In the presence of four rank 4 Gu Masters, the silence was suffocating, making everyone in the room increasingly nervous. Finally, someone broke the silence. "Tribe leader, could you please tell us why we are here?" The rank 3 Gu Master, Shui Tian, was an elder from the Shui tribe and not a member of the Ma tribe. However, when he said "tribe leader" everyone knew he was referring to Ma Xia, the leader of the Ma tribe, and not his own tribe leader.
"Yes, yes, sorry for making you all wait. Vice leader, could you please inform our esteemed guests what you have learned from the spies in the Jin tribe?" Ma Xia addressed Ma Li, signaling him not to withhold any information.
Ma Li understood and began explaining. "Alliance leaders," he started, intentionally using "alliance leaders" instead of the usual "tribe leaders", "The situation is very complicated, but the gist is this: our spy in the Jin tribe obtained information about Jin Huang attempting to refine a powerful Gu worm." He paused to let the tribe leaders absorb this information, but some of the elders didn't grasp the significance and began arguing.
"First Elder Ma Li, are you telling us your tribe requested this meeting just for some useless information about Jin Huang refining a Gu worm? Do you know how many Gu he has or has refined over the years? Is this alliance a joke to you?" another elder from the tribe said. "Yeah, I'm sure First Elder Ma Li has more information, but stil —" He didn't even finish his sentence before his own tribe's leader started speaking.
"Lin Chen Ning, Shui Tian, if I hear you speak to Vice Leader Ma Li like that again, I will cripple both of you. Do you understand?" Although he was intimidating his own elder, Lin Chen Ning, the other elder, Shui Tian, wasn't even from his tribe and felt outraged. However, seeing the intense glare from his tribe's leader, he felt immense pressure. Eventually, both of them said. "We understand, alliance leader. We apologize to Vice Leader Ma Li."
"It's alright, no harm done. Thank you, Alliance Leader Lin Ling Li," Ma Li said, grateful for the support. Realizing that both leaders somewhat understood his point, he continued. "as the elders mentioned, refining a Gu worm isn't usually a big deal, but this one is different. Jin Huang is trying to refine a rank 5 Gu worm!"
The higher the rank of the Gu worm, the more destructive it becomes. However, one rank 5 Gu worm alone shouldn't be enough to terrify such powerful individuals. "Yes, I know what all of you are thinking." he continued. "It's true, our great alliance shouldn't be afraid of just one rank 5 Gu worm. After all, we have six rank 4 Gu Masters, who are experienced fighters. Together, we can restrain Jin Huang and the Jin tribe." He began praising himself and the other rank 4 Gu Masters in the alliance.
"But please, don't get overly confident," he cautioned, glancing at the tribe leaders. Seeing no rejection or annoyance in their gazes, he continued. "Even though we can restrain him, Jin Huang typically uses at most rank 4 killer moves, and occasionally rank 5 Gu. He never uses rank 5 killer moves, which led us to believe, and eventually confirm, that the Gu he possesses don't work well together to form rank 5 killer moves.
"Even though we know his tribe, like our alliance, has these powerful killer moves, merely possessing them isn't enough. If you don't have the specific Gu worms required for these killer moves, they become utterly useless. You can try to adjust the killer moves to fit the Gu worms you have, but that would take an enormous amount of time, assuming that you have what's required. Even if you managed to alter such high-rank killer moves, the result would likely be weaker, potentially even dropping a rank in effectiveness."
After saying this, some of the elders who didn't understand at first finally showed a look of horror on their faces. Ma Li continued. "The Gu worm he is trying to refine, we believe, is very important to him. It will likely help him form some killer moves, potentially more than just one. The last information I received from my spy was alarming. 'He is crazy, risking war with us. The casualties both sides will suffer will be immense. Please, First Elder, this war is inevitable. At any cost, you must not let him succeed in this refinement. Otherwise, our tribe, no, the alliance, will be destroyed or even enslaved by the Jin tribe eventually.' He didn't know the exact function of the Gu worm or the killer moves it could help form, but he mentioned it was at least rank 5. If someone as strong as Jin Huang gains access to such killer moves, our alliance will be rendered useless." He stopped speaking, allowing all the elders, not just the leaders, to digest this information.
'Our alliance was founded after the Jin tribe's leader, Jin Huang, succeeded in advancing to rank 5. What Elder Ma Li's last words mean is that if he possessed such strong killer moves from the start, we wouldn't be here today. The Jin tribe would be ruling over this region of the world.' The elders pondered deeply. Another elder thought. 'We were just lucky. If their tribe had any rank 5 Gu worms stored for the usage of rank 5 killer moves, we wouldn't have even formed this alliance. Instead, every tribe would have tried to align with the Jin tribe, even becoming their servants if it meant their survival. We were truly lucky, but I guess this luck is over now.'
