Ascendant Mother Sakura would return the Armor of Zeus to the Golden Knights with a warning about corruption in their ranks, as well as knowledge of two other Golden Knights serving Muses of the Black Curia who would need to be removed from their ranks publicly. The Diviners had already confirmed the innocent blood on their hands, and their services were no longer needed if that was true. The ban against Dark mages was also going to affect a considerable number of the Acropolis’ loyal Knights, but the option to Burn those Elements away and basically secure their rise to the next Tier was still there and right in front of them, if they chose to grasp it.

Sama didn’t doubt many would take it, while others would instead greatly resent the sheer idea that they would have to and leave in a huff, knowing they could find places where they would be valued elsewhere... and at least some of those places would be rivals of the Acropolis.

They’d be idiots to go to the Synod, which would only use them up as cannon fodder, but angry people made stupid decisions.

The other two dead Muses had only been Mages, basically servants to a Sage, and their once-desired positions would suddenly not be missed at all. A new Great Mother was going to be appointed, with new aspirants to be her aides, and nobody would care about the two who had fallen with the previous one.

Such was politics.

Sama departed the private chambers of the Great Mother as smoothly and unobtrusively as she’d entered them. There was no sign of anyone in them, or the abrupt deaths that had taken place there. What story Sakura would tell the public, and what she would tell the powerful Muses of the Acropolis who remained, was not Sama’s concern.

The only other Candidate for Divine Mother, the woman who was basically the adopted daughter of the father Sakura had never known, was also a Dark Mage, lured into the path by her guardian, and so Compacted to Shadow.

Despite that, she was known to be loyal to the Acropolis, it was just that her use of the Magic could no longer be tolerated, given what it portended: the constant temptation to knuckle under to the Netherworld with the goal of furthering her status after she died.

The young woman was also an Archmage, marvelously talented and well-equipped, a truly dangerous woman. She still had the option of burning her Shadow Element clean and returning to the fold in honor, and the experience would make her rise to Sagedom simplicity itself if she chose to take it.

But that wasn’t Sama’s problem, either. The offer and the potential were there. Whether or not she chose to make use of them was her own fate, her own decision...

------

The Young Family’s name was literally Cold Rice Mountain, when translated.

Like most Families, they were suppressed and preyed upon by the existing Great Families of their homeland, in this case China, who marshalled their existing networks of existing vassal Families to pressure them, bleed them, and force them to give up their independence to seek protection from the very Great Families bearing down on them.

It was a tactic that worked all the time, especially in times of conflict, when the government was busy with defending the populace and had no time for inter-Family rivalries, even if it hurt the nation as a whole.

China was hardly above being corrupted by Family members and the manipulations of monstrous old Clans. Great Family greed and cold-blooded moves were a byword in the magical world, and their lack of ability to work together one reason why they had a lot of people, but not a lot of international power, influence, and wealth.

This naturally rankled those Great Families all the more, but the ability to suppress their countrymen and stand atop a weak foundation didn’t care about their desires. They couldn’t rise to greatness because they kept undercutting one another for their own benefits, resulting in a zero-sum game that constantly brought their greater ambitions crashing down. A great plan that might benefit the nation, but clearly favor one Great Family over another would be undercut, misdirected, and flounder uselessly, while effective leaders and visionaries who might guide the government to a better future were constantly hampered, suppressed, and even outright eliminated if their visions might endanger the Great Families.

Such was life in China. It didn’t matter what the government did or had done. The Sages were above the petty struggles of warlords, would-be governors, or the hollow all-encompassing words of the ruling Communist Party. Certainly, no individual Great Family would go against the entire government and the powers of the military, the one area where non-Family mages might rise to power, and which would have no hesitation in bringing a rebelling Family to ash and ruin.

A couple generations, and as in every government before, the Families rose to power within it, appointed their own, and the game of nepotism and influence rapidly diluted any few remaining noble ideals they had left. The game of courts played so well by the Families over the millennia continued in a new form, that was all.

Surviving the backstabbing and double-dealing required influence, personal power, and a level of reputation that made it untenable for the Families to act against you. If you succeeded... then you joined them, however much they might look down on you, and the games continued, if not as arrogantly as before.

Holding onto your virtues in the face of these Human politics was extremely difficult, even for one generation. Whether they could hold true across multiple generations... well, that was a bet with all the odds stacked against you.

The Eastern cultures had their own philosophies and traditions in the way of morals and ethics. The idea of an overriding morality that transcended bonds of family and friends was in general quite alien to their culture, and seen merely as more manipulations by organizations of power to get you to bow to them and obey, especially ruling institutions. Religious institutions just used such things to justify whatever they decided to set as ‘moral’ and divide people, just like governments did.

It didn’t help that there were no proven gods, and so they were ultimately correct on the matter. The Church of Light hid behind misleading morality to trick the non-magical to follow them as being kind and virtuous, when their ultimate goal had nothing to do with that at all, and retaining their worldwide grip on power was their number one objective.

