In the 21st year of the Republic of China (1932), the Anti-Japanese War in Songhu came to an end, and the towns around Shanghai were devastated. Although the Japanese army temporarily retreated, they secretly colluded with the remnants of the Beiyang warlords to smuggle arms; the trade route from Peking to Tianjin was controlled by the "arms gang", and scarce medicinal materials (such as coptis for treating gunshot wounds and Panax notoginseng for stopping bleeding) were monopolized. Jianghu bodyguards were reduced to minions of the warlords, and only a few people persisted. According to the old rule of "protecting the people but not the wealth", traditional escort agencies secretly compete with emerging spy organizations (such as branches of the Blue Clothes Club).
