----------------------------------------- Two Years Later In The Hervalle Empire-----------------------------------------
In the capital city of the Hervalle Empire just below the Emperor’s Throne Room, lay the Council Chamber where the true leaders of the Empire sat.
Davim Farfeather looked around at his fellow council members. Ever since the Emperor’s assassination two years ago the little amount of power the emperor held had been whittled down even further. The current Emperor, a ten-year-old boy, was nothing more than a figurehead controlled by him and the other eleven council members. Davim sighed to himself as he took in his council members once more. His once proud companions looked nothing like their usual haughty selves. In fact, more than one was shivering uncontrollably as if readying themselves to face their executioner.
In truth, although most high-level figures “in the know” believe the council took control over the empire that plan had actually failed rather spectacularly. The scenes of what had occurred that day still had yet to fade from his mind. Still as vivid as the day it occured just two years ago.
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In this very room all twelve of the council met the night after the boy's coronation. Planning to pass a series of new laws eliminating the last of the emperor's authority, finally seizing control. They had made all their preparations, their private forces were in wait, the right merchant companies and garrison commanders had been bribed, and the scapegoat was already prepared, but right as Davim was about to place his signature on the paper a squadron of imperial guards broke into the chamber with swords drawn.
Davim had watched in shock as one of his old colleagues, council member Bouvitte Malim, flew into a rage asking to speak to their commander. Bouvitte, as the Military Councilor, believed he had the imperial guards in his pocket and why shouldn't he? He'd been paying their salaries for the last two decades and often got away with whatever he pleased because of it. But this time instead of getting their commander, one of the soldiers, a young brown-haired man ran the obese Bouvitte through with his sword, killing him on the spot.
After that, the council room fell silent as all councilors realized their lives were at stake. The young imperial guard, the same one who had killed Bouvitte, then calmly pulled out a scroll and began reading a declaration of accusations against the council. It contained a hint of slander, but almost all the accusations were accurate, some of them were things even they didn’t know about each other. One such thing being Bouvitte's like of little boys.
Davim will never forget what calamity soon followed. Like heralds of the apocalypse, the sound of leather soles striking stone rang out from beyond the entrance to the council chamber. The imperial guardsman, upon hearing footsteps behind him, gained a look of unmasked terror on his face. He immediately stopped reading our crimes to us before slamming himself into a kneeling position with his head bowed. Quickly, the other dozen guardsmen followed showing equally terrified expressions. Davim had initially assumed it was the emperor, after all, Imperial Guardsmen are only supposed to kneel to the emperor. But as the footsteps drew closer Davim along with the other councilors quickly realized they were not the footsteps of their boy emperor. When an old but fierce man with a grey mustache dressed in a black uniform with silver accents stepped into the councilroom's light they all knew they had been outplayed by a hidden party.
At that moment every single council member knew this man had been watching their machinations all along. Every secret meeting, every plot, they had been as exposed as a newborn throughout it all. What a joke Davim had thought. All his work had been nothing to this hidden player. Davim began to prepare himself to face his death. Luckily for him, he was soon pleasantly surprised by what came out of the black-uniformed man's mouth.
“You all have two options, serve or die.” The man spoke in a deep voice that permeated the room.
Davim, remembering how the imperial guardsmen had looked so horrified, figured they had probably been given a similar choice. And seeing the guardsmen's terrified looks it was obvious this unassumingly sharp old man had the ability to carry out his threat.
Davim immediately knelt just like the guardsman had and spoke “I wish to serve.”
Six other members followed Davim's lead and knelt although not all did it with his same fervor, likely not quite realizing the severity as Davim had. Out of the four who remained standing, two spoke kind words such as “Who is the esteemed one we’re to serve?” while the other two misread the situation thinking this newcomer hadn’t killed them because he was looking to bargain and made offers along the lines of “I can give you twenty thousand gold if you let me and my family flee the country.”
The grey-haired man didn’t respond to any of them, he just spoke “If you won’t decide I‘ll decide for you.” And just like that Davim heard the sound of wind whooshing followed by four newly detached heads thudding against the stone floor.
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Davim could feel a warm trickle slide down his pant leg as he failed to control his bladder. He steered his mind away from being bitter about failing to claim power and towards gratefulness for being able to survive. He felt himself beginning to faint from the overstimulation and so bit down hard on his lip drawing blood, but keeping himself conscious.
