Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 142. Hurrying North.
“Come,” Jasmine said simply and leaped off the wooden roof with enough force to crack it. Seeing her so, Laien didn’t think twice and grabbed Arslan. He held him firmly in front of himself and before Jasmine landed, he followed suit along with the other three who were strong enough to make the jump on their own.
A few seconds later, the whole six of them landed in front of the Prophet one after another and sure enough, Jasmine didn’t wait long before letting her anger out.
“Would you mind explaining what is going on?” she asked in surprisingly polite words, but at the same time in a tone that sent chills down one’s spine. All the plans they had meticulously prepared were about to be flushed down the drain and then torched with fire! It was no surprise that she was brimming with rage.
“Do calm yourself,” the Prophet said calmly, although judging from the cautious look in his eyes, he appeared to be aware that one wrong step was going to cause his head to roll. “Whatever you do, the only way for you to avoid a disaster is to follow along with the flow of the river. The dam has been broken… I broke it, so it’s too late for you to change the course of fate or resist its stream,” he spoke without a hurry, his voice brimming with religious, almost fanatic-like conviction.
“Bullshit,” Jasmine cursed, but the rest of the words she wanted to speak ended up stuck in her throat. She had given some faith in the Prophet’s prophecies, so she realized that she would be a hypocrite if she suddenly expected the man to act rationally. If anything, she thought she was the one to blame for trusting someone like that with an important role in their plans, to begin with.
“Kill me if you want.” Seeing the internal conflict going on within Jasmine, the Prophet stated with a perfectly calm expression. “But do know that killing me is the worst choice you can make. You are free to distrust my words, but that will bear you no gain,” he said unhurriedly, keeping his hands behind his back without putting his guard up at all. If Jasmine wanted to kill him, he wouldn’t be able to resist at all… and it wasn’t like he feared dying if it was to become his people’s martyr.
“Tch,” Jasmine clicked her tongue, her head beginning to hurt from all the anger and the high blood pressure. She wasn’t young anymore so she knew she couldn’t act on emotion, no matter how much she felt like smashing the Prophet’s head into little pieces. She didn’t care about that man’s life or death, but she did realize that controlling those eight million people without him without become an impossibility. The question was, though, was it worth taking the risk? Not only the risk of what was going on at the moment but also the risk of the Prophet doing something unpredictable again?
“Nothing more that I won’t clearly tell you of will happen on my side,” the Prophet said with a smile, thus startling Jasmine. Yes, it was a point someone would make in the Prophet’s situation, but was it just a coincidence that he waited for a moment and only did so when she started thinking about it? Did he read her expression? “If you wish to bring your enemies down in the future, it’s the only path you can take,” the Prophet added meaningfully, appearing to be fully convinced of the truth of his words.
“…” Jasmine grit her teeth. She didn’t like the feeling of being led around by the nose in the slightest, but she also realized the pointlessness of arguing with the Prophet. “So, am I to assume you’ve got something left to ‘clearly’ tell me?” she asked grudgingly. She had calmed down somewhat by this point, so she was beginning to think more clearly. She had been infuriated in the beginning, but when she thought about it more, what the Prophet did didn’t change much in the grand scope of things; it only made everything more difficult and inconvenient.
“Three days,” the Prophet replied straightforwardly. “Three days from now, we will be at the border of the Guode Yimarate and we shall start entering it,” he stated, though for some reason he edged back ever so slightly, almost as if he was expecting to be slapped across the face by Jasmine.
“Three days too early then,” Jasmine said discontentedly, not even planning to argue with the Prophet. She could tell how pointless such an act would be, but at the same time, she didn’t feel like wasting her breath while she was trying to concentrate and think about something else. “Well, it’s annoying but it’s not catastrophic,” she mused to herself. The schedule being interrupted was a pain in the ass, but thanks to the nature of their plan, it would only strain it and not destroy it.
After all, the only information that had been leaked was that ‘Arslan might try to sneak through to the Holy Union using the eight million refugees that are being thrown out of the Ruishi Federation’. Elder Samuel had made absolutely sure that no other information left the Grand Camp and thinking further, it wasn’t like those eight million would be able to magically cross the seven or eight thousand kilometers to the Holy Union or the six thousand kilometers to the Guode Yimarate’s capital in the blink of an eye. Even if they rushed, they would at most be able to cross around a four to five hundred kilometers per day, and that was only if the weather was good and no one and nothing obstructed them.
