Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 77. Blood Debt.
“I finally made it,” Zakar muttered, looking at the mighty walls of the Fortress-City of Masalle, the second largest city in the Faren Yimarate. “If I got my hands on a better horse, I would have crossed those four thousand kilometers faster,” he thought restlessly. He had no time to waste; he didn’t know if those people who destroyed his village and killed everyone in it were following those Euleanian infidels or not and even if they were, a few days was more than enough to get out of the country. Be it toward the Ruishi Federation, the Anarchic Lands or the port city of Kaen; if they intended to flee, they might have already gone beyond their reach.
“I hope Furi is in the city,” Zakar said anxiously, but quickly stopped this train of thought when the unrestrained aura of the gate guards reached him. He hadn’t thought much of it when he saw a few dozen people guarding the gate since the Fortress-City of Masalle had an army nearly as powerful as the Capital City of Palee, but it definitely wasn’t normal for so many martial and spiritual masters to be assigned to mere gate-guarding duty! He could tell that each and every one of those men was considerably stronger than him too; just what was going on for the city to be on such a high guard?
“Halt!” one of the guards walked to the front and blocked Zakar’s way. “By Yimar Furi’s orders, no unaffiliated Realm of Heroes experts are allowed into the city. Identify yourself or leave,” the guard stated, his tone neither aggressive nor subservient.
The look in Zakar’s eyes hardened, his worries growing considerably. Would his old friend even be able to help him out? It looked like whatever was happening, it was something of great importance. “That should be enough,” he said impatiently and produced a golden insignia, on which engraved was an image of a crow that had a blood-red ruby as its eye.
The guard in front flinched nervously. The number of people who had the ruby-gold insignia of Yimar Furi’s could be counted on one hand. Someone like him couldn’t afford to offend any of those important personas! “My lord, if you require I’m assistance, just say a word,” he assured hurriedly. There were many different kinds of people in the world, amongst whom were those who would bear a grudge for the slightest offense. Just in case, it was better to be careful than to end up dead later.
“Take me to Yimar Furi,” Zakar said straightforwardly. To his relief, the man bowed hurriedly and led the way; it looked like his old friend was here, at the very least.
Ten minutes or so later, Zakar entered the Grand Palace and after getting off the horse was led directly to Yimar Furi’s private chambers by another guard. Thankfully, he his old friend had forced him to take this ruby-gold insignia of highest-authority back then. According to that palace guard, were it not for that he wouldn’t have been let into the ongoing council meeting.
“As I thought, something important must be happening,” Zakar murmured, then pushed the large black door decorated with many golden ornaments open. Immediately, he fell short of breath as a powerful pressure washed over him; the eleven people inside must have been not too pleased with this sudden disruption, thus their reaction. Because there were some people with shorter tempers in the luxurious chamber, the aura emitted by them was mixed with a dose of killing intent that honestly caused him to go weak at the knees. Of those present, the weakest was a martial master of the third rank while the strongest seemed to be a dual expert with both martial and spiritual cultivation at the level of the fifth Realm of Heroes. To him, the pressure released by all those people was almost unbearable.
“Wait, Zakar?” the man dressed in black and gold asked in disbelief, then smiled and laughed merrily, causing the other ten men to quickly withdraw their auras. “What happened? You always refused when I invited you to come and live at my place,” he inquired, the smile quickly disappearing from his face. He knew Zakar’s personality well enough; he wouldn’t have randomly come to visit him unless absolutely necessary. That could only mean something terrible had happened or was about to happen.
“I didn’t think I would ever do that, my old friend.” Zakar closed the door and walked deeper into the room. “Forgive me, I told you I wouldn’t… but I’m here to take you at your word,” he forced himself to say. He truly didn’t want to do that as he never thought about those old events between friends as anything worthy of a blood debt, but he didn’t have a choice this time around.
“Is he talking about…?” the ten experts, amongst whom four had gold sewed into their black clothes, wondered about the same thing. Was this strange man in dark cloak speaking about a Blood Debt? Was it possible for Yimar Furi to actually have an unpaid Blood Debt to someone?