"Vice Leader, what does the spy mean by 'stopping him'? How can we do that? If they are trying to refine the Gu worm, our only option seems to be disrupting their refinement and making it fail, right? But how can we do this with Jin Huang defending the refinement process himself? They could have already started refining right now, for all that we know." Finally, someone broke the silence and asked an important question.
"Elder Lin Kui Lang, as you said, Jin Huang isn't the one who will be refining, as this is an important process and he can't risk it. But according to the information we have, the refinement hasn't started yet, and it will probably not start for a long time," Ma Xia answered the question on behalf of Ma Li and continued. "Vice leader Ma Li's spy sacrificed his life, and possibly all the other spies with him, to deliver this information to us. We have some time to prepare, and this brings us to the purpose of this meeting."
Before he had the chance to explain, Shui Xiang asked. "What do you mean by that, Ma Xia? How can we have time to prepare, and how much do we have?"
"Shui Xiang, let him finish." Lin Ling Li said to him in an angry voice, but Shui Xiang ignored him, listening to Ma Xia's response.
"As I was going to say, the spy already told us most of the information that we needed to know, and among them is one of the main ingredients of the recipe for this Gu worm. It's the illuminating iron." The two other elders understood immediately.
"And are we sure that the Jin tribe doesn't have any of it?" Shui Xiang asked immediately. Ma Xia nodded at him.
"Yes. They don't have it, at least not the full amount they need to refine the Gu with." The two leaders nodded at each other, but Lin Ling Li noticed that some elders didn't understand what they were talking about.
"The illuminating iron is a metal path resource. It's produced by the earth regularly, so even though it's abundant, none of the tribes in this region can extract it, not even the Jin tribe. They need it to come out of the ground on its own, and it does so at intervals of ten years." He explained to them and then remembered the duration it needed to emerge. However, he didn't know when was the last time it came out, so he looked at Ma Xia for confirmation.
Ma Xia understood and explained, "The last time it emerged was 3-4 years ago. So, in other words, we have at most 6-7 years before the Jin tribe starts the refining process. As I was saying, we have time to prepare. My tribe requested this meeting to discuss how to prepare for this inevitable war." He finished speaking and let the other two leaders and the rest of the elders process the time limit.
"We have to increase our strength even more. We need a lot more rank 2 Gu Masters to overwhelm the Jin tribe's defense lines in the future."
"Yes, and this time limit is barely enough for some rank 3 Gu Masters as well to emerge." another elder added.
The elders started discussing among themselves, strategizing how to bolster their forces within the given time frame.
"This generation is the only one that will get to advance to rank 3 before the war, but perhaps some geniuses of the upcoming generation may as well."
"Don't base our strategies on wishes. We have to be sure who will be worth investing in and who isn't."
"Yes, Elder Lin Lou is correct. The C grades and below won't be able to advance to rank 3. We should focus more on the B grades and above, but we shouldn't forget about them either. Perhaps we can help them with rank 2 killer moves and make them even stronger."
"Okay, but we also must make sure to guard the location where the illuminating iron comes from."
"Are you an idiot? We should just send someone to check every now and again. We don't want the Jin tribe to feel pressured and start the war immediately."
"Yes, that makes more sense. Sorry, Elder Shui Xin Xiao."
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"Okay, so the final decision is: we mustn't make the Jin tribe feel pressured and risk a war from the beginning. We must invest heavily in the younger generations and increase the rewards they receive when they achieve something noteworthy. Additionally, we shouldn't forget about the kids who are C grade or below. If they aren't talented enough to use simple rank 2 killer moves, at least they should be thoroughly trained to serve as good meat shields. Is there anything else?" Ma Xia summarized all the good points brought up by the elders.
"Yes, you know that our alliance was formed in a hurry. We didn't get to fight with each other that much, so we don't know how to cooperate, especially in the older and, most importantly, the younger generations. We should focus more on that aspect too." Lin Ling Li said, while thinking to himself. 'The Jin tribe never attacked anyone, not because they were scared of the alliance or anything, but because the conflict would just cause a lot of casualties for both sides. They would most definitely not gain anything if they won because we would not allow that, destroying everything valuable along with us. That decision is now paying off, Jin Huang was truly smart. Maybe that was his plan all along, to strengthen his tribe while waiting and collecting all the illuminating iron he needed in secret.'
"That's a good idea, academy elders, please discuss this amongst yourselves and come up with something." Ma xia orderd the academy elders of the three tribes, who responded in unison. "yes, alliance leader." They ended up discussing more minute details, like how much they should invest in the younger generation, how many ranks 1, and 2 gu masters would eventually reach rank 3 by the time of the war and if anyone will reach rank 4 at all, the elders included, and the meeting continued for over 5 hours like that.