A Meeting of the Grand

Convir's POV:

"Ahem, we should get this started now, no? Cortritia, give us a brief of everything that happened yesterday."

"Yes mam. According to eye-witnesses, the attacking party was a group of Wild Beasts of the Bamboo Bear species. The attack was split into two battlefields: the living and campus sectors. As we all know, the Bamboo Bear species works in a way where only one beast can be "The Bamboo Bear", which usually grows until reaching Gold Class, from which it will leave a successor before migrating to the Ice Region. This was the beast that attacked the campus sector at the current level of the 2nd Half of Coal Class. While the rest of the Junior Bamboo Bears and the Bamboo Bear Guards attacked the living sector."

Cortritia took his eyes off the clipboard before sweeping his eyes across the table, giving an opportunity for anyone to make any inputs. After nothing was said, he continued speaking, "During this time, the leaders of the newly formed Sect Faction, were holding a speech that involved almost everyone that was a part of their faction and many from the L'Amour Family as well. Once the bears laid siege, a similar scene to when we were attacked by a pride of Shadow Lion not too long ago unfolded. The closest household and people were slaughtered, but after the initial chaos, casualties were few and far between. After around an hour of combat, the bears were all cleaned up, and the speech was to be postponed to another day."

He once again took a break in his speech, awaiting any input. This time there actually was something, "Have we identified the number of deaths and such yet?"

Cortritia looked at his board before his eyes landed on the speaker and answered his question, "The current tally is 243 deaths and 15 permanent casualties. Three-fourths of those deaths have been identified. The total could be more than that once more time is spent investigating."

The man nodded his head, and Cortritia continued to speak, "On the other side, at the campus sector, The Bamboo Bear attacked. The only people on campus at that time with any ability to do anything were Onvima Pessvin, Vernam Taex, Paxium Otio, Iraspisit Moruum, Culdia Sapillum, and Igmor Proebel. In the end, Igmor was able to kill The Bamboo Bear but not without the sacrifice of Iraspisit. It is unknown how he was able to kill The Bamboo Bear. Afterward, time was put into restoring order and cleaning up the mess made."

Medisma nodded her head and then smoothly said to him, "That will be all then, you may leave."

With Medisma's word, Cortritia turned around and exited the room leaving only us four. There were no words for what seemed to be the longest time, only the meeting of eyes and a growing tension. It wasn't until one of the two men opposite of us on the circular table spoke that the silence was broken, "Igmor huh? I heard that he's only Dirt Class, it's mighty suspicious that he could defeat a Wild Beast capable of using a Spell and that no one bore witness to it. But then again, he is one of your pawns, correct Medisma? It makes sense he's suspicious."

With such words spoken in an instigative manner, it wasn't surprising that Medisma's mouth began to twitch. But what was more surprising to me was that she didn't outrage, and instead joined in on the passive-aggression, "My, that's pretty bold words coming from you Tempinis. I'm sorry that I give my aides the freedom to make choices, even if that results in some unsavory comments. But, considering how your servents' leashes are so tight that you choke the free will out of them, you wouldn't know much about that."

Tempinis was about to open his mouth to rebuke Medisma, but before he was able to a hand reached out to his shoulder and the body belonging to the hand spoke, "You both know this isn't the time to be fighting. For now, we must forget our past grievances and discuss the matters in front of us. We can all agree that this sudden Wild Beast attack is very suspicious. The Bamboo Bears are usually a docile type of Wild Beast, so to attack a settlement for no apparent reason is strange. But what is even more questionable is how the sleuth was divided into two. I can sense the touch of humans in this incursion."

I nodded my head. What he said made sense. Animals of any kind have a natural tendency to follow those stronger than them, and this is taken even more literally when it comes to Wild Beasts. If it were just a freak accident then they wouldn't split up into two groups and attack on two different fronts. The only explanation was that a human was controlling the bears. But this incident couldn't just be explained as an attack from a Demonic Enslavement Branch Cultivator because of how unorganized the bears were once they began their attack.

Due to the Enslavement Branch being outlawed, that only left one choice: someone led the bears to the sect and then left before they could be endangered. And because there was only one sect that controlled the Bamboo Bears, there was an easy argument to make. Of course, Medisma and I figured this out a while ago. We had alternate plans in revealing this info.

I coughed a little to gain the attention of others before presenting my case, "Well, I'm sure we can all agree that the signs all point toward the Fortune Nine Sect being behind this. They own the Bamboo Tree and we all know how they have had their eyes on us for a while. I'm surprised they haven't placed a body in our sect and used that to declare war on us yet."

My words brought the other three to silence, seemingly contemplating my deduction, and the other man spoke once again, "It's safe to say that is a reasonable answer. If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it's a duck, right? I don't see any reason to make an outlandish theory. But the question that truly plagues us is what should we do now? If we let the Fortune Nine Sect off without any restrictions we'll look timid. And as history has shown time and time again, the bold lion eats the hesitant deer."

Medisma nodded her head, agreeing with his opinion, and gave her response, "It is apparent that we return the favor, otherwise they might start getting ideas. But we can't just do something out in the open, otherwise it would be our heads on the chopping block once the Jungle Lotus Sect gets word of it. We must do something sly... For example, what if The Bamboo Bear destroyed its own Bamboo Tree in a rage before continuing its rampage at our sect?"

