Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 86. As Good As Dead.

“What do you mean they ‘disappeared’?” Yimar Maar asked angrily, causing the messenger to shrink away in fear. “What are you waiting for? I asked you a question,” he reminded coldly. The prolonged silence of the kowtowing man was beginning to get on his nerves more and more.

“I-I meant…” the messenger attempted to force some words out of his mouth. He was clearly aware that his master was in a foul mood, so the scenes of him being executed for incompetence were already flashing before his eyes, causing the cold sweat to appear all over his body and drip on the floor from his forehead. “We couldn’t find out what happened to them. They are gone, but we can’t be sure if they perished to the last man or betrayed… so I said they disappeared…” he tried to explain, hoping that his words would sound reasonable enough for Yimar to forgive him.

“Retard,” Yimar Maar said with a snort. “Are you trying to tell me you didn’t hear what Mustafa did to the City of Masalle on his way back? Yimar Furi and his top officers might have sent their families away to Arkaria in time, but the seven million citizens that were left behind…” he stopped speaking and trembled at the memory. Towards the end of the battle, Mustafa ‘retreated’ into the City of Masalle with the few dozen White Guards at his side. The forces of Yimar Furi’s were the closest, so they all gave chase and joined with the city guards… The city was then washed with blood as the skirmishes began. However, those small clashes weren’t the worst of it.

“Mustafa…! You are worthy of the title of the Blood Djinn!” Yimar Furi thought while clenching his fists. None of them had thought that the scattered White Guard of Mustafa’s would not only not be wiped out, but proceed to successfully reform with minimal loses! Before their main army caught up, they had all seen the humongous fire-element Grand Spell being formed by the three hundred and sixty spiritual masters of Mustafa’s White Guard, right before the walls of the City of Masalle.

Merciless. If there was one word that could be used to describe Mustafa, it would be this one. Even up until now Yimar Maar could hardly believe that Mustafa dared to release the Grand Inferno Apocalypse upon a major city. Yet, Mustafa did so without any hesitation; he baited the fifteen thousand experts of Yimar Furi’s into one place, then destroyed everything that happened to be around them. The Grand Magic laid waste to millions of people in mere moments, the sea of flames burning down houses, people and everything in its path. The stronger experts at the first Realm of Heroes and above survived the onslaught, but the regular citizens… they stood no chance.

“Tell me,” Yimar Maar said dispassionately. “Do you think Yimar Furi could have betrayed us? Are you that stupid?” he asked, thinking that he should perhaps find himself a new messenger if this one was so mentally defective. Mustafa had purposely ordered the Grand Spell’s power to be lowered in exchange for covering a larger area; he obviously didn’t care about Yimar Furi’s elites. He wanted to make a thorough example of what awaits the families and friends of those who backstab him… and he certainly did just that. According to the newest reports, the estimated casualties ranged between three and four million people, not including all of those who had been severely wounded and were expected to die within next few days due to the lack of healers and doctors.

“N-no Yimar!” The messenger pressed his head tightly against the stone floor. “Forgive me, this servant wasn’t thinking!” he uttered in a hurry, his body trembling all over.

“Tch.” Yimar Maar shook his head discontentedly. “If you have nothing else to say, then get out of my sight,” he ordered, prompting the man to scuff away in a great hurry. “Useless. Why are all of them so useless compared to Mustafa’s subordinates?” he complained, feeling absolutely furious. He had thought his men were already almost at the level of the White Guard, but even when the five thousand of his elites and the three thousand of Arakar’s men fought against a mere six hundred White Guards, they failed to kill more than a few dozen of them. It was an absolute disgrace…!

“Don’t get so angry.” From atop a fur-covered sofa, the silver-golden-clothed man said with a calm laugh. “I told you we shouldn’t have tried to give chase at all, but you insisted so much. We already achieved our goal and won this battle, you just need to be more patient,” he assured in a very much relaxed manner, then took in another whiff of apple-flavored smoke from the gold-coated shisha.

Yimar Maar frowned slightly. He couldn’t accept that their eight thousand elites, assisted by fifty thousand regular experts of the Realm of Heroes and more than one hundred thousand additional forces were only the means of allowing them to have a non-suicidal fight against Mustafa and a mere six hundred White Guards. True, those four lieutenants who roamed the battlefield as they fought Mustafa were terrifying… even he didn’t feel confident in beating any of them in a one-on-one fight! But! Wasn’t this too ridiculous? He couldn’t comprehend how Makarash’ power has grown to this extent. He had been doing everything to make his own forces stronger, but they couldn’t hold a candle to Mustafa’s White Guard! This helpless feeling was making him extremely mad.

