472: Chapter 472 Chinese becomes the official language

Four minutes later, the Office of the Spokesperson for the United Nations Secretary-General confirmed to the media: A formal note had been received from the Federation of Myanmar regarding the extradition of war crime suspects in Malaysia. The spokesperson did not read the content of the note, but almost all the reporters had already downloaded the original text from Shuguang Cloud.

In the corridor outside the United Nations General Assembly hall, the U.S. delegation's emergency meeting lasted seventeen minutes. After the meeting, the U.S. representative, accompanied by Ambassador Haley, left quickly without a word, ignoring all questions from the reporters on both sides of the corridor.

Li Lanzhi looked down at her tablet. The first document Anwar signed after taking his oath was not an amnesty order, nor a cabinet list, but the "Permanent Agreement on the Joint Management of the Strait of Malacca." On the signature page of the agreement, after signing his name, Anwar handed the pen to the representative of the Federation of Myanmar—the representative was one of the political Death Soldiers assisting with the temporary constitutional coordination in Putrajaya during the takeover, with a baobab leaf emblem pinned to his cuff.

The photo of the two shaking hands was captured by "Vega" and pushed to every connected device globally four seconds later.

When the news reached Penang, the coffee shop on Armenian Street was crowded with people again.

The chisel marked the reference line on the keel for painting the new boat. Chen Shunfa squatted at the doorway, embedding the remaining fragment of the Mazu talisman into the mortise of the new keel of the "Shunfa." The new keel had been replaced overnight by several old fishermen helping out, and the wood was Red Willow Eucalyptus that Old Lin had transported from his hometown in the Pahang mountains. He pressed the talisman fragment into the groove, then covered it with a layer of waterproof tung oil.

He was wearing an old short-sleeved undershirt, with old bruises on his arms from being beaten by UMNO Youth. But he didn't mention this, just looked up at the footage of the signing ceremony on TV. Anwar's pen paused on the paper—that pen was an ordinary ballpoint pen, not some gold-inlaid limited edition. Chen Shunfa stared at the tip of the pen, suddenly remembering what his father had said: "We fishermen don't know many characters, but we know which characters are written for people to see, and which are written for the Dragon King of the Sea to see."

He said: "This one is written for the Dragon King of the Sea to see."

Old Lin was inside pouring coffee for customers and poked his head out to ask him what was written for the Dragon King of the Sea. Chen Shunfa repeated it in Hakka, and Old Lin didn't respond after hearing it, instead placing the coffee pot back on the stove, coming out to squat opposite Chen Shunfa, and pulling a kraft paper envelope from his apron pocket.

Inside the envelope were the fingerprints Chen Shunfa's father had pressed when he was detained by the British army in the 1960s—three copies in total: one with blue ink on a white background, one with black ink on a white background, and another that had been soaked in seawater, with all the characters dissolved, leaving only the solidified texture of the smudged ink. Following his father's original words to him on the boat during his last time at sea, he firmly embedded the remaining talisman fragment and the residual texture of the old fingerprints into the most stressed point of the new keel.

"The boat is repaired, it can be launched tomorrow morning," Old Lin said. "Still called the 'Shunfa'."

Chen Shunfa didn't answer. He used his palm to smooth the tung oil over the surface of the keel, the friction raising sawdust and paint chips, some of which embedded into the scar on the web of his hand.

At the same time, in the deep mountains and dense forests on the border of Kelantan State in northern West Malaysia and Thailand. After the remnants of the UMNO Youth armed forces and the remnants of the Malaysian Army 8th Division fled into the mountains, a portion crossed the border and infiltrated southern Thailand, while another portion retreated southeast along the Central Mountain Range. These people took with them javelin missiles, RPG launchers, portable radios, and a sum of cash in US dollars of unknown origin. Their commander was Major Shafiq, the former chief of staff of the 12th Reserve Division—after surrendering in the battle of the Perak River, he had taken advantage of the chaotic period as Zhao Yuxun's troops continued to advance to escape while being transferred as a prisoner of war, and had rallied the remnants of his troops.

After receiving his severance pay, Shafiq tore up his promise twenty-four hours later and assembled the scattered troops at the border of Pahang and Perak. Communications intercepted by Vega showed that the encrypted channel he was using highly matched the satellite communication link of the U.S. Central Command. The signal characteristics were consistent with an F-band terminal belonging to an agent who went missing from Langley last month.

The secret chamber of Council of Elders beneath Manhattan.

Barrett faced the holographic map, using his finger to circle the East Malaysia region on the situational map. The terrain of Sabah and Sarawak was magnified to the highest precision—mountains, rivers, jungle trails, and offshore reefs. The screen marked dozens of armed strongholds scattered across the two states, most of which were the old nests of local separatist forces, now reinforced by Malaysian soldiers to become core nodes of the resistance front.

"About four thousand remnants of the 3rd Division have arrived in Sabah. The supply line in the southern Philippines has been opened—we are transporting weapons through the Sulu Sea into Sandakan and Lahad Datu; the Myanmar Army does not currently have the ability to cut it off." Haskins placed a paper report on the table, carefully pressing down the crease on the corner with his fingertips. "In addition, the female Sergeant Farid, originally deployed at the Kuantan armory—yes, that Malay female soldier who deliberately delayed the shipment of javelins—it has been confirmed that she overheard the commander's deployment on the east coast last Wednesday and personally forwarded the pre-deployment schedule of Operation 'Grey Wolf' to Naypyidaw. She was hidden in the logistics system sequence of the Malaysian Ministry of Defense, and her identification tag was only matched yesterday."

Barrett didn't look at Farid's intelligence. He had been looking at the names of places in Sabah and Sarawak—half of which he couldn't even pronounce himself. His grandfather had participated in the British colonial planning for Malaya and left behind several manuscripts. The manuscripts mentioned the rivers of Sarawak, recorded using an old-fashioned English spelling, each followed by the same note: Inaccessible by gunboat.

"So what I am going to do today," Barrett finally spoke, "is to turn these rivers that are inaccessible by gunboat—into swamps that can trap the Myanmar people."

He curled his fingers, his fingertips tapping lightly on the dark green primeval jungle terrain of East Malaysia.

"Fighting an armored war with the Myanmar people on the plains of West Malaysia was the biggest mistake we have ever made. He possesses a full set of electromagnetic suppression systems, tank units, and satellite chains—but the mistake we made previously in Meiktila has already proven that his 'Sky Dome' anti-radiation strike capability is an entire order of magnitude higher than we estimated. In Kuala Lumpur, we learned it again—the cost was the total loss of operational capability of Grey Wolf Team B and an acting Prime Minister."

"But this is a different matter. Even the British never truly controlled this jungle during the colonial period. We don't need to control it now—we just need to make sure he can never control it." Barrett pressed the desktop terminal, bringing up an encrypted file marked "Plan B." "Fully support the resistance forces in Sabah and Sarawak. Not a proxy war—a war of attrition. javelins, stingers, mortars, tactical satellite chains, unconventional warfare consultants, all routed through the Philippine archipelago, not through Malacca. Turn Sabah into a second Afghanistan—no, turn the entire northern Borneo into a second Afghanistan. Let him be bogged down in the jungle for ten years. Ten years later, the administrative system he established in West Malaysia will be dragged down by guerrilla warfare, and his regime in Yangon will be hollowed out by massive military expenditures."