The Wuwukeng
Liangqiao
Zhaoze
Akai
Liangqiao
Zhaoze
Akai
ZHI-HUA
Noise. The city of Liangqiao for all its flaws was never so quiet, always alive. There was a certain poverty to this ancient place, its walls standing above the new and decaying tower blocks which dominated it. One could see this place - old and bare, without cohesion. It was a chaotic place, where men and children fought like beasts, among their hungry hides. The streets were filthy and decayed the further you went out into its vast and endless sprawl. And then this pale horse rode over the city, in its wake a black cloud which gave poison to all those underneath it.
Yet there was not all misery in this settlement, but history as well. Behind those walls was an older city, one far older than the nation which it was in. It was ancient as it was excessive, covered in gaudy gold monuments to lost glory. Old rulers of dead kingdoms and empires looked on their old home with stone eyes situated on tall obelisks. Pyramids and ziggurats dominated the sky; monuments to the misery of those who made them, now long dead.
This was Liangqiao, the city of Clan Ibhu - one of the oldest names to survive in this nation. It was said that there were five great clans who have been survived for ten thousand years: Clan Haituohua of Laozhen, Clan Cangbai of Baishan mountains, Clan Woerjin of Nueshan, Clan Baermali of Antia and the rumoured to be the oldest of them all Clan Ibhu. Their name looks foreign to most Akai, as is their city. It’s ancient designs survived through them as well as their queer looks. It was said that the Clan predated that of the Lazin’s by millennia, predating perhaps even Akai itself. Each one of them looked bizarre with freakish narrow head with flat noses and sulken almost white eyes. Records told of the demon kings who ruled over the realm of the jungles. Their spawn brought ruin to the Xuanese potentates and their god-kings before they were unified under the First Ditorate of the Yaohaung. Ditor Akai Shi-Yaohuang as he is now known was the man who brought Akai its first taste of unity. He was a regarded as a general without peer by his contemporaries, managing to create a dynasty which would last centuries after his death. His main legacy however was being the codifier of Akai’s culture, without him it’s nature would be very different indeed. From him, the thousand sects of Omahiji emerged, and from them the Lazins created Baiqiang and Dawei Christianity. This society's values of self sacrifice, discipline and ruthlessness were first recognisable in this man and his coordinated brutality.
And what was this all for? The man Zhi-Hua thought as he walked among the streets with a pained expression hidden underneath his military half-mask. He wore a cracking leather trench coat, aged and starting to wear given its age. It was first made in the aftermath of the Guizitong in 1984, when he was made an officer “for valiant service against anti-cultural forces.” That’s what the regime then called, unleashing D232 on child soldiers in the jungles of Zhaoze. It’s what they called the massacre of families in Yaosai. And its was they certainly called obeying Jieke. Akai was a guilty nation to him and one which, needed punishment. Yet he was a culprit in these horrors as much as anyone else then was. He could always recall that image, the one that haunted him so. Children with dead eyes, rotting before him.
His past stood there as a monument to the sins of the nation while the present faded away as a blur. What he knew now as that he job to do. He walked down the filthy streets of Liangqiao with disgust as he saw its people impoverished once more. Children with flesh thin enough to see their bones underneath, feasting of a rat hanging above a crude fire hanging outside of a particularly seedy establishment.
The boy’s loins was a particularly curious type of business which provided many things for the degenerates that loved this city of vice. Everyone from SIA officers to the Heizu clans invariably appeared down here if they worked in this region. Here one could find the finest debauchery in the city - narcotics from the jungles, vices of all descriptions, and the exploitation of the flesh was the norm there. Zhi-Hua was more than aware of a murder involving all three of those things involving a feud between two Yemanrai officers who wanted the other dead in the most creative way possible. Needless to say, there was this Tezhentuan or Geluxu colonel - who came in once searching for another colonel of his rank. The rest was fuzzy but it was an entertaining night for sure although a morbid one. Who owned this place was a certain ex-OS officer known as only Xinli. Zhi-Hua has some suspicions for who he might be, there were once rumours of a soldier who earned a reputation for murdering commanding officers in their sleep.