“Are you sure of what you said?” Yimar Maar asked after taking a deep breath. “Are you sure that Mustafa is as good as dead like you said?” he asked strongly. If Arakar was wrong, then they would have lost thousands of their elites and tens of thousands of regular soldiers for nothing! Given that they had also failed to capture Mustafa’s son… then the moment the reinforcements came from Makarash, their lives would be most definitely over. Mustafa wasn’t one to forgive his enemies.

“I’m absolutely sure,” Arakar said with a calm smile and glanced at Yimar Maar lazily. “Thanks to you and your sword, Aban or whatever he was called? Mainly thanks to him I got in a clean hit. I’m certain that I managed to permanently damage Mustafa’s Qi Origin. All we need to do is to focus on defense and wait for a few weeks, then we can mount another attack and finish it,” he said contentedly and sucked in another mouthful of smoke. A moment later, he puffed it out of his mouth unhurriedly; just thinking that he would go down in the annals of history as the one who ended Mustafa, the greatest Ikarian expert in the known history, made him feel warm and fuzzy inside.

“I do hope you are right,” Yimar Maar stated in a half-convinced manner. “It would have been better if you didn’t shout it out on the battlefield though… Do you know how much our morale fell when our soldiers discovered that Mustafa isn’t actually quite dead yet?” he complained bitterly. He had thought they would be able to crush Mustafa with all the power they amassed to fight him, but they ended up just barely winning; that’s, as long as Arakar wasn’t wrong in saying that he crippled Mustafa. “No wonder even the Great Prophet avoided any strife with Mustafa for all those years,” he thought resignedly. If only Mustafa was of the same mind as the rest of them, then Arkaria would have conquered half of the Starlight Continent by now! What a great waste of potential it was.

“Stop sweating the small things,” Arakar said with a laugh. “Instead, you should pay more attention to your security,” he pointed out, the previous smile quickly disappearing from his face. “I don’t know what their goal is, but the Guild of Shadows is meddling in this war. All the message birds in our two Yimarates were slaughtered and even normal birds are too terrified to fly in the sky… not to mention that we lost sight of the hundred White Guards that were hanging around Mustafa’s son…” he mentioned, for the first time showing signs of being worried. Against Mustafa, he was still confident in at least saving his life… but against those three freaks from the Guild of Shadows? He wouldn’t offend them no matter what, even if it was the Great Prophet himself ordering him to do so.

“What?!” Yimar Maar exclaimed in shock. He recalled the letter he had found on his desk a week ago… then instantly grew furious. “That useless bastard! I will have him skinned alive!” he roared uncontrollably. What was that trash thinking, failing to mention such an important information! Forget the message birds; the Guild of Shadows was unlikely to do much more than that considering their policies. However, the matter of one hundred White Guards disappearing was a huge one!

Arakar laughed and shook his head a little. “You frightened your messenger off, what do you expect? It’s your fault for managing your people badly,” he reprimanded casually. He had been watching Yimar Maar for those last few months and he came to understand a few things about him. The man was definitely decisive and smart enough… but he only demanded perfection from others, without thinking if he himself could have done more to improve the issue on hand. Someone like that would forever be a second-rate leader in his eyes.

Yimar Maar’s eye twitched dangerously, but he suppressed his anger. There weren’t many people in the world from whom he would take such blatant criticism from, but Arakar was most definitely one of them. He didn’t agree with his words… but at the very least, he would concede the matter of punishing the messenger this one time.

“Do you have any idea where they could be?” Yimar Maar asked, struggling to keep the tone of his voice neutral.

The silver-golden-clothed Arakar chuckled in response. He glanced at Yimar Maar out of the corner of his eye and said sarcastically. “Didn’t I tell you enough already? If you are so stupid you can’t figure the rest out on your own, then maybe you should do the job of a messenger the next time around.”

Almost instantly, Yimar Maar grew furious, the colors of his face turning into a deep shade of red. For a second, some killing intent began leaking from his body… but it disappeared just as fast as it rose the moment he saw the usually unconcerned look in Arakar’s eyes turn serious. “Forget it, he is only a level weaker than Mustafa… I can’t argue with him,” Yimar Maar reminded himself. It had been ages since anyone had been so rude to him, so he had lost his cool momentarily.

