Chapter 407 — Darkness
Blade of Dawn · Page 2 of 3
"It's about time we stopped public activities..." Giprie sighed softly. "The situation in the city is deteriorating. There are rebels hiding in the Royal Capital, and those in Silverhold will likely order the whole of San Sunil sealed off before long. It's only by relying on the Duke's protection that we've been able to move freely all this while, but for the time being we'd best not keep testing Silverhold's sensitive, fragile nerves..."
"Who knows what the future holds," Pierce could not help but exclaim. Born in the slums, this was the first time he had ever sighed over matters that ought to have had no connection whatsoever to his life. "This kingdom really is getting more and more chaotic..."
"The chaos before us is only temporary. The Duke will in the end bring prosperity and order to this kingdom," Giprie said, lifting her eyelids to look at Pierce. "That prosperity and order will be a product transcending this age—yet we may well live to see it."
"That sounds like something Mr. Santis once said," Pierce laughed. "It sounds overly optimistic, but I think there's sense in it."
...
If what one saw in the Cecil domain was prosperity and order, then in the places the noble armies had ravaged, what one saw was only decay and chaos.
Southwest of the Carroll domain, in the Consco region, a small village had been all but razed to the ground. At the edge of the village ruins, a small armed column was passing by.
The column was well disciplined, and above it flew a banner of black and red bearing the Cecil family crest. Half the column were Cecil combat troops in gleaming armor with battle packs on their backs; the other half were non-combatants in light armor and smocks, who did not much look like soldiers. On the smocks of the latter was printed a red triangle—a symbol that in Ansul tradition had always marked the professions of physician and apothecary.
Walking in the column was Lett Aivican, the only man in it clad in full heavy plate whose station was nonetheless that of a physician. His physician's mark was printed on his breastplate, and that striking red triangle made him stand out sharply among the others.
Of course, what stood out even more than the red mark was his build—a full head taller than even the strongest of the soldiers.
At that moment this strong, towering priest and field physician gazed at the ruins before him, and after several seconds of silence could not help but let out a sigh.
Every building in sight had collapsed or been destroyed. The village's granary had been plundered bare and then set ablaze; the well had been filled in; the cattle and sheep had been slaughtered by hungry noble soldiers to fill their bellies, and whatever could not be carried off had been consigned to the flames along with the granaries and houses. And in some places Lett could still see unpleasant dark red stains.
This village had been destroyed—destroyed by war. But it was not the Cecil men, the "enemy," who had destroyed it. It was the village's nominal protector, its nominal master—the knights of the Consco region, and the noble coalition allied with Viscount Consco.
The noble coalition, routed from the front at Gravel Ridge, had destroyed this place, just as they had destroyed every other place along their path.
Nobility was synonymous with plunder, and in wartime especially so. Yet Lett was still shocked by what he saw and heard. He had not expected that the plundering and destruction wrought by the noble coalition in their rout would be more appalling than the damage they had caused on their advance—so appalling that he could not help but wonder whether those fleeing noble soldiers were men at all, or a swarm of termites that stripped flesh from bone.