There were many monsters in this place, yet Zhi-Hua walked into it with a certain boldness and inside there was this nightclub feel to the place. Music was a mixture of house, synth and rock which pounded with a certain dated passion. Smoke hung in the air like a pale spectre, although from the sweet tastes of some clouds, the old officer was certain that it wasn’t just tobacco. There were buxom women, young girls and feminine boys dancing for men and women of varying statuses with some receiving more attention than others. They watched sword fights between young competitors and cold veterans, attracting large crowds of OND conscripts by the looks of it. Most of the OND outside of the Geluxu now days was infamously corrupt and self serving yet it was all for their own agenda.
At a table sat a man who seemed distinctly out of place with his clothing, reminding Zhi-Hua of pictures he saw of the excessively ornate attire of the renaissance elites yet it still bore a sense of practically. The man who wore it also wore a half-mask of an odd shape, one almost fishlike in its dispassionate appearance. The officer in Zhi-Hua could tell that this was a noble of Akai, a youthful one. His flesh was youthful and his taste in clothing was distinctively modern. The mask gave away he was an Ibhu - who he was from that large family remained the question.
“And here comes the gift from the divine lord Katu,” he loudly declared with his voice which rubbed him almost like sandpaper on metal. It was quite simply unpleasant: “It seems you are just the type I need.”
“Who do you need exactly, Lord Ibhu,” Zhi-Hua replied as he retracted a seat from his patron’s table. He swept from cigarette ashes from the red spherical seat and noticed a bottle of whiskey, seemingly written in a language he did not understand nor did he care to understand. He poured himself a cup, he took note of the two guards observing him carefully. Each carried a submachine gun of some kind at their side and presumably were trained enough to know how to use them, something he himself kept in mind. “I have a vague idea that it is some kind of mercenary role?”
“Observant, huh? Anyway you would be most correct, Commandant, one in Haidao,” the lbhu lordling began as he drank some wine of his. “I want you to lead them, or in particular a group of them in seizing an oil tanker in the region.”
“What’s the pay,” Zhi-Hua inquired rather rapidly. Most things were not his time he often felt, especially when he could just join up Waidiyi or Zhongluo knowing his experience. He on paper looked like the exemplar of a soldier given his rank although he always suspected his means of departure from the forces would be a detriment there. Combined with his utter loathing for them both, left him as an independent contractor of sorts. “If you want me for a job which looks down right suicidal, I need to be getting a good pay for in it return.”
“Of course Commandant. I am able to offer your clan, family and yourself enough money to fund anything you so desire. You would be the richest ‘independent contractor’ in Akai, worth around 123,450,000 Lazins in that sense. Clan Ibhu certainly has that wealth available.”
“Interesting, so it is a small percentage of it for what purpose,” inquired the old soldier as he took another sip of the whisky, being careful not to drink enough to dull his senses too much but enough to drown out the annoyance before him. “That and what sort of assistance should we… I be expecting?”
“Lining our vaults with gold, of course,” the Ibhu lordling blurted out as he grinned rather manically. “If this happens, we will profit in a way which also you may see develop as well. That and I owe a favour to someone rather important as well.” He mulled his drink as a girl, oddly youthful but unsurprising for an establishment like this. The north of Akai suffered greatly with the generations of orphans left over by the work of warriors, often unable to sustain themselves, the predatory nature of criminals took over and exploited them for a variety of purposes. Zhi-Hua was a man who hated his helpless, the fact that this was allowed to persist, the degeneracy of it all and he could do all but nought to change it. The Ibhu lordling gave the girl a look which the old Commandant found rather unnerving to say the least, it looked strangely violent in its sheer arrogance. Alas, even Molxue was not that unpleasant.
“I’ll take the job, just make sure I have enough awaiting me here. I think I have a purpose for this money of yours,” he spoke as he arose from the table with a displeased look to this face. “And oh, I do want to know my employers name…”
“Call me Yongle Yoxing Ibhu, and if you wish please do excuse me,” he said as he walked off with his guards into a room contrasted with lush colours. Zhi-Hua looked around grimly as his surroundings as he did, and contemplated what brought him down to the levels of these people in the first place. And he realised its answer lay at the bottom of a bottle sometimes.
The sea was awfully black tonight, a vision of an abyss which hid what lay beneath its fierce waves. Strong winds howled and battered the commandant’s vessel as it rocked in the waves. AS it turns out any reinforcements in the air were exceptionally unlikely tonight given the weather being extremely violent. However he had surprisingly had all he needed among the pirates.
