent learning from the West, so it no longer paid as much attention to the figures and power dynamics within the Qing Dynasty as it had before the First Sino-Japanese War, because they no longer considered the Qing Dynasty their adversary.

If it weren't for Ito Hirobumi's criticism, Ito Miyoji, who was mainly studying Western law, would never have sought to understand the power dynamics within the Qing government. But after listening to Liang Qichao's explanation, he suddenly realized that in the current Qing Dynasty, political power had completely lost its checks and balances, becoming the dictatorship of the Empress Dowager alone.

This means that once the Empress Dowager made a decision, it would quickly become the country's major policy, and no one would dare to oppose it. This was completely different from the period before the Reform Movement, when the court was divided into two factions that checked and balanced each other, and in that period, the court's policies required at least a compromise between the two factions before they could be implemented.

This means that if the Qing Empress Dowager were to blindly declare war on the foreign powers, it would immediately become a government decision—a truly terrible form of autocracy. Even Itō Miyoji, who upheld a constitutional monarchy, could not accept the existence of such a hereditary monarchical system in modern times.

After a few seconds of silence, he finally explained the purpose of his visit to Liang Qichao: "...The above is the increasingly dissatisfied behavior of the peasants in northern China. I would like to ask Mr. Liang, if these peasants' spontaneous anti-foreign movements unite and attack your country's court, will your country's court take advantage of these peasants' anti-foreign sentiments and declare war on other countries?"

After pondering for a long time, Liang Qichao finally nodded and replied, "Yes, in order to prevent these peasants from directing their hatred towards the imperial court, the imperial court will definitely comply with their wishes and let these peasants drive out the foreigners. This is what is known as diverting the trouble eastward."

Seeing Liang Qichao's unmoved expression, Ito Miyoji was somewhat shocked. He couldn't help but ask him, "Mr. Liang, do you know what such an action means?"

Liang Qichao quickly added, "That's why I've always emphasized that the current Empress Dowager is a puppet ruler; His Majesty the Emperor has absolutely no power. This decision has nothing to do with His Majesty the Emperor. To maintain friendly relations between the Qing Dynasty and other countries, those countries should unite to pressure the Qing Dynasty and force the Empress Dowager to return power to His Majesty the Emperor..."

Ito was greatly disappointed by the limited understanding of this Chinese reformer. He rose to take his leave, saying, "Mr. Liang, you should pay more attention to your country instead of just thinking about your emperor, otherwise your ideals will become worthless."

Faced with Ito Miyoji's abrupt and incoherent remarks before leaving, Liang Qichao was completely bewildered, still unable to understand what he had said that had offended the other party.

When Ito Miyoji reported to Ito Hirobumi, he said with regret: "In order to avoid peasant uprisings, the Qing Dynasty will indeed take the initiative to launch an anti-foreign campaign against foreigners. This is not a possibility, but an inevitable reality, because the upper class of the Qing Dynasty has no sense of national identity. Even reformers like Liang Qichao did not deviate from the Confucian concept of the country and its people."

I can assert here that the reformers could not save China because they lacked an understanding of modern civilization. They treated relations between nations as private friendships, believing that simply befriending a few rulers in other countries would establish good relations between the two nations—this was utter wishful thinking.

Standing by the window, Ito Hirobumi replied casually, "If the reformers in China were so capable, would China still need Japan's support?"

Ito Miyoji's anger subsided immediately. After thinking calmly for a moment, he said, "It seems that my considerations were still shallow and not as far-sighted as Harumu-kun's."

Ito Hirobumi sighed and said, "But these Chinese reformers are too incompetent, which is very worrying. At a time when the great powers are invading and colonizing the world, if China cannot stop the invasion of the Western powers, can Japan stop them for us? But if we stand by and watch China be divided up by the great powers, what direction should Japan take in the future? These are all problems."

After a few moments of silence, Ito Miyoji suddenly said, "Fortunately, Japan was the first to wake up. Now, a new generation of talented people are emerging, able to see the danger to Qing China first. This shows that Heaven intends to prosper our Imperial Country."

Ito Hirobumi glanced back at him and said, “Indeed, all competition between groups eventually boils down to competition between people. Therefore, talent is the most important factor. Send a telegram to the Western Minister in Beijing, asking him to pay attention to the connection between the Qing court and the Boxer Rebellion, and to send back any news. If the Qing Dynasty really does declare war on other countries, we'll have to consider Japan's position. What time did Ogawa arrange to meet?”

