Battle Royale of the Sinners

"FBI, You're surrounded! Surrender now!" The threatening sound of the hundred policemen shocked the spies.

Behind the police, Sima Fang and Jia Xu were observing the situation from behind.

"Please let one of them escape. Don't forget this." Jia Xu whispered Sima Fang.

"We're not killing all of them?"

"No, I want to leak a false intel. Let one of them go."

"I see."

Sima Fang whispered to the one-hundred man commander of the unit.

"Let one escape."

"Which one?"

"The guy with good muscles. Make it believable."

"Yes, sir!"

Accepted the order, the commander passed Sima Fang's order in secret.

Meanwhile, the spies were hesitating if they should surrender or not. The escape route on the front gate was blocked, but there were still more escape routes they could take.

Before they could decide, a volley was fired.

A hundred arrows flew for the spies' torsos, turning half of them into porcupines. The remaining half were shot by the legs. Two of them stumbled and fell on the ground.

"RUN!"

The three remaining spies started running. Each of them separated and ran back into the government inner area.

"GIVE CHASE!" The police commander shouted. Fifty soldiers rushed after the fleeing spies while the remaining fifty stayed behind to deal with the injured prisoners.

"Disarm them and treat their wounds. I want to interrogate them later." Sima Fang ordered.

Jia Xu peered at Sima Fang. "There's no need to. Just kill all of them."

"We can still squeeze some info from the survivors. Killing them all right now is too wasteful."

"No, you misunderstood me. There's a reason for the swift kill. I want to make the other hidden spies of other forces think that we're pissed because an important info has been leaked."

The eyes of Sima Fang glinted by the torchlight. He could understand a bit of Jia Xu's initial fake intel plan, but he still could not understand the meaning of this move.

"Explain in more details, please."

"Even if one of the spies survive, the other spies in his force or from other forces will think that this group of agents was incompetence and won't completely believe in the survivor. But if we kill everybody here without bothering to interrogate the captured spies, they will think that our action is too unnatural and will lead their mind into thinking 'The survivor has a good info'. Do you get the idea?"

Sima Fang was astonished from Jia Xu process of thinking and planning.

"You want the survivor to spread the information?"

"Exactly! I want everyone to get a hand on this info. The more people knew the more credibility it is!"

"But what's the point of this? The edict is already said enough that we were cooperating with the Xiangnu. That alone is enough proof that we are at odds with Ding Yuan in the eyes of others."

"But not to Liu Ping."

Like a thunderbolt struck on Sima Fang, he stood still motionless as he remembered that it was Liu Ping who issued the framing edict. He should have known the truth that the Tong and Xiangnu tribes were not in league with each other.

If only one spy were to report that Ding Yuan and Tong were at odds with each other, Liu Ping would get suspicious!

However, if there were other sources of information that had the same intel, what would Liu Ping think?

"Will the fleeing spy spread the news?" Asked Sima Fang.

"Normally, he won't. But once we show the heads of these guys in the public, they will make a move. If my guess is right, all our neighbor spies in Julu city will help this lucky guy out of the city in exchange for this information."

…

As planned, one of the spies managed to slip through the net. Sima Fang ordered the police to chop off the heads of the spies and put in on poles.

"Make an announcement to the public. These people are traitors that tried to infiltrate our government hall at night." Sima Fang ordered.

Jia Xu also made another public announcement notes for Sima Fang to use.

"The new Emperor Liu Ping is jealous of our city's prosperity. Yesterday, he sent an edict that Zhang Jiao, Zhang Tong, and his entire family are in leagues with the barbarian tribes which is false!"

"Not only the Emperor wants to kill our hardworking governor and his family, he demands that the citizens have to pay extra taxes because they supported the governor and harmed the Han Court indirectly."

"With such tyranny, I, Zhang Jiao, the Governor of Julu Commandery City, will no longer serve the tyrant Emperor. I and my family will fight against the corrupted officials, evil Han Court, and the iron-fisted Emperor for the sake of our people and our city."

"Please forgive me for implicating all of you citizens."

"Signed: Zhang Jiao."

