Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 67. Irreconcilable Hatred.

Just like Yin and Arslan, Laien was startled by the unexpected request of Sarah’s. However, his surprise didn’t last long. If one thought about it properly, it was all that unexpected for those youths and children to desire revenge.

“Are you sure you know what you are asking for?” Laien asked, displaying such a calm and composed attitude that in turn, he managed to throw Sarah off a little. “You wants us to kill them all? Even their children?” he added, curious if this girl knew what exactly she was asking for.

“All of them,” Sarah confirmed with a stern conviction. “I already asked these two guards of yours, but they said the choice was up to you three. That’s why I’m asking you. It’s not only me though; I believe I can speak for everyone here. Those Ikarians and the converts all deserve to die,” she said strongly and if the nods and expressions of the two dozen youths around her were any indications, she truly had the backing of her friends in this matter.

“Eh,” Laien sighed resignedly. He wouldn’t object to killing adults when they were blatantly evil, but wiping out a whole village, children included? It wasn’t something he could do without feeling bad afterward. He didn’t think he could agree to Sarah’s request and he knew that Yin’s thoughts on the matter were the same.

“Tell us why first,” Arslan suggested. Whenever he asked for something strange of his father, Mustafa would tell him to explain why he needed that or why he wanted to do that. He wasn’t sure if having this young woman explain her reasons would help much, but at the very least they would understand what made her and her friends come forth with a request of this kind.

Laien and Yin raised their eyebrows a little. Did this mean Arslan was considering to accept this request if the reasons stated were sensible enough? Still, regardless of whether Arslan’s intentions were as they guessed or not, they were interested to hear an in-depth explanation.

“Oh, we can tell you why,” Sarah said with a helpless, filled with hatred laugh. However, before she said anything she looked at those of her friends who were still staying on the side and attempting to calm themselves down. Some of those children noticed her gaze and since they had heard the exchange between her and the three boys, they caught on her intentions rather quickly. Thus, in spite of how much those children wanted to keep to themselves at the moment, almost half of them chose to approach and join the conversation.

“What eyes those children have,” Jasmine said in a low voice as she stood at Reian’s side. She had very rarely seen such cold and stern eyes in such young kids; the oldest of the bunch that was approaching was perhaps eleven or twelve, while the youngest kids appeared to be younger than Arslan. Yet, despite all the anger which could be seen deep inside their pupils, their eyes weren’t dead. Those children… they had just gone through Khatan, and yet none of them had given up on living nor given in to despair. Most people wouldn’t understand how amazing it was for those kids not to have broken so far… and the reason for their strength was probably…

“She’d make a fine leader,” Reian replied in agreement, keeping his voice quiet enough for only Jasmine to hear him. Truth to be told, he was tempted to test the aptitudes of all those youths and children to see if he couldn’t bring them back to Makarash and have them join the army… and even if they weren’t talented enough, he would be happy to make them his own servants.

“Well, why don’t I begin?” Sarah asked with a sarcastic laugh. “You know, my and Johan’s mother used to be a herbalist. That in itself is not relevant, but she taught me a lot before those Ikarian swine raped her and killed her… and raped her corpse more.” She laughed again, unable to cope with the reality in any other way than laughing at the ridiculousness of it. “Do you want to know why she was killed? It wasn’t that she resisted the rape; she had allowed those pigs rape her over and over to protect her family, but when one day when I was ten they turned their eyes to me. She tried to stop them, but you already know how it ended,” she spoke with a smile, but suppressed the hysteric chuckling which was forcing itself onto her. She didn’t want to frighten the other kids by acting mad.

“But well, I got sidetracked,” she added and shook her head. “You know, my mother taught me how to make quite a few decoctions, including the Morning Misery and the ‘Frivolous Night’,” she explained with a smile that seemed to be calm, but at the same time gave off a very scary feeling.

