"Well then, follow me inside." Nova interjected with a big political smile, "The room is already prepared since Baron Agashi sent word ahead of what happened in Durlivan eagerly wanting to discuss things."
"Yes, I would love to speak of terms and such things after hearing from the royal knight captains who have done us a big service taking care of the royalty," I replied with an equally big smile, though mine was genuine.
They are indeed doing us a big favor by taking care of the royalty, on their way out that is.
Nodding the diplomats began talking between myself and Nova whilst subtly fighting between one another in a combat of words, though I had long since lost interest ignoring most of their conversations.
Instead, I focused on the city, it is a beautiful place, the homes have balconies and are of fine stone, real authentic glass is used for the window's and it is neither broken nor cracked.
The people all look well fed and well taken care of not even a single sign that would suggest the reason why they are looking at us with such discontent.
Focusing on my hearing I listened in to a few conversations among the people around us.
"That's him right? The bloodthirsty demon that kills even children?"
Oh?
"Not just children, I heard he forces himself onto women and make the children watch, a sick man."
Hey, wait-
"Not only that, but I also heard he enjoys the company of corpses and impales them once he's done! He even took a large army and put them upon spikes out in the fields to water the growth of his crops!"
Feeling a vein pop on my neck I almost spun, however,
"Who do all of you think you are insulting a baron of the carrien empire?!" Keneth snapped at the people, though he is not as powerful as I am he was farther out to the edges of the formation and thus could hear just as well, "Are you people of the capital only capable of gossip? How filthy must you be to speak of someone you don't even know, and of a place you have never been?!"
Naturally, Keneth would snap, Senal, Anept, Huantu, and Marcus all looked just about fed up as well, they had been put on the edge of the formation and heard many things as well.
"A dog of the devil deserves no respect!" One brave man yelled from within the crowd, "You who slaughter innocents at the behest of your lord!"
"These people do not know how to differentiate fact from fiction, maybe we should go ahead and turn some of that fiction into fact for them then....?" Huantu stopped gripping his Warhammer tightly and exerting a thick bloodlust making the people around him fall back in fear.
"Stop, do not harm the civilians, they do not know any better." I called out lightly releasing my qi to smother out his bloodlust and that of the soldiers who had begun getting nervous, especially the greenhorns.
"..." Huantu smiled viciously at the crowd one last time behind returning to his normal friendly giant look.
Keneth continued glaring at the civilians who would speak secretly scaring them with his bloodlust now and then, many of the other knights did the same along with the commanders, feeling better after doing so.
No more interruptions occurred during the march through the capital after that incident, the army was settled in the barracks of the city which was very spacious due to the lack of soldiers, to begin with.
"Alias, do me a favor, disguise and enter the city, gather as much intelligence as you can about the people and report back tonight, take a few men with you." I told Alias secretly before entering the palace.
Nodding Alias half-melted into the darkness, that's right, he trained with Hardvar and Nefamiti so he must have learned that skill, though not to completion as he can't do it as smoothly.
"We should perhaps put negotiations on hold until tomorrow." I suddenly said apologetically, "I am eager to make this deal with your kingdoms however this has been a long journey and I was injured in a battle, I could not show it before as it is not right to allow the people to worry but, I feel I must rest for today."
Holding my side I half smiled at the diplomats who had some calculating looks in their eyes.
"Of course, Lancard does not mind waiting for your lordship to feel a little better before negotiating." Lucio said with a bow, "Then, excuse me."
"Tensent is proud and of course will give our benefactor time to heal, negotiations can wait, excuse me." Pitir said leaving as well.
Once they were gone I continued holding my side and followed Nova who led me into his study.
"You can stop now." Nova said with a big sigh as he sat back, "Sorry about the people, they are misled by the Loijon syndicate."
Sitting on the couch I laid back lazily playing with the Qi in my body as a form of light training, "They overplayed their hands and the people won't attack us, so why are you sighing so much?"
Slowly I felt a headache coming on as a possible reply formed in my mind.
"Your right that they have overplayed their hands, at this point they have put their kingdom's into a political chokehold, we will be able to get extremely good terms for a trade deal or we will out them to the Federation who's nobles and diplomats from the Gulf Kingdoms will not hesitate to take the chance to cut Lancard and Tensent off, but," Nova continued sighing once more, "The question now is how do we get those two to agree on written paper for this trade deal before an informant from their kingdoms arrives?"
Ah, that's right.
"Wouldn't they need to confirm it with their respective kingdoms as well before signing such a trade deal?" I thought aloud.
"No, they have come here with the seals of their respective kingdoms, both are high ranking diplomats and have the trust of their kings." Nova replied calmly, "But it is because they are high ranking diplomats that it will be very difficult to get them to sign before an informant arrives."
"....So in essence, we either need to lay down terms that have no choice but to be accepted because they are so good and likely lose out, or we can attempt to threaten them with the loss of their trade with the Federation and getting locked out from trading with the Republic likely causing millions to starve. " I said with a heavy sigh, "Great choices."
