Chapter 25 August 406 AD-The News

            At four sixteen in the morning, a loud banging was heard on the door to the male dorms of the Believers Church in Paulsland’s capital. The dorm was filled with addicts struggling with addiction, alongside a few men and their families who ministered to them. The loud banging woke up half the dorm, and Pastor Humbra went to the door in a bit of a huff. Nine times out of ten, a loud banging on the door in the middle of the night meant that one of the guests they had no choice but to ask to leave, days or weeks earlier, got drunk or high and made their way back here. The one time out of ten was usually an emergency.  

            When he opened the door, he was surprised to find a soldier holding a lantern. He asked, “What’s wrong? What do you need?”

            “You probably don’t remember me, and if you do, don’t repeat my name. I owe you a lot because thanks to your ministry, my dad stopped beating my mom.” Pastor Humbra nodded, and the man continued, “We just got word that King Shimbir killed one of his guards and denounced the rest as traitors at Flattop Mountain. Currently, the man camp's graduating class is acting as his guard. Normally, we would have received word within an hour of this happening, but the message was delayed because the communication tower at Flattop Mountain is not allowed to send messages under order of the King. One of the seventy families’ loyal subjects had to walk thirty miles to send the message, and they gladly did so into the night.”

            Pastor Humbra’s eyes went wide in shock. “That’s major news. Why are you telling me this?”

            “Last I heard, Hani, the King’s maid, lived somewhere on your property.”

            “Oh. Yes.”

            “Do whatever you need to do with this information. I just wanted you to hear it as soon as possible. I suspect the seventy families don’t even know about this news yet, although if that’s true, you are only hearing it minutes ahead of them.” With that, the soldier left without even a goodbye.

            Pastor Humbra rushed back to his room, where his wife waited, and as soon as he entered, he said, “I need you to come with me to the women's dorms.”

            “What's wrong?”

            “I will explain on the way.”

            The pastor's wife quickly left the bed, and as they made their way to the women’s dorm, Humbra explained to his wife what was going on.

            When they reached the women’s dorms, they knocked on the door, and Hani opened it up. Despite all the bad press, she was a very responsible young lady, so she was one of the dorm moms.

            Before Hani could talk, Pastor Humbra said, “I just got news, that is only a few minutes old, that the King somehow killed his guard at Flattop Mountain, and denounced the rest as traitors. The graduating class of man camp are now his guard.”

            Hani’s face lit up in joy and she excitedly said, “He is free? He is free! I must go to him.”

            “We wanted to talk to you about your options.”

            “There are no options. I am King Shimbir’s loyal maid. I will go to him at once. Mrs. Humbra, I need you to take over my duties.” As she said that, she began walking out of the building.

            Mrs. Humbra asked, “Aren't you going to gather your things?”

            “No time. As soon as word spreads, reporters will come here. I need to beat them.”

            Pastor Humbra took out a pouch with coins and said, “Take this.”

            Hani looked at it, took it, and said, “Thank you.” There was a slight thought to refuse, but her mission was to get to her King as soon as possible, and the coins would help. A moment later, she was walking into the night. It would take her a couple of weeks to get to her King, maybe less if she walked well into the night, but it was worth it. He was finally free.

            She had no fear of danger as the roads between the capital and Flattop Mountain were constantly traveled, and predators had been wiped out of this part of Paulsland ages ago. Her fear was the seventy families and their agents, and she was trying to get ahead of them by leaving immediately.

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            At five eleven in the morning, Malkia woke up with someone knocking on her door. Her husband got out of bed, opened the door, and asked, “Who died?”

            The man said, “Manager Nji was killed by King Shimbir.”

            Malkia growled from her bed, “WHAT!”

            “King Shimbir was using a steam weapon during a demonstration, turned it on Manager Nji, and killed him. Then denounced his guards as traitors, who were then killed by the newly minted soldiers at man camp.”

            Malia’s husband said, “Rush to the castle and tell the employees there to make their way to the Erythraean Sea. We will arrange transport to somewhere safe. Perhaps Zhang China.”

            Before the man could move, Malkia said, “Belay that order. If all the employees left, they would look guilty. We would look guilty. Instead, have our reporters interview them and write up stories about how deranged Shimbir is. Shimbir is only twelve, and he has a lot of power; it will be easy to write a believable story. Furthermore, we need to get those who are left at the two halls of representatives, those who were too old to go to war, to write up articles of impeachment.”

            Malkia’s husband said, “But until the war is over, we cannot impeach the King.”

            “That’s true, and I don’t know if we want to impeach him yet or not, but if we empty out the castle, we look guilty and lose control of the situation. If we start work on impeaching the King, then we retain control. In fact, if we play our cards right, we will get even more control than we had to begin with.”

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            When news reached Jinka about Shimbir killing his guards, he laughed as he found the situation hilarious. He then had his papers write about how awful it was that when he went to war, traitors replaced his loyal people who were protecting and teaching the King. He didn’t care that his papers were contradicting things they had written for years at this point. All he cared about was scoring political points now.

            Nearly a week after he heard about Shimbir’s killing spree, he received word from the steam factory that King Shimbir, as partial owner, thought that the steam factory could make more money selling to farmers, miners, and other low-class people, with loan money from the Illuminati Borrowing and Lending Company, than with Jinka’s plan. Jinka was furious as it would destroy his plans for monopolizing coal mining in Paulsland.

            After a few moments of consideration, he decided to reach out to the Universal Church, and a few unsavory characters and see about having King Shimbir assassinated. Meanwhile, his papers continued singing the praises of king Shimbir. Nobody would suspect the one praising the king of murdering the king.  

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            In Rome, Michael almost bounced as he made his way to the Emperor’s office. After he was let in, he told Emperor Trajan, “I have wonderful news. King Shimbir had his guards killed as traitors.”

            “Were they traitors?”

            “No idea, but it means that the king in Paulsland is seen as a different faction to the seventy families and Jinka. Furthermore, this faction came to power with violence, which makes my job of destabilizing the nation easier.”

            “How so?”

            “I will use different avenues to tell everyone that the other side, whoever the other side is, is out to get them, and they must defend themselves before the other side can hurt them. Preemptive self-defense is a great way to start a civil war.”

            Trajan laughed and said, “And since it's self-defense, they will feel morally superior when they kill someone who has never harmed them.”

Authors note-Traveling today and tomorrow so dont expect a chapter until saturday. Next week y schedual should get much more stabilized.