“Now, could those who needed to regularly take the Morning Misery raise their hands?” she requested and raised her own hand. Seconds later, all the older girls pursed their lips and similarly raised their hands, their faces turning paler than they already were. In the end, more than half of the girls present stood with their hands raised, some of them holding them up high like Sarah, some only keeping them up timidly. Going by how those girls looked, the youngest of them appeared to be around eight or nine years old.

“Put your hands down,” Sarah said calmly, nodded and followed up with the second request. “Now, could those who needed to regularly use the ‘Frivolous Night’ raise their hands?” she asked and smiled meaningfully when saying the name of the decoction, getting most of the youths and children present to smile back at her. By the looks of it, they had kept the old name of the decoction on purpose.

Including Sarah herself, this time each and every one of the youths and children standing with her raised his or her hand. Even some of the kids who remained on the side did the same.

“Put your hands down,” Sarah said and turned her eyes to Laien, Yin and Arslan. She briefly glanced at Jasmine and Reian and also at the two healers, Sirius and Kasha if she recalled correctly from what Jasmine told her, then laid out straightforwardly. “The Morning Misery is a decoction, or a potion if you prefer to call it so, that causes a miscarriage if taken within the first two weeks of conception. The Frivolous Nigh is a balsam-like decoction that helps wounds in your private areas to heal more easily while preventing infections. It can be applied both in the front and in the back.”

Even though they had already suspected what Sasha was about to say, Laien and Yin couldn’t help but grimace. Didn’t that kind of treatment put all those youths and children in the same position as salves, if not worse? Most of the slaves in the south would all in all be able to live bearable lives after being bought by someone. Those in this village on the other hand… they must have felt as if the sky shattered and fell on their heads with all of its weight, crushing them mercilessly.

“That’s how sending fanatics ends…” Reian murmured. He, just like all members of the White Guard, was of the same mind as Mustafa. They didn’t consider those barbaric Malazans to be of the same faith as them; the people who were capable of acts of this kind were no better than beasts.

“That’s….” Arslan said quietly, but his voice broke midway. He didn’t know what to say; what he had seen here was already terrible enough, but this young woman was telling him that there was much more? How come the world outside of Makarash was so evil?

“Did you start getting it a little now?” Sarah inquired almost angrily, but was stopped by a youth who looked like he was around two years younger than her.

“Sarah, that’s enough,” the grey-eyed youth put his hand on Sarah’s shoulder and asked in a warm, gentle voice. When he saw that Sarah calmed down after a few seconds, he let go of her and looked at Laien, Yin and Arslan. “Guys, there’s a lot we could tell you, but I don’t think it will answer your questions. We all lost many important things and even after our parents converted, nothing changed for better. When we say we would love to see all those people dead, it’s because we hate them all. Even their kids who are as young as three or four treat us as badly as their parents and older siblings… and we aren’t allowed to do anything about it, else we will be beaten up,” he began explaining, but stopped at one point and laughed as he caught himself doing the same thing Sarah was doing a moment ago.

“What I mean is.” The grey-eyed youth smiled helplessly. “I don’t think you would disagree that killing those adults and youths from the village is a bad thing. Your problem is with killing the toddlers and babies, right? But, what do you think those kids would grow up to be if they were left alone? Be it with their parents or without them, they will grow into monsters,” he elaborated on the problem, hoping that the three would understand their way of thinking and agree with it.

“Unless we took them…” Jasmine pointed out, though she soon clicked her tongue at her own words. “That would be too idealistic thinking. It’s better if you consider there are only two options, we kill everyone in the village or we take those guys with us and leave. If you are too soft, the world will take advantage of you. Trust me, it’s something this old granny has learned from experience,” she said in a somewhat of a self-reprimanding manner. It had been over two hundred years since she had left the City of Makarash; she had forgotten many important things in those two centuries.

“So it’s fine to be evil on a principle?” Laien asked, intrigued by Jasmine’s viewpoint. He wouldn’t care if he needed to do evil to protect those he considered to be his close friends… but was it fine to do something immoral just because it was the lesser evil or the greater good?

