The Anointed Ones (7)
“Sometimes we even had to eat the oil. The first time I accidentally swallowed some that got into my mouth, it felt like my body and soul were both defiled—I nearly vomited. But... in the end, I adapted to that too. And when I finally licked my lips of my own will, that taste—how delicious it was.”
The moment Maryam uttered those words, her eyes squeezed shut.
She endured some very expensive torture.
Pig fat itself wasn't a precious commodity. But torture that cost more than utilities like water and electricity? That qualified as luxurious. Especially when it was such waste in a backward inland backwater.
If they'd invested this much effort in a single, strikingly beautiful Uyghur woman, the purpose was obvious without asking.
“Those who claim to be Allah's true servants, yet torment their own people worse than the Han Chinese, say things like this. Anyone who commits an impure act has a soul stained for forty days. Even vulgar words taint it for forty days; seeing something lewd, forty days; drinking alcohol, skipping prayers, eating without giving thanks, or consuming food cooked by a smoker—all forty days each...”
Maryam paused here, asking self-mockingly,
“So, how many years from now will my soul, unable to repent daily through prayer after licking that pig oil, finally be clean again? Can it happen before I die? How can I even pray with a body and soul this filthy?”
“Why worry about such nonsense from those fools? The ones calling themselves fundamentalists are usually the most rootless of all. Even as an unbeliever, if my memory serves, the Quran says pork eaten unwillingly isn't a sin.”
“O you who have believed, eat from the good things which We have provided for you and be grateful to Allah if it is [indeed] Him that you worship. Prohibited to you are dead animals, blood, the flesh of swine... but whoever is forced [by necessity], neither desiring [it] nor transgressing [its limit], there is no sin upon him. Indeed, Allah is Forgiving and Merciful.”
“That's the exact passage I remembered.”
“...Unfortunately, my people weren't so understanding. I had to walk past fellow Uyghurs in the camp while anointed like that. Every time, they recoiled as if I were something filthy. No one pitied me.”
Desperate crowds always react that way. Low education levels make it worse.
“Then one day, one of them pointed at me and shouted in our language: 'There's a traitor over there!' For daring to use Uyghur, he got beaten by the Korean guards—and earned respect among the camp's Uyghurs as a brave soul. In turn, I was branded a complete traitor without a chance to defend myself.”
“Was that finger-pointer Alim Shahidi, by any chance?”
Maryam nodded gloomily in affirmation.
The gap in delivery dates made me suspect as much.
From the Hulong Bang ledgers, there was a three-year-plus gap between Maryam Batur's receipt and delivery dates and Alim Shahidi's. With 'training periods' at one year, I'd assumed they were from different cohorts.
After a year, trainees met one of three ends: release as top performers, sale as merchandise, or death as failures. Even merchandise didn't guarantee survival—human organs were valuable.
Merchandise selection was a brutal beauty contest, survival of the fittest.
So Alim had something exceptional about him. Unlike Maryam, who'd been sold first, he'd endured years more in the camp. His looks were top-tier, sure. But they wouldn't invest extra years just for a pretty face—likely ties to socially prominent kin or potential threat status. Though being sold eventually meant his usefulness had an expiration date.
I asked,
“After you were branded like that, did guards or the camp warden you rarely saw start pulling you aside for 'kindness'? At first badmouthing Uyghurs, then later tempting you with offers of a new life?”
Maryam's eyes widened slightly.
“How did you—?”
“Obvious. Your looks are rare and valuable. Once they scarred your spirit without marring your body or face, where would they use a submissive you? Propaganda outside, agitation inside. 'Uyghurs can rise like this. All those old rumors are lies.'”
“...”
“I salute you.”
“What do you mean, suddenly...?”
“You ended up sold as a slave. Instead of accepting their temptations for controlled freedom and glory, you held your integrity to the very end. And even after, with repeated tortures and lures. I like strong-willed people.”
Quality humans, once won over, rarely waver.
The temperature around Maryam's eyes rose faintly. Emotions welling up. For someone meeting an understanding soul like me for the first time, this mild comfort was enough to provoke it.
“I'm sorry.”
“No need to apologize.”
As tears finally welled in her eyes, I nodded to Suyeon, who handed over a handkerchief.
Moments later, eyes reddened, Maryam clutched it and posed an odd question.
“Is the lady beside you your benefactor's wife?”
“...No. One of my most trusted advisors and an excellent warrior.”
“A warrior? A woman?”
