ALL NOVEL 152: To-Do Listing
With Yan Mingqing returning from the kitchen with five glasses of water—one for everyone—the discussion continued. In the end, Lin Songmei was... satisfied. Well, to be more accurate, feeling a lot better about their prospects.
Wang Taigang had kept everyone on track. Zhao Liying and Han Youhong, though throwing snide comments towards each other as banter, provided a lot of good ideas. Mingqing, well... though not talkative, she did take notes and got everyone snacks halfway through.
Songmei, herself, also helped, and in the end, though it felt like some people did more of some things than others, everyone contributed towards everything.
Fun stuff.
Their plan too, boiled down to a few—hopefully—achievable goals. Looking over the list, Songmei was impressed, they had narrowed it down to five things, for now at least. More things would come up, but for now, they had thought of the following.
[1. Rescue the captured disciples.]
Right now, Songmei and the others didn’t even know where they were detained, so some scouting was needed first. However, one thing working in their favor was the illegal detainment of the disciples. Because there wasn’t—as of now—any legal reason behind it, a “breakout” of sorts, wouldn’t put them under the watchful gaze of the law.
Another idea they had was to try and capture a few of the politicians, but... even Taigang who proposed it knew it was a bad idea. Just because the mayor’s group had broken a couple of laws to do their illegal detainment didn’t mean they could. After all, the mayor’s side had a powerful tool called nepotism on their side when it came to dodging the legal system’s prying eyes.
Youhong, though, had brought up the very real possibility the disciples were detained in the city. For the most part, fighting in the city, they had agreed, was to avoid. It’d cause destruction, and brew some really spiteful feelings in the populace. Which wasn’t their goal, they needed to win over the populace. Therefore, fighting would be stealthy, made up of covert strike groups when in the city.
It was as Mingqing said: “slow and steady.” Which led to their next point:
[2. Drag it out and widen the rift between the politicians, the mayor, and the two underworld bosses]
Time, surprisingly, was on their side. The general non-cultivator people in the city didn’t like having their lives disrupted by the mayor. If they could drag it out, not only would the mayor’s already unstable alliance fracture, they could force the populace to push the mayor. If enough resentment grew, the current populace in a pseudo-quarantine would fight back against the mayor.
Who knew though, the second part of their plan was to just force a stalemate of sorts? They’d try and eat away at Avarice and Pride’s territories and chip away at their manpower. The last benefit of dragging it out was also their third goal:
[3. Get to the peak of body enhancement and prepare for the foundation establishment tribulation.]
It was a little unrealistic to have everyone in the party challenge it at the same time, but if they could just get one or two people into the foundation establishment realm, the tables would turn. They’d be able to smack around every single person on the opposing side without too much trouble.
They’d then go onto the offensive. Simple as that.
Songmei and others knew though, the mayor wasn’t stupid. He’d do everything he could to capture people on their side or to convert people to their side. To... counter, the best they could at least, there was number four:
[4. Establish a base of operations in Wrath’s base. Depending on the condition of the rescued disciples, house them there.]
They were just planning on having everyone near each other. If the mayor launched an attack, they needed the numbers advantage and the preparation advantage to stave the opposition off.
On the other hand, for the disciples, it depended on their condition. If everyone was still healthy, the pavilion disciples could return to their housing. Otherwise, it’d be smarter to just move everyone to Wrath’s base and check the people who needed it into the hospital.
The sect would pay the medical fees anyway!
Their last bullet point though, took a little more brainstorming. It worked but needed a lot more investigation.
[5. Expose the mayor and/or find concrete evidence for his wrongdoings]
Being an upright dude, Songmei and the others weren’t expecting to find something like... human trafficking. Something which could turn the entire populace against the mayor immediately.
They did, however, very much so suspect the mayor had dealings with the demons. Though this wasn’t something they could use to leverage the public against the mayor, it would allow them to have the sects—or, well, the cultivation world as a whole if needed—back them in installing a new mayor for the city.
They’d need time anyway, to spy around for this type of stuff. The goal was—as said before—to just let the public’s opinion worsen as time went on in a more natural progression.
Pushing herself up off the couch, Songmei wandered off toward the kitchen. Everyone had agreed to a break, a quick recharge before they decided whether or not to discuss more. With some time on their hands, Mingqing, Youhong, Liying, and Taigang were planning on booting up the bricklaying game and playing some more.
Songmei, though, was worn to the bone and didn’t have the energy to join in. She was content to just sit around snacking, watching, and maybe cheering for Mingqing. Walking further into the kitchen to grab a bowl of fruit, Songmei listened to the conversation happening in the living room.
“You know, I still can’t believe we’re actually doing stealth,” Youhong pumped his fist as he moved couches to have a better seat. “I’m so pumped. I can finally use my assassin skill set.”
“I mean, that also means you have to teach us some of your assassin skill set,” Taigang added, patting Youhong on the back. “Which probably won’t be that easy.”
“No, no, it’ll be great!” Youhong grinned, popping a lychee jelly into his mouth. “For beginners, you really only need to be able to walk silently. With an experienced person, like me~, I can take care of the rest like scouting around corners!”
Fake gagging as Youhong sang “Like me,” Liying shook her head. “Well, I’m looking forward to it. We’ve done a couple of scouting missions, but this will be the first time we’re sneaking into buildings and stuff. Do you think any of the underworld bosses would be willing to help?”
“It wouldn’t hurt to ask... but I feel like we shouldn’t rely on them too much.” Songmei returned with a bowl of fruit and a bonus bag of chips. “I feel like we could do it alone, and the sects would probably prefer that.”
“True...” Youhong nodded. “It’ll be a long while, but a fun one. Watch and learn, babies.”
