Walking over to Aois, I wave my hand and say, "I am Willow."
"Maple husband," he says with a jolly tone. "She happens to talk about you all the time."
"What does she say?" I ask with a joyous look.
"Wel-," Before Aois can finish speaking a stone is thrown that passes by his head, and then he says, "I value my life."
"That's a smart decision."
Walking forward with a gravestone in hand, he says, "Come with me as I work."
Seeing him struggle I pick up the gravestone along with a couple of others lying about and follow him.
"You're a good man."
"I just grew up around lots of respectable people."
"That's nice to hear. I hope all of my kids will be able to turn out like you as well."
"I think they all have a rather respectable man raising them, so I am sure they will."
"I am not as good as you think I am. My words and pleas caused the beastkin to go to war with each other. My fear of another slaughter pushed me into making what I can only refer to as a mistake."
"Many were tricked by the ministers even me and Maple wouldn't have figured this out unless Suzuka came and told us."
"In the end that doesn't matter, despite how short to confrontation was people died due to it. Even if it wasn't me who started it all, I still have responsibility for it.
And running from that will just make the lives of those that felt be even more meaningless than they have been rendered due to my actions."
Smiling I say, "See respectable."
"Thank you. Now Willow why are you here?"
"Hey Aois, during the battle I fought to catch the perpetrator of the attack on the Fanalis, I ended up fighting a single Fanalis warrior which I killed called Barr."
Aois not even stopping for a moment says, "He was a child raised here due to being orphaned at the end of the first war."
"You raised a Fanalis? I thought you only raised non-Fanalis?"
"Fanalis children don't always start off looking like animals, sometimes the adaption grows as they age, and Barr was one of those cases. He grew up after a giant crisis and was raised by me during a formative stage of his life. Back then I was far less friendly to Fanalis than I am currently in my life. And he was exposed to all of that. The reason he was orphaned, all of these people had died, and all his friends lost their parents was due to fanalis, and his hatred for them grew each day. During the post-war era, the hatred many felt for Fanalis united them, and the boy who had lived through the end stages of that war found a home in that hatred. But when he became a Fanalis all of that fell apart. His friends abandoned him, his community some him as the enemy, and worst of all even I let my love for him fade. For the second time in his life the Fanalis in some form have taken what he truly wanted, but this time he had no one to comfort himself with, and eventually became the man you saw."
As we eventually reach a place with lots of dirt that was recently dug up and put back into the ground, Aois takes the gravestones from me and sets them down over the specified area.
And as he does I shake a bit, then I say, "I am sorry."
"Don't be it wasn't your fault."
"But he was a person, he was your son."
"He wasn't my son. I don't deserve to call him that."
Turning to me, Aois says, "Willow I can see you regret what you have done, that's why you came to me, and I am sure hearing his story has only increased that regret. But don't beat yourself over something like this."
"I won't, I have decided to take all of this and move forward regardless of whether I think it was good or not."
"A strong resolve. And if you have that don't regret Barr's death. He had suffered a lot, but he had chosen to replace his lost love with hatred that eventually turned on himself. I didn't help, but I can also tell you after raising countless children they aren't clean slates, he was capable of making choices himself which could change his end. Dumnorix was raised by me as well, and instead of choosing hatred, he spent the days under me ignoring my teaching and looking for a way to bring peace to everyone. We all carry a certain degree of responsibility and only by realizing that can we all truly help each other and move forward. I failed Barr, and Barr failed Barr, so don't fret Willow."
"I am sorry but I will fret. If put in the same situation a hundred times I would still end up killing Barr, so I won't regret that action, but I will fret, I will know I could've saved him. All of this is so that when I next encounter this situation, I can look for an alternative I wouldn't have encountered with Barr. Like you said everyone will take a certain degree of responsibility, and I will take my own and use it to grow."
"You're a strong man."
"I think someone who can admit their wrongdoings to a stranger is far stronger than me."
"Thank you, now please use that strength to help me finish this."
"Definitely."
ΦAs the two of them work together from Abais castle Orb stares out towards them, and says, "I hope everything is going well for Willow."
Orb quickly turns his head to Ivana, Gheorghe and Wadim, and says, "Come on three idiots, let's get this done."
But the three of them shake far too much and say, "We can't, we can't."
"Oh come on, Avram lent you guys to me today, so let's try our best."
Ivana says, "No in that room are way too many heavy hitters, we can't deal with them."
Wadim says, "I feel like I am back at school again. They're going to bully the shit out of me."
Gheorghe says, "We escaped from Blestemate so we wouldn't have to put up with nonsense like me."
