Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, but avoid mentioning the Diao connection you discovered, leave the matter with the deviant cultivation and sacrificial practices going on. [70% Success. Success means avoiding threats and having some fraction of the Diao enforcement turning to rounding up stray children. May be temporary.]

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, but avoid mentioning the Diao connection you discovered, leave the matter with the deviant cultivation and sacrificial practices going on. [70% Success. Success means avoiding threats and having some fraction of the Diao enforcement turning to rounding up stray children. May be temporary.]

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, but avoid mentioning the Diao connection you discovered, leave the matter with the deviant cultivation and sacrificial practices going on. [70% Success. Success means avoiding threats and having some fraction of the Diao enforcement turning to rounding up stray children. May be temporary.]

Tentatively this.

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, but avoid mentioning the Diao connection you discovered, leave the matter with the deviant cultivation and sacrificial practices going on. [70% Success. Success means avoiding threats and having some fraction of the Diao enforcement turning to rounding up stray children. May be temporary.]

There's a line between political efficacy and political cowardice. You have to tell people harsh truths and shit they don't want to hear sometimes. If you build a relationship without ever having friction it'll be unpredictable when the friction inevitably does happen. There'll need to be points that we push back and have friction with Diao Hualing. I don't particularly enjoy the way that she cast the Duchess' reforms as "the nobility being too involved in ministry matters" while walking in Diao gardens as a Diao scion within the Ministry of Law that is regionally very intimate with the Diao. Meritocratic advancement is something that prevents the Ministries from being "Nobility Parallel" and helps shift them to being "Ministries, with respect given to them that parallels Nobility while being notably different". The Peaks have consistently had an issue with their nobility taking over meritocratic institutions as in-all-but-name extensions of noble power. Diao Hualing's complaints here smell of that sort of issue.

In any case, I don't think this is the juncture to pull the trigger on that Truth. We don't have enough details to make it really stick, we don't have the context to make it hurt, we don't have the weight to throw around, and we don't have the leverage to throw weight into even if we had it. In short, we don't have a handle on the Narrative and couldn't wield it well at this time.

The narrative here has to be focused on the Hui, and the ways that they scarred the land and people to their own benefit. This predator was relying on holes in the Imperial Dogma that could be covered and caught through the New Emerald Seas Paradigm which started with the Argent Heroes. An alloy of the Imperial and the strength of the old ways, to purge corruption that adapted to persist within just one or the other. Combination and/or cooperation is stronger than competition.

For that narrative, we'll need some ingredients and skills we don't currently have. It'll take time. In the time between then and now there will be suffering that may have been prevented by causing friction sooner, and not waiting for a more perfect moment. What's important is that we keep sight of the goal, and keep engaging with it rather than letting it go back under the rug. This sort of cult-adjacent clean-up is the virtuous activity that our Imperial Rep became a hero for, and that's how a true Imperial-Weilu fusion will be able to function. An alignment of virtues, if not exact methods.

1. Su Ling needs the strength to be a hero of the mission
2. We need the skill at Narrative to publicize the mission properly
3. We need a Diao Rep we trust (probably Hualing) to witness and report on the Diao connection to the Diao, so that they can begin processing that sin in-house
4. We need an Imperial Rep (I'm thinking the overseer fellow) to attest to the virtue of the activity, and the virtue of the heroes involved
5. We need to plan on following this up, so that province attention doesn't linger on this specific Diao-Shame for too long. Heroes of the Province sorta deal, always the next exploit to talk about.

Additional Point- because the Neo-Weilu or Weilu-Imperial Fusion was started with the Argent Heroes, having Suyin come along as an Argent Sect rep would work pretty well c: yay frens

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, but avoid mentioning the Diao connection you discovered, leave the matter with the deviant cultivation and sacrificial practices going on. [70% Success. Success means avoiding threats and having some fraction of the Diao enforcement turning to rounding up stray children. May be temporary.]

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, but avoid mentioning the Diao connection you discovered, leave the matter with the deviant cultivation and sacrificial practices going on. [70% Success. Success means avoiding threats and having some fraction of the Diao enforcement turning to rounding up stray children. May be temporary.]

Is this going to be a flat success or failure or are their tiers of success and failure?

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, using the Diao connections you've discovered to make implications, let the possibilities of deviant cultivation and sacrificial methods to do the rest. [80% Success. Will cause some friction with Diao Hualing even on success, will cause more stringent attention on the matter of Madam Grey. Negative Diao rep on failure. Other potential side effects.)

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, but avoid mentioning the Diao connection you discovered, leave the matter with the deviant cultivation and sacrificial practices going on. [70% Success. Success means avoiding threats and having some fraction of the Diao enforcement turning to rounding up stray children. May be temporary.]

[X] Bring round the subject of the fox children, but avoid mentioning the Diao connection you discovered, leave the matter with the deviant cultivation and sacrificial practices going on. [70% Success. Success means avoiding threats and having some fraction of the Diao enforcement turning to rounding up stray children. May be temporary.]