The black uniformed man continued.
“You may call me Bastian as that is the name our Lord bestowed upon me. As for our Lord's name, your ears are too lowly to hear it.” Davim could hear the scorn in his voice, it seemed the man called Bastian had been truly offended by the previous council members simply having the audacity to ask who they were going to serve.
This tone truly drove home the point to Davim that this new organization he had been brought into was not something one could apply logic to. It seemed anything other than zealot-like devotion would result in death.
“Now listen closely I have some missions for each of you.” The man called Bastian continued as he began engraving information directly into our brains, an extremely painful process. Tortured wails of council members filled the room for the rest of the night.
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That was two years ago. Now Davim Farfeather looked around and found of the seven members of the council who knelt two years ago five remained. Davim had heard one had tried to flee while the other had made a rather large mistake, some had even believed he had done it on purpose to undermine Bastian. Both had been dealt with swiftly. Their vacancies had of course been since been filled with new members brimming with loyalty towards their hidden overlord. Of the twelve-member council, Davim was familiar with all but two of them. It shocked him to learn such powerful figures had been secretly supporting Bastian well before that horrifying night two years ago. Despite their likely seniority, they seemed just as nervous as us original five. It seemed likely to Davim that despite being brought into the fold earlier than him they'd experienced similar “initiations.”
Tonight, they had all come to meet that monster. Bastian. A man Davim hadn’t seen in person since that first unforgettable meeting was coming to check on their progress. They had all done their best but no one was confident they would be able to walk away from the meeting scot-free.
It was then when we were all staring at the door that a sound came from the head of the table.
“You may begin your reports, starting with Farfeather.”
Davim and the rest slowly turned to face the head of the table where the sound originated from only to see the man of their darkest nightmares and deepest fears, Lord Bastian already sitting at the head of the table. None of them had any idea how he had gotten there. Was he a mythical shadow mage of the 7th able to jump between shadows? Davim thought to himself, before corralling his thoughts. It didn’t matter what Bastian was, he needed to be obeyed. After all, standing behind Bastian was the rest of his ever-mysterious organization headed by figures such as Bastian’s frightening True Lord.
Davim was broken out from his train of thought when he saw Bastian staring at him with those merciless blue eyes. Did he ask me a question!? Davim had a heart attack before recalling what had happened before his head had blanked. Report!
“I’ve isolated the merchant guild’s government support including re-establishing their need to pay tariffs on all imported goods as well as laid the groundwork for a new trade branch of the empire to promote and control the trade of commodities.”
“Groundwork?” Bastian asked, sounding annoyed.
“We have over two hundred warehouses across the Empire and more than forty trade caravans under our banner. However, membership has been struggling as many refuse to switch from the merchants guild seeing this as a government overreach.” Davim finished saying what he had practiced for the last two days since he'd found out about the meeting.
“Good. Aim to double those numbers within a year and at least one hundred of the new warehouses should be outside of the empire. The membership numbers will rise once merchants realize it's here to stay.” Bastian elegantly responded before moving on to the next council member.
Bastian went through each member, few received responses as positive as Davim had, two were told they’d be visited by “helpers” and one, a council member who had replaced one of the two who had died in the last two years, was killed on the spot when he tried to fudge some numbers to make his brothel business seem more successful than it actually was. Davim could only shake his head at his late companion's rookie mistake. Lying to Bastian only leads down one path. Death.
At the end of the meeting, Bastian ordered for some symbol to be created which would mark someone as untouchable as he had some VIPs coming through the territory soon. Although none of us were dumb enough to ask who. The task itself should be an easy fix: just get Emperor Seals and give them to him. Ha, easy. Getting an Emperor Seal used to be a multi-year long affair but now Davim saw any task that didn't carry the risk of death as easy.
After Bastian left disappearing into the wind, all the council members seemed unusually happy. After all, only one of them had died and it hadn’t been them! That was much better than they had expected.
Either way, Davim couldn't help but be worried about what Bastian had been doing the last two years. Was he out conquering another empire? Was his mysterious lord really a calamity en route to take over the world?
Davim might never know, but he knew one thing for certain. He was going to double the number of warehouses and caravans within the next year, no matter what he had to do.