Chapter 339: Tripping Contingencies
“So…I hope that cleared up everything,” Zhen Liu began to say as he unfused with Hurricroak, “Any questions?”
Zhen Liu’s cousins stared at him with mixed expressions as he finished his literal song and dance and then divided into a person and a puppet again.
The four of them had honestly expected Zhen Liu to hit a sour note or break a leg or something with his dance moves…if only they knew that those moves were thanks to some “internal” help.
[Hah! They’re stunned!,] Hurricroak gloated, [nothing pleases an artist more than a shocked audience.]
Surprisingly, however, Zhen Xing was the first to talk.
“For starters…I would like to apologize for my behavior these past few years. We’re family, it was uncouth behavior on my part.”
“Noted and accepted.”
“Second…can you teach us how to move like that?”
“Oooh. I second that,” Zhen Guo agreed, “but on a side note, has that Rianna girl been here recently? I wanted to ask her about she managed to get her hair like that.”
“Uhh…sure to that first question,” Zhen Liu nodded while mentally noting to have Hurricroak on standby more often in the future, “as for Rianna…”
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“THE JUNGLE QUEEN DEMANDS HER KING!”
“CALM DOWN ALREADY! NEPHERAGE, FROSTTUSK, HELP ME OUT ALREADY!”
“O…Kay…”
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“She went off to practice her saber forms in private,” Zhen Liu lied,”they’re not up to snuff as much as her archery skills.”
“Ah.”
“But she did mention that her got like that due to a trick she picked up while hanging around Insect Hell for a training trip.”
“Oh! Interesting…”
“Well, it that’s all, I’ll be on my-”
“Wait, I just remembered why we came here,” Zhen Yue interrupted, “not going to lie, the back to back subjection to mind bending music arts was disorienting to say the least.”
“Kind of the point.”
“Regardless,” Zhen Yue continued, “grandfather wanted to see us.”
“Huh?”
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‘I can’t believe I’m going to be saying this,” Zhen Shi thought to himself as he sat his desk waiting for the arrival of his grandchildren, ‘I probably won’t have to mention this to them, since three of my sons have managed to break through, but still…’
The sudden gifts from that ever mysterious master was just the boon the clan needed to help bolster their forces before heading back to the homeland.
Aranea and Lucille were welcome additions to the clans, what with them being Grandmasters, but the Sacred Beast Essence was a tad more important to Zhen Shi, because they turned out to be just the thing his sons needed to breakthrough to the next rank.
Zhen Long, Zhen Lao and Zhen Yan turned out to be surprisingly compatible with the Sacred Beast Essences of the Infernal Spider Queen and the Cataclysmic Windstorm Lacewing and managed to breakthrough with some unexpected bonuses.
Zhen Long ended up enhancing his own innate Caligos aether affinity, Zhen Lao’s Aeroqi aether got stronger while Zhen Yan ended up getting an enhancement from both.
On the flip side, his other four sons, while not able to breakthrough from consuming the essence were now at the peak of the Aether Master rank and just need a little more time or an external stimuli of some sort to breakthrough.
‘Sitmuli…,’ Zhen Shi mused as he thought over a certain grandson’s quirk. As he did, he felt his serpentine companion start to stir.
{…}
‘Before you ask, no, I don’t plan to expose his abilities to the clan unless he wants to.’
{…}
‘I know he could probably elevate everyone by an absurd degree, but he’s too young for that kind of responsibility. Old bastards like myself should carry the burden of supporting a clan, not a young man….not my young grandchildren…’
{…}
‘Wait, that’s what you meant? I mean…I guess that wouldn’t hurt to imply…’
“Patriarch?”
“Hmm?”
Before he could converse with the Lesser Primordial World Serpent in his head any further, Aranea had poked her head through the door.
“Young masters Zhen Hai, Zhen Yue and Zhen Liu are here. Do you wish to meet with them now?”
“Ah. Just give me a few moments, Aranea.”
“Of course sir.”
‘Alright, old boy. Time to share a mildly distressing contingency plan…’
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“Hello patriarch.”
“Please, just call me grandfather. We are family after all. Take a seat.”
“Of course, grandfather.”
Zhen Hai, Zhen Yue and Zhen Liu entered into their grandfather’s office and proceeded to take seats across their grandfather’s desk.
‘Huh…looks like everything is going fine inside him…for now,’ Zhen Liu thought to himself as he traced the minute amounts of [Chaos] radiating from his grandfather’s body.
