Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 102. Decisions, Choices.
“Good,” Jasmine said with a pretty scary smile on her face. “Reian, I assume you aren’t going to object?” she asked just to make sure. Kasha was still too young and inexperienced while she cared little for the opinion of those six White Guards from the reconnaissance unit, so Reian’s agreement was the last thing between them and that new plan to achieve a victory.
“It’s not that,” Reian shook his head. “I’m more worried about whether Lord Mustafa is going to agree when he hears of it, you know,” he explained in a troubled manner. Given the circumstance, would Mustafa be willing to go through with a plan that was relatively more dangerous to Arslan?
“He will agree,” Jasmine said confidently. “He never was one to shrink from danger and he surely expects Arslan to do the same. He did allow him to go on this little journey just with us, didn’t he? I’m sure that if Mustafa knew as much as we now do about the inner workings of the Ruishi Federation, he would have taken an offensive option into consideration,” she elaborated calmly. She truly saw no reason for Mustafa to reject their proposition; Arslan had even eagerly agreed to it, so unless Mustafa became a coward after his cultivation was damaged, he wouldn’t object to the idea.
“Mhm,” Reian nodded in a half-convinced manner. Despite everything, he knew best how precious Arslan was to Mustafa. However, considering that Arslan would need to rule on his own much sooner than expected, then preserving one thousand of their elite White Guard to serve him and crushing one of his future opponents early on would certainly be of great benefit to him. “We might as well start making preparations without wasting time. Let’s work out the details and get to work,” he proposed, wanting to have a proper frame ready and established to let Mustafa know of their intentions as soon as possible.
After all, there would be little point in sending those six to merely deliver the news of a ‘rough plan’, they needed to have more than that before approaching Mustafa. Not to mention, the two-ways journey from the Ruishi Federation to the coast of the Faren Yimarate involved moving right through the positions occupied by Yimar Maar’s army; as skilled at moving stealthily as those six White Guards were, making repeated trips was like asking for an accident to happen.
“Yeah,” Jasmine supported. “Before we approach Elder Samuel, we need to know well what we intend to do and how. It shouldn’t be hard to decide everything, so let’s take it step by step and then make sure we didn’t miss anything,” she suggested, then smiled at everyone’s more or less enthusiastic agreement. She could see that those six grey-cloaked men were still unhappy with how the situation was developing, but their personal opinion couldn’t change the fact that Laien’s plan was simply superior to the one they had considered going through with before.
“Okay,” Jasmine turned to look at Yin. “First, those six days you mentioned. I’d honestly have liked to make it four or at least five… but are you sure you are going to need exactly six days for your body to recover fully?” she inquired hoping that maybe Yin had given himself a day or two of a window just to be safe. If so, then cutting the time by a day would be a viable option.
“Yes, I’m sure,” Yin responded simply and briefly, causing Jasmine to feel a little helpless.
“Six days it is then,” Jasmine conceded easily, much to the consternation of the grey-cloaked men, the leader of whom quickly voiced his objections.
“Excuse me, but I see no reason for those boys to be an active part of this plan. What use can they be in the Holy Union? They will just get in the way and make the way there more dangerous. I get that you want to involve them because this plan came from their side, but putting personal feelings before-…”
Before he could finish though, he saw Jasmine raise her hand and tell him to shut up for a little with its gesture.
“Zaban,” Jasmine said with a resigned sigh. “I know you and your guys want for the best, but unless you think we are all stupid, please refrain from such remarks. If anything, I have reasons to trust that those two will be of great use in the negotiations with the Holy Union,” she said with a slight smile and sent Laien and Yin a meaningful glance. Those two had been going beyond her wildest expectations time and time again, not to mention they held a considerable political influence in the south. She couldn’t claim for certain that they would make the negotiations easier, but she absolutely convinced that their presence there wouldn’t be disadvantageous to their side.
The leader of the six-man team of the grey-cloaked men, Zaban, frowned unhappily at Jasmine’s remarks. He really had a hard time understanding why everyone from little master Arslan’s group, the little master himself included, was so trusting of those two adolescent boys. On the other hand, he was forced to admit that he didn’t know enough to make a judgment, so he decided to stop complaining and allow the matters to run their own course. As for whatever the end results would be… he would give his utmost to serve Mustafa’s and Arslan’s case, even at the cost of his life.
“Six days before we go to the Holy Union then,” Jasmine returned to the subject. “We will need half a day to arrive there, even if we move at the highest speed. Then come the negotiations… I think that having little master move out from the Ruishi Federation in the morning of the eighth day should be good. Not too little time to prepare and not too much to risk any leaks,” she spoke half to herself and half to the others, then glanced around to see if anyone wanted to add anything. Seeing as it wasn’t the case, she continued along the same line of reasoning.
