On the eve of the fall of Liaodong, he led his troops in a remonstrance against the young marshal.

"Gentlemen."

Zhang Xueming said loudly:

"Since everyone agrees, I hereby declare that, starting today, the Northeast Border Defense Army and the Northeast Political Affairs Committee officially declare war on Japan."

"Wang Shuhan!"

"arrive!"

"Draft telegram! Declaration of war against Japan."

"yes!"

Zhang Xueming walked slowly around the conference room with his hands behind his back.

"To all 400 million compatriots of China:"

Since the First Sino-Japanese War, the Japanese invaders have never given up their desire to destroy China. First they occupied Korea, then they ceded Taiwan, then they swallowed up Port Arthur and Dalian, and finally they seized southern Manchuria.

"Their ambition is as greedy as a jackal, and their methods as venomous as a snake or scorpion. In recent years, the Japanese pirates have become increasingly unscrupulous."

"In July of this year, Japanese pirates instigated Korean ronin to forcibly seize our farmers' farmland in Wanbaoshan, Changchun. Japanese police opened fire, killing and wounding hundreds of our unarmed farmers and arresting dozens. The blood from this Wanbaoshan massacre is still fresh!"

"In August, the Japanese invaders fabricated the Nakamura Incident, falsely accusing our soldiers of killing their spies, and used this as a pretext to increase their troops in southern Manchuria, creating a tense situation."

"At around 10 p.m. on September 18, the Japanese invaders blew up the Liutiaohu section of the South Manchurian Railway on their own initiative, falsely accusing our Northeast Army of doing so. They then launched an attack without declaration, bombarding our Beidaying Camp in Fengtian with heavy artillery and launching a strong attack on Fengtian City with an infantry regiment."

"The wolfish ambitions of the Japanese pirates are now crystal clear. Their goal is to annex our three northeastern provinces, enslave our 35 million compatriots, seize our mines, occupy our railways, plunder our grain, and exterminate our race!"

"The 300,000 soldiers of our Northeast Border Defense Army have long endured humiliation and hardship."

"Since the old marshal was alive, he has taken it as his duty to protect the territory and the people. He has been taking precautions against the infiltration and encroachment of the Japanese invaders, step by step, and has not yielded an inch of land."

"However, the Japanese pirates have become even more ruthless. They even used bombs to kill my old commander at Huanggutun, and today they brazenly attacked the city, killing my soldiers and slaughtering my people."

"Enough is enough, there's no need to endure it any longer."

Wang Shuhan's pen flew across the paper, and as he wrote the last word...

He spent half his life writing telegrams and drafting countless announcements, but never once did his hands tremble as he wrote one.

He stood up, holding the telegram in both hands, his voice hoarse:

"Second Master, I've written down the entire text. Is there anything that needs to be revised?"

"Not a single word changed!"

"Send it out."

"Send it to Nanjing, send it to Beiping, send it to Shanghai, send it to Guangzhou, send it to Taiyuan, send it to Xi'an."

"Send this telegram to every place that can receive it."

"yes!"

Wang Shuhan, holding the telegram, strode out of the conference room, and the crisp clicking of the telegraph machine echoed down the corridor.

..............

Beiping.

When the declaration of war was sent to the editorial department of the World Journal, the editor-in-chief, Cheng Shewo, was hunched over his desk revising the manuscript, his red pen hovering in mid-air, not falling for a long time.

He read the telegram three times from beginning to end, then suddenly stood up, pushing his chair back with a creak.

"Place it! Front page! Publish the full article! Not a single word can be deleted!"

He shouted at the top of his lungs toward the typesetting room, his voice so loud that it startled all the reporters in the next room.

The typesetters had been working all night without sleep, but after seeing the contents of the telegram, everyone forgot their drowsiness.

Some people wiped their eyes with their sleeves while typing, while others secretly copied the telegrams onto small slips of paper and stuffed them into their pockets, intending to take them home to show their wives and children.

The next morning, the World Journal published the telegram's contents on its front page with a bold, extra-large headline in bold black font.

The newspapers were sold out in less than half an hour after they were put on the newsstand.

Newspaper vendors rode bicycles all over town, their backs loaded with bundles of reprinted newspapers. Before they could even unload, they were surrounded by passersby, one hand reaching out and another grabbing the newspapers with a rustling sound.

The campus of Yenching University was in an uproar.

A student in a gray long gown rushed out of the library, holding a newspaper and shouting as he ran:

"Fight the Japanese devils!"