“Do not ask me for forgiveness,” Yimar Furi shook his head. He stood up from the carpet and looked Zakar in the eye, then put his right hand on Zakar’s shoulder. “I told you, you saved us all back then. We didn’t listen to you, but you still came back to save us! Tell me what it is you need, I will do everything in my power to help you,” he said sincerely, not planning to go back on his word.
“Thank you, my friend,” Zakar said in a breaking voice. With Furi’s help, he believed he would be able to avenge his family.
“Now, sit down and tell me what happened,” Yimar Furi insisted, unhesitatingly pushing the original subject of the meeting off for later.
“No need, it’s not a long story,” Zakar said while shaking his head. Then, he explained the events of two days ago in brief words; how his eldest son was most likely killed, how the experts of Ulme Village disappeared, likely killed by that group of people. How an ice-element spell laid waste to the village and how his friends were killed by that terrifying cluster of shadows.
By the time Zakar finished speaking, the look on Yimar Furi’s face turned dark and murderous. The ten men present in the room also grew angry, partially due to being infuriated by the knowledge that someone had committed an atrocity of this degree and partially because their leader was angry.
“You are telling me you saw them, though from a large distance,” Yimar Furi brought up, restraining his anger in order to find out as much as he could. “Did you notice what kind of clothes they were wearing? Anything of importance?”
“It was too far away,” Zakar replied bitterly. “The only thing I could tell… I think there were some kids amongst them. Those in the front were all dressed mostly in white, but that’s the extent of what I saw,” he explained with his eyes closed and his forehead furrowed as he tried his best to recall the scene. Perhaps he should have taken the time to search the hill by the village to see if there weren’t any traces left there? Still, he doubted he would have found anything relevant.
Yimar Furi clicked his tongue. This much information wasn’t nearly enough; he could naturally tell that the cluster of shadows Zakar described was most likely a member of the Guild of Shadows, but he wouldn’t be able to tell who the rest of those people, including that ice-wielding spiritual master were. “The only option is to find those traitors and their caravan and get them to speak. Guards!” he mused, the yelled with the aid of his Qi. A second later, the two guards who had been standing at the door entered and immediately fell to their knees.
“Ulme Village in the south-eastern part of the Yimarate was destroyed two days ago at dawn by an ice-element spiritual master of fourth, fifth rank or above. All the villagers were frozen to death, multiple martial masters had been killed before that. A group of a few hundred Euleanians from that village should have moved out at that time. They might be traveling with those responsible, but they certainly know how those responsible look, perhaps who they are. In case you locate the experts in question, they are not to engage with them alone! Send the orders, I want Kashim and Skar and their thousand-man companies searching for them right now! Tell them they can use all the intelligence resources and money needed to perform the search.”
“Yes, Yimar!” the two guards responded in unison. They stood up, then ran out of the room to deliver the orders; they had never seen their master so agitated before, so they dare not delay.
“Furi,” one of the men wearing black and gold spoke up. “Are you sure we shouldn’t consult the White Guards stationed here before we take any action? With how the situation between Mustafa and Maar is, I don’t think it will be appreciated of us to act independently,” he pointed out, worrying that even if Mustafa didn’t punish them immediately out of convenience, he would do so afterward.
“It doesn’t matter,” Yimar Furi replied without hesitation. “If he gets angry with me, so be it. We can’t allow devils of this kind to go unpunished. Mustafa should share the same opinion on this matter,” he said somewhat dismissingly but ended up frowning a little. “Fine, Kuu, go and inform our guests of what we are doing. If they want, they may send a request for permission to Mustafa, but we won’t wait for it to make its way back before we start acting,” he said calmly, attempting to find an appropriate middle ground. He wanted to do all in his power to help Zakar, but he didn’t want to sacrifice all the men who followed him for all those years if it wasn’t the only option.
“I will excuse myself then.” The man clothed in black and gold, Kuu, smiled slightly and left the room, his steps calm and unhurried.
