As much as Yoshika wanted to rush over to Yamato, personally storm Hayakawa’s castle and forcibly rescue her master, that wasn’t a real option. For better or worse, she now had obligations, and her actions had to represent the entire nation. An aggressive act of war like that would doom Jiaguo.

That wasn’t to say she was entirely without recourse. In the delicate game of international politics, there was a lot of wiggle room for disputes over territory, broken agreements, or other supposedly ‘just’ causes for war. Even with Kaede’s education, it wasn't something Yoshika was particularly experienced with, but Ienaga Tsuyoshi was an old master.

“If you want to get involved, there are a few ways we could manufacture legitimacy.”

It sounded so duplicitous when he put it that way, but Yoshika wasn’t about to turn down advice from a man with quite possibly the most warfare experience on the entire continent.

“Hayakawa’s done us a favor by taking his time with it. If we were officially at war, that would give us fewer options. Option one would be to declare yourselves as vassals of the Ienaga clan. Jiaguo’s territory would then become part of Yamato under my flag.”

Kaede shook her head.

“We’re not surrendering to you, Ienaga. Jiaguo has its own national identity to maintain, and even as a political fiction, that would be suicide. It would destroy the existing agreements we have with other nations, not to mention place us in the awkward position of being culpable for any of your actions as a leader.”

Lord Ienaga nodded.

“I agree, it’s a bad option. But none of these options are good, so perhaps keep it in mind as a baseline.

“Option two is the other way around—my clan and its vassals schism from Yamato and declare ourselves under your flag.”

Yoshika’s eyes widened.

“You would consider that?”

He scoffed.

“Don’t get too excited, we’re just talking hypotheticals right now. It’s not as favorable to you as you might think. Accepting our surrender would still be considered an act of aggression on your part. You’d be at war with the rest of Yamato in an instant, and the other nations aren’t just going to look the other way. Not all of my vassals would accept it, either. Maybe two thirds at best—so we’d be losing a significant chunk of our fighting force.”

“We’d be forcing my father’s hand, but placing ourselves in a losing position.”

“Right. The last option is the most complicated, but before I get into it, I’d be remiss if I didn’t bring up the safest course of action—none. This isn’t your fight, so you always have the option of just staying out of it.”

Kaede frowned and shook her head.

“That’s no option at all. Master Yumi is more like family to me than Hayakawa Takeo ever was, and while I may have officially renounced myself as a leader of Yamato, it’s still my home. I can’t stand by in silence while a bloodthirsty warlord leads my people into ruin for his own personal glory.”

“Hmph, you’re Yoshika now. Goryeo is your home. You may not be dead in the way that your father claims, but you’re not really Hayakawa Kaede anymore either, are you?”

“I am. People often get confused about our identity. They assume that we are simply an amalgamation of our individual selves—equal parts Lee Jia, An Eui, Li Meili, and Hayakawa Kaede. It’s not so simple. I am entirely Hayakawa Kaede, and entirely Lee Jia. All of these aspects exist in parallel to create Yoshika. Yamato is and always will be my home, and the fact that I now have others doesn’t change that.”

He pursed his lips, mulling over his words.

“I see. Forgive my ignorance, then. The last option, then, would be for you to declare yourself under Hayakawa’s banner.”

Kaede blinked.

“What?”

“Not as a vassal, mind you. You are Hayakawa, and you have every right to fly the clan banner. The shogun hasn’t publicly disowned you—merely declared your death. No doubt he’ll do so as soon as you reveal yourself, but by then it will be too late.”

“Too late for what?”

He grinned.

“This is where things get a little murky. Acknowledging your role as a Lady of Yamato would essentially classify Jiaguo as a province under your rule. However, unlike being a vassal of my clan, it wouldn’t negate your independence.”

Kaede furrowed her brow, trying to internally untangle the mess of political affiliations that would create.

“I’m not sure where that leaves us, exactly.”

“Nobody is. It would be unprecedented. An independent city-state, a province of Yamato, a sect of Qin, a protectorate under Goryeo—you’d be all of these things at once, and that carries a lot of risk. The confusion leaves room for interpretation, and every nation is going to interpret it in the way that most favors themselves.”

“And the advantages?”

He grunted.

“Not many, to be perfectly honest. But within the sphere of Yamato politics, you would at least be recognized by the other lords. Clans split and schism all the time, though they usually have more backing. Not a single province is going to recognize you as the true Hayakawa clan, but that’s easy enough to rectify.”

