>>5297806>>5298462{Art: Lloyd Kenneth Townsend Jr.}
<span class="mu-i"> But I need Ke Awa back at full force. More than that even. We'll need another fleet to get more of this material, refunding the ships there is the first step.</span>
"Another Fleet? We just got back."
<span class="mu-i"> Yes. And it WORKED. This new material, making sure the Anyaten aren't a threat, cycling out our diplomats there. It's the dawn of a new age and Ke Awa will be at the center of that.</span>
“Understood.”
<span class="mu-i">Don’t worry about our guests. A trained killer is no match for a city full of politicians and moneylenders.</span>
“I guess not everything’s changed.”
You share a laugh interrupted by a growling stomach.
<span class="mu-i">Come. You and your guards earned a hot meal and a night of rest. No use campaigning if you look like you’re half dead.</span>
---
In the morning you leave Guret and several Elite Guards at the Hall of Peace to train with the Anyaten.
Kasi of the Ponni will lead your guards until the return is finished.
How odd that a few years ago, your intertribal group would draw attention.
Now you walk through the streets looking like any other Islander.
Before you head out the Ochre Gates, you remember what your metasister said.
“Excuse me.” You ask a pork merchant. “Where is <span class="mu-i">Nekotane?]</span>”
<span class="mu-g">New in town, eh? Just follow the mud trails.</span>
The telltale red mud of Taya buildings litters the streets but it's concentrated in certain alleys.
You follow these to a collection of homes closer to a beehive than to a place of humanity.
Small and slapdash mud homes stacked on each other in twos and threes and built so close together you would have to walk in single file.
A throng or accents you recognize as Muli, Ponni, and Nupuri ring through the air. Above you, youths no older than twelve scale the roofs in makeshift nut-rope bridges.
<span class="mu-b">Hey! Niṟuttu!
</span>
A child runs past Kasi and slides into the alleys.
<span class="mu-b">The little shit tried to pick my pocket. A thief so young, they could have been from my own sibling.</span>
You put a calming hand on the māhū’s shoulder.
“It’s okay, I understand.”
So this is where the prisoners would talk. If they’re even here. You admit to yourself your concern for them is secondary.
This... you don’t know what to call it, surpasses explanation. The explorer in you wants to venture deeper, but you know you have a responsibility in Ke Awa.
>Go Straight to Ke Awa.>Explore Neikotan first. 