Chapter 52 – Declaration of War (II)

Chapter 52

Declaration of War (II)

The wind turned oddly cold as I stepped out of the hall and into the open.

The thin branches of the nearby trees bent and swayed, lulled by the invisible force. And I… I felt a bit choked.

Naturally, I wasn’t going to participate in the war–even if most of these guys here would want to see me humiliated, it wasn’t to the point they’d threaten the sect’s security for it.

At the same time, I wasn’t actually nearly as worried as most of them; if it was true that our Elder Generation could achieve a victory, then we will win.

It’ll probably be a wait of six months to a year before the ‘war’ kicks off, and, by then, there’s a good chance that Dai Xiu would have broken through, too. And even if she doesn’t, Long Tao can probably win by himself if need be.

That is… if he feels like it.

“Are you worried?” Elder Qin suddenly stopped by my side and asked, his expression somewhat sallow.

“… are you?” I asked back.

“Always.”

“Heavy burden to bear.”

“… let’s go play some chess.”

I barely stopped myself from rolling my eyes, nodding instead. The two of us descended and ascended in silence, observing the nature in all its glory. Oddly, the seasons haven’t actually changed all that much in the past six months that I’ve been here; the days have grown a bit cooler, but there were still occasional ones that would shoot up into triple digits, seemingly intent on burning the world.

Elder Qin whipped out a full chess set as we sat down in the central room of the house, arranging the figures. They were made out of rather smooth wood and were clearly hand-carved.

“It was a gift,” he elaborated.

“It’s beautiful.”

“I learned to play chess when I was eleven,” he said as I started positioning the figures, too. “My grandfather came to live with us and found it absolutely unacceptable that his only grandchild could not play chess. Thus, every morning at the crack of dawn, he’d wake me up, drag me out, and teach me how to play. He was awful; within a week, I was beating him consistently, yet he insisted on playing every day. It was like that all the way until my Master discovered me and brought me here.”

The figures were set, and he grew quiet.

“Chances are,” he said, making the first move, dragging the corner pawn two spaces up. “That we will not win.”

“…”

“I fully believe that if our disciples had as much time as theirs, we’d emerge victorious. But, for cultivators, even just two or three extra years can be a difference of life and death.”

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“Why didn’t you try harder to convince them?” I asked, pushing the king’s pawn two spaces up.

“… it wouldn’t have mattered,” he said. “The Fire Sun sect would have continued attacking our disciples until we declared a war. It was the difference between declaring it now and declaring it after we’ve lost a few more kids.”

“How certain are you that the Elder Generation will win?” I asked. The two of us played completely different games; I played your extremely standard king’s pawn opening into an Italian Game, while he… well, God knows what he was doing, randomly pushing pawns and doing nothing else.

“We will win,” he said with confidence, smiling. “Why? Do you want to join us?”

“Only in the feast to celebrate the victory.”

“Ha ha ha.”

“… if the Middle Generation loses, do you plan on surrendering?” I asked, looking at the board. I was about four moves away from mating him and wondering whether I should just also start doing random crap.