“By challenging my father?”

“Precisely. Not a war between nations, but an internal conflict within the clan. I would, of course, support your claim—which would mean war. But it would be a war for which you couldn’t be held responsible.”

Kaede scratched her head. Not that she was questioning his wisdom, but it seemed like any outside observer would immediately see through such a flimsy justification.

“I’m not sure it would be so simple...”

Ienaga laughed and shook his head.

“Of course not! It’ll be an enormous mess, and you can expect to be picking up the pieces and putting out fires for decades or even centuries. But if you insist on meddling, that’s the way to do it without destroying your country in the process. Hell, if you win, you’ll even expand it.”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

She blinked.

“Expand it?”

“What, you think you’re going to war without any territory on the line? If you win your war of succession against your father, you’ll be the new head of the Hayakawa clan. His lands will be yours—and thus Jiaguo’s.”

A war of conquest was the last thing she wanted—but what was she supposed to do? Lead an army against her father, defeat him, then just give his land back? Nobody would accept that. It would just lead to even more death and suffering.

“I’ll have to consider this. It’s not a decision I can make rashly.”

“A wise choice. In the meantime, your scout team is quite talented. We’ve been watching the borders closely, yet the first I heard of them was when one of my generals informed me that they’d snuck into his own home.”

Kaede chuckled.

“The fact that it was her home as well probably helped there.”

“Maybe, but it’s no small feat. That, combined with your impressive ability to communicate with them over such a long range makes for a unique tool that we’d be fools not to make use of.”

She frowned. Yoshika didn’t like to think of her friends as tools, but that was just Ienaga’s way of thinking—the least she could do was hear him out.

“What did you have in mind?”

“We need information. I still don’t know what’s keeping Yumi from just escaping on her own. There’s no force in Yamato that could hold her against her will. I recommend sending your spies to infiltrate his territory. We can learn a lot about his short term goals from things like troop movements and local rumors, and if they make it far enough, a concrete evaluation of Yumi’s status.”

That would be incredibly dangerous. Rika was strong and talented, but sending her all the way into enemy territory was a much bigger task than a simple scouting mission to find out what was happening in Yamato.

“I’ll need to consider that as well.”

“Don’t deliberate too long. The sooner we can learn what Hayakawa is really up to, the better. If we wait too long, we may miss our window to act.”

“Thank you for the advice, Lord Ienaga. We’ll contact you again once we’re ready.”

He bowed.

“You’ve grown up well, Lady Hayakawa. If Takeo weren’t such a bloodthirsty fool, you would have made a shogun I could be proud to serve under.”

She returned the bow.

“I’m honored to receive such lofty praise.”

----------------------------------------

In the heart of Jiaguo, the largest lecture hall had been repurposed for the first grand assembly of Jiaguo’s upper and lower courts.

Representing the people of Jiaguo, the councilors of the lower court gathered on the highest level. The diversity of the councilors was—to Yoshika—a true representation of what Jiaguo strove to be. Immortals such as Lin Xiulan, Seong Eunae, and Lady Tennin stood shoulder to shoulder with the mortal councilors An Minjun, Pan Zixin, and monk Shinji—who had no family name as far as Yoshika knew.

Unfortunately the same could not be said of Long Ruiling and Yang Qiu, who stood out among their peers as pariahs. The fiends and especially the demons had not yet been accepted entirely.

Below them, representing the state of Jiaguo, was the high court. These were Yoshika’s closest advisors—Hyeong Daesung, Ja Yun, and Yan Yue. Technically, Hayakawa Kaede was part of the high court as the general in charge of Jiaguo’s non-existent army. Ideally, Yoshika would have preferred to have her seat filled by Takeda Rika, but as she wasn’t present, Kaede would instead be politely abstaining.

Yan Yue presided over the assembly as the prime minister, but it was Yoshika who sat in the central position at the head of the podium. Her role as the High Arbiter was to be the ultimate decision maker as the councils made their arguments. She was present in her spirit form.

The avatar’s appearance had changed somewhat after Kaede’s decision to remain as part of Yoshika. She was taller, with sharper facial features, and the white streaks in her otherwise black hair gradually turned red toward the bottoms. It was subtle, but Kaede was part of her now and that was reflected in the true form of her soul.

