The sun quickly rose on the next day, and with it so did the various armies on the Anazoi Canyon. With the mercenary armies of Maximillian being the first to depart north, under the supervision of nearly half of the eastern army, while the rest of it merged with my own forces, as we headed north-east, to catch up with Valdour and Khairuddin at Appethus and end this war. Yet before I could join my marching men, I had to deal with two unexpected snags along the way, The first was in the form of a message from the War Dragon himself, in which he expressed his unprecedented enjoyment of our game, his hope to play another one soon, and finally the promise of gift in honour of this new founded rivalry. 'What is he scheming now?' I thought in annoyance, but I couldn't dwell too long on this as I had to deal with the other and more prominent issue at hand. A problem which came in the form of the uncharacteristically hard headed Horus and Leonid, who have just awoken from the effects of the Dew of Pathiya, refusing to follow my orders and return home to recuperate. Looking at the two wounded heroes of the southern front kneeling before me, like two stubborn statues, I commanded with a fatigued sigh "First of all stand up, you two shouldn't have be have taken two steps out of bed toady, let alone this." Yet they didn't, and instead lowered their heads even lower until their noses were nearly touching the floor, as Horus spoke up with a clearly strained voice, trying to appear strong and vigorous when it was clear for all to see that it was concealing an agonizing pain and tiredness "Thank you for your concern sire, but we're fine." "No, you're very clearly not!" I yelled out. "You're as pale as parchment! I doubt you two can face even a fifth rank martial artist at this point." The two said nothing in return for a moment, before Leonid said, his melodic voice tense like an overtaught string "My emperor, please don't refuse us." A sigh escapes my lips after hearing their words, as I ask "Why so persistent? The two of you have never challenged my words before." But yet again they refused to divulge their reasons, prompting a furious roar of Abraham to ring out "Insolence! Since when does a loyal subject, and especially one who is a member of the Palace Guard disobey his emperor's command?!" His words seemed to single out Horus, his subordinate, but they were clearly meant for both. And despite shrinking at his words, with Horus even flinching at them, they remained where they were, their tongues as lifeless as a corpse. Abraham was about to rebuke them once again, when my voice cut him off before he could start "Fine, you may do as you please." The two raised their heads with beaming smiles, wanting to thank me, but I quickly stopped them with a raised palm, before coldly saying "But if a catch of you two even donning your armour during this period of time, and before the priests give you their expressed permission to do so, then I will have the two of you chained, caged and shipped back to Eklepsos without another word. Understand?" "Perfectly, sire." They quickly answered as they saluted, their faces still a joyful mask of satisfaction. But then the tension that had held their bodies up till now slowly faded, and with it their remaining strength, as they began to wobble unsteadily on their feet, the world quickly growing unfocused in their now hazy eyes. "Take them back to the rest!" I loudly commanded, as I braced the teetering Leonid, while Abraham supported Horus. As soon as they left with the aid of the priests, Isaac, who had remained quiet so far, spoke up "My liege, if I may ask; why did you humour them?" "It's not as if I am blind to their feelings." I calmly said, before looking back at the two of them, as I continued with a small smile. "And at the end of day, how could I punish someone, who'd brave such pains and risk the danger of angering both me and you, all for the sake of pride and loyalty." Indeed, the reason for their atypical obstinacy was their hurt pride and unflinching fealty. Horus saw it as a deeply shameful thing for him, the emperor's first spear and guard, to be wounded so badly against such a brutish man, as he described him, even if he was stronger than him, and be forced to abandon me at this critical moment. Even if again, none viewed it this way and none would have blamed him for it. And Leonid was no different, as he too thought his performance in this battle was humiliating, since he believed himself to have brought nothing but contempt and hardship to me, the man who not only reunited him and his sister, but the man he swore his eternal allegiance to as well; as he got wounded and captured by the enemy at the worst time possible, and if not for the arrival of the eastern army and lord Sodarus, this battle would not have ended the way it did. I and the two ancient pillars of the empire stood still for a moment in peaceful silence, small smiles decorating our usually stoic features, before they once again retook their regular sternness, and we rushed to the head of the army, to sweep away the final vestiges of persistent grime still spoiling the face of our nation. An action that could only be done by cleansing fire and scraping steel, as we spared none on our murderous path. Every castle, keep or fort that belonged to a traitorous noble family was conquered on the same day, much in part due to Sodarus and his knights' rage at these turncoats, who saw their plight for months and did nothing but bar their gates and bow to their false king. And it