“It should still be all right, no?” Laien asked just around the time Jasmine had come to her conclusions. “We just need to hurry up and get going right away,” he added with a smirk. Just like Jasmine, he wasn’t pleased by this unexpected development, but he similarly didn’t lose his head and didn’t start panicking. He might have lost his cool had he been faced with a similar situation in the past, but he had gained far too much experience and had matured a lot during the relatively short period of time during which he had been out of the Sarkcente Kingdom.
“Yes,” Jasmine confirmed, although she wasn’t able to prevent a look of surprise from emerging on her face. She didn’t expect that the boys would face this news so calmly. It wasn’t only Laien who didn’t appear to worry, but the other four also seemed to have only been startled in the beginning. Was Laien’s calm demeanor rubbing off on them? “However, that’s only if that man isn’t about to tell us more bad news,” she added after a brief moment of feeling impressed and shifted her gaze to the Prophet. Did the man have more unpleasant surprised in store for them or was it already everything?
“Nothing else,” the Prophet assured with a slight smile, which for some reason once again made Jasmine feel like beating him up.
“So be it,” Jasmine said with a snort. “The more important question would be if we are willing to risk ourselves by cooperating with this unpredictable guy… but well, we can always abandon the ship and retreat back here if he does more stupid things,” she said with a resigned sigh. In part, her words were meant to reassure the youths, but at the same time, they were a warning to the Prophet. She refused to believe that he thought that he and his followers wouldn’t be straight-out walking to their utterly senseless deaths if Makarash and the Ruishi Federation withdrew. So, she at least hoped that he wouldn’t do any more stupid things because of some ‘visions’ or something like that.
“Mhm,” Laien nodded a little, then put his fingers to his mouth and whistled loudly. He had noticed that Jasmine brought their horses, which at the moment were waiting in front of the house, so all that was left was to call them over. And sure enough, his own black war horse came over the instant he was called, causing the other two to follow him with more or less hesitation. In case of Yin’s horse, the brown one didn’t think much and joined Bellicose, while Jasmine’s Hisan Horse stayed behind for a second or two before deciding to go with the other two.
“Oh, here they come,” Jasmine said with a sigh, seeing the four high-ranked nobles from the Grand Camp. Prince Ludwig, Chancellor Meinhard, Duke Ayer, and Duke Diego. The four were hurrying over here, looking worried and anxious. “And those too,” she said quietly and looked to her right, at another four figures that were approaching. Elder Samuel, Elder Simon, Julien, and Victoria were hurrying over from the fort, undoubtedly wishing to learn what in the world was going on.
In addition to them, Reian, Sirius, and Kasha, who had left one of the nearby houses just a moment ago, started heading their way.
“Just give me a few minutes,” Jasmine said resolutely, though also with a fair bit of resignation mixed in within her voice. She stepped forward and gestured the approaching nobles to come over to her side, then waited for all three groups to arrive before explaining everything. Their original ideas for how Arslan and his protectors would be moving needed some adjustments too, but she was planning to just mention it and discuss it very briefly as to not waste any time. There was more than enough capable people on their side, so she didn’t need to take care of everything by herself.
In the meanwhile, as Jasmine and the others talked, the Prophet headed back to the Grand Camp. He wasn’t stopped by anyone, so he left just like that.
With three horses standing a few steps away from them, the five youths stood where they were without saying anything for a good moment. The silence continued for a bit, in part due to the fact that they had just gone through a somewhat nerve-wracking event, but mainly because they couldn’t find right words to say their farewells. It was just a little bit awkward for them, though they didn’t let themselves act so wishy-washy for long.
The first one to act was Mikaela, who instead of looking for the perfect sentence to say went ahead and hugged Laien. “Don’t die, okay?” he said simply, all the while holding onto Laien very tightly. Be it Laien or others, they were all speaking about how relatively safe this endeavor was, but he couldn’t help worrying. Something had already gone awry, so he really hoped that it wasn’t a sign that everything else would similarly start crumbling little by a little.
