The Saint of Sacrifice
Special: (Conifer’s Story)
☷ - Liwei San-Young
I: The Year of Paper Cranes
When I was ten years old, my parents decided that words alone were not enough to teach me what it meant to honor the sacrifices my parents had made by moving from Mais to the Bay. So one morning, my mother placed a warm, crisp piece of paper onto the kitchen table and declared, “Fold a crane, one for every mistake you make in your life. Fold a crane as a promise that you will do better.”
That morning, I creased and folded the paper into my first origami crane. And sealed into it in the folds were the intentions and heart of doing better a ten year old could muster up. To promise my mother, the world, and myself I could live up to the family name. To honor the sacrifices that my family made for moving from distant, faraway Mais to the Bay.
By lunchtime, I had already folded three more, one for each math problem I’d gotten wrong on a test. At the dinner table, I refused to speak in the language of Mais to my parents, and so I was forced to fold two more; one for not honoring my motherland, one for not honoring my parents.
By the next week, the practice of folding a crane for every dishonorable mistake I had made became ingrained upon my impressionable young mind. Engraved into the very nature of my being.
My mother taped the paper cranes above my bed, each to remind me how important it was to uphold what it meant to be good. To be successful. To work hard in mind and spirit.
So it became ritual. So it became engraved.
My heart rushing like the thumping of butterfly wings as I received homework grades and folded them into cranes. Each paper animal lightly penciled with a sin. 89%. B-. Incomplete.
My paper reminders soon blossomed into my own confessions as the year went by. Cranes papered my ceiling, each adding to a building pile. My mother would remove them as she saw fit, when I had grown closer and closer to a true Mais Work Ethic. Still, they hung over my head as a reminder to my failures.
I’ll study tonight. I’ll do better. I will not disappoint my parents. I’ll ask for help.
I promised. I folded. I prayed.
I had a piano competition the day before my eleventh birthday. I scored third place. I was not proud. I should have gotten first place. The chocolates and award I was handed on stage did little to wipe a disappointed, off-staring look off my face.
My parents were silent on the car ride home. I knew that not only had I disappointed them by not performing at my full potential, I had forgotten to save face for my family.
My birthday plans, what little they were, were called off.
I spent that night awake in my bed, staring up at the pastel rainbow of wings, trying my best to convince myself that paper too, could hold promise. I prayed in the hopes that I would do better next time.
Then came the quiet sound of cracking. Of tape unfurling from the painted ceiling. And one by one, the cranes tore themselves away. The cloud of paper sins descended, catching the ceiling fan and migrating from corner to corner across the room until a hundred paper wishes blanketed every corner of the room.
I promised myself I would never fold a paper crane again.
II: Ghosts in the Lunchbox
By the time I was fourteen, I had begun to resent my Mais ancestry in a way that was hard to explain in simple terms. At home, I would worship and follow the traditions and rituals of my parents and their people before them. But at school I would try my best to hide the fact that technically, my parents had come from across the sea with a very young me all the way here.
It did not make me the target of discrimination, not really. The people of the Bay had ties to an ancient time where parts of it were a Mais Colony. And we lived in a hotbed of Mais immigrants, a town near and under the control of the City itself, Machiryo Bay.
For culture day, my parents pushed me to represent Mais. I did not want to. I had no say in the matter. I recited Mais poetry and performed the shadow-puppetry theatre with my friends.
It was the snide and off-comment remarks my father would make about any friend of mine who had no obvious connection to Mais. “No, no, you see, they are from the Bay. They are not like us. Lazy. Stupid.”
It was the demands my mother would make of me. “Do not be friends with people below yourself. They only want what you have. Be friends with people above you, so you can learn.”
I grew sick of this rhetoric early.
Near the end of the year, my rank in school came out. Upper ten percent. It was satisfactory, and for this, my father gave me a handpainted lunchbox. The murals on the bright red box depicted orchids and peonies, as well as a scene of a folk tale I don’t quite remember.
I took this lunchbox to school, and one such day I found it to be full already, a gift from my father for finally performing above my peers.
I opened my lunchbox to find a scene meticulously prepared. Tofu cut and diced to represent the City’s skyline, the same line I would spend hours staring at back home. But here, it felt wrong. An appropriation.
A tower missing. A famous sight gone. It didn’t feel like the Bay I wanted.
It felt as if the glimpse and promise of the Bay was something that could only be granted to me if I had succeeded in the eyes of someone other than me. To glimpse and hope for the city was a privilege.
So I began to rearrange the piles of tofu to neater cubes. My friend, Priya saw this. “Liwei, what are you doing?” I was called by my Mais-Born name back then.
I froze. I couldn’t exactly explain myself. Carved specks of tofu clung to my fingers. “I’m fixing it.” It was an act of quiet defiance.
I traced the scales of the dragons-among-orchids hand painted on the lunchbox. I looked back into the neatly rearranged blocks of tofu within the box. For however much I tried to deny it: I could not avoid what contained me.
So I plunged a fork into the tofu and ate it. It was bitter, too hard.
III: Midnight Incense/My Name
During my first semester at the Bay Institute of Technology I found a series of lesser used hallways and classrooms belonging to a very old building that was rarely in use. I would sneak back into a room I liked sometimes, if I felt too bothered by the world outside.
I think being in college was the first time I had any freedom at all. A place where I felt like I could say what I wanted to say. To move freely without the fear of being watched, the fear of having to save face for the family.
The Institute had a cultural organization for people of Mais, and I fell in love with my culture while at school. I had always found it oppressive most times, neutral at best. But now, moving from Maiqiyun to Machiryo Bay proper, I was surrounded by faiths and cultures for the first time, I was a minority.
