"Revolution breaks out in Russia; the Tsar is overthrown."

"The United States requests to formally sign a treaty with us regarding joint declaration of war by the US and China."

"Large-scale battles between French and German troops are taking place between Reims and Soissons."

"The Russian Provisional Government states it will resolutely not withdraw from the Entente Powers and will continue to fight."

......

After the People's Party entered the world stage with a relatively equal status for the first time, all kinds of complicated information flooded in like a tide. Before determining how to respond, it was discovered that international telegraph costs had soared.

As far as Chen Ke himself was concerned, he fully understood why the information technology revolution allowed the United States to win so many actual economic benefits. The higher the level of industrialization, the smoother the information flow and the lower the cost. When Chen Ke time-traveled, one gram of silver was less than three yuan. Not to mention network communication, even using international calls to transmit a few messages from abroad to China would not exceed the price of one gram of silver. However, the above news cost more than three hundred taels of silver in telegraph fees, which was more than ten thousand times the cost of modern communication.

Chen Ke calculated that if he wanted to build a more effective communication system, the initial technological investment might look huge now, but the subsequent efficiency would save the money back in a few years.

The comrades did not have Chen Ke's troubles and considerations; that was really too advanced for them. What everyone worried about was how to deal with the current situation, trying to make various prompt judgments based on the received news, and also determining the correctness of the judgments. The difficulty was no less than Chen Ke considering how to improve the technological level of the information industry under the current situation.

To temporarily deal with foreign issues, Chen Ke organized a Foreign Affairs Committee responsible for contacting and negotiating. This time, Zhang Yu retired from the leading position and returned to the propaganda department. Wang Bin, the Ministry of Commerce's representative to the US, temporarily took over the duties of the Foreign Affairs Committee. The so-called committee's strategic planning and final decisions still had to be reported to Chen Ke and ultimately decided by him.

The comrades now even lacked the idea of asking questions. It wasn't that everyone didn't want to ask, but asking fewer questions was just a waste of time. If they asked Chen Ke systematically, everyone knew that neither they nor Chen Ke had that time to waste on this.

The layouts that seemed understated and inexplicable before had now become the strategic cornerstone of the People's Party's foreign affairs. Even manufacturing things like stimulants that couldn't be put on the table could exchange for national treasures lost overseas for China. It could also earn some gold and silver from Britain and France along the way. The money earned could not only recoup all the investment in drug research and development but even support the financial expenses of the Fine Chemical Research Institute and the Analytical Chemistry Research Institute for three years.

Industries that the cadres of the People's Party used to look at with bitterness and deep hatred were now profitable across the board through foreign trade. Coconut processing, an industry with quite thin profits relying entirely on industrial scale operation, also made a lot of money due to the export of produced coconut portable food, palm cables, and even buttons. Steel enterprises, as long as they could produce steel, absolutely did not worry about sales. Even pig iron with limited uses and low prices could make a lot of money by transshipping to Japan through the British. Not to mention the continuously rising international grain prices, allowing chestnuts originally produced in many mountainous areas to sell wildly internationally. As for mechanical processing and heavy chemical products with higher technical content, these products had been like the emperor's daughter who didn't worry about getting married for several years.

Whenever the railway expanded to a new area, the specialty products of that area could enter the People's Party's expanding list of commodities. Not to mention raw silk, an industry that would never disappoint people. The people of Shandong, especially the impoverished areas of Yimeng Mountain, showed signs of getting rid of poverty and becoming rich within two years relying on tussah silkworms. The impoverished areas of Dabie Mountain near the Yangtze River line had already realized the process of initially getting rid of poverty through raw silk and tea income.

And Chen Ke's performance made the comrades feel even more at ease. Through the surging wind and clouds of the world situation, Chen Ke became incredibly calm, as if the vigorous wars happening in the world and the fierce changes caused by the wars were as gentle as a clear breeze and bright moon.

Practical experience told the comrades that when the situation seemed deadlocked and quiet, Chen Ke would occasionally show anxiety and impatience. Moreover, Chen Ke would always boldly push various radical plans or lead the whole party to bury their heads in hard preparation. When the situation entered a stage of fierce turbulence, it was the season for the People's Party to harvest massively. Before it was domestic, now the harvesting sickle of the People's Party had begun to wave internationally.

The Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army officially took over Northern Vietnam and Laos. The masses in these two regions were not much different from those in Guangxi, Yunnan, and Guizhou. As soon as the war in Europe ended, these two regions would be formally incorporated into China as provinces. Recovering lost territories and expanding frontiers without unifying China surpassed the comrades' imagination of civil and military achievements.

