House in the inner sect grounds, Green Blade Forest Sect.

Feng Yan led the lord to one of the dorms in the inner sect. The room where Ye Kang was wasn’t hard to find; It was the only one with guards watching over it.

Ye Kang had been put under house arrest following the clash at the city, due to his blood ties with the Ye Clan. Only the lack of evidence to any true crime prevented his banishment or premature execution.

He followed right behind Lord Aryon as he waved the guards off and entered the room. Inside, they saw their person cease his meditations, standing up to give a respectful bow to the lord and paying no attention to him.

“How can this disciple help lord?” he asked in a monotone voice. Feng Yan took a good look at Ye Kang: his once-muscled body had thinned, his hair was unkempt and his eyes, once filled with arrogance, were now subdued and dull.

Aryon tapped the floor with his ever-present white staff, wherein a muffled boom sounded on impact, followed by a wave of air filled with spirit energy that swept the room.

“You can talk freely for a time. I assure you, nobody in this room but us will hear it.”

Ye Kang breathed a sigh yet kept a neutral face. “Again, what does lord want?”

“Your father is the Ye Clan patriarch, yes?”

“He is. All of the sect knows.”

Even Feng Yan knew that; his status as the heir of the Ye Clan is, by and large, the biggest reason for his conceited attitude. His genius talent and duo-spirit veins couldn’t compare to the fact that, without doing anything at all, he will come to inherit the mastery over one of Dragon Border Gate Prefecture’s local powers.

“The heir of a clan, yet here you are training in the sect. Why?”

“Does lord not know? Father was a man who wanted to build good relations with everyone when he moved the Ye Clan here. Since he and the grandmaster had a friendship before, he sent me here to be taught under their masters before I inherited the Ye Clan’s heirloom techniques.”

Aryon nodded. “I see. Know, then, that I am here because of your father.”

“Lord must know he’s incapacitated.”

“I know. But not how he is in that state.”

Ye Kang sighed and began telling his tale, with both he and the lord leaning in to listen.

‘Poison. So it’s an inheritance drama.’

The plot was something even Aryon could see coming a mile away. Elder brother gains power. Younger brother becomes jealous. Brother plots against brother, poisoning the other. The end.

Ye Kang’s story was a little less tragic. He had been sent to the sect at a young age to foster good relations. But after a month in the sect he was told by people loyal to his father to stay put, unless he wanted to die in the hands of the Ye Clan’s new lord. From there, he’d been focusing completely on gaining enough strength to save his father and clan from Ye Shao.

“So the patriarch is still alive? After all this time?” he asked.

“Yes. Father possesses the highest cultivation I know of in the prefecture: Fifth-level in the Nascent Soul Realm. He’s not easy to kill, but he’s not left his sickbed for seven years.”

“Why not just kill him outright now that he’s poisoned?”

“Two friends of father’s. Monk San Zheng and Cao Yang, keep watch over his room at all times since his poisoning. As Nascent Soul practitioners of the first-level and well-loved in the town, not even Ye Shao can make a rash move against them.”

Aryon paused for a moment, rubbing the metal imitation of his beard.

‘This would be a whole lot easier if I had a cleric. Bah. The one time the Dukedoms could be of use, and it’s far off in the distance with Tarminas.’

Aryon sighed in his heart. ‘Well, there’s that way. It’ll do. I hope you know what you’re doing, Arry.’

His ruminations done, he looked at Ye Kang once more. “I can heal your father.”

Ye Kang’s face took such a sudden change that his aide, Feng Yan, was startled. Desperation and hope flared in those frenzied eyes, and Ye Kang kowtowed towards him. “Please do so lord! The Ye Clan will forever be in your debt.”

‘That’s what I’m hoping for.’ thought Aryon. “Right. I have a plot readied for this, but you’ll have to do your part.”

Feng Yan spoke up. “Lord… you’re not planning on breaking him out, are you? That’s against the sect’s will!”

“You’re a good lad, Feng Yan.” nodded Aryon. “And I don't approve of it, myself. But some things need to be done.”

“No! Lord, He’s one of the enemy!”