The town I’d grown up in, Maiqiyun, was atypical.
I had thought everywhere else would be like it. Descendants and immigrants from Mais Eternal. But despite the Bay’s colonial history, the culture was completely different. It was odd. It made me feel like a roly poly. Out of place.
But I liked it.
I think finally understanding that I had culture, that I was different, helped me fall in love with my culture again, after so long. So I joined the Mais Cultural Board, even got myself elected student representative of it.
I had the idea to adapt one of the empty rooms in the old building me and my friends frequented to a Shrine to Mais. It was perfect. A wood table. Blue Paper inscribed with the symbols of the Mais Faiths.
A stack of incense. A lighter. A prayer mark to do our ceremonies.
I liked the room. Beyond my dorm, it became a second home to me. I began to dread the days where my parents would visit, and the proceeding winter break where I returned home.
I had changed. No longer compatible with my parents’ vision board towards my success.
“Liwei,” my mom would say, “when are you getting a boyfriend?”
I would answer. “I’m focusing on my work.”
“Liwei,” my dad would say, “be careful what you do in College. People will think you are strange.”
I think, culturally, there was too much of a divide. My parents spent their entire lives growing up in a distant village in an obscure Mais Province, and then they met in the capital of Mais proper. They immigrated soon after they had me.
I think I am a Child of the Bay. I’m not Mais, culturally, but more of a mix. To be honest, I felt more at home at college than back in Maiqiyun.
So I began to diverge from my path. I started to do things that previously, I considered unacceptable. A sin. I lost faith in who I was before and started to build myself anew.
I went to parties. I didn’t like them, but it was an experience. I hiked all the way with a friend around Egret’s Landing and ended up kissing them under the sunset.
I drank Milisk and started a cult in the woods for fun. We worshipped an eraser than had quite a few profane words on it.
I made friends with some of the weirder students and scratched hastily combined, very illegal pleasure sigils into my skin. It was an experience.
I studied for hours with my roommate Maya, I celebrated with my lab partner, I drank with my friends. I was becoming someone I had never truly known I could be. Someone my child self would’ve shunned to save face. Someone my parents could never know.
I found myself deep in the night at the Shrine I had pieced together with my friends. I had been studying there all day, and my laptop lay dying, a textbook half closed.
The room smelled of old dust and sandalwood. I knelt in front of the table we called a Shrine. I held a wooden nameplate, a gift from my grandmother and ran my finger through the Mais calligraphy of my name, then the english translation.
Liwei San-Young. The name stared at me with reproach, conviction.
I struck a single incense stick and lit it. I whispered apologies for missing family dinners, for not doing well enough. I set a halfway folded paper crane next to the incense, and I prayed.
Tonight I carried with me a different prayer from the ones that had been engraved into my being. Ones that were quickly fading.
I felt the new nameplate I had my friend engrave last week in my right jacket pocket. A nameplate that felt better to hold, better to feel. The weight of which had been drowning my mind.
The name read Conifer San-Young.
I had to feel it in my mouth. To savor the taste of a name I wanted to be. “Let me be Conifer San-Young,” I prayed. “I want you to call me Conifer,” and I pause. I thought of them, “even if you never will.”
I continued to pray. I opened my eyes. I put the new plate in front of the old and wept. I prayed for courage, but I knew the only reply would be silence. There were no gods here, no prophets.
Then a soft creak behind me, a beam of light from an ever lit hallway.
Maya’s voice. “I was worried about you. I thought you were going to bail on tomorrow’s graphics marathon. Today’s graphathon?”
I met her eyes. I lowered them. “Sorry. I needed this.”
She came over to me, I remember. “What?”
I handed her the nameplate. “To ask for forgiveness. To hope they’ll call me by my name.”
Maya put an arm around me. “Conifer. So you decided on that. I like it. It fits. I think it’ll go fine.”
I want to believe her, but my throat tightens. “If- when my parents know, they will be furious. Liwei is the daughter they wanted. I was named after my grandmother. The name is a gift.” I pause, and I finally meet her eyes. “But I don’t feel at home with it. Not anymore.”
“So what? It’s a gift. You don’t always have to accept gifts, you know. You’re not, Liwei, not anymore,” she assures, bringing me closer. “You deserve to be your own person. You deserve to be called what you choose.”
I close my eyes. I take a deep breath of the incense and let it fill my lungs. I imagine myself at the dinner table. “My name is Conifer.” When I open my eyes, Maya is there to meet me. I tuck the steel plate back into my pocket. “Thank you.”
So I grab my laptop. We ascend the stairs, back to our room. And tomorrow, for the first time I code and design my sigils, as Conifer.
[Machiryo Morning Media]
Brief, industrial theme song.
Ami Zhou: “Welcome back to today’s broadcast of Machiryo Morning Media, I’m your host Ami Zhou-”
Lind Quarry: “and I’m Lind Quarry. Top story this hour: Operation Iron Lotus has officially begun. Early today, the Bay national guard launched coordinated assaults across our territories against the dangerous insurgent terrorist organization known as the Summer Tide. This follows the brutal assasination of Councilor Melloh two weeks ago, a crime our government has attributed to these insurgent networks.”
Ami Zhou: “Indeed so. Today we have with us Major Ai, one of many operations leaders that begun the coordinated assaults against the Summer Tide this morning. Major Ai, you have the floor.”
