Peaceful Winds Breed Storms

"W.. p... a..."

"Wak... p... apa."

"Papa, wake up!"

The sun glared against my closed eyelids giving my vision a tinge of pink. As the words being spoken became more eligible, my eyes also began to flicker, trying to get passed the sunlight. Once I finally woke up from my slumber, I had enough brainpower to come up with the idea of blocking the sun with my arm. With this triumphant solution to my problem, I rose out from under the covers into an up-sitting position. I moved my head, which had regained its original strength, and observed my surroundings.

I was inside what seemed to be a normal bedroom fit with a dresser, a nightstand, an oil lamp for that nightstand, and that was about it...

My eyes drifted to the black-haired girl lying next to me. Her hair draped just over her bare shoulders, stopping at the top of where her chest began to grow. Her slender yet soft hands were holding onto my bare chest, leading my eyes back to her face. Her silky black hair slightly covered her forehead, her nose modest, her lips pink and slim, her jaw punctual. And her eyes looked up at me with a shining brilliance as if I were the most important thing in the entire world.

I stretched my body a tad as memories of last night poured back into me. I went to go find Vernam to inform her of her duties, but I couldn't find her anywhere. I ended up checking her almost abandoned clothing store that stood on the thin stilts of a three-month rent contract. There was where I found her. I suppose she was working on her own robe design to make it more lustrous, or she was getting the most out of the place before her allotted time was up. Long story short, I ended up sleeping in the same bed as her.

It wasn't anything out of lust, only a girl who wanted to sleep with her dad. Although the lack of clothing was strange in my normalities of sleeping with a family member, it was normal in the Jungle Region, so I couldn't go against it. At least it meant I hadn't left the same position in her heart that I held onto before this. I wouldn't have to worry about rebooting her for a bit.

I said good morning to her and chatted a bit while I got clothes on and dyed my hair a shade of brown so that people couldn't identify me as Quis. Vernam did the same, and we walked out of the clothing store, starting our walk to Onvima's house. He was the only one who bought his house while the others either rented or were provided one from their last job, so it was the only place we could reliably meet up.

Eventually, we arrived at our destination and opened the doors, letting natural light attack the inside of the house. Inside was everyone who belonged to my faction, making me the last one to arrive. We did this every morning, which would eventually change, but needed to be put into place right now. Plus today was an important day. This was the day that the political war between our three factions truly began.

As I entered, I gave my greetings and soon enough we all found ourselves seated. I looked around the long table and eventually settled onto the tabletop. Then, I suddenly twisted my head back up and addressed the situation we found ourselves in, "We're broke."

My words broke the tension that I built up creating a pregnant pause, just before a slight laughter broke out throughout the table. Beulus looked up at me and said blithely, "Yeah, we're aware. Otherwise, I would have expected a paycheck by now." After he said this more laughter could be heard and even I chuckled a bit to not make myself seem too cold to those directly under me.

After this wave of laughter passed by I returned to a serious posture and said, "Alright, let's bring it in. What I have come to discuss isn't the problem itself, but what we are going to need to do to execute a solution... And it's not going to involve many moral practices."

I let the weight of my words spread over everyone's minds before I continued, "I have discovered Convir's major source of income, or at least what caused him to start his takeover ten years ago. He has made some kind of deal with the Specie Sprouts that allowed him to monopolize the trader's market. Our objective is simple. We will find them before Convir can, make a deal with them whether they are willing to or not, and then get out with buckets of Dschungels. We will hold onto this deal until we eventually control the entire sect. When that happens, we will return the trading to its earlier functionalities."

I let the information sink into everyone before giving my final sentence of this beginning argument.

"Get ready because this mission is going to be the most important one that we will ever have..."

"It will be the difference between life... and death."

____________________________________________

Convir's POV:

God damn it.

I stood up from my chair as out looked out the window behind me, watching the wind cause the leaves to flutter. What a deceptively peaceful time. Just like the pain in the neck I have right now. It started small, unable to cause harm, and constantly under surveillance. I watched it grow bigger and bigger and still believed it to be under my control. It wasn't until it popped into a large pain that I noticed it was my body that this pain used to grow... only to hurt me in the end. How unbelievably foolish.

I sighed, letting the weight of regret be let out with it. I really couldn't think about what I did wrong, as it already happened. I had to move on and look to the future... but damn was that a hard thing to do. I already know that soon enough, he'll be out of money, and soon enough everything will fall back into my hands. The people would forget about him. Then Medisma and I will force the sect leader to join forces with us, unifying the sect once again...

However...

