Chapter 503 — Remembrance

The crowd was somewhat surprised. Some, once they caught on, at once doffed their hats in salute to the holographic image in the plaza, while some innocent children shouted with delight, and a bold child pointed at the hologram: "Look! The lord!!"

The impetuous child was immediately hushed by the adults, while the lord's voice continued to come from the holographic projection:

"Today is the Festival of Souls, the day we remember those who have passed. This festival began as a commemoration of a nobleman, and today we use it to remember our fathers and mothers, our brothers and sisters, our departed kin and friends...

In Pioneer Plaza, Betty stared blankly at the great bonfire before her, listening to the lord's voice come from the holographic image behind her, and quietly lost herself in a daze.

"In the early spring of the year 375, a disaster descended upon old Cecil, and countless people left this world on that day..."

The night wind, carrying smoke and dust, blew over and startled Betty from her daze. She saw the people around her beginning to toss wooden branches into the fire, so she too picked up the small branch she had long since prepared, stepped forward, and rather clumsily threw it into the flames.

The little branch was swiftly swallowed by the fire. The little maid stared somewhat blankly at those bright flames, and in her not-overly-quick mind, each leaping tongue of fire seemed to turn into a face.

"Mrs. Hanson... Mrs. Morris... Uncle Taylor..."

Betty murmured softly, murmuring those names she had once spent great effort to finally remember, and then suddenly bent at the waist and bowed deeply—with that signature vigor of hers, as though she meant to fling herself out of herself.

"I survived!"

A figure stepped past Betty—it was Rebecca, likewise holding a branch in her hand. The heir of the Cecil family tossed her branch into the fire as well, and the leaping flames cast their light across her face. This girl, always so rash and impetuous, was for once uncharacteristically quiet. She stood in silence for a while before speaking softly: "Eight hundred and eighty of us made it out alive... Father, I did all I could."

Hetty had come to Rebecca's side at some point: "Everything is developing very well now, and Rebecca has grown a great deal too..."

Behind them, Gawain's holographic projection still floated above the plaza, his voice vibrating through the air and carrying far, far away: "...To all the common folk who perished in misfortune, may your souls rest in peace. To all the soldiers who gave their lives, I salute you... May the dead rest in peace. Rest assured, Cecil will keep moving forward—I give you all my word..."

"To all the living and the dead—good night."

The holographic projection above the plaza gradually faded. The people stood in solemn silence, and within the "broadcast hall" of the Magic Net control center, Gawain stepped down from the platform used for capturing holographic images.

Amber sidled up to him, a wicked grin on the half-elf's face: "So is this you going against the grain yet again—it's always been commoners honoring nobles, and here with you, for the first time, a noble honors commoners, and 'salutes' them besides..."

Gawain let out a faint breath: "From now on, at least on Cecil's lands, the Day of Souls will be a thorough, ordinary commemorative day... Even scholars who specialize in history won't cling any longer to the festival's original origins and meaning."

"So your real goal was hoping everyone would stop dancing and singing to celebrate your death day from now on, huh~~"

Gawain regarded Amber quietly—the half-elf who seemed to be running her mouth and asking for a beating again—yet he saw that faint trace of unease deep in her eyes.

He asked: "Do you have no kin of your own to mourn?"

Amber turned her face away: "I don't even know what my parents were called, and I'm not even sure they're really dead. Who would I mourn?"

"And your adoptive father?"

Amber said nothing, until a few seconds later she murmured: "...He was a thief wanted by the nobles, and when he died a priest of the Holy Light performed purification on him... In the bonfires of the Day of Souls... what place is there for him?"

Gawain looked at Amber's profile, and at last he understood why this half-elf was so relentless in her hostility toward every priest of the Holy Light.

"Your adoptive father... what crime did he commit?"

"Nothing more than wanting to find a book in the church, but he fumbled and knocked over the candles the local lord had consecrated there. I told you before—he was a clumsy little thief..."

The room fell quiet for a moment, and after a brief silence Gawain broke it: "I cannot undo that purification, but as ruler of the Southern Frontier, I can pardon your adoptive father. What was his name?"

Amber stared at Gawain in astonishment, then it registered: "Sari... his name was Sari?Randolph..."

Gawain was somewhat surprised: "He had a surname?"

"Yes, he had a surname. I asked him about it, but he said nothing... Later I looked into the genealogies of many families in the Southern Frontier, and never found that surname."

"Is that so..." Gawain breathed out. "Perhaps a scion of some fallen noble house. In any case, Sari?Randolph is innocent now."

A word of pardon could not bring the dead back to life, nor summon a sunken soul back from the lowest depths of the Kingdom of the Dead—but often, what people want is not anything of practical meaning, only a measure of comfort.

Gawain patted Amber lightly on the shoulder: "While the bonfire still burns, go on."

The next second, the half-elf's figure had vanished into the air.