Chapter 975 — Falling
Blade of Dawn · Page 2 of 4
The door was pushed open at once, and a trusted subordinate appeared in the doorway. The young adjutant stepped in, snapped a salute, and said rapidly, his face anxious, "General, something's happened. There's a riot in the God of War officiants' quarters—a group of battle officiants clashed with the guards on duty, and there are already... many casualties."
"What did you say? A riot?" Anluo was startled, then immediately went for her sword and the outer clothes she would wear out—though she had heard an unbelievable piece of news, she knew well the competence and judgment of her trusted subordinate; such a report could not have been fabricated out of nothing. "What's the situation now? Who's on the scene? Is it under control?"
As she spoke, she handed her sword to the adjutant for the moment and, pulling on her clothes, strode quickly out.
"Knight-Commander Brewer has the situation under control—because it broke out so suddenly, the soldiers had no time to react at first, and seven are dead, thirty to forty wounded, at least fifteen of them seriously. After that the patrolling knights and battle mages nearby arrived quickly and drove back and separated those officiants who looked somewhat deranged," the young adjutant said rapidly as he followed, "Patrols and surveillance have been reinforced in the other districts; for now there's no sign of disorder."
Looked somewhat deranged...
Anluo's heart sank, and her steps quickened again.
As soon as she drew near the camp within Winterwolf Fortress where some of the officiants were housed, a pungent smell of blood assailed her.
The knights had already secured the entire scene. A great many fully armed soldiers were guarding every entrance and exit of the district, battle mages ceaselessly scanned every magical fluctuation in the camp with detection spells, ready at any moment to deal with the loss of control or resistance of an extraordinary being; several tense-looking patrolling knights noticed Anluo's arrival and at once halted to salute.
Anluo waved a hand and passed straight through the wall of men into the interior of the camp.
The wounded had already been moved away; the corpses still lay on the ground. The hot blood that had sprayed out had cooled in the cold winter night, and the residual waste energy left after the dense discharge of spells and divine arts still pooled nearby, appearing misty in Anluo's magical vision. She frowned at the bodies of the soldiers in imperial regulation armor—all of them had been killed by searing evocation blades or divine arts, and in fact little blood had flowed from them; the smell of blood here came mostly from the officiants killed by blade and sword.
The officiants' corpses lay all around, fallen together with the soldiers they had killed.
Suppressing the violent emotions in her heart, Anluo came to the body of one of the God of War priests and, heedless of the blood and filth around her, crouched down and reached out to turn the remains over.
The officiant's corpse rolled over. The hollow eyes stared at Anluo, or perhaps at the black, heavy sky; some confusion and fanaticism seemed still to linger in them, and the sight was deeply unsettling.
But Anluo's attention soon left those eyes—she looked at the officiant's wound.
A single fatal wound, a cut that had begun near the neck and cleaved through the entire chest. The enchanted blade had sliced through the thin cloth and padded robe that offered little protection, and beneath lay torn flesh—the blood no longer flowed, and on either side of the wound could be seen many... strange things.