Assassin's Creed: Templars 4
Assassin's Creed: Templars 4 is the fourth issue of the Titan comic book series Assassin's Creed: Templars. The comic, written by Fred Van Lente with art by Dennis Calero was released on 27 July 2016.
Publisher's summary[edit | edit source]
The streets of Shanghai have erupted into utter chaos as Black Cross finally evades the henchmen of Big-Eared Du and heads to the International Settlement to establish just how mush trouble the Shanghai Rite is in, and he learns that the corruption goes deeper than he ever could have imagined...[1]
Plot summary[edit | edit source]
1927: The Nationalist Army approaches Shanghai. Darius is trapped in the boot of a car, but is rescued by Roo herself who knocks out her husband. She reveals that she removed the item inside the box, and that it is now empty. Meanwhile, the Black Cross investigates the servant of Madame Sun, earning himself a meeting with her. They discuss how she orchestrated events to retrieve the box, and ultimately shows him the empty box.
Fessenden goes to meet with Du. After a heated discussion, General Chiang arrives to explain that he has no need for the Templars, and has betrayed them. A note is then delivered which contains the black Templar cross...[2]
Supplementary material[edit | edit source]
- Du Yusheng and the Green Gang that ran Shanghai
The chaos and terror that filled a streets of Shanghai in April 1927 was orchestrated and controlled by some of the most powerful and notorious men in the city. One of them was Du Yusheng [sic]. In the refined French Concession of the International settlement .
Born in the eastern provincial town of Gaogiao [sic], his family moved to the nearby city of Shanghai when Du was just a year old. The move was not an auspicious one, as his mother died shortly afterwards in childbirth, his sister was sold into slavery, his father died, and his step-mother disappeared and was never seen again. With no family to support him, Du returned to the countryside to live with his grandmother.
He returned to the city when he was fourteen years old and managed to secure a job in the French Concession, working on a fruit stall. His nefarious tendencies made themselves known early on, as he was fired from that role for theft. Unwilling, or unable, to return to his home town, he scraped together a meager living on the streets, eventually becoming a bodyguard in a brothel, aged only sixteen. It was this job that solidified his position as a member of the underworld, and it was In this brothel that he first became aware of the Green Gang, the secret society and criminal organization that was flourishing in the disorganization and confusion of the International Settlement and French Concession at that time. Du was intrigued, trusted and quickly became a member.
Still. a child by any standards, Du's life course was now set. After some time as a minor gang member, he was introduced to Huang Jinrong, the notorious mob boss who moonlighted as the highest ranking Chinese detective in the French Concession police. While not actually a member of the Green Gang himself, his wife, also a highly accomplished criminal, took a shine to Du, and elevated him to the coveted position of gambling and opium enforcer throughout the territory she controlled. This prestigious position allowed Du to indulge himself with the finer things in life. He dressed in the best fabrics, pure Chinese silk, and was often surrounded by beautiful, biddable, women. He was even able to buy a mansion in the French Concession, which he set about filling with wives and concubines. This was before he truly came into the power that would change the course of Chinese history.
In 1924, Huang Jinrong was arrested for the savage beating of the son of a warlord. He stepped down from his public positions immediately, and handed control of his criminal empire over to Du. In one fell swoop, he became the “zongshi”—the grandmaster of the underworld. He was controller of gambling dens, prostitution, and protection rackets, and, with the compliance of the police and colonial government, he ran the opium trade in and out of the French Concession. However, he also established a number of legitimate corporations, such as Shanghai's largest shipping company, and two banks. It was the opium trade that would plague him though, as he became heavily addicted to the drug.
Politically, the Green Gang had significantly benefited from the disjointed government of the Shanghai International Settlement and French Concession. In this murky legal environment, organized crime was allowed to thrive, driven by mass Immigration to the city and a favoring of ancestral ties. Yusheng and Jinrong became acquainted as they were both natives of the Suzhou area. As their power and Influence grew, the Green Gang were often hired by the Kuomintang to put down strikes and disrupt labor meetings. Working with other criminal organizations, the Green Gang were instrumental in the White Terror massacre of April 1927, which saw 9,000 pro-Communist strikers brutally killed in the Shanghai streets on the orders of Chiang Kai-Shek. Following this, Du Yusheng was appointed the President of the Board of Opium Suppression, in a specatularly brazen move on the part of Chiang Kai-Shek. Du Yusheng was now unequivocally in control of the entirety of China's opium trade.
He used this position as a means to further the causes of the Nationalist army, and amassed sufficient political power and prestige in that role that he was able to build and dedicate a temple to his own family. The three days of celebrations saw the great and good visiting to pay their respects. A few months after It opened, however, Yusheng had converted two of the private wings of the building to the manufacture of heroin.
Du Yusheng was not able to maintain his close relationship with Chiang Kai-Shek. The war between Japan and China that started in 1937 brought to light many of the differences in ideology between the two. Having fled to exile in Hong Kong, Du Yusheng did not return to Shanghai until 1945. Far from being greeted as the returning hero, as he imagined, he found his position diminished beyond recognition. He returned to Hong Kong in 1949, and eventually died there in 1951.
Cover gallery[edit | edit source]
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Variant cover by Dennis Calero -
Variant cover by Ashley Marie Witter
