"No," Katashi chuckled. "I don't think the Mizuno clan should rule over everyone."

"As if I'd believe you just like that," Jishin snorted contemptuously, approaching and sitting down next to the twitching corpse lying on the ground. "Everyone knows about your desire to surround yourself with a bunch of smaller clans under your control. Fukasa, Raiden, and Genji – these clans decided to accept your patronage. And what came of it? Now they are just parts of the Mizuno, never to become free and independent again!"

"But is your clan's principle, Sumada, any better?" Katashi's voice sharpened as he launched into a counterattack, stung by Jishin's accusations. "Anyone who dares to oppose you, you destroy mercilessly and without hesitation! You slaughter everyone down to the little children. And after that, you're telling me that Fukasa and the others have a hard life?"

"We also have clans that have asked for our protection!" Jishin retorted. "Don't talk as if you're not doing the same!"

Stas struck the corpse on the head with all his might, causing it to gnash its teeth furiously. The slap of his palm against the metal of the helmet made both debaters look embarrassedly at the smiling earthling, who gave them a nod.

Ordyntsev said nothing. It was unnecessary. Both princes realized that in their argument, they had unwittingly crossed the line of decency.

"I don't think the Mizuno should rule over everything," Katashi finally spoke again, and this time Jishin didn't interrupt him. "I believe that power should belong to a council of the heads of the most influential clans that join the alliance. Only then can we take everyone's wishes into account and move forward."

"It won't work," Sumada shrugged indifferently. "Some clans won't even consider negotiating. How do you plan to persuade the likes of the Deathbringers or the Rangiku, the clan of executioners? All this talk of peace is fine until you have to make tough decisions."

"Who said I think we can avoid bloodshed?" Katashi said slowly, his gaze drilling into the skull of the corpse. "I want to build a bright, new world without wars, but for my dream to come true, many will have to die and vanish."

"Now you sound like a proper warmaster, not some monk gone mad from meditation," Jishin smirked. "Still, I think your idea is complete nonsense."

"Why?" Katashi asked, genuinely interested in the response.

"Look," Jishin said, sitting more comfortably on the grass after making sure the zombie couldn't reach him. "Let's assume the entire Mizuno clan unanimously supports your idea, and you all set out to unite the warmasters. Suppose you manage to persuade a whole bunch of smaller clans to join you. You, Mizuno, have a way with words, I'll give you that. With that crowd, you might conquer one, maybe two great clans."

Jishin paused to take a breath.

"But by the second clan, your strength will be spent. You simply won't have enough people to continue the expansion. Sure, others might join you, but it'll be a drop in the bucket."

"You're mistaken, Jishin-san," Katashi chuckled. "I propose to start not with the smaller clans but by uniting a couple of large ones."

"That's pure fantasy!" Jishin rolled his eyes. "Even between us two, there's so much mistrust that we can't form an alliance. So what kind of union between clans are you even talking about?"

"Hmm," Katashi looked thoughtfully at his interlocutor. "You say there's no trust between us, so there can't be any between clans? What if I'm the first to trust you, Jishin-san? Will you reciprocate?"

"What are you talking about?" Sumada clearly didn't like Mizuno's strange behavior.

"Are you willing to let go of the hatred of many generations from your side if I provide you with proof that my words are not just words? Are you ready to take my words at face value, disregarding all the evil our ancestors did to each other?"

Jishin hesitated to answer. Sumada's gaze involuntarily crossed with Stas's. The earthling subtly nodded, expressing his stance.

"Alright, if your proof does us no harm, I agree," the youth concluded resolutely.

"Then let's go!" Katashi, like a bouncing ball, sprang up from the ground and, without looking back, headed towards Aoi, sitting on a log. For warmasters, it was no trouble to bring one of the felled tree trunks to the camp, creating seats around the fire.

Ordyntsev and Sumada exchanged puzzled glances but hurried after the excited Katashi.

"Uncle, how are you feeling?" the heir asked, examining his relative closely.

"I've been better," Aoi grumbled, though by the look of it, he was already somewhat recovering. He stretched out his injured leg, apparently to lessen the pain. "Decided to check on your uncle after all?"

"Uncle, don't grumble, I have an important matter for you," Katashi rushed to cut off the stream of lectures at its source.

