Chapter 65 — The Last Seed Keeper

The long-range radio in Cau Bach Thinh's office, the most sophisticated piece of equipment Khe Mien had ever seen, emitted a familiar hum the next morning as the group had a hasty breakfast before heading back to Green Dome to report, and the operator, a young girl working in Vom Cat's communications team, rushed to call them with a confused look on her face.

"Someone asked to speak directly to the Green Dome's Seed Keeper," she said. "He claims to be the representative of the Central Council."

Khe Mien exchanged a wary look with Bach Lam before walking to the machine, holding the receiver with a caution she had never needed when talking to Tang Dieu Lam over the radio before.

"Vu Khe Mien listen," she said.

"Do you still remember me?" the voice rang out through the noise, gentle and calm in a chillingly familiar way. " Doanh Ba Thong, from Central Station."

"I remember," Khe Mien replied, her voice trying to remain calm even though her heart was beating faster. "Are you following our journey?"

“I keep track of a lot of things,” he replied, not dodging the direct question in his characteristic way. "That's my job. And I'm calling today because I think you need to know that the invitation to attend the conference at the Upper Dome, which I mentioned to you, is now much more urgent than before."

"How urgent?" Bach Lam asked, standing close to Khe Mien so he could hear the conversation clearly.

"The Central Council has officially convened a peace conference, scheduled to take place in the next two weeks," Doanh Ba Thong replied. "All the major Domes were invited to send representatives — the Sand Domes, the Stone Domes, and even the Salt Domes. The purpose, according to the official word, was to negotiate a ceasefire and restore order in the area."

A heavy silence enveloped the small room as those words rang out, and Khe Mien felt a sharp suspicion rise in her heart, so fast that it was almost instinctive. "Do you really believe this is a sincere peace effort?" she asked bluntly. "After all we've just seen—a settlement burned to the ground, armies searching for survivors across the Ashes—now the Upper Dome suddenly wants peace?"

A short silence echoed through the line, long enough for Khe Mien to wonder if Doanh Ba Thong was considering something he couldn't say directly through a communication channel that was clearly not completely private.

"I'm not telling you what I believe," he replied finally, his voice carrying a new caution. "I'm telling you what's going on. You have the right to draw your own conclusions, as you always do."

"What if we don't attend?" Khe Mien asked.

"The voice of the Green Dome will not be present in the room where decisions about the future of this area are made," Doanh Ba Thong replied, without beating around the bush. "And I think, based on what I know about you, that's not something you can accept easily."

The conversation ended soon after with a few details about the specific time and place, and when Khe Mien put down the receiver, she turned to look at the waiting group with an expression as tense as hers.

"This could be a trap," Ngan The Binh said immediately, his voice unable to hide his skepticism. "Inviting all the Arches to a single place, under the complete control of the Central Council, right after Confucius had just demonstrated his willingness to use violence to quell any resistance? That doesn't sound like peace. It sounds like a way to gather all those who might protest in one place."

"But what if that's really the only chance to speak to all the Arches at once?" Diem Quynh argued, her voice carrying a mixture of worry and hope. "If we don't go, we'll never know whether it was a real opportunity or not."

Bach Lam stood still for a long moment, his eyes glued to the map of the area still spread out on the table from the previous day's meeting, his fingers tracing the path from Vom Cat to Vom Thuong that he had walked once, a long time ago, with his deceased teacher.

“I went to the Upper Arch once,” he said at last, his voice low. "Years ago, when I was an apprentice under Tan Dinh Vu. It was the richest place I had ever seen — and also the place where I felt most watched, even though no one did so openly. If we go there, we need to go there with eyes wide open and without any illusions."

Cau Bach Thinh, standing at the door of the room listening to the entire conversation, finally spoke, his voice carrying the weight of someone who had considered carefully before speaking. "Vom Cat also received a similar invitation," he said. "And I have decided that we will attend, although I share all the doubts you have just expressed. If the Green Dome attends, we can come as allies, not as lone representatives easily divided."

"What about the Stone Arch?" Khe Mien asked, recalling the tense and unresolved relationship with Wei Ba Cuong and Han Dinh Sang.

"I don't know," Cau Bach Thinh admitted. "But if you can contact them before the conference takes place, perhaps this is also an opportunity to mend the rift between the two Arches."

Khe Mien nodded slowly, clearly feeling the weight of the decision forming before her eyes—not just the question of whether or not to attend a questionable conference, but the question of whether she was willing to enter the very center of power she had suspected all along, bringing everything she knew, everything she believed, to face directly those who might be manipulating this entire war from the shadows.

"I need to send word about the Green Dome before I decide," she said. "This is not a decision I can make on my own for the Council."

That night, after the message was sent via radio to Green Dome, Khe Mien sat alone in the small room that Cau Bach Thinh arranged for her to stay in, writing in a notebook fragmented thoughts, trying to sort out the complex emotions rising in her heart.

* Doanh Ba Thong said he did not tell his children what he believed, only what was happening. But why was a Central Council observer so careful when talking to the organization he served? Perhaps he doesn't fully believe in what he was conveying. Or perhaps you're seeing hope where it shouldn't be.*

The room door knocked softly, and Bach Lam walked in as she closed the notebook, carrying two cups of hot tea from Vom Cat's common kitchen.

“You're still awake,” he said, not a question, placing a cup of tea in front of her.

"I can't stop thinking about this," Khe Mien admitted, accepting the cup of tea with cold hands even though the air in the room was not cold at all. "If we go, we may be walking straight into a trap designed to extinguish ourselves. But if we don't go, we will certainly have no say in shaping what happens next."

"Sometimes," Bach Lam said, sitting down next to her, "there is no choice that is completely safe. There is only one that is worth the risk." He looked at her for a long moment, his eyes carrying a mixture of gentleness and determination. "And I think, after all we've been through, you know better than anyone what kind of risks are worth taking."

Khe Mien smiled slightly, though the smile carried a hint of unconcealed fatigue, and took a sip of hot tea, feeling the warmth spread through her body while her mind continued to revolve around the great question that lay ahead — a conference that could be the door to true peace, or it could be where she, along with all she represented, was crushed by the very power apparatus she was trying to challenge.

Three days later, when the response from the Green Dome finally came over the airwaves — a cautious approval from Bien Ba Uy, accompanied by a series of strict safety conditions drafted by Su Dinh Lam himself — Khe Mien knew that the path forward had been set. They will come to the Upper Arch, not with illusions of an easy peace, but with eyes wide open, ready to look straight into whatever awaits them at the power centers of the post-Great Cataclysm world.

Rereading the conditions attached by Su Dinh Lam - no one should go more than three steps away from the group alone, all private conversations with members of the Central Council must be witnessed by at least one other person in the group, no one can sign any documents on the spot without sending them to the Green Dome for review first - Khe Mien laughed softly, a short laugh mixed with emotion. The man who had most vehemently opposed the opening of the Green Arch was now the one who had drawn up the most meticulous instructions for protecting her in a foreign land, and in that meticulousness, she recognized a form of concern that he would never directly call by its name.