Isaac spent the next day with the A98 Enoch battle rifle, and then another day. Despite the cold nipping at his exposed fingers and whipping at his face until his nose turned red, Isaac laid at the edge of the firing range and kept shooting. Sometimes Bell was there; sometimes it was Dan, who had a running gag of pretending to get shot every time Isaac fired the rifle; sometimes it was Oksana, who could hit the farthest bullseye, and who would always say nothing as she did so. Oksana the snake sometimes slithered up to Isaac; despite the chill, the little snake didn't look all that cold. It flickered its tongue with each shot, offering a sympathetic hiss when a sudden snap of wind made Isaac miss the target entirely.
The days of silence helped. The rhythm, the methodical nature of it all, soothed Isaac, and eventually became so routine and usual that he desired for something beyond it. While healing his injuries after the armada, Isaac found himself longing to go into combat again. The silence of the hospital, despite being perfectly naturally, seemed artificial and fake compared to the crashes of battle, the bullets whipping overhead, the crackle of energy that came with cultivation powers. The quiet was too much; he needed to hear the sounds again. But when the fight with Tommy and his men provided them, Isaac soured on the whole thing, because he had killed so many in his journey, would have to kill so many more, and there was one in particular that hurt most of all. So he went back to shooting his rifle all day after the tavern.
But the shooting had run its course. On the way home one day as the sun started to set, Isaac passed by the dojo. It had just reopened a few days ago; he stopped in place, gazing up at the building, now rebuilt in concrete. After a moment, he could feel the desire to cultivate drawing him in. Cultivation itself was a routine; its application had led to the deaths of many, not necessarily the training of it. And besides, Isaac realized with a small smile - he still had a country to save. Time wouldn't stop just to let him mope around. He had things to do and discoveries to make. So he stepped inside the dojo, found an unoccupied training dummy in the back corner, and nodded slowly. A few months ago, he had spent days in front of similar dummies, practicing the Fists of Anji for days on end until he could finally get it to work.
This time, Isaac leaned his head back, closed his eyes, and exhaled. Rddhi built up in his body, and then exploded outwards with the exhale, the activation sending lightning streaking across the newly repaired floor. With ease, he redirected the energy down his arm, into his fist, reared it back, and let it fly. The motion was automatic by this point. Earlier, the Fists of Anji took thousands of attempts before Isaac could even send out a weak bolt of lightning from his fist. This time, one blast emitted a tremendous wave of energy and a sharp cracking sound as the training dummy was torn in two. The upper half landed at Isaac's feet; vacant eyes stared up at him, as they had a tendency to recently.
His body no longer hurt. His mind definitely did, but there was still enough in there for him to do what needed to be done, to shake off the rust and go back to what he came here to do - avenge his brother, find the truth, save this country, and establish a world based on freedom. He closed his eyes and sighed again.
All in a day's work.
Thus, after checking in with Coleridge and assuring the officer that he was done for the night (it didn't take much effort to convince Coleridge), Isaac felt ready enough for his next assignment. At the administrative building at the back of the base, a Combined Fleet guard escorted him to an empty conference room. This was the most official conference room Isaac ever had the pleasure of sitting in. Even the chairs felt comfortable! It's the little things, after all. A map of Arcadia was framed on the wall, along with portraits of old generals. There were no windows, but a few potted plants provided a little atmosphere, at least. A manila envelope awaited Isaac on the table; when he opened it, a photograph slipped out. In black-and-white and taken from a distance, it depicted the mouth of a mountain cave. The opening looked slim; from another angle, it would’ve been easy to miss entirely.
And that’s when some of the most powerful men within Arcadia entered the conference room. Isaac caught his breath; he was expecting to meet with just Stockham, not with the other two as well. He immediately rose from his seat and gave a crisp salute to the three men.
“At ease,” Stockham said. He then gestured to the old man next to him. “Cadet Spallacio, allow me to introduce you to Secretary Ricci.”
Ricci - the man in charge of the entire Arcadian Navy, the man who worked at Military General Headquarters downtown, the man who was part of the ruling junta itself. Isaac wanted to topple that junta, but he couldn’t just knock it down alone. He needed allies, and as the man currently keeping the Navy from tearing itself apart, as well as keeping the ambitious State Police and Army at bay, Ricci would be a powerful one. However, his appearance didn’t make that strength obvious. Puffs of white hair escaped from below his blue naval cap; the bags beneath his eyes betrayed his age and exhaustive work schedule; he leaned on a cane. But when Isaac shook his hand, the old man’s grip was surprisingly strong.
The other man had a bookish appearance and held a briefcase. “And this is Rear Admiral Leyton,” Stockham introduced. “He currently works within the Research Bureau as head of Naval Intelligence.”
“Nice to meet you,” Leyton greeted. He looked to be in about his mid-fifties, thin and wiry, with graying hair. Yet, Isaac understood something innately when they shook hands - this man is a cultivator. Circuit 3, maybe?
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
Isaac knew with certainty that Leyton was a stronger cultivator than him purely from the handshake, from the way the Rddhi flowing through each of them interacted when palm touched palm - Isaac’s Rddhi made a slight retreat away from the point of contact. Nothing nefarious on Leyton’s part - just pure strength.
