Chapter 960: What It Will Do to Itself

Under a night sky, Jason and Emi stood on a wooden platform, high in a tree house. They were in the city of Arbour, in what was more a tree mansion than a tree house, spanning across several towering redwoods. Even the living trunks were part of it. Hollows grown naturally into the living wood didn’t weaken the grandiose trees, despite seeming like they would have to.

Emi stood next to her uncle, looking up at the moon.

“Could you turn it into cheese?” she asked.

“Yes. I’m trying to avoid doing anything too extravagant, though. People live on this world, now. I want them to be confident they live in a real world, not a cartoon.”

“Didn’t you say you offered to stage an eclipse for those government guys?”

“It was a long day. It’s possible I made some choices in the moment that weren’t the best.”

“Uncle Jason, I think you just found the title of your autobiography.”

***

Jason had found himself at loose ends while waiting for events to play out. Most of the clan members had been returned to Europe, but Jason had taken his close family and given them a tour of his astral kingdom.

In the meantime, the powers of Earth were still formulating reactions to the latest events. Carlos, Clive, Audrey and some members of her research team from the clan were trying to figure out what the vampires had been up to. Neil and the other healers were caring for the victims, alongside local authorities.

The delivery of the Earth people returned from Pallimustus was still days away, Anna monitoring the negotiations of who would claim the individual members. One of the refugees, Li Li Mei, had been released to help with that process, being the voice of the others.

After an amount of negotiation, a site had been chosen, not just for the refugee handover but as a neutral site for future formal summits involving the world governments and the magical factions, Clan Asano included. The Australian government had declared Asano Village and the surrounding area a special-interest territory, similar to the standing stones. It would likewise be managed by a multi-national organisation rapidly being assembled, with Lenora Coleman placed in charge.

The Network had swiftly excised the existing residents, their own version of the Asano Clan, from the village. They were looking to bury them in the deepest hole they could find and pretend very loudly that they didn’t exist.

Li Mei found herself in Asano village, either meeting with the international committee planning the handoff, or with the Chinese delegation. On the second day, the delegation was joined by her gold-rank uncle, Li Chen. He had been assigned a house in the village and she had met him there. Always stern in public, he wrapped her in a warm hug the moment they were behind closed doors.

“Little Mei. It is so good to see you home. Later, you can address me as a representative of the Chinese government. For now, I want to hear everything, as an uncle who has missed his niece very much.”

***

“Uncle, I have not hidden anything from you.”

Li Chen sighed.

“So you say, but your allegiance is to Asano, now. As family, I love you, but as a representative of our nation, I cannot trust you. Not fully. Not when your first loyalty is to another.”

He and his niece were in a sitting room still decorated in the Japanese style of the previous occupants, with some minimal western furniture. He and his niece sat on a couch at the edge of the open room.

“Uncle, I can promise you this: having someone in Asano’s camp with our nation’s interests at heart is only good for China. When you and I met him, twenty years ago, we were looking at him as a potential asset for what I understand is a very different China to that of today. He—”

“That is part of the problem,” Chen said. “You have been away for so very long. The world has changed, China has changed, and you have changed. There are so many uncertainties.”

“I can promise you that Asano has changed most of all. Have you spoken with Lu Yan?”

“I have.”

“And what has he told you?”

“Things that do not bear consideration without verification.”

“Then verify them. Go to Asano’s world and see for yourself.”

“He would allow that?”

“Asano wants the leaders of this world to understand his perspective of the Earth. He is waiting for events to settle, but he will be announcing an open invitation to every government and magical faction to visit his realm. He will place no restriction on who they send, in numbers or power.”

“He has no fear or what they might do or learn?”

“No, Uncle, he does not. His intention is to lift the frogs from the well, and show them the breadth of the sky.”

“He looks down on us so much?”

“He would not say so, but how could he not? You have heard my story. The things I have seen him do with my own eyes. He is not the man we met two decades ago.”

“And this is not the world you and he left behind. The rise of magic—”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“Is too slow, Uncle. He intends to accelerate it, for everyone. His intentions are egalitarian, but there will always be winners and losers in great change. Even he cannot prevent that. If I can influence him, even a little, then our country has a better chance of rising with the tide, instead of being submerged.”

“I want to believe you, Little Mei. But you tell stories that would fit amongst myths and legends, but such stories are impossible metaphors. Transforming into birds and slaying armies. Shaping worlds out of souls.”

“You have seen him turn into a bird on being killed, Uncle. There are recordings of him doing so at Makassar, and I can assure you that his power has grown. Far more than simple rank suggests. Go to his world and see for yourself.”

Chen got up from the couch and paced the room.

“I do not like what you are telling me, Niece. If you are lying to me, it will break my heart, but I can live with a broken heart. If you and Lu Yan speak the truth, there is now a power in this world that none can go against. A power before which a nation that has lasted thousands of years can do little, perhaps nothing.”

“Then do not go against him.”

“And if he goes against us?”

“He claims that is not what he is here for.”

“Do you believe him?”

“Yes. We’re not powerful enough to be worth lying to.”

Chen walked over and dropped next to his niece again.

“You are telling me,” he said, “that a tyrant has come to this world, and our only hope is to hope he doesn’t disfavour us.”

Li Mei considered her words for a long moment before answering.

“He is aware of the potential to be seen in that way,” she said. “He has spoken to me of this. He does not fear what the world will do to him but what it will do to itself, out of fear of him.”

“You speak of him almost like a god.”

“He would not like to hear it, but it might be wise to treat him as such. Other gods already do. Yes, his wrath could be terrible, but what he can offer could raise us up.”

“If we worship him.”

“He doesn’t want worship.”

“But we still would be supplicants.”

“Perhaps. I don’t have a good answer for you, Uncle. You were right in saying that there is a new power in this world, that no one can defy. All I can counsel is to not put yourself in a position where you need to.”