“Have you heard of saints?” Jasmine asked instead. When Laien nodded, she smiled at him. “Then, did you heard of any living saints?” she asked and laughed quietly when the look on Laien’s face changed. Yes, all the world-famous saints were people who had done great good during their lives... but all of them died early and came to be called saints after their deaths.

A saint was undoubtedly a great person, and the achievements of any of saint could make for a great tale. However, was it saints to whom people of the Starlight continent looked up to? No! They looked up to the heroes! The heroes were the mighty people who achieved greatness through their strength and talent; everyone wanted to become a hero, but who dreamed of being a saint?

“…” Laien suppressed a sigh. What was the right thing to do? Should he abide by what he thought was moral, or should he prioritize the well-being of the future situation of his own self and his dear ones? If one was to ask him if he wanted to be a saint or a hero though, then the answer would be quite obvious to him. “I want to be a hero,” he said with a laugh, then smirked when Jasmine and many others revealed looks of confusion.

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“Since we are getting involved,” Yin spoke up with a happy smile. “Since we are trying to do good, then we should at least prioritize ourselves in our actions. I think we should go along with what they want and kill everyone in this village to avoid future trouble coming our way. We should kill that hunter and his party that is yet to return too, just to be safe,” he said contentedly, very pleased that he and Laien have finally found a common ground. They would risk their lives to help those who needed aid, but they wouldn’t try to become saints; they would be heroes! And what heroes were to ones, were devils to the others.

“Yeah, I agree,” Laien nodded with a smile. He felt as if the burned he had been unconsciously carrying in his heart was lifted off him. It hadn’t been anything as large as the darkness Yin had gotten rid of, but it made a difference regardless. How should he describe it? It was as if his soul became a bit clearer due to him having figured out what path he wanted to follow in life.

Jasmine was a bit dumbfounded to see those two make their choice so quickly and so easily. She had thought they would take a long time to deliberate and consider this problem, and she had suspected they would go with a way that would leave their immediate conscience untouched, but they really ended up surprising her. They had impressed her quite a lot as a result. Those two boys definitely had the qualities necessary to become excellent leaders in the future.

Since Jasmine was so surprised, it needed not to be said that Sarah, Johan and their friends were wondering if they had heard right. They had already been quite daring with their request, but they made it because of how much they hated those people… including many of their own siblings, parents and grandparents who instead of protecting them, chose to become Malazans and forsook them. If all those detestable people died, then at least some justice would be done to this world. That was what they wanted to happen, but they never thought that it would come true; the best of what they had hoped for was this group Johan brought killing all the adults and older youths. Yet, they were agreeing to get rid of everyone just like they requested?

“If that’s what you want to do.” Reian didn’t oppose the idea. There were times when whole cities needed to be burned down and there were times when people would be dying in tens of millions. If one was to be concerned with every little ‘good’ and ‘evil’ thing he did, he would never live to see his grandchildren and what’s worse, he would bring the same fate onto all those who followed him. “If that’s what you want to do,” he repeated, this time looking not simply at the three boys, but looking directly at Arslan. What did the little master think? It might be seen as harsh to face a five-year-old with so many hard questions one after another, but he trusted that Arslan would be able to deal with such a challenge despite that.

“Honestly, I don’t know… again,” Arslan said with a troubled look on his face. “Is it really fine if I follow what Laien and Yin want to do every time? I mean, I have nothing against it… but won’t this journey be pointless if I keep doing that?” he voiced his concerns, unsure what was the right things to do. Should he rely on those two, or should he try to understand everything on his own and make his decisions? Looking at it realistically, he doubted that he would be able to make his own informed choice on a matter that hard anytime soon.