Sima Fang read the draft with a deep frown as Jia Xu boldly forged Zhang Jiao's public statement without his permission.

Dissatisfied with this method, he glared at Jia Xu. "This is too much! I can't public this without our lord's consent."

"Oh, please. Politic is always dirty. War is even nastier. This is softcore."

"I knew that. But public this without his permission won't do!"

Jia Xu stopped and glanced back at Sima Fang to calculate his next move, then he was reminded of Tong's behavior on the day he called Jia Xu out.

'That brat seems to be interested in me. I should use him as my backer.'

"Go ask young master Zhang. He'll approve of this."

Sima Fang was taken aback when he heard Jia Xu mentioned about Tong.

"… Haiz." He sighed as he gave up. "Fine. I'll do it. But you'll take full responsibility for this if this goes wrong."

"I know. Haha!"

…

…

September 1st, 182 A.D.

Heads of the spies were pierced by poles and a new announcement was posted on the public announcement boards.

The spy criminals shocked the townsmen, but the rebellion announcement threw the city into an uproar.

War!

A simple word that could intimidate any county or city that was about to experience it. The horror of being on the side of the invaded city, county, or a country could shake the moral of the citizens to the soul.

Even if there was not any concrete proof or news about the Imperial Army approaching, the first thing the people thought about was their safety. As a result, the citizens were running around, telling their families about the news and started stocking their provisions.

The panic spread like a wildfire. Fortunately, Sima Fang had prepared for this and already deployed all police forces at several important locations, such as government shops, government buildings, granaries, and water sources. As a result, no damage occurred in the city as all potential rioters were arrested in time.

This announcement also caught the eyes and ears of all spies in Julu City. Each organization was in chaos, trying to get every information and rumor they could get.

And they caught a clue of last night incident.

Ten suspects infiltrated the government main hall and nine of them were killed.

"The last one was caught?"

"No, didn't they say they killed everyone on the spot?"

"I got an intel from the participated soldier. They were ordered to kill everyone."

"So one has escaped!"

"Isn't it odd that they didn't bother to capture any prisoner?"

"It is."

"Too weird."

"Something has made them hasty."

As Jia Xu had predicted. All spy organization made the conclusion that something was not right in the operation last night. They should have captured a few to extract some information first. However, the government intentionally made an illogical decision by killing them all.

"Maybe those ten found something sensitive?"

A question appeared in the mind of these lurkers. They mobilized their men to find a trace of this spy, so they could extract the information from him and reported it back to their lords.

A few smarter agents planned to infiltrate the government buildings instead of looking for the escaped agent. But after seeing the increased in the security of the government houses, they changed their mind.

"We can't get that info this way. We have to look for that man!"

…

…

Meanwhile, the afternoon of the same day.

In a closed room inside the government main building, Tong and Jia Xu were having a private conversation about the past preparation made by Jia Xu, the military overhaul, and about the fake info plan.

They had been in the room since morning as there were too many things that both Jia Xu and Tong had to ask each other and tune their brain waves.

Tong revealed his abilities, [Inventory], [Create Food], and his radar map. He also told Jia Xu about the relationship between his force and Ding Yuan's.

Despite the shocking revelation, Jia Xu was happy that Tong was honest with him as he was also a fair person. If his lord was honest to him, he would do the same as well. Jia Xu told Tong the process of his thought in earnest and pointed out all flaws in Julu City, including his economic system.

"So, you've made this stupidly large map to fool the neighbor spies?"

"Correct, my lord. All our city classified info has been leaked and still leaking to our neighbors for a long time already since your father has been instated as a governor. It's about time that we use our weaknesses to our advantages."

The current topic of their conversation focused on the counter-spy plan that Jia Xu improvised.

"With the stance of Liu Ping, I believe that he will dispatch his troops to this city soon. So the false info we have leaked will be the pivot of our entire movements."

Jia Xu opened another roll of paper. It was a small map of Ji Province that he drew. His finger pointed at Jinyang as he explained.

"If he wants to eliminate us that badly, he will mobilize his troops from the capital and garrison at Jinyang while the other detach armies will head to Yie Commandery."