“That means we will need to ask Samuel to change the date of the eviction for those eight million people from three days to eight days… heh, looks like this Prophecy won’t be working out this time around,” she mentioned with a little laugh. From her investigation, she knew that the so-called Prophet rarely made any detailed predictions and focused more on speaking about the past and the future of certain individuals, or at most of the small groups of people or their communities. Thus, she wasn’t all that concerned with the whole ‘Six-Day Prophecy’ and sure enough, she wasn’t about to base their whole plan around an unreliable superstition.
“Well,” Jasmine mused silently. “There’s also the problem of the Grand Council changing their previous verdict, but there should be a war to work around this. For example, claiming that some unforeseen problems happened and it will inevitably take a few days longer to evict the people. We will come up with something either way,” she thought in precaution, trying to make sure that she wasn’t forgetting about any vital points that could prove consequential to the plan.
“On the same subject,” Sirius interjected, seeing as Jasmine was getting sidetracked by her own thoughts. “There’s a question of whether you two little masters are going to go with the reinforcements sent by the Holy Union or if you are going to stay there. The choice in this matter is up to you,” he stated straightforwardly. In a battle of tens of thousands of martial and spiritual masters, an addition of Laien and Yin would hardly make a difference, so he would understand if they preferred not to take the risk, especially considering the two of them had almost died fighting Yimar Furi and his men a few days ago.
Laien and Yin looked at each other, then laughed at the same time. After what, Yin replied cheerfully. “I wouldn’t have insisted on waiting six days if I didn’t intend to fight. It’s true that we are still too weak to be all that useful in a big battle, but on the other hand, we are strong enough to keep ourselves alive. It will be a good experience and we will be able to help Arslan out too, so why wouldn’t we join?” he finished by asking with a smile and exchanging another look with Laien.
With Yin saying so and Laien appearing to be in full agreement, Sirius could only reveal a helpless and yet warm and pleased smile. The same went for Jasmine, Reian and Kasha and of course, for Arslan, who was perhaps the one feeling the most grateful to Laien and Yin. He felt like he had true friends in both of them and could trust them no matter what; it was something he had only felt about his father up until this point, so it was an emotion of a great importance to the young him.
“Zaban,” Jasmine glanced at the grey-cloaked man. “I’m planning to be the one to go to the Holy Union with those two since I won’t be of that much use in protecting little master Arslan with my kind of a skillset. I want to also take you and one of your men to accompany us so after the negotiations are over, you will go back and deliver the news back to Arslan and his father,” she informed. Relying on flying beasts was most often good enough, but with how they had been shut down entirely during the battle a few days ago, she wouldn’t make a mistake of putting all her faith in them. It would be best not to send them out at all, actually, just to be on the safe side.
“Understood,” Zaban acknowledged the order and bowed his head. Although his response was too still and formal for Jasmine’s liking, she paid it no heed and continued.
“To be on the safe side, we should also go and discuss our plan with that Prophet. It would be troublesome if he insisted that his people move out on the sixth day, so getting him to cooperate would be great. Given that he might get his chance of raiding the Capital City of the Guode Yimarate thanks to us, and only thanks to us, he will agree… or so I think,” she suggested cautiously. A moment ago she had dismissed the Six-Day Prophecy, but she couldn’t neglect this aspect of their plan. It was necessary to get the Prophet to cooperate for everything to go smoothly, so she would do just that.
“With all of that said,” Jasmine brought up after a moment of thinking. “Are we missing anything?” she asked, unable to think of any more things they would need to decide upon or discuss preemptively.
“Maybe one thing,” Sirius mentioned with a smile that for some reason appeared a bit playful. “You could go and tell about our idea to Julien. He will support us eagerly, so it will make negotiating with Samuel easier,” he said straightforwardly and laughed quietly when he noticed the troubled look on Reian’s and Jasmine’s faces. He had only asked if she hadn’t fallen for Julien as a joke, but those two fools took it so seriously they were still bothered by it; it was quite amusing to watch though, so he wasn’t about to help them clear up this misunderstanding.
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“Couldn’t we help those people out a bit too?” Arslan suggested with the eight million refugees in mind. “There’s no point in having children attack the city… so maybe we could have them split up and have some of them head to the lands of the Holy Alliance? Or would that be too hard?” he asked, unsure whether his idea would be possible to work around. If it wasn’t convenient for them, then he wouldn’t insist; he had given up on those people once, so he could do so twice.
“Hm, it depends.” Jasmine raised her hand and rubbed herself under the nose, finally breaking out of the annoying train of thought involving Julien and Reian. “One argument we could use when persuading the Holy Union is helping out those kids. It might or might not work out, but the idea itself of not having the youths take part in the attack is good, regardless of whether the Holy Union agrees to take them in or not,” she explained with a smile, happy to be able to deliver a positive, or at least a hopeful answer to Arslan.
