Hong Kong variety show: The mastermind behind the scenes is emerging.

On New Year's Day, at 6 p.m., the Baishichuan private camp was filled with an atmosphere completely different from the outside world.

Since last night, the night sky over Sha Tin has been illuminated by distant fireworks, and through the rusty barbed wire fence, one can see the colorful lights and neon signs lit up between the city buildings in the distance, like stars from another world.

However, the scene inside Baishiying, just across the net, is quite different.

The gray and white prefabricated houses were arranged in neat squares, and the tin roofs rattled in the sea breeze. Only half of the camp's streetlights were lit; the others either had broken bulbs or had their wires gnawed by rats. The dark lampposts stood in the mud like a row of abandoned crosses.

Several large iron pots were set up on the open ground, containing Baishiying's dinner for the night—clear soup noodles.

The soup in the pot had long since cooled, with a thin layer of oil floating on top and a few lonely vegetable leaves drifting on it. People squatted on the steps at the entrance of the prefab house, holding enamel bowls and using chopsticks to pick at the lukewarm food in their bowls, and no one spoke.

Today is New Year's Day. Logically speaking, even a refugee camp should have some kind of holiday celebration—a few more pieces of meat, a few more eggs, or even just an extra pack of cheap cigarettes would be a token gesture.

But today, there's nothing. The supply trucks didn't come at all, and even the canned food and rice that usually arrive on time are nowhere to be seen.

Some people gathered in the open space and whispered among themselves; some squatted at the door of the prefab house and stared blankly at the outside of the barbed wire fence; some argued with the guards in the southern Vietnamese language, and were pushed by the guards, and dared not make a sound again, but the dissatisfaction in their eyes grew stronger.

The leader of the Southern Yue Gang, Sang Gou, squatted at the door of his prefab house, leaning against the wall, quietly watching the crowd gathered in the open space not far away. As he listened to their increasingly loud voices and increasingly urgent tones, his lips curved slightly.

No one knows that before he ended up on Hong Kong Island, Lost Dog actually had a rather elegant name: Ruan Wenxiong.

He was from Da Nang, South Vietnam. His father was a lieutenant colonel in the South Vietnamese government army who died on the battlefield the year Saigon fell. He was just sixteen years old at the time, orphaned, and fled with the remnants of the defeated army, eventually squeezing onto a dilapidated fishing boat that drifted to Hong Kong Island.

He gave himself this nickname because after arriving in Hong Kong, he lived like a stray dog, wandering around and being looked down upon. Even after being taken in by a refugee camp, he initially had to live at the mercy of the seasoned veterans who controlled the distribution of resources. So he gave himself this nickname—"Lost Dog"—which was both self-deprecating and a form of catharsis.

However, perhaps due to his upbringing alongside his father, or perhaps because he was naturally adept at manipulating people, he quickly adapted to the environment after arriving at Baishi Camp. He even gradually became the leader of the Nanyue Gang, one of the two major forces in Baishi Camp, managing over a hundred people and engaging in various smuggling activities. He also had a stable drug and arms supply chain, which he would use to smuggle goods in by hiding them among supplies during periods of refugee reception, and then distribute them through external connections.

But Sang Gou knew very well that no matter how big these businesses became, they were just going around in circles in this "birdcage." If he wanted to take another step forward, he needed to go out and explore.

This opportunity came a week ago.

A powerful figure codenamed "Nightingale" found him through an intermediary, gave him a large sum of money, and assigned him a task—to incite the people in the camp to fight between the refugees and the correctional officers. The bigger the commotion, the better; ideally… they should just charge out.

Lost Dog knew Nightingale was definitely not the mastermind, but he wisely refrained from asking any further questions. After spending so much time in this kind of place, he had learned one thing: don't ask what you shouldn't ask, and just take what you should take.

He took the money and then spent two days spreading the rumor layer by layer.

The rumors are terrifying—the Hong Kong government is not going to take care of us anymore, and they will send us all back to South Vietnam after the Lunar New Year!

This message was like a boulder thrown into the water, creating ripples that were even larger than the dog had anticipated.

The reason is simple: most of the residents of Baishi Camp were not ordinary people. Many of them were soldiers of the South Vietnamese government who had fought against North Vietnam their entire lives; others were colluders with the South Vietnamese regime, people who made their living off that territory.

What were they after when they risked their lives to escape Vietnam and cross the ocean to Hong Kong Island? Wasn't it just a way to eke out a living?!

Once forcibly repatriated, they will face imprisonment, execution, or the slaughtering knife already sharpened on their homeland.

They can't go back!

So, starting on Christmas Day, sit-in protests began to appear one after another in the camp.

At first, there were only a few dozen people. They sat silently in the central open space, holding up signs with crooked English and Cantonese writing on them: "Give us identity," "We need ID cards," and "Don't deport."

At first, the guards would come over to drive them away, but the protesters neither resisted nor backed down. Even when pushed to the ground, they insisted on getting up and sitting back down.

After a few times, the guards got tired of it and figured that as long as nothing happened, they could just sit there.

But soon, more and more people joined the sit-in. By New Year's Eve, two or three hundred people were sitting in the open space, a dense, dark mass that completely blocked the road leading to the main gate of the camp.

The entire camp quickly became a giant powder keg, just waiting for a spark to ignite it.

Soon, Mars arrived.

……

By 9 p.m., no trucks had passed by the entrance of Baishiying, which meant that the promised New Year's supplies had completely fallen through.

In fact, the supplies for White Stone Camp should have been distributed yesterday, but Nightingale used her MI5 connections to seize them directly, and even deliberately gave the guards double the gifts in a provocative manner.

This caused an uproar at the camp.

"They're not even giving us New Year's supplies! Are they trying to starve us to death?"

"It's not that we're stuck on the road, it's that they simply don't want to give it to us!"

"They didn't treat us like human beings at all!"

The refugees gathered in the open space, their angry shouts growing louder and louder.

Some people waved their arms, some shouted at the top of their lungs, and some even began to smash the surrounding public facilities. Dozens of guards formed a circle, holding batons and shields, standing guard at the door and blowing whistles frantically, their faces pale with fear.

Just as the atmosphere was tense and on the verge of exploding, Sang Gou gave a wink to his trusted underlings who were already mixed in with the crowd in the corner.

The henchmen immediately understood, and they quietly blended into the crowd, shouting loudly:

"Go! What are you waiting for!"

"If they dare point guns at us, we'll fight them!"

"Since we're going to die anyway, we might as well fight!"

As we all know, when people are in a state of collective frenzy, their rationality approaches zero, and their emotions are easily provoked and become extreme! Soon, the angry crowd began to march toward the iron gate, and order became increasingly out of control.

In the chaos, a refugee walking in front was pushed to the ground and instinctively grabbed the guard's trouser leg. The guard, already tense and terrified, instinctively swung his baton upon seeing this.

"Bang."

With one blow, the man cried out and fell to the ground, a gash appearing on his forehead, blood streaming down his cheek.

This blow was like a drop of cold water splashed into boiling oil.

"Someone's been killed! The police have killed someone!"

"These lackeys went all out!"

"Let's fight them!"

The next second, the refugees surged forward like a tide, wrestling with the guards. Roars, screams, and the clanging of metal mingled together, creating a deafening cacophony.

Standing at the back of the crowd, Sanggou watched as the iron gate of Baishi Camp was violently smashed open by the combined force of dozens of people, making a sharp metallic tearing sound, and then the crowd surged out like a flood bursting its banks.

A cold smile slowly crept onto his lips.

It became.