“Since they disappeared…” he mused quietly. “They could have only moved into the Ruishi Federation. Was it because of them that Yimar Furi failed? Did our plan get leaked, or were we simply unlucky?” he wondered. It would have been great if they captured Arslan when his defense was lacking, but now that he was guarded by one hundred elites, it would become almost impossible.

“It looks like we can only rely on Mustafa losing his strength. The moment his presence is invalidated, the few hundred White Guards of his will be slaughtered by us,” he concluded and sighed inwardly. It had been mainly him, Aban and Arakar who fought against Mustafa, but that man’s presence alone was holding a huge number of their elites in check; after all, they weren’t capable of tying Mustafa down in one place with just three of them. Truly, the lord of Makarash was an unpreceded monster.

“I’m leaving,” Yimar Maar stated more or less calmly. “If there’s anything important, call for me,” he added and left the chamber.

Arakar led Yimar Maar away with his gaze, then chuckled quietly when the door closed behind him. “What a pitiful man,” he thought with a smile and took another whiff of the apple-flavored smoke. The meddling of the Guild of Shadows had been outside of his predictions, but so far everything was going according to the plan.

As for Yimar Maar himself… he went back to his study, intending to take care of some formalities in order to calm his mind. However, the moment he entered his private room, he instantly spotted something that caused a shiver to go down his spine. On the desk, there was yet another, identical grey envelope waiting for him with a few words written on top of it.

‘To Yimar Maar, From The Quite-Amused Spectator.’

After hesitating for a split-second, Yimar Maar reached out and opened the envelope. He prepared himself for there to be another provocative hint-like message inside, but this time the content proved to be both less offensive and more straightforward.

‘Yimar Furi and his puppies were killed by two young Devils. You’d be wise to be on guard against them, else they will come to seek you out in the future… along with Mustafa’s son. If a chance appears, be sure to kill them! Good luck~!’

“Devils..?” Yimar Maar frowned. The message was indeed more straightforward than the last one, but he had no idea to whom those words were referring to. “They are either with Mustafa’s son or are involved with him. It’s going to be hard to find anything out if that kid went into the Ruishi Federation… but it won’t hurt to try,” he decided pretty easily. By this point, he understood that he had become irreconcilable enemies with Mustafa; in the future, he would need to concern himself with Arslan’s revenge. Thus, if an opportunity presented itself, he would definitely make use of it.

---

“Pretty ruthless, I admit,” Laien mentioned with a somewhat troubled smile. Hadn’t Mustafa basically done the same thing he did in Ulme Village, but on a much larger scale? No wonder that Arslan insisted that the two of them had the same look in their eyes… they were similar to a scary degree.

“I didn’t finish speaking yet,” the messenger said unhappily. He could guess that this black-haired boy was a friend of Arslan’s, but he didn’t like being interrupted randomly, especially by a simple kid. As far as he was concerned, this boy, whatever he was called, needed to learn some manners.

“Aren’t you an oversensitive one,” Laien said with a smirk and laughed a little. It wasn’t like he spoke up while this man was mid-sentence or anything, so why was he getting so uptight about it? Weren’t the news he brought really good? There was no reason to get so stressed over every little silly thing.

The messenger looked like he was about to reprimand Laien, but he got interrupted by Julien’s cheerful and rather amused laugh.

“I wouldn’t offend this little fellow if I were you. You’ve only stepped into the Realm of Heroes a few months ago… he can probably kill you with one random slap,” Julien said cheerfully. The story Jasmine had told them was so ridiculous that he couldn’t possibly not believe in it; if someone wanted to tell a lie, he would have at least made it more realistic! “He’s apparently a true Ice Devil,” he added and laughed again, making it hard to discern whether he was being serious or not.

The messenger couldn’t help but give Julien a confused look. He glanced at Laien, then turned back to look at Julien; was Julien being serious? This child was younger than his own little brother!

Seeing the man’s doubtful expression, Laien merely chuckled a little. He couldn’t be bothered to brag or say anything; it mattered little to him if this man believed Julien’s words or not.

“So anyway, what else do you have to say?” Julien asked the messenger after a moment. He had thought one of those two would say something… but surprisingly, neither appeared to care. He would have been able to write off Jasmine’s story as a strange joke more easily if those two boys, as Jasmine claimed them to be, began boasting. However, their response, or the lack of thereof, made him feel all that much bewildered.