Yue stepped into the center of the floor, commanding the attention of the assembly with her presence alone.

“The first grand assembly of Jiaguo is now in session. Lady High Arbiter Yoshika will address the assembly first.”

She stepped back, yielding the floor to Yoshika, who took a deep breath.

“Thank you, Lady Prime Minister. I’m sure you’re all eager to know why I called this assembly, so I will be brief. It was inevitable that it would happen eventually, but this came sooner than I’d have liked—our nation is on the precipice of war.”

There was a brief susurrus in the gathering, but most of them had expected some sort of emergency to justify the sudden meeting.

“Shogun Hayakawa Takeo of Yamato has captured Lady Ienaga Yumi and charged her with the death of Hayakawa Kaede. It is our belief that he intends to use Ienaga’s connection to us as justification to go to war.”

As the councilors most intimately familiar with international politics, Lin Xiulan and Seong Eunae were the first to respond. Lin Xiulan stood first.

“Hayakawa Kaede is alive and well and in this very room. Does that not weaken their claim?”

Seong Eunae responded before Kaede could.

“That just makes her a traitor in the eyes of her clan. Whether we reveal that she’s alive and part of our nation, or allow them to believe that we were involved in her death, he still has cause for war.”

The deliberations went on like that for some time, with much of the time spent bringing the councilors up to speed on what was happening. Eventually, they got to the meat of the discussion.

“Why should we mire ourselves in the internal power struggles of other nations?”

The question came from Pan Zixin. As soft-spoken as he was with his family—and particularly his wife—he could be just as strong-willed as his daughter, Jiaying, when presenting arguments to the council.

Surprisingly, it was the monk, Shinji, who answered him.

“Our people fled Yamato because we feared the direction in which Shogun Hayakawa was taking the country. Though we are reluctant to involve ourselves in the very war we came here to escape, it would be a tragedy to see our former home and countrymen brought to ruin.”

Eunae nodded.

“And it’s not as though they would stop with just Ienaga. Once the shogun crushes his rival, he’ll likely bring the newly unified country to bear against us. If it’s between a difficult war now, and an impossible one later, the choice should be obvious.”

Lin Xiulan tapped her fingers, frowning.

“What of Goryeo? Will our allies not protect their so-called ‘protectorate’ from outside forces?”

Yue shook her head sadly.

“The best we could do was non-interference. Goryeo won’t strike while our backs are turned, but they won’t help us either.”

Yang Qiu had been silent for most of the assembly, but she chose that moment to speak up for the first time.

“Say we do go to war—who’s going to be doing the fighting? Sure, there are some former Yamato soldiers around, but most of our people are mortals from Qin and Goryeo. The cultivation academy hasn’t been running long enough to significantly increase the population of immortals—and that’s assuming your educational experiments even end up working. Frankly, Jiaguo’s too soft for war.”

Dae adjusted his glasses and cleared his throat.

“What Jiaguo lacks in quantity, we more than make up for in quality. The Cult of Harmonious Stars has some of the finest healers on the continent, and we are host to several peak houtian cultivators.”

Lin Xiulan crossed her arms.

“It’s presumptuous of you to assume that my people will be on the front lines of this war. And besides, many of our peak houtian cultivators have domestic obligations. Are you going to shut down the entire academy in service to the war effort?”

Yang Qiu huffed and rolled her eyes.

“We’ll do it.”

All eyes fell on her, and she met as many as she could with a challenging glare.

“You’ve been constantly denying us any opportunity to prove ourselves. Don’t get me wrong, you’re right to be suspicious—most demons would happily bite the hand that feeds them. But the ones in my prison are the ones that were smart enough to surrender instead of continuing to fight or flee.”

She turned to Yoshika, entreating her directly.

“Tennin’s been helping us control ourselves. And I think that a lot of the demons are ready to rejoin society, if you’d just give them a chance. Ja Yun, have you ever regretted hiring Beishang?”

Ja Yun jumped, startled by the unexpected attention.

“N-no! She’s my best worker, actually.”

“See? But I get it. You think that we’re mindless, violent beasts. So let us at least do this. If I’m right, then you get your army, and if I’m wrong, then you’ve unleashed a bunch of mindless, violent beasts on your enemies.”

There was a beat of silence, and then the entire hall erupted into a chaotic mess as arguments started flying in every direction.

Yoshika sighed and rubbed her temples. It was going to be a long day.