«Here we are far enough. Show me your face, immediately», orders Zhan, after reaching a forest not too far from Sao's home.
Gogun whimpers, but knows that it won't have any effect on the KoZ.
«If I kill you here, what kind of corpse will you leave? That of a dog or of a person?»
Discouraged and terrified beyond measure, Gogun decides to obey. Last he wants is to make an enemy out of Zhan or to annoy him even more in a moment like that. He knows better for his own sake. He trasforms into auriold and drops on his knees at the KoZ' feet. «P-please, forgive me...» he sobs with trembling voice.
«Hm.» Zhan grabs him by hair and forces him to stand up. «You are just a useless kid. What is your name?»
«Gogun...»
«Your name as a person.»
«Gogun...»
«You have always been his dog... Who knows how amused he will be to see your real face.»
«No! I will do everything you want, I'll be your own slave, please don't tell him!» he shouts, desperately.
«If you were older, maybe. To me you are useless, there is nothing I can think for you. So, you will either give me a funny show or he will reward me for revealing this plot to him. I have nothing to lose.» Zhan teleports in the middle of Shiirhuang, dragging Gogun towards the EIAs hq. Totally naked among the people of the city.
«NO! Please! I beg of you! Give me just some hours», he cries loudly, trying to cover his manhood while being pulled by hair in the streets.
People around don't dare to interfere, knowing Zhan is an EIA and guessing Gogun must be a prisoner or something.

As they reach the hq, Zhan takes him to Sao's office and throws him inside the room.
Gogun, still crying, falls on the floor and prostrates himself in front of the General, trembling like a leaf and feeling sicker than ever before.
«What's the meaning of this?» growls Sao, moving his gaze from Gogun to Zhan.
«Tell him or I will do it. Or maybe you could force him to speak, you are so good at it», the KoZ says to his cousin.
«Shixing, don't test your luck with me», he growls.
Zhan kicks Gogun, very hard. «Tell him your name!» He kicks him again. «DO IT!»
«I'm Gogun», he sobs in a very low voice.
«What are you trying to do? Do you miss my treatments, all the sudden?» Sao clearly is not buying it.
«It is the truth. That is your dog. Show him, stupid boy.»
Gogun shakes his head, still crying desperately.
«SHOW HIM!»
The boy jumps and eventually obeys, taking his dog form. Gogun looks at Sao, whose expression turned into that of total disbelief, and whimpers in sorrow. He can't stand it, he doesn't feel prepared to his reaction, sure that it won't be anything positive.
Feeling crushed by what happened, Gogun jumps through the window, breaking the glass, and runs away from the hq, to hide somewhere.

Now that Seok is in punishment and thus away from home most of the time, he takes profit of his absence to do something he had been thinking for a few days.

After everyone leaves home, he goes to his usual hideout to take his normal form and wear clothes, then gets out of the city until he reaches the shop of an alchemist. He stops by the shop window and counts the money he has with him. «If it is not enough, I will hit the man until he says it is enough», he says to himself with a smile.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=BFVqVE6XhrM

After the disappearance of the King, the North managed to turn even gloomier and grey than it used to.
There is close to nobody who wasn't struck by it, since it was so sudden and nobody still has any clue what it was of Morgan. But nobody's sorrow will ever be even close to the stage of despair Meredith fell in, after being told her son disappeared. She never wanted to rule the country, which makes even that a bad news to her eyes.

Edward, Frederick and Benjamin are already on the desperate research of him, backed up by whole Hunters, Army and a fair amount of both Royal and Elite Guards. Even East offered full support, sending their most elite troops to join the Princes. Sao and his whole military squad. The IA were sent to search every inch of the East to make sure some rebel isn't behind it somehow. Overall, it is a mess.

Mei Ni, on the other hand, doesn't feel affected by any of that at all. She never paid any attention to politics and doesn't even know the name of the new Eastern Emperor. She lives in a too poor contest to bother about such information.
Thanks to Yung family, specially Zhan, she start her new job in the North, following her dream to become a chef. For now, she is just an apprentice. She is talented, but still has a lot to learn.
Right now, she just finished preparing the cooking line for dinner, so she leaves the restaurant to spend some free time exploring Thylum a little.
She stops in front of the window of a famous tailor and looks at the dress through it, a little Oo. Definitely finding Northern fashion weird.