“I’m not planning to die anytime soon,” Laien reassured with a laugh and hugged Mikaela back. Jasmine was still in the middle of her talk with the rest of the adults, so he wasn’t in a hurry to let Mikaela go and by the looks of it, neither was Mika in a hurry to let go of him. “So cute,” Laien thought and chuckled a little. Almost involuntarily, he started tousling Mika’s silvery hair with one hand, enjoying how they shined in the morning sun and how smooth and silky they felt to the touch.
A moment later, Mikaela stepped back reluctantly. He knew there wasn’t much time left and he wasn’t the only one who wanted to say goodbye to Laien, so he wasn’t about to selfishly monopolize him. Instead, he couldn’t help himself and smiled wryly when he and Yin exchanged a glance. He chuckled and hugged Yin, too, causing the green-haired youth to smile in helpless embarrassment.
“He really isn’t used to it at all,” Laien thought in amusement, though he didn’t get long to enjoy the scene before he noticed Arslan walk up to him slowly, as if hesitatingly. Judging by the kind of look Arslan had on his face, there could be only one thing he was thinking about. “Hah, come on,” Laien laughed and crouched in front of Arslan, then pulled the five-year-old into a hug. In contrast to Mikaela, Arslan blushed heavily, but he squeezed Laien back soon afterwards.
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A few breaths worth of time later, Arslan was released by Laien and went to hug Yin, who had already been released by Mikaela. As for Laien and Raphael, the two of them laughed the moment they looked at each other. These farewells were a bit exaggerated and so they couldn’t help but feel amused because of how strangely awkward they made them feel. “Be safe,” Raphael said without wasting time on pointless words. He reached out with his hand, then shook hands with Laien while exchanging a meaningful smile with him. Hugging was nice and all, but wasn’t it a bit embarrassing to do it at their age, after all?
Yet, even though the two of them understood what the other was thinking, Laien appeared to have different thoughts on what to do with it. To Raphael’s surprise, he suddenly pulled his hand and got him to step closed, then hugged him with a laugh. “Didn’t we already hug before anyway? The only minor difference is that our clothes were torn to shreds at that time,” Laien pointed out playfully, causing Raphael to recall the moment right after their duel and sigh with embarrassment. The degree to which Laien like to tease people, he didn’t lose out one whit to Mikaela as far as that went.
Finally, a moment later Raphael shook his hands with Yin, concluding the brief and fairly simple farewells; and just in time as Jasmine appeared to have just finished talking with the adults. “If you’re done saying goodbye, then get on your horses. We’ve got no time to waste,” she said as she mounted her own stallion. “Take a look at that too before we go,” she added and threw two interspatial rings, one each into the hands of Laien and Yin.
The two youths quickly placed their own imprints on the interspatial rings and peeked inside. “Oh, makes sense,” they both thought the same thing and took out the maps of the Guode Yimarate and the nearby territories. They took around half a minute to thoroughly familiarize themselves with the positions of the Ikarian outposts and the routes of their patrols before putting the maps away. With their memorization abilities enhanced by their level of cultivation, they had no trouble with completing this task as quickly as they did.
“Good,” Jasmine said contentedly when Laien and Yin jumped onto their own horses. She sent a glance towards Reian and the rest of the group, causing Laien and Yin to do the same. However, the three of them didn’t indulge in any more goodbyes as Jasmine tucked the sides of her horse and galloped forward, forcing Laien and Yin to follow her without delay.
“Off they go,” Elder Samuel said and suppressed a sigh. In his heart, the importance of this group of five youths was impossible to be understated. His youngest son was obviously incredibly important to him to begin with, but now the boy’s potential had been unleashed and he had even made friends with so many unrivaled geniuses. How could he be perfectly willing to allow any of those five to get in danger? Alas, he understood that the true genius could only be shaped by real-life experience… and he did admit before himself that he had been too overprotective of the young generations for the past one hundred years. Luckily, most of those youths had been hot-blooded enough to seek their own adventures and trials, so it didn’t hurt the overall power of their country by much.
“I’ve even bestowed the Core Martial Sigils upon the two of you, so don’t you die on me,” he thought while watching the backs of two youths disappear into the eastern path out of the Grand Camp. This way, although they would need to cross about fifty kilometers more, they would avoid the vast crowd of the refugees and easily overtake the head of their procession, so it was a good choice on Jasmine’s part, as obvious as it should have been to anyone with half a brain.