The four men took a seat at the conference table, with Ricci sitting at the head. He almost slumped in his seat from exhaustion, but managed to keep his head held high, his small blue eyes appearing milky in the lamp-lit meeting room deep below in the bunkers beneath the base. The Secretary kept quiet while Stockham and Leyton caught Isaac up to speed.
Leyton opened his briefcase and pulled out several documents. One caught Isaac’s eye immediately - the slip of paper Lysandros gave to him a few days ago, which he then subsequently passed up to Stockham. “Naval Intelligence agents have confirmed the location given to us by your Atalantan contact,” Leyton explained. “It’s just beyond the edge of former Zhanghai forest and farmland now under the control of the Army along the base of some foothills at the western end of the Whiterock Mountain Range.”
That all made sense to Isaac. Lysandros kept him in the loop about the activities of Atalantans beyond the refugee camps, such as a pair of lumberjacks in the north who found an abandoned Zhanghai depot and sold that info to Lysandros for a price.
“What do you think is in there?” Isaac asked.
Leyton looked through his documents. “It’s a supply depot, so probably Zhanghai paper for charms, fuel drums, ore storage, ammunition, weapons.” But then his eyes grew ambitious. “But take a look at this. We’ve compared the location to several maps, some dating to before the Unleashing.”
Isaac looked through them, but saw nothing of note. The location, marked with a red X by Leyton on each of the maps, was an unmarked spot well beyond the borders of any adjacent town or property. Isaac lingered on the pre-Unleashing maps a little longer, not because they gave any further info, but because he was gazing back on life, so to speak, from centuries ago. Those cities were long gone, but their names survived through the maps now held in his hands. Isaac recalled the stadium that housed the Polyphemus before it ascended, imagining how it must’ve looked long ago, filled with thousands of people, all of them cheering, all of them living in a world at peace.
Then Isaac got to the last map and his romantic nostalgia for a time he never lived in vanished. This one looked far more official than the other pre-Unleashing maps - a crisp-looking seal depicting a bald eagle had been stamped in one corner. The makers of the map were revealed by the title at the top of the page - DEPARTMENT OF DOMESTIC SECURITY.
Isaac kept his best poker face on, but something bothered him. He had definitely seen those words somewhere before, but couldn’t pin it down as he examined the map. In contrast to the other maps, the area which now housed the Zhanghai depot was clearly marked, being labeled by the map-makers as something called “Population Exchange, Northeast Region, Third District Headquarters”.
“The Zhanghai depot sits on the site of a pre-Unleashing government facility,” Leyton summarized. “Given its title as a headquarters, we suspect that there may be highly valuable information in there beyond just Zhanghai equipment.”
“I’ll be activating Squads 1 and 3 for this assignment,” Stockham said. “Reed has informed me that she's made a full recovery, and Bell has proven himself valuable in the tavern operation.”
Squad 1 - Dan, Demetrius, and Oksana. Isaac felt comfortable with them. Reed too, of course. But Bell…
Stockham recognized the look on his face. “I understand you may have some concerns. But Bell was personally hand-picked by me for your squadron. He worked under me in the Research Bureau. You can trust that man.”
“I can vouch for him as well,” Leyton added. "I've worked with him before."
Isaac could at least admit that Bell hadn’t done anything to earn his suspicions beyond existing, so he nodded in agreement. But even more than just Bell, trust was simply hard to come by nowadays - the man who tried to kill Tommy during the raid was a member of the ultranationalist Knights of Greater Arcadia who wanted to eliminate him under orders from his masters. Not to cover up Tommy's crime - but because they subscribed to the motion that justice is death. Anyone who harmed Arcadia was eligible for such a punishment, and they cast a wide net for suspects. Many members of the Cultivator Marines officer corps were at least sympathetic to the Knights, if not outright members - which is why a cadet like Isaac was meeting with powerful figures like Stockham directly.
But paranoia will destroy ya, so the saying goes. Isaac had fought alongside the other cadets of Squad 1 and 3 before - he felt comfortable trusting everyone besides Bell, and he could tolerate the new squadmate, at least, so he nodded in agreement with Stockham and Leyton. With that out of the way, the rest of the meeting was spent discussing logistical issues, the timetable, and other administrative details.
Just as the meeting was winding down, Secretary Ricci spoke for the first time.
“Cadet Spallacio.”
Though his voice sounded exhausted, it carried an experienced edge to it, a firmness that immediately made the other three men look at their superior with full attention.
“We live in dangerous times,” the Secretary said. “The State Police and Army are pressuring me to appoint Vice Commandant Spinelli as the new head of the Naval Police. I will not. I’ll be appointing Rear Admiral Leyton to the role.”
Isaac glanced at Leyton, but the admiral kept his eyes on the secretary.
“The State Police and Army will be reducing the budget and resources such as coal and steel allocated to the Navy in response,” Ricci continued. “They want to seize control of our branch of the military, but I won’t allow it.”
The Secretary looked right as Isaac; his foggy eyes contained a stark clarity to them.
“I’ve been told of your involvement in the defeat of the conspiracy of the junior officers this past autumn. I heard you performed admirably. If we are to survive this winter, you will need to replicate that performance.”
Ricci tapped his finger on the Department of Domestic Security map, right on the current spot of the Zhanghai depot.
“Cadet Spallacio, take care of it.”