Name: Mei Ni;
Family: Lee;
Status: poor;
Age: 20;
Family: Higa Momoru, grandmother;
Lives in: Kusuhr, poor quarters. (Slums.)

The reasons why her grandmother was looking for Zhan, were two: the fact Mei Ni was kidnapped by a slave trader and that the old woman would ask for help to nobody else in the world.
Why?
Going back in time, Higa was one of the only 3 women ever to be taken to Xan Island and decide to leave it. (Persida being one of the three.)
At that time, Higa was pregnant of a man she was in love with and thought the feeling to be mutual. The man was a criminal, who pulled his family into all sort of dangers.
Zhan saved Higa from a group of rivals of her man, who had tried to have revenge on him. He brought the woman to his place and when she left, he simply let her go, as he always did.
For Higa, it was much easier to trust her man, blinded by her love for him, than a mysterious stranger than took her to such place.
Years went by and the real face of her man simply showed up. He was a violent drunkard who cared very little about his family. When the man got killed by his enemies, Higa was left with a daughter to raise, totally alone.
No job and not a chance to get one, all the woman had left to try, in order to feed her family, was to become a prostitute.
Constantly fighting to get a better life for her daughter, the environment they lived in simply ended up swallowing the girl as well. Who preferred to follow a path of criminality and dishonor, rather than giving respect to the sacrifices her mother made for her.
Parted from her daughter, Higa tried to pull her life up, rather suffering hunger than continuing to be a prostitute. That just until her daughter came back, with a baby girl. Mei Ni. Daughter left again, abandoning the child there and Higa never saw her again.
Having to raise a delicate little child, the grandmother was forced again to abandon herself to the only realistic way she had to earn some money.
While working on the street, one night, so desperate and humiliated to not even recognize him, Higa tried to lure Zhan, who was in the area for a mission. He recognized her immediately and after some touching conversation, he handed her a very generous amount of money to raise her granddaughter.

As soon as Higa managed to contact Zhan, explaining her problem to him, the IA went to investigate on the fact and, after a few hours, he found the girl in an illegal brothel in the North. He made a whole massacre of owners and customers, turning the inn where it all was happening into a slaughterhouse. Truly grim, blood and limbs scattered all over the place.
He took Mei Ni back to her grandmother, whom invited him to return to them whenever he wanted to, to try to repay him how she can: treating him motherly.

STARTER.
After all that, when she recovered from the shock (nobody had the chance to touch her, so it was mainly stress and fear) she decided to go to the North for a few matters.
With a kind teleporter who accepts to get her there for free, she reaches Thylum. She can not speak Northern and knows nothing about the city, except that she has to reach one shop, which address she has written on a piece of cloth.
When in the centre of the city, she turns around a few times, reading the paper and trying to understand how to orientate.