“Time to get going.” At the same time, Zaban said quietly on top of the main house’s roof. He raised his hand straight up, signaling to his subordinates. The next second, his figure blurred and along with his men, he left the place. Their job was to make sure that little master Arslan’s advance would be safe, so given that the schedule had been pushed ahead, they needed to leave without delay. As for delivering further information to Mustafa, it was more convenient for Elder Samuel’s people to take care of it since their White Guard wanted to focus on the battle-oriented part of their plan.
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“Whew,” Laien allowed himself to let out a sigh when almost three hours later, their group of three finally left the mountain paths of the Ruishi Federation. The road had finally gotten relatively flat and turn-free, so he no longer needed to concentrate that much to keep up with Jasmine. “She’s better at riding than Ruan, though I probably shouldn’t be surprised since she’s almost a thousand years old,” he mused, all the while stretching the parts of his body one after another as to not drop any speed. Something was telling him that by the end of this ride, all the muscles in his body were going to be screaming in pain, especially since they would need to go through quite a few desolate roads or even straight through pathless forests in order to avoid Ikarian eyes.
“We’re out!” Jasmine called out from the forefront, using her Qi to send her voice to the boys’ ears. “Pay attention from now on. If you notice any danger, inform me immediately! Don’t let your guard down either, we never know what might happen! If we are spotted by any random Ikarian patrols, wait for my decision before doing anything. If they don’t look too suspicious of us, it’s better for us to leave them alone instead of killing them,” she instructed, reminding the boys of what they should already be aware of.
“Got it,” Laien and Yin responded at the same time, much to Jasmine’s satisfaction. She could allow and even enjoy rowdy behavior during usual times, but when it mattered, she expected discipline and obedience. They would be making their way through the lands controlled by Yimar Maar, so it would be for the best if they got through without any accidents.
“Guys,” Jasmine called out again. “The next one thousand kilometers is a straight way ahead. Can you go any faster than that?” she asked, unsure what was the limit of Laien and Yin’s riding skill. She didn’t know exactly how good were their horses either, so she could only ask. They were going at more or less three hundred kilometers per hour at the moment, but she felt that it was a bit lacking to be satisfied with. They would waste a lot of time later, after all, so they needed to make up where they could.
“We can still go faster,” Laien replied with a laugh. It wouldn’t make much of a difference to them if they sped up on the relatively straight road and their horses weren’t weak enough to get exhausted so easily either.
“Go as fast as you can then,” Jasmine said contentedly. “Pass me on the sides and leave enough space for me to get to the front again,” she instructed once more. Such simple maneuvers were the basics of the basics of what the White Guard learned as far as riding in groups went, but since those two had never been trained in those things she had no choice but to play the teacher in real time.
Still, she didn’t dislike the role and she was more than satisfied when the two did exactly as she told them. Moreover, she was startled to discover that they reached the speed of around three hundred and fifty, sixty kilometers per hour before steading their pace. The top riders with their best horses could at most go at the speed of a little over four hundred kilometers per hour, but those two got fairly close to this speed on this not-so-perfect road. Truly, there was no end to the pleasant surprises when those two were involved.
Once again in high spirits, Jasmine left the unpleasant surprise from the Prophet behind and moved to the front of their little three-man group. In this way, the three of them sped out of the Ruishi Federation’s territory and entered the Guode Yimarate at a neck-breaking speed. Soon, they couldn’t even be seen from the last mountainous parts of the lands as they disappeared behind the horizon.
With the sun climbing higher and higher into the sky, a strong gust of wind blew throughout the whole area, stirring the rare patches of grass and moving crowns of the faraway trees. As this momentary, beautiful picture unfolded, a few majestic eagles rose into the skies. Just like that, the memorable time Laien and Yin had spent in the Ruishi Federation came to an end.
Soon, ten hours of the ride passed and by that point in time, the group of Jasmine, Laien, and Yin crossed almost three thousand kilometers. Thankfully, despite the harsh pace which Jasmine had set for them, Laien and Yin were still feeling relatively fine, though their bodies were annoyingly stiff. However, since the two of them both boasted powerful bodies, they could handle this kind of a ride without growing more and more exhausted as the time went on.
