Shi Huo slumped down into the tavern seat with a put-upon sigh, uncaring of the racket made by his armor as he loosened the shoulder straps, allowing them to clatter to the floor.

None of the other patrons of his favorite tavern even glanced up as he casually batted the loose bits of armor under his table with his feet. Nor did they look up as his compatriots joined him, repeating his actions.

Their table was far from the only one with shoulder pauldrons gathered beneath it. It was a favored hangout for the Sect Guard of the Brazen Claw.

“So, we’re to be rebels now?”

His compatriots grunted quietly as the tavern owner’s daughter placed mugs before each of them without a need for prompting on any of their parts.

“Not just rebels,” Xing Zhong muttered quietly. “Part of the Grand Army of Ten Huo besides.” He spat to the side. “If I’d wanted to spend my days gallivanting across the country fighting bandits and Instinctive tribesmen, I’d have joined the Imperial army.”

Shi shrugged as he took a sip of his drink. “Well, it seems we’ve not much choice in the matter now.”

“Aye,” Xing nodded. “That we don’t.”

Such was the life of a mortal in Ten Huo. Cultivators made decisions and it was the mortals who had to live with the consequences.

It wasn’t like any of them would dream of quitting their jobs, throwing off their colors and disappearing into one of the city’s many back alleys.

And gain what work? Shi thought. The merchant caravans are basically a death sentence. The nearest farms are abandoned. Fishing boats have all but stopped going out since they started being attacked by sharks. Empress above, even the gangs have gone quiet as of late.

No, as unpalatable as this latest change was to him, he knew that the alternatives were worse.

The four men and one woman sat in silence, each sipping their drinks as they mulled over their worries.

“Do you think we’ll get gonnes?” Zhuan finally asked, glancing up from her drink. “Johansen’s guards have gonnes.”

“They call themselves the militia,” Xing corrected, though he did not move to correct her otherwise.

“Gonnes…” Tian breathed. “That’d be a thought.”

The weapons had achieved a near mythical status amongst the mortals of the city during the siege. Mystic tools that might allow a dozen mortal men and women to stand toe to toe with a cultivator.

Sure, the Brazen Claw had some of their own; fire-lances they were called, but they were reserved for the sect’s elite mortal troops.

Not the street-sloggers like him and his friends.

“Forget that!” the thus far silent Zou snapped at them. “You all realize that we’re rebels now? Dissidents!?”

Tian glanced at his friends, before they all mutually shrugged.

“Wouldn’t be the first time.” Tian leaned back in his seat. “I mean, not for us, obviously. But my grandad was around back when the whole Northern Independence movement was going strong.”

Indeed, he was pretty sure the old man would have been hooting and hollering with glee at the thought of Ten Huo trying for independence once more if the cold hadn’t taken him a few winters past. Still, lots of the city’s older crowd would no doubt be waxing poetic about the new magistrate taking the city back to its ‘golden years’.

Personally, Tian was dubious this wouldn’t all turn out the same way it had for them. With the rebel leaders all rounded up and their closest family lines forced to face decimation.

Well, with the exception of the former leader herself, Tian thought. I mean, you can hardly decimate the Imperial family for one of its members rebelling against the Imperial Family.

Though wasn’t the former magistrate now part of Johansen’s inner circle? She was an Imperial. So was she a hostage or a collaborator? And now that he thought about it,hadn’t he heard some chatter about her losing her powers?

He vaguely recalled some chatter about that back when they were running the Imperial army out of the city. Or rather, back when the sect’s heavy hitters had been doing that. He and his squad had spent the entire ‘conflict’ guarding a checkpoint near the wall. The closest they’d come to seeing any of the fighting had been when they’d heard gonne-fire going off near the Imperial Palace for a few evenings.

The whys hadn’t really mattered. That sort of thing was for cultivators. Mortals like him just did as they were told.

Which, while sometimes annoying, also meant that they usually avoided the fallout that came with those decisions.

His grandad had certainly fought for the rebels during the Northern War of Independence, yet he’d not been punished for it. He’d just missed out on some of his pay and been re-inducted into the guard when the Imperial Army rolled back into the city.

Oh, certainly there’d been a few hangings of mortal officers, but that was to be expected. Appearances needed to be kept.