Major Ai: “Thank you, thank you. Let me be the first to tell you what an honor it is to be on your show. I’m quite the fan! For quite some time we’ve suspected that the Summer Tide has been receiving aid from outside agitators to undermine Bay sovereignty and economic dominance. Intelligence briefings have alleged these terrorists have been receiving weapons and aid from our neighbor to the West.”
Lind Quarry: “You speak of the Western Isles Coalition, yes?”
Major Ai: “Indeed so. A clandestine raid on a cell just last week allowed us to intercept radio chatter on the sale of several Class Three missiles and highly regulated compound sigils. Citizens, these connections lay deep. We’ve seen evidence of Bay collaborators, laundering through our financial institutions, and safe houses all across the coast. If you or someone you know have seen any sign of suspicious behavior, please let us know immediately.”
Ami Zhou: “Those of you living in the Ember Strand up on the Northern Coast are asked to stay indoors and have proper identification ready. Checkpoints have been established at every major road- expect delays. A field team from the Bay Medical Center have been dispatched to treat any injuries.”
Lind Quarry: “We understand you may be feeling anxious. But in these trying times we must try our best to support our troops on the front lines and stay patriotic to our rightful cause. For a limited time- any donation towards Machiryo Morning Media will be donated to our troops!”
Ami Zhou: “But as our troops mobilize, we must remember the human cost behind these headlines. While the murder of Councilor Melloh was abhorrent- we must also remember that many of these insurgents are local bay citizens driven by desperation- by unemployment, by cultural marginalization, even by fears of our demanding sacrifice quotas. We owe them our understanding and we should support legislation to quell these symptoms, even as we condemn their violence.”
Major Ai: “Again, the Department of War would like to remind everyone that any armed resistance will be met with deadly force. This is not a war on our people- this is a necessary fight to protect Bay stability from outside interference.”
Ami Zhou: “And yet in Port Rilate we have already received word of tanks rolling past shuttered shops, mothers weeping as young men in civilian clothes are hauled onto trucks for detainment. These are not foreign saboteurs, but our neighbors.”
Lind Quarry: “We’ll be back in thirty minutes live from Port Rilate’s Eastern Gate with news reporter Marisol Tan! As of now, the Bay stands at a crossroads: defend our sovereignty or risk falling prey to foreign intervention. Citizens are already asking the question- will we go to war with our western neighbors to ensure our sovereignty? I’m Lind Quarry-”
Ami Zhou: “and I’m Ami Zhou. Stay tuned.”
IV: Double Loyalty
☲ - Conifer San-Young
“Liwei, we can tell this will be your first achievement,” my parents sang, a week before the contest. “You have worked hard. You are smarter than those Bay people on your team.”
“I am part of the Bay,” I argued. “And we’re all equal in this.”
“You should’ve done it yourself. Keep all the prize money,” my mother insisted.
“I can’t do it myself. I don’t know sacral dynamics well,” I fight.
My father shook his head. “Take this,” he says, and he places in my hands a small banner. Inscribed upon it is the name Liwei San-Young, and two words I didn’t understand. He attaches the small banner to the lapel of my suit. “This means Double Loyalty.”
“For when you win,” my mother assures, “that you might not forget you you are. You are loyal to your family, your blood, to Mais. And your loyalty your studies. Honor both, and you will never be lost.”
I thought about this for a while.
I thought of the pin attached to my suit as I, running on less than three hours of sleep, tested our compound sigil for maximum effectiveness. The day of the contest was here.
I was tired, but hearing my name gave me hope. “Conifer, I need more efficiency on the King’s Mark,” Medan shouts, still busy on his end of the table.
Maya shakes her head. “The problem isn’t with the King’s Mark. You aren’t drawing the Bales properly!”
For months we’d been designing a compound sigil for the contest. It was extra credit on our Dynamics class. The winner of the contest- a government grant. Prize money for a startup we wanted to build.
Our compound sigil now had to be transferred and tested from modeling and simulation software- onto soft clay, ready to be molded into a brand. The sigils we were trying to use were volatile apart, but together, we hoped they would return a docile blessing.
“It’s the firework sigil,” I murmured, “it has to be drawn backwards.”
Our compound sigil was ingenious, really. A combination of Mais firework folk tradition, a relatively obscure Firework Saint, and a splash of more common slash and burn signs, finally topped off with some fertility rites.
Theoretically, the sigil would not only be able to be dispersed via rocketry- it would require a fifth of the industrial grade sacrifice current farming equipment relied on.
I reworked the sigil. I ran a test- success. “Good- now-”
A sharp ringing of bells. “Time out!” A legion of aides descended. “Please send your compound framework to the prints!” I finished up my portion and stepped aside.
The next hour consisted of tests on the sigil. Sacrifices made. Sigils exploded. Signs glew with charged energy and blood. Our was next. And it was glorious.
The frame for our rocket, our sigil wrapped around it. A human sacrifice inside. We tested it over a patch of desolate land near the college. The soil’s efficacy went up beyond our simulations- from 150% to a 300% increase.
We had succeeded. We won second place, only being beat by a team who had designed some experimental new sigil, one that dampened sacrifices to a wild extent.
But we’d attracted attention. A representative of the government approached us an hour later, as we were cleaning up. “I like what you’re doing,” she praised. “I’d like to offer your team a contract.”
We heard her out.
She was a representative of the Department of Agriculture. She began to ask us questions, an impromptu interview for a startup we were suddenly going to create. The pin at my chest began to feel heavier and heavier with every word I spoke at the interview.
It was becoming a burden.
So mid-interview, mid sentence, I unclapsed the banner. I let the air take it, rippling as it fell to the floor, coiling around my boot. I kicked it away. “Thank you for your faith in us,” I thanked, ever grateful. “And let me tell you that my loyalty will always be to the Bay and our future as a people.”