“Eh, we might have been hurrying too much,” Reian admitted with a sigh and scratched the back of his head. “A normal journey would still be fine, but this… this might be too much for you right now. However, I still believe you can learn a lot just by watching everything closely. I think you’ve learned some sad things about us Arkarians already…” he pointed out, in response to what Arslan grew so perturbed that he looked down on the floor. Indeed, it was mainly those who came from Arkaria who were doing so many bad things in Eulene. How did it come to that…? He would need to ask Reian to explain this whole situation to him in detail later.

Reian smiled with understanding, then crouched in front of Arslan and patted his head with one hand. “Never lower your gaze. Never,” he said calmly and strongly. “Always look ahead. The moment you stop looking, you become blind,” he said and smiled at Arslan, who raised his head and looked him in the eye. He was only repeating the words he had heard from Jasmine when he was still but a boy, not that different and not much older than Arslan was now, but those simple words allowed him to keep going when the shadows of the past haunted him in his early childhood. He trusted that those simple worlds would help Arslan walk forward too.

Although he wasn’t sure if he got the meaning of Reian’s words right, Arslan nodded strongly and decided to take care and not look down at his feet ever again. Feeling strangely relieved, he hugged Reian and stuck to him tightly. He really wouldn’t know what he would have done if he was here alone, without anyone to help him when he didn’t know what to do.

Reian laughed and returned the hug. After this eventful night, he was sure that Arslan needed to be comforted, and well, the way Arslan relaxed in his arms was more than enough of a proof that he was right. “We might have had a little too high expectations of this boy, both I and Mustafa included. It should be fine if we take it slower,” he mused

“So, any plans how you want to do it?” Jasmine inquired, glancing at Laien with a slight smile. She didn’t think the boy would tell them to go into the village and kill every one by hand; she was a fire-affinity spiritual master of the fifth rank and unlike Sirius, her abilities were battle-centered. It wouldn’t be easy, but she had a few spells capable of eradicating a small village. As far as she could guess, Laien probably intended to request her to do something like that.

“Yeah,” Laien replied with a hint of… excitement? Why was he excited about killing so many people? “If there’s no wind or only weak wind, then I have a way. But before that, aren’t there any people you want to get out of your village? It would be good if you took all the goods and weapons and alike that will be useful later on too,” he asked, turning his gaze from Jasmine to Sarah.

“He isn’t asking me for help?” Jasmine’s eyes widened a little. “Does he really have a convenient way to destroy the village? Or is he looking forward to slaughtering the villagers with his own hands…? If it’s the second one, then I must have misjudged him…” she thought grimly, once again thinking back to the trauma the boys were claiming to have had gotten over. Was Laien not so well after all? “I guess I will wait and see,” she told herself and for the time being, made the choice to observe Laien.

“Uh, yes. There are some people we would like to lead out,” Sarah said after she collected herself enough to speak. The heavy atmosphere which had prevailed in the hall had been dispelled almost entirely by a few exchanges between those people; the experience was so strange that she had needed a moment to make her brain, which had turned off by itself, work again.

“There are a few babies in our parents’ houses that we intend to take. I also trust everyone will be able to make their own choices whether we will be taking your families with us or not. If any of you wants to take someone we haven’t spoken about before, please come to me or Albert to discuss it beforehand. I shouldn’t need to say that we can’t wake up anyone who could raise an alarm, do I?” she spoke loudly and decisively, wasting no words for idle chatter. The nearly one hundred youths and children all nodded or spoke a few words in confirmation that they understood; planning their escape had been a pipe dream before today, but it was one of the few things which kept them going. They had discussed the whole thing countless times already, so there was no chaos or uncertainty now that it came to pulling the plan off.

“As for the items…” Sarah began saying a bit awkwardly. She first exchanged a look with Laien, then looked at the bloodstains left after the corpses of the men and women killed in the hall. Most if not everything they had was in hands of those few dozen Ikarians, so even if they looked for additional things in the village there wouldn’t be much they could take.

