Interlude 2

On a dark, dark night, in a dark, dark room, in a dark, dark corner...

In reality, however, the room was very bright, and it was far from being a shabby little room. It was an enormous space, in comparison to which even the Great Hall of Hogwarts might seem not so large. The conversation wasn't taking place in the corner either, but in the center of the room, at an oval table made of a material resembling transparent marble.

"We've distracted them enough," grumbled the man dressed in a formal-looking cloak. "It's time to adjust the plans and start implementing them. Prolonged neglect of opportunities is costing us resources."

"For now, they're rather laughable, if we rely solely on the material aspect... But some of us forget that this isn't the only thing needed in our business. Unfortunately," added a second, younger man, though his attire was closer to a modern Muggle suit.

"You're taking too much risk with such statements," the third, dressed in darker clothes, though not black but rather grayish, frowned disapprovingly.

"I agree. Rushing won't lead to anything good," supported him the eldest, whose beard could easily compete with that of a certain famous British wizard.

"We've waited long enough!" the first man raised his voice slightly, slapping the table with his palm.

"I agree! We've lulled them enough... These Lords and Ladies have already relaxed; their parents have either passed or stepped away from business entirely. They think that the structures we've backed have slackened and, after bribes, have completely accepted the current state of affairs," added the second of the duo advocating for more active measures, earning disapproving glances from the other pair, who held different views.

At the head of the table sat a man of indeterminate age, around forty or so. He hadn't yet intervened in the conversation, observing the open bickering with a polite expression on his face.

But in his thoughts, there was only head-shaking and the understanding of how much ordinary folk are mistaken when they argue over their petty matters in the background of the grander stage of power. They think that those at the top discuss their affairs quietly, calmly, sipping expensive wine and listening to soothing music. It's quite amusing to watch their most naive assumptions.

They are by no means elegant celestial beings who never raise their voices or say a harsh word. Yes, that's certainly a convenient mask, one that forces overly ambitious subordinates to disdain fiery tempers, but it's far from reality. And in dealings with equals, this quickly becomes apparent.

Of course, the people gathered here could sit through the entire discussion with emotionless faces, but what's the point?

The founders and their predecessors had ensured that they were primarily allies, not competitors. If one fell out of the group, the others would suffer too. This significantly changed the level and direction of competition, making it a rational one.

Yes, it's an almost impossible feat. However, their predecessors succeeded. And that's why they, and no one else, now rule most of the world. But not all of it, unfortunately.

Under the weight of these thoughts, the fifth man shook his head, though if the heated debaters noticed, they quickly forgot.

To his great regret, their group… in terms of shared interests, wasn't as ancient as many magical families. In his opinion, this was the only thing keeping the pure-bloods, stuck in the past, from collapsing. Noble kings and aristocrats had long since become a thing of the past, and the magical world, like the Muggle world before it, must come to grips with that.

But just as in the mundane world, the magical nobles clung to the remnants of their power with all they had.

Their duty was to cast these remnants of history into the abyss, reshaping the outdated world order.

At least, that's how the official story went. In reality, their motives, of course, were a bit more self-serving. Oh, they didn't completely deny the ideals they preached to their subordinates, as they aligned with the desires of the five people. But still, nothing in the world has ever been free, even in the times of noble and honest knights — if such ever existed.

And they would take their payment for bringing the world order into modernity — power and strength.

"And so," the previously pondering man began, and the others gradually fell silent. He was no stranger to acting as a diplomat between two sides, and he would manage it now. "One side..." he nodded to the left. "Believes it's time to take action, arguing that we are ready. The other side..." he nodded to the right. "Thinks we are not ready, also presenting perfectly logical arguments and citing the failures of our predecessors. Those in my position have always adhered to the middle ground, as I do now. Therefore, I believe it's reasonable to express my opinion at this moment."

"Do your best," grumbled the old man, who, being the eldest, was allowed certain liberties.