After nodding in agreement, Ito Miyoji said, "It's scheduled for tomorrow afternoon from 2 to 3 pm..."

While Ito Miyo was talking to Ito, Ogawa Heikichi was returning to his office from the courthouse. His office was located in Kojimacho, and his home was nearby. It was a castle town of the old Edo period, so the buildings were predominantly Japanese-style, and the population was relatively dense, but the rent wasn't very expensive. Upon returning to his office, a legal intern enthusiastically reported to him, "Mr. Ogawa, I've placed your letter on your desk."

Chapter Nine Published

As Tian Bangxuan was writing a letter to a friend back home while hunched over his desk, Shen Jin suddenly rushed into the room with a stack of newspapers and called out to him, "Boji, come and see this."

Tian Bangxuan looked up and saw that it was her roommate Shen Jin. She put down her calligraphy brush, took the newspaper from him, and asked, "What news has made you so excited?"

As he was searching for news in the Tokyo Hiragana Illustrated Newspaper, Shen Jin flipped through the newspaper and pointed to an article in the supplement, saying, "Read this novel."

"A novel?" Tian Bangxuan was initially displeased. He didn't think this was the time for leisure. As Liang Qichao's disciple, he was a member of the reformist faction. However, with the failure of the reform movement last year, he had already shifted from the reformist faction to the violent reformist faction.

Although he came to Japan following his teachers Liang Qichao and Tang Caichang, he was disappointed with Kang Youwei, the leader of the reform movement. At this critical juncture, Kang Youwei actually went to Canada to form the Royalist Party instead of staying in Japan to discuss with Sun Yat-sen and other revolutionaries how to rescue the emperor.

Although Liang Qichao raised funds from Yokohama Chinese merchants Zheng Xiru and Zeng Zhuoxuan to establish the Tokyo Higher Datong School in Higashigokencho, Ushii Ward, Tokyo, which provided a place for these students, the reformers who followed Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao to Japan were not there to study; they wanted to join the two in fighting back against the imperial court.

However, faced with their pleas, Kang Youwei chose to flee to Canada, while Liang Qichao used a school to confine them. As a result, these original supporters of Kang and Liang gradually began to gravitate towards the revolutionaries. Tian Bangxuan's friend Li Binghuan had angrily returned to China two months earlier, and Tian Bangxuan was about to write to his friend to inquire about the situation in the country.

At this point, he naturally wasn't in the mood to read any novels, but after glancing at the beginning of the article, he was finally somewhat surprised, because this novel was a rare story about modern China. The *Tokyo Hiragana Illustrated News* was a tabloid, mainly targeting the working class in Japan, so its content was generally quite accessible, and even its serialized novels primarily focused on Japanese stories; stories about contemporary China were indeed rare.

While in Japan, his teacher Liang Qichao was still hoping to use Japanese power to rescue the emperor, so Tian Bangxuan was also very interested in understanding how the Japanese viewed China at that time. He straightened up seriously and glanced at the title of the novel: *The Letters of the Kameyama Reporter*. The title certainly didn't sound like a novel.

With this thought in mind, he continued his journey, and soon he couldn't help but say, "I never imagined that the Japanese had such a deep understanding of our rural areas. Many Chinese people probably don't even have this kind of knowledge."

Shen Jin then said from the side, "Keep reading. The important part is below."

Tian Bangxuan looked up at him, then continued reading. Gradually, his expression became serious, and he read aloud in a low voice: "...The concern expressed by various governments to the Qing government regarding the personal freedom of Emperor Guangxu was, in fact, not about whether the Qing emperor was free or not. However, they hoped to use this concern to force the Qing government, which lacked legal legitimacy, to cede more rights to them."

However, the foreign envoys' concern for Emperor Guangxu's personal freedom had already shaken the legitimacy of the Empress Dowager's rule. Under such circumstances, even if Emperor Guangxu could not regain his freedom and power, the Empress Dowager could not stop the peasants' discontent with the court. Once the peasants raised the banner of "removing the corrupt officials from the emperor's court" or raised the banner of anti-Manchu nationalism, then the Manchu rule over China for more than 200 years would come to an end.

