Chapter 407 — Darkness

Beside Lett stood a Cecil veteran, an old soldier serving as squad commander in the column, who had seen his share of battlefields and understood the ways of traditional noble armies. Shaking his head, he explained to Lett: "When they were advancing, there was still some order. At least then they still styled themselves protectors of the land and its people. Passing through villages and towns they'd levy a great deal of grain and goods, but at least they wouldn't destroy things. But once they're routed, they become jackals... Unlike Cecil's troops, those noble soldiers don't regard 'plunder' as any sort of crime at all, and they won't be strung up and flogged for taking a few loaves of bread from common folk. They'll dare anything to fill their bellies—and to keep grain and houses from falling into the hands of their pursuers, they burn every place they come to..."

"Do they not even spare their own land?" Lett could not help interrupting the veteran. "Those routed nobles... would they really order the destruction of villages on their own domain?"

"Why wouldn't they?" The veteran sighed. "They've lost anyway. By the rules of noble warfare, the victors always get their plunder. They figure that even if they don't carry off all the grain and burn all the houses, the pursuers will do it anyway. Better to do it with their own hands than let the enemy have at it—and that way they can carry off some of the grain besides... They don't consider it a losing bargain at all."

"..."

Lett fell silent. The darkness and the evil in war left him unsure what to say. He came from the comparatively prosperous and stable Holy Spirit Plain; even in the course of preaching he had witnessed the despicable deeds of certain savage nobles, but a true war on this scale was something he was seeing for the first time. What the nobles did in the course of their rout and flight far exceeded his expectations.

But he was not a naive man. Though many, upon learning of his adherence to the classical virtues of the Holy Light, called him naive, he knew he was not. He was shocked by the cruel darkness of war, but he would not therefore naively conclude that this war should not have happened, still less that Cecil's victory had brought about the tragedies before his eyes.

He knew human greed, and he knew noble greed. Having read the commentary and analysis in the newspapers, he knew this war had been inevitable, and that whatever its outcome, those greedy, brutal nobles and their armies would do much the same things. Plunder and destruction would always happen; the only difference was where.

And he knew too that the Cecil army had done all it could to keep such destruction from spreading. During the great pursuit they had constantly tried to drive the enemy toward wastelands and the like, and where they came too near towns, they had striven to catch up and press the attack hard before damage could be done, driving the enemy off. After all, protecting those towns and villages was also protecting Cecil's future property.

But no matter how hard they tried, the battlefield was always full of variables, full of the uncontrollable.

So Lett could only watch in silence, then bow his head and quietly pray for those who had met with disaster.

The Lord of the Holy Light would not answer his prayers, but neither did he expect anything to answer them.

The commander glanced at this field physician of priestly origin, did not disturb the man's prayers, and instead began assigning tasks to the soldiers. "You two, go look around nearby for any households still standing and ask whether any survivors of the flight are about—find them if you can. You, and you three, search the area for places where bodies have been left, gather them up and burn them. The rest of you, come with me—let's see what's still usable."