[ well.. he is Pride, after all, ] I am. [ like why lie, ] My title is that of the Marquis of Order - I am the commander of the Black Iron Camp of the army of Great Liang, which covers our and and air forces.
[ like. all of them. whew.
anyway! this is one of many times he's had to explain this now, but gu yun still feels odd doing so, sometimes - it's so normal at home that it's wild to think anyone wouldn't know it. ]
...As for the liquid, it's called ziliujin. It's a natural resource that can be found underground, and burned to produce power, usually in combination with steam, though it is an incredibly rare, precious thing to have. [ so... fantasy oil, kinda. ]
I'm not familiar with the Great Liang--but it sounds quite grand, an entire country, perhaps? My, if you commanded such a wide swath of forces, you must have been quite powerful indeed.
Especially with the power of this...ziliujin. No doubt with its rarity, you were deemed one of the special few who deserved to have it on hand, hmm?
It's not so much about me having it on hand. It's the army itself. The distribution of ziliujin falls into the hand of the emperor - His Majesty is the one who decides what is done with it.
[ fantasy oil, and all that. gu yun's a pretty (ha) prideful guy, but, his pride comes heavily with the love of his country and his camp, too, so. filial piety bleeds into his bones, and he's not about to consider himself above the emperor.] I was undercover, waiting for an invasion I expected to come. If I'd been without, I may have been in deep shit.
[ A man with great power who also gets his hands dirty in the day to day hard work? Sure, they were already both on Pride to begin with, but Vlad is truly sensing a KINDRED SPIRIT here. ]
[ he hums, almost a little playfully, as if trying to decide to tell the story or not, before ultimately: ]
The Fourth Prince had been missing for some time. His mother, a former princess of the barbarian tribes to the north, committed treason against the Emperor and the nation, and the emperor loved her enough not to have her executed - only exiled. She fled with the fourth prince when he was a baby to avoid any further punishments, and disappeared over the border - but not long after, we got news that she returned to a tiny town called Yanhui, not far from where my men are stationed. We'd been attempting to track him and the princess down for years - eventually, I was able to locate the prince, who had no idea of his origins or his story, only that his mother had been impossibly cruel to him throughout his life, and that instead of returning home, the princess chose to stay in Great Liang and attempt to coordinate a coup. The tribes were planning to invade my nation through Yanhui town, and meet back up with the princess as well as the Fourth Prince, and they snuck in on a large airship, disguised as soldiers from Great Liang, then launched a brutal invasion of the town.
[ i just need you to know this plot is very confusing as to "what is icly known" and "what is not icly known" SO I DID LOTS OF REREADING FOR THIS IM SORRY IF ITS UNCLEAR ]
I'd been undercover in Yanhui for a year or so, watching over His Highness as his yifu and keeping an eye on the princess's plans. The princess must have known we were there, once the barbarians invaded, though - sensing her imminent capture, she committed suicide before we were able to capture her and return her to the capital for interrogation. We couldn't risk losing the Fourth Prince in the process, so we had to bide for time, until we were able to act and prevent such an invasion from getting any further off the ground.
Waiting turned out to be key, anyhow. The invasion was led by their Wolf Prince, a wanted figure with aggressive tendencies towards Great Liang. My men and I were able to capture the wolf prince, bring him in for questioning, and bring His Highness back to the capital and his remaining family as originally planned.
[ ...wow. the complexities of war and politics! This is a hell of a lot to absorb and Vlad isn't sure he fully gets it, but he thinks he's got the gist. ]
I'd say so. [ he smiles at that, waving a hand! this is a backtag and he has two hands. ] We were able to capture two birds with one stone, so to speak, and I no longer had to pretend to be a layabout and live with my second in command.
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[ like. all of them. whew.
anyway! this is one of many times he's had to explain this now, but gu yun still feels odd doing so, sometimes - it's so normal at home that it's wild to think anyone wouldn't know it. ]
...As for the liquid, it's called ziliujin. It's a natural resource that can be found underground, and burned to produce power, usually in combination with steam, though it is an incredibly rare, precious thing to have. [ so... fantasy oil, kinda. ]
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Especially with the power of this...ziliujin. No doubt with its rarity, you were deemed one of the special few who deserved to have it on hand, hmm?
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[ fantasy oil, and all that. gu yun's a pretty (ha) prideful guy, but, his pride comes heavily with the love of his country and his camp, too, so. filial piety bleeds into his bones, and he's not about to consider himself above the emperor.] I was undercover, waiting for an invasion I expected to come. If I'd been without, I may have been in deep shit.
[ lol ]
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[ A man with great power who also gets his hands dirty in the day to day hard work? Sure, they were already both on Pride to begin with, but Vlad is truly sensing a KINDRED SPIRIT here. ]
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The Fourth Prince had been missing for some time. His mother, a former princess of the barbarian tribes to the north, committed treason against the Emperor and the nation, and the emperor loved her enough not to have her executed - only exiled. She fled with the fourth prince when he was a baby to avoid any further punishments, and disappeared over the border - but not long after, we got news that she returned to a tiny town called Yanhui, not far from where my men are stationed. We'd been attempting to track him and the princess down for years - eventually, I was able to locate the prince, who had no idea of his origins or his story, only that his mother had been impossibly cruel to him throughout his life, and that instead of returning home, the princess chose to stay in Great Liang and attempt to coordinate a coup. The tribes were planning to invade my nation through Yanhui town, and meet back up with the princess as well as the Fourth Prince, and they snuck in on a large airship, disguised as soldiers from Great Liang, then launched a brutal invasion of the town.
[ i just need you to know this plot is very confusing as to "what is icly known" and "what is not icly known" SO I DID LOTS OF REREADING FOR THIS IM SORRY IF ITS UNCLEAR ]
I'd been undercover in Yanhui for a year or so, watching over His Highness as his yifu and keeping an eye on the princess's plans. The princess must have known we were there, once the barbarians invaded, though - sensing her imminent capture, she committed suicide before we were able to capture her and return her to the capital for interrogation. We couldn't risk losing the Fourth Prince in the process, so we had to bide for time, until we were able to act and prevent such an invasion from getting any further off the ground.
Waiting turned out to be key, anyhow. The invasion was led by their Wolf Prince, a wanted figure with aggressive tendencies towards Great Liang. My men and I were able to capture the wolf prince, bring him in for questioning, and bring His Highness back to the capital and his remaining family as originally planned.
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Well...all's well that ends well, I suppose.
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I'd say so. [ he smiles at that, waving a hand! this is a backtag and he has two hands. ] We were able to capture two birds with one stone, so to speak, and I no longer had to pretend to be a layabout and live with my second in command.
no subject