White Dragon Stories

Path

The millionth sigh left Hakuryuu's mouth. Lately the war meetings turned into a "What if" discussion without any conclusion. Theoretically everything was possible, so why bother with even the most unlikely scenario? This wasn't the first time that the Kou Empire was in a tough situation, they had faced many crisis before, however this time the old generals and strategists panicked. And they were divided, since some wanted to use a more aggressive approach, while others wanted to maintain the more reluctant approach. Hakuryuu had to admit that he was at loose. He was unsure what to do. The current situation was new for all of them. No, war was not new, but a civil war was different than one against another country. Killing those, who once were one's comrade, was not nothing that could be done so easily – and all of this because of the witch. Hakuryuu was sure that his mother was behind the civil war like she had been behind the murder of his father and his brothers and uncle. He wasn't arrogant enough to think she was after him now, for that he was not strong enough, not enough of a threat to her and her plans, but a war was according to her plan. She loves creating suffering. What was she after? No one knew. Well, barely anyone even knew that she was not the kind and loving person she had pretended to be, so many did not think about this matter at all. Hakuryuu also had no intention of telling them, because they would probably not believe it and it did not matter anyway. At the moment the witch was gone, but for how long and when she would return was unknown. Yes, he had killed his mother, but seemingly simply killing her was not enough to get rid of her. Although he had no confirmation, he was sure she had run to the usurper's side. She probably had haven stirred up this conflict, so that a civil war was created. Of course, this was not her fault alone. She may have influenced the other party, but the other party had decided to follow, to believe her and act out. Now they had a war and Hakuryuu had no intention of losing, however this also meant that he had to stop being so nice to them. The soldiers, who died on the battlefield, were not at fault, they did what they thought was right and who knew what they had been told. On the other hand, a war was not won by doing nothing. If he wanted to win, he had to order his soldiers to fight their former comrades, which was a bit of a problem until now. Maybe it was, because he had problems with this thought and his people felt his uncertainty and reservations. Not a good attitude for a ruler in this kind of situation. He had to be strong for his people, but instead he was weak. Because of this there even was this dispute between the generals and strategists, if he gave an order all of this could be solved, but he was unsure what to do and therefore gave no orders – or at least none that gave his people a concrete direction.
"What if we take a break for now and discuss our further actions afterwards", Hakuryuu said and stood up from his chair.
He was exhausted and in the past two hours they hadn't talked about anything new, only repeated the same old arguments over and over again. Without waiting for a reaction he left the room and walked towards his bureau. His father often had taken a small stroll around, when he needed to make a difficult decision, because it helped him to think of new possibilities or outcomes. As child it had scared him, when he met his father in the hallways and greeted him, but instead of being greeted back faced a man, who had no expression and did not even seem to realize where he was. Hakuryuu had thought that his father may be controlled by someone and this thought scared him. Also he had feared his father may get hurt, since he seemed not to pay attention to his surroundings. Hakuryuu didn't know how many times he had bumped into someone, because he hadn't paid attention, but somehow his father had never run into another person. One could only wish for such an ability. On the contrary it may be better to simply pay attention, instead of wishing for luck.

