Bawsi

Cletus, Joy and Dorcas were standing over James while one of the horsemen tried to revive him and kept trying to stop his bleeding. Joy was sobbing and did not even watch what was happening. After some time, when Joy had been convinced to go to sleep, James finally gained consciousness and he tried to stand up but Cletus told him to stay down.

"Where am I and what happened?" James asked Cletus

"You are in Bawsi a village located in this desert we were found by some of the hunters who helped us to stop the attackers and got you here. Only one man from our entourage survived." Cletus said in a low voice.

One of the maidservants of the village head came with some hot water and started massaging his injured face and body while he

groaned in pain and Cletus had to leave to the room and go to sleep in one of the rooms the village head gave them and as he got in, one of the head's daughters gave him a sly look but he pretended to have not noticed it and went to sleep.

Meanwhile in Derbias, in a temple which was dark and barely lit with a few candles and a group of men wearing black hooded cloaks with the image of a snake at the back formed an aisle while holding cups and in front of them, there was a huge golden statue of a cobra and then a man in a black hooded cloak who is the chief priest came in with a slave who was unconscious and dropped him in front of the statue and everyone in the temple bowed before the statue and they started singing

"Oh great Fangs we thank you for another nation conquered and we bring before you a blood payment which we pray you accept." The chief priest said as he slit the throat of the slave

slowly while blood trickled down and took a cup and took some of the blood and drank it and then the other men in the room took their goblets and went to take some blood from the slave and put the blood in their cups and formed an aisle again and then said "It is done oh great Fangs may you bring us more victories." They then drank the blood from the goblets and immediately, the Cobra statue eye lit up and immediately, the chief priest started singing and the people sang along with him and then Benard removed his hood and went to drink another cup of blood as custom demands and after all that, they were all given snake like necklaces and they all left.

After the blood payment, Benard went to meet with the chief priest vandrol asking him on whether an attack on fadian is wise. Vandrol told him that fadian is a stronghold and it will be very hard to get them to attack but it is still possible and he will inquire from Fangs for what

they have to do to take over fadian and told him that he knew where the rest of the Chanchanian soldiers were and then told him to eliminate all of them or there might be a strong resistance to his rule and then Benard got on his horse and left while giving him some money.