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Fates Parallel Chapter 564 - Ploy
🕑 Added 2024-09-23 18:20:42 +0000 UTCEveryone had their own reason to fight. Duty, loyalty, ambition, insatiable bloodlust—it was hardly an exaggeration to say that there were as many reasons as there were soldiers in the war. Those reasons mattered. They did not need to be the same, but they at least had to be compatible.
Yang Qiu cared little for the defense of Jiaguo as a nation, beyond the fact that it was a haven for her and her people—their only hope of salvation. Narae fought to prove her own worth, Yumi out of a sense of duty, and Xiulan simply because she had a bone to pick with the sects that had stripped her sect of its status. Their reasons were not the same as Yoshika’s, but they still aligned.
What, then, were Qin’s reasons?
Yan De suggested that it was because Jiaguo had grown too large, too fast. That she was proving herself too much of a threat for the ancient empire to ignore. Yet, if that were true, why hadn’t the God-Emperor himself made a move? It was the sects themselves who had come together against Yoshika, their interests suddenly aligned where they hadn’t been before.
The obvious catalyst was Eunae, and it was Yue who pointed that out when Eunae came to her, exhausted after another uphill session of trying to win over the captured prisoners.
“Qian Shi couldn’t get enough support for an all-out war with Yamato, while Sun Quan had the same problem with Goryeo. My father holds a grudge against Jia and Eui, but while we were a tiny nation state across the largest mountain in the world—ostensibly sponsored by his very own sect, even—there was little he could do.”
Eunae groaned, sinking into Yue’s disgustingly comfortable furniture. A huge advantage of being Yoshika was that she could travel between Jiaguo City and Kucheon with almost trivial ease.
“So by uniting them under Jiaguo’s banner, and myself as part of Yoshika, I made all of their targets the same.”
“Precisely, even so I find it odd that they were able to come together so quickly, but perhaps there’s something else at play.”
“The Jade Pillar?”
Yue clicked her tongue and took a sip of her tea as she considered it.
“Maybe. We don’t know enough about it—which is suspicious in and of itself. No secret is that well kept—not even in Qin.”
“I’m beginning to develop an inkling. Too vague and uncertain to put into words, but it’s like a cultivation breakthrough, tantalizingly close but just out of reach.”
“Pfft, as if you’ve ever done anything less than smash your way through every obstacle your cultivation has ever presented.”
Eunae crossed her arms and pouted, blushing slightly.
“Don’t lump me in with Jia and Eui—I struggled quite a bit before joining Yoshika.”
“Mhm. And Kaede?”
“Makes Jia look positively lazy by comparison.”
Yue froze, giving Eunae a concerned look.
“No.”
“Oh yes. Hayakawa Kaede has spent nearly every waking moment for as long as she can remember on a single-minded obsession with martial arts. It was only after becoming part of Yoshika that she learned to relax, and even then only after the war in Yamato. We barely had time to start considering her future when another war came along to steal her focus.”
“Oh dear. Well, we’ll have to do something about that after we put my father in his place. Speaking of which—let’s get back on track. How is your progress with the prisoners?”
Eunae rested her chin on one hand and huffed.
“Slow. Most of them don’t want anything to do with Jia, much less me. I believe I’ve garnered some goodwill from my treatment of them, but they are suspicious.”
“Of course they are—they’re from Qin. Suspicion is our default state of mind.”
“It wasn’t like that in the villages I visited.”
Yue sighed.
“Yes, well, those were common folk—these are cultivators. They’ve lived in the sects, and they know better.”
“Do you think it will work?”
“Were it anyone else, I would say no. Even you aren’t going to be able to cause open revolt within the army’s ranks, but you don’t need to. If you break down their morale enough, the grandmasters will have no choice but to make their move—and that’s when we make ours.”
Eunae stared solemnly out a window, furrowing her brows.
“It feels wrong—like I’m tricking them or something.”
“Eunae—Yoshika, you would have treated them well regardless of any ulterior motives. It’s not even a good strategy—it’s just us arguably sane people doing our best to plan around your insanity.”
“I’m not sure if that makes me feel any better.”
Yue laughed sharply.
“It’s not meant to! You can be utterly insufferable sometimes, and I will not apologize for reminding you of that. Yet, we all love you for it. You just keep being yourself, and we’ll do our best to support you.”
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me—apologize!”
Eunae giggled.
“Sorry! I know how difficult we can be.”