Yimar Furi took a deep breath. He was brimming with fury deep inside, but he also knew there was little point to him letting it out at this point in time. Not only would he cause his companions to grow distressed, but Zakar wouldn’t appreciate a pointless gesture like that either. “Old friend, I doubt you would agree to sleep if I told you to, so take a seat. We were discussing how to go about enacting the new laws by Mustafa’s edict,” he suggested, slowly beginning to regain his calm. He could have ended the meeting prematurely, but he thought it would be better for both him and Zakar to take their thoughts off Ulme Village for the time being.
“Yeah,” Zakar agreed at first, but he stopped after taking one step. “Tell me where your baths are. I spent one night in the forest and two days on horseback, I must stink,” he said with a weak smile. The image of those nine men sitting on the carpet, their exquisite clothes and their neat appearances made him realize how uncomfortable it would be for them to smell him the whole time. Those people would be the ones helping him kill that cluster of shadows and the ice-element spiritual master; it was better if he kept their opinion of him at a decently high level.
Yimar Furi was startled. He was calmer by now, but he was still too agitated to have considered the option of sending his friend to the bath. He could only nod, knowing not whether he should be amazed by how cool-headed Zakar was or worried how dejected he had become.
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“How long are you guys planning to keep hiding there?” Laien asked with a laugh, glancing in the direction of the door to the room Turukan had placed the four of them in. “Are you scared all of the sudden?” he asked, seeing as none of those behind the door came in or made any sound.
“I wouldn’t call it ‘all of the sudden’,” Yin said teasingly. “They heard about Ulme Village, so of course they are all a bit wary,” he added with a chuckle, displaying little to no if any sympathy for those villagers killed by Laien.
Yet, this casual attitude of Laien and Yin’s made the youths behind the door relax considerably. The few of them exchanged glances with each other, then entered on the tips of their toes and without making any hasty movements as if scared of provoking a beast into leaping on them.
“Is it true?” the oldest of the three boys present, the usually cheerful eleven-year-old asked quietly. “You used magic to kill thousands of people in Ulme Village?” he inquired in a secretive tone, making it look like he was asking Laien to share some kind of a great secret with him.
“It’s true,” Laien confirmed from atop the bed. “You should have heard what I told your father and everyone, no?” he asked and received nods of confirmation from the five youths.
“If our parents were bad people…” the eleven-year-old brought up bravely. “Would you have killed them and us too?” he asked the question, which was immediately followed by the atmosphere in the room becoming heavy. The adults might have accepted that what was done was done, but children always thought and asked about things anyone else would keep his mouth shut about.
“Who knows?” Laien asked with a little smirk but laughed soon afterward when he saw the expressions of the five turn rather scared. “I don’t think there’s much of a point to think about that. If your parents were some other people, you wouldn’t be who you are now either,” he said with a calm smile, being both honest and a little misleading at the same time.
The five youths took a moment to think about what Laien told them. They had never thought about themselves like that… so if their father had some other wives, they would have never been born? Instead, some other children would be there instead of them? It was a bit scary. However, this new point of view allowed them to discard their worries. They assumed it was just like Laien was saying; since their parents were good people, there was no point worrying about some ‘what ifs’.
“We were stupid to be scared,” the twelve years old girl, Amina said with a timid smile and a blush on her face. “There is no way little master Arslan would be friends with evil people…” she added, making the reason for her flushed face clear enough.
“Look, she’s hitting on you,” Laien commented frivolously, causing Arslan to grow more embarrassed than he had already been due to Amina’s unexpected comment.
“The first love huh? How cute,” Yin joined the teasing too. He usually wouldn’t have done so, but he was in a mood for some fooling around at the moment.
“You shouldn’t tease him about it too much…” Johan brought up shyly, but contrary to his intentions, he made Arslan and the girl feel all the more ashamed.
As the older friends of Arslan’s kept poking fun at him, Amina and the other four relaxed thoroughly, the last lingering bits of fear dissipating from within their minds and hearts. They had joked around and played with Laien and the rest at the dinner, so why were they getting all scared now? Instead of doing that, they would rather make the best of this night and play with them!