Under such internal and external pressures, the Qing Empress Dowager had no choice but to cater to the xenophobic sentiments of the people, thereby suppressing voices demanding that she relinquish power to the Guangxu Emperor. With the court's open support, the Boxers quickly transformed into a peasant organization spreading throughout the northern countryside. Although this organization was extremely loosely structured, it shared a very simple consensus: to exclude outsiders in order to restore peace to China…

Tian Bangxuan looked up at Shen Jin in surprise, only to see the other party pointing to the newspaper below and saying, "The one you are looking at is from the day before yesterday; it's also in yesterday's and today's newspapers."

Tian Bangxuan suppressed his urge to speak, flipped open the newspaper, and read the entire serialized story in one go. Afterward, he put the newspaper down and remained silent for a long time. Shen Jin then said to him with a serious expression, "Although it's a story about a fictional future, I think such a story might very well become reality."

Tian Bangxuan finally nodded and said, "The Empress Dowager Cixi might very well do something like this to shift the blame eastward. Since she can imprison the Emperor, she can certainly declare war on all nations. But would any country really invade us with the aim of destroying China? After all, we are a major East Asian country with 4 million people. Would any country have such a big appetite?"

Shen Jin countered with, "If all the countries really form a coalition to invade our country, what should we do? Should we rally loyalists from all over the land to rise up, overthrow the Empress Dowager's faction, and rescue the Emperor? Or should we prioritize protecting the country and support the revolutionaries in overthrowing the Manchus?"

This issue plunged Tian Bangxuan into confusion. The reformers' fundamental aim was to maintain the rule of the imperial court. If the court ceased to exist, what was the point of reform? This was also the root cause of Kang Youwei's absolute refusal to join forces with the revolutionaries. Although these people acknowledged the existence of the Empress Dowager's faction, a peaceful reform movement could not be implemented. Therefore, the only option was to follow the path of Japan, where the four powerful domains used force to overthrow the shogunate. Joining forces with the revolutionaries to overthrow the Empress Dowager's faction was thus an alternative.

However, neither the path of peaceful reform nor the path of violent resistance against the Communist Party had considered what would happen if China went to war with the great powers. Just as the two fell silent, Cai Genyin and Qin Dingyi and a few others walked in. Seeing the two sitting there in a daze, they couldn't help but ask what was wrong. Tian Bangxuan then handed them the newspaper he was holding.

After reading the article in the newspaper, Qin Dingyi immediately said, "What else is there to think about? Of course, we should go to the newspaper office to ask for the author's address and ask him for advice on what China should do. Is this person's knowledge not better than ours? In addition, we should send the newspaper to Mr. Ren Gong to see what he has to say."

Cai Genyin clapped his hands and praised, "That's exactly right. It's not easy to see a Japanese person who analyzes the Chinese situation so thoroughly. Wouldn't it be a waste of an opportunity not to ask him for advice? I think we should go there now. This newspaper office isn't too far from where we are."

Without further hesitation, Tian Bangxuan got up to get his wallet and said, "Brother Shen, go and deliver the newspaper to Mr. Ren Gong. Lishan, Songpo, and I will go to the newspaper office..."

Faced with the newspapers delivered by the students, Liang Qichao was immediately troubled. He was actually more suited to concrete work, and when it came to matters like deciding the direction of the group, he became indecisive. Although he chose to contact the revolutionaries after Kang Youwei left Japan, this was a reluctant move under the pressure of the students.

Because these reformers who went to Japan were already visibly angry with the Empress Dowager Cixi, if their leaders couldn't come up with a way to deal with her, many would defect to the revolutionaries. To appease them, he had no choice but to contact Sun Yat-sen. However, he himself wasn't sure if this path was viable, so he wasn't so resolute about uniting with the revolutionaries, and didn't even dare to explain it to Kang Youwei, who had already left Japan.

The future described in this newspaper has only exacerbated the complexity of China's political situation, leaving him completely unable to see the future direction of China. Putting down the newspaper, he slumped back in his chair and said dejectedly, "So the Japanese all have this kind of understanding? They all see that the Empress Dowager will head down a path of confrontation with the great powers, which is why they don't want to cause trouble for themselves. Is the Qing Dynasty truly beyond saving...?"

Upon hearing this, Shen Jin immediately said with dissatisfaction, "Even if the Qing Dynasty is truly beyond saving, at least we can still save China. If you, sir, cannot come up with a solution, you should at least discuss it with the revolutionaries. We cannot simply stand by and watch China, like India, become a colony of the great powers, can we?"

Faced with the students' reproaches, Liang Qichao finally rallied somewhat and said, "Yes, yes, we can't really watch China become a colony of the great powers..."

