The Chinese fleet's demonstration in the Netherlands delighted a faction of the Japanese upper echelon. Years ago, being driven out of Korea had dealt a terrible psychological blow to Japan. Conversely, the impact on national power was not as terrifying as it appeared. Historically, Japan's plunder had focused on Northeast China, but China had long since retaken the Northeast. After the Great Kanto Earthquake, Japan had exploited Korea to an unsustainable degree; the Korean people were universally opposing Japanese control, making Korea Japan's greatest bleeding wound. After retreating to the Japanese home islands, various losses actually decreased.

Given the precedent of Korea, Japan dared not go too far in Taiwan. The People's Party had also sent quite a few personnel to Taiwan to launch guerrilla warfare. Japan could only intensify the blockade of Taiwan while employing both carrot and stick to strengthen control, striving to purge Chinese guerrilla forces. During this period of retraction, Japan had to accept the reality. However, after Hirohito successfully ascended the throne, new trends appeared in Japanese politics.

Japan's current Prime Minister, Takahashi Korekiyo, asked his aide and assistant, Kita Ikki, "Kita-kun, what do you think China intends to do by demonstrating against the Netherlands?"

Kita Ikki shook his head slightly. "It is definitely not as simple as a mere demonstration. When Chen Ke does something, he either doesn't start it, or he sees it through to the end. I have never seen anyone who could play him in the palm of their hand."

Hearing this answer, Takahashi Korekiyo fell silent. This was Takahashi Korekiyo's second cabinet. Just like the last time, his cabinet formation finally halted the revolving-door changes in Japanese politics. The outside world generally believed that Takahashi Korekiyo would be able to finish his term just like last time. For Takahashi Korekiyo, Japan needed to maintain a relatively stable relationship with China. But the affairs of Japan were not something this 79-year-old man could completely control.

In May 1925, Tanaka Giichi, who was widely expected to become a Field Marshal, suddenly retired from active duty to enter politics. "Entering politics" didn't just mean wanting to be Prime Minister; given Tanaka Giichi's status at the time, the premiership would be his sooner or later. Tanaka Giichi wanted to be a party leader. Japan's domestic contradictions were deep, and the call for universal suffrage was growing louder. Tanaka Giichi wanted to sacrifice his Marshal title to win greater space for the military.

Thus, in 1925, Tanaka retired and went to the Rikken Seiyukai (Friends of Constitutional Government) to succeed Takahashi Korekiyo as the fifth president. This "Seiyukai" was the party "personally created" by Ito Hirobumi. Tanaka didn't go empty-handed; he brought a greeting gift of three million Japanese yen. What was the concept of three million yen at that time? Three million was equivalent to 500 years of salary for an Army General. Where did he get it? When the Army Ministry was frantically plundering Korea, they obtained 24 million yen in secret funds. Eight million was used in the interim, and the remaining 16 million or so had unknown whereabouts. As the Minister of War, Tanaka Giichi naturally knew exactly where this money was.

After the defeat in Korea, Japanese politics finally stabilized. A "Constitution Protection Three-Faction Cabinet" was formed under Kato Takaaki's leadership, but the Kenseikai (Constitutional Association), as the largest party, still held the reins of the political world. As a result, the first Kato cabinet was shaken by attacks from the Seiyukai and resigned en masse. The right to form a cabinet after the general election fell into Kato's hands again. Tanaka Giichi refused Kato Takaaki's invitation to join the cabinet and fully exploited the issue of reorganizing earthquake disaster bills that emerged during the financial crisis. He instigated the bureaucrats of the Privy Council to reject the government's emergency imperial decree to bail out the Bank of Taiwan on the grounds of it being "unconstitutional," forcing the newly formed Wakatsuki Reijiro cabinet to resign en masse.

After all, both the Army and Navy bore responsibility for the defeat. To ease the conflict, Saionji Kinmochi had to compromise, and Tanaka Giichi actually became Prime Minister through his own maneuvering. After becoming Prime Minister, Tanaka Giichi did not stop universal suffrage; instead, he wanted to guide universal suffrage in the direction he expected.

The Tanaka cabinet was formed hastily after the resignation of the Wakatsuki cabinet and was a regime based on a minority ruling party. In June 1927, the opposition Kenseikai and the Seiyu Honto merged to form the Rikken Minseito (Constitutional Democratic Party). Under the slogan of "implementing parliament-centrism under the Emperor's rule" and supported by the Mitsubishi zaibatsu, the party actively approached elder statesmen and bureaucratic forces, attacking the Tanaka cabinet's domestic and foreign policies with the intention of taking power, posing a huge threat to the Tanaka Giichi regime. Tanaka decided to mold a powerful ruling party through the general election to be held in 1928.