(From the book City of Glass)
The Hall was full of Shadowhunters, more Shadowhunters than Clary had ever seen
in one place before, even on the night of Valentine's attack. Their voices rose
in a roar like a crashing avalanche; most of them had gathered into contentious,
shouting groups-the dais was deserted, the map of Idris hanging forlornly behind
it.
She looked around for Luke. It took her a moment to find him, leaning against a
pillar with his eyes half-closed. He looked awful-half-dead, his shoulders
slumped. Amatis stood behind him, patting his shoulder worriedly. Clary looked
around, but Jocelyn was nowhere to be seen in the crowd.
For just a moment she hesitated. Then she thought of Jace, going after
Valentine, doing it alone, knowing that he might well get himself killed. He
knew he was a part of this, a part of all of it, and she was too-she always had
been, even when she hadn't known it. Adrenaline was still coursing through her
in spikes, sharpening her perception, making everything seem clear. Almost too
clear. She squeezed Simon's hand. "Wish me luck," she said, and then her feet
were carrying her toward the dais steps, almost without her volition, and then
she was standing on the dais and turning to face the crowd.
She wasn't sure what she'd expected. Gasps of surprise? A sea of hushed,
expectant faces? They barely noticed her-only Luke looked up, as if he sensed
her there, and froze with a look of astonishment on his face. And there was
someone coming toward her through the crowd-a tall man with bones as prominent
as the prow of a sailing ship. Consul Malachi. He was gesturing at her to get
down from the dais, shaking his head and shouting something she couldn't hear.
More Shadowhunters were turning toward her now as he made his way through the
throng.
Clary had what she wanted now, all eyes riveted on her. She heard the whispers
running through the crowd: That's her. Valentine's daughter.
"You're right," she said, casting her voice as far and as loudly as she could,
"I am Valentine's daughter. I never even knew he was my father until a few weeks
ago. I never even knew he existed until a few weeks ago. I know a lot of you are
going to believe that's not true, and that's fine. Believe what you want. Just
as long as you also believe I know things about Valentine you don't know, things
that could help you win this battle against him-if only you let me tell you what
they are."
"Ridiculous." Malachi stood at the foot of the dais steps. "This is ridiculous.
You're just a little girl-"
"She's Jocelyn Fairchild's daughter." It was Patrick Penhallow. Having pushed
his way to the front of the crowd, he held up a hand. "Let the girl say her
piece, Malachi."
The crowd was buzzing. "You," Clary said to the Consul. "You and the Inquisitor
threw my friend Simon into prison-"
Malachi sneered. "Your friend the vampire?"
"He told me you asked him what happened to Valentine's ship that night on the
East River. You thought Valentine must have done something, some kind of black
magic. Well, he didn't. If you want to know what destroyed that ship, the answer
is me. I did it."
Malachi's disbelieving laugh was echoed by several others in the crowd. Luke was
looking at her, shaking his head, but Clary plowed on.
"I did it with a rune," she said. "It was a rune so strong it made the ship come
apart in pieces. I can create new runes. Not just the ones in the Gray Book.
Runes no one's ever seen before-powerful ones-"
"That's enough," Malachi roared. "This is ridiculous. No one can create new
runes. It's a complete impossibility." He turned to the crowd. "Like her father,
this girl is nothing but a liar."
"She's not lying." The voice came from the back of the crowd. It was clear,
strong, and purposeful. The crowd turned, and Clary saw who had spoken: It was
Alec. He stood with Isabelle on one side of him and Magnus on the other. Simon
was with them, and so was Maryse Lightwood. They formed a small,
determined-looking knot by the front doors. "I've seen her create a rune. She
even used it on me. It worked."
"You're lying," the Consul said, but doubt had crept into his eyes. "To protect
your friend-"
"Really, Malachi," Maryse said crisply. "Why would my son lie about something
like this, when the truth can so easily be discovered? Give the girl a stele and
let her create a rune."
A murmur of assent ran around the Hall. Patrick Penhallow stepped forward and
held a stele up to Clary. She took it gratefully and turned back to the crowd.
Her mouth went dry. Her adrenaline was still up, but it wasn't enough to
completely drown her stage fright. What was she supposed to do? What kind of
rune could she create that would convince this crowd she was telling the truth?
What would show them the truth?
She looked out then, through the crowd, and saw Simon with the Lightwoods,
looking at her across the empty space that separated them. It was the same way
that Jace had looked at her at the manor. It was the one thread that bound these
two boys that she loved so much, she thought, their one commonality: They both
believed in her even when she didn't believe in herself.
Looking at Simon, and thinking of Jace, she brought the stele down and drew its
stinging point against the inside of her wrist, where her pulse beat. She didn't
look down as she was doing it but drew blindly, trusting herself and the stele
to create the rune she needed. She drew it faintly, lightly-she would need it
only for a moment-but without a second's hesitation. And when she was done, she
raised her head and opened her eyes.
The first thing she saw was Malachi. His face had gone white, and he was backing