I had no difficulties with entering and exiting China as I wished, as there was no way they could keep me there or keep me out. Cold Rice Mountain contacting us cordially and asking to set up a meeting meant the meeting would be in China. Crossing the oceans with mundane transportation in this day, while the Sea Emperors were killing one another’s Tribes so violently, was just asking for death. The only flights crossing seas were military flights, or aboard Commander-grade or more powerful Beasts capable of making the flight... like Dragons.

Or, if you were really lucky and rich, some Void Machine might be able to do it. I’d never used one, but all the ones I knew of were restricted to the same landmass, not across seas.

Or you could just use a Teleport w/o Error combined with a Waterjump, and cross the seas, no problem.

If you happened to have a convenient Pocket Plane existing outside normal space, you could just open a Portal right to your intended destination. Gave the governments heebie-jeebies that a Sage could pop around so easily, but given my contributions to the world, there’d been no real attempt to stop me from doing so as yet.

Scrying the destination wasn’t hard, nor the follow-up. I literally walked out of nowhere in front of their gates, and the two Adepts on duty in front of the gates to the private compound of the Cold Rice Mountain family nearly jumped out of their shoes, first when I arrived out of nowhere, and secondly when they recognized who I was.

“Lady Fae!” the older of the two men blurted out in alarm, looking around in alarm. “We, we were told to expect your arrival, but we thought you would be coming by car...”

“At ease, gentlemen,” I smiled at them, and they relaxed so much they almost went boneless. “Many of the factions in your country have earned our absolute distrust, so I was not going to use standard conveyances here. As a matter of fact, those watching this entrance right now can’t even see me.”

The two guards were startled, looking about quickly, and finding nothing, which only made them feel depressed.

“So, I am requesting admission to your Family’s Compound. I can see myself up to the main entrance if you care to phone ahead.”

“Of course! Right through the side door here, Lady Fae!” the shorter guard said, waving at the other one to radio it in. I glided through the proffered door calmly; it was closed behind me as the second guard called up to the main manor ahead of me.

I moved into the center of the drive and simply glided forwards up and along it. The outbuildings and secondary quarters for members of the Family rose to each side, newly made and well-done, with care and thought put into appearance and construction.

The word was that Cold Rice Mountain had purchased some land here just before The Great Flood had started, secured an Earth Pistil and a Ward for it by their own efforts, and it had been designated one of the centers for people to retreat to as the littoral invasions increased. They had helped design and construct the city that had expanded nearby, defended it, and made it one of the rare beacons of hope in the nation, with lots of disillusioned mages flocking to it and the reputation of the pair who led it, without a doubt the two strongest young mages in China.

Mu Xuehua was from a branch family of the Mu Great Family, who I knew as one of the Families that had contributed an Ice Sage to pissing off The Ice Emperor... and one who’d actually survived as a puppet of the Emperor, for a short time at least. The Mu were the pre-eminent clan in China for use of Ice Magic, the literal source of the Mu surname; they were thousands of years old, with fingers everywhere, and ruthless in their clawing for power and the competition among those who wished to work for them, who they exploited ruthlessly.

That Ice Sage was now dead, outrage over what he’d done ensuring he’d be killed one way or another, but the Mu was also grasping at Coralost technology, and had made several attempts to gain one of the Spellhouses for themselves to exploit.

Alas for them, there were no Spellhouses in China, so they had to go to India and pay like everyone else. After they’d grabbed an Artificer, Chuck Handley, who’d come here to Vivic up some ancient jade braziers they’d paid him handsomely to do so, Sama had gone in, freed him, and gutted about thirty Mu who got in her way (and the Archmage who’d ordered the plan carried out). We’d had nothing to do with the Family since, nor China in general.

Mu Xuehua supposedly had been one of the talented outliers chosen by the elders of the Mu Family to ‘feed’ an ancient Weapon with her Talent, empowering it for another person to use, a sacrifice that, if it didn’t kill her outright, would strip her utterly of magical talent, just another sacrifice for the glory of the central Family.

Unfortunately for those elders, Xuehua had proven more talented and disciplined than they had believed. She had wrested control over the soulshards of the bonded Weapon from the Elder who was meant to reassemble it, in part through the auspices of her mighty natural Talent: an innate Soul Seed to Ice of the highest degree that naturally grew in power as she did!

The Synod considered her Talent a huge threat to them, as it didn’t work for them, and as a result the Magic Association and the Courts were looking for excuses to move against her and neutralize her.

Unfortunately for them, she was a hero to China and to many young mages of the country, as well as many non-Families in the government who admired what she had accomplished and done. Despite several moves, including one outright attempt of several vassal clans of the Mu and greedy, bribed government officials to outright kill them off and drive them off of the territory they’d built and defended with blood and magic, Cold Rice Mountain had endured and fought them off.

Cold Rice Mountain was more popular now than ever, and a lot of young mages wanted to join them, which helped grow their power further, even if the true Talents went to the wealthy Families who could promise them extra compensation and cultivation aids.

That performance had earned our attention. Coralost didn’t have any generational history, either, so an alliance made sense.