While things were smooth sailing internationally, domestic problems, especially the issue surrounding Cai Yuanpei's life and death, fermented even more. The debate of several months finally crossed the turning point in early May, and the situation gradually became clear. Those more impatient comrades discovered again that waiting and patience were essential virtues for a person.

The attitude of the masses had always been clear; they all supported the execution of Cai Yuanpei. The reason was very simple: the masses supported the policies of the People's Party. The Guangfu Society in Western Zhejiang executed policies similar to the People's Party. Cai Yuanpei started a massacre in Western Zhejiang, so if Cai Yuanpei seized the territory of the People's Party, he would inevitably start a massacre against the people in the People's Party's territory. Therefore, the masses did not think there was any reason to pardon Cai Yuanpei at all.

Those who supported Cai Yuanpei not dying believed that Cai Yuanpei did not kill for personal gain, and his actions were entirely out of political considerations. Li Dazhao in Beijing, even though he believed Cai Yuanpei had indeed committed great sins of killing, thought political prisoners should not be executed. It was unfair for the People's Party to designate Cai Yuanpei as a criminal. Chen Duxiu, Chairman of the Anhui CPPCC, supported this greatly. He even declared that if Cai Yuanpei must be killed, he should be killed as a political prisoner. Otherwise, this would be "death not for his crime," a kind of power play played by the People's Party.

The first job Zhang Yu did after regaining control of the Propaganda Department was to write a signed article "A Brief Analysis of the Constitution and Political Prisoners." In the article, Zhang Yu analyzed repeatedly that there was no concept of political prisoners in the Constitution of the People's Party. Discussing what happened in reality, what stance one held was by no means a reason for conviction. Since the concept of political prisoners did not exist in the People's Party at all, Cai Yuanpei was naturally not a political prisoner.

Thus, the focus of the debate immediately turned towards the legislative basis of the People's Party Constitution. The matter in Article 1 of the Constitution regarding the liberated areas being political entities led by the People's Party became the focus of attack.

Zhang Yu took out the resolution records of the People's Congresses of various provinces in the liberated areas. This article was passed by the vote of the People's Congress, not forcibly written into the Constitution by the People's Party itself.

When the debate reached this point, Li Dazhao was the first to withdraw from the debate. He only implored Chen Ke to use the Chairman's power of special pardon to pardon Cai Yuanpei.

Zhang Yu immediately mocked Li Dazhao, "The State Chairman certainly has the power of special pardon, but the request for special pardon is not made by the Chairman, but by the People's Congress, and finally issued by the State Chairman. It is really ridiculous to come and request a special pardon without even clarifying that power belongs to the people."

Even though mocked by Zhang Yu, Li Dazhao remained silent. Instead, Chen Duxiu continued to plead for Cai Yuanpei. He believed that not setting up political prisoners and not punishing anyone for political views was a great political progress. However, this did not indicate that someone would not use judicial means to deal with people with different political views. Cai Yuanpei's actions were all during his administration in Zhejiang, and at that time, there were political prisoners in Zhejiang. Even if dealing with Cai Yuanpei, the laws of Zhejiang at that time should be used to solve the problem. Or use the Constitution and laws of the Republic of China that were still in use in Zhejiang at that time to solve the problem.

Zhang Yu mocked Chen Duxiu: where is the logic that the People's Party leaves its own laws unused but insists on using Zhejiang's laws? Moreover, those who sued Cai Yuanpei were the families and friends of those killed. The People's Party had no intention of paying attention to Zhejiang's past politics. Someone sued Cai Yuanpei for murder, and the People's Party determined after investigation that it was a fact that Cai Yuanpei premeditated murder. So Cai Yuanpei was sentenced to death according to the facts. Since the concept of political prisoner did not exist in the People's Party's laws, it was naturally impossible to touch a hair of Cai Yuanpei due to political factors.

By early June, some local celebrities either gave up "rescue" or simply focused on clearing Cai Yuanpei's name like Chen Duxiu. Whether giving up or clearing his name, in fact, these celebrities knew very well that they were powerless to save Cai Yuanpei's life.

On the contrary, the former gentry in the localities, since they finally had the opportunity to challenge the People's Party and learned that the People's Party would not punish them for political views, even if anxious in their hearts, these people began to try to elaborate their political concepts and oppose various policies of the People's Party including land reform.

As a result, the People's Party really stuck to the declared law of not setting up political prisoners and not convicting people for different political concepts. Those people who originally seemed to gather together to try to rescue Cai Yuanpei began to disintegrate rapidly under the People's Party's strategy of responding to all changes with constancy by adhering to the Constitution and laws, revealing their true colors one after another.

