To this day, Inari still cursed the king’s inaction that allowed his elder brother to gain such confidence and standing, where he could feel confident enough to intrude upon a meeting of the thirteen generals. Hideyoshi was as dangerous as he looked. For so many years, while the king’s other siblings accepted Satori’s rule and all that came with it. Hideyoshi had chosen to stand opposed against his younger brother, even as Satori was born an Enlightened. The elder brother believed he held the true future of Ichika in his hands. It was only whispers but in time, his influence grew and before long Hideyoshi stood as the biggest opponent against the king. Inari, prepared for a great shift. Unfortunately it was greater than what she could have ever imagined.

  “Shortly before he left, King Satori had met with a great many members of the Imperial Court to commence plans to put an end to our reliance on Iliad and the Stygians. And the courts have agreed!”

  There was an audible gasp as several generals rose to their feet.

  “What!” the first Lunar General Atsushi Matsumoto roared, his greying hairs flared with shock.

  Others broke out in discussion amongst themselves, Taro looked over at Lord Nishimura dumbfounded expecting a similar expression on his friend's face. Instead the Third Lunar General looked onward indifferent at the declaration. Taro found his reaction odd. However he did not have time to address it before the environment escalated further.

  “I was not made aware of this,” General Inari Huli Jing’s voice cut through the noise, deafening everyone.

  “Well of course, you are not queen.” Hideyoshi grinned, reminding her and everyone present. “Furthermore I am sure my little brother neglected to inform you for good reason.”

  It was an unsatisfying answer, yet no one else dared speak. All at one time or another had also wondered why Lady Huli Jing was not the Queen of Ichika. The rumors had run rampant throughout the palace and beyond. Hideyoshi’s choice of highlighting a sensitive subject matter was done in hopes of upsetting the thirteenth general. She would not be goaded by such childish antics, instead she looked to push back unsatisfied by this revelation. Satori would have told her.

  “What proof do you have?”

  Hideyoshi looked at her bewildered, “What do you mean my lady?”

  “The king has made his position painfully clear that he not only supports the Stygians but their current king.” She moved her hands together, “Now we are to believe that he has been planning to dissolve our alliance in secret?”

  “Do not be afraid my lady, We are not alone. There are other realms who seek to assist us.” The prince stepped forward deeper into the room. His confidence grew.

  Lady Huli Jing showed greater restraint than she thought she possessed at his remark. The urge to split him in half made it difficult to think but she held firm. She would not allow this farce to continue on any further, she could feel the slightest waiver in the generals who remained silent.

  “What proof do I have?” he repeated her first question.

  His retort shook the room, along with the minds of the other generals who all turned to look at Hideyoshi. The news he had relayed was seismic and sure to shake Ichika and its aftershocks would reach the other realms too. Iliad would not simply stand by and allow multiple millennia’s worth of alliances and treaties evaporate into the wind. There were still those even within the Imperial Court and this very room who valued the Stygians and Iliad like their king. Proof was required that this change was true, if not the alternative was far worse. Prince Hideyoshi was all too aware of this and his grimy smile only grew wider at the demands of Lady Huli Jing.

  His brother’s whore was an obstacle he was unsure of overcoming, in truth this whole ordeal had given him much pause. However as piece by piece things fell into place and with the help of the hooded man behind him it had all come together. He was on the cusp of achieving all he had desired, just as the Nephilim Queen had promised him. Here now, he would claim the Thirteen Lunar Generals under his control, their strength more than enough to bring all of Ichika to heel. The prince reached for his back pocket and unfurled a pristinely kept parchment paper.

  “Here is a signed declaration by the Imperial Court stating Ichika’s desire to dissolve all alliances with Iliad.”

  All previous moments paled in comparison to the stunned silence that consumed the entire room. Hideyoshi had fantasized about this for years on end since given the smallest hint that his plans could succeed. Honor was a binding pillar that held Ichika in place, it was because of it that they had survived as long as they did. He knew despite their feelings on the matter they were all bound by their honor as Lunar Generals to follow the imperial mandate set forth. The reality of all he had spoken prior was true, the royal courts had agreed with enough majority to pass a royal decree. Even Lady Huli Jing showed surprise, not thinking that things had progressed this far.

  “It is shocking I know, you can see why we have taken to such secrecy.” Hideyoshi rubbed his goatee, his pride oozing out of himself, “So much so under the king’s orders we have taken your families into hiding. In anticipation of the Stygian retaliations.”

  “What?” the Ninth Lunar General, Taro Hisakawa, stood up. “What are you talking about?”

  Hideyoshi’s smile was putrid, “Quite right Lord Hisakawa. Who knows what tricks the Stygians may employ to undermine this new golden age. The king agreed that in his absence we should move your families to more secure locations. Knowing you would all accept of course.”