On one hand, Yin’s overall physique had already exceeded the standards of a martial master of the first rank when he had been merely a martial practitioner of the eighth rank. Now that he was at the very peak of the ninth rank his overall physical prowess was above that of a marital master of the third rank, while his forte of speed and agility exceeded the standards of most marital masters of the fourth rank. On the other hand, Laien’s marital cultivation was comparatively lower in level, but the pure endurance of his body was actually close to Yin’s since he was a water-element practitioner.
“We’re leaving the forest soon,” Jasmine said clearly, as usually aiding herself with some Qi to send her voice only to Laien’s and Yin’s ears. “How are you two feeling? We can take a fifteen-minute break here if you want to. The next time we will have a chance to stop will be in another five thousand kilometers, when we leave the heavily-patrolled areas,” she said straightforwardly.
“We’re good,” Laien replied for the two of them, his voice sounding quite confident and even a somewhat cheerful. This made Jasmine slow down a little and look over her shoulder, but when she saw the two boys smile at her in response, she could only nod in agreement. If there were saying they were fine, then so be it. However, she wasn’t going to listen to any complaints later on.
“Focus, you two,” she warned, trying to sound stern but for some reason, she had a feeling that she failed to do so. “The next five thousand kilometers will be the most dangerous with the middle part being the worst. I will do my best to lead us, but do not hesitate to tell me if you notice that something’s wrong,” she reminded, preferring not to need to break through repeated attacks of Yimar Maar’s men. Worst case scenario, they would be forced to kill so many of the cannon-fodder on their way that the experts would be sent to kill them. If at all possible, she’d rather avoid this scenario.
“Yeah, got it.”
“Of course.”
Laien and Yin replied one after another, causing a smile to emerge on Jasmine’s face. There weren’t many youths who were so satisfactory even amongst all the disciples she had taught throughout the centuries. She definitely had no complaints about the two’s strength and they were also acting far better than she had worried they might. After all, Laien was quite a stubborn person and in certain areas, Yin could be just as inflexible. Moreover, as unrivaled geniuses of their generation, it would be strange if those two weren’t at least a bit prideful. Thus, having the two of them obey her instructions so easily without arguing about anything was a very pleasant surprise to her.
As such, the three of them progressed smoothly and first left the forest, then headed down the maze of the tight and unkept dirt roads that connected the many small villages in the area. While avoiding those settlements and making sure not to trip over any of the roaming Ikarian patrols, they crossed a few more hundred kilometers. Yet, as they were riding through the road running across the great wheat fields, the three of them suddenly pulled their reins at the same time and directed their horses to the right, plowing straight into the high-growing wheat.
The next instant, over fifty grey-robed riders rushed out from the forest-line that stretched four kilometers ahead. They plowed directly into the fields without hesitation, undoubtedly heading directly after the fleeing party of three.
“Should we turn and kill them?” Laien asked as they were rushing across the fields. Unless this fifty-man unit was comprised of the top elites, the three of them would be able to handle them. A few would inevitably escape, but it was still better than being chased around by them! It wasn’t hard to notice that the fifty were all riding top-quality horses, so leaving them behind, even though doable, wouldn’t be easy by any means.
However, just as Jasmine was feeling inclined to agree with Laien’s suggestion, two more groups of fifty riders appeared in front of them, one to the left and one to the right, both aiming to cut off their path of retreat. Along with the fifty grey-robed riders chasing them from behind, towards their left side, there already were one hundred and fifty riders moving to encircle them. A coordinated attack of this kind and with those numbers… it couldn’t have possibly been carried out by a few alarmed units of Ikarian patrols who might have caught a glimpse of them during the past twelve hours of the ride. Moreover, it was likely that another hundred people had been stationed in the fields to their left and would soon join the chase, cutting off the last path of retreat they could attempt to use.
“Impossible, did the information leak?” Jasmine asked herself, her heart beating wildly as she was overcome with anxiety and anger at the same time. She had many questions that she wished to be answered in her mind, but at this moment, she questioned only one thing. Were those riders elites, or regular experts? Because if they were elites, then the three of them were in deep shit!