"If you don't pay me back the money, you will not escape," said Liu in a text message on Tuesday morning to Chen, who did not reply or answer a number of phone calls from his employee.
"I got even angrier. Being full of resentment, I decided firmly to take revenge on him," said Liu, who then bought two lighters and some gasoline in a plastic can. He sprayed the gasoline on sponges and the floors of the building.
While he was spraying the gasoline on the stairs of the second floor, he heard the sound of footsteps and quickly threw the can.
After that, Liu lit the sponges on the ground floor and ran away from the site, according to his confession.
"I felt no regret for doing these things. As I could not get all my wages back, I had to give my life in this gambling with him," said Liu.
When asked about the innocent 14 lives lost in the fire, Liu said that he had not thought of them.
Chen was not in the building at the time of the arson attack.
Chendian Township, home to the factory, is a renowned underwear production base, containing hundreds of such enterprises.
Twenty-seven workers were working at the factory when Liu set the fire. Besides 12 people who succeeded in escaping, 15 workers were trapped in the blaze.
"The fire started on the ground floor and all of us had difficulty escaping. I was working near a window and survived by jumping out of it," said Chen Xiaoshan, a 21-year-old female survivor.
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