However, the people of Kansai, deep down, have a more restless spirit than the people of Kanto.
In Dongjin, faced with the empire's iron fist, people chose to submit.
But in Osaka, when the knife of hunger was turned against their own loved ones, some chose to perish together with their loved ones.
In the city's underground sewers, in abandoned subway lines, and in the slums that the Imperial Army considered "worthless" and too lazy to clear out, undercurrents of despair and anger began to gather.
They call themselves "Kuroshio".
It means that their lowly lives should be transformed into a black wave to crash against the seemingly indestructible dam of the empire.
The leader of the "Black Tide" is a man named "Onizuka Eikichi". He was once a special forces instructor in the army. On the day "divine punishment" descended, he was out on a secret mission and narrowly escaped.
His wife and children were all reduced to ashes in that divine punishment.
Now, all that remains in his heart is the flame of revenge.
In a dark and damp basement, hundreds of core members of the "Black Tide" gang gathered. Most of them were former military personnel, gangsters, and ordinary citizens who had been driven to desperation.
The weapons they carried were a motley collection. There were hidden rifles and pistols, but more often they had homemade Molotov cocktails, explosive packs, and even crude weapons made of steel pipes and nails.
"Brothers!" Onizuka Eikichi stood atop a wooden crate, his voice hoarse but full of strength, "We have no way out!"
“Those monsters are slaughtering our parents and starving our children! They are treating our women as spoils of war! They are treating us as slaves to be used at will!”
"Can we still tolerate this?!"
"No!!" A suppressed, beast-like roar erupted from the crowd.
"No! We can't!" Onizuka Eikichi's eyes burned with a mad flame. "We can't beat those iron ships in the sky! We don't have weapons to fight against powered armor! But we have lives! We have this worthless life that they despise!"
"They want to plunder? Then we'll destroy everything! They want to enslave us? Then we'll show them with our blood that slaves can bite too!"
“From tonight onwards, our target is not the army, not those monsters in iron shells! It's their supply lines! It's their warehouses! It's those traitors who serve them! It's those ‘bride schools’ that are teaching our daughters how to please the enemy!”
"We'll set this city ablaze! We'll show those monsters that this isn't their paradise, but a hell that will drag them all down with it!"
"Jade shattered! Jade shattered! Jade shattered!"
Crazy slogans echoed in the basement.
That night, a suicide terrorist attack that swept across Osaka broke out.
Dozens of "Kuroshio" squads were mobilized simultaneously.
An armored train loaded with rare minerals from Kyushu was derailed and overturned as it left the station by pre-planted explosives that destroyed the tracks.
A warehouse containing newly disassembled precision instruments caught fire, burning all the priceless equipment to scrap metal.
Several of the largest "bride schools" were attacked. Members of the "Black Tide" gang, armed with machetes, stormed in, not to kill, but to destroy the girls' "worth" in the most cruel way. They slashed the girls' faces with their knives.
"Wake up! You are not glory! You are a disgrace!" the attacker roared in despair before being killed by the arriving Imperial soldiers.
In an instant, Osaka Castle was engulfed in flames of war.
This sudden and frantic resistance did indeed catch Wei Zheng somewhat off guard.
Inside the governor's mansion, he stared at the list of losses and damaged facilities in the report before him, his face so grim it seemed to drip water.
"Your Excellency, should we send more troops to conduct a city-wide manhunt?" the adjutant asked cautiously.
"Search and arrest? Like headless flies, scrambling into those stinking ditches and playing hide-and-seek with rats?" Wei Zheng sneered. "That's too slow, and too...undignified."
He stood up, walked to the huge floor-to-ceiling window, and looked down at the city in the distance, where flames and thick smoke rose from time to time.
"Do they think they can scare us with this method? That they can make us pay the price?"
Wei Zheng's lips curled up once again into that chilling, cruel smile.
"They are wrong."
"They just gave me a perfect excuse to carry out the 'final purification plan'."
He turned around and gave his adjutant an order that froze the latter's very soul.