“Of course! You show promise- all of you.” She nodded, crisp and calming. “Sign here- this isn’t the contract- this just approves you for the actual interview- and the award.” She handed us a tablet. “But I assure you, this ingenuity is exactly what the Department is looking for.”
Maya hands the tablet to me. I sign my name on the dotted line. My name.
Conifer San-Young.
V: Dinner Table
Warm lantern light spills over the dinner table, carving patterns across the steamed fish and bowls of rice. The platter steams in the center, a thin line of smoke bringing the scent of home into the room. I enter the room, and I slide onto the chair at the table.
A moment’s silence. The quiet too heavy to break. My mother and father’s eyes turned down, ashamed. Of me. I know this will be the day. I’ve seen it coming.
“We saw your name on the Graphics Award last week,” my father begins, “congratulations.”
I blink. My mother slides the most recent issue of Sainttech magazine across the table. “Conifer. Not Liwei,” she scolds. Across the cover is an image of my team.
“Yes,” I reply, “thank you.”
My father speaks next, disappointed. “You signed the partnership grant with the government as ‘Conifer San-Young’. You’ve been using that name on official documents. Who told you to do this?”
My stomach tightens. I refuse to meet his eyes. “I chose to. It represents who I am. It’s more accessible than, uh, Liwei.”
My mother shakes her head. “You hide behind a name change and we only learn this from a competition notice? You erase our legacy, our reputation, and you hide behind,” she takes the magazine, “this?”
“My work requires a name I can stand behind, something recognizable. Liwei belongs to who I was before,” I argue, “Conifer belongs to who I will be. Who I am.”
My father draws rice from the central bowl. “You think this is about a name? You have severed more than syllables. You’ve cut yourself off from your family.”
My mother raises a hand to her heart, as if wounded. “Don’t you feel any guilt? We sacrificed so much leaving Mais. Working two jobs when we came here. Sleepless nights- so you could have every opportunity! And you repay us- by erasing the child we brought here.”
I look up and put a bitter smile on my face. “I am not erasing anything at all. I am claiming a path forward.”
“You hide behind this bayling word, this is not who you are. We named you after your grandmother. You are publicly tearing our family, one award at a time!” My mother shakes her head. “Did you ever think what this does to us. Imagine the gossip: the daughter who tears away her family for an award.”
I suck in breath, shaking as I do. “You should be proud of me. It’s authentic. I won the award. I’m moving forward.”
My father pushes away his plate. It hits a glass of water, and it falls to the ground. The sound of shattering glass punctuates his words. “Authenticity? You call it that? You avoid calling us, refuse to go to family reunions when your cousins visit, then you flaunt this false identity in public arenas and drag us through the mud. We sacrificed everything for you- and this is how you repay us?”
“You chose to move here,” I stagger, standing up. “You moved here not just for me. You told me the pogroms forced you to flee from Mais. How can you say you sacrificed everything for me? How can you worship Mais so intently when they pushed our people into the sea!”
“Do not bring Mais politics into this,” my mother snaps. “The Regime now is unfaithful. We are the true people- and you should represent that. Not be lost in Bay falsehoods. Liwei-”
“My name is Conifer,” I hiss.
They disagree. “We raised you as Liwei. Every lesson, every moment, every lullaby. All for Liwei San-Young. An investment. How dare you erase her?”
I close my eyes. I think of the Shrine. “I did not erase Liwei. That is a part of me as it has always been. I honor that name as part of me.”
“And yet,” my father snarls, “you do not value your heritage.”
I push the chair into the table. “I value my heritage more than you think. But I will not lead someone else’s life. I’m sorry I’m not the child you wanted. But I will not apologize for leading my own life.”
“Your choice will bring shame to us. To you,” my mother warns. “It will follow you to every meeting, every act.”
“Then let it follow me. I will carry it willingly. I am my own person.” I take my bag and take a step away. I pause. There is nothing left to be said, not now. I move towards the door.
“Liwei,” my mother sings, “come home.”
I don’t look back. “I’m already home.”
[Machiryo Morning Media]
Brief, patriotic theme song.
Lind Quarry: “Good morning, Bay citizens. We are saddened to report that through the course of this week, Western Isle battalions have struck at the northern reaches of our territory. The Ember Strand has particularly been hit heavily by shell fire and amphibious assault.”
Ami Zhou: “It would appear the special operation Iron Lotus to push within Isle territory to root out the insurgents has taken a rather drastic escalation. The guilt is on the Isles for striking back against innocent civilians on our side rather than collaborate with us to root out the insurgents undermining our democracy! Refugee camps in Port Rilate overflow beyond capacity, tents spilling into battle-torn fields. Families are lining up for rations that may not arrive in time.”
Major Ai: “Indeed so. Our enemies fund terrorists to undermine our nation. The Isles refuses to change their ways and work with us towards an era of peace. Instead, they choose massacre and murder. Field reports confirm that Isle tactics are outmatching our prized R-2 missile defense system. Our counterbattery targets have failed to lock on to these new sacrificial batteries and have allowed the Isles to carve a 40 kilometer corridor through our Northern Territories in the last 24 hours, separating the upper delta from aid and reinforcements.”
Lind Quarry: “Medical units are understaffed in the Upper Delta. Waterborne diseases flourish in the refugee enclaves. The Bay Medical Center warns that if they do not receive additional sacrifices to their health gods, we may face the possibility of an epidemic.”