The man clicked his tongue in dissatisfaction before criticizing Medisma, "Yeah, trade one of their resources for hundreds of our inhabitants' lives and a hit to our reputation as a sect. What an incredible deal." He gave out a rueful sigh before giving up on his previous words and said with discontentment, "I suppose it'll have to do for now. But if we have a chance in the future to do something more, we must take it. I refuse to be the plaything of a sect that is weaker than us!"

After he ended his words with passion, it became clear to me how he was able to keep his position despite his unpopular opinion. Yes, being Iron Class was a big thing, but because of the righteous setting we found ourselves in, pure strength wouldn't be enough to become and stay as the Sect Leader. He was charismatic, no, he was almost hypnotic. Whenever he spoke, it seemed like he was larger than life. If it weren't for Medisma, me, and even Tempinis a little bit, then I'm sure this sect would've become a clan in no time at all.

Tempinis raised his head and said with pride, "Yes! The Fortune Nine Sect will be drowned by the weight of their sins. If not now, then later. If not later, then the Wood Sovereign didn't bring vegetation to the Desert Region. We will take care of destroying the Bamboo Tree, just be on the lookout for any opportunities to bring more damage to them."

Medisma nodded her head, somehow tolerating the obnoxious way that Tempinis spoke, and announced, "Well, I would say that this meeting has outlived its purpose now. Convir and I will be on our way out. You can imagine how busy we are with cleaning this mess up."

With that, Medisma stood up a began walking away and I did the same. Before we left completely, the Sect Leader declared to us, "Goodbye you two. Though, I'm sure that it won't be long before we meet like this again."

I just ignored his obviously ominous words and left the room. After the door closed behind me, I ran a bit to catch up to Medisma before saying to her, "Well, that went just perfectly now didn't it?"

The corners of Medisma's mouth crept up her face, and in beat with the sound of her cane hitting the floor, she affirmed my thoughts, "Yes, yes it did. Now it's clear that the true criminals behind this are Tempinis and the Sect Leader. It makes sense at first to think that the Fortune Nine Sect did this, but that would make too little sense for them. It was much too risky to do, as it would be too obvious that they were behind it, and either way, their reputation would take a hit. Plus the time period when the bears hit was just too perfect to be an outside job. This must have also been obvious to the Sect Leader, yet he agreed so easily to your explanation. The only reason would be that he was agreeing with us to hide his own crime."

She frowned a little as she recounted the recent events, "We took a huge hit in reputation due to that attack. And it also ended up killing many of our faction's members. Though luckily the only Elder who died was Iraspisit, otherwise we would be in real trouble. It seems that we must take some measures I would have liked to avoid before."

I was mentally wowed by Medisma's words.

'So it's really come to that now?... She must be pissed."

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Tempinis' POV:

We stood silent in that room for a while after the two others already left. I figured that Opacus was in the middle of deliberation, which was something he did often. So after I waited without any words being said for a couple of minutes, he finally opened his mouth, "Ah, I think I understand now."

I raised my eyebrow before questioning him, "What do you mean? I thought we already figured it out?"

He shook his head in response, "No, that was only a smokescreen for the real masterminds behind this ploy. It is so easy to blame this on the Fortune Nine Sect because of how connected they are to the Bamboo Bears, but it's that fact that makes it impossible for them to have done it. I've had my share fair of dealings with their Sect Leader, and I can firmly say he is not an idiot who would do that."

I was definitely confused now, and I made that clear, "Then who could've done it? If it isn't the obvious answer then that only opens the door for many other possibilities."

Opacus nodded his head before answering my question, "Yes, it does do that. But there is an easy method to figure out who would have done this, we have to look at motive. Who has the reason to do this? Simply put, it must be Medisma and Convir. It seems unlikely at first because it hurts them in the short run, but if they can stir up conflict between us and the Fortune Nine Sect, then they can use the chaos to push their own narrative."

I brought my hand to my head in contemplation. I was never the best at deduction, which was why I let my brother do the thinking. And it wouldn't stop now, "But doesn't that seem... a bit inconcrete? To go off of that alone leaves room for error, and a big error at that."

Opacus chuckled a little and replied to me, "Haha, I'm glad to hear you ask that, you are getting better at strategizing. But to answer your question, yes, it's an unfoundational claim. That was only before this meeting though. As I said before, it isn't the hardest thing in the world to figure out that the Fortune Nine Sect couldn't be behind this attack, and Medisma is smart enough to see that as well. This means that the only reason she would let Convir bring something like that up and not debate him is because it's convenient for her. Why else would she let something that could drag her precious sect into ruin go unchallenged? It must be because she was using the obvious answer as a smoke screen."

Hearing him say this was like an awakening experience for me. Who would've thought that the rabbit hole went so deep? So much went into this game, yet Opacus was able to see through it all. It brought some second-hand pride into me. But now that I knew the truth of this incident, it left me wondering, "Now that we know this, what should we do?"

Opacus poked at the table with his fingers for a couple of seconds before raising his head and answering my question, "First she creates the Sect Faction and now she's planning for my downfall. This is an obvious power play and an incredibly aggressive one at that. If we don't act in kind, we will be run over. We must weaken them before they can do anything crazy... Heh, I guess I'll have to meet up with an old friend of mine."

He stood up and began to walk toward the door while saying to me, "Tempinis, I need you to run things for a bit in my stead. We both know that this isn't your forte, but I believe you can handle this. I'll only be gone for one or two days, so give your brain a workout in the meantime."

I got out of my chair and asked him, "Could you at least tell me what you're gonna do? I just want to be able to prepare, mentally that is."

He stopped just before the door, opened it, took a step outside, and, without turning around, imparted to me, "I'm visiting The Underground."