Whatever policies the People's Party promoted—land revolution, equality between men and women, compulsory education, industrial development—these people opposed. The reasons for opposition were bizarre, but summarized into one point: "Landlords and gentry want to continue to hold power."

Zhang Yu originally didn't believe that these granite heads had any salvage value, and facts also proved that this bunch of people shrank into the "glory memories" of the past and refused to face reality. But what surprised Zhang Yu a bit was that these guys actually had no reaction to the fact that the United States declared war on the Central Powers in May after the People's Party concluded a war declaration treaty with the United States. They attacked everything, but just didn't attack the biggest change in the People's Party's foreign affairs.

Because Yuwen Badu was also responsible for matters in this regard, Zhang Yu couldn't help finding Yuwen Badu to discuss this issue.

"Those people are afraid of foreigners." Yuwen Badu didn't even feel puzzled, "Besides, do you think they can distinguish what camp those foreigners belong to? Do they know what the Entente Powers and the Central Powers are all about?"

"Even if they don't know, they should at least make some noise, right?" Zhang Yu was still somewhat puzzled.

Yuwen Badu looked at Zhang Yu carefully, wanting to determine if Zhang Yu was joking. Determining that Zhang Yu was indeed not joking, Yuwen Badu replied: "Minister Zhang, we must seek truth from facts. I can only provide an inference now. Those people probably still think about relying on the power of foreign devils to get rid of our People's Party in the future. Precisely because they can't distinguish the difference between foreign devils, they dare not make a sound. They are probably afraid of saying the wrong thing now and being held a grudge by foreign devils."

Zhang Yu hadn't communicated with people of low quality for a long time. After listening to Yuwen Badu's explanation, Zhang Yu spent several minutes considering the explanation proposed by Yuwen Badu. The more he thought about it, the more reasonable it seemed. It was just that Zhang Yu felt Yuwen Badu still overestimated the landlords and gentry. How could such a bunch of country bumpkins take various worldwide forces into consideration?

"This inference makes sense, but inference is still inference," Zhang Yu said.

Yuwen Badu admitted frankly, "I said long ago that this is an inference. The basis of this inference is that the gentry are at their wit's end on this matter. The biggest manifestation of a guilty conscience is barking loudly but daring not to provoke more enemies."

Zhang Yu rolled his eyes, "Comrade Yuwen Badu, a few months ago you were gritting your teeth and insisting on getting rid of this bunch of landlords and gentry. How come a few months passed and you are not afraid of them at all?"

These words poked Yuwen Badu's "shame point." He blushed and replied very embarrassedly: "I also think it's too shameful that I actually took this bunch of birdmen seriously a few months ago. Whatever others said, I took it for real. This is too shameful, too shameful."

Hearing this, Zhang Yu looked somewhat respectful. He said to Yuwen Badu very seriously: "Comrade Yuwen Badu, knowing that superficial phenomena are never reliable is really great progress. It seems that for this year's Third Plenary Session of the First Central Committee, I have to cast a vote for you."

Mentioning the People's Party Plenary Session, Yuwen Badu's expression became completely serious. In the past, the situation was turbulent, and the work of central leaders changed frequently. Chen Ke even fled everywhere with the General Office of the Central Committee. Now the situation was gradually stabilizing. When the whole country was liberated, mobile office work would no longer be the mainstream, at least not fluctuating as much as now. The Third Plenary Session of the First Central Committee would be a meeting to determine the new order, or at least to determine the true core leadership.

Yuwen Badu said: "With my ability, I don't consider entering the decision-making level at all. It's enough to do a good job at the executive level. But Minister Zhang, as the Minister of Propaganda, you are qualified to participate in every Standing Committee meeting. I have high hopes for you."

"Tch!" Zhang Yu sneered, "Participating in this meeting doesn't mean I am qualified to lead the meeting's resolutions. I am also working at the executive level. The adjustment of the Central Committee this time will definitely not be small. Now the Politburo gives great power to the Organization Department and the Propaganda Department, but in my opinion, these two departments hold great power but will happen not to have seats in the Standing Committee of the Politburo."

"Why?" Although Yuwen Badu felt Zhang Yu was right, he still wanted to ask what was going on.

These words undoubtedly disappointed Zhang Yu very much. He rolled his eyes, "You can go ask Comrade Qi Huishen about this, or go ask Comrade Ren Qiying. I think they will explain it clearly to you."