Tian Bangxuan and his companions arrived at the Tokyo Hiragana Illustrated Newspaper and explained their purpose. The newspaper staff initially refused them with suspicion, but Tian Bangxuan did not give up. Seeing that it was almost time for the newspaper to close, they waited outside the newspaper office. When the staff member who had been receiving them came out, they forcibly dragged him to an izakaya (Japanese pub) for entertainment.

Despite Japan's victory over Qing China in the First Sino-Japanese War, ordinary Japanese people didn't hold any particular views towards the Chinese. They simply felt that the war allowed them to see the Chinese, whom they had previously looked up to, as equals. Therefore, the Japanese were quite satisfied with the compliments from the Chinese.

Slightly drunk, the newspaper employee finally agreed to help them find the author's address so they could write to him with some questions. Tian Bangxuan pressed his advantage, requesting that the search be done that very night. Faced with the large black cloth Tian Bangxuan handed him, the employee agreed.

After receiving the address from the employee, the three opened it and immediately exclaimed, "Kobe Village, Suwa Ward, Nagano Prefecture? Where is that? It's not in Tokyo, is it?"

Cai Genyin and Qin Dingyi said dismissively, "We'll just ask the girl when we get back. We've come all the way from China to Japan, so why would we be afraid of not being able to go to Kobe Village..."

Chapter Ten: The Ito Hirobumi Residence

When Ogawa Heikichi arrived at Ito Hirobumi's residence with the invitation, he was quite excited. Although he was a member of the ruling class of the country, he was still some distance from the true rulers. Ito Hirobumi, on the other hand, could be considered a core figure among the rulers. Being able to get close to such an important person was undoubtedly like a door to the upper echelons being completely opened to him.

After handing the invitation bearing the Ito family crest to the valet who opened the door, the valet asked him to wait a moment and then quickly summoned the butler. The butler addressed Ogawa Heikichi with haughty yet tactful manners, saying, "The Marquis is in his study; please come with me."

Ogawa Heikichi straightened his clothes and followed the butler into the Ito residence. The Ito family was actually a large clan, and compared to the number of people in the Ito family, the residence seemed a bit small. However, in Ogawa Heikichi's opinion, the lives of these nobles were a bit too extravagant, after all, Ito's wealth was accumulated after the Meiji Restoration.

But this thought was fleeting, replaced by the realization that only by becoming the ruler of the empire could one live like a human being. Compared to Marquis Ito's life, he was merely scraping by. Ogawa Heikichi had forgotten that maids in Tokyo received only one and a half yen a month for pocket money. If his life was considered barely enough to get by, then the lower classes were struggling on the brink of life and death.

At home, Ito still preferred to wear a yukata, although when he was out he always wore a three-piece Western suit. This was the British gentleman style he learned while studying in England. Even though the climate in Japan is much hotter than in England, the Japanese always believed that Western suits must be worn meticulously and not as casually as yukatas. Some Meiji Restorationists even regarded the way of wearing Western suits and yukatas as the root of national differences.

Of course, at this age, Ito has become much more open-minded, no longer suppressing his feelings as he used to, and has regained some of the unbridled personality he had in his youth. Or perhaps, thanks to the Meiji Restoration, Japan defeated Qing China, which instilled confidence in the Japanese people, and naturally, they no longer measured Japan's level of civilization by wholesale Westernization.

Ito was somewhere in between. He neither supported the continued full-scale Westernization, nor the extreme advocacy of leaving Asia and joining Europe; but he also disagreed with the conservatives' so-called imperial special theory, which argued that Japan's current achievements in the Meiji Restoration were due to the unbroken imperial system of Japan, rather than the introduction of Western democratic and liberal ideas.

According to Hirobumi Ito, Japan has always been an Asian country, an unchangeable reality. And the center of world civilization lies in Western Europe, that too is a reality. Therefore, Japan must embrace enlightenment and the civilization created by Europe, but it cannot abandon its Asian identity; it must become the center and protector of Asia to ensure its place among the world's great powers.

However, few in Japan truly understood Ito. Even his comrade from the Choshu Domain, Yamagata Aritomo, the creator of the Japanese Army, couldn't comprehend Ito's appeasement towards Europe and America and his closer ties to Korea and China. For Yamagata, the purpose of building an army was to strengthen the nation, and powerful nations need to expand outwards. Therefore, entering China along the Korean Peninsula was Japan's destiny. Ito, on the other hand, wanted to tie the army's hands. So what was the purpose of their military buildup?

