Chapter 77 To Stand Alone
Hundreds of people gathered in front of the seventh king's palace in anticipation of their inevitable death, the negotiation with the leader of district one led to a cruel decision, that all other districts would be forced to leave the area of district one.
This was a decision that the residents of District 2 rejected without even giving it much thought.
Rivok was ready for war if the situation went wrong, but Chris was different, he tried to minimize casualties by taking advantage of the triple full moons that were soon to come.
The palace of the seventh king was a sacred place that no one could enter without special permission, that is why people from district two couldn't manage to enter it this whole time.
Chris in the last month managed to create a special relationship between him and the people from district one, he acted very closely with each one of them, and he didn't create any hierarchical structure just so that people could reach him easily.
It was done intentionally to control them and avoid any confrontation or resistance.
He was not charismatic but he managed to make them love him and respect all his decisions, he planted hope inside of their heads and somehow that was everything.
He didn't notify any people from district two that he was going to do anything to make them leave, he acted normally on the day of negotiation as if he was considering making them stay, and the second he left that meeting he ordered some of the mages to create a sealing spell in the whole region that surrounds the palace.
They were all low-ranked mages but district one's mages were numerous and used the element of surprise.
Just a few hours from the triple full moon, they gathered all of them and surrounded that palace and started to make a spell to lock that place down.
They intended to capture those mages in the palace area during the period of the triple full moons to face its horrors and to be killed after that by the monsters.
For hours people from district two tried to break that spell with all sorts of magic but the result was one, they were just so weak and less numbered compared to people from district one.
The old ones and women, kids were trembling in fear of the consequences, and men were putting an act of resistance in front of them.
"We agreed on the deportation, this is an unacceptable act from us, it would be a massacre and you know that, " Arino said to one of the mages beside him the moment he saw that wall of mages doing the sealing spell.
After the spying mission in district three, he decided not to be involved in whatever Chris was doing in a desperate attempt to ease the burn of his conscience, he kept on taking care of his family while being silent towards everything.
People adored Chris for his simplicity and his devotion to protecting them from that external enemy, and he was unable to make them see what he looked like.
Arino ran towards Chris's house where all the meetings happened for the past weeks, his features were very contracted, he was angry and he couldn't just ease the weight of the knowledge he was carrying.
He walked fast towards the door, knocked loudly with his fist, opened the door immediately, and entered the living room that became the center of commandment.
He went straight to the point when his eyes met Chris's:" You could justify what happened in district three by saying that you didn't want to jeopardize our people's lives to save others in a suicide mission, you could definitely say that, However, to kill someone who is in our district brutally is just so messed up and cruel, I don't know what is your problem but you don't have to go there, there are kids, old people, women..."
Arino was gasping for air, he walked fast to reach out for him, and even he talked like he was battling the most powerful mages in the old globe which made him lose all his energy in the process.
To stand for what he believed was a very difficult thing to do, especially when everyone around him was not on his side.
It was a scary thing most men feared, his wife advised him to stay away from the conflict in times like these, she believed in what he said, but she couldn't support him more when they had a child to protect.
Arino was a 35 years old man, with a very tall and strong thick body, braided ginger hair, and a beard with two braids on each side.
He looked tough and he was stronger compared to Chris, but he knew that if he fought with him he couldn't manage to succeed when he was surrounded by thousands of mages that follow his rules blindly.
Arino was interrupted by another mage who said with an angry loud voice:" You can't just say that to our leader, if you want to be heroic then you should join us, being heroic doesn't mean that you have to glorify morals, being a hero has to be related to taking the best decision in a tough time"
"I am not trying to be anything, a hero? I am not acting like that..i want justice for them"
This time Chris who was looking from the window while he was speaking turned around and looked at him again, he gave him a look of pity then said:" We should put our people first, that's the only way we can survive, i am not trying to divide our people, but you clearly are, this is not the first time that you disagree with our collective decision, it is a collective decision, you know that, right?"historical
Arino knew exactly what Chris wanted to say, by standing against this decision he was indeed standing against all of them when the real fact was that it was Chris's decision but he controlled them to believe that it was theirs.
"It is still a massacre" Arino argued.
" In order to save our people", Chris insisted.