“You are all remarkably brave,” said Sen.
Or remarkably foolish, he thought. He’d told Song Lan to ask for volunteers. He’d even explained so reasons why a cultivator might brave those risks. However, Sen hadn’t expected anyone to actually take up that particular challenge. Cultivators might face the heavens alone, but they had to survive long enough to do it. He supposed that the task he’d put before them didn’t quite rise to the level of certain death. It was damnably close, though. He found himself studying the three volunteers’ faces. He wasn’t even sure what he was looking for. Desperation? Madness, maybe? A passive wish to end their long lives without doing it themselves? Sothing that could explain why these three had volunteered.
What he found was resolve and a steely determination. Wait, thought Sen, as another explanation occurred to him. Did these three beco true believers? While Sen’s main purpose in the war was simply to preserve humanity, he rarely discussed it with the cultivators. It wasn’t a reason that most of them would find selfish enough or focused enough on cultivation. It was easier to just fra the war in terms that appealed to their self-preservation. That and the potential for achieving advancent through conflict. He’d never considered the possibility that any of them would co around to seeing the war the sa way he did. If that was the case, he honestly didn’t know if it would make sending them better or worse.
Or, I’m reading too much into it, he thought. Not looking desperate isn’t the sa as not being desperate.
“Thank you, Lord Lu,” said the three before they bowed to him.
I’m so tired of people bowing to , he ntally complained. Especially when I’m about to send them off to do sothing so hideously dangerous. He kept all of that off his face, choosing instead to change the subject. He also did sothing he abstained from most of the ti.
“What are your nas?” Sen asked.
The tallest of the three, who seed to register the question the fastest, took a half step forward. He had that vaguely unearthly attractiveness that all cultivators developed once they reached core formation.
“This one is Wang Zi Han.”
He stepped back, and a shorter man with intense eyes stepped forward.
“This one is Li Hong.”
Li Hong stepped back, and the lone woman stepped forward. She was thin, even for a cultivator, and Sen couldn’t help but imagine a strong wind picking her up and carrying her away.
“This one is Yang Lian Hua.”
She stepped back, and Sen made a point to commit their nas to mory. If they made it back, he would reward them in so way. If they didn’t, though, the least he could do was rember their nas.
“Your task has been explained to you, correct?” he asked.
“Yes, Lord Lu,” answered the three in unison.
“Then, I won’t explain it again. What I will say is that returning with so relevant information is infinitely more helpful than dying with extensive information. Don’t throw away your lives in a dood bid to learn more if the situation becos too dangerous. There will be plenty of threats without inviting more. Do you understand?”
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“Yes, Lord Lu,” they once again intoned in unison.
“Then, go, and may luck favor you.”
The three bowed before leaving the tent. As necessary as sending them was, Sen couldn’t escape the feeling that he was killing them just by giving the order. He wasn’t ignorant of the fact that other people had died because of his orders. Every fallen soldier and cultivator from the army had, in one sense or another, died because of him. But this felt different. Those others had died in battle, where life and death were often decided by personal strength and the vicissitudes of luck. He’d created the circumstances of their deaths, which ant he bore responsibility. But he hadn’t had a hand in the specific monts of their deaths.
The trio he’d just sent off were not going into a battle of thousands against thousands. They were quite possibly headed straight into territory controlled by a vast army of spirit beasts. More than enough spirit beasts to run them down if the cultivators were discovered. A prospect that was, unfortunately, all too likely.
“Lord Lu?” asked General Hu Kai.
Sen looked at the man before sweeping his eyes over the rest of the people in the tent. It was mostly the mortal generals, their aides, and Xu Xiao Dan. After a brief pause in the march, they were getting ready to move forward again. Their regular scouts had confird that no overwhelming armies were waiting in striking distance. So, Sen was there to suppress any misgivings that the mortal leadership might be feeling about his decision to continue marching south.
“It’s nothing,” said Sen.
“Is it?” asked the general cautiously.
“It’s nothing that talking will change,” anded Sen.
The other man’s forehead creased before he nodded.
“I see,” said General Hu, before he quietly added sothing. “It’s never easy. Sending people into almost certain death. We’ve all done it at least once. You can’t lead an army without doing it. But it’s never easy, and it’s not sothing you can prepare for.”
“I suppose it isn’t. I thought being a cultivator would make it easier. We don’t—” Sen paused to think. “We don’t value lives in the sa way mortals do. But taking lives in a duel or to punish the wicked isn’t the sa. I didn’t bear those three any particular ill-will. If anything, I respect them. That changes it sohow.”
“It’s, perhaps not easy, but easier to condemn those who seek to kill you, or those you know are guilty. You can say they deserve it.”
There it was. The difference that Sen had struggled to put into words. Most of the ti, when death ca by his hand or his order, there was bla to assign. There had been no bla to assign here, and death might still co because of his order. However, they had also volunteered. He might not know their reasons, but they must have had them. He couldn’t decide how much guilt he should rightly shoulder here if the worst ca to pass. So of it, certainly, but all of it? He felt like that would trample on the dignity of their choices.
Sen had to stomp down on a swell of frustration. Life had been so much simpler as a wandering cultivator. It had also been harder in many ways, but the decisions and consequences had usually been clear-cut. See a rampaging spirit beast. Kill a rampaging spirit beast. Get attacked by another cultivator. Kill another cultivator. Get tricked into participating in a sect war by your friend. Bring the sect war to an end with hollow threats. He’d found many parts of that ti in his life harrowing, but it had been simple. Leadership, it seed, was a constant process of trying to find one’s way through a mire of complexity.
“Yes, it is,” agreed Sen, finally responding to the general. “So, how go the preparations.”
General Hu took the change in subject in stride.
“The army is well-practiced at this. Aside from the newest additions, it’s going quite smoothly.”
Sen and the generals were used to this. Every ti they added new soldiers, there was an adjustnt period. Sen’s army had beco extrely proficient at establishing and breaking down temporary camps. So of it was practice, but they’d also developed tricks for making it happen faster. They’d altered everything from the way they packed to who marched where. He wasn’t quite ready to say they’d elevated it to a crude art, but he suspected they were getting close.
“Have you dispatched more experienced n to assist them?”
“We have, Lord Lu.”
“Very well. Inform when we’re ready to march.”
“As you say, Lord Lu.”
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