A little after Zhen Liu blasted his grandpa with the Possestol with a Frosttusk payload, he made sure to ask Logos and Pathos about everything that could or could not happen to his grandfather.
The possibilities he was given was numerous, but he managed to narrow it down to specific outcomes that were happening to his grandfather now.
The most obvious ones was his regained youth and ability to make use of ice aether more efficiently, but the most subtle change was related to his formula, or rather, the aether beast spirit he was hosting.
While Zhen Liu wasn’t entirely sure what Frosttusk did in there, but it caused the aether beast spirit that was crucial to his grandfather’s formula to suddenly become a whole lot stronger and radiate very mild [Chaos].
It hadn’t done anything so far, but Zhen Liu still kept a close eye on
it just in case shit went sideways and he had to do an emergency exorcism or something.
But that was a future issue, right now, they had other things to worry about.
“So there’s a possibility that I’ll get murdered while we’re in the Pearl Scale Empire.”
“What?!”
Namely addressing the bombshell bit of information that their grandfather just used to open this meeting.
Zhen Shi let out a sigh as he began to explain why he opened up the meeting with such a heavy statement.
“You three are well aware that our relationship with the main branch family is…frosty, at best.”
“To be fair, we didn’t even know the main branch existed until recently,” Zhen Hai added.
“Yeah, there’s a reason for that…,” Zhen Shi continued, “your grandmother and I pissed off a lot of people when we eloped and left to start a new life here in Stone Claw and even though we figured those grudges would have cooled by now…there might be some stubborn bastards out there who could still be trying to kill me and my sons, your fathers, out of spite or pride. Now there’s also the possibility that I’m just overthinking it and nothing happens on this trip other than burying the hatchet officially, but still. I’m telling you three all of this because if this entire affair does go sideways…I want you three to come up with a contingency escape plan, based on the idea that your fathers and I don’t make it.”
“What?!”
Zhen Yue, Zhen Hai and Zhen Liu all reacted with the same amount of shock at their grandfather’s statement.
The man was arguably the strongest person in all of Stone Claw and he was worried bout getting murdered.
“But grandfather….why?,” Zhen Yue asked.
“Isn’t it obvious? You three have progressed much, much faster than your forefathers in terms of cultivation. In time, I have no doubt that all three of you will reach heights far beyond us and safeguard this family from all that the world has to throw at them. You guys are our future, but we can’t have that if you all die because of some grudge I might have caused. So please, when the time comes, I’ll try to hold the line as long as possible, but promise me you’ll all escape when the time comes.”
“But grand-”
“Promise me,” Zhen Shi repeated with more seriousness in his tone.
“Of course… grandfather.”
Zhen Yue and Zhen Hai looked visibly upset with the idea of their parents dying to save them because some bastard in the past couldn’t get over the fact that their grandparents wanted to be happy. But as for Zhen Liu, he might have agreed on the surface, but deep down, he knew that this contingency plan probably wouldn’t be needed.
His grandfather may have had contingency plans in case shit went sideways, but Zhen Liu had plans to prevent such contingencies being needed in the first place.
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‘Logos, Pathos. Have y’all determined which kaijin are compatible with which members of my family?’
=We just finished compiling the list as soon as your cousins agreed to get the hell out of dodge if these main branch guys turned out to be of the more nefarious sort.=
‘Uhh…huh…’
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“Well…that’s all I had to say to you three. So get ready and pack for-”
“Grandfather,” Zhen Liu interrupted, “This is probably the worst time to ask this, but it might help if you told us exactly who you pissed off by eloping with grandma. I mean the main branch sure, but you never told us exactly who grandma was engaged to when you ran.”
“Zhen Liu! Are you -”
“No no Xiao Yue, Xiao Liu’s right,” Zhen Shi sighed, “I suppose it’s only right to tell you three since your fathers all know.”
Zhen Shi opened a drawer on his desk and the sound of a button being pressed followed by gears caused Zhen Yue, Zhen Hai and Zhen Liu to pause and listen.
Moments later, Zhen Shi produced a small lacquer box and opened it for the three to see, showing them a black pearl ring with very intricate detailing on it’s surface.
“What is…”
“This,” Zhen Shi answered, “is your grandmother’s engagement gift that she received from her former fiancee…a son of the Pearl Scale Emperor.”
“Oh. Ohhh.”
All three scions eyes went wide as they realized that their grandparents didn’t just piss off any noblility, they pissed off royalty.
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‘<=Well, shit.=>‘