"What now?" Aoi suspiciously looked over the clueless Jishin.

"You're good with seals, right? Can you look at Sumada's shackles and try to remove them?"

The man's jaw twitched, ready to drop, but he miraculously held it in place. However, the wide-eyed Jishin and Stas, who raised an eyebrow, were not so composed.

"Katashi, are you sure?" Aoi skeptically looked into his ward's eyes as if trying to telepathically convey the foolishness of his decision. "This Sumada is full of energy and has a full reserve of prana. I wouldn't advise..."

"Aoi," Katashi's voice hardened again, as it had before. "This is my decision and my responsibility. Please do what I ask."

"As you say, heir," the bodyguard relented. "Well, what are you waiting for? Katashi-san has made it clear. Come here and show your hands, or we'll be at it until late evening."

Jishin carefully eyed the calmly standing Katashi, then warily extended his hands to Aoi.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Stas noted that the injured Shin and Kusa happened to be conveniently nearby. They didn't show any attention, but they were close.

"Hmm, interesting work," Aoi murmured after thoroughly examining the shackles. He twisted Jishin's hands back and forth, memorizing even the smallest carved metal swirl. "Clearly the creation of the Tokitoru. Only those scoundrels have enough perversity to approach the art of seals like this."

"So, can you remove them?" Jishin asked, trying to keep hope out of his voice.

"Who do you take me for, lad?" Aoi grimaced, mercilessly crushing all hopes. "...Of course, I can do it. Although the Tokitoru are the true experts in the craft of seals, sometimes a simple axe strike is enough to break a fine filigree."

"Do you mean these shackles could have been removed..." Stas began.

"That was just an expression," Aoi waved off. "Hey, does anyone have a piece of paper?"

Fortunately, a piece of paper was quickly found.

Mizuno placed the paper on the tree, then pressed his fingers to the marks on Jishin's shackles. After a few seconds of stillness, he sharply pushed his fingers into the paper.

Before Ordyntsev's amazed eyes, a pattern of symbols spread from the man's fingers across the paper, burned directly onto it.

After a few seconds of "drawing," a picture appeared before all interested eyes: one circle was inscribed within another, with numerous different lines between and around them.

The area of the resulting image clearly exceeded the area of the shackles. This could only mean one thing – the local seals went not only on the surface but somehow also inside.

Mizuno's work then consisted of thoughtful examination of the scheme and burning his own thoughts and calculations onto the edges of the paper with prana.

Jishin waited patiently, not commenting on the work of the master of seals.

Finally, Aoi nodded at something and then began to touch various marks on the shackles slowly and carefully. After each touch, the marks glowed with a greenish light, which Ordyntsev had seen when the shackles were locked.

Watching the warmaster work was a pleasure. Every movement was precise and measured. He resembled a pianist playing a complex melody simultaneously in three different dimensions.

But the true triumph of his skill came when the shackles clicked open, releasing Jishin's hands.

Sumada began to rub his wrists joyfully and rotate them in all directions. He then stood up and stretched thoroughly, cracking all his joints.

Three months without being able to stretch properly – it was tantamount to light torture.

Jishin's face flashed a smile as he concentrated, and with a light upward movement of his hand, he caused the earth to rise before him, doing so without a word. Assured that his prana was under control again, Jishin leveled the small mound back to the surface.

Katashi's demanding gaze met Sumada's confident one. Now, both had access to prana. And Mizuno had only partially recovered his strength since their last battle.

If they decided to clash, it would be a disaster for everyone.

"I, Jishin Sumada, am grateful to you, Katashi Mizuno, for your help," Jishin demonstratively indicated a half bow. "And I accept your arguments. I am ready to listen to your words without prejudice."

A broad, satisfied smile spread across Mizuno's face, and then he practically teleported to Jishin, embracing him by the shoulders.

"Why all this formality, Jishin-kun, among friends? Just relax," Katashi called out to the twitching Shin and Kusa. "I'm not planning to harm your prince. If I wanted to, I would have done it long ago."

"He's right," Jishin managed to say, clearly struggling to accept his opponent's friendliness. "Now here we have only... friends."

"I'm glad you finally acknowledged that," Mizuno nodded happily. "Let's go to the fire! Only we'll burn this first," he nodded toward the corpse, "and then rest!"

