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The other evening I was with a cup of rice wine over at Yunsil's tavern, contemplating the latest lesson I had received from the Chonguns in Sun Tzu's "The art of war". Among others, my great teacher Leones lectured about chapter XIII, titled "The use of spies". If you followed the events a few days ago regarding a smelly incident at Pepper's - the odor is most likely gone, but in my mind, not so much, which is why I was sitting in the other famous Buya tavern - so if you followed that story, you already know the topic fascinates me. The rush I felt exercising my conceiled poisoning was something I had never felt before, and for sure, a feeling I wanted to have again. While my face was reflected with a blur in the clear surface of the rice wine, my thoughts sorted through the classes of spies, that Sun Tzu had identified in his book, wondering what kind of spy suited my dreams best. Local spies, normal people in every day life, rewarded by a foreign power for keeping their eyes and ears open to report whatever seems out of the ordinary, was definitely not something for me. No foreign power could pay me enough to betray my Queen and her kingdom. The same is even more true for inward spies, officials of one kingdom reporting to a foreign power, an even more disgusting form of betrayal. Converted spies are the top tier of betrayal in this regard, turned or double agents, of great use to the foreign power and potentially the highest amount of damage to their own kingdom. Despicable, though without a doubt, a valuable tool for a kingdom if they can convert the enemy's spies in this way. The remaining two kind of spies are doomed and surviving spies, both kind of field operatives. The doomed spy working openly within the enemy's domain or directly for the enemy, usually to deceive the enemy, and always exposed to he great risk of capture, torture and potentially death. The surviving one is on a covert mission with the aim of retrieving intelligence or sabotaging enemy facilities, with the aim of staying unnoticed. Both classes of spy missions intrigued me, and I wanted to learn more. Sadly, this chapter in Sun Tzu's book was rather short. I would need to find out more elsewhere. I decided to pay a visit to the Librarian in the morning, before I started my daily work at the Buya palace, and see if the old man, old enough to have served the late king Yuri, could point me to other books that provide more in-depth information on spies and spying than Sun Tzu, who, while clearly emphasizing their value for the art of war, treated the topic as one of many to be considered for a successful leader. I also took a mental note to discuss the the topic with the new Buya minister, once appointed, because I assumed, our kingdom wasn't doing too much in this regard and should take the lessons of Sun Tzu under consideration. But then again, maybe Buya was already excelling in this domain so well, that a low ranking bureaucrat of the ministry like me would never notice it. After paying Yunsil and leaving the tavern, while slowly walking home under a moonless sky, I was approached by a masked figure, who whispered that I should listen to a business proposition. I followed the fellow into a quiet alleyway, wondering what this encounter would lead to. Was I just a random encounter, or was someone looking for me, specifically? I casually put a hand in my pocket, grabbing my Nangen fan, a heritage from my Do grandfather Shinmen; a rare piece of art, beautiful to look at, and deadly on the touch of the hidden blades embedded in golden embroidery. * continued in next post * | |