The forty-eight-hour recess felt like a ticking time bomb buried in the foundation of the No. 4 Mill. Lin Xia knew the Zhaos wouldn't wait for the law to catch up to them. In the brutal transition of the early 90s, when the "Old Guard" felt their grip slipping, they often resorted to the only language they had left: structural violence.
"Check the perimeter again," Lin Xia ordered Auntie Mei.
The factory was on high alert. The village weavers and the city workers, once divided by suspicion, were now united by the common threat of the Zhaos. They had heard the rumors: the Red Crane was coming to "reclaim" their property, with or without a court order.
At 1:00 AM, the temperature plummeted. The fog rolled off the Huangpu River, thick as milk, swallowing the streetlights of Pudong. Inside the mill, the only sound was the low hum of a single generator and the heavy breathing of the fifty men and women Lin Xia had organized into a "security detail."
Suddenly, the silence was shattered by the screech of tires and the heavy thud of a ram hitting the main gate.
"They're here!" Su Bo shouted, dropping his flashlight.
A convoy of unmarked trucks had pulled into the courtyard. Men in dark jumpsuits poured out, carrying crowbars, cans of gasoline, and—most terrifyingly—industrial acid. They didn't want the factory; they wanted to destroy the Ghost-Stitch inventory. If the spring shipment for Maison de Lyon was ruined, Lin Xia's exclusivity contract would be breached, and her "Line of Credit" would vanish.
"Don't let them reach the vats!" Lin Xia's voice cut through the chaos. She stood at the top of the iron staircase, a flare gun in her hand—a relic she'd purchased from the docks.
The attackers, led by Big-Ear Sun (who had been hired by the Zhaos for revenge), surged toward the weaving hall. They were met by a wall of crates.
The Zhaos expected the workers to run. They didn't expect the ferocity of women who had finally found their worth.
Auntie Mei and the village weavers didn't have iron pipes. They had the heavy wooden shuttles from the old looms—solid oak weights that could break a man's jaw. As Sun's men tried to climb over the crates, the weavers rained down a barrage of shuttles and high-pressure steam from the industrial cleaning hoses.
"You want to burn our home?" Auntie Mei screamed, directing a blast of 100°C steam at a man holding a gasoline canister. "You'll have to go through us!"
Lin Xia watched from above. She saw the tactical movements of the attackers. They were professional, moving in a pincer formation toward the "Master Loom"—the one currently weaving the secret Ghost-Stitch pattern.
She fired the flare.
The red streak of light illuminated the fog-filled courtyard, signaling the second phase of her plan.
From the shadows of the warehouse across the street, a second group of men emerged. They weren't wearing jumpsuits; they were wearing the grey uniforms of the Municipal Industrial Police.
At the front was Han Huojin.
He hadn't intervened in the courtroom, but he had used his authority to "investigate a report of illegal chemical transport." The moment the attackers brought out the industrial acid, they had crossed into a criminal territory that Han could legally suppress.
"Drop your weapons!" Han's voice boomed through a megaphone.
The attackers froze. They were caught between the fury of the weavers and the authority of the state. Big-Ear Sun, realizing the trap had closed, tried to slip away toward the back fence, but he was tackled into the mud by Su Bo and two dockworkers.
As the police began zip-tying the attackers, Lin Xia walked down the iron stairs. Her face was smudged with soot, and her hands were shaking, but her eyes were iron.
She walked straight to a black car that had remained parked at the edge of the chaos. The window rolled down. Zhao Kun sat inside, his face pale with a terror that went deeper than skin.
"Your mother sent you to watch the fire, Kun," Lin Xia said, leaning against the door. "She wanted you to see me break."
"I... I didn't want this, Xia," Kun stammered. "She said it was the only way to save the family."
"Your family is a ghost, Kun. It just doesn't know it's dead yet." Lin Xia reached into her pocket and pulled out a small, charred piece of silk—a sample that had caught fire during the first scuffle. She tossed it into his lap. "Tell your mother the factory is still standing. And tell her that tomorrow morning, the 'Embezzlement' evidence isn't just going to the judge. It's going to the Central Discipline Inspection Commission."
Kun's jaw dropped. The Commission was the final level of hell for corrupt families. Once they moved in, even the "Old Guard" could be erased in a weekend.
"You're going to destroy us all," Kun whispered.
"No," Lin Xia replied. "I'm just finishing the audit you were too weak to complete."
By 4:00 AM, the factory was quiet again. The attackers were in custody, and the workers were cleaning up the debris. Han Huojin walked over to Lin Xia, his trench coat covered in the grey dust of the yard.
"You took a massive risk, Xia," he said. "If I hadn't made it in time—"
"I knew you'd come," she said, looking at the Master Loom. It was untouched. The shimmering red silk was still taut, a testament to her victory. "You have too much invested in this 'experiment' to let it burn."
Han looked at her, his expression unreadable. "It's more than the investment, and you know it. But after tonight, the Zhaos are going to be desperate. A cornered tiger is more dangerous than a hungry one."
"Then we'll have to make sure the tiger doesn't have any claws left by noon," Lin Xia said.
She turned to Su Bo. "Get the ledgers. We're going to the courthouse early. I want to be sitting in that front row before the sun even comes up."
As Lin Xia sat in her office, waiting for the dawn, she picked up a needle and a thread. She began to mend a small tear in a weaver's apron.
She realized that the "Night of Long Needles" hadn't just been about defending a factory. it had been about proving that the era of the "Hidden Tigers" was over. The future didn't belong to those who inherited power; it belonged to those who could weave a new world out of the wreckage of the old one.
The forty-eight-hour recess was almost over.