September 27, 10 ATC

Propolis Province, Oligarchy of Bumblebee

The mid-autumn winds of Bumblebee stirred the stray leaves on the path as the White Rose convoy rode through. Captain Yuichiro pressed his horse into a hard pace across the dusty path, casting a backward glance to make sure his men were keeping pace. The sky was overcast, so he could not see the sun, but he guessed that they could ride for another hour or two before they had to strike camp.

The communications they carried were of the utmost importance. The Church's vassal lords were growing discontented; the house of cards was swaying beneath them. Knowing who they could trust and who they couldn't would be the key to survival, and the letters with him would tell Jannis exactly where his vassals stood.

"Hurry up, you louses!" Yuichiro bellowed behind him. "We'll strike camp in an hour!" He did a quick scan of the surrounding hills and found nothing. The Bumblebee highlands were notoriously thick with bandits, and his men could not afford to be delayed.

The path ahead of them thinned, the depression to their left side growing deeper and deeper until they were riding on the edge of a cliff. Ahead of them, past a few more treacherous turns, they could see a small break in the hills, where the bridge to White Rose's territory would be. Once across, they would find some flatland to strike camp.

"Faster!" Yuichiro bellowed. The path steepened, and the fog around them grew thicker. Yuichiro clutched his knapsack close to his chest as they galloped toward the bridge, hoping that, just maybe, an escort would be there to greet them.

"Whoa!" The man at the front of the line reared his horse and stopped, causing the rest of the line to stop. A few of the men asked aloud why they had stopped, and one other struggled to remount his horse after stopping so quickly he had been bucked off. Yuichiro quickly dismounted and walked to the front of the line.

"What's the problem?" he asked nobody in particular, but then he saw for himself: the bridge was out. About halfway across the wide gorge, he saw the other end of the bridge, relatively unharmed. Beneath them, the supports of the bridge still stood, scorched by burn marks and splintered as they went farther up. The smell of powder was still in the air; this was a recent sabotage.

"What happened here, sir?" A soldier asked. Yuichiro frowned and took scope of his surroundings. To his left, an almost sheer drop, pockmarked by a few malformed trees and scraggly bushes. To their right, the high hills sloped up a little further, with enough trees and bushes to hide an ambush force.

"It was an ambush, clearly," Yuichiro replied. "And a recent one, by the looks of it." He took stock of his men. A dozen tired cavalrymen, but they would have to do.

"What should we do?" Another rider asked. Yuichiro furrowed his brow.

"George, Douglas, Omar, Dwight!" He called. "Send a sortie up the hillside. Let's rid ourselves of these mountain pests."

The four men dismounted, readied their weapons, and slowly ascended the hillside. One of the men came up behind Yuichiro and watched the sortie with him.

"Why so few men, sir?" he asked. Yuichiro smiled.

"The fact that the bridge hasn't been totally dismantled tells me that these men are either few in number or lacking in skill," he said. "It's still smoking, so they must be nearby. And the damage isn't so severe as to stop us completely. We can double back for the supplies and fix it up tomorrow."

"And the ambushers?" the soldier asked. He watched his four fellows poke around the greenery on top of the hill, finding nothing. "Where are they?"

"An excellent question," someone behind them said. Yuichiro turned around to see which of his soldiers had joined their conversation, only to suddenly feel a searing pain in his knee and fall to the ground. He looked down at his knee and saw an arrowhead sticking out of the back of it.

"What?" he yelled, but instantly, he understood. The ambushers clambered up from the cliffside, taking his men by surprise. Yuichiro tried to crawl away as a woman with an eyepatch skewered the man he was talking to.

"Damned bandits!" Yuichiro cried, and he unsheathed his sword. Already, though, it was over: his men were all killed, or were severely wounded, and Yuichiro could see the sortie he had sent out fleeing into the wilderness, their attackers close behind.

"We aren't bandits," the woman with the eyepatch said. "Do you think bandits could've fooled the most noble soldiers of the Church of Thorns?"

"Scum!" Yuichiro yelled. The woman ignored him, keeping her sword pointed at him. A man with a prosthetic leg emerged from the scene behind her and put his hand on her shoulder.

"Austin," he said. "We lost Robert, Sidney and Jackson. Two more are wounded."

"Then we'll suture them and double back to the hideout," Austin said. "Once the good captain gives us what we want."

"Wait," Yuichiro said. "You're Austin? Then you must be… Nitesco!"