Ami Zhou: “This morning. Tanem City’s chancellor offered emergency aid and reinforcements- at a price. Field hospitals, additional sacrifices, food shipments- even munitions and troop support. But their envoy demands that we cede control of two thirds of our side of the Grace over to them. This is tantamount to surrender- if our leaders go through with this deal, this may stage a dangerous precedent where invading armies could stage and exploit humanitarian crisis to extract sinful concessions.”
Major Ai: “But we must remain strong. We will defeat and reclaim the Ember Strand territories despite the economic blockade on our ports. We must not listen to opposition talks of ceding the Upper Delta in exchange for a ceasefire. We face a foe with, I admit, unexpected superior firepower. Yet even in our darkest hour we must remain strong. Compassion must guide us- share with the wounded, care for the sick.”
Lind Quarry: “The Council will host an emergency meeting tonight. We’ll reporting from there later today- but for now continue listening, continue to stay strong in these trying times. As for now we have live coverage from field reporter Marisol Tan. Mari?”
Marisol Tan (via uplink): “Good to hear from you, Lind. I’m at the refugee enclave up here in Port Rilate. People are dying here of thirst and exposure. They say the Isle sent in two Hawk-Angels! The entire frontline collapsed soon after- but the Angels continued to wreak havoc upon the Port itself. Neutral merchant ships refuse to dock for fear of being destroyed. Still- our people here are strong. We would rather risk a delay than cede to the Isles or to Tanem.”
Ami Zhou: “Devastating indeed. Next up in the studio we have the renowned Prophet Lark, who comes bearing a message of relief from the Church of Crane and Fish.”
VI: SaintShield
“Turn that off, would you?” The man sitting down across me in my office sighs, then coughs. He lights a cigarette and lifts his hand, offering it to me. I shake my head. The Prophet on the television is espousing empty assurances that everything will be all right, offering additional aid at the Churches scattered across the territory. I turn it off. “Never liked the Prophet much. Have you met her?”
“No, I haven’t,” I confess. He shrugs, and then hands over a briefcase to me. “My name is Major Ai- but please, call me Tony.”
I sit down. I look him up and down. “I know you. You were just on the news. I thought it was live?”
The Major laughs. “Usually they do it live, but their field reporter said she wouldn’t be able to make it at their normal time, so we filmed it an hour early. I just got back from the studio.”
“Desperate times.” He nods. I stir in my seat, restless. I pick at the fibers of the chair. “I got your email last week. I think your terms are quite favorable. My issue is that I’m not entirely sure my team will agree- and if we can match your timing.”
“Your technology is renowned for their agility and networking, Conifer,” Major Ai continues, “this is something we need.”
“Three days,” I stammer, “you want us to do a total conversion of our network systems from- well, from agriculture into a missile system. We don’t have time. And I don’t know if my people will agree.”
He nods his head. “You will have all the resources I can give you. Your Agriflux network theoretically, I’m told, functions the same way a missile system would on a slower, larger scale. But we want your network’s ability to detect what needs a sacrificial boost and when. We have systems that can predict where the next insurgent attacks will be- but our R-Two systems were hit last week. You’re the closest thing we have. Hell, I’m told your system uses firework-saint based ‘missiles’ to deliver sacrosanct fertilizer!”
I think about it. “Why three days?”
Major Ai breathes a moment. Whatever he’s going to tell me next is top secret. “We’ve been losing battles in our own territory from the Isle army. They have a mole in our leadership- we’ve been parrying at least, conceding at most. We want to strike directly into the Isles themselves while they’re busy in three days. If we can get a missile system running before that information leaks? Then we win our first major battle.”
“It’s for the good of the people,” I comment. “We’ve tested the system on a minor defensive scale to deter gangs and thieves. Nothing on this scale.”
“And that is precisely why we need you. You’ve already thought of this. It needs to be scaled up.” The Major is right. I have thought of this before.
“Agriflux is a small company,” I remind. “Why us? Why not Sacred Dynamics? Why not Marchleaf?”
“Information leaks,” the Major points out. “A company like yours, traditionally, would not be brought on contract, much less as a weapons team. No, the only use you would have is for food science, rations. But what we need is surprise. An underdog.”
I muse on this. I get up and treat myself to a cookie. I think better when I’m eating. “Three days. How many other small companies have you offered this to?”
“Twelve.” It’s a cold confession. “To tell you the truth- we’re desperate. You’re not our first choice.”
That’s what I’ve been waiting for. There was no way we were that special. “I’ll talk to my team.” War was one thing. But sacrifices are necessary. This was the opportunity of a lifetime. “You do realize I’ll need to see every single detail on the current- er, disabled R-Two system.”
“You’ll have it all.” He gestures towards the briefcase.
I open the briefcase. “Your missiles rely purely on a one-to-one sacrifice. Our framework can’t work with the sacrifices inside the missiles- there’s no space. We use a reactive relics matrix to disperse our blessings. That’s the secret. That’s why we’re so effective. You turn a direct person inside a missile into a bomb. We turn people into high yield fertilizer that packs a higher punch because we can fit a high kilowatt-blessing amount into a relic.”
“So what? You can’t do it?”
“You’d have to use our firework-missiles,” I offer. “But we’ll need sacrifices. And we’ll need more. We use a high pressure system to turn our sacrifices into prophets before melting them down into relics. We react these relics in the air. Your system won’t cut it. It has to be done our way.”
“I’ll talk to the sponsor of this program on this, Councilor Guillot,” Major Ai assures. “If you can get us a draft, a working prototype by the end of tomorrow and have it ready by the invasion. You’re promising the SaintShield project a lot. I hope you deliver- for the good of our nation.”
