AUGUST 5th ARRIVED and the Saisei Coalition received a message that they were to arrive at the usual meeting spot at the Brass Gate Inn by 6 PM Bianjing time. This stood out as peculiar for two reasons. Firstly, the Brass Gate Inn was located in Juatong as opposed to Bianjing, which was far enough away to necessitate its own time zone. Secondly, and most importantly, they had already known of their leader’s death and were thus hesitant to reform themselves out of fear that the power vacuum would be filled by somebody sympathetic toward the nobility’s cause. The oddities only continued to pile up from there.

When they arrived, the Brass Gate Inn was quieter than usual. The bouncers who usually stood at the door and requested a passcode no longer stood there, although this was a common meeting time for what remained of the Saisei Coalition. Once they entered, they were greeted to a remodeled room. The table was repositioned to where the head faced one of the windows on the side as opposed to the front of the room. The walls were painted with a mahogany hue.

The members sat at their seats at the table, albeit compensated for the new location of the table. These spots were rather uncomfortable for many who had chosen their preferred seat in response to room conditions. For example, one of the pipes leaked onto the floor in a certain spot in the room. The table had been placed in such a location that this did not concern any sitting. Since the table had been moved, however, the dripping pipe had now been positioned directly over one member's head. The complaints about this placement continued until a familiar buzzer silenced them. They had not heard this sound since July 27th, but how could this be? They had thought Kasegi’s eye to be destroyed in the attack on Akuni’s nobility following his subsequent death. This theory was quickly proven wrong as the door opened, revealing the new leader of the Saisei Coalition.

“Who the hell do you think you are?” one member inquired.

“Who do you think you are speaking to your new leader with that tone,” Satsujin fired back.

“Ah, so our new leader is a maila,” he continued. “Last I checked the maila were Akuni nationalists. How can we know that we can trust you?”

“The natives of the Unkempt do not have national boundaries,” he replied, “only the geographical kind. I saw your struggle and decided to help you take control of your situation. Perhaps we could even take over Crenon as a whole.”

“What are you, insane? We only wanted to liberate those that suffered underneath the rule of the Kenshi dynasty!”

“Well, mission plans can change. You will learn this well.”

“I...I have no words.”

“Then stop talking so I can explain this.” Satsujin walks to the head of the table and lays out a map of Crenon.

“We currently do not have control over any of this. The second we take out the royals and replace them, however, we gain all of this.” He begins to shade in the entirety of Akuni and Aotoshi.

“Once we have this power, why bother to stop? The people in control are limiting our reach by not gaining control of Medikai, but we’re going to change that,” Satsujin adds as he shades Medikai little by little.

“If things go right, we can launch an attack on Medikai by December and take the nation by the end of the year, at which point we will have complete and total control of Crenon, something that has not been accomplished since the 1700s when these three nations first formed. All we need to do is remove the Queen and her brother from the equation and place ourselves in the power vacuum. Now, are there any questions?” One man raised his hand before being prompted to provide his query.

“How do you expect us to take down a heavily militarized nation like Medikai? Have you seen their weapons? Every weapon they use is vastly more efficient with cutting down hundreds of troops in a short period. They have guns. They have heavy artillery. What do Akuni and Aotoshi have outside of a few flintlock pistols that can hardly aim properly?”

“If we need better weapons,” Satsujin answered, “then we will make better weapons. We have an upper hand that Medikai doesn’t. The same thing that allowed us to defeat them in the Great Trifecta War will allow us to beat them today.” He then opened a burlap sack of garnium and laid it on the table.

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Within the palace of Akuni, Lanya and Musuko were working together to hang up their royal portraits. These paintings, made by Elmer Pokorni, were made for every royal in Akuni, usually completed within three weeks of the ruler’s coronation. Seldom was a ruler appointed in a short enough period from another that one royal artist was able to make more than one royal painting, yet Elmer had been a first, making the portraits for Yukan and Lanya. Yokina the Ravaged had his portrait completed by Elmer’s father, Yokina’s father had been completed by Elmer’s grandfather, and so on.

A worn ladder of wood stood propped against the wall, situated so that a window on the western side of the palace sat between the two legs. Yukan had always positioned the throne in such a manner that it would face toward this window, given how his hometown of Shirotaun was in that direction. Lanya and Musuko did not care to modify the position of this throne since they had been born in Central Akuni less than a year after Yukan and Ite became the rulers of the two nations.

Once the two finished hanging the painting on the wall, they heard the sounds of a battle outside. Musuko looked through the window underneath the ladder to see a militia of twenty-seven people fighting the guards at the gates of the palace. Leading them appeared to be a maila. More specifically, it had looked like the maila that the two of them had brought into the nobility of Akuni but a few days earlier.

Seeing the threat, Lanya grabbed the Fabled Swords as Musuko left the throne room for the Nukenai Bow. Once the queen and her brother had their weapons, there was no grace period. The door to the palace burst open, revealing the militia to the royals.