“Grandad was fine.” He said philosophically. “Just do as you're told. Don’t talk too much and hope it works out for the best. And if it doesn’t… just shut up and get ready to surrender when things start looking dicey.”

Zou looked at him in disgust, but the rest of the table nodded along in agreement.

“…So gonnes?” Zhuan ventured again. “And silver. Specifically more silver. Because I’ve heard the ‘militia’ gets paid four silver a week?”

“Four silver a week!? Someone’s having you on.”

“No, I’m serious. And one more besides if they see any actual fighting.”

“Horseshit. I bet you-”

This time it was Tian who interrupted, clearing his throat as he posed the other question that had been bothering him since he sat down. “Before all that, do you think the sect will actually hand us over?”

Sure, the sects didn’t actually care for him and his, but in his experience cultivators never backed down on anything without a fight.

Zou scoffed. The man had finally realized that no one else shared his patriotic outrage at Ten Huo’s rebellion and was mulishly nursing his drink.

“You seen any Silver Paw Sect members wandering around recently? If they didn’t put up a fight over Johansen turning the whole city against the Empire, I don’t think they’re going to put up much of a fight over him taking a bunch of mortals from them.”

None of them had much of an argument against that.

------------------

As soon as they were back at the compound, Jack tossed his new ornate scepter over to Ren, who only barely caught it. Which said a lot about how surprised she was by what was essentially a key to the city’s more mystic defenses.

Of course, normally, in the hands of anyone who the weapon was not keyed for it was just a big paperweight.

“Wha-” the merchant started to say before trailing off as her eyes became momentarily glassy. “This… this is keyed to me!?”

“Surprise,” Jack singsonged, as the seals of his armor cracked open with a hiss before unfolding like a flower, allowing him to step out.

“Surprise?” Ren murmured quietly to herself, before rounding on him with a… complicated expression. “This is a rod of control. Whoever holds it may as well hold the city.” She eyed him. “Why is it keyed to me!?”

Jack scratched the back of his neck.

Yeah, the artificer in charge of carving the rod hadn’t been happy about Jack’s request for that small alteration. At first he’d refused politely. Jack had politely requested he reconsider. The artificer had refused again. Impolitely, that time.

At which point Jack had made the request again.

Impolitely.

The other man had then acceded to the miner’s wishes.

Benefits of destroying the equivalent of two sects simultaneously, I suppose, Jack thought.

Fortunately, aside from Ren, no one else seemed too bothered by this new development. Elwin was already following the members of the newly established ‘Steel Paw’ down into Jack’s workshop.

Which was probably for the best. While he had some assurances against poor behavior on the part of his newly acquired band of cultivators, that didn’t mean he trusted them.

And An…

“I don’t know about that,” An opined as she rather casually dug her little finger into her ear canal, wiggling it back and forth in a rather unladylike manner. “The old Magistrate had one and she still lost the city.”

Ren whirled on her fellow cultivator. “After she lost her ability to cultivate. Which would have rendered the city’s internal defenses useless to her.”

Defenses that were, to hear them described to him, pretty potent. The protections surrounding the walls were among the least of the tools available to an Imperial magistrate. Once an attacking force penetrated deeper into the city, it was possible to summon phantasmal spirit beasts, activate anti-cultivator traps, and bring down precision lighting strikes.

Potent stuff, Jack thought.

Stuff that might have come in handy in the minutes immediately preceding the Red Death’s arrival.

Unfortunately, not only were most of those defenses located around the Imperial Palace, the one person capable of activating and controlling those defenses had been busy fighting said dragon herself rather than directing the city’s ancient weapon systems.

Ren continued, gripping the rod in her hand so tightly Jack was actually a little worried she’d snap it. “If Lady Huang had still been capable of utilizing her control rod, the success of Tian’s coup would not have been nearly so assured. Even after her erstwhile bodyguards abandoned her.”

“Sounds useful,” An hummed, before her gaze slid over to him. “So why are you handing it off to the dog?”

Sure, the little black haired tiger-kin was trying to sound nonchalant, but Jack could detect just a hint of jealousy and avarice in her gaze now.

He sighed. “Because Ren’s spent the last few weeks trying to run this city. Sure, she’s got Huang helping now, but it’s still ultimately been her work. She’s the one I trust most with anything… city related.”

Even as Ren puffed up, An seemed to deflate slightly, as if in recrimination.