Picking them all up in a hug, Orb says, "Please I need you guy's help, your all so smart that I can't do this without you guys."
All together they say, "You think we are smart?"
"Oh course I do."
From all of their eyes tears poor out, and then Orb with grey hair says, "Huh. Why are you guys crying?"
Gheroghe says, "Iancu, Avaram, and Elia never compliment us."
Wadim says, "They are always giving us sass or complaining."
Ivana says, "Is this what nice words feel like? I never thought it would be this good."
They all stand up and look at Orb with tears pouring down their faces, and then say, "We do it!"
Excited Orb says, "That's good to hear. Now let's head in!"
Walking towards the door with yellow hair, Orb opens it and he enters Cultúir dining room, the same one she meets with Maple and Willow in.
But around the circular table is five beastkin.
Φ From the journal I got from Cultúir I was able to learn a lot about the way this country is put together, but more importantly than that I was able to figure out something that was slowly becoming an issue; Who is competent?
I have had to dismantle or at least freeze many things within the country for the sake of showing public trust in the beastkin and Fanalis who have been harmed by the current rulers.
But even in a corrupt system there are still those who have earned their way through some form of merit, and those skilled workers are the pillars of society who will be needed going forward.
And from that journal, I identified 5 people who I need to quickly gain on my side.
Fois the pangolin. Among the druids who specialize in medical studies, he is at the forefront, creating many new drugs per year that have been misused by the current administration to great effect.
Luachan the monkey. The chief economist of the beastkin, whose efforts have made sure that the policies implemented by the ruling government post-war had the ability to ease the troubles of the public.
Síofra the matriAnt. A Fanalis who leads a large number of ant Fanalis. Due to their biology and physical capabilities, they are able to build large amounts of structure with incredible speed and precision.
Aoibhinn the bear. A druid who specializes in genetic modification of plants, and wonderbeasts. He has inherited the teachings of Boann the druid and has followed her teachings to ensure that they keep a diverse bloodline and food supply.
Ganthrú the marshal bee. The leader of the military of Nialathrú and also the man who tried to kill Maple and Willow upon their first arrival. He has the trust of the people within Nialathrú and is respected by his men to an intense degree.
Together all of these people in front of me make up the true backbone of this country and if I don't sway them to my side chaos will spread and ensew in this new country of ours.
-A little time before Orb arrived-
Φ Tapping his foot again and again, Luachan says, "I can't deal with this, I can't deal with this."
Aoibhinn says, "Stop being a child Luachan, you already know that complaining doesn't solve anything. I can't believe this is the man who has stopped economic crisis for us so many times."
Fois says, "If you here ever dealt with economic theory you would know it is always a certain degree of randomness thrown into it. Someone who deals with that for their job is no doubt going to be stressed."
Síofra says, "I find it funny that you like to pretend you aren't scared Aoibhinn."
"You have something to say Síofra!?"
Ganthrú looking at Aoibheann says, "Calm your tone, if you don't you will end up like your sister Cultúir and thrown in prison."
Calming herself down, Aoibheann says, "You say that like you won't be first on the list."
Fois says, "Now, let's all calm down, you young children are getting far too rowdy for me."
All of the other beastkin in the room look at Fois the tiny Pangolin who looks similar to a child.
Síofra says, "Don't say such things Fois, you might make Aoibhinn feel old."
"You're the second oldest here, I don't want to hear that from you!"
Síofra takes part of the wonderbeast the matriant, and antlike wonderbeast. Though, unlike a normal Fanalis whose animal parts tend to overpower her humanistic elements, Síofra looks far more like a normal beastkin leaning towards a Fanalis. Her body shape is clearly that of a woman, with her skin and body being made out of the same material as an ants white exoskeleton, but despite that, her head is that of a human.
With a smug look on her face, she says, "But unlike you, it's nearly impossible to tell my age since my exoskeleton nearly breaks."
"You annoying little Fan-." Aoibheann stops herself, and Síofra laughs.
"You can no longer use that as an insult, oh how good it feels to be socially dominant I can't wait to abuse this power."
Luachan says, "How are you all so calm!"
Their attention all focused on him, and he continued saying, "We are now being thrown into the world, with extremely little information, or any form of goodwill to use as bargaining power.
The humans have been sharing stories of how the beastkin have been evil villains for over 2000 years, and now we have to enter such a world. In fact, we are already at a disadvantage in our negotiations with king Orb, because he has sole control over all the ice and snow that covers Victoria. None of you seems to understand how utterly screwed we all are."