"In the flesh," Nitesco said, flashing him a grim smile. Yuichiro pointed his sword at him.

"Traitors!" Yuichiro spat. "What do you want with me?"

"We don't care about you, captain," Austin said. "We only care about what's in that knapsack of yours. A friend of ours told us that what you have with you could be very valuable."

"I won't—" Yuichiro was interrupted by Austin's fist crashing into his jaw. He sank to the ground, dropping the knapsack and his sword. Austin swatted his sword off the cliff while Nitesco picked the knapsack up and began combing through it.

"A lot of letters here, captain," Nitesco said. "Why do you have them?"

"I'm not telling you reprobates anything!" Yuichiro yelled. Austin sighed.

"My sword may disagree with you," she said. She pointed the tip at Yuichiro's injured knee. Nitesco winced at the thought, but stayed silent.

"Why do you have them?" Austin repeated. Yuichiro growled. There was no point in resisting.

"Jannis's vassal lords," Yuichiro said. "Correspondences, events, places. Just to ensure who's loyal and who isn't, and to keep the malcontents in line."

"Some interesting names here," Nitesco said. "Generic of Lancaster. Horsea of Springthyme. And… Inferno of Crosshares and Pollination!" He chuckled. "The boy-king of Crosshares. Never thought I'd see the day."

"Any other names?" Austin asked. She relaxed her grip on her sword and looked to Nitesco, leaving her blind side toward her hostage. It gave Yuichiro all the time he needed.

"You'll never know!" Yuichiro yelled. He snatched the knapsack from Nitesco and backpedaled to the edge of the bridge. Austin recovered and grabbed her sword while Nitesco raised his hands in a placating gesture.

"Easy captain," he said. "There's no need for such extreme action. Just throw us the knapsack and we'll take you prisoner. No point in dying over a few pieces of paper, is there?"

"I would rather die than fail in my mission," Yuichiro said. "You can pry them from my cold, dead hands! Long live the Church!"

At once, Yuichiro heard a loud bang and felt a searing pain in his hand. Looking up, he saw Nitesco aiming a strange device at him. A lead pellet fell from Yuichiro's hand as he tumbled backward in surprise, and he dropped the knapsack. It gave Austin all the time she needed.

As Yuichiro and the knapsack went over the edge, Austin dove forward, landing with an uncomfortable thud on her stomach, and thrusted her sword over the edge. She managed to grab the knapsack, just barely getting the strap on the edge of her sword before catapulting it backwards to safety. Yuichiro could do nothing but watch in shock before he fell onto an exposed support with a sickening crunch and plummeted into the ravine.

Austin breathed a sigh of relief and turned to see where the knapsack had flown. It had landed on the ground and spilled its contents. A few soldiers began grabbing the letters that had fallen while Nitesco reloaded and holstered his hand cannon

"You know, you didn't have to be so dramatic about that," Nitesco said. Austin grinned and flicked the side of his head.

"Catch it next time, then," Austin said. "You're the one with depth perception." Nitesco shook his head and failed to hide a smile. He picked up the knapsack and shoved it in his horse's side satchel.

"So flippant," he chided. The soldiers handed him the letters, and he shoved them into the inside of his cloak. "These could bring down the Church, you know."

"You really think this will turn the tide?" Austin asked. She felt a shock of eagerness, but it quickly subsided. There was no point in premature celebration, she thought.

"I do," Nitesco said. "The Church isn't just another power-grabbing tyrant. They're astute. They're clever. We can't just bring them down on our own. We need to take their supports out from under them. Their allies. Without their levies and subjects and blackmail—" He flashed a handful of envelopes. "They're just Outlanders. Nobody will want to help them."

"The Captain seemed quite insistent on dying for the Church. He didn't sound like an Outlander," Austin said, mounting her horse. Nitesco sighed.

"Well, the question of what to do with their converts once this is finished remains. But that can be dealt with another time." Nitesco urged his horse into a trot and turned back down the mountain path. "We can discuss such things back at the hideout. Men! Let's move out! We need to return before nightfall!"

Nitesco and the men began riding down the mountain path, which had been cleared of the Church soldiers' bodies. The blood, though, still remained. Austin sighed and, with one final glance out into the ravine, turned her horse and followed Nitesco.