“I’ll uh, I’ll talk to my team.” So I shake his hand. The Major leaves, and I contemplate the terms of the deal.
So I tell my team.
“No,” Priya declares. “I can’t do this.”
“Priya, you’re the best hydrosanct engineer I know. If anyone can do a total conversion in three days, it’s-”
But she cuts me off. “This isn’t farming anymore. This isn’t fertilizer. He wants us to build weapons of war.” She steps back, arms folded. “This isn’t what I helped build this company for. Besides, this is a brutal shift. It’s not feasible- how do we turn something built for crop blessings into- into a missile.”
Amar, a friend I made only a year ago steps up. “Priya’s right that it’s a brutal shift. But to be honest, I’ve thought about this before. If we had the previous system, we’d simply be able to adapt the compound network sigils together.” I hold up the briefcase. “Ah. The only question would be the missiles. We know that military missiles need a chamber for the sacrifice within them.”
“We just change the reaction from farming to something more explosive,” Maya finishes. “Simple, really.”
Medan shakes his head, sitting on the counter of a lab table. “Do you all hear yourselves? We built Agriflux to feed people. Using this technology to build weapons of war does the opposite.”
Maya gives him a look. “How can you say that?! We’re already at war. And we’re going to lose if the Islers don’t take a shot!”
“Maybe we wouldn’t be at war if our government didn’t oppress our citizens to the point that they had to strike back!” Priya shouts. “The Summer Tide were collaborating with the Isle- but what drove them to that point? If we make weapons for our government, we are perpetuating a cycle of oppression and hatred that-”
I slam my fists across the lab table. “Priya, how can you say that?! The Summer Tide are radical insurgents that are quite frankly- anarchists!”
“Because the government failed them!” she snaps. “Sure, we can index our theology for destructive use. But once that’s out there, there’s no going back. No limit to how many Summer Tides may form.”
“Priya, Connie has a point,” Medan murmurs, quietly. “If the Islers or the insurgents attack our city- we stand to lose everything. Where would we go? I don’t like this either, but-”
“There has to be lines drawn, Medan,” Priya hisses. “We live in a genocidal state. We oppress the people of the Grace and force them to farm for the system. We forcibly cleared out the lower delta gods and their followers to build the industrial districts! This isn’t agriculture. This is annihilation. My duty was to feed the world. My duty was not to make sacrifices to the gods of state! How many more will die?!”
Maya sucks in a beath. “Priya-”
“Don’t ‘Priya’ me, Maya.”
“Fine.” Maya takes a breath. “I understand where you’re coming from. But we cannot be moral paragons. We are Sacrifice Engineers. This is our duty. Our entire field requires the sacrifice of an individual to fuel a blessing. What is the point of a Sacrifice Engineer who refuses to make their sacrifice?!”
“Please, Priya,” I beg, “we need your diagnostic expertise. We need you.”
“Once we do this,” Medan points out, “we can’t go back. We’ll have to transition to a weapons firm. It is more lucrative.” I give him a look. It isn’t a good one.
“Fine,” Priya concedes, quiet. “I will help you, but it won’t have my signature on it. And then I’m done. I refuse to be a part of the genocidal state.” And then she walks out of the Agriflux building, away to collect her thoughts.
Priya was my oldest friend. I lost her that day. In truth, our relationship had been fracturing. I was always too patriotic, too proud of the nation which had given me so much. She had been too empathetic to our nation’s history.
We’d fought on this before.
Maya senses my inner conflict. She was always able to do that. “I’ll support whatever you do. I’m sure Priya will understand, one day.”
“I hope so.” I turn around. I hug Maya. I drift back. “Okay- Medan-” he perks up, “you integrate our networking sigils with the R-Two.”
Maya steps up. “I’ll find a reaction we can work with to suit the uh, new framework.”
I nod. “I’ll find and begin conversion of the hardware we can pull. We can make this happen. We can win ourselves a contract.”
“Well we can’t call ourselves Agriflux anymore if this works,” Medan offers. “Have another name in mind?”
I think back to the Major. “They call this program the SaintShield program. Offering it to a bunch of firms like us. I say if this works- we claim the title for ourselves.”
[Machiryo Morning Media]
Brief, patriotic theme song.
Lind Quarry: “Good morning, Bay citizens. After days of stalemate we have just received word this morning of our first major victory against the Isle. This morning, Machiyran ships, aided by the newly unveiled- and she’s a beauty- R-3 missile system allowed a strike deep in Isle territory- cutting of their supply and industrial stations.”
Ami Zhou: “While the human cost has been steep- reports from the frontlines indicate that civilians have been displaced, they are managed. Bay Command indicates that the R-3’s decisive networking capabilities minimizes civilian losses while neutralizing military installations.”
Major Ai: “Precisely, Ami. And this is just the beginning- the R-3 missile system is only a prototype. Things will only get better. And for this, we have Conifer San-Young and her team at SaintShield to thank. Conifer, you have the floor.”
Conifer San-Young: “Thank you, Tony, Lind, Ami. It’s truly a pleasure to be here. I’d like to thank the Bay for putting faith in me and my people, for giving us the opportunity to save lives, to do good work for the bay.
You may know me as the CEO of Agriflux. Maybe not. We were a small agricultural firm-faith that believed in improving our farms and reducing foodborne diseases. Now, we’ve been given the opportunity to save lives through more direct means.