She’d tried to help with the more bureaucratic side of Ten Huo’s administration. For a little while, before it became abundantly clear that her total lack of familiarity with administration in general - and the political makeup of the city specifically - meant she was causing more harm than good.

Enough so that I’m reasonably certain she had someone else helping her set-up Jiangshi in my absence, Jack thought. Because if not… well I shudder to think of how much of a mess the place must be.

He said none of that though.

“It’s not a slight,” he added quickly, attempting to cheer the cat up. “You’ve been just as busy working with Gao to set up and integrate the Jiangshi militia in the city. And I’m sure you’ll be even more busy trying to integrate the sect forces into the new Ten Huo army.”

An seemed to perk up at that, tail fluttering about behind her back even as she stifled a smile.

“Still Master, I have to ask, why bother with this… delegation in the first place?” Ren asked quietly. “It’s a… not insubstantial break in tradition. And while I am one hundred percent loyal, others might see it as a weakness in the security of your rule should they learn that it is I, not you, who holds the reins of the city’s defenses.”

“Well, ideally no one will ever know,” Jack responded easily. “And as to why, well, you said it yourself about a minute ago. Things went to shit for Huang because she was both the city’s most powerful defender and the person in charge of directing those defenses.”

Jack tapped one of the thrusters on his suit with the back of an oversize knuckle. “I don’t intend to hamstring myself like that.”

It was An who finally got it. “You intend to repeat what you did in Jiangshi across the province. Build more edifices. Summon more spirit beasts. Put the mortals to work.”

Jack nodded, glad to see that one of his followers got it. “Exactly. I can’t afford to spend all my time in Ten Huo. That fortress I’ll be building on our Northern border is just one example of the kind of projects that might take me out of the city for days at a time.”

Ren nodded. “And you do not wish to leave the city defenseless in your absence.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say the city was defenseless even without the defense matrix, but essentially yes,” he acknowledged.

It took him a while to realize both women were staring at him.

“So beneficent,” Ren finally murmured as she fell seamlessly and gracefully to one knee. “To focus on the wellbeing of the province as a whole, even over your own personal power.”

The blonde dog-kin stared up at him, eyes burning with an earnestness that made him mildly uncomfortable – which was ironic given that once upon a time he’d dreamed of being worshipped as some manner of living god.

“This Delan Ren shall strive to prove to you that your act of faith and selflessness was no mistake. So she swears.”

Jack could only nod mutely as he realized that An had likewise taken a knee.

“That’s… good.” He spent a moment searching for the proper response to this unexpected show of enthusiasm. “See that you do.”

A little gruff, but it sounded appropriate.

“Of course,” Ren nodded eagerly, as if she’d just had some manner of holy mission bestowed upon her.

It almost made Jack feel bad that the two main reasons he’d foisted the control rod off onto her were because he was almost entirely sure the thing wouldn’t work for him – and he didn’t want to be cooped up in the city all the time like some oversized guard dog.

Well, I guess it’s good that Ren’s happy about it, he thought.

Still, this seemed like the most ideal moment to slip away.

“Right,” he said, shifting slowly towards the door. “With that done, I’m sure we all have a lot of work to do. An has army stuff. Ren has city stuff. I need to check in with Elwin.”

Both women nodded eagerly, showing not a hint of aggravation at the veritable shitload of problems he’d just offloaded onto them.

“Of course, Great One.” Ren smiled happily.

An just nodded slowly. “I’ve got it handled.”

He certainly hoped so.

…Because he’d be totally lost if either of them didn’t.

Not least of all because I’m pretty sure Gao would kill me if I attempted to foist off any more work onto him.

—----------------------

As Jack strode through the halls towards Lin’s quarters, he watched through his tablet as Elwin fussed over the newly formed ‘Steel Paw’.

A name about as subtle as the moniker itself where the origins of the unit were concerned given that the was made up of survivors of the now defunct Silver Paw Sect. Cultivators that had been outside the compound when he’d leveled it.

Now, he’d been aware that the attack would leave survivors. Counted on it even. He’d expect them to see which way the wind was blowing and leave town as quickly as possible.

…Or be gunned down assaulting his compound in some futile attempt at getting revenge.

He’d been leaning towards the former outcome though. That was usually what happened with a rival gang once you’d broken up the core membership.