“Their interspatial rings, huh?” Reian, who was still crouching beside Arslan figured out quickly. “Come here, I will give them to you. I’d also present you with carriages and provisions, but I fear you guys would have trouble taking them out from the interspatial ring with your strength. I will give them to you later, when we part our ways.” Having said so, he tousled Arslan’s hair one more time and stood up, then produced a high-grade interspatial ring and handed it over to Sarah, who had a slightly surprised and very grateful look on her face.

“Thank you,” Sarah accepted the ring gracefully and quickly inspected the contents of it. She was surprised to see so much Arkarian golden coins inside in addition to the Euleanian golden coins, but at the same time she felt a bit sad that he favorite longbow wasn’t there.

“If you want the rings of those who were outside, you should ask Liza,” Laien said casually. “We’ve made them wait long enough anyway. Come on, let’s get it done before Zakar returns,” he suggested and began walking towards the exit without waiting for anyone’s response. Yin followed him in step, while the rest of those present took a second or two before they began leaving the building.

“You done chatting in there?” Liza asked leisurely from beside the row of small bonfires, with a cup of warm wine in one of her hands and a with a big sausage in the other. The seven of them who were keeping watching the watch had long ago noticed that the fight inside ended, so with the exception of the black-cloaked Gahar who decided to keep watch on the village itself, they sat down and made some snacks for themselves to pass the time in a more pleasant way.

“Yup,” Laien replied carefreely. “You have the interspatial rings of the people we killed here, right? Give them to her,” he instructed simply, knowing there was no need for excuses or other wasted words. They had an unspoken agreement back from the Anarchic Lands that if they want it, then the belongings of those Laien and Yin had killed on their own would be theirs. In this case the ones who did the killing were Reian and Laien, so Liza took out a ring and threw it to Sarah without complaining.

Sarah was a little stunned to see how much authority this young boy had in this group, but she didn’t comment on her observations. She caught the interspatial ring and revealed a smile when she found what she was looking for inside it. She took out the longbow and the quiver with arrows, along with a belt with a large hunting knife attached to it. With her cultivation of the sixth mortal realm and her weapons, she wouldn’t need to fear those who were left in the village even if something unexpected happened. Regrettably, the equipment her mother had seemed to have been sold long ago, otherwise she could have used it to concoct a potent poison to coat her arrows with. Although such poisons were at most useful against people who didn’t reach the peak of the mortal realm, they would be more than enough against the people she could contend against with her strength.

“There doesn’t seem to be any wind, at most a slight breeze,” Laien mentioned contentedly. A mere wind wouldn’t affect a spell directly, but it would interfere with it enough to cause him a headache. Had the night turned windy he was planning to ask Jasmine for help, but it didn’t seem necessary. “Let us take a look at the village,” he suggested and headed towards the place where Gahar was standing and keeping a watch from.

“Those who want to go down there, come with us,” Sarah said to her companions, standing with Albert by her side. “The rest should stay on the hill with those people and wait for us to return,” she instructed briefly and followed after Laien and Yin. Some of the one hundred youths and children exchanged a few sentences, asking the older amongst them to escort some of their family members out or to take some of their belongings out of their houses, but this discussion didn’t take long, at most half a minute. Thus, they all soon went to join Sarah and Albert at the spot on the hill from which the village could be seen from.

“It’s been built in somewhat of a valley,” Laien noted aloud. “Well, it will be a perfect place to try that out. Hurry up and get who you need to out. Ruan, take everyone and assist them just in case,” he ordered in his usual, casual tone. Ruan and the rest of his original guards were used to hearing Laien speak in this manner, but Sarah and Albert couldn’t help but wonder if Laien was being serious enough or if everything was something like a big game to him.

“If everyone’s ready, come with us.” Still, regardless of what she was thinking Sarah did as Laien told her to. She patted Johan’s head and smiled at him, then left towards the village with about two dozen of the oldest youths from their group of a hundred. She saw the seven adults come along with them, but she didn’t engage in a conversation with them. Everyone knew what needed to be done.