Chapter 1081 — The Closed-Door Meeting
Blade of Dawn · Page 3 of 4
"...Neither he nor I are men who like to waste time," Luo Yan said after a brief pause for thought. "There will be two conferences here: one is the formal treaty between Cecil and Typhon, the other a league conference of the mortal nations. He and I both know full well that compared with the second, the first must not waste too much time or too much effort. Tonight we will settle the framework and the bottom line of the treaty in the form of a closed-door meeting. He will not let this drag into tomorrow, and neither will I—so he will most likely lay out his terms directly... and then it will simply be a matter of bargaining."
Matilda pondered this, and just as she fell into thought, footsteps and a knock came one after another from beyond the door. Then a high-ranking attendant entered the room and bowed at the threshold. "His Majesty Gaoyang Cecil has arrived."
"Show the guest in," Luo Yan said at once—he had no need to compose himself, for he was always prepared for what was about to happen. "Matilda, sit beside me."
When Gaoyang walked into the reception room, he saw an exquisite tea table set at the center of the room, the light of the chandelier falling across its surface—a tabletop ground from blue crystal, gleaming brightly. Luo Yan Augustus was already seated on the sofa at one side of the table, and beside him sat the "Pearl of the Empire" who had once visited Cecil. Beyond them, no one else was to be seen in the room.
This was a closed-door meeting, a meeting of leaders held before the formal, public negotiations. It did not much accord with the conventions of interstate relations—but here, Gaoyang and Luo Yan, the two of them, were themselves the convention.
Beside Luo Yan was only Princess Matilda, and Gaoyang likewise had brought no more people: only Amber, the intelligence minister in whom he placed deep trust.
A click came from behind, and the door of the reception room closed at their backs. Gaoyang walked forward with Amber, and Luo Yan Augustus rose to welcome them before they drew near—this middle-aged man, whose face always carried a gloomy air, now wore a smile, and his originally dark and negative bearing seemed to diminish considerably. This obvious change of course did not escape Gaoyang's eyes, and he offered a faint smile. "Good evening, Luo Yan. You look considerably better than when we last met."
Luo Yan's smile grew a little more pronounced, and he even made a joke: "A good night's sleep is very important for a middle-aged man like me—fortunately, my sleep has been excellent for some time now."
Gaoyang clearly knew what the other was referring to. It was a good opening—a shared experience that could just about be called fighting side by side could effectively draw the two sides closer, and at the same time make certain less "friendly" terms harder to put into words. Though pleasantries of this sort might have little effect on men like him and Luo Yan, they could at least improve the atmosphere that followed.
"It seems there are only the four of us here today," Gaoyang said with a nod toward Matilda not far away. "No idlers present—so it seems we can talk to our hearts' content."
"Miss Amber," Luo Yan too looked toward Amber beside Gaoyang. His expression turned very grave for an instant, but quickly returned to normal. "I hear you are a shadow grandmaster whose strength cannot be gauged at all, and an expert in the field of intelligence. Your appearing in public before others means that Gaoyang Cecil's sincerity is at its greatest."