From his perch high in the tree, Rhys looked down upon the campsite. It was a display of casual arrogance.
At least thirty cultivators were gathered, their tents arranged in a haphazard circle around a large bonfire.
The emblems of the Thorne and Sterling families were everywhere, stitched onto banners and armour.
They had set up a perimeter, but it was sloppy, full of blind spots that a child could exploit.
’Amateurs,’ Rhys thought, shaking his head. They were treating the Whisperwood like their family’s back garden.
At the centre of the camp, by the fire, stood the two leaders.
Tiberius Thorne, the ’Raging Bull’, was a mountain of a young man radiating brutish power.
But.
’Something is wrong,’ Rhys frowned. ’Why is Tiberius leading, instead of Aiden?’
He looked around hoping to see the presence of Aiden.
Lady Seraphina Sterling was his opposite, a picture of cool, aristocratic confidence.
’If I remember correctly, Anya Sterling is the leader of younger generation. She is even better than my father in talent.’
Rhys had heard rumours about Anya awakening an elemental trait which had a prototype of aura.
About Aiden’s trait wasn’t heard a lot as Thorne family blocked every details of him.
But he had heard his uncles talking about him awakening a Monster trait and could fully transform to a monster.
If anyone to lead these groups, that would be either Aiden or Anya.
[Something is really wrong...]
Rhys nodded.
After the incompetent trio had been berated and dismissed, the camp slowly settled. Guards were posted, but they were lazy, talking amongst themselves instead of watching the dark woods.
The rest of the disciples gathered around smaller fires, eating and drinking, their voices loud and careless.
Rhys watched them for a long while, his initial confusion slowly turning into a deep-seated frown.
Sure, the families having one or two idiots was common. He had grown up surrounded by them in the Ashton family.
But this was different.
This wasn’t just one or two fools; this was an entire expedition of them.
They were loud, inefficient, and their leaders were a hot-tempered brute and an arrogant princess who seemed more interested in maintaining appearances than actual progress.
It was all too convenient. Too sloppy.
The great families, for all their flaws, were not stupid. They had ruled the Azure Province for centuries.
Lord Thorne was ambitious, but he wasn’t a fool. Lord Sterling was a shrewd merchant who wouldn’t risk his heir on a mission led by incompetents.
Would they really entrust the greatest discovery in a thousand years to this circus? It felt like a stage play. A poorly acted one, but a play nonetheless.
’This is a secret mission, right?’ Rhys mused, his mind piecing together the inconsistencies.
’So why are they using massive bonfires? Why are they wearing their family emblems so proudly? Why is their route so inefficient? It’s almost like... they want to be seen.’
[The Host’s logic is sound. Their actions are counter-intuitive to the stated goal of a secret expedition. It is a highly inefficient methodology.]
’Exactly,’ Rhys confirmed. A cold realisation dawned on him. A cannon fodder team!
The great families knew they couldn’t keep the Labyrinth a total secret. The province was filled with the spies of minor families and merchant guilds.
A discovery of this magnitude would inevitably leak. So, instead of trying to hide it, they controlled the narrative.
Rhys closed his eyes and sensed his surroundings. Sure enough, there were many presences in the vicinity.
They created this loud, obvious ’main party’ to draw the eyes of every spy in the province, leading any unwanted followers on a long, slow, wild goose chase.
And while this decoy army stumbled its way north, the real chosen heirs, the true geniuses were taking a different route.
A secret route or rather a faster route.
Tiberius and Seraphina weren’t the true leaders. They were the lead actors, the public faces of this grand deception.
Their arrogance and incompetence weren’t a flaw in the plan; they were a part of it. They were perfectly cast for their roles.
Rhys felt a chill run down his spine. He was impressed by their cunning but also disgusted by their ruthlessness.
Every single one of the disciples in that camp, even the two leaders, likely had no idea they were bait.
They were disposable pawns, sacrificed to protect the family’s true interests.
Following this group was now utterly pointless. They weren’t the players; they were the smokescreen.
He looked at the camp one last time, no longer with amusement, but with a cold, detached understanding.
They were a collection of bright, noisy lights in the vast, dark forest, destined to lead nowhere.
They were so confident in their numbers and their family names, completely unaware of their true purpose.
Without a sound, Rhys dropped from his branch. He landed on the forest floor as softly as a falling leaf.
He gave the camp a final, dismissive glance and then turned, melting into the northern lands.
Suddenly he stopped...
’Since the great families planned all this, they also made countermeasures to protect their heirs if someone else finds out about their plan, like me.’
And they might also know if the cultivators in the province finally knew about the Labyrinth, things would surely turn chaotic.
The chances of them going as far as trying to force entry into the Labyrinth or even trying to steal from the disciples completing the Labyrinth run were high.
He gulped.
What might be their arrangement for this matter?
[Assembling an army of strong people, to protect their heirs.]
If anyone dared to wage war against the five great families, they would surely have strength enough to face the great families.
That meant the powerful people of the province would be gathered at the entrance of the Labyrinth. It made the eighteen towns without many strong people to defend.
[The fate of the province is already fixed...]
Rhys staggered a bit.
’You knew it all along, right?’ Surprisingly his voice didn’t waver. It was steady, almost detached.
[".."]
’....that I have no choice..’
[No weak person has a choice in their fate. But they have a choice in themselves. You have a choice... which changes and twists as per your selection. Now, you have two choices which may or may not have outcomes you don’t want to hear..]
’No need to say it alo-’
[Do you want to go to the. Labyrinth? You have lesser than 0% chance to survive inside of it.
Or do you want to stay behind, wanting to protect the people abandoned by the strong? You also have lesser than 0% of survival in that too.]
And so Rhys ran in the direction of north. The sharp ends of the Dragon Tooth mountain started to zoom in his eyes.