Chapter 1092: Treasure Mystery
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
“At first it was called the Special Operations Section.” Ma Jichun, the liaison officer sent by the Secret Service, was telling Zhao Yu the story of the search for the treasure. “Before the founding of the People’s Republic of China, we had received information from the BIS and knew about the traitor Liu Dianchen. It is said that BIS paid close attention to Liu Dianchen’s confession. After the war in Liaoning and Shenyang, they wanted to send him to the south for custody. Fortunately, we got the news ahead of time. We planned to snatch him, but BIS executed him secretly in order to avoid him being rescued.”
“It is said that there was a terrible gunfight at that time, and the investigation record was incomplete,” Ma Jichun continued. “The interrogation record found by group leader Zhao is the part we were missing.”
“Well…” Zhao Yu thought for a moment then asked, “So, only the traitor’s notes mentioned the treasure? There’s no more evidence? According to the situation at that time, Liu Dianchen wanted to keep his life, so it was likely he made up the story about the treasure.”
“Of course not,” Ma Jichun replied. “In order to confirm his story, we have done several years of investigation and research in the northeast. First, some stories about the treasure that spread among the people were consistent with Liu Dianchen’s notes. Second, after their defeat, not all of the Kwantung Army withdrew to Japan. Many Japanese stayed in the northeast. These people either assimilated into the local communities and stayed in China forever, or they worked as spies on the orders of the Japanese military.”
“The founding of China was followed by Mao’s purges. A large number of spies were captured. According to them, the buried treasure was real. Well…” Ma Jichun paused for a while and said, “Among them, it is worth mentioning that in the 1950s, we captured a group of Soviet intelligence agents in the northeast, including Soviet secret police and some geological experts. From them, we obtained some more information and even some top-secret information the KGB had gotten from Japanese senior officials.”
“According to the Japanese senior officials, the treasure left in Northeast China was not just a rumor. They had heard about it themselves. However, many of them were war criminals and had been executed by the International Court of justice. No one knew the specifics of the treasure after that. Therefore, the Soviet Union had also been trying its best to find the treasure and they even sent people to Northeast China to search for the treasure,” Ma Jichun said. “Of course, their target is the missing gold. they think that the Japanese couldn’t have used up all 600 tons, and there must be some left. As long as they can find it, they will have sufficient evidence to file a lawsuit with the Japanese government and apply for a claim.”
“Because we have information from multiple different sources, the treasure is considered a real thing. And, led by the Special Operations Section at that time, a nationwide treasure hunt started. It’s just…” Ma Jichun shook his head and sighed. “Although UNESCO has done a lot of work and field investigation, and have obtained a lot more information, the treasure has not been found. In the past few decades, they have traveled through almost all of the mountains and forests in Northeast China, but they have still found nothing.”
“And over time, the treasure was gradually forgotten and become more difficult to find.” Ma Jichun opened the papers and showed Zhao Yu an old map. “This is a copy of the treasure hunt, which records in detail the location and route of BIS’s search for the treasure.” Zhao Yu and the others opened the huge map and saw various route signs and symbols on it. It showed that the treasure hunting team traveled most of Northeast China.
“Later, the BIS was renamed the Secret Service Agency, but the search for the treasure never ended,” Ma Jichun continued. He then opened another map and said, “This map shows our exploration routes over many years. These places marked in red have all been searched by us. We used high-tech gear, satellites, and remote sensing systems in searching for the treasure. We found several abandoned Japanese factories, but we still didn’t find any trace of the treasure.” Ma Jichun sighed. “Alas. Our focus shifted. For a long time, our focus had been on access to international information, investigation of suspicious foreign personnel, and the existence of the treasure.”
“Even inside the Secret Service, people hold different opinions. The experts we hired basically spent most of their time trying to find out whether the treasure even really exists,” Ma Jichun said. “And, this is interesting. We didn’t end up empty-handed. We got a piece of important news. We have confirmed that long ago, the Japanese also secretly set up a treasure hunting team to look for the treasure. They had infiltrated the northeast of China several times to conduct a secret investigation.”
“Oh?” Zhao Yu frowned slightly. He seemed to have heard this before.
Ma Jichun continued. “The Japanese buried the treasure, then they came to search for it, which confused us. So, we continued to investigate and learned from elsewhere that the Japanese at that time might have lost the information about the treasure by mistake.”
“Oh…” Zhao Yu just remembered that Li Jing had told him this. It turned out that her information was from the Secret Service, and it had nothing to do with any of her friends.
Li Beini frowned and asked, “In that case, will the death of the elderly experts have had anything to do with the Japanese spies?”
Ma Jichun shook his head, then said, “We don’t have any evidence, but we don’t think Japanese agents are that bold. They wouldn’t be able to afford the immeasurable international impact if they were caught killing people. So, we think that the death of the experts may have more to do with Tao Xiang.”
“Oh?” Zhao Yu nodded and asked, “What do you know about Tao Xiang?”
“Not much more than you,” Ma Jichun said sincerely. “What we particularly want to find out is, from whom did Tao Xiang get the traitor’s notes? This is very important. Not everyone can have access to such notes.”
Zhao Yu smacked his lips and said, “I’ve thought about that as well, but Tao Xiang’s notebook doesn’t say that. It’s probably a long time ago. At that time, Tao Xiang was still a young man.”
“Yes, where he got the notes from still needs to be investigated, but the name list… It did have a lot to do with us,” Ma Jichun said. Zhao Yu felt momentarily nervous when Ma Jichun mentioned the list of names. Ma Jichun continued, saying, “It’s obvious that Tao Xiang must have gotten the list from us, it was part of our top-secret files. Only those who work for the Secret Service have access to it. However, there is no record of the list being lost or slipping out. Because of this, things get rather confusing.”
Li Beini frowned then said, “So, you didn’t leak or lose it. How did Tao Xiang get it? Did he dare to steal a document from the Secret Service?”
“So, Captain Li doubts…” Ma Jichun raised his head and said with a complex expression, “the list may have been leaked. That means we have a mole.”