"Your arguments are honestly equal in weight. We are indeed ready for action, but excessive haste and rashness will ruin decades of delicate and expensive work. I fully understand the motives of both sides, but today I must lean towards your side..." he nodded to the left again. "However, you are forgetting the balance needed in our business. Sometimes certain actions are advantageous, and other times, different ones. I'd like to remind you that it is precisely for this reason that our group never held a single, unified opinion on all matters. Depriving ourselves of initiative and potentially risky but often very profitable actions won't lead to anything good. But nor can we be guided solely by it."

"Have you thought of something?" asked the man in the formal cloak, leaning forward with interest.

"Of course," the man at the head of the table smiled thinly at the somewhat excited supporter of the group's more radical faction. "It's the duty of someone in my position to pay attention to the thoughts of others. Your phase of active discussion on future actions has been going on for a while now; even our subordinates have noticed it."

"Tch," the lover of Muggle suits scowled in dissatisfaction. It seemed he had slipped up somewhere after all. It was one thing to do so here, among his own, but in front of subordinates... At least he wasn't the only one to slip.

"My suggestions will only be ideas; we will work out the main plan together," clarified the man at the head of the table, fully aware that while they were allies, no one present would hesitate to offload the work onto someone else.

The preferences for personally carrying out any given task weren't significant enough to justify the time spent. If they were greater, competition would long since have escalated from rational to destructive. And that couldn't be allowed. Under no circumstances. That was another duty of the head of their group, who sometimes began to feel that he had more duties than Muggle countries had debts to each other.

"Based on the experience of our predecessors, who were overly zealous in their actions and, shamefully, got tangled up in their own multi-layered plans, we need to act more simply, so that the situation remains completely under our control. A distraction maneuver, a distraction from the distraction, a main plan, and two backup plans."

"That sounds... too simple," the man in gray clothes grimaced.

"Exactly. They'll think the plan is more complex and that what I've proposed is just a cover for it. It seems like a well-known and simplest move — to use a simple plan so that the opponent deceives themselves into thinking it's actually complicated... And because of that, they'll never believe we're going for something so easily predictable. They'll assume we're aiming for reliability, using a plan as complex as the previous ones, and everything else is just a multi-layered disguise for it. It's their mentality — one of inheritance by bloodline. They will think just like their fathers, imitating them in many ways, if not in everything. We'll use that, making them believe they're dealing with the same inherited ideas and views, because it's much easier for their outdated mentality to think that way rather than accept that the world and its order have long since changed. How many times have we faced something like this?" the man smiled a little wider. "And staying on topic, I will announce the primary target — Durmstrang. Due to the same inheritance features, children are, for them, unlike for us, a vulnerable point. It's their only chance to pass on their ideas and views to the future. We can choose any suitable successor, whereas they cannot. As we well know, this lack of flexibility in bloodline ties is one of the main reasons why their order is outdated and should remain only in the pages of history books."

"Durmstrang isn't the best target," grumbled the old man, though he was clearly intrigued by the leader's words.

"And why not?" the man countered. "There is only one worthy opponent there, whose actions largely nullified the efforts of our predecessors — that much is true. But we know him. We know him well. He doesn't know us. Or are you referring to Mr. Dumbledore's initiative, where he placed someone loyal to him as headmaster? I dare say, you know better than anyone how to discreetly remove people who are inconvenient for us. We can use the hands of the aristocrats; they fully understand that the Great Light Wizard is not an ally to us either. And we've lulled their attention well enough. They may very well believe it... And if not, we can negotiate with Mr. Dumbledore. Some of us won't like it, and I myself feel uneasy about making concessions to him, but it's far better than allowing the plan to fail once again."

"The old man doesn't realize that by opposing the pure-bloods, he's helping us," the lover of formal cloaks grinned openly.

"Careful now, boy, I'm an old man too," scoffed the eldest in the room. "And Dumbledore isn't as foolish as we'd all like him to be. Where he lacks influence, he can compensate with brute force, which he also knows how to use. Or did you really believe the tales he tells the young folk?" he added with a dismissive snort.

"Is this just your old-man solidarity, or wha—" the man faltered under the leader's gaze.