To win the election, the government replaced or transferred over a hundred local officials down to the level of governor. At the same time, they massively interfered in election activities through bribery and inducements. Any speech mentioning "3 million yen" or "Army secret funds" was banned by the government. The opposition Minseito also joined the bribery war. The election result was that the Seiyukai did not reach a majority, winning only one more seat than the Minseito. To this end, Tanaka used large amounts of money and positions to divide and win over independents, seeking to control the parliament. Finally, he obtained 217 seats, achieving the status of an "unnatural majority party" in the parliament with a razor-thin margin. This was the true scene of Japan's first general election.

Tanaka Giichi didn't actually care whether the parliament was elected by universal suffrage or was an aristocratic diet. What he truly hoped for was a complete reversal against China. The Japanese Army knew very well that if China was allowed to continue growing stronger, Japan would sooner or later be finished off by China. There could not be two powers in the Far East; how to overwhelm China became the sole objective of the Tanaka cabinet.

Before the First Sino-Japanese War, Japan had scrimped and saved to win, with the Emperor himself donating money to build ships. Entering the late 1920s, warfare had become three-dimensional, requiring even more investment. Not only the Navy, but the Army and Air Force also needed strengthening. This time, there was no vacillating Korea for Japan to exploit. Although the internal situation in Korea was not yet stable enough, when it came to Japan, Korea had an extremely clear attitude: strictly preventing a repeat of the past. Japan turned its gaze toward Southeast Asia.

Man proposes, God disposes. Just as Japan's great cause of revenge—enduring humiliation to bide its time—began, the Great Depression arrived. Tanaka Giichi knew nothing of economics and was truly powerless to solve this matter. However, the Emperor had his own trusted small clique like the "Three Crows of Baden-Baden" by his side. Hirohito had already made up his mind to root out the Choshu clique that had dominated the Japanese Army for decades. If Tanaka Giichi really wanted to use universal suffrage to completely sideline the Emperor, that would have been one thing, but he happened to want to use the Emperor's name to build a united Japan. This gave Hirohito the opportunity. The Great Depression dealt a heavy blow to the already teetering Japanese economy, and in February 1931, the Emperor publicly rebuked Tanaka Giichi, saying he "didn't understand economics at all."

A few days later, Tanaka Giichi died on the belly of his concubine. Rumors spread wildly among the Japanese public that Tanaka Giichi had been scared to death after being scolded by the Emperor.

Although Tanaka Giichi, as a Choshu clique elder, was a mortal enemy of Nagata Tetsuzan and others, the tricks Tanaka Giichi played using universal suffrage actually aligned quite well with the mindset of the "Control Faction" (Tosei-ha) represented by Nagata Tetsuzan. By the time of the Great Depression, the Control Faction had thoroughly established their political platform and line. They advocated for steady and gradual national reform through lawful means from the top down, under the control of the military headquarters, without using force. The Control Faction demanded the establishment of a total war system and strengthening control over the military.

In the view of Nagata Tetsuzan and Okamura Yasuji, Tanaka Giichi was right in wanting to defeat China to determine Japan's future path, so Japan must endure humiliation and wait for the opportunity. As long as an Asian anti-China, anti-communist alliance could be formed, and Japan joined hands with Britain, the United States, and other countries to launch another "Eight-Nation Alliance," they could finish off China. At that time, Japan, as the vanguard of anti-China and anti-communism, would naturally receive immense benefits after the war. In the process of achieving this goal, Japan must be sincerely united.

To be sincerely united, domestic contradictions had to be weakened. But domestic contradictions based on economic recession could not be weakened. After Tanaka Giichi's death, in 1931, the 77-year-old Takahashi Korekiyo was forced to come out of retirement again to take charge of Japan's economy at the request of a group of people. Takahashi Korekiyo also hired an assistant: Kita Ikki, who was serving as a temporary lecturer in political science at Takushoku University and had been elected as a Tokyo local assemblyman during the general election of the Tanaka Giichi era.

It was helpless that the old man Takahashi Korekiyo came to power. Everyone in Japanese politics knew that their own faction couldn't solve the problem, and no one could get support from other factions. Prime Ministers and Cabinet Ministers rotated like a revolving lantern, but only Takahashi Korekiyo, as Minister of Finance, always stood firm. The only person who could be recognized by both the Japanese upper echelon and the citizens was Takahashi Korekiyo.