“Good. Now, let’s discuss a few possible scenarios...”
—-
The returning prisoners slowly began to increase in number. Gao never saw the one he’d escorted again—and he’d been lightly reprimanded for asking so many questions. Nevertheless, rumors began to spread as more and more returned, each with the same story.
Jiaguo treated their prisoners well—even luxuriously, compared to the strict conditions of the army camp. Gao had no idea where they got the provisions for that—Kucheon was a small settlement, and there was limited farmland in the surrounding area. He hadn’t heard anything about supply trains coming in from the south, and the army would have at least attempted a raid on them if they had. Was it the teleportation formation he’d heard about? After seeing those teleporting shock troops, Gao was ready to believe anything.
Wen You was excited about the prisoners receiving parole.
“Senior Gao! Do you think Shun will be returning soon?”
“Hm, perhaps. It seems that Jiaguo releases only those who swear never to return to the field. As far as I can tell, none have been willing to renege on their oath. I hear that they’ve been sending them home.”
“Really? Strange, I haven’t seen any convoys leaving.”
Probably because they wanted to be subtle about it. It wouldn’t be good for morale to see so many men quitting the battlefield. Orders from command were already quite strict about the returning prisoners, even if it was too late to stop the spread of rumors. Gao could see why, too. Morale in the army was poor, to say the least.
He saw it in the way his brothers spoke, and how they fought. Their hearts weren’t in it—they kept losing, and why fight to your last breath when you could surrender and be treated like an honored guest? Avenge the fallen? Look how Jiaguo returned them unharmed. The demons were horrific and monstrous but...well, they seemed rather well disciplined, didn’t they?
It was...hard to keep fighting. Taken alone, any one of those factors would have been a non-issue. As Gao reminded his brothers, the enemy were never monsters—they were people capable of rationality and cunning. Which meant, on the other side of that same coin, that they were capable of mercy and generosity. He’d always known that, and he was sworn to fight them anyway.
But together, each factor built on the others. The losses they took, the resentment over being commanded by some wealthy northerner, and the almost suicidally gentle hand of their enemy—contrasted heavily by how soundly they’d defeated an indefatigable elder of the great sects.
It wore heavily on Gao and his brothers. Some were even entertaining thoughts of surrender or desertion. Gao made sure to smack sense into any that he heard, but the fact that any were voicing such thoughts boded poorly.
Just when he began to worry that they’d need to withdraw entirely to wait for the northern reinforcements to arrive, something strange happened. Or rather—stopped happening.
The return of the prisoners halted. At the same time, Jiaguo’s strikes gradually reduced, then stopped. It was a welcome reprieve, but Gao grew nervous after two days without any movement from the enemy.
His worries were vindicated when the largest army yet approached from Kucheon, a single mass of troops marching straight for the middle of the encirclement—what would have normally been a suicidal deployment.
Except that they weren’t Jiaguo’s troops. They were the proud brothers and sisters of Qin—each and every one that had been taken prisoner. Leading them, standing boldly in front of over a thousand of Gao’s fallen brothers and sisters at arms, was the legendary terror that had taken Kucheon from the empire centuries ago. The Nine-Tailed Fox Princess.
The worst had come to pass.
—-
The absolute worst case scenario. Eunae had discussed all manner of possible reactions to her ploy with Yue, but even she hadn’t expected Yan De to stoop so low. She understood now, why he had chosen to strike the moment she joined Yoshika, why her plan was doomed from the start.
He’d expected it. Yan De had known what she would do when faced with an army from Qin, how she would fight. And why not? He’d probably studied her every move after the war with Yamato. She regretted to admit that she’d underestimated him, while he had not given her the same discourtesy.
Now, her only remaining course was to spring his trap in a last ditch effort to turn it against him. No matter how bad it looked.
“People of Qin, heed my words. I am Empress Yoshika of Jiaguo. I have no quarrel with your people, nor designs on your empire. As a demonstration of good will, I hereby release all captured prisoners from my custody.”
Her voice was magnified by magic, resonating throughout the entire valley. Even Yan De, hiding at the back of his army, would hear her voice.
She meant it when she said all prisoners. Some had been unwilling to swear not to return to war against her, others had agreed insincerely and would no doubt renege. Eunae didn’t care. She brought them all with her. It was now or never.
Shun Song fidgeted nervously behind her, searching the endless sea of cultivators surrounding them. He was the only one that knew why Eunae was doing this, and he had every right to be fearful—even if he didn’t entirely believe her.