“I see,” Arslan nodded happily. They would basically be using those eight million people for their own convenience, so it was the least they could do for them in exchange. Knowing that it was possible to keep the kids in a relatively safer spot, he could feel a bit better about this aspect of their plan.
“I will ask again, are we forgetting anything else?” Jasmine inquired, then began to sort through their plan step by step once again on her own to make sure it wasn’t the case.
Everyone sank deep in thought for a long while. What they were setting up now was the overall plan; the details of how to convince Elder Samuel and the Holy Union, and the Prophet, would be left to the likes of Jasmine and Sirius, so there was little point in talking them out at this moment. As for the overall idea… none of them could find anything they might have forgotten to speak about and decide upon.
Getting an agreement from General Julien, talking with Elder Samuel, discussing the matter with the Prophet, sending an initial inquiry to Mustafa, getting to the Holy Union and negotiating there, having Arslan go out ‘in secret’ with those refugees and letting it leak out to Yimar Maar. They had the broad idea, now they needed to work on the execution and the minute details of each step.
“One last thing,” Jasmine brought up all of the sudden, only now having thought about it. “Will you two be tagging along to Elder Samuel and the Prophet, or should we deal with it on our own?” she asked Laien and Yin, leaving the choice up to them in a little of a sly way. Objectively speaking, she was pretty much asking whether they were willing to join those negotiations and in consequence, offer those two, with Elder Samuel in particular, some benefits from their own side. An average pair of twelve-year-olds wouldn’t have understood that, but going by the wry smiles those two gave her in response, she could be sure they had grasped the hidden intent behind her question very well.
“We will go with you,” Laien replied with a smile. “We are in it together, so if there’s anything we can reasonably help out with, we will do so,” he assured straightforwardly.
“Thank you.” Jasmine allowed the words to slip out of her tongue before she could think them though. Seeing the cheeky smiles on the faces of those two boys and the raised eyebrows of her companions, she coughed awkwardly, her face flushing red. It really was a bit too embarrassing for an old lady like her to genuinely thank those two young boys for their aid.
“Okay, enough of that,” Jasmine said and clasped her hands together. “I will go with Reian and discuss our plan with General Julien. You guys can go and finish your training. I will find you and tell you when the meeting with Elder Samuel and then with the Prophet is set up,” she informed but could only roll her eyes helplessly. It was a serious matter and yet, she had a feeling that those around her were smiling since she said she would go with Reian to talk with Julien instead of going alone. Sheesh, couldn’t they take this a little bit more seriously?!
“Fine,” Laien said with a laugh, then stood up and gave Arslan a look. “See you around the noon,” he reminded casually. Just because they were setting up this whole plan, it didn’t mean they couldn’t enjoy themselves in the afternoon, no? As far as Laien was concerned, it was better to relax and have fun if possible rather than to worry yourself over all that could possibly go wrong.
Arslan, on the other hand, wasn’t sure if it would be okay for them to spend their time leisurely. He couldn’t help but glance in Jasmine and Sirius’s direction.
“Go ahead,” Jasmine said with a chuckle and Sirius nodded in agreement. “We will take care of the setup and tell you about it. The three of you will only be needed for the final part of each undertaking,” she assured with a fair degree of confidence. She might have failed to take a correct approach in the beginning, but as far as managing the plan that was already sketched, there were few people better suited to that task than her, with Sirius perhaps being one of them.
“Okay!” Arslan responded so eagerly that after the fact, he blushed slightly and scratched the back of his head. He didn’t even know when, but the downtrodden mood of his had gone up and disappeared; he had been so worried and anxious, uncertain of the future… he had felt totally powerless. Yet, just with Laien and Yin appearing and turning everything upside down, his emotional state changed one hundred and eighty degrees. It was a soothing but at the same time, a bewildering thing.
“See you later then.”
“See you.”
Laien and Yin said one after another and left the living room and the house, and headed off to pick some peaceful spot do their Soul Realm training.
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Along the way, Yin asked quietly and with a smile on his face. “We’ve gotten ourselves involved in something crazy again, eh?”
“Don’t we always?” Laien laughed in amusement. “At least this time around, we know what we are getting into,” he added with a laugh. Yin was right; they needed to be reasonably cautious, but they couldn’t avoid all the dangers and challenges in the world. If they truly had sky-high ambitions, then they sure as hell weren’t going to achieve them by staying in hiding or under someone else’s protection for their whole lives. As to what the future would bring to them… only time would show.