Students who were in class poured out of the classroom and surrounded the student holding the newspaper, crowding around him in layers.

Someone snatched the newspaper and read it aloud. When they read the line "Rather die in battle than live in dishonor," a suppressed sob rose from the crowd.

A girl covered her face and squatted on the ground, crying and trembling all over. She had fled from Fengtian, and her whole family was still in Fengtian City except for her.

The people around her helped her up. She wiped away her tears and suddenly shouted with all her might:

"Fight! Well done!"

That afternoon, handwritten proposals were posted on the bulletin boards of Yenching University and Tsinghua University. The ink was not yet dry, and the signatures had already filled several pages.

The proposal consists of only one sentence:

"Go to Fengtian, go to the front lines, go to the place where we fight the Japanese devils."

Students passing by lined up to sign their names, and some of them, after signing, took out the few dollars they had and threw them into the donation box next to them.

Some people took off their school badges and pinned them to the letter of appeal, meaning they were sending this honor and oath together to Northeast China.

Meanwhile, other universities are also responding quickly.

That very evening, the student self-government association of Beiping Normal University held an emergency meeting and passed a resolution to organize a "volunteer team to aid Liaoning." Nearly three hundred people signed up on the spot.

Law students at Chaoyang University drafted a petition to the League of Nations, printed thousands of copies in Chinese, English, and French, and sent them to embassies of various countries in China.

The students from the Railway Institute took the initiative to contact the Beiping Railway Station, requesting assistance in transporting aid supplies to Liaoning.

Fundraising activities were launched simultaneously on various campuses.

Within two days, the number of students from various universities in Beiping who volunteered to go to Northeast China exceeded three thousand.

Some studied medicine, some studied engineering, some studied radio engineering, and some studied chemistry.

A chemistry student wrote a line in small print on the application form:

"I studied chemistry, I know how to make explosives, I'm sure I'll come in handy."

The person in charge of registration paused for a moment after looking at it, then looked up at him and nodded emphatically.

...........

Shanghai.

The Shen Bao newspaper office in Zhabei, Shanghai, was brightly lit.

President Shi Liangcai held the declaration of war telegram in his hand. He remained silent for a long time, then looked up at the editor-in-chief and said:

"Publish the full text as is, and all losses will be borne by the reporting office."

He knew that publishing such an article might anger the concession authorities and could even lead to the closure of the newspaper.

But he knew even more that if he didn't publish this article today, he would never forgive himself for the rest of his life.

After the Shen Bao published it, major newspapers in Shanghai followed suit.

The newspaper published an editorial on its front page with a title of only three words: "Stand Up."

The editors at the Shanghai branch of Ta Kung Pao added a note to the telegram:

"The gunfire of the Northeast Army is the wake-up call for the entire Chinese nation! It's time for our 400 million compatriots to wake up."

On Avenue Joffre in the French Concession of Shanghai, a long queue formed in front of a trading company run by overseas Chinese from Southeast Asia.

The boss withdrew all the company's working capital, exchanged it for boxes and boxes of silver dollars, placed them at the company entrance, and processed the donation on the spot.

He personally donated 50,000 silver dollars, then stood on the table and shouted to the crowd:

"Fellow countrymen! The Northeast Army is fighting desperately, we can't just applaud! Those with money should contribute money, and those with supplies should contribute supplies!"

A rickshaw puller squeezed through the crowd, pulled a cloth bag from his pocket, opened it layer by layer, revealing several silver dollars and a handful of copper coins, which he poured onto the table.

The person in charge of registration asked him his name, but he waved his hand, pulled an empty car, and disappeared into the crowd.

An elderly woman selling wontons poured all her earnings for the day into a donation box.

Factories across Shanghai are also taking action. Workers at a yarn factory in Zhabei went on strike and donated their entire day's wages.

Jian Zhaonan, the owner of Nanyang Brothers Tobacco Company, personally donated 100,000 silver dollars and called on all employees of the company to donate. Within a week, they raised 500,000 silver dollars, which were then converted into gold and silver dollars and shipped directly to Yingkou Port.

The Shanghai General Chamber of Commerce held an emergency meeting and agreed to set up anti-enemy material receiving stations at major docks, and to waive all handling fees for all materials transported to Northeast China.

On the spot, Yu Qiaqing donated cotton-padded clothes and medicine worth 200,000 silver dollars in his personal capacity. He said something that was later repeatedly quoted by major newspapers:

"What's the point of money when the country is about to perish?"