I could feel the embarrassment inside of myself well up into a fountain of anger, wanting to be released. I tightened my grip to try and subsidize this dangerous feeling, but I only heard the crunching of paper in response, reminding me that I was holding onto paper. I immediately snapped out of it and placed the disheveled slip of paper on the desk behind me. Even though the feeling of anger was gone, I still felt that unbelievably heavy rock in my stomach.

It was such an annoying subject to think about. Even if he would eventually be crushed and pay for his betrayal, he is doing massive amounts of damage. This stunt of his had a couple of repercussions hidden in it, but the most damaging was the fact that he took three of my teachers... my only teachers. And he also took half of Medisma's supply of Elders. Quis having eight Elders on his side was no small threat. That was almost half of the total in the entire sect. And he was a literal sixteen-year-old! That was the only reason I gave him a blind eye! But it seems that nowadays, even the kids are out for power!

I began to pace around the room. I mean, I wasn't the only one who got tricked. Medisma did as well. And all she did for the past couple of days was complain about it. And You'd think that would make me feel better, but it only made me more frustrated. Has the Wood Sovereign forsaken me?! Or should I say the almighty Zeus?! Oh no, I mean the Sun King!

I felt the anger building up inside of me again, so I breathed in and out as I calmed myself down. This wasn't going to be a difficult process. I know how people work... somewhat. It was hard to say after this whole incident if I really could read people, but I'm just going to chalk it up as an outlier. I've already learned my lesson, so I won't be underestimating Quis again. With that in mind, there was only one thing I had to do to make sure he had no chance of survival. The only way Quis could stay afloat right now is if he suddenly gained a source of income. All I had to do was prevent him from doing that and soon enough I'd find myself in the presence of three Elders.

But then there was also that strange performance Quis gave the other day. I'm not sure why he did it, but whatever he's after, I'm sure it was working. The people were in a state of wonder when it came to him. He somehow, with one little show, created a visage of smoke around his character. People talked and talked about it, it was practically the only thing you could hear. You can't even take a walk without someone mentioning the "Sun King"! And then there was even a group of people who were dedicating themselves to figuring out the mystery behind the one play they put on!

I honestly have no clue why they did this, but I don't have a good feeling about it, so I'll shut it down as fast as possible. But even that had to wait in line for the mess that was my education system. I couldn't have expected that my teachers would just up and leave like that, so I was in a very tricky position. And it was all because of this shithead's one move! My sovereign! It's such a teetering little annoying bite to the leg!

Knock, knock, knock.

The knock at the door snapped me out of my frustration, bringing me back to reality. I walked up the door genuinely curious as to who could be knocking. It was a mystery because I already knew that it wouldn't be Hasrem giving me more paperwork, Telferr trying to push some idea onto me before eventually ending up balled up on the floor in regret, or the old man coming for a chat over tea.

I opened the door as that fact weighed heavily on my heart, but was once again lifted off as confusion overtook it. On the other side of the door was none other than Spiravit.

I pushed past my many wonders and said to him, "Hello Spiravit. Why have you come to my office today?"

Instead of answering me, he simply walked past me and sat down on the only couch in my room. I was already in a bad mood, so this only added to the fire. But I kept myself composed. I was in front of a student after all. I simply walked in front of him and asked him again, "Would you mind telling me what you want?"

Spiravit simply sighed and while still refusing to look at me simply said, "Quis did quite the number on you guys."

I felt my head start twitching as he said this. This was almost enough to push me over the edge. But I've lived long enough to be able to avoid making a fool out of myself. So I simply said to him, "If there's nothing else, then I'm going to have to ask you to leave-"

"Leave? To where? It's not like we have any classes to attend."

And that was it.

"Listen here you fucking edgy, cocky, asshat of a fucking Quis-clone! I don't know where the fuck you get off, but would mind stepping off for one fucking second? You come to MY office. In MY school! And for what?! To make fun of how all that I thought I fucking knew is crumbling?! To get a laugh off of how a guy you don't like too much was betrayed!? Not only by the one kid he thought he actually could relate to! But also the only people he's thought to be his friends?! Yeah, I lie a bit, and I also have done some less-than-pleasant things. But who fuck hasn't?! Every single fucking time! First, it's my parents, then it's someone who I thought I loved, and now it's the only people I considered to be even a little bit close to me!"

The rush of anger wore off quickly, followed by a liquid I hadn't seen in a long time.

"I just want someone who understands. Who I can laugh with... Is that so hard?"

I turned around and walked over to the window, wiped the tears that escaped my eyes, and turned back around to Spiravit, "I'm... I'm sorry for what I said... Let's just... Say, why is it that you came here? I know that you wouldn't come here for no reason at all."

He said to me with a smile, "I'd like to drop out of school."

Great, another one.

"And join the Sect Faction."

...

Now that, was interesting.