“Let’s make good use of those six days,” Yin said in a calm, yet eager tone. “If we both manage to get to the first bottleneck in our new Mysteries, then we can get a bit stronger,” he mused, actually looking forward to the next time they would fight a life-or-death battle. He didn’t want it to be ridiculously dangerous… but he wanted to experience danger again. Was it his magical beast blood that caused him to feel like this, or was it just his own personality? Maybe it was both of those things.
“In six days?” Laien asked with a laugh, meanwhile agreeing with Yin’s inner feelings in silence. The spiritual bond between them, it really was convenient; they always knew what the other one was thinking or was concerned about, so they could work the problem out before it became unsolvable or led to some unpleasant consequences. “I don’t think we can reach bottlenecks in those mysteries in six days… at least I don’t think I can. I would need two… no, three weeks of doing nothing but that to reach it,” he said lightheartedly, seeing no reason to insist on setting an overzealous goal for himself.
“Yeah, I’m about the same,” Yin agreed with a laugh. “But isn’t it good to set your goals high? Forget about a week then, let’s just see who reaches the first bottleneck faster. Those Mysteries are of comparable level, so we can use them for that,” he proposed, thinking it would be fun to compete with Laien in such a thing. He always enjoyed their rivalry and he was quite sure… no, he was sure that it was the same for Laien, so why not make their normal training revolve around it too?
“Sure, why not,” Laien gave in without resistance. A little competition in the area of gaining new insights would only serve to speed up their training and on top of that, he would be able to try and win against Yin; but either way, whichever one of them won, the unmentioned part of the winner making a demand of the loser would be pretty enjoyable regardless.
“I wish there were some nice open hot springs here,” Yin mentioned in a seemingly random fashion, then exchanged a look with Laien. The two of them laughed, quietly agreeing to leave those things for some time later, when there would be a better opportunity and when they would be in a nicer place. For the time being, they left the frivolous thoughts alone, set up a tent for themselves and started training.
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“You are back,” Albert greeted Arslan with a slightly concerned smile. “Is everything all right?” he inquired. Arslan’s expression was better than he expected, so maybe he was wrong about the news being bad? But then, what happened that Arslan spent the whole afternoon and night away?
“It’s fine now,” Arslan replied in a vague manner and smiled at Albert and the others. Thankfully, Albert had enough sense not to ask any more questions while the rest of the youths present in the room sensed that they shouldn’t probe into this subject too deeply. And yet, surprisingly, Johan made an unusual request the very next moment.
“Say, could we maybe talk alone for a little bit?” he requested with a peculiar mixture of shyness and decisiveness.
Although he was a bit surprised, Arslan responded relatively quickly. “Will some other room here be fine?” he asked, to what Johan nodded.
“What do you want to talk with him about?” Sarah asked as the two boys were about to leave, but to her consternation, Johan only looked at her briefly, then ignored her question and walked away, soon followed by Arslan. “He really ignored me,” she muttered, not sure what just happened. Her little brother… she thought everything would return to how it used to be between them and even get better now that they found a safe place to live, but somehow, she had a feeling they were growing more distant by the day. She could no longer understand what he was thinking at all.
“You got what you deserved for prying,” Daniel mentioned from the side, his words accompanied by a quiet snort and shaking of the head. The kid obviously wanted to keep this thing private, but she asked him about it in front of everyone! Who in the world would answer her like she wanted him to?
“Why do you stick your nose where it doesn’t belong?” Sarah asked provokingly. “No one asked for your opinion, so next time keep it to yourself,” she said bluntly, unwilling to listen to Daniel’s opinion. She had cared for her little brother ever since he was born and she always wanted only the best for him, so she saw no reason at all for Johan to ignore her in such a rude way.
“Wow,” Daniel laughed in disbelief. “I thought you were nice, but you are actually quite nasty, huh?” he pointed out with a smirk. He could take shit from his superiors in the military or listen to his friend in a calm argument, but he wasn’t about to let some random conceited girl get on top of his head.
“Sarah, let it be,” Albert intervened in a hurry, recognizing how Sarah was about to get into a full-blown argument with Daniel. Sarah always had a fiery temperament and was incredibly stubborn so he could sympathize with her, but he didn’t want a conflict to escalate because of something so silly.
“What do you mean let it be…?!” Sarah hissed quietly, though when she saw the way Albert was looking at her, she was reminded of her own position. That kid… he was younger than her, but he was a talented member of this country’s army. Even if she disagreed with him or if she was angry because he insulted her, she shouldn’t make it too obvious, or so was the conclusion she reached.
“Eh, I wonder when we are going to leave this place,” Daniel mused in silence. He wanted to get to know Laien, Yin and Arslan better, but he didn’t want to deal with an annoying woman in the meanwhile. “Maybe I should have let those two siblings go alone and stayed in Lugna,” he thought resignedly and let out a heavy sigh.