Ito was also deeply troubled. He felt there was nothing to say to the army commanders like Yamagata Aritomo; they completely misunderstood the empire's direction, only knowing how to use force and embezzling a significant amount of military funds, leading to growing public dissatisfaction with the clan politics. This is why he conceived the idea of ​​establishing a new party to start afresh, so that his politics wouldn't be held hostage by the Choshu Domain.

Ogawa Heikichi, a graduate of the Faculty of Law at the University of Tokyo, had his own core support base and could offer such insightful views on East Asian affairs. In Ito's eyes, he was a key figure for the future of the New Party, so he attached great importance to meeting Ogawa. Facing the young man brought in by the butler, Ito casually but warmly invited him to sit down and talk.

Ogawa knew that Ito's meeting with him was probably due to his comments on Qing China at the banquet that night. However, he was still shocked to hear Ito ask him about his views on Qing China. He hadn't expected that this stepping stone would be so valuable.

He thought for a moment, then finally took out a manuscript from his briefcase and placed it in front of Ito, saying, "Sir, most of my insights actually come from this novel."

Upon hearing Ogawa's answer, Ito was taken aback, but having seen it all before, he calmly picked up the manuscript in front of him, flipped through it, and then put it down, asking Ogawa, "Who wrote this novel?"

Ogawa cautiously replied, "A junior from the same hometown."

After estimating Ogawa's age, Ito continued, "Are you also a student at the University of Tokyo? What's your major?"

Ogawa hesitated for a moment before replying, "He's preparing to take the entrance exam for No. 1 High School next year and plans to apply to the Faculty of Letters at the University of Tokyo."

Ito stared at Ogawa, his eyes filled with a question that seemed to say, "Are you kidding me?" Ogawa was also quite helpless about this. If he hadn't been so unfamiliar with Qing Dynasty affairs, he would have liked to keep the novel a secret. However, he hadn't expected Ito to take this possibility so seriously, and the manuscript had already been given to a classmate to be serialized in the newspaper.

In other words, if he were to use the viewpoints from the novel to deal with Ito Hirobumi, and the latter were to discover his mistake, then he would have a major stain on his political record. For a politician, corruption and incompetence are not necessarily flaws, but betrayal is unforgivable. He treated the opinions of others as his own, especially those of a close friend and fellow townsman—who would trust him in the future?

Moreover, his views were all based on Lin Xinyi's judgments; in other words, without Lin Xinyi's judgments, he couldn't find any direction. Being an expert on Qing Dynasty affairs was clearly not his goal; his main focus was on domestic law. Therefore, he preferred to give up the opportunity to be appreciated by Ito rather than be labeled as such—a path he wouldn't go far on.

Seeing Ogawa Heikichi's sincere expression, Ito realized that the other party was probably telling the truth; otherwise, there would be no need for him to present such a manuscript at this time. He then felt somewhat annoyed about the meeting, feeling that he had wasted his time, which was extremely valuable.

Losing interest in conversation, yet unable to immediately get up and send the other person away—after all, even if the other person wasn't some insightful expert on Qing Dynasty affairs, he was still a member of the Faculty of Law at the University of Tokyo, and it wouldn't be appropriate for him to adopt a distant and unapproachable attitude—Ito picked up the manuscript again and began to peruse it. Smiling, he said to Ogawa, "I never imagined that one of your fellow townsmen would be such a young talent. Well then, I really must take a look."

Ito was merely making polite remarks to smooth things over. However, once he opened the manuscript and began to read, he became completely absorbed. When he looked up again, the clock in the corner had already ticked half an hour. But Ito quickly looked away from the clock and pressed Ogawa for an answer: "What about the next part? Hasn't it been written yet?"

Seeing Ito's serious expression, Ogawa, who had been sitting there for a while, breathed a sigh of relief. He knew that Ito hadn't taken his anger out on him, which meant that Lin Xinyi's novel still had some value. So he smiled ingratiatingly and said, "Oh, this fellow townsman is still just a middle school student. His views on Qing Dynasty affairs have some merit, but the later part, which describes the so-called balance of power in Europe, the clash between rising powers like Germany and the United States and established powers like Britain and France, which inevitably leads to a major war involving Europe and even the world, I think is just the wild imagination of a teenager. That's why I didn't bring the later part with me..."