  “Where is Fumi, Hideyoshi?” Lord Taro’s eyes glowed a violent deluge that shook the room.

  “You know, about sixty thousand years ago,” his voice soothingly placated the souring mood. “The first several generations of the Lunar Generals were castrated at mount Takai to the north along the western coastline. King Hoshi Sugawara believed, if his generals had no attachments to the realm outside of their honor it would make them as strong as the legendary Lords of War. Unfortunate though honor is not enough to vanquish such vile beings.” The hooded man moved forward past Hideyoshi, addressing the generals.

  “Really?” Lady Yukimura responded with a yawn, “I thought the story was that they were castrated in the deep south by the Midori Swamps? Or have I been telling my little Taka the wrong tale all this time?” she patted her daughter doing her best to calm her.

  “Oh my it seems you are terribly right Lady Yukimura, forgive my oversight. I have learned many stories about your home and may be mixing them.” The man bowed deep.

  “What right do you have to speak here?” the Tenth Lunar General, Aoi Kumagai spoke with venom in her words. She rose to stand, growing tired of this charade.

  With that a soft wind of malice blew through the room in response to her question.

  The tune was distant at first, almost unnoticeable. It was closer to a faraway cry for help than the kind of melodic singing that one expects. The shrieks only grew in ferocity the moment he arrived. Right then in that fraction within a singular moment, he had caught all of them into his tune. And the terrible sound made by his blade played through their ears. Some of them turned their gaze to the man, it was more apt to call him a beggar of sorts. His clothes tattered, exposed to the elements, all color and life from them drained. He was barefoot, black soles knelt respectfully on the table. He had walked the ground of Aurum at every opportunity memorizing her curves. His oily black hair unkempt with noticeably greying streaks. His rugged beard aged him a few more decades than he already looked. However his badly damaged eyes were where most of the attention had been drawn. Healed cuts around his eye sockets told a story of a man who had his sight viciously stolen. Yet even with his eyelids shut to hide the horrors that lay beneath them, the way he held his head still, unwavering, gave off the impression that he could still see.

  The rest of the attention was on the immediate danger the horrific looking blade he gripped tightly exuded in their presence. It was an insult to address the piece of metal he held in his hand as a sword, perhaps it was once eons ago during a different time, under the ownership of a different master. Those were distant memories to the thing he held, countless masters through countless ages had lost the need to know its name, simply addressing it for the calamity it brought to any who dared wield it without knowing its true name. By the silenced tongues of a thousand masters, the man held one of the thirteen blades of Enki, the blade known as The Terrible One. Who knelt before them on the table was a Sword Saint. It was unmistakable.

  The man turned his head ever so slightly, “Lady general, I beg you to remain seated.”

  “How dare-” Aoi exclaimed, before she could address the vile thing in front of her. Lady Huli Jing gazed at her. The Lunar General stopped herself and gingerly sat back down.

  “And who might you be Sword Saint and your little sword?” Lady Yukimura asked, with a terribly cold smile.

  “My name is Averse Nine-Skies my lady,” he raised the blade regarding it with disgust despite not having sight. “This is a cursed blade, a terrible blade. Do not sully yourself with wanting to know its name.”

  Lady Yukimura turned her gaze towards Hideyoshi, “My prince, forgive me but it seems I have a hard time accepting all of this. I am sure my fellow generals feel the same. Even with that incomplete decree you hold in your hand.”

  Hideyoshi looked annoyed, “What do you mean?”

  Lady Yukimura leaned on the table pointing at the paper, “I see the Imperial Court's seal, but where is the king’s?”

  All the generals turned to Hideyoshi.

  From the moment Prince Hideyoshi and his oddball group arrived to address them, she had sought every possible avenue for escape. There were several she had identified, the issue lied with moving quick enough to get Takara out of here unharmed. Added with the possibility that the other generals may try to stop her including Lady Huli Jing, she was unsure she could have them escape without bloodshed. It was clear to the old general that this was a rebellion in the making, at the very least one that had been implemented for several days now. What shocked her was not that Hideyoshi had finally achieved what it was he was secretly building but that they were able to isolate the generals quite easily.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  The mandate from the Imperial Court had forced them all to take quarters within the royal palace, separating them from their armies and their families. The ease in which this was done would have been amusing to Lady Yukimura had the gravity of what was happening not been as severe as it was. However the biggest cause for concern for her was throughout all of this Crown Prince Hiei Sugawara had remained silent.

  “Well you see…” Hideyoshi stumbled on his words slightly, the growing stare of all the Lunar Generals unnerved him, their eyes filled with expectation. “ Sato-I mean the king did not-”

  “Why does it matter?” the hooded man asked earnestly.