“…” the messenger sighed secretly. Having no other choice, he reported the rest of what he had learned. “I wanted to say that it doesn’t look like Mustafa is going to make a move at the moment. After destroying the City of Masalle, he retreated a few hundred kilometers back and is staying in Vase City. I confirmed there are around six to seven hundred White Guards there with him, but I don’t know if the rest died in battle or is spread throughout the country. My guess would be that he had been injured during the battle, so now he is being more careful. Perhaps he is waiting for reinforcements from Makarash,” he elaborated, then to make everything clear added.

“That’s all.”

“Injured instead of killed, huh,” Laien mused aloud, some suspicion present in his voice. “I don’t want to be ‘that person’ who kills the good atmosphere, but does that make sense to you?” he asked, his gaze stopping for a moment on the faces of Julien, Reian and Jasmine. He knew Yin understood what he was talking about… and as those who knew the sensation of cutting another’s flesh and pouring their Qi into another’s body, he was quite sure those three martial masters understood it too.

At Laien’s mention, the faces of those experts present lost some of their liveness. It was especially the case for those three marital masters who received a glance from Laien. Mistaking a serious injury for a kill… it wasn’t impossible, but in a fight between true experts, both sides would be able to tell whether they had delivered lethal damage or not. Did this messenger say that Mustafa had been wounded by Arakar, the Sword of Rala of the Great Prophet’s? It indeed was worrying.

“Huh? What is it about?” Arslan asked anxiously. He was a smart boy, but he was only five years old; he lacked the experience necessary to understand what point Laien was making.

Since what followed Arslan’s question was a moment of awkward silence from the adults, Laien sighed a little and explained on his own. “When you wound someone directly with your weapon, you can mostly sense how much damage your Qi did. We don’t know how your father was wounded, so it’s only something I thought about… We should likely wait for him to send some information our way. He will surely contact you sooner or later, and probably sooner rather than later.”

After listening to Laien’s explanation, Arslan pursed his lips a little. He was so glad and relieved when he heard his father was alive, but now he was beginning to worry again. He felt rather bad and his mood became worse… but he wasn’t petty enough to blame Laien for mentioning his worries. If something was truly wrong with his father, then he wanted to know. After all, if he knew then he would be able to do something to assist instead of remaining clueless and getting in the way.

“Mhm, we will just wait for father to contact us,” Arslan said more calmly than those around him expected. He smiled a bit helplessly at the surprised looks he received as a result; compared to how nervous he had been yesterday, now he was just a little stressed. He wouldn’t sulk the whole time just because he was worried about his father.

“Good, let us leave it at that,” Julien said with a slight smile. He exchanged a glance with the messenger just to make sure the man had nothing else to say, then thanked him and dismissed him. “The moods seems to be good enough…” he mused, then toward the group of youths that stood a dozen or so meters away, waiting to be allowed to approach.

“Come on over. If you have any business with those two little Devils, then your chance is right now,” he called out with a smile.

As the group of youths of various ages approached, Laien and Yin exchanged a glance. It wasn’t just their imagination that those seven were looking at them with a very competitive look in their eyes, was it? Some of them had challenging and provocative emotions added to the mix, some were fairly neutral, while one or two seemed to have a fairly clear hint of reverence present in their gazes.

“We heard about you the last night,” a boy who looked to be a year or two older than Laien and Yin spoke up. He had a competitive look in his eyes and was emanating a surprisingly strong aura; his martial cultivation was at the seventh mortal realm while his spiritual cultivation was, amazingly enough, at the ninth mortal realm. “To be honest, I just can’t believe that whole story. I don’t know why a respected lieutenant of the White Guard would make up something like that,” he said bluntly, his gaze focusing at Laien in particular.

“Well… as expected?” Julien chuckled in his heart. He had known those brats would come to stir trouble after hearing an unbelievable story of this kind, but he didn’t mind. He wanted to see how those two so-called Devils would react and truth to be told, he wanted to see them fight with those youngsters he and his friends had been grooming at the Fortress-City of Lugna.

“Yeah, and?” Laien raised his eyebrows a little and asked dispassionately. He needed to admit that this guy was talented and could be described as a genius, but… that was just it. He was impressed, but he felt no obligation to respond to those annoying accusations and provocations of his.

The youth frowned. He couldn’t help but feel that Laien was looking down on him, so this time he spoke without beating around the bush. “If you are really so strong, then fight me. You stopped a Grand Spell cast by thirty-six spiritual masters on your own, no? It should be simple for you to defeat me unless all of that was one huge lie,” he said challengingly, looking like he would pull out his weapon and attack Laien the moment he agreed to fight him.