They hadn’t done that though. Or at least, some of them hadn’t.

Instead, they’d shown up on his doorstep begging for mercy.

Mercy, which he’d granted – after a fashion.

His eyes tracked to the nearest member of the group as she took off her tiger-mask helmet, unveiling a fuzzy pair of tiger ears – and a mark on her neck.

The old explosive chip special, he thought, a complicated expression flashing across his features.

As he watched, Elwin all-but grabbed the muscular tiger-kin onscreen. The slight elf was utterly ignorant, or perhaps uncaring, of the way the bigger woman practically snarled at her, instead focusing on the runes engraved on the woman’s pauldron.

One of which was visibly flickering, the low blue light weak and inconsistent.

“Wu!” Elwin shouted. “The buffer on this enchantment is failing. I could hear this one’s armor clicking as she walked in here.”

“This one has a name.” The tiger-kin muttered sullenly.

Elwin ignored her, turning instead toward the sheepish looking dog-kin woman that appeared on-screen.

She wore robes, much like most cultivators Jack had met, but they were of a distinctly different bent. More European than Asian. That was not to say it didn’t have Asian elements, it certainly did, but it was clear that Elwin had a part in designing the uniforms of her apprentices.

“This one apologizes mistress,” the dog-kin bowed. “This one thought the matrix would hold.”

Elwin snorted in a manner that somehow managed to be graceful while still conveying the utmost disdain. “No, you hoped it would hold.”

A single delicate finger pointed to the offending piece of armor. “Magister’s do not hope. They know. Why is that Wu?”

The young woman shuffled uncomfortably. “Because unreliable spellwork is a blade without a handle.”

“Precisely,” Elwin turned to where Jack assumed her other apprentices were standing. “Now, because Wu thought she could get away with subpar work, I can only assume others amongst you feel similarly.”

She received no reply in response, from the still undressing members of the Iron Paw or her apprentices. “As a result, you shall all be redoing these runes in their totality. And if I find even one weight reduction enchantment or rust resistance rune that is not up to my standards, you shall be wiping them and doing them again.”

“May we use the laser cutting artifact for the physical work, mistress?” A voice timidly asked from off-screen.

“No,” Elwin scoffed. “I’ve noticed more than a few of you growing dependent on our lord’s artifacts for your labors. I would be remiss in my duties as your teacher if I failed to correct that failing, lest you prove utterly useless beyond the walls of this-”

Jack stopped just in time to avoid bumping into the doors of Lin’s room. Putting the tablet away, content that Elwin had the former Silver Paw members in hand, as well as her apprentices, he glanced up at the two guards stationed outside to make sure neither had noticed his faux pax.

They hadn’t. Or at least, they were doing an admirable job or pretending they hadn’t by standing at attention and staring at pretty much anything that wasn’t him.

Hell, if he didn’t know better, he’d say they looked uncomfortable.

Which he supposed made sense. He could well see a cultivator acting… poorly towards anyone that had seen them embarrass themselves.

“Is Lin in?” he asked, content to let the moment pass by.

“She is.” The woman on the left answered quickly, her eyes remaining fixed on the far wall. “Along with Lady Huang.”

God, they still sounded nervous, he thought. How bad must cultivators be?

“Right, well I’ll just be heading in then,” he said.

Both guard’s eyes opened wide, and one visibly twitched, but neither said anything.

So Jack pulled open the doors.

Just in time for a rather long, rather feminine moan of pleasure to echo out from inside. A moment of stunned silence followed.

He started to close the doors.

“Wait, Jack this is-” Lin’s surprised voice started to call out from within the room, accompanied by Huang’s gasps.

He finished closing the doors.

He ignored the blushing of both guards.

He walked away.

And only once he was down the hall did he whisper quietly to himself.

“Christ, I knew they were close, but I didn’t think they’d grown that close.”

He certainly hadn’t thought they were both lesbians. Sure, they’d been hanging out a lot, but he’d thought they were both just close friends. That was the logical assumption. Neither had given him any hints beyond that friendship that they liked women.

That was… fine though.

Good for them. Two members of his nominal harem liked each other. That was good.

He wasn’t jealous. Not at all. He already had two women he was with. His ego had not been stung at all.

“Speaking of which,” he murmured. “…I need to find An. Or Ren. Or both.”

Yes, both sounded good.