They were surprisingly resourceful in terms of their equipment, for example the vessel that Zhi-Hua was using himself was a testament to his. It was a narco-submarine around twenty meters in length, powered by a battery which seemingly fumed constantly as it propelled itself through the waters. Inside its thick walls were around twenty men of mostly a dark complexion carrying Qi ATM-74s as old as them. Zhi-Hua was quite certain more than a few of these people were children or had fought when young. He knew those eyes, the emptiness that lay behind them, he often saw them too often for his liking. Their copper skin was covered in a variety of scars from a varying amount of blades. They had forgone the usual full body coverings here as a rejection of Clan Lazin’s ‘culturally oppressive obsession’ with the topic.
Zhi-Hua had around a good hundred under his command, whether they would be particularly effective that was his main concern. He was going to attempt the seizure of an oil tanker, something only really possible due to the fact that his subs could evade Waidiyi’s rather vicious Phantom gunships. As soon as they are alerted to his presence however, there was the ever presence chance that he may or may not be completely and utterly devastated by their firepower. Combined with the veterans they employ to serve in their ranks which these The only real defences against this would have been the combination of old MANPADs which he managed to acquire from some friends in the Black Clans who happened to have a few favours among the conscripts.
Zhaoze was a harsh place and one not without its maddening cruelties, and these pirates were one some of them. Zhi-Hua contemplated whether he might have left some of these men without families in the past, given his own service in the region and how he slaughtered entire towns with the assistance of his fellow comrades. Their screams haunted him and he fought it was fitting that he would receive such a punishment from the Outer-lord. The memory of whoever his superiors decided to absolve with death. It’s jungles haunted Akai, hiding every type of monster you could imagine, ranging from Heizu to tribals who would eat your flesh if they got their hands on you.
It’s waters were no harsher than the mainland, perhaps worse but the commandant could not focus on that now, he had to focus on seizing this ship.
And what a huge ship it was, dwarfing his tiny submarine with ease. By several lengths this monstrous leviathan of the seas moved with haste cutting through the waves with an uneasy effort. The ship’s lights made it look almost like the sort of village you might find hidden in the jungles of Zhaoze. He could make out its dim red hull and the green metal surface on top, a garish combination of colours. The text along the side of the ship was seemingly foreign, Latin in its appearance. Is this an Edomite ship?
Then in a particularly precarious maneuver they surfaced right next to the ship and began their attempts at boarding it, arising huge ladders in order to do so. With that Zhi-Hua slid his old Qi-SX7 in a sheath next to his small dao blade; climbing up onboard this demonic beast of the sea with his many men doing the same. It was a perilous feeling, seeing the waves below, matching the speed, the stability of things but thanks to a miracle it worked. He and his men after a few minutes were onboard near the stern. The darkness of the night covered them rather effectively, as they avoided the lights. They dashed across the metal hide of this cruel monster as they did, the more competent rifles kept pointed down with their hands off the trigger while some of the youths were more careless. Why can’t some of these fools know how to handle a rifle. The commandant heard gunfire occur behind him as some of his other men began to storm the bridge. He himself saw a man arming himself with some kind of assault rifle, something which he resolved with a few careful rounds. You’ve still got it he smirked as he watched his foe fall down.
It was not too long until they had successfully overridden the entire ship, and he stood in the bridge looking over its crew. He was soaked with water, it still dripped from his black hair, as he looked down upon the hostages that lay before him. He decided not to speak as he studied them and then his own men, raising his small carbine in hand as he studied his own men. “Let none of these men escape, if they talk to one another beat them into silence, if they resist shoot them. Do not let them talk to you and especially do not…”
“I can understand you, pirate,” one of the men, tied up to the railing along with the rest of his comrades. “You caught us off guard, but don’t expect that you will escape from this.”
“You, you look like an Edomite are you not,” the commandant spoke as he moved his gloved hand to sheaf his weapon. “Your accent sounds like one, and you are clearly not Akai. Would I be correct in stating that this ship is in the hands of the National Petroleum Corporation?”
“Yes, you would be cor…”
“No, you are wrong. This ship is in the hands of the Fair Band in the name of Xiang Bai. At least that is who they serve. I am not a pirate, just a freelancer who happens to be under the current circumstances accompanying some in an act of piracy.” He looked at his own rifle: “This here is not something a mere pirate would be able to get his hands on, neither this uniform. Anyways, I ask you could you please forward a message that I wish to...”
“Sir, we have good news!” a youthful brigand with skin a shade of cooper, clearly out of breath as he sprinted up the stairs. As Zhi-Hua walked over, he noticed something shifting and heaving in the dim light before him.