With the atmosphere brightened up, the group of youths went ahead and spent the first half of the night chatting, laughing and playing games, and… drinking a little bit of wine. As for what kind of games happened before they all went to sleep, the nine youths agreed not to mention it to anyone. They might not have gone far enough for it to bring any real trouble, but they preferred to keep the events of this night between themselves, leaving them as a little dream, a little secret of theirs.
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At the same time when the nine youths were sleeping soundly in Turukan’s house, just an hour or so after the dawn, a bird brought a certain message to the City of Masalle. The servant who received it quickly took a look at the piece of paper he withdrew from the interspatial ring on the leg of the bird; the message wasn’t confidential, so he unrolled the piece of paper and read it.
“The Ulme Village was… by… no!” The servant just so happened to be on the bright side, as most people employed by Yimar Furi. Just like most people in the city, he had heard about the big search for those responsible for the destruction of Ulme Village. Additionally, he had just so happened to have been serving Yimar Furi for a long time, so he understood Yimar’s disposition nearly as well as his close aides. Because of that, he hesitated; should he destroy this message?
He thought about it but discarded the idea almost immediately. Yimar Furi would have learned the news sooner or later; he wouldn’t have made much of a difference and all he would get would be an early death for himself and his family. He had no doubt Yimar Furi would have been absolutely furious with him had he concealed this letter, thus he stopped thinking about things servant shouldn’t be thinking about and ran to his master’s private chambers as fast as he could.
Only later would this servant find out that just after he left, yet another bird came flying, this time carrying a message from Palee City, a message from Mustafa.
Regardless, it was just a few minutes later when Yimar Furi received the message from the servant and read it aloud to his ten companions and Zakar.
The moment he finished, the room fell into an utter chaos as the ten aides of his began voicing their opinions and talking one after another.
“How could Mustafa’s son have allowed this to happen?”
“Do you really think it’s weird? If Ulme Village was a fundamental one, then it’s not surprising.”
“What should we do? They say that a kid is that ice-element spiritual master… isn’t it a bit too ridiculous?”
“Do you think they have a reason to lie?”
“More importantly, what do we do? Are we really going to go to war with Mustafa?”
“We could join Yimar Maar’s camp…”
“You believe he will win? Unless the Great Prophet sides with him openly, he will inevitably lose.”
“Is there no other way?”
“Maybe if we tried talking to Mustafa...”
Amidst the clamor, Yimar Furi remained silent. However, with each passing second, the still suppressed aura of his was growing more and more menacing. The man closed his eyes, contemplating the choice he had to make for a brief moment; then, he stomped on the ground as his eyes suddenly snapped open. The sound of the cracking floor accompanied by the loud bang as he involuntarily released some spiritual energy, which immediately turned into a splash of water at his feet, made the ten aides of his shut their mouths in an instant.
Now that the room was quiet once again, Yimar Furi spoke with strong conviction. “Whether this information is true or not, we will confirm it ourselves. I suspect Mustafa will be acting quickly now; he will try to deal with the Banxi Yimarate in a hurry since he slipped up and let many experts of the Faren Yimarate flee and join Yimar Maar. Luckily, the White Guards stationed in our city didn’t want us to ask for any permissions when Kuu told them about Ulme Village in the evening. That’s why the best opportunity to act is now,” he paused briefly and swept the ten aides of his with a stern gaze. He had somewhat expected it, but he couldn’t help but reveal a smile when he saw no doubt or hesitation in the men’s eyes.
“The Blood Debt must be paid… Zakar, I’m planning to kill everyone with the exception of Mustafa’s son. We need to capture him, else be it Yimar Maar or the Great Prophet, no one will be able to protect my city and our families from Mustafa’s wrath,” he said in a questioning tone, looking for Zakar to either agree to this plan or not. If the latter was the case, then he was absolutely ready to throw caution to the wind and set out to slaughter all those people, Mustafa’s son included!
Still, as long as Zakar agreed, he wanted to leave a way for his family, friends and the City of Masalle to survive.
