Jackson dragged away the unconscious Arwen to one of the unused rooms because what we will be discussing about is sensitive for an Astrean like him. Even if he is a assigned Imperial Knight for the Salix city, he is still not one of us Children at the end of the day. We cannot trust anyone in this world except for us few individuals.
All four of us, including Isaac, moved to a better place which is far from any possible eavesdropper in this castle. We saw Matisse on our way, but Isaac did not invite him even though he is a Children. This just to show how serious the topic at hand is.
Having more people knowing about his business right now may be more of a problem than helping him achieve his goal.
"No matter what you say, I'm still not in favour of using Gates. I can't believe you of all people will be the one to accept the words of the Pope even after what the Gates have done to her."
"I also don't want to end up with this. But from situation we have in hand, I am forced to follow the Pope's advice for the benefit of our people."
"But still…"
"He is still our king, Helen. The well-being of the people is his priority.
"Thank you for understanding."
"So what does Vaughn mean about the nobles planning to go against us?"
As expected of Jackson, he seems to understand how dire the situation is by connecting the few dots we had. I also expect the other Children to realize this after they see what Isaac is about to do. For all I know, the other Children who did the delivery to the other cities first may have known it sooner than we did.
I had my doubts ever since I saw how suspicious the air between the nobles when they visited here last time. Add it to the fact that Isaac also let them off easily when clearly something is bothering him about those City Lords. Now that I understand his intention of using this Rift device, it was the moment for him to stop being idle.
"Many of them are silently increasing their military force without notifying any of us here in Opidelhm. I can easily restrain them for what they are doing if not for the Travellers suddenly showing up."
"Do their military prowess improved that far that we should be afraid of them? Even if all cities combine their forces, overthrowing you with all of us Children by your side won't be possible."
"And yet citizens of their city do not think so. Or more precise to say, they don't revered us much as before."
"What do you mean?"
"Once the Pope labelled the Travellers as the saviour of Astrea, we're already below them in their eyes."
That is also one thing what I noticed during the one time I have visited Twilight City. They did nothing about their awful behaviours, but instead just tolerated them. It was beyond explaining why they have viewed them in such way for a short period of time.
Actually, I remembered that they actually know about Travellers before the Pope even officially preached out his word. And the same Pope actually told them without us knowing. This always bothered me, so I ask Isaac.
"They know about Travellers longer than we do. Do you know about this?"
"I also got the same report from the others who I sent out to observe the activity inside the cities. Their respective Lords seems to have receive a word from the Pope beforehand and they educated their people. I don't know what is going on the mind of the Pope, but his actions have endangered us."
"The Pope here, the Pope there… Why don't we force that old man to speak up what he wants?"
An irritated Helena is preparing to barge out the room and ran towards the Pope's Palace. Of course she was not able to do this because Isaac was here. A single order from him, especially when he means it, should be done without violent reactions.
Although, attempting to touch the Pope for no good reason is just inviting death. You will not find any person more favoured by God than him which begs you to think if he is the God himself. He should be a strong force in our fight against the Netherworld, but he does not do anything except spread the word of God.
There is no point in getting frustrated by him since this has been our situation for our whole lives. Even when Isaac became the King, it is supposedly due to his words why we got our positions so easily.
"Back to the topic in hand, what were you planning with Rift that made Vaughn thinks it is a way to fight back against their intangible coup?"
"It's simple. We're going to charge every time they use our Rifts. Travellers are earning and spending more gold than anything in their cities. It will be harmful for their side while beneficial for ours if we have a certain control of their economy."
"A strike that won't be obvious for the public."
"I'll also slowly force them to use our Rifts by cutting the trade routes. We can use the increasing amount of strong beast roaming the land as an excuse for this. They won't have any choice, but to accept it while they can't really oppose to my action."
"Avoiding hostility to one another won't be possible already. We may support them for the face value, but we need to show them who they are messing with."
If Isaac is that desperate enough to use shabby methods like this, see to it that he will achieve whatever he wants.
We might not want it but changes in Astrea is inevitable. I guess the peaceful days of our comfortable reign is about to end. There will not be many instances where I can relax like I want to. I guess I need to start getting into fighting shape once again for the many conflicts that might occur later on.
'But I'll make sure not to tell Helena and get her involved or else, I'll be breaking my bones every single day like we used to.'