Chapter 409: Nightfall

Night had fallen.

Amid the ruins of the ravaged village, a roaring bonfire blazed. The firewood was gathered from charcoal and brush found scattered among the wreckage nearby. The warm flames drove away the chill that crept in with the night, while the bright glow kept the lurking wolves at bay, offering the survivors a fragile sense of safety.

Seventeen villagers who had made it through the ordeal huddled around the fire. They stretched out stiff limbs by the warmth, thawing the cold that had settled deep in their joints after days spent hiding in cellars. Several fully armed Cecil soldiers stood guard nearby, roasting their hardtack and jerky over the flames.

Leight finished a brief evening prayer, then took a piece of hard bread and approached the villagers. They stirred uneasily at first, but after a day’s contact, they had come to realize that this towering, intimidating soldier was actually the gentlest and most approachable among the strangers. They quickly settled down and made room for him by the fire.

“We’ll rest here tonight, warm ourselves, fill our stomachs, and set out at dawn,” Leight told them, not knowing how much they understood or even if they were listening. “We’re heading southwest. There’s a Cecil frontline camp there—someone will escort you safely to the south.”

The survivors stared into the flames, at their hands and feet, or poked at the fire with sticks. No one responded at first. Then, after a few moments, a woman spoke up. “You say you’re Cecil soldiers… the ones fighting against our lord?”

“Your lord started the war,” Leight said, shaking his head. “But that doesn’t matter anymore. Your lord has been defeated. The Duke of Cecil will protect the entire southern region. From now on, you’ll all be Cecil people.”

“Doesn’t matter. It’s all the same…” An older man with graying hair shook his head. “We… sigh…”

His words were sparse, and all he could do was sigh. Leight was used to the awkwardness of common folk and paid it little mind. His gaze drifted around until it settled on a little girl sleeping between the woman and the man—the one with bright, wide eyes.

“Are you her parents?” he asked.

“No, I’m her uncle,” the man replied, shaking his head. “Her parents died last year during the famine. I planned to raise Emily for a few years, then send her to the church in town. Who could have guessed… sigh.”

Emily—the little girl’s name was Emily.

Leight silently committed the name to memory. He glanced at the girl again. She must have heard the adults talking or was simply restless in her sleep, because when he looked at her, she slowly opened her eyes.

Her eyes sparkled in the flickering firelight. She blinked a few times, then recognized the big man before her. Boldly, she met Leight’s gaze and, after a moment, broke into a smile—though no one could tell what she was laughing at.

Her uncle looked nervously at the somewhat reckless girl, worried she might anger the Cecil soldiers and cause trouble. “Emily, what are you laughing at?”

Still smiling, the girl said, “Big uncle has a ring of light around him.”

A ring of light?

Leight froze for a moment, then looked down at himself. The firelight reflected off his Cecil-issue armor, shimmering across the surface. The girl must have mistaken the gleam for something magical.

The woman nearby tensed at the girl’s words and hurried to explain, “Sir, please don’t mind her. She’s always been a bit slow…”

“It’s alright, it’s alright,” Leight said with an easy smile. He broke off a piece of his hardtack and handed it to Emily. “Here, eat this.”

“She’s already eaten…” the woman protested.

“Children get hungry easily. She should eat more,” Leight waved her off. “Our lord says children are the future of the land. No matter how hard things get, children must not suffer.”

His strange words left the villagers puzzled. None of their lords or knights had ever spoken like that. Still, some grew curious watching Leight’s actions. A young man nearby asked, “What kind of place is Cecil?”

Leight thought for a moment, struggling to find the right words to describe his impression of Cecil. After two years of missionary work in the south, this was the first time he felt his vocabulary was lacking. “It’s… an incredible place. People don’t have to worry about survival. There are no nobles oppressing commoners. Everything in the land is governed by strict laws, and those who enforce the laws are qualified officials…”

The villagers listened, confused. Many of his words and descriptions were hard for them to grasp, but they didn’t dare turn away. Seeing this, Leight paused, then pointed to the people around him. “You can have your own farmland and homes—no one can take them illegally. You can work in factories and be paid by the lord. You can go to hospitals to cure your poison sores—no one will throw you out of your house. And you…”

He looked at the wide-eyed little girl and smiled. “Emily, you can go to school. There are many children your age there. You can make lots of friends.”

