Laska had about as little reaction to the general's proclamation as Nirou did. Which was weird to him. He was still mostly disconnected to the politicalities of this world, but the way Shilan said this seems to indicate it's a big deal. However he was shortly proven to merely be overthinking things once again.

"I could say I was surprised to hear as much, but that would be a lie." she says bluntly. "You are certainly the type of man to work towards overthrowing a superior you dislike. So I take it you took this long to find a pretender to throw your support behind? An illegitimate sibling of the King's perhaps?"

"Pretender?" the man replies incredulously. He stays there with his eyebrow raised for a moment, just letting the word hang. After a few seconds of silence, he bursts into laughter. "Hahahaha, how can you go from making a claim about the type of man I am to that assumption of all things? Are you sure you know who I am? Why would I follow protocol for a revolution?"

Laska had a look of confusion, but with a tinge of offense. As if she had just been insulted. Hargujad stifled his own laugh from his seat, while his wife gave him a stern look. Sahla was still standing over by the stairs, and tried to scold her father in her own timid way.

"Father, please don't talk to Laska like that." she pleaded. "Weren't we supposed to be here for her?"

Shilan's laughter abruptly stopped. He put on a serious face and looked straight at Laska. "She's right. You grew up in the nobility, so of course your first thoughts would be in that direction. It's not something I should be ridiculing you over. I apologize."

"No, it's alright. I'm not about to let a bit of laughter hurt me." Laska brushed the whole thing off. She looked like she just wanted to get on to the rest of the conversation. Nirou could tell it obviously wasn't the laughter that had been the problem, but she wanted to leave things at that.

The general waved to Sahla, who took it as direction to head back up the stairs. Shortly after, that dull ringing sound from before started up again. Now that he was right under it, Nirou could tell it was actually a series of different tones. A musical instrument? It sounded kind of like bells, but a lot lower. However, Nirou was quickly snapped back to the present conversation.

"I understand your intention, General." Laska begins. "But I feel you may be too reckless. Anjdrahm has held a steady line of succession for hundreds of years. The present king may be worth overthrowing, but the kingdom is still prosperous from the previous one, and the older generation remembers him fondly. You are well liked to be sure, but will you be trusted to lead a nation after heading a violent uprising? The royal family's legitimacy can't be questioned, they have been with the country since its inception. But yours can. Especially from regional leaders within the kingdom. They'll take it as an opportunity to splinter off and claim some power for themselves. I know you want what's best for your people, but are you sure you are acting correctly to that end? You may end up regarded as no better than the steppe warlords."

"Make no mistake Laska, I have considered everything you mentioned." Shilan leans back in his chair nonchalantly. "The minor neighboring kingdoms that I personally helped to subjugate in my youth would probably love to break off if they could. I've been taking every opportunity to meet with regional leaders and discuss this matter in secret. The King hasn't been especially good at holding onto friends or allies, so I have managed to get many on my side. Though it is still a work in progress."

"As for legitimacy..." the general sets his chair back down and stands up for this part, evidently for emphasis. "There's one thing infinitely more legitimate than royal blood. The will of the people! I will be accepted by all the citizens of Anjdrahm if I overthrow the King on their behalf. I'm going to make Anjdrahm into a representative republic!"

Laska actually does a double take this time, completely blindsided. "What? Is that even possible? All of Anjdrahm, a republic? There's no way it could be done, it's too large an area. Regional interests are far too much at odds. Republics are only possible for smaller nations like Kelth or Heskod. A tightly knit group of people with shared interests. Those regional leaders won't let you represent them, they'll want power for themselves."

"Villages and towns decide on mayors amongst themselves, and regional centers all have landowners and businessmen that form councils to decide on things. This is a system that already exists." Shilan argues. "We just expand upon that. The elected mayors of all the towns in a region choose which wealthy council member in their regional center represents their interests best, and he becomes the governor. The process then repeats and the governors choose which person in the capital is the most suitable to lead them. After my term is up, of course."

Laska remained unconvinced. But Nirou had been silent this whole time, and he figured he finally had a reason to speak up.

"Actually, the world I'm from has a lot of republics." he interjects. "Most nations either are one, or are pretending to be one. Some of them are really huge too. So theoretically it could work, I don't really know the situation here to say for sure though."

Shilan gives Nirou a nice big grin in response. "See, somebody here has some faith in me! Just because such a large republic hasn't been formed on this continent doesn't mean it isn't possible. All of the Southern Kingdom is fairly close culturally, while the Beastmen and the Eastern Empire have long been established as mutual enemies for us. With my fame, I could unite the people on their own terms."

Laska is silent for a while as she mulls things over, before going on. "So you've been at this for while now? Getting key players on your side. How much longer do you expect before you will finally make your move?"

"I think the soonest it could be is half a year from now." the general answers. "It's a real pain to go out to all the territories of the Kingdom and speak with regional leaders without arousing suspicion. It takes a lot of time and planning. I've been working at it steadily for a couple of years now, but I am close to having enough support. See, all I have to do is convince the nobles that have major investments in land or business, since they will get to keep their power in the shift. It's tied to something tangible. All the noble lines that do nothing but flaunt their pedigrees are worthless as allies."

