In fact, even without this last message, I still wouldn’t be able to tell him – it involved national security. As a specialized work unit, you could say that everything we did at Unit 701 was top secret and classified. It was our responsibility, our life, our past, present and future – everything. What’s more, my shifu – Chen Sibing’s father, Chen Erhu – well, he was at the heart of Unit 701, the secret buried within the heart of the enigma. How could I talk about this man to an outsider? Impossible. I can’t tell his son – I couldn’t even tell the Son of Heaven what was going on. To tell you the truth, I understood quite clearly what ‘ensure that it remains a secret’ meant, and it wasn’t directed at people like Ah-bing; rather it was meant for those who worked in the cryptography division. That’s right. It was meant for the insiders, for my old comrades. No one else knew, only me. ‘That matter’ is a secret pertaining to the cryptography division; it’s a personal secret concerning Chen Erhu, a secret he kept hidden from the intelligence service, from the cryptography division itself, from Unit 701. This is how it was. In Unit 701, Chen Erhu was not an ordinary man; he was extraordinary, and he had received perhaps more honours than any other agent. These honours were like a suit of shining armour, and even though he is now dead, Unit 701 will not forget him; they will in fact commemorate him, respect and praise his memory. I’m convinced his memorial service will be grander than grand, and that the tears of Unit 701’s personnel will fall interminably; but all of this will happen only because people don’t know what ‘that certain matter’ was. I was the only one who knew, and I understand why, on his deathbed, he had so solemnly warned me to keep it secret. Actually, this wasn’t the first time he had told me to make sure I held my tongue. That’s to say, even without these last words, I knew I had to keep ‘that matter’ secret from everyone, even from his son. To be frank, Chen Sibing doesn’t have the proper qualifications; I will never talk to him.