At that moment, Stas had much to ponder.

Katashi's dream refused to leave the earthling's mind.

Yes, it was naive and full of inconsistencies, often contradicting itself.

The main problem lay in the very nature of warmasters, which Stas tried to hint at in their previous conversation.

The whole essence of the local mage-warriors' culture boiled down to war. The only source of income that warmasters recognized was war.

What would happen if Prince Mizuno somehow managed to fulfill his dream?

Wouldn't such an outcome be an even more terrifying solution?

Thousands of clans whose members would be completely deprived of the means to earn a living.

For Ordyntsev, it was clear that before such modernizations, it was desirable to think everything through carefully and take precautions.

Another important point was that since there were a great many clans scattered across hundreds of countries, they believed in different gods. Moreover, political principles in various clans differed greatly.

For example, while the Sumada clan had a division of all warmasters into the main and side branches, the Mizuno operated an inheritance system limited to a privileged and very small family.

And how many clans had even stranger customs?

In order to unite such a vast crowd of people, some "cementing material" was needed. An idea that would lead the new people.

Religion might have been well-suited for this role, but warmasters were not particularly religious.

Moreover, one should not forget about the daimyo of the countries and their samurai. Stas doubted that the rulers would be pleased to learn that they had become hostages in a huge conspiracy of warmasters that spanned the entire world.

This meant that following the unification war, another one would immediately ensue, this time against the whole world.

And all the blood that Katashi worked so hard to avoid would turn into a trickle compared to the ocean that could ensue in the worst-case scenario.

However, it wasn't just that which troubled the earthling.

Evening had arrived, and he lay in the earth dugout Kusa had created again, but sleep eluded him.

Stas had been in this world for more than three months. He had more or less figured out what was possible and what was categorically not.

Not all knowledge came easily. The iron grip of the Sansa clan elder was still fresh in his memory.

The connection with Jishin should make it easier to extract knowledge from the Sumada clan. Ordyntsev saw nothing wrong with squeezing every bit of knowledge from the stone clan in exchange for helping Jishin with advice and his brains.

The prince had called him his friend, and Stanislav sincerely intended to live up to that title.

However, Stas couldn't help but think about what he would do next.

Assuming that, as he planned, the warmaster techniques would submit to him, then, one way or another, he would have to serve the Sumada clan, embarking on endless missions to eliminate inconvenient nobles, destroy trade caravans, or even devastate enemy lands.

In the latter case, warmasters were required, for example, to burn houses and drive peasants from their lands, destroying the economy of various countries.

Stas did not want such a life for himself.

Ordyntsev even considered the possibility of becoming a renegade at some point and disappearing somewhere in the wilderness.

But Stas knew himself too well. He would not be able to lead a quiet, inconspicuous life, and sooner or later, a squad of enforcers would still obtain his head, separate from his body.

And in this respect, Katashi's plan stood out favorably because it offered something different. In this case, something else appeared before the earthling besides a road filled with dismembered corpses, burned villages, and rivers of blood.

However, if Ordyntsev really wanted to help realize this idea, he needed to become much stronger.

In the world of warmasters, strength was the decisive argument. Worse yet, warmasters only listened to others like them.

On the other hand, there was still time, as even Katashi himself had not yet decided anything. He was just an heir, and all decisions were made by his father.

Not to mention Jishin, who, being the second son, was, in fact, just a servant to his older brother.

And such a servant that they would gladly get rid of.

Realizing this lay of the land made Stas even more irritated than usual.

Stas turned over and lay on his side more comfortably, inadvertently opening his eyes. At that moment, the moonlight shone very conveniently into the earth hut, illuminating the torn face of the Kuchisake-onna lying almost right up to Stas's face.

The yokai herself was in her human form and lay along the wall parallel to Stas.

Ordyntsev had strong nerves, but at that moment, he not-at-all-heroically let out a string of profanities.

Or rather, he tried to, as the cold hand of the dead spirit firmly sealed his mouth, not even letting him twitch.

The large, black eyes of the yokai drew even closer to the restless eyes of the man, after which Kaede whispered in an intimate murmur.

"Now, why did you, my dear Shiro-kun, burn down my home?"