Ye Kang stood up at his accusations with a face twisted in a scowl, but Aryon held a hand out to stop him. “I ignored your sect’s own actions in the battle that night out of courtesy to my hosts. But that doesn’t mean I approved of it. I want everyone here to have a good end, and if you’ll try and stop me…”

“Well!” said Aryon with a laugh. “Good luck with that. “

He pointed at Feng Yan, his finger emanating a curious light. When the boy looked at it he suddenly fell down on the bed, unmoving and breathing peacefully. “That’ll last for a while.” he said. “But I wager it won’t be long until he wakes up and, like the loyal disciple he is, alert his masters.”

Aryon stood up and drew a symbol on the back of the room’s door. ‘That’ll give us a bit more time. No turning back now. You're on your own, your highness.’

“W-what does lord intend to do?” asked the nervous Ye Kang.

“I want you to do something for me first.” he said. He came closer to Ye Kang, putting one hand on his shoulder as he stared directly at his eyes. “Think about your father’s room. Concentrate on that.”

Ye Clan Manor, Viridian Town

Today was Monk San Zheng’s turn to stand guard in the patriarch’s quarters.

He knew the patriarch, Ye Long, back in his imperial officer days, and they forged a long friendship during his tenure in the army. When the patriarch decided to venture to the colonies in the south for retirement he requested San Zheng to join him, to which he agreed.

He lived a good life here under his new liege, but now he felt like a prisoner under watch.

‘I only hope the young master is faring better.’ he thought. But the current times were turbulent; from what he’d heard from the gossiping guards who returned from the city some nights before, relations between the factions have all but deteriorated and they were now preparing for conflict. If that was the case…

‘Young master must be under scrutiny by the sect, or worse…’

It took both him and Cao Yang, the head guard of the main family, to keep an eye on the patriarch and ensure the loyalty of the clan to the main house. With Ye Shao plotting in the background as well, neither had the time to see to the young master.

Sighing, San Zheng sat on his customary seat right in the middle of the room. It was a sparsely decorated room, with only a table, a meditation mat for his seat and the bed where the lord lay. Most of the furniture had been moved to storage or seized by Ye Shao for his own.

Giving the room a once-over with his eyes and spirit sense, he took out a scroll and a string of prayer beads and began chanting his usual prayers. As he read the words on the scroll softly, he thought in his mind. ‘Please let the young master be s-’

He suddenly opened his eyes. A great surge of spirit energy appeared in the room. Before he could even stand up to react to it, there was a flash…

...And when his eyesight returned a split second later, there were two people in the room.

It was an armoured man wearing a bulky but ornate set of steel plate and a white staff in one hand. And there was another on all fours on the floor, coughing and panting…

“Young master Kang!”

The very youth he’d been thinking of had appeared all of a sudden, in the patriarch’s room nonetheless!

“Young master! W-what, how… what’s wrong with you?”

“That’ll be the teleportation sickness. It happens.”

He immediately focused on the speaker, his cultivation of Nascent Soul unleashed. “Who!? Who are you!? What have you done with him?”

“Elder, elder! St-stop.” said the youth as he steadied himself up. “He’s here to help.”

Before San Zheng could say anything, the sound of many footsteps came from outside.

“Who? Is it Ye Shao’s men?” said Ye Kang in a panic. “Lord, we must-”

“No, young master.” he said. He had already probed them with his spirit sense, and one of them was all too familiar. Before those people could reach for the door, he had already come up to open it.

An old, burly man with a moustache and wearing the Ye Clan’s red armour stood at the forefront of several more armoured men. “San Zheng! There was a spirit energy surge just now! What hap-” he saw the other two within the room. “Who!? Wait! Young master!”

The man was Cao Yang, Ye Long’s left-hand man and de jure leader of the guard. “What are you doing here?”

“No time to explain. Ye Shao or his subordinates will likely be coming here to investigate as well.” said the young master. “Can you hold him off while we work here?”

“O-of course, young master.” said he in reply. “San Zheng, old friend, keep an eye on the young master and… him.”

“I will.” he replied. He watched the men spilt up and take positions near the doorway, with Cao Yang himself closing the door and standing guard before it.

San Zheng turned back to face the two in the room. “Now, young master, you said this man can help? How?”

Ye Kang had no reply, turning instead to look at the armoured man. The man was bent over, looking at the patriarch lying on his sickbed while muttering in some foreign tongue. “Well, it’s poison alright, and not a spel- I mean, mystic art or curse.”

“Can you cure it?” asked Ye Kang. San Zheng and the young master moved closer to the bed.

“I wouldn’t be here if I couldn’t.” said the armoured man. “But… it won’t be pretty.”