  “How dare you!” the First Lunar General Atsushi Matsumoto, shouted. “Why do you think we would follow the commands of the Imperial Court without the king’s approval?”

  “Because when Prince Hideyoshi Sugawara announced that Ichika would seek to break free of Iliad, many of you thought, finally.”

  Lord Matsumoto was stunned into silence. The look on his face as though his innermost thoughts had been laid bare. Several generals also conveyed the same expression with their silence. Fuck, thought Lady Yukimura. She had not imagined that many of them strongly opposed the Stygians, the growing minority may not have been as small as the king and many of those loyal to him at thought. She had looked to unsettle Hideyoshi, force him to stumble across his words and show weakness. It was a bold move to admit that he had taken their families hostage, many of the generals would not have been able to overlook that. However the hooded man intervened, changing the flow of conversation towards a thought Lady Yukimura desperately did not want to address. She glanced over at Lady Huli Jing who looked stoic, not even she would dare interrupt now. It would show weakness, a desire to silence, they walked a very narrow tightrope, one that held the fate of Ichika in the balance. She remained quiet, allowing the hooded serpent to speak half truths into the ears of her fellow generals.

  “None of you here except Lord Matsumoto and Lady Shirai remember what it was like during the last days of the Stygian Civil War and Third Great War. The blood that soaked these lands, all in service of the Stygians who warred with each other incessantly. Forcing their allies to pick sides within the same family. Wars so gruesome and vile that even the famed Lords of War refused to continue to partake.” They could not see his face but they felt the wisdom in his words. “And in the end when King Barranagan Xerxes arose victorious over his brothers, when he arose victorious over the mad emperor. Who sung the praises of Ichika?”

  All remained quiet.

  “The oldest allies of the Stygians, the first to seek refuge underneath their care and look at how they abandoned you all for well over a century, leaving you to clean your wounds. Clans once forced to fight each other now asked to work together again. It is what they do, it is what they have always done. They take and they use you until they no longer have need for you. Until they call again for their next war.”

  Many wanted to hear more.

  “Many of you here already decided the moment you saw the decree, even without the king’s seal. Because you know, what the southern realms have known for multiple millennia–you do not need the Stygians anymore. The power they possess is of a bygone age that died with their previous king and abandoned by his eldest son. How long will Ichika and the rest of the northern realms be weighed down by the carcass of a rotting corpse?”

  Some of them had discussed it with each other in passing comments. Others had broached the subject with their closest confidants, all of them whispering it in hushed tones even to themselves when they were at their most alone: what would we be without them? They all chose to dismiss it in their own way, but still searching for their own individual answer as to what it would mean for them. Iliad was an old realm a mythic one at that, a realm that had existed longer than all the other realms combined. The ways of those who lived among the mountains were secretive and selective to who they shared such information with. Ichika were the oldest of Iliad’s allies and yet felt as though they hardly understood them. Which only further complicated matters when other realms approached them to speak to Iliad on their behalf.

  The last five years had strained an already tense relationship between both realms, what this hooded man had done was resurface a growing trend that many within Ichika had felt. That like the Beastmen of Laconia who were bound to eternal servitude to the Stygians, so were those of the people of Ichika. Where the southern realms looked to operate in a true alliance, those in the north were meant to serve the best interests of Iliad alone. There was a growing desire to see what Ichika would be like free of the influence of Iliad, some of the generals present had not even seen a Stygian before and were expected to offer them and their king greater reverence than they did their own king, a farce they could barely accept. Their attachment to the beings who wore the night as crowns was as fleeting as it was genuine. The hooded man had spoken many of their darkest truths and brought it to light. The energy had changed, and Lady Yukimura sought to break it.

  “That is all well and good,” she yawned dismissively. “I will be the first to admit, I know very little of the Stygians.” She glanced at her daughter, “They do enjoy their secrets. I cannot imagine the horrors that one sees fighting in their wars, I imagine it is as brutal as they say. However what I do know, is that I was there when our enlightened king was born. I was there when his father handed him off to Crown Prince Hyperion Xerxes, and I was there when Prince Hyperion returned to us a decent man worthy enough to be king.”

  She was annoyingly happy at the memories that flooded her head. She was sure when Satori was announced to be an Enlightened at birth he would not be ready to assume the throne, no matter what those around him had said. His birth had put him in a realm that no one within Ichika could attain or even understand the loneliness that came with that level of power. It was of course no shock that such a boy grew up to be spoiled, always demanding his way. She would be the first to admit that when the late King Eiji Sugawara announced that Satori would be under the care of Prince Hyperion, she was sure that was the king’s attempt at trying to kill his son. However, years later through a myriad of rumors of their exploits throughout Aurum, Satori had returned a Crown Prince, worthy of the throne his father had so desperately thrown on him since birth.