“My Three Gods of Plenty, you sound just like the priests,” an old woman exclaimed. “That’s a place we only go to after we die, isn’t it?”

Leight was momentarily taken aback, then couldn’t help but chuckle. He shook his head and began patiently explaining all that the Cecil lands offered.

The flickering firelight shimmered close by, casting a warm, bright glow over the former priest who had lost his holy light.

But amid the dancing flames, a shadow flickered at the edge of Leight’s vision.

At the outskirts of the village ruins, between the burned fences and collapsed sheds, something darted past.

The soldiers guarding the fire had stopped their chatter without anyone noticing. Their hands rested cautiously on the hilts of their ever-present plasma swords, faint rune glows flickering along the seams of their vambraces.

One soldier signaled to Leight with a military hand sign. Lowering his voice, Leight said to the villagers nearby, “Quiet—slowly move toward the cellar.”

Several Cecil soldiers rose from the fire, stretching as they closed ranks around Leight. The villagers, confused and frightened, stood up one by one—but their movements were too sudden, too obvious.

A few soft “thumps” sounded in the night sky, followed by the sharp whistle of something slicing through the air. An experienced soldier reacted instantly, shouting, “Crossbow bolts! Enemy attack!”

Force field shields activated immediately. Each Cecil soldier’s vambrace unfolded a translucent, softly glowing barrier. Tiny silver sparks struck the shields, ringing out with a metallic clink. Then, a fireball flared between the ruins, slamming heavily into one soldier’s shield.

The explosion lit up the area. Panic-stricken villagers scattered, screaming in terror. Chaos erupted instantly. Amid the turmoil, the Cecil soldiers shouted orders: “Civilians, into the cellar! Everyone else, find cover and prepare to fight!”

Figures emerged one after another from hiding spots, firing crossbow bolts at the shielded soldiers and the unarmed, panicked villagers. Many bolts missed in the darkness. The attackers then drew various weapons, shouting madly as they charged from all directions.

In the flash of the fireball’s explosion, Leight caught a clear glimpse of the assailants—they looked like ragged refugees but were clad in armor and armed. Some wore knightly surcoats and sorcerer’s robes, their faces smeared with dirt, clothes torn, eyes bloodshot and wild. They screamed like lunatics as they surged forward, a far cry from their once-glorious, lofty past.

They were the remnants of the noble coalition army—defeated at Shattered Stone Ridge, scattered in the retreat, turned into outlaws roaming the wilderness.

Among the frenzied band, Leight even spotted two church knights in surcoats wielding longswords, and a holy light priest in tattered robes!

Without hesitation, Leight activated his magic terminal’s force field shield and drew the plasma sword recently issued to him, stepping forward to confront the desperate bandits.

At the same time, memories of recent intelligence flooded his mind—

After the noble coalition’s defeat, the mixed ranks of church knights and holy light priests had fled alongside the army. Many were captured by Cecil forces during the brutal pursuit. The few who escaped had broken off from the main force, fleeing northwest along wilderness paths, hiding in the grand cathedral of the southern diocese of the Holy Light Church—shivering in fear, as the newly victorious Cecil army had yet to trouble that church. Those who failed to cross the wilderness and remained trapped in the war zone with other noble soldiers had become outlaws.

The Cecil army was still active throughout the southern region, hunting down the fleeing noble remnants. News that the Duke of Cecil would soon retake control of the south had spread far and wide. These wandering noble remnants dared not return to their lands. The serf soldiers and conscripted commoners among them could shed their weapons and don rags to blend back into rural life, but the gifted—especially those of noble rank—remained in the wilderness, starving and desperate.

(End of chapter)