Becoming Prime Minister again at the advanced age of 77, Takahashi Korekiyo implemented a series of policies. He first passed numerous bills such as the Army Disarmament Proposal, the Prefectural System Amendment to expand the scope of suffrage, the Juvenile Law, and the Health Insurance Law. Under the situation at the time, the Takahashi cabinet was one that mixed policies to strengthen public security with reformist policies.

Economically, Takahashi Korekiyo pushed for inflationary economic policies. Takahashi's strategy was nothing more than devaluing the yen to promote exports, freeing it from the constraints of the gold standard, and issuing banknotes to increase "liquidity." It combined fiscal policy, quantitative easing, and exchange rate devaluation. Facing a deficit, he didn't raise taxes to raise funds but issued bonds.

Takahashi used this method to let the yen exchange rate "float downward." From December 1931, when 100 yen exchanged for 49 US dollars, it fell to 1933 when 100 yen could only exchange for 25 US dollars. That year, the US dollar left the gold standard, and the yen recovered slightly, stabilizing between 29 to 30 dollars per 100 yen. In about two years, the yen fell by about 40% against the dollar, making Japanese goods "no longer expensive" internationally, especially in the US market, and export volume surged. In 1929, Japanese exports reached 2.15 billion yen; impacted by the Great Depression, it fell to 1.15 billion in 1931. After Takahashi implemented the "Takahashi Policy" in 1931, Japan's export volume increased year by year. Japan's national income (there was no "invention" of GDP at that time) increased by 60%, consumer prices rose by 18%, and the stock market "doubled."

The veteran economist finally stabilized the economy with great difficulty, and Kita Ikki played a significant role in this. Kita Ikki now counted as having sufficient background. He finally printed and publicly released his revised "Outline for the Reconstruction of Japan." In terms of strengthening social fairness, restricting large capital, expanding the survival of small and medium capital, and promoting employment, Kita Ikki made outstanding efforts and achieved results. Compared with the People's Party, these results naturally had a gap, but ending the chaos of liberal capitalism and promoting employment could itself improve Japan's economic and social stability.

In addition to these political achievements, Kita Ikki also officially began to propagate the distinction between feudalism and capitalism in Japan, criticizing the hypocrisy of feudal socialism. This won Kita Ikki immense prestige in the intellectual world, but also brought him numerous enemies and fellow travelers.

The Control Faction regarded Kita Ikki's thoughts as a thorn in their side, while the newly risen Imperial Way Faction (Kodo-ha) regarded Kita Ikki's thoughts as a guiding light. The political platform of the Imperial Way Faction was to "clear the Emperor's side," eliminate the treacherous ministers and villains around the Emperor, and support the Emperor's personal rule to transform Japan. This was the Way of the Emperor, hence called the Imperial Way Faction. Although theoretically related to the Emperor, the members of the Imperial Way Faction all came from the bottom. It was a loose group, generally composed of young field officers, or even company-grade officers.

As for how loyal such an organization really was to the Japanese Emperor, Kita Ikki himself had privately said to Takahashi Korekiyo, "Sometimes lies are just things you have to say."

Most of these young people came from rural areas or were grassroots citizens. When they returned home after leave from the army, they would encounter things like their families going bankrupt or their sisters being forced into prostitution. Rather than saying they were loyal to the Emperor, it was better to say that their limited social knowledge made them believe that the tragic encounters they met were all "caused by bad people around the Emperor." All the injustice in this world was because bad people held power.

Since Kita Ikki became the spiritual leader and political mentor of the Imperial Way Faction, the Imperial Way Faction began to change gradually. Many young people finally began to recognize the existence of classes and realized that class oppression was the real cause of the tragedy of the ruled people at the bottom of Japan.

The initiator of this attempt to join hands with the Netherlands and Britain to build a military alliance encircling China was Japan's Control Faction. Kita Ikki felt increasingly worried about Japan's situation.

Just as he had said to Takahashi Korekiyo earlier, Chen Ke, or rather the People's Party's style of doing things was indeed completely different from other political figures or political organizations. This organization had no half-hearted thoughts. If Chen Ke made a gesture of military threat to the Netherlands publicly, then a subsequent military strike was almost inevitable. Meaningless threats were never the choice of the People's Party. Since the People's Party decided on a military strike, then even if the King of Heaven himself came out halfway to stop it, the People's Party would have the confidence to knock the King of Heaven down.

Seeing Kita Ikki frowning in thought, Takahashi Korekiyo didn't let him continue thinking. "Kita-kun, let's talk about the matter of the national industrial unified standards you promoted a while ago."