  Seeing him back then, the look in his eyes, the joy he found in life and desire to be a part of it was a sight she could never quite forget. It is why she was filled with so much rage at what Hideyoshi and the hooded man had done. To taint the legacy of a man who believed in the good of the Stygians more than anyone in Ichika. This was an insult to who their king was, and what he believed in. She would not let them have their way, only Lady Huli Jing was bound by that decree, if she could not act then she would do so on her behalf.

  “Tsuru do not,” Lady Huli Jing called out.

  Tsuru smiled.

  “You see, I would have overlooked the lies and deceit. As well as separating us from our families.” She chuckled, while she cracked her neck.

  Averse Nine-Skies turned his attention towards the Lunar General, “My lady please.”

  “Even this young fellow here,” she pointed at the Sword Saint. “It is clear you spent quite some time planning this whole thing.”

  The room was growing tense, something was coming.

  “Lady Yukimura stop this, the decree has been given by the Imperial Court we are all in agreement.” Lord Nishimura announced.

  Taro turned to his old friend, “Katsuo you cannot possibly accept this?”

  Lady Tsuru Yukimura grinned, “Ah you see, Lord Nishimura we are not all in total agreement.” She turned towards her daughter who looked back at her with frightened eyes, “It is all going to be alright my little Taka. Look after her Taro, it will be good practice for when Fumi gives birth.”

  “L-Lady Yukimura, I am Prince Hideyoshi Sugawara, you will obey the decree of the Imperial Court. The force of Hideyoshi’s Kingspeak reverberated through the entire room.

  “Insolent child I could make you pull out your own innards if I so pleased,” her words in the old tongue of Ichika were biting and painful. “Since I am in a good mood I shall let you in on a little secret. Know that I do this because quite frankly, Hideyoshi Sugawara. I find you repulsive in every aspect and I will not make this easy for you and your cabal.”

  Tsuru kissed her teeth before the Sword Saint’s blade pierced her chest. However not before the fire storm she created took effect.

  The subsequent explosion created from the growing of mana that pulled around her lips completely obliterated the meeting room of the Lunar Generals. The release of highly pressurized mana superheated to its absolute peak in such a tight area sent pieces of molten stone and wood raining down all over the Imperial Palace and the surrounding area. It was as though a malevolent blazing flower had bloomed in all its glory with carnage as its petals. Alarms rung out in retaliation throughout the city of Ichi as thousands of soldiers mobilized on the location to ascertain what could create such a terrible eruption. A cloud of black smoke rose up into the air blotting out the surrounding blue skies of the morning along with the sun. With that, the first bells of conflict and been rung.

  “Was that necessary Lady Yukimura?” the hooded man had raised an ice barrier protecting himself as well as Hideyoshi and the other hooded person with them. His face now visible.

  Lady Tsuru found the Stygian man attractive and shrugged in response to his question, “I wanted to make a point.”

  “That being?” Salok Yn pulled his hood back over his face, unamused at the bleeding general laying before him.

  “It is going to take more than a fancy speech and a foolish decree to convince the Lunar Generals to betray the king.” As she tried to grin she wheezed at the pain building from the open wound. The Sword Saint had pierced a lung and it was filling with blood.

  “Is that so?” he asked, turning his body back to the smouldering scene in front of them.

  Lady Yukimura followed his gaze to see Lunar Generals, Atsushi Matsumoto, Saki Yokota, Katsuo Nishimura and Crown Prince Hiei Sugawara appearing out of the flames. Surprise had gripped her enough to make her forget the pain of the deep wound inflicted on her. She did not think that there were that many Lunar Generals who would be so easily swayed, to even include the Crown Prince himself. Were there that many who despised the Stygians? Tsuru wrestled between several great pains that dominated her body. Chief among them was that she was unsure what pained her greatly was that there were Lunar Generals that would betray the king, or that she was not surprised by who those generals were.

  “If you think this is enough to betray-”

  “Betray?” Hideyoshi found his voice again, stepping forward, “Why can you not see it Lady Yukimura? This is the will of the king! You will see when he returns, isn’t that right Lady Huli Jing?” he motioned in the direction of a greater wall of smoke.

  From within it exited the White Fox of Ichika in all her glory. She lowered herself to one knee and bowed her head. “I along with those Lunar Generals present follow the decree of the courts.” Her nails dug painfully into her palm, dousing her milky skin in bloody red.

  “Excellent!” Salok Yn announced, clapping his hands together.

  “What of the others?” Hideyoshi did not hide the worry growing in him, “They could retaliate."

  “It is as Lady Yukimura said, it will take more to convince the other generals of our noble cause. We will do so, with the king’s return. Until then they can run around, we will keep their families safe in the meanwhile.”

  “And what of her?” Prince Hideyoshi asked.

  Salok Yn looked at Tsuru Yukimura and smiled.