was during these rapid conquests that we also realized that many of these so called nobles that were dumb or slow enough to not immediately run away, and foolishly tried to hide behind their stone walls or to flee together with their wealth, were in fact not the original owners of these holdings. Because as we scoured the dungeons of many of these high and proud seats of old noble houses, we found many highborn ladies and sons of the previous and true masters of these lands, jailed in their own homes. Apparently, according to these newly freed noble scions, these men and women who fancied themselves lords and ladies, were nothing more than thieves and loyal dogs of Zadkiel, who had allowed them to snatch their families' rightful lands and titles. When I asked them why they had been spared, they all replied that these shameless bandits wanted to marry them to legitimize their rule. Then when asked how long they were imprisoned for, and how long these thieves had taken over their territories, they quickly replied that they'd been held prisoner for several months, varying by a few weeks or days when each one answered. Then when I asked where their parents or grandparents were, the true reigning lords of these lands, they all said the same thing this time "They were taken to Appethus at the start of the war." And that's when a great many things became clear, most importantly of which is how Zadkiel had managed to evade the surveillance that the mighty Darius Khan had built in the eastern lands. He had arrested the nobles who worked for us, or had defected to my Imperial Faction early on, and then he had forced them write back falsified letters. And since they were written by the hand of the same nobles, with no change in tone or font, they raised no alarm bells in Darius' mind. But it would be impossible for Zadkiel to achieve this on his own, he doesn't have the capability nor the resources to have pulled something like that. This also still doesn't explain how they managed to evade the eyes and ears of the Shade Corps. 'Seems the only way to find all the missing pieces and finally reassemble this puzzle is to pry it open directly from the source.' I darkly thought. Meanwhile, Maximillian's mercenary army, after five days of marching had almost reached the empire's borders. "Another day's march at most and we would enter the Yue Dynasty's territory." Sophia said, as she consulted the map in her hand. "Finally! I can't wait to get home already." Morgana rejoiced, as she kept an eye on the men below the hill they were standing on, as they slowly built today's camp. Thıs text ıs hosted at 𝓷𝓸𝓿𝓮𝓵※𝓯𝓲𝓻𝓮※𝓷𝓮𝓽 "We would need another month of travel across the Jurren De Yachi Mountains and then get home." Eliana with her ocean blue eyes and long blonde hair that was tied up elegantly, teasingly reminded her as she walked to stand next to her. Morgana loudly groaned, as she complained "It would only take us a couple of days if the four of us went ahead of the army." "You know we can't do that or they might just fall to their old habits, and pillage some poor town or village along the way." Sophia this time replied to her nagging sister-wife, with an exasperated tone that seemed to convey that what she said was obvious. Morgana wanted to keep arguing, enjoying her act of playing like a spoiled brat, but Eliana quickly cut her off instead, saying with a hint of annoyance in her voice "Do you want those annoying old men from the Silver Court to come complaining to us again?" "Exactly. Besides we just finished a war with one of the four great empires, it would be foolish to anger another." Sophia quickly added. "Fiiiiine!" Morgana finally said, unhappily surrendering before the alliance of the other two that always seemed to want to spoil her fun, when she turned to look at her husband, who stood a few steps away from them staring off into the distance, deep in thought, making the other two follow her gaze. "What's on your mind darling? You've been spacing out lately." Eliana suddenly asked, as she walked towards him and gently placed her hand on his shoulder. "Oh, nothing to concern yourself with, my loves." He said looking at all of them tenderly, as he covered Eliana's hand with his own. But Morgana wasn't convinced by his words, as she quickly, half angrily half worriedly said "If your still upset by how a clear victor wasn't decided in your battle against the Eclipse Emperor, then we can just turn back! Those few ten thousand he sent to keep an eye on us wouldn't last an hour, and with all of us here, I'm sure we can easily secure you victory!" Though the idea seemed mad, the other two, who were usually the sound of reason in their small family, didn't object if it meant Maximillian would be happy. Yet instead of answering, he began to happily laugh as he hugged them all in his arms, saying "The Gods have truly blessed me beyond my worth!" as he spun them around. The he continued, after having let them go "You really need not worry. If I'm being honest, I was just thinking what sort of gift I should send that young emperor." He finished with an awkward grin. "Wait, you were serious about that?!" Morgana nearly screamed in disbelief. "Why wouldn't I be?" He asked back. "Even after he ruined everything we and everyone else had planned?" Eliana asked in disbelief as well. "Ruin?..." Maximillian muttered that word he felt as though he had been hearing endlessly since his meeting with the young emperor, when he suddenly beamed with a large smile, and loudly exclaimed "I've finally found it!"