October 2, 10 ATC

Osiria Cathedral, Laevig Province, Kingdom of White Rose

Jannis knelt before the three coffins, shivering in the cold air of the crypt. The cathedral was under construction, still, and the autumn winds blasted cool air through where the windows would soon be. The gusts made their way all the way down into the private crypt, chilling Jannis. He had grown too used to the Subreddit's warm climate, he thought. He pulled his cloak closer around and shuddered.

He stood up and put his hand on the coffin to the left. A few scavengers had found Faker's body in the river in the aftermath of Faker's assault. The scum recognized who he was and even had the gall to sell the corpse back to Jannis for an exorbitant sum. Jannis had "persuaded" them to give it up for free, and he gave Faker the proper rites.

Jannis gave a forlorn look to the coffin on the right. When they found Draco after the attack on Fort Bombus, he was comatose, occasionally awakening to mumble nonsense and apologies before slipping back into unconsciousness. After six months of attempting to reawaken whatever remained of him, he ordered a servant to slip a certain concoction into his food and put him out of his misery. Despite his distaste for what Zissman had done to him, Jannis had allowed the undertaker to mark his grave under the name 'Draco.'

And in the center was Zissman. It was surreal to see the person who had raised him up to be the most powerful warrior in the Church laid so low. Death by poison, the weapon of a coward. The Church back in the Northlands would surely have been devastated to hear of their beloved Scion's death, but Jannis knew that there were few who had not left the Northlands to settle the Subreddit, so little would change for them now that he was unofficially in control.

"Jannis," a voice said. Jannis sighed and turned around. Vicar Rowing was standing in the archway, smoothing his hair, which had been frizzled by the gusts of wind. "The rest have arrived."

"Have they been waiting?" Jannis asked.

"No," Rowing replied. "I came as soon as the General and the Baroness returned. I sent a servant for Lord Link as well."

"Thank you, Rowing." Jannis stood and wiped the dust off his shoulder. "Shall we?"

Rowing nodded and began following Jannis through the unfinished cathedral, finding their way into the back rooms. As they walked into the unfinished main chamber, Jannis turned to Rowing.

"Tell me the truth, Rowing," he said. "Our followers. Do they support this war?"

Rowing sighed. "Some have grown tired of it. Some never agreed with it in the first place. But that doesn't matter; we are bidden to follow the commands of the Scion, no matter what."

"You yourself disagreed with Zissman, yes?" Jannis asked. Rowing sighed again and nodded.

"Zissman was always a radical," he said. "Far too zealous for my tastes. But he brought together not only our own communities, but this entire new land under one rule. For all his faults, I cannot argue with his results."

"Do you think we can maintain his gains?" Jannis asked.

"Not all of them," Rowing said. "Not by force. We should start missionary activity. The more they see us as foreigners and tyrants, the fewer we will assimilate, and our victory will not be complete until they love us as their own."

"There is no love in this horrid Subreddit," Jannis said. "Only strength. Only cunning. I understand where you come from, but we must secure our dominance before we can rub elbows with the natives. And we should not forget our heritage."

"No, we shouldn't," Rowing said. "But we should also remember that our goal is survival first, empire second. You ought not to make the same mistakes Zissman made." Jannis pursed his lips, but said nothing, and they went the rest of the way in silence.

They arrived in a spacious chamber. Seated around a small dinner table sat Jannis's closest confidants: General Strike, Baroness Anti and the most recent addition to their inner circle, Lord Link.

"Jannis!" Anti said. "I'm surprised you weren't here to meet us."

"I was busy," Jannis said. He took his seat at the head of the table, and Rowing took the seat to his left. "But we have more important matters to discuss."

"Yes, we do," Strike said. "The League is in shambles, but still they manage to harass us! Junipera remains firmly outside our sphere of influence, and our campaigns there fare poorly. What's more, South Heroa and Villainia—"

"Strike," Jannis said, and Strike went silent. "I am fully aware of the military situation. I know our problems. Why do you think they afflict us? Are we not powerful enough? Do we not have the resources? Are our tacticians not up to the task?"

"The problem is our vassals!" Link exclaimed, though his answer was muffled by the scarf that was ever wrapped around his face. "They won't come through when it counts! They dodge our messengers, disobey orders, waste their troops on power plays! It's infuriating!" He slammed his hand into the table. "To think that anyone could defy us; defy the Goddess!"

"Pull that insufferable scarf off," Anti said. "Nobody can understand you with it on."