“What is this,” he questioned sharply, with a curious malice present in his sharp voice. This better be worth my time he thought to himself, as he plotted his way through the situation.
“The other team, they have stumbled across another vessel here, when they investigated it they found out that it was carrying a bunch of people, mostly foreigners it seems.”
A refugee ship… fuck this complicates things the commandant thought to himself as he realised the implication and issue his men had just given him. He could use them as hostages but that could easily backfire if they got desperate or ambitious. And Yongle had told him in another message of his to hand over any spare hostages to the Heizu for their enslavement. Although now he guessed he could raise the stakes of his demands.
“The Edomite who can understand me, what’s your name,” he barked rather viciously.
“Isaiah Tekton, I’m from Pada…”
“I do not want to hear your life story, Isaiah. What I need you for now is to translate a message for me and send it to your parent corporation.” If I send it through them it hopefully will be caught up in the bureaucracy buying me some extra time hopefully.
“That would be possible,” he cowardly remarked as he did. What a meek and weak man, if he continues to help me I will almost certainly kill him after this. No nation deserves such a pathetic example of a man.
“Men, I want to you raid all information this place has, to liberate it of its secrets so we have the upper hand here,” the commandant said over the intercom radio system. He then followed up: “Refugees, I’d highly recommend pacifying yourselves unless you want to get shot, we will kill you if you resist.”
There was an old Akai proverb which Zhi-Hua happened to think about as he reflected on this sudden turn of events. One he felt was ever appropriate for this situation. Curse the man who falls into the same trap once again.
To the National Petroleum Corporation: David Daniels
It has come to my attention that the vessel which this one has boarded is in the possession the the National Petroleum Corporation of New Edom, currently heading to the Enlightened Matriarchy of the Shrailleen Empire.
My masters have commanded me to seize this vessel in the name of the Lord Xiang Xiah Bai, first Count of the seas and the island of Huozhusi in the Haidao island chain. This ship is currents in international waters north of Zhaoze and in particular directly north of the Sutu’s twin straights. We managed to pacify the entire ship and its crew have become our hostages. Isaiah in particular has been a great use in translating this message into a language with you would be able to understand.
To this end, we will like to explain the precariousness of your situation. We are currently in control of a substantial amount of USD and your company's profits currently heading to the Shrailleen Empire. Your entire crew is currently held hostage by a force of many violent and cruel individuals of an unsavory nature from the island chain of Haidao. While I find them unpleasant, I must serve my masters with regards to their vile actions. Your ship has been rigged with plastic explosives which will detonate if any forceful attempts to seize these hostages back from us occurs. Please keep in mind this also will cause a large oil spill of a disastrous scale and whose impact shall be an environmental crisis to ruin your reputation even more.
We should also note that we happened to save a combination of valuable individuals in the form of refugees from South Acheron and Ayaca. They were rather foolishly trying to make it to the Shrailleen Empire in what seemed to be a fishing trawler - with around eight hundred people onboard. They are also our hostages with regards to this situation. They too are under our control and will be killed if our demands are not meet, sacrifices to the gods along with your crew.
We in turn demand that Ditor Hulang I Huieke Lazin of Akai ends the quarantine of the Haidao islands by withdrawing his uncle Prince Yanfeng’s Waidiyi forces from the region. We want him to hopefully learn the harm that his actions have caused for my client's Haidaoese people.
We also demand a sum of 1.5 billion Universal Standard Dollars be given to us in order to ensure the survival of this ship's contents, and a further 125 million in term for lives of all the hostages aboard this vessel. We expect this by a week today.
If our demands are not met, them woe to the bastards who have condemned their own crew to suffer the pains of death. This ship will sink, of the coast of either Akai, the Shrailleen Empire, Ayaca, Ceti or New Edom. Its contents shall burn a mighty flame as the nature of the seas is ruined forever more. We shall make sure every soul that is not on our side will be handed into bondage back in Zhaoze or if they prove to be a nuisance flayed and their skin worn as cloaks. This ship of yours, the Ploiarion can easily be turned into a great failure, we’d advise you not to let you make it so.
We hope this is enough to make you contemplate how to act next. Note force is not a reasonable option here.
Yours truly
Former Commandant Zhi-Hua Zhishang Shang Liu Laoweng Ibhu Aoxing Jieke Li.