The R-3 is the brainchild of both our previous enhancements in agriculture, the generosity of our nation, and the previous R-2 system. We’ve improved the system to be able to target and counter enemy batteries mid-air. Our systems are also more mobile- I can’t share specific details, but the way we sacrifice to build our missiles is radically different from the standard.
And this is only the beginning. What you’re looking at, what you’re hearing about is only the prototype of the R-3. When we’re finished, we will drive the false-faiths from the land. Our sovereignty, our supremacy is not to be ignored.
We are the people of the Bay. And make no mistake- we will prevail.”
Lind Quarry: “Support for the campaign has seen an 88% surge in the polls. Many citizens are hailing the prototype R-3 as the ‘sacrificial hammer’ to finally shatter the Isle’s resolve. Even in the upper delta we’ve seen the efficacy of this already- we’ve heard reports of their battalions retreating to natural chokepoints, the embargo and blockade on Port Maiqiyun finally lifted after months of assaults.”
Ami Zhou: “Analysts also note a recent surge in industrial bonds tied to defense contractors such as Marchleaf- and now Agriflux- turned SaintShield. While this boosts the war effort financially, critics caution against overeliance in investments on a single stock- and warn of widening economic disparities at home.”
Major Ai: “This is a victory, but this is not the end. In the shattered towns of Kulai and Marek’s Pass, families still scramble for shelter as Bay troops continue to stalemate against Isle invaders. Aid convoys and reinforcements are on the way- but local relief groups warn of renegade angels and winter storms that could dampen relief efforts.”
Ami Zhou: “Back in the heart of our city, recently elected Councillor Harrow presses a question integral to the war itself: how can we prevent this from happening again? How do we address the inequalities rampant in our nation? And how do we prevent the normalization of industrial scale mass sacrifice as tools of war?”
Lind Quarry: “Stay with us for the hour as we report live from the Council Chambers.”
VII: Daiyi
This war has become a genocide. Two years into the war and no sign of stopping. After we drove the Isle forces from our lands, from my hometown of Maiqiyun to Kulai and then to the uniting the delta, we just kept going. Armed with divine righteousness and the paradigm of Bay supremacy, morale and pride pushed our troops further into the Isles.
Priya was right. Maybe.
SaintShield prospered. We began to be hailed as heroes- but as the war droned on and on, we began to fall. Public opinion waned, and by the end of the first year it began to dip into the negatives.
We were going too far. The Western border completely militarized. And with my banner- the Saint of Fireworks everywhere from aid to obliteration- we became an easy target to blame.
I became an easy target to blame.
No longer were we the saviors of Port Rilate. No longer were we the hammer of righteousness. The war had dragged on too long. We were seizing the archipelago one sacrificed base at a time.
Because why stop at driving the insurgents and the opposition from the land. Machiryo Bay suffers from a sacrificial crisis. Never enough sacrifices to feed our industries.
The Isles offer bounty in terms of fresh faces- assets to process. It would be a fool’s errand to ceasefire. And they’d made it lucrative. Major Ai personally seized Pulau Bintang and gifted it to SaintShield as an industrial grade weapons development platform.
After that, Medan quit and resurfaced a few months later to light himself on fire. Public opinion shifted permanently into the negatives. My name become fire and spat upon by the centrists, by the old and new faiths. Harrow spoke of me almost as if I was the man-in-fire incarnate. Prophet Lark condemned my actions on live television- calling it a heresy of all things faithful.
They call me the Saint of Sacrifice.
The worst part is that I don’t care. The atrocities we are unleashing on the Isles are horrible, yes. But they struck against our people first. They unleashed terror on Rilate and the upper delta towns.
This is rightful. This is deserved. And yet our people still call to end the war, still blind to the suffering our enemies did upon us mere months ago.
I map relief convoys. I donate funds towards refugees. I am successful. SaintShield received one of the most profitable awards from the Angel’s Economist Journal.
My parents should be proud. But they aren’t. The public should be proud.
We’ve given an offer to the Western Isles. Our envoys went to their capital- Daiyi with a ceasefire agreement. The Isles sent back their decapitated heads. The brutality. The barbarism of our enemies.
In a way, it isn’t our fault. They refuse to sign the ceasefire. Rejected four times. They prolong this war. Not us. And certainly not me. I built the machines- but I was not responsible for their firing.
I was under the impression I would be given an unlimited budget. But as always, there were constraints. I could not build the perfect R-3 system, but I sure as hell came in close.
So I sit in my penthouse, alone. Maya remained my roommate, but she’d taken leave a day before to oversee the latest missile formula on our island.
I look out onto the bay itself. It’s pretty. The storm casts patterns of rain drops across my face and across the room. It was silent. I bask in my chair surrounded by magazines condemning me as the Saint of Sacrifice.
I meditate.
And then a series of erratic knocks on my door. And then the muffled but familiar voice of my father. “Liwei! We know you’re in there!”
My heart seizes, and for the first time in a year, I feel a pang of guilt. I hadn’t heard from them in months- in truth I was avoiding them. I hadn’t been with them since my graduation, much less spoken since Medan’s suicide.
“Liwei,” my mother shouts, “we know you live here. Priya gave us your address.”
Ah. So of course it would have to be Priya.
I sigh. “”Liwei,” I hiss. “Not anymore.” I open the door, and they are there. Faces stern, drenched in water and pale across foyer lights. They step inside without waiting, disapproval in the air. I shut the door behind them.
“Look at this place,” my mother snarls. She picks up the magazines and begins to page through them. She reads them aloud. “War Criminal. The Company of Death. The Priestess of Hate. Genocidaire. The Saint of Sacrifice.” She throws them to the ground. “How many names will you have before you accept this is wrong. That you should come home as Liwei and stop playing this game.”