"Over half a year from now. So that brings me to our situation." Laska changes gears. "I have vowed to take revenge on Temat and his band. But more than that, they were hired by someone. I will wring who it was out of them, and then see justice served there as well. I came here not merely for asylum, but to ask for your aid. Given your position, the hope was that you could send an elite contingent of your men with us to wipe out the Bandit King. With these revolution plans of yours, I doubt you will have the forces to spare us."

"Temat? And you call me reckless." Shilan exhales sharply, managing to hold himself back from a full scoff. "Even with the most elite group I could give you, victory wouldn't be guaranteed. The only way he could be defeated for sure is if I went and handled it myself, but that's not possible, revolution or no. I've got too many responsibilities here. But putting aside the question of if you could win, I seriously doubt I could get away with sending such skilled soldiers with you for this task as long as the King is in power. The Southern Kingdom is cut off from the steppes by mountains and desert, we are in basically no danger from his band. It would be seen as beyond frivolous, given the Beastmen could attack at any time. Part of why I plan to revolt in typhoon season, no worries about getting flanked on that end."

"So we have no choice but to wait regardless. We need you in charge to get the support in manpower we need." Laska sighs. "So then, what do you expect us to do for all that time? It wouldn't do to get complacent before heading off to fight some vicious marauders, and combat practice by our lonesome would little prepare us."

"Oh? Are you suggesting you want to help the effort?" the general smirks. "You could just say so, you know. I know you wouldn't want to stay cooped up in here. How about this? I assemble an appropriate team to send after Temat with you when the time comes, and you two join them for now in some assignments. You can get some proper training in while getting to know who you'll be working with better."

Laska nodded, seemingly content with that arrangement. Nirou didn't really have anything to say about the matter, if Laska was going to do it, he was too. He knew getting dragged along with her would accomplish more than anthing else he could decide to do.

"Honestly, you should be glad to have a bit of a delay." Shilan added. "It gives the two of you some time to make tributes while keeping your health up. And you never know when a gift can completely change everything. If you're still about as strong as you were last year, you don't stand the slightest chance against Temat at this very moment. But that could change with just a smidge of luck."

"You're right. On all accounts." Laska admits. "So I suppose I should be grateful. How long will it take to assemble this team? What kind of missions did you have in mind for us to go on with them?"

"I can have it ready to go by the end of the week." the general assures. "As for the content of the missions, I'll probably decide as I go along. Though I have heard tell of some covert Beastmen invader remnants lurking about the archipelago down south. That may be a good start."

Suddenly, the dull ringing from upstairs that had been constant got louder, with a series of particularly booming noises. Though it was part of a rhythm and interspersed with some softer noises, so it didn't sound completely off. Likely just some plausible deniability.

"Oh, we'll have to drop the topic for now, someone's here." Shilan stands up from the table and starts making his way to the door. "In fact, I wouldn't doubt that they're here to get me. They've started dragging me to things as of late instead of waiting for me to take my own time. Always such a pain."

The general steps outside for a while, seemingly making conversation with the visitor on his doorstep. Nirou could hear that they were talking, but with the distance, the door between them, and the ringing from upstairs, he couldn't make out what they were saying. Unfortunately, his translation didn't adjust volume on his behalf like it did for accents.

After only a couple of minutes, the general opened the door back up and leaned in.

"Alright, I've got to get going. Got plenty of things to do." he claimed. "I'll talk to someone that I want you to meet tomorrow, so get ready to accompany me then. For now, just make yourselves at home! Ask the kids if you need anything."

With that, the man headed off to work for the day. His son seemed to follow his lead, getting up and handing the baby over to its mother.

"I better head out too." Hargujad groaned. "I've got all sorts of administrative responsibilites, keeping track of logistics, etcetera. You know how it is."

"Have a nice day, dear." Tajau tells her husband, while making a waving motion with her daughter's hand.

As the eldest son left, Nirou decided not to think about the fact that he was going to be spending all day trying not to be awkward in a house full of women. Thinking of a suitable distraction, he got his companion's attention.

"Laska, I had something I wanted to ask about." he tells her. "You guys keep bringing up countries I don't know about, and even Beastmen, it's starting to bother me to be totally out of the loop like this. If we're not doing anything else today, couldn't you tell me about all that stuff? So I'm not totally lost when it comes up again. I was only able to butt in the one time before, but with more context I might have something else useful to say from the knowledge of my own world."

"Ah. Yes, of course we can. I'm so sorry." the girl apologizes sincerely, surprising Nirou. He didn't realize she would treat it like something she had to be sorry over. "It's inexcusable that I've left you in the pain of ignorance while we talk politics. I'm the one who brought you here, yet I've not even bothered to consider any special insight you could provide from your otherworld experiences and knowledge. We'll have to rectify that. Today will be a day of study. I'll bring your understanding of the situation on the continent up to par with any layman of this world's!"

"Oh my." Tajau giggled lightly, from the place she had sit on the floor with her baby. "Sounds like you'll be working hard. You kids let me know when you want lunch, okay?"

Nirou prepared himself to be the one to do so when the time came, as he had no illusions of Laska stopping the lesson she was about to unleash.