Since Takahashi Korekiyo had spoken, Kita Ikki could only focus his attention on the specific issue. Japan's biggest problem lay in its deep-rooted feudal traditions, which economically manifested as numerous handicraft workshops. When he was in China, Kita Ikki saw with his own eyes how the People's Party transformed the raw silk industry. Except for maintaining the existence of various silkworm species and mulberry trees in some areas subsidized by the state to ensure "biodiversity," other areas forcefully implemented the most advanced technology and silkworm species. In the production field, the state would forcefully eliminate technologies every year, forcing various production units to adopt equipment and technology upgrades. With state-led productivity development and state-forced elimination of backward production methods, China's industry progressed slowly but steadily.

Banking sector loan issuance also had targets, refusing to issue loans to backward production, which itself could improve the repayment rate. Improving the technological level could itself create quite a few new labor employment opportunities. Kita Ikki added this part to Takahashi Korekiyo's economic policy, which indeed effectively improved Japan's production efficiency and reduced costs. Takahashi Korekiyo was preparing to imitate China's technology tree plan and build a "technology tree" belonging to Japan itself in Japan.

After discussing these matters, Kita Ikki rose to take his leave; he still had a pile of things to do.

"Matsuzurumaru" was already the place where Kita Ikki was most frequently active. It had been burned clean by fire during the earthquake. When Kita Ikki was distributing relief grain, he used this place as a base. Many disaster victims who came to receive relief sighed after the disaster relief ended: "For the first time in my life, I ate white rice for six months straight."

In the eyes of these former disaster victims, Kita Ikki was simply a god-like existence. Later, during the general election, Kita Ikki managed to become the assemblyman for this district. In this area, wherever Kita Ikki went, people would greet him.

Since it had been a place for serving porridge, the scale of Matsuzurumaru was naturally not comparable to before. The tavern's area was several times larger. Because it introduced the Chinese breeding farm and fast-food restaurant model, the front part had several long tables surrounded by densely packed stools, selling a large amount of fried chicken foods and Japanese-style meals. The back part consisted of various private rooms. After entering Matsuzurumaru, Kita Ikki went directly to the back. At this moment, several men in plain clothes were already waiting inside.

As soon as Kita Ikki entered, he saw Captain Ando Teruzo waiting anxiously. Before Kita Ikki could stand firm, Captain Ando stood up and said, "Mr. Kita, you've finally come. These are comrades who have newly joined us. They are all Navy servicemen."

The young officers seemed to be visiting Matsuzurumaru for the first time. In front of each of them was a plate of batter-fried chicken legs, a bowl of white rice, and a dish of pickles. Sake was placed on the table, and the few of them were burying their heads in the food, chewing vigorously, their cheeks bulging. Upon hearing that the person coming in was Kita Ikki, the young officers hurriedly stood up, trying hard to swallow the chicken and rice in their mouths. One young man with a relatively slender neck was so anxious to swallow that his face turned red.

Captain Ando was just about to criticize these people, asking "where did your manners go," but Kita Ikki had already stopped Ando. "Everyone sit, finish eating first, finish eating first."

This approachable style was nothing to Kita Ikki. At the Party School in China, he had even taken turns cleaning the Party School toilets with provincial governors and party secretaries. But those young Navy officers were moved to tears. In front of them was the Tokyo local assemblyman, the famous Kita Ikki. That was the legendary figure who let tens of thousands of disaster victims eat white rice for half a year.

Seeing these people standing there dumbfounded, Captain Ando asked them to sit down first. Kita Ikki sat down first himself, picked up the teapot, and poured tea into the cup of the young officer who had almost choked while swallowing rice. Then he invited everyone to sit down and talk again. This style truly moved those young men. They first saluted Kita Ikki and reported their names before sitting down.

"Mr. Kita, we have all read your book. We all want to see the new Japan you wish to build, so we came to see you through an introduction," the Navy servicemen said earnestly.

Kita Ikki knew that in the Navy, where the Control Faction held the advantage, his book was a banned book. In the Army Ministry, with the secret support of Inspector General of Military Training and War Councillor Mazaki Jinzaburo and Obata Toshishiro of the Military Academy, Kita Ikki had many supporters within the Army Ministry, but supporters from the Navy were few and far between.

The group talked for a while and brought up recent events in the Navy. These servicemen included lieutenants and sergeants. They mentioned one thing: recently, the Japanese Navy was conducting military exercises with China as the hypothetical enemy. Talk of going to war with China and blockading Chinese shipping was rampant in the Navy.

Kita Ikki felt a chill in his heart after hearing this. This was a way to seek death.