A moment of silence passed as we sat in contemplation.
"We can also wait for the arrival of the informants and begin trade negotiations from there which is fine as well, but likely they will be a lot more hostile and on guard causing us to have trouble." Nova chipped in taking a sip of his tea.
"What if we threaten them without threatening them?" I said curiously a plan forming in my head.
Nova raised an eyebrow at that listening to the plan.
Time passed as we discussed back and forth the details and nuances of the plan, sunlight from the windows turning to moonlight by the time we had finished discussing the plans for the negotiation tomorrow.
"Well." Nova said taking the second sip of his tea he had had all day, "You are a gambler, a real tenacious one."
"And you are extremely shrewd, something I knew but didn't understand until after this conversation." I replied in kind with a smile, "I'll be off to sleep in the barracks."
Just as I was about to leave Nova spoke once more, "I'll have documents on the history of the Loijon syndicate sent to you, as well as the general history of Dra."
"Thanks."
With that, I left quietly into the night.
By the time I arrived at the barracks Alias was already waiting for me alongside a few soldiers in civilian dress, Yu sitting quietly on top of Alias' head using her stealth ability to hide them.
"Follow me, what is there to report?" I said quietly entering the barracks, not alarming the guards.
Exchanging glances Alias spoke calmly, "The people here are brainwashed to the extreme, when asked about the previous royal family more than half of them said that they were killed for conspiring with slavers and that Duke Loktre was killed by the 'bastard prince' and his 'devil dog' to try and bring back the age of slavers when I asked them if they knew of the declaration and events that happened they either didn't know, knew and thought it was a lie, or believed but did not dare to voice it out."
"They are being fed a very specific line of information, much of it being left out or filtered, this is something that Nova likely knows and is trying to fix which is why despite the people here mostly believing the evil narrative, there are still a few who trust in the old royal family and the ones who came." I replied evenly.
This is so..... difficult.
Let's say around seventy-five percent of people believe we are evil, and twenty-five do not, then, taking in the approximation of the capital's population and imputing these very very loosely estimated numbers which are easily much too low, that's two hundred thousand plus people who are against us.
If this were a city like Durlivan we would have been obliterated by now from the shadows.
"Yu?" I said lightly as we arrived in the main area where my men were waiting for my arrival camped in the courtyard rather than inside any of the given homes.
They don't trust the homes huh, good instincts.
Yu released her stealth ability as we entered the tent causing a mild panic among the knights and commanders but most of them already knew of Yu's existence.
"Yes, there is, well...." Yu's eyes quivered slightly, "....almost no fairies around the capital the forests that look to be flourishing are really dying out and very quickly, without the tending of the fairies magic the accumulation of negative qi and death qi is becoming toxic and not only for the tree's but for the people as well while investigating I saw several people sick covered in the deathly qi but when I tried to help they swatted at me calling me a monster and saying that I am to blame."
That's...
".....they are crafty and cunning, the Loijon family, using their influence they caused the biggest population hub in Dra to turn against its ruler, then using that as a basis along with their economic power got the support of the surrounding farmer families spreading lies about the forest fairies so the farmers would report it to them and then they could catch the fairies to add to their power." I felt a rise of anger, but also a bit of respect for how extremely well built their foundation was.
They would never need to show up to get rid of me or Nova, simply using their overwhelming influence they could send out a massive army of slaves to crush us with numbers.
The only way that it wouldn't work like that is if they have to be within a certain radius of the controlled to hold control over them, but there is no evidence of that since I have only met Matel and she was shocked at my strength, likely she was that close because she expected to just kill me and end the battle quickly after.
"What about the old knight families? They can't be with the Loijon family after what they did to the Antikas house twenty years ago, from what I understood from what Leyalt told me long ago while training, Que Antikas the royal knight captain from back then had fought with the Loijon family and managed to expose them, though he was killed soon after and the incident covered up, the knight families no longer trusted the Loijon family and tried to escape their hold hiding away in the lands surrounding the capital." Alias chipped in curiously, "Where would they have gone?"
"If they were true knight families, their's only two ways in which they would fade out so completely, one is that the family was stripped of its status as a noble household of knights, and two is if they were shamed into seclusion." Anept said seriously.
"Yu, I'd like you to try and find these knight families that may have been thrown out of the capital or hiding, they will be important towards getting the Loijon family out of power." I said calmly, "Also try and find as many fairies as you can within the surroundings of the capital, tell them it is safe within this camp as we have a treaty against the killing of fairies in cold blood."
"Got it." Yu replied flying out of the tent quickly followed by her growing squadron of fairies.
"Keneth, what is the custom in Carrien if a syndicate or underground guild is proven to be turning its people into slaves under the name of an evil deity?" I asked suddenly an idea popping into my head.