away from her with a look of horror. He said something-a word in a language she
didn't recognize-and then behind him she saw Luke, staring at her, his mouth
slightly open. "Jocelyn?" Luke said.
She shook her head at him, just slightly, and looked out at the crowd. It was a
blur of faces, fading in and out as she stared. Some were smiling, some glancing
around the crowd in surprise, some turning to the person who stood next to them.
A few wore expressions of horror or amazement, hands clamped over their mouths.
She saw Alec glance quickly at Magnus, and then at her, in disbelief, and Simon
looking on in puzzlement, and then Amatis came forward, shoving her way past
Patrick Penhallow's bulk, and ran up to the edge of the dais. "Stephen!" she
said, looking up at Clary with a sort of dazzled amazement. "Stephen!"
"Oh," Clary said. "Oh, Amatis, no," and then she felt the rune magic slip from
her, as if she'd shed a thin, invisible garment. Amatis's eager face dropped,
and she backed away from the dais, her expression half-crestfallen and
half-amazed.
Clary looked out across the crowd. They were utterly silent, every face turned
to her. "I know what you all just saw," she said. "And I know that you know that
that kind of magic is beyond any glamour or illusion. And I did that with one
rune, a single rune, a rune that I created. There are reasons why I have this
ability, and I know you might not like them or even believe them, but it doesn't
matter. What matters is that I can help you win this battle against Valentine,
if you'll let me."
"There will be no battle against Valentine," Malachi said. He didn't meet her
eyes as he spoke. "The Clave has decided. We will agree to Valentine's terms and
lay down our arms tomorrow morning."
"You can't do that," she said, a tinge of desperation entering her voice. "You
think everything will be all right if you just give up? You think Valentine will
let you keep on living like you have already? You think he'll confine his
killing to demons and Downworlders?" She swept her gaze across the room. "Most
of you haven't seen Valentine in fifteen years. Maybe you've forgotten what he's
really like. But I know. I've heard him talk about his plans. You think you can
still live your lives under Valentine's rule, but you won't be able to. He'll
control you completely, because he'll always be able to threaten to destroy you
with the Mortal Instruments. He'll start with Downworlders, of course. But then
he'll go to the Clave. He'll kill them first because he thinks they're weak and
corrupt. Then he'll start in on anyone who has a Downworlder anywhere in their
family. Maybe a werewolf brother"-her eyes swept over Amatis-"or a rebellious
teenage daughter who dates the occasional faerie knight"-her eyes went to the
Lightwoods-"or anyone who's ever so much as befriended a Downworlder. And then
he'll go after anyone who's ever employed the services of a warlock. How many of
you would that be?"
"This is nonsense," Malachi said crisply. "Valentine is not interested in
destroying Nephilim."
"But he doesn't think anyone who associates with Downworlders is worthy of being
called Nephilim," Clary insisted. "Look, your war isn't against Valentine. It's
against demons. Keeping demons from this world is your mandate, a mandate from
heaven. And a mandate from heaven isn't something you can just ignore.
Downworlders hate demons too. They destroy them too. If Valentine has his way,
he'll spend so much of his time trying to murder every Downworlder, and every
Shadowhunter who's ever associated with them, that he'll forget all about the
demons, and so will you, because you'll be so busy being afraid of Valentine.
And they'll overrun the world, and that will be that."
"I see where this is going," Malachi said through gritted teeth. "We will not
fight beside Downworlders in the service of a battle we can't possibly win-"
"But you can win it," Clary said. "You can." Her throat was dry, her head
aching, and the faces in the crowd before her seemed to meld into a featureless
blur, punctuated here and there by soft white explosions of light. But you can't
stop now. You have to keep going. You have to try. "My father hates Downworlders
because he's jealous of them," she went on, her words tripping over one another.
"Jealous and afraid of all the things they can do that he can't. He hates that
in some ways they're more powerful than Nephilim, and I'd bet he's not alone in
that. It's easy to be afraid of what you don't share." She took a breath. "But
what if you could share it? What if I could make a rune that could bind each of
you, each Shadowhunter, to a Downworlder who was fighting by your side, and you
could share your powers-you could be as fast-healing as a vampire, as tough as a
werewolf, or as swift as a faerie knight. And they, in turn, could share your
training, your fighting skills. You could be an unbeatable force-if you'll let
me Mark you, and if you'll fight with the Downworlders. Because if you don't
fight beside them, the runes won't work." She paused. "Please," she said, but
the word came almost inaudibly out of her dry throat. "Please let me Mark you."
Her words fell into a ringing silence. The world moved in a shifting blur, and
she realized that she'd delivered the last half of her speech staring up at the
ceiling of the Hall and that the soft white explosions she'd seen had been the
stars coming out in the night sky, one by one. The silence went on and on as her
hands, at her sides, curled themselves slowly into fists. And then slowly, very
slowly, she lowered her gaze and met the eyes of the crowd staring back at her.