“Why would I fight you?” Laien asked with a laugh and shook his head helplessly. If this guy approached him amiably and requested a spar, he wouldn’t have had anything against exchanging a few blows with him. However, in this situation, he simply couldn’t be bothered. At his current level, especially after gaining the half-complete foundation of the Aspect of Humility, he could kill most martial masters of the third rank with ease and fight on equal terms with some of the marital masters of the fourth rank. A thirteen, fourteen-year-old who was in the mortal realm wasn’t nearly enough to be a challenge to him.

“Why?” the youth asked angrily. “To prove the story about your strength isn’t a lie,” he stated strongly, thinking that Laien was too scared of him to agree to a fight. With each exchange of words between the two of them, he was growing more confident that Jasmine’s story was full of crap.

Laien chuckled in response to the slightly older boy’s statement. He tilted his head slightly and said with a smirk. “You are free to think it’s a lie. I don’t care.”

“You...” the youth stared at Laien with a mixture of fury and disbelief. “Do you admit that story was a lie then?” he asked sternly.

“You just don’t get it,” Laien said with a sigh. “What’s in it for me to fight you? What do I stand to gain from that?” he asked in return.

“You will prove that the story about you isn’t fake,” the youth repeated his point without giving it much thought.

“Don’t care,” Laien replied immediately, causing the youth to frown.

“Your name will spread in our country if you defeat me…” the boy suggested. He was officially recognized as one of the top three geniuses of his generation in the whole Ruishi Federation, so he thought this point would sway that black-haired boy a little. However…

“Don’t care,” Laien said and shrugged his shoulders a little. He truly didn’t need this kind of fame at the moment.

“… I will give you one hundred platinum coins if you defeat me,” the thirteen-year-old offered after a moment of hesitation.

“Don’t need them.” Yet, Laien’s response remained the same. Although one hundred platinum coins were more or less equivalent to one hundred crystal coins, this sum wasn’t all that enticing to him. If this guy learned what kind of fortune he was carrying in his interspatial ring, he would probably faint.

“A top-grade weapon…” the youth began saying with a groan, but just like before got denied by Laien.

“Already have one.”

“… I will sell you my older sister,” the youth said with a weak laugh and gave Laien a defeated smile. He no longer knew what to say.

“Hey!” the fifteen or sixteen years old girl that stood by the youth’s side smacked his head with her knuckles. “You spoiled brat, don’t go selling your own sister just because you can’t get what you want!” she reprimanded with a laugh and with a smile on her face, then gave Laien an apologetic look. “Sorry about him, he’s always been chronically competitive,” she said amicably.

“Mm, I don’t mind,” Laien said in response. Unlike her little brother, this girl had a calm, level-headed look in her eyes. She also looked like she was eager to try and fight them, but her approach was very different; at the very least, Laien didn’t think she had written off Jasmine’s story as a lie just yet.

“Ice Devil and Lightning Devil,” the girl said with a smile. “Is there anything that would entice you to fight any of us, or is it hopeless?” she asked very straightforwardly.

Whereas Laien started pondering the answer to this question, Yin said without needing to think about it for long.

“I’m still recovering, so I won’t be fighting anyone for a few days at least. Sorry.”

“Too bad,” the girl said, her voice sounding rather disappointed. “What about you?” she inquired hopefully.

“Um, I don’t know,” Laien said while scratching the back of his head. Had this little brother of hers kept being aggressive to the very end, he would have refused straight-out. Now, however, he didn’t feel as averse to the idea of sparring… but he didn’t quite want to do it without any benefits either.

“I’ve got a suggestion,” Julien mentioned with a playful smile. “How about anyone who loses to our Ice Devil works as his servant and guide for the time he spends in our country?” he threw the idea up in the air and glanced at Laien, curious to see what his response would be. The boy hadn’t been tempted by any of the things offered to him so far… so maybe something like that would work out better?

“Hmm, why not! I’m in,” Laien said and laughed in amusement, mainly because of the looks on the faces of those seven youths. That girl who spoke to him a second ago still looked fairly composed, but the other six were startled, if not scared by the prospect of working as servants. “Come, I will make a quick work of you before the breakfast,” he said wryly, looking the slightly older youth in the eye. Was he still up for fighting him, or would he shrink away from the challenge?