In Guangdong, the Tongmenghui was being slaughtered; in Fujian, both the Tongmenghui and the Guangfu Society were being killed. As for Zhejiang, due to the weak influence of the Tongmenghui, the primary target of the purge was the Guangfu Society.

On April 12th, the city gates of various cities in Zhejiang, which had been under martial law for a while, suddenly opened wide. The Beiyang Army and local militia groups stormed into the cities and began arresting people. Anyone who had been introduced into the Guangfu Society by Xu Xilin, Qiu Jin, or even Tao Chengzhang was arrested without exception. Only a portion of the members who had joined under Cai Yuanpei's approval, as well as those who were strongly protected by local gentry, were spared. Hangzhou, Shaoxing, and Jinhua were the hardest-hit areas for arrests.

By April 20th, the number of people arrested in Zhejiang exceeded 40,000. Regarding what to do with so many arrested people, the Fujian-Zhejiang Governor Feng Guozhang instructed: "Do not release them; leave no future trouble." Everywhere knew what "leave no future trouble" meant. Zhejiang had plenty of water, so starting from the 21st, large-scale executions of prisoners began in all localities.

In the past, when killing people, they would at least post a notice, even if it was a frame-up, explaining what these people had specifically done. This great purge initially had this process too, and those killed had to be publicized for their evil deeds of "radicalism" and "opposing landlords." However, by the third day, the various localities lost interest in this. Fabricating notices was an extremely brain-racking task. So in the end, the notices simply read, "On XX date, XX rebel party members were killed. Rebel party member So-and-so, rebel party member So-and-so..."

After killing for another three or four days, batch executions were followed by batch notices, and writing down all the names exhausted the people responsible for clearing the party in various places. To further improve efficiency, they only posted notices once in the morning and once in the afternoon each day. A sheet of paper was filled with "Killed XX people in such-and-such place, killed XXX people in such-and-such place." This finally liberated those responsible for the paperwork from their hard labor.

By May 7, 1915, the frequency of posting execution notices finally slowed down. Zhejiang Governor Zhu Rui woke up early in the morning feeling very lethargic. A servant served ginseng tea for Zhu Rui to drink, then changed to white tea for Governor Zhu Rui to rinse his mouth, and only then withdrew.

During these days of mass executions of rebel party members, what Governor Zhu Rui had to do was not check off names for execution, but select from the list those who would temporarily not be killed. As the killing went on round after round, the later it got, the more Governor Zhu Rui had to rack his brains to weigh who not to kill. So he had been working through the night recently. Yesterday, those who could be released from the last batch were all released, and the remaining ones were all to be executed. They were all veterans of the Guangfu Society, as well as a group of people with relatively high influence locally. Even if he was unhappy in his heart, Governor Zhu Rui changed into his military uniform, preparing to go to the prison to see these people off. Human relationships were just such a thing; Governor Zhu Rui could have waited for his subordinates to bring the execution report, but that would make Zhu Rui appear completely heartless. Going personally to deliver some food and fine wine before the condemned prisoners' last day would greatly reflect Governor Zhu Rui's benevolence.

The ginseng tea probably had some effect, and Governor Zhu Rui felt a bit more energetic. After eating a bowl of longan porridge, Zhu Rui ordered the guard to set off for the prison. Although he didn't want to see those death row prisoners personally, Zhu Rui really wanted to see Wang Jinfa's final moments with his own eyes. As one of the big shots of the Guangfu Society, Wang Jinfa was arrogant and looked down on Zhejiang Governor Zhu Rui, who came from the New Army. But after being arrested, Wang Jinfa extremely wanted to live. Being able to personally deliver the final meal to Wang Jinfa put Zhu Rui in an excellent mood.

Zhu Rui hadn't ridden a horse for half a year. The British had given a batch of cars to high-ranking officials in Zhejiang, and Zhu Rui naturally chose the one he liked best first. Riding in a car through the streets of Zhejiang, those envious and jealous gazes always put Zhu Rui in a good mood. As usual, two cars set out at the same time, and this time Zhu Rui chose to ride in the first one.

There were few people on the street. Although the shops were still open, they could only be described as deserted. With the recent mass killing of rebel party members everywhere, Hangzhou had already shot over a thousand people, so where would everyone find the mood to buy things? The car drove slowly as usual, and Zhu Rui looked around from inside the car. As they were driving, a woman appeared on the road. The woman was not very old and looked quite pretty. It was just that her standing in the middle of the street was very alarming.

Zhu Rui saw the driver slow down, and the mounted guards clearing the way also stepped forward to drive her away. However, the woman first untied her hairpin, letting her jet-black hair slide down her back. Then the woman unbuttoned her clothes. She was wearing absolutely nothing under her skirt suit. The woman blocked the Zhejiang Governor's convoy completely naked. Now, not only the guards but even Zhu Rui inside the car watched with wide eyes. The woman had an extremely beautiful figure and fair skin. Plus, being stark naked, it was completely impossible to see any threat.

The driver didn't know how to respond, whether to continue moving forward or simply stop. Just at this moment, the woman bent down. Although he couldn't see clearly from the back seat, judging by the posture, Zhu Rui knew the woman should be kneeling. "Is this woman going to cry out a grievance?" Zhu Rui thought. But the only so-called grievance recently was probably the mass killing of rebel party members. Even if the woman cried out a grievance like this, Zhu Rui wasn't prepared to play any "granting grace" drama from a play.

