The Butcher's Report

The repurposed freighter, the Jade Serpent, rode at anchor in the murky, oppressive waters off the Sumatran coast, a ghost ship flying no flag. Its holds were filled not with tea or silk, but with communications equipment, crates of munitions, and the cold, hard ambition of Viceroy Yuan Shikai. The main cargo cabin had been converted into his command center. Maps covered the tables, a telegraph key occasionally chattered in the corner, and the air was thick with the stench of stale cigar smoke and thwarted rage.

Yuan stood motionless before a map of northern Sumatra, his hands clased behind his back, his massive form radiating a palpable aura of fury. He was a man who prided himself on brutal, undeniable results, and the reports trickling in from his agents on the ground were an utter catastrophe. The Medan uprising, which was to have been the glorious opening act of his conquest, had been crushed. The rebel cells in Palembang and Aceh, spooked by the disaster, had gone to ground, their revolutionary fervor evaporated. And his masterstroke, the silent, invisible plague that was supposed to cripple the Dutch army, had simply… vanished. There were no reports of sickness, no panic, no chaos. Nothing.

His perfect, swift victory had dissolved into a humiliating, baffling failure. He, Yuan Shikai, the butcher of the north, the man who got things done, had failed in his very first operational command for the Emperor's southern strategy.

A small, wiry agent named Chen, his face smeared with grime and his clothes torn, stood trembling before the Viceroy. He was one of the few survivors from the Medan fiasco, having escaped the city by hiding in a sewer for a day before making his way to the coast.

"Viceroy," Chen stammered, his voice hoarse with terror and exhaustion. "It was a trap. A perfectly executed trap. They knew we were coming. The barracks weren't just defended; they were fortified. New machine-gun nests, sandbags, searchlights… positions that weren't there a week ago. They were waiting for us. It was a slaughter, not a battle."

Yuan's eyes, cold and dead as a shark's, remained fixed on the map. "And the other part of the plan? The asset we provided?"

"Nothing, Viceroy," Chen whispered, shaking his head in disbelief. "The Dutch troops are perfectly healthy. Their water sources are under heavy guard. They have new equipment… filtration units. It's as if they knew that was coming, too. It makes no sense. Someone betrayed us. Someone warned them."

Yuan turned his head slowly, his gaze finally falling upon the terrified agent. He could not process the possibility of a traitor. His operation, sanctioned by the Emperor himself, was known to only a handful of the most loyal men. A leak was impossible. Therefore, another explanation must be found. An explanation that did not involve his own failure of intelligence, his own lack of foresight.

He knew, with the cold certainty of a born political survivor, that he could not report this debacle to the Emperor. Meng Tian's minor setback had been a compromised shipment; this was a complete strategic collapse on the very first day. The honorable Admiral had been publicly shamed for a trifle. What would be the fate of the ruthless Viceroy who had promised a swift, decisive victory and delivered this… this abject humiliation? It would be a fatal blow to his prestige, an end to his meteoric rise. The Emperor did not tolerate failure.

He made his decision in a heartbeat, his mind a cold engine of pure self-preservation.

He turned to the two hulking Beiyang guards who stood by the cabin door, men whose loyalty was absolute because their fortunes and lives depended entirely on his.

"This man is a coward," Yuan declared, his voice a low, brutal growl, pointing a thick finger at the terrified agent Chen. "He is a defeatist who fled the field of battle at the first sign of resistance. Now he returns with fanciful lies of traps and betrayals to cover his own cowardice." Yuan's lip curled in a sneer of contempt. "The failure in Medan was not due to some mythical Dutch trap. It was due to the weakness and poor discipline of the Acehnese rebels. This man's cowardice is an insult to the Empire." He gave a curt, final nod to his guards. "Throw him overboard."

Chen's eyes widened in sheer, uncomprehending horror. "Viceroy, no! I speak the truth! I swear it! Mercy!"

His screams were cut short as the guards seized him. They were brutally efficient, their movements practiced. They dragged the struggling agent from the cabin, and a moment later, Yuan heard a single, choked cry followed by a heavy splash. He had just erased the only eyewitness who could contradict the new official history of the Battle of Medan. He had cauterized his wound.

Yuan Shikai returned to his desk, his composure absolute. He took out a fresh sheet of paper and began to compose his official dispatch to the Emperor. It was a masterpiece of calculated deception, a work of art in the medium of lies and half-truths.

He began by praising the courage of the rebels, then immediately undermined it. The initial uprising in Medan met with stiffer than expected resistance, he wrote, due largely to the poor quality and inherent lack of discipline of the local rebel forces. While brave, they lack the tactical sophistication of true soldiers of the Empire.

He then addressed the failure of the plague. Regrettably, the biological asset was less effective than anticipated. It appears the Dutch have, through sheer fortuitous coincidence, recently improved their sanitation and water purification measures across their main garrisons, neutralizing much of the weapon's impact. The lie was elegant. It admitted a setback while blaming luck, not a catastrophic intelligence failure.

He framed the entire event not as a strategic collapse, but as a minor, initial setback—a probing attack that had revealed unexpected enemy strength. He was not a fool who had been outmaneuvered; he was a prudent commander gathering new data.

He concluded with his masterstroke, a proposal that would both cover his failure and grant him more power. This initial engagement has proven that the native forces cannot win this war on their own. I therefore request permission to escalate our involvement. I propose inserting teams of my own elite Beiyang 'advisors' to take direct command of the remaining rebel cells. We will reorganize them, retrain them, and lead them in a protracted guerilla war from the jungle. This will require more resources—more rifles, more funds, and more direct logistical support from Admiral Meng's fleet—but it is the only path to certain victory.

He had brilliantly transformed his own incompetence into a rationale for deeper Imperial involvement, with himself at its center. He was no longer just a supplier; he was now proposing to become the field marshal of this new, harder war. He sealed the dispatch, knowing it was a gamble. The Emperor was no fool. But it was a better gamble than admitting the truth.

He walked out onto the deck of the Jade Serpent. The sun was setting, painting the sky in lurid streaks of orange and purple. He watched the last light fade from the sky, his mind already churning, plotting new strategies, new ways to win the war he had so badly lost. He was a man who could not, and would not, accept failure. If it meant sacrificing his own agents to create a convenient narrative, so be it. If it meant deceiving his Emperor to maintain his position, that was a necessary risk. The path to power was paved with such things. And Yuan Shikai intended to walk that path, no matter how many bodies he had to step over to do so.