"Pass on my order to mobilize the 'scavenger' forces."
“In Osaka, all slums classified as ‘D’ or lower will be subject to indiscriminate, standardized cleanup.”
“Format...clean up?” The adjutant’s lips trembled. He knew what that word meant in the Empire’s military terminology.
“Yes.” Wei Zheng’s voice was devoid of any emotion. “Use flamethrowers, blaster machine guns, and fuel-air explosives. Wipe those areas, along with the buildings, the garbage, and all living creatures, off the map.”
“I don’t need to catch those ‘black tides.’ All I need to do is destroy all the soil that could breed them.”
"In addition, a city-wide announcement will be issued."
"For every incident of sabotage, one hundred slaves will be randomly selected from the 'labor camp' and executed. For every attack on 'reserve citizens,' the families of all 'worthless people' in that area will be implicated and executed!"
"I want those self-proclaimed heroes to see with their own eyes that every time they 'resist,' they are met with a hundred times more blood and tears from their compatriots."
"This is the most interesting game."
A bloody crackdown, so brutal that even the devil trembled, began.
The "Scavengers" are the Empire's most notorious units.
Their soldiers are selected from the most cold-blooded and brutal criminals, and then subjected to cruel brainwashing and transformation into pure killing machines.
They drove armored vehicles into the slums. There were no warnings, no announcements.
What greeted the desperate residents was an overwhelming wave of death.
Flamethrowers transformed the narrow streets into a purgatory ravaged by fire dragons.
Heavy blaster machine guns tore the simple houses, along with the people inside, to pieces.
An air-fueled bomb fell from the sky, leveling the entire neighborhood to the ground, leaving not even ashes.
The cries, pleas for mercy, and curses quickly faded into deathly silence.
The "purification" of blood and fire lasted for three days and three nights in Osaka.
As the last wisp of black smoke dissipated, this once bustling metropolis in the Kansai region had become a silent, hellish place.
Those slums designated as "Class D" have physically vanished completely. The ground has been burned to a glassy state, and among the ruins, not a single intact corpse can be seen, only some barely recognizable, charred remains. The air is filled with a nauseating, burnt protein odor.
The "Black Tide" organization was eradicated. Their resistance, far from shaking the Empire's rule, became a catalyst for the Empire to implement the "Final Solution." Their families, their sympathizers, and countless innocent civilians paid a hundredfold price for their "honorable death."
In the "labor camps," thousands of people were publicly executed every day for various "collective punishment" offenses. Their bodies were hung high as a warning.
Fear, like a plague, seeped into the very marrow of every survivor.
No one dared to resist anymore, not even a hint of dissatisfaction.
Wei Zheng stood at the highest point of the governor's mansion, looking at his "masterpiece" with satisfaction. He liked this order, a deathly order built on absolute fear.
“Your Excellency,” the adjutant stepped forward, his voice trembling slightly, “Osaka is… ‘peaceful’.”
“Peace?” Wei Zheng sneered. “No, this is just the beginning. True peace will come when they forget that they were once human and only remember that they are the property of the empire.”
He paused, then cast his gaze further south and west. On the holographic map, the territories of Kyushu and Shikoku radiated an alluring crimson glow.
"The 'purification' work in Osaka is nearing its end. The resources here have been exhausted. The slaves here have been tamed. It's time for the glory of the empire to 'shine' on the next piece of land."
"Pass on my orders," Wei Zheng's voice was cold and unquestionable, "'Heavenly Grace Western Expedition' joint fleet, rest for twenty-four hours. Afterwards, split into two groups. The 'Southern Expedition Fleet,' led by the 'Dreadnought,' targets the four kingdoms. The 'Western Expedition Fleet,' led by the flagships 'Divine Might' and 'Conqueror,' targets Kyushu!"
"Your Majesty needs more 'reserve citizens' to fill his harem. He also needs more slaves to build his great empire."
"Our steps cannot stop."
"Yes, sir!" The adjutant kowtowed heavily and turned to leave. He knew that a larger and more brutal "liberation" was about to begin.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com