Near his bureau was an open area. There one could sit or even work, in case it was quiet enough, outside. Since this place was roofed, it could also be used when it rained or in the winter. Sometimes he ate lunch there with his wife, who had her bureau in the same area, only a few doors away from his office. It was nice to have her near him and she also enjoyed visiting him during work to start a conversation about something trivial. A nice conversation about something trivial was exactly what he needed now, but it would be better if he focused on the problem at hand. Unfortunately neither his wife nor a nice conversation with her would end his problems – but it could make it easier for him to bear with them.
Luckily his wife was indeed at the mentioned area, sitting at the table, eating a lot of sweets and looking depressed. Whenever she was in a bad mood, Hakuryuu felt like it was his fault. He knew how much she had given up for him and so in return he wanted her to be happy all the time, which of course was not the case and also impossible to achieve. Being sad, angry or unwell was normal and happened to everyone once in a while, sometimes without another person being responsible for it. Still, Hakuryuu thought he was responsible, he always thought he was responsible for everything. For a long time he had blamed himself for the murder of his older brothers and his father – fortunately his wife had made him realize how ridiculous this was. There was still a long way ahead of him until he was free of all his unnecessary guilt, but he already had made the first step.
When he approached his wife, she only looked at him without saying a word or appearing happy to see him, which was quite unusual for her. Normally she always had a smile saved for him, whenever they saw each other – the only exception was when they had a dispute before. As far as he knew they hadn't had a dispute, so he was a bit confused about her behavior. Maybe someone said something mean about her – well, probably about someone, who was dear to her. When she got insulted she often did not react to it, however when one of her loved ones got insulted, she could commit murder right on the post. She was not as calm and level-headed as she often appeared. So she also could be very emotional, which she thought was embarrassing. Hakuryuu had no problems with that, since he himself could be very emotional, although he had become calmer over the years. Yet his feelings sometimes still got the best of him, which he thought was embarrassing. As emperor he should always be calm and collected.
"Hello, my dear. How are you?", Hakuryuu greeted his wife with a smile, hoping she would return it.
Maybe she was just too tired to smile right now?
"Hello", she greeted back.
Her voice was quite soft. It seemed like she didn't want to speak at the moment.
"Are you tired? If so, then you should take a nap, there is no reason to stay up, when you're sleepy."
If there was an important matter she had to take care of, he would understand that she was keeping herself from going to bed, but since she was sitting her and eating it appeared as if this was not the case.
"No, sleeping is boring. Don't want to."
Hakuryuu had sat down next to her, if he hadn't done so before, he would have probably fallen over by her response. She didn't want to sleep because it was boring? Since when? Wasn't she the one, who could sleep everywhere and at any given time? Wasn't she the one, who always explained how great their bed was and how she loved sleeping and napping? And now it suddenly was boring? No! Something must have happen to her! Something extremely horrible!
"What? What are you talking about? Since when do you think like that? What happened?"
Hakuryuu was very worried about her and her well-being. Tenderly he took her hand in one of his and wrapped his other arm around her. She loved hugging. Well, she seemed to like to have body contact with him in general – he enjoyed it as well.
"Nothing. Just woke up this morning and everything was stupid. So, I tried to fall asleep again, but failed and then I wanted to eat, but I am not hungry, so I decided to eat some snakes. I am bored."
Gently Hakuryuu placed a kiss on her forehead and said: "Well, if you are bored, then we have to do something against it. What would you like to do?"
"Sleeping."
Great answer. Hadn't she just said that sleeping was boring and didn't want to do it and now she wanted it? Had he misheard?
"But didn't you just said that you do not want to sleep, because it is boring?", Hakuryuu asked to clarify this matter.
"Yes, I did. I don't know myself. A part of me wants to sleep and the other part don't want to, but also does not have any idea what to do instead. I am really conflicted here", she admitted and placed her head on her husband's shoulder, "By the way, why are you here? Shouldn't you be in a war meeting with those boring idiots?"
She never had a positive word for his people. Often he wondered, why she disliked the people in the palace so much, but maybe it was not a normal disliking and more a "they annoy me and keep you away from me with their unimportant nonsense, so I have nothing positive to say about them"-dislike. It wouldn't be a surprise. Or she really just hated all of them, because they were stupid. She often had a different definition of words than others, which had caused a few misunderstandings in the past.
"I should, but I took a break. We were only repeating the same things over and over again. Maybe after the break, we will have new ideas how to handle the current situation."
And Hakuryuu sighed again. Had he ever sighed so much in one day? Probably not.
"And why should they suddenly come up with something new, during a what? 10 minutes break?"
She wasn't wrong. For the past months they had discussed how to proceed further and hadn't find a satisfying conclusion and he had decided for a break, because they had no new ideas.
"One never knows. Well, they probably still discussing what to do instead of sitting down and thinking about a new approach."
Another sigh.
"It should be you, who tells them what to do. They not used to think for themselves or to make decisions. If they only repeat themselves then it's because they're at the end with their thinking capacity. Thinking more complex or solution orientated is not their strong point. You need to be the creative one here. Also it is not that hard to decide what to do next. It's not the first time this Empire has a war going on. Shouldn't you all be experts already?"
Again she wasn't wrong. The emperor hold all the power, however he was not the only one, who could make decisions. It also was impossible for one person to take care of everything, so there were other people that could make decisions like the generals. As emperor he could not be everywhere on the battlefield, so the generals had to decide for themselves what to do and they did. However, whenever he was around everyone expected him to make the decisions, what he could understand since he was the most powerful person and his words were law. In case a general made a decision it could still be revoked by someone, who had a higher position like the emperor, but there was no one, who had a higher position then the ruler of the country. For him this meant that he could not pass the decision-making to someone else. Well, he could do it, but only in private matters, when he passed it towards his wife, who often just throw it back at him, because she was too lazy to decide anything – she could not even decide whether she wanted to sleep or not right now.
"It's the first time that we have to deal with a civil war. Those, who attack us are our own people. They are citizen of Kou and our comrades", he tried to explain the problem to her, yet he had the feeling that she already knew that, but simply did not care.
"So what? Those who attack us do not care about their former comrades, they are willing to kill us. So why should we not do the same? For them we are not comrades anymore, we are their enemies. And the enemy will be killed. It is that easy. Why are you so hesitant? Do you want your people, those who are loyal to you, to die? They believe in you and are fighting for you, so they are ready to die for you. And you? You just sit around hoping for a solution to poop out of nowhere. That's mean."
She said it in such a nonchalance voice that it was almost scary. From a logical point of view she was right. However, it was not so easy to throw away one's feelings. How did his soldiers feel about the current situation? They were probably not satisfied with his hesitant approach in this matter. Would they be really ready to kill their former friends, allies and comrades? Did they really believe in him so much? Did they really believe he was in the right? And what was with the families of those, who now opposed him? How did they feel about this situation? And how should he handle them later on? So many questions and no answers. Maybe it was better to not think so much and just act.
"You should send them all straight to hell! Those bastards do not deserve mercy. They deserve death! How dare they to oppose us and kill their friends and comrades, who had been willing to protect them with their lives! They are the worst! If I were you, I would send my soldiers out to destroy this trash and bring peace to the country. You've tried to talk with them and find a peaceful solution, but they rejected you and instead followed the witch's words. Your kindness is just wasted with them."
"I always thought you were against war."
Hakuryuu was confused and astonished. Of course he knew his wife had no problem with violence in itself – which may be a bit strange since war was nothing else besides violence -, but hated war and therefore also hated soldiers.
"I am, but I am all for killing bastards! Seriously, it's them or us and I actually have no intention of dying, so I would prefer it, when we could stop them. By the way, we already have war. I am just suggesting how to end it."
How to end this war, was the huge question he tried to answer. There were only two option, either Hakuryuu's side won or they lost. And losing meant dying. No one wanted to die! However, fighting back would mean fighting against your own people and Hakuryuu was not ready to do so. The question was just, did it matter what he was ready to do or not? He wasn't ready to die either.
"Stop trying to search for a nice way out. No matter what decision you make in the end, it will never be the right one. Ask yourself with what decision you can live with and what decision you can justify. Don't worry about me, I will be by your side no matter what. But don't forget that no one here wants to die and they will leave you, when you are about to lose. A war cannot be won by being nice and doing nothing."
When he decided to hold back like until now all the deaths, all the sacrifices made by his soldiers and his people would be in vain. One could ask why he even had started the civil war and hadn't given up right at the beginning, when no one had died. The more he thought about it, fighting back was the only option for them.