Before he could finish this thought, a burst of gunfire came from the roadside. Zhu Rui saw several guards on the left fall from their horses in succession. "Drive quickly!" Zhu Rui roared at the driver. Regardless, this was not the time to stop here and get beaten.

"There's someone in front!" the driver answered subconsciously.

"Run her over!" Zhu Rui had already realized that the woman in front was inevitably one of the assassins, and he roared viciously.

The driver also figured out the connection. He stepped on the gas, and the car accelerated and rushed forward violently. Just as he estimated the moment of impact with the woman, Zhu Rui felt a huge shock. The car windows shattered, and the car flew into mid-air. When the momentum from many angles converged on his body, only then did Zhu Rui roughly understand that the woman had detonated a bomb. In the split second before losing consciousness, Zhu Rui still hadn't figured out where exactly the bomb was placed?

Zhejiang Governor Zhu Rui was assassinated. The car he was riding in was blown into the air by a bomb, and the burning car rolled and flew more than ten meters away after landing. According to the recollections of the surviving guards, the woman hid the bomb inside her clothes, and everyone's eyes were on the woman's naked body. No one noticed the trickery inside the clothes on the ground. And when the woman was kneeling and bowing, she was already holding the fuse. When Zhu Rui's car hit her, she detonated the bomb.

Of course, many years later, bored people also tried to reconstruct this assassination case. They believed that the woman used the kind of detonation device developed by the People's Party. The woman only needed to pinch the electronically controlled fuse, and as soon as she let go, the bomb would explode. Because in a kneeling position, the front of the car would hit the woman's head first, and a normal person could absolutely not effectively control the detonation time in such a posture. This detonation mode developed by the People's Party ensured that even if one lost their life, they could still detonate the bomb, guaranteeing that the assassination effect would not be failed due to various accidental reasons.

The investigation into the woman's identity afterwards also yielded results. She was the daughter of a landlord family in western Zhejiang who had joined the Peasant Association and had attended the Jinhua Girls' School. When clearing out western Zhejiang, some young girls were spared. However, their end could absolutely not be called lucky. These girls were all sold to brothels. Later, somehow, this woman contacted the Western Zhejiang Branch and carried out this assassination together with people from the Western Zhejiang Branch.

However, those who participated in the assassination were either shot dead or committed suicide by taking poison before capture. Since there were people from the Hangzhou locality among them, some also suspected that someone within the Guangfu Society had planned this murder.

Regardless of the speculations, this assassination indeed greatly changed the situation in Zhejiang. It is unknown if the prisoners in the jail were lucky or not, but due to the investigation of this matter, they lived for three more days. Immediately after, anyone locked in the prison, regardless of whether Zhejiang Governor Zhu Rui had decided for them to die before his death, was executed by firing squad under the order of Fujian-Zhejiang Governor Feng Guozhang.

When the news reached Anhui, the young comrades of the Western Zhejiang Branch did not celebrate. Even the least sorrowful person only shouted with tears streaming down their face that Zhejiang Governor Zhu Rui deserved his death. Li Shouxian's prediction that the various places would massacre Guangfu Society members had been proven true.

The Western Zhejiang Branch had also sent out a portion of comrades, but the majority of them were unable to return. Those comrades who were lucky enough to return spoke with lingering fear about the scenes of killing in various places. The Beiyang Army was somewhat better; at least they arrested people directly. Those militia groups were like mad dogs on the streets; they would kill anyone they saw in the countryside wearing foreign-style clothes, and even those wearing glasses or western-style hats. Some places had become so frenzied that they reached the point of killing anyone wearing leather shoes and carrying a fountain pen.

The People's Party basically hadn't had any real work in Zhejiang. Even the public representatives and commercial units stationed in Hangzhou had all withdrawn to the People's Party base area when Cai Yuanpei implemented anti-People's Party propaganda in 1914. The so-called killing of "People's Party rebel party members" was already a suppression targeting Westernization.

From January 1915, the scale and intensity of militia recruitment in Zhejiang and Fujian greatly increased. Local militia groups in Guangdong were already large in number, so no massive expansion occurred there. In these times, trying to find a livelihood was quite difficult. Originally, militia groups relied on connections; if you weren't an acquaintance, they wouldn't recruit you at all. Even if you were an acquaintance, they might not necessarily recruit you. Militia groups ate rations; who would have that much money to support such a large group of people?

How could those militia groups in the countryside distinguish what the People's Party was? Because the People's Party's goods competed with foreign goods in Zhejiang, this group of people felt that anything Westernized was the People's Party. Plus, that group of Westernized people in the local areas did attempt to lead the new order in Zhejiang, and there were plenty of gentry and landlords dissatisfied with them. The slaughter fell directly on the heads of this group.

"Jealous of the worthy and capable," "stubborn and unchanging," "reactionary to the extreme"—the young people of the Western Zhejiang Branch slapped all sorts of labels on these conservative reactionary gentry in the local areas.

Li Shouxian regretted the comprehension ability of the Western Zhejiang Branch. These comrades very likely attributed the cruel acts to personal character, or so-called human nature. In short, they would think that countless "accidental" factors determined everything that happened, and very few would truly believe that this was the inevitable result of class struggle developing to a certain stage. Li Shouxian didn't want to criticize the young comrades for their lack of experience because of this. He himself had carefully studied Chen Ke's "predictions" regarding this matter before it happened, and after it happened, Li Shouxian forcibly studied it many times before he had to admit that everything that happened was inevitable. There were no accidents in class struggle.