"Speak later. I'm not finished. Durmstrang... is an excellent bait and distraction. What noble lord will worry about the actions of some lazy ministry, rife with bribery, if his legacy is under threat? And not just an external threat, but a familiar internal one — other pure-blood families. Unlike us, our enemies are far from a united front. It's incredibly ironic that, despite their familial ties, they have never been, and will never be, as united as we are, bound by something far stronger. Yet another reason, among the many others, why they don't fit into the new world order," the speaker narrowed his eyes slightly. "And based on that, what do they need to continue their lineages? That's right — marriages. These fools exile anyone from their families who breaks tradition, even if doing so would be beneficial. One of the distractions will provoke rumors, forcing them to gossip not about us, but about their own. I've recently acquired an interesting asset that could help with this."

"Knowing your way of doing things... Does the asset even know that they're an asset? Even a little bit?" the bearded man smirked, stroking his beard.

"Of course... not," the leader clasped his hands on the table. "That would only be harmful. Our main obstacle in Durmstrang isn't stupid. The identity of the asset won't mean much to you, but their background... they're one-eighth incubus. Maybe the relation is slightly closer or more distant, but it's hard to determine. We'll need to devise a new ritual specifically for that."

"O-oh..." came a collective murmur of surprise. Demons and their kin were incredibly rare beings, perhaps the rarest in the world. But unlike angels, they actually existed.

"Are you planning to have him dishonor pure-blood maidens?" the old man raised an eyebrow skeptically.

"I understand your skepticism. We all know full well that parents overlook their children's mischief and flirtations until it becomes serious. And if I didn't have such an intriguing asset, I wouldn't propose this distraction. It's a pity to sacrifice a descendant of demons, of course, but using him will definitely yield the effect we need. With him, the situation will quickly cross a line, and the young sheltered flowers will help that along. The scandal will be grand, very grand. But it won't fully distract those we need it to. That's why the second part of the distraction will be carried out with the help of the Unjoined."

"That bunch of naive kids who, fitting their age, still believe in fairy tales? The ones we use out of desperation as a poor imitation of an agency?" the man in gray robes commented with extreme disdain. "Compared to the incubus descendant, they won't have any effect."

"You underestimate them. It'll cost us, but wealth is only a means to everything else for us. The current Unjoined won't have any significant effect, true. But a child's mind is pliable, changeable..."

"Are you planning to use them to spread propaganda among other half-bloods?" the youngest man, dressed almost in Muggle clothes, frowned in confusion.

"No, no. That takes time, and it would interfere with the plan involving my asset. The shift in his behavior will already draw plenty of attention early on," the leader smiled patronizingly. "Their numbers and makeup are perfect for a one-time use. Kamikaze tactics are wasteful but always effective for drawing attention. So simple and effective in essence that there's hardly a countermeasure against it. Radical ideas sometimes succeed unexpectedly well. Remember the Reds? None of our predecessors at the start of the century expected that a small push would lead to such disastrous consequences for us," he frowned slightly. The loss of vast assets across the northeastern expanse of Eurasia was a serious failure. Not his, but that didn't make him feel any better about it. "So why not try the same thing again? Only this time, we'll be smarter, setting up something doomed to fail. One day, such ideas will spread, and any potential founders of such movements need to be nipped in the bud. The East must not be lost to us again."

"Two birds with one stone, as they say in the East," the bearded man stroked his chin contentedly. "But it'll really cost us quite a bit."

"All of this is dangerous. Our predecessors likely thought the same — that they'd control everything and intervene at the right moment... And in the end..." the man in gray robes grimaced.

"I'm glad you understand the mistakes of your mentor's mentor," the man at the head of the table nodded approvingly. "But too much caution harms us just as much as radicalism. Should I remind you about Japan? Our mentors could have crushed them, but they didn't take the risk. And ten years ago, we learned that back then, the narrow-eyed ones were bluffing. Desperately, believably. And it worked then."

"As you say," the man shrugged, accepting the arguments. Perhaps he didn't fully agree, but so far, it made sense, and they weren't pure-bloods to dismiss something so useful.

"Now that we're all in agreement, let's move on to the main and backup plans. These aren't as precise, so I'm asking for your advice and ideas; we need them now more than ever..."