“Rare, but even among Muslim women, there are those who fight in Allah's name. Like the Zand tribe from the Peshmerga. They produced war heroines like Margaret Malik... Though such tales might be unfamiliar to you.”
Uyghurs in Xinjiang connected to the outside world via smartphones, but under China's infamous AI surveillance system IJOP—the pinnacle of the Golden Shield Project. They were inevitably in the dark.
“I've heard vague rumors, but... it sounds too unrealistic.”
Shaking her head, Maryam gazed at Suyeon with wonder, then lowered her eyes under the pressure of Suyeon's impassive stare.
I asked anew,
“What was that about ancestral honor earlier?”
“Pardon?”
“Alim said it, right? Don't sully your ancestors' name—end your life. Was there another reason the warden invested in you?”
“Ah...”
Hesitating, Maryam spoke in a smaller voice about her lineage.
“I heard my great-great-grandfather was one of the Twenty Horsemen.”
“Twenty Horsemen?”
“The twenty heroes who briefly revived our Uyghurs' last homeland, the East Turkestan Republic. They started with just twenty cavalrymen and won independence.”
Revival meant the Second Republic. Independent from the Republic of China, then swallowed by the People's Republic. It lasted less than two years, I recalled. For a nationless people, that brevity fueled intense resentment and nostalgia.
In Korean terms, like a great-great-granddaughter of An Jung-geun or Yun Bong-gil.
In Korea, that's practically a stranger. Few even know their great-grandfathers' names. But in Islam, where early marriage was common under Prophet Muhammad's sacred precedent, four generations from great-great-grandfather to great-great-granddaughter weren't so distant temporally. With luck, shared meaningful memories were possible. Uyghurs rushed marriages to avoid forced Han pairings, despite regulations.
“Did you ever meet your great-great-grandfather?”
“No. He fled to the Soviet Union when the country fell. He passed before I was born.”
“That's a pity.”
“Yes...”
People are as useful as their knowledge allows. I welcomed this intel, but Maryam looked burdened. Inherited blood must weigh like a curse. She'd lived under constant surveillance from childhood, every move cautious. Perhaps her lineage leaked after being kept secret. Even as one of dozens of descendants, there were ways to exploit it.
“I get the picture.”
I interlaced my fingers on the table.
“I'd love more details, but duties await. So, to the point. Why did you want to see me?”
No immediate reply. She started to speak, swallowed it, repeated, struggling long enough to test my patience before finally squeezing out words.
“Benefactor. Won't you be the Messiah for me and my sisters?”
“...”
What nonsense is this?
Staring in disbelief, the unveiled woman straightened with a deep breath, spine rigid, eyes locked on mine.
“Even if you're busy, hear me out just a bit more.”
“I'm listening.”
“Like me, the younger sisters sold as playthings to Communist Party cadres had no hope. The members-only harem in Myitkyina where I was held was deadlier than Karamay camp. Potbellied Koreans' violence and lusts exceeded what human bodies could endure.”
She continued with a sigh.
“I at least survived long without major harm, thanks to Myitkyina's favor. The manager said no one had lasted like me. So I witnessed multiple... generations turn over.”
Her voice trembled faintly, fists clenched at “generation turnover.”
“New arrivals filling vacancies were mostly younger sisters. When they seemed at their limit, I'd prostrate before Myitkyina's owner, begging mercy. Sometimes food, rest, or treatment.”
“That's why the surviving sisters follow you?”
“More like depend on me.”
“...Continue.”
“The sisters leaning on me wept daily through the bars. All sobbing, asking if God truly abandoned us. If our defilement barred salvation. Each time, I—”
Her words halted on a tear.
“Each time, I reassured them: no, someday Allah will send His messenger to save us. They believed me. They had to—nothing else offered hope. We chanted daily: Allah will save us. Allah will save us...”
“Why specifically a messenger? God's will takes many forms.”
“Despair that deep needs hope just as vast. And clear hope is best. For believers, what hope is greater or clearer than a savior's arrival?”
Sharp mind. Born right, she might've been a cult leader.
“And in that situation, I became your savior?”
“Yes. The harem suddenly emptied of visitors; fires out, sisters left starving in darkness, losing even final faith one by one. Then you opened the locked door, light flooding in. You fed us porridge, led us from that hellish harem.”
This was... uncomfortable. Hearing myself described almost religiously from another's lips. The Round Table imperialists loved that sort of thing. My loathsome mentor had demanded religious worship from me and the other orphans, after all.