“Of course, I’m more than satisfied as long as that ice-element Djinn spawn dies,” Zakar said and bowed his head. “I’m grateful you are willing to go that far already. I would never ask you to embark on a path of certain death for you and your people. Rather than that, I’d rather attempt to get the revenge on my own,” he said gratefully, keeping his head low the whole time. Truth to be told, he hadn’t been sure if Furi would still act after this letter arrived. Paying the Blood Debt became pretty much equivalent to at the very least heavily offending Mustafa, if not with becoming sworn enemies with him. For his old friend to be willing to go so far… Zakar was at a loss for words. One would only know his friends in his greatest hour of need, this saying was very much true!
“Shall be it,” Yimar Furi said, a dangerous smile creeping onto his face. “Any objections?” he asked his ten aides, only for his smile to grow wider when no one spoke up. He hadn’t been mistaken in choosing those people to be his comrades and companions!
“We will confirm what Mustafa is doing first. We already agreed to support him and did so during the hunt for the experts, so he shouldn’t suspect anything. When the time is right, I want to take all of you and your elite men to come with me to chase down that caravan! We shall move swiftly and finish everything before Mustafa can react. As for how it all goes… it’s going to depend on the attitude of that kid, Arslan,” he explained for the sake of clarification and looked at Zakar. His old friend should be fine with this course of action, he was pretty sure?
“That will be for the best,” Zakar admitted somewhat reluctantly. “As long as that Ice Devil is killed, I will be content,” he said, then suppressed a sigh. His bloodthirst would have only been completely sated if all the people involved in the slaughter of his village were killed, but he couldn’t very well demand his old friend to make the greatest sacrifice.
“Good…” Yimar Furi said a bit more calmly. “Make the preparations. I want each of you and your ten strongest men to be ready to depart at any time. Needless to say, you are to take the best horses,” he instructed, to what the ten men responded by lowering their heads and shifting to a kneeling position from the sitting one. All ten of them owed everything they had to Yimar Furi; they would always voice their own opinions, but if it was what their leader wanted, they were ready to sacrifice that everything for his sake and follow him into the most dangerous of fires.
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“It’s a pity you are leaving so fast,” Turukan said truthfully as he was seeing off the three little masters and their companions. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay longer? We could have another great feast in the afternoon,” he mentioned with a smile, trying to tempt the boys to stay. He was pretty confident that given a week, Amina could manage to get Arslan to woo her. By then, the well-being of hers and of her immediate family would be guaranteed. Not to mention that he personally found the characters or Arslan and those two other boys to be very agreeable; finding better husband material for his nieces wouldn’t be easy.
“I think we’ve had enough fun for now,” Laien responded with a cheeky smile. “Let us get all those people to Ruishi Federation first. We will be traveling this country after that too, so we might as well come back to visit you then,” he proposed compromisingly. He enjoyed staying in this village quite a bit, so he didn’t want to outright refuse to ever come back.
“I will hold you to that promise,” Turukan said with a happy, content smile. As long as the boys returned here, it was good!
“It wasn’t a promise though…” Laien pointed out without beating around the bush. He wasn’t about to let this old man goad him into agreeing to something he didn’t say.
Turukan winced his nose slightly but could only shake his head in resignation. “I can’t beat you. Fine, do as you wish, little master! I will only hope you won’t forget about us altogether and will indeed at least visit us again with your friends,” he requested with a helpless laugh.
“I will try, no promises though,” Laien said wryly, then waved farewell to Amina and her siblings who had also come out on the road to see them and their caravan off. He hopped into the carriage and Yin got in right after him; the two of them were already looking forward to their daily training in the Combined Souls Realm.
“See you sometime, I guess,” Arslan said with a smile and with slightly flushed cheeks. He exchanged one last look with Amina, then followed Laien and Yin.
“See you,” Johan said hurriedly as he scooted away, too embarrassed to look any of the youths in the eye.
Seeing this little interaction between the kids, Turukan smiled contentedly. Those little spawns wouldn’t tell him anything no matter how he asked, but just seeing the looks on their faces was enough for him to guess a few things. “It’s fine. Even if they will not come back, Mustafa’s son will keep our village in his memory and will favor us in the future,” he mused, looking how the caravan consisting of many new carriages and even more new horses set out to the north-east.