Link huffed, but he obeyed. The scarf came down, revealing the scar on his left cheek: a massive brand in the shape of an "H" that signified him as a heretic. The former king of White Rose had not been kind to the first converts, especially one as zealous as Link.

"As I was saying," Link said, quieter now, "the problem is our so-called 'vassals.' Until we can be assured of their loyalty, we cannot hold the lands as our own."

"Didn't you dispatch messengers to meet with our agents in the south?" Jannis asked Link.

"I did, my liege," Link said. "Captain Yuichiro, my finest bodyguard. He's a reliable guy. But he was to return some time ago."

"He could be delayed," Rowing offered. Strike scoffed.

"If he's as reliable as Link says, then he would not be 'delayed.'" Strike began drumming his fingers. "It's the rebels, it has to be! Was the information Yuichiro was sent to retrieve valuable?"

"Correspondences of our vassals," Link said. "Proof of their loyalty, or blackmail if they weren't."

Anti's eye twitched. "If they got their hands on that information…" She grit her teeth. "They could turn our subjects against us!"

"I am well aware of what that means for us," Jannis said. He pinched the bridge of his nose. "Clearly our agents are incapable of keeping this information secret. Is there any other way we could reacquire what we lost?"

"Not short of uprooting the league and finding the letters ourselves," Strike said. "I would be glad to do that, by the way."

Jannis sighed and turned to Anti. "Anti, do you know anybody with comparable spy networks? Someone we could sway to our side?"

Anti stroked her chin and nodded. "There is one man: Governor Sphinx Black, the ruler of Checkmate."

"Checkmate?" Jannis leaned forward. "Never heard of it."

"It's an exclave of Monochrome; territory they control farther up the Confirmed River. Sphinx governs the territory with his grandson, but he has forty years' worth of connections and influence. He's been a ruler longer than any other man or woman in this Subreddit."

"Is he obedient to us?" Jannis asked.

"No more or less than Onyzyon, his liege," Anti said. "But if we had him on our side, the intelligence he could gather would be worth it."

"Can we trust him?" Link asked.

"We do still have an empty seat at the table," Rowing said, gesturing to the seat at the end opposite Jannis. "It could be a profitable arrangement."

"I know of his reputation," Strike said. "I've heard he's the dependable sort. If we get him on our side, then we can still pull through!"

"Then it seems we are in accord," Jannis said. "Anti, Rowing. Invite him to the town nearby and see what you can do to get him to assist us. His intelligence could make up for what we lost."

"It will be done," Rowing said. He bowed his head obediently.

"You should know that it will take time to get him over here," Anti said. "He is old, and travel is difficult for men of his age. We must make up for our lost time, no matter what he has to offer."

"Oh, I intend to," Jannis said. "There are several prominent lords and ladies who have been quite… noncommittal since swearing allegiance. Generic of Lancaster, Inferno of the Commonwealth, Taco of the Yaoi Coalition. We must ensure their obedience." He looked up. "Link!" he said. Link snapped to attention. "You and I will treat with these leaders as soon as we can. Anti and Rowing will handle Governor Sphinx, as we discussed."

"As you command." Link pulled his scarf back over his scarred face.

"And what am I to do?" Strike asked.

"Continue our campaign in Renora," Jannis replied. "We have brought down Guns N' Roses. We have bloodied Arkos's nose. If we cripple Renora, we cripple the League remnants too." He stood and bade the rest of them to rise. "You are all dismissed."

His lieutenants rose and left without another word, and Jannis was alone. He shut the door to the cluttered dining room and went over to the pile of treasures in the corner. From behind a set of extra chairs, he pulled out a portrait of Zissman and leaned it up against the wall. He never liked how eagerly Zissman took to the customs of the nobility, but he kept the portrait around anyway.

"Well, Irving," he said. "I think I've taken to your role quite well. Never thought a brute like me could take after you, huh?"

Zissman didn't answer. His gaze seemed to be skeptical.

"Ah, what am I doing?" Jannis sighed "Talking to an old portrait. I must be going mad…"

"Jannis!" Rowing's voice sounded down the hall. "The masons say there's trouble with the rotunda supports. They want to speak with you!"

Damned architects, Jannis thought. Could barely do their jobs without his supervision. As if he didn't have enough to deal with.

"In a minute!" he replied, and he turned back to Zissman's portrait. Oddly, its gaze seemed to have taken on a more sympathetic appearance.

"Must be going mad…" Jannis said again. He pushed the portrait back behind the extra chairs and went to meet with the masons.