Sun Quan, rather than Yan De, was the one to approach, calling back from a distance so great that it would have been almost comical if they weren’t both xiantian level experts.
“I know who you are, Lady Seong. No matter which name you hide behind, I see beyond it to witness your true nature. I name you—Kumiho, the Deceiver. The great spirit of the nine-tailed fox, who has been a plague upon this world since time immemorial, twisting the hearts and souls of innocent men to feed your wicked whims.”
Eunae took a step forward and slashed at the air with one hand, shaking her head.
“You are wrong! My ancestor may have been a monster, but I denounce her without reservation. Is the wisdom of the Heavenly Empire of Qin so shallow that you would condemn me for my appearance alone?”
“Not merely your appearance, witch! You carry the spirit’s qi within your very soul, as all your kin do. History may have forgotten, but I have not—the great spirits were destroyed for a reason, yet you and your kind would revive them! There were reports of a great fox spirit manifesting in the sky during your ascension.”
How did he know about that? Qin’s spies must have infiltrated deeper than Yoshika realized, despite the best efforts of Yagi and Ishihara.
“You mean this spirit?”
Eunae manifested her Foxfire Avatar, greatly diminished by how much she’d been drawing on its power during the war, but still present even weeks after it was created by her divine art. She suspected it was permanent—a sort of semi-autonomous familiar spirit bound to her. Perhaps it really would grow to become a sister to Heian one day.
The lithe fox-shaped blaze of shimmering iridescent flame stared defiantly across the battlefield as Eunae gestured to it.
“Judge for yourself, Grandmaster—not with your eyes, but with your soul. I do not hide who or what I am. I know you can sense it.”
Sun Quan did not falter.
“Lies. You are a being of pure deception. My predecessor may have fallen to your tricks, but I will not be so easily fooled.”
“How convenient for you. That anything I say can be discarded as lies, and any proof to the contrary ignored as more trickery. There is nothing I can do—no force in heaven or earth that could sway you. A perfect shield from truth.”
And that was Yan De’s trap. While Eunae had simply been a princess of Goryeo—or even if she had been queen—Yoshika could have kept her away from the battlefield, as far away from Kucheon as possible. But there was no way for her to do that now—not without denying a part of herself or quitting the field entirely.
Kucheon wouldn’t stand without her, but as long as she was present Yan De had an airtight way to deny her domain.
“You perform your sophistry well—as you always have. It changes nothing. Begone, creature—and take your thralls with you. By the God-Emperor’s name, we will not be manipulated by hostages. If you turn our people against us, then we will steel our hearts and do what we must to free our brethren from your torturous influence.”
Eunae clenched his fists so tightly that her claws dug into her palms, drawing a small trickle of blood.
“Is that what you did to the others I sent back?”
Sun Quan glanced back briefly at the army behind him, listening with bated breath. He could not afford to lie or obfuscate here, not when it would be so trivial to verify his response.
“They refused to retake the field—one could not ask for a more blatant subversion. No oath can supersede that which we all swear, to uphold the sanctity of our mighty empire in the name of the God-Emperor Qin. They were compromised—a danger to kin and country.”
“So you killed them.”
The elder stood with his back straight, his expression giving nothing away. He did not flinch from her accusation.
“They will be avenged.”
Yoshika could feel the emotions of the prisoners behind her and the army ahead as a riotous storm of uncertainty. There was nothing more she could do. Sun Quan—but no, she knew that it was Yan De behind this—he had forced her into a war of annihilation, then placed the blame squarely on her shoulders.
It was a farce, but there was nothing else she could say to change things. Eunae glared across the battlefield to meet Sun Quan’s eyes, wishing her stare could burn a hole straight through the damnable veil—and then his skull for good measure.
She had only one thing to say to him before turning away.
“Yes, they will.”
Comments
Eric
We have a rebellion at our hands dear readers the morale is down for sure
Dukeofchaos
It's one of my favorite quotes "Wisdom doesn't automatically come with old age. Nothing does - except wrinkles. It's true, some wines improve with age. But only if the grapes were good in the first place"
CringeWorthyStudios
Holy shit I expected that but still what the fuck!? Thanks for the chapter!
ErrebanRrereban
Oh boy.
Spoon 4232184y091
Lmao, way to absolutely demolish morale. Spoken like a man who spends all his free time meditating and actively avoiding talking to anyone not over a hundred years old.