I laugh. I can’t help myself. I sit down on the floor. Let them see me as the mad and sainted they think I am. “You come all this way to criticize my name. Not the atrocities. Not the violence. But my name?”
My father looks at a vase in disapproval, his own reflection staring back. “You refuse our calls. You refuse to attend our ceremonies. You are not yourself. Come back, be a good daughter.”
“I am busy.” I get up and move the vase away. “In case you haven’t heard, there’s a war going on.”
My mother tsks and shakes her head. “A war that is going on too long. A war where you kill people. Think of what that does to us.”
“I map relief corridors! I send refugee ships to the Isles and welcome them into our home!” I watch them intently as I scramble to get my papers. I throw them into the air, fuming with hate. “Do you not see I am trying my best. I will end this war. I am doing my best. You should be proud of me. I succeeded. I live here. I will end this war. I will!”
“You will end this pretending!” my father takes me by the arm, and I almost trip. “It is time to come home, Liwei. This is not who you are.”
I struggle back and I fall to the floor, arm still being dragged away. “Don’t touch me!” and I wrangle myself free. “This is who I am! My name is Conifer San-Young and I don’t care if I’m the Saint of Sacrifice. I don’t care if I’m the so-called Messenger of Death. But at last I am my own damn person.”
“We sacrificed everything to be here. You should honor that sacrifice,” my mother hisses, contempt in every ounce of her words.
I try to get back up, but I just fall to the floor. I catch a glimpse of myself in the reflection of the vase. My cheeks are red, puffy. “I didn’t ask for it! I make sacrifices every day. I have designed a system that kills thousands every week. Do you not think I haven’t made sacrifices? My best friend Priya left me. Medan set himself on fire! All I have is Maya and SaintShield. Please- please don’t take this away from me.”
My mother spits next to me. “You fool. They tried to help you. You lost every friend who tried to save you from this madness.”
“Maya is still here. Mack runs the system just as well as Priya, just as well as Medan.” I push myself away until I’m at the window. “I am my own person,” I whisper-chant. “I deserve all that I’ve built.”
“You pampered, spoiled girl,” she growls. “Your life has been easier than our lives could have ever been. Where is the sacrifice in that?”
“Isn’t that the point?” I hiss. “What’s the use in decrying your sacrifices for my better life if you want be sacrifice just as much?” But of course, I don’t say it. It wouldn’t be respectful.
“Conifer San-Young,” my father simmers. “You think this name makes you special? Even a stranger's name would be more honest than the disgrace you bring to your own. You break our hearts. Look at you, red-faced and crying. What kind of monster cries for her victims. You can’t even be proud of that. Come home, Liwei.”
“I am home!” I shout.
My mother kneels down and takes a hand to my chin. She forces me to look at her. “In our village, they tell stories of daughters who dishonor their family. They are erased from their legacy, erased so that their spirits may not curse the living. You’ve already made our legacy begin to break. Come home before it’s too late.”
“In Mais,” my father begins, “they say a daughter’s duty is to her parents. A son’s duty is to his land. But a traitor is cursed by both. How will you find forgiveness by becoming that traitor?”
“I am my own person,” I chant. Maya taught me this. Countless days of affirmation. “I deserve all that I have accomplished.”
“Remember this,” he continues, “the gates of heaven watches unfilial children with a frown. They will curse your name forever.”
“When this land, this Bay you want to serve so much tears you down, they will tear us down with you,” my mother warns. “You will leave our family nothing but questions. When did our daughter become a god of death? It’s time to come home, Liwei.”
I push them away. “I am my own person. I’ve done all I can.”
My mother stands up. “Fine then. Have it your way.”
And then they leave. They don’t bother to close the door. They leave it hanging open. I am too much of a disappointment. Because I am Conifer San-Young.
This war has dragged on for far too long.
Daiyi was the last hope for peace. It is clear to me now. We sent envoys with olive branches only to receive decapitated heads in return. Four times we offered a ceasefire and four times our branch was cut down in return.
Liwei believed in folding paper cranes to hope for a better future. Liwei hoped to atone for mistakes she hadn’t yet made. But neither incense nor origami can save the lives that will and have been lost in the war.
So I became Conifer. A new name. A name of rebirth. I told myself that I would not hesitate any longer. Than sacrifice was the currency of justice. Of pride.
I had the R-3 system built into the penthouse so I could update the software and optimize runtimes at my leisure. Two years of watching children’s faces across my feed. Two years of mapping relief corridors for aid that comes just too late.
I believed only I could stop the flood of terror. But I am wrong. And so here we stand. Yet another genocide with another name. The war on insurgency. The war against terror. The war of the summer tide.
My parents insinuate I will drown our family in disgrace. That I already have. But I am my own person. I am enough.
I will become who I must be. I must claim the final sacrifice- not of assets, not of people. But of a world who cannot let go of hate. So I will drown the war in fire to end it. I will ensure that this does not continue any longer.
So I override the Ethics Engine. I override the targeting protocol. I know every key, every switch. Enough to make it look like the system misfired. Enough to make it look like the system thought launching into the heart of Daiyi would end the war- and it will.
Every single R-3 system near Daiyi will fire as soon as I give the command. And this war will end. I will show the Isle a threat of peace they would be disgraced to refuse.
I’m sorry, Liwei. I know this was not the atonement you wished for in your prayers.
I’m sorry, Conifer. I know this isn’t what you wanted with yourself. I know this isn’t the person I wanted to be.
I am the Saint of Sacrifice now. Daiyi will be my relic.