Send them straight down to hell, she had said. But this was not possible. There was not straight path to hell or heaven – the path to hell was paved with good intention, they said. What one thought was right could actually be wrong and vice versa. They all could only try to do the right thing and hope to be rewarded later on. No matter what decision he would make, it would not change the fact that people had died and even more would die in the future. Even when he decided to fight back more aggressively, his people could still lose. There was no guarantee for them to win. But there was a guarantee that they would lose and die, when they stayed as passive as they were until now.
In the end no matter what decision he would make, it would be the right and the wrong decision at the same time. It was as his wife had said, he had to make the decision he could live with.

"Hakuryuu!", a female voice shouted.
Hakuryuu and his wife turned around to see, who called for him. It was Kougyoku, Hakuryuu's older cousin and one of the generals.
"Hakuryuu, are you coming back? Everyone is waiting for you. I think they got a new idea, what to do next or they got tired of that stupid dispute and want a final decision from you", she sounded worried.
She also knew how conflicted Hakuryuu was and how hard it was to make a decision. Kougyoku was one for those, who wanted to stay passive, because she did not want to fight her own people, but she also didn't want her comrades to die, because she did nothing. She was also very conflicted and troubled by the current situation.
Hakuryuu sighed again, gave his wife another kiss on her forehead and then stood up.
"Sorry, I have to leave for now. I'll be back soon and then we will do something fun together. Promised!"
"No problem. I will be waiting here, on his bench, eating my sweets that I stole from the kitchen and taste like a strange mix between strawberry cupcakes and honey sirup. Well, if I am not here, when you come back, I am probably in my bed, sleeping. Then don't wake me up."
With a smile he left her and approached Kougyoku, who waved at his wife for a greeting. Those two got along very well, but barely had time for each other, because of the war. As general Kougyoku often was out on the battlefield and when she was at home, she was busy with war meetings. Hopefully this would change soon and they all could have a nice dinner together like they used to have before the civil war started.

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