Chapter 162: Do Not Leave Your Post on Night Watch

Everyone tacitly avoided mentioning the purpose of their arrival, quickly counted heads on the spot, and retreated along their original path to a position where those vibrant corpses were no longer visible, beginning to unload supplies from the horses tethered there.

In fact, at least half the weight was already worn on their bodies; the remainder consisted mainly of tent frames, canvas, and the least-used load of the journey—oil for fire.

The attendants carefully removed the small jars packed in rope net bags and placed them in batches at a distance from the campfire.

They still did not know what consideration had led them to carry such troublesome items, but this did not prevent it from becoming, in hindsight, the wisest decision, greatly reducing the workload of gathering fuel and meaning they could destroy this place more quickly and thoroughly, preventing it from becoming a source of waking nightmares they would frequently revisit.

Once the evening shelter was erected, the attendants began chopping down trees to collect firewood, splitting it roughly and shaving off most of the damp, diseased core.

Setting fire is also a science; first, one must clear the open ground around the village to create a firebreak. Most of the prepared wood was intended for the central church to ensure the supporting beams and structural columns would be destroyed, while the residential buildings, with their high proportion of wood and some thatched roofs, would be sufficient to burn on their own.

Progress was not ideal; after a busy half-day, the amount of firewood brought back before nightfall was still far short of what was needed, perhaps requiring them to wait until noon the next day to act.

The resting group gathered around the campfire to soften their dried rations, filling their bellies while engaging in casual conversation that carefully avoided certain topics; the night watchman tended the fire while the others, clutching their weapons, returned to their tents to lie down.

Logically speaking, the more difficult the situation, the more one should seize every moment of rest to ensure that when one must wake again, there is a bit more strength that could save a life.

But Brett knew they had not; those pairs of eyes that could not close were surely staring into the darkness at the shadows cast by the fire onto the tent canvas, fearing that upon opening their eyes again, they would see that place, that road which might be unforgettable for a lifetime.

He was the same. It was hard to say whether the watch duty Martin had assigned him was punishment or simply going with the flow, given the involvement of Barro. On such a sleepless night, at least for him, keeping watch by the fire was better than tossing and turning in a tent.

However, it must be stated that although he offered no rebuttal, he still felt his decisive act of throwing the throwing axe was not an error. After crossing the path lined with mushroom "trellises" and witnessing a distorted humanoid silhouette with its back turned, how could anyone resist the impulse to strike first?

Even if that axe had been in the hands of Barro, the knight he followed, it would certainly have been thrown, and even more accurately.

"Hmph." Brett shook his head to dispel this disrespectful thought toward his elders; humility was a virtue knights should possess, and as a reserve, he should accept Martin's criticism rather than harbor resentment in his heart.

As the second son of a family, assigned to learn under a knight, he sometimes felt he had only learned the two sides of the same coin, courage and recklessness, without absorbing the alertness that occasionally contradicted Barro's rough exterior.

Adding a log to the fire, the crackling sound filled his ears, so monotonous that he could not stop himself from thinking of those dazzling, mind-bending images; the trellises and strangely shaped silhouettes appeared before his eyes, as if sitting opposite him across the campfire.

A low cry of fright, startled by illusion and imagination, escaped his lips; Brett suddenly straightened his back, coming to his senses. The companion on the opposite side of the fire was startled, looked up to meet his gaze, and they both saw the same thing in each other's eyes.

"You mean that person Martin the Knight calls the Professor; why did he bring so much oil?" Brett asked quietly, the only person he could speak to at that moment, while glancing toward the edge of the camp to confirm those things were merely products of a tired imagination.

He did not expect an answer; he just intended to chat, although it was indeed very puzzling.

"Who knows? But I saw calluses on his hands, like someone who knows how to use a sword," the companion took up the topic naturally. "Anyway, he doesn't look much like a professor. Have you ever seen people from those academies? Usually, they are either old or bald, or both."

"Or both." Among the topics they couldn't discuss openly, they found a fresh point of amusement.

The campfire brightened as new wood was added, the flames expanded, and the warmth heated their hands and feet, lifting their spirits. The shadows behind them grew longer and swayed.

After chatting for a while, Brett's lips grew dry; he took two swigs of clear water from his waterskin, and a feeling that made him unable to sit still gradually became apparent. He intended to endure it, but the long night was far from over, and he would have to deal with it sooner or later.

Rubbing his numb legs, he stood up from beside the fire and inspected the camp; the sounds of turning and shifting had gradually ceased as fatigue sent people into sleep.

"I'm going to handle a private matter just nearby; I'll be right back."

"Go quickly and return; I'll take over once you're done." Such matters, once mentioned, tended to lead people to want to go together, but duty restricted them from leaving their posts simultaneously, so they had to take turns.

Brett walked toward the edge of the camp; the light source shifted from in front of him to behind him. As he approached the tree shadows that differed slightly in shape from normal ones, tension seeped back in from outside the mental walls reinforced by language and fire, and he couldn't help but wonder what lay within that forest.

Looking back toward the fire, his companion impatiently waved him to hurry. The tension made the sensation in his lower body increasingly obvious; ultimately, the urgent physiological need took precedence, and he had to solve the pressure problem.

No matter how terrifying those things were, they were already dead; their danger level was not even comparable to a child holding a dagger. He comforted himself with this thought.

Humming a tune he had overheard to bolster his courage, he stepped out of the blurred boundary between light and dark, walked a few steps into the woods to a distance where he wouldn't be complained about for odors in the morning yet could still see the campfire, found a satisfactory tree, and intended to finish quickly.

As he emptied himself, his tense mind also felt a moment of relaxation, and he began to think about how knights wearing full plate armor would solve such urgent problems.

Although one could handle it in advance each time, after all, life is unpredictable; what if there was a sudden emergency and one couldn't quickly remove the armor? As a knight reserve, he felt it was necessary to ponder this.

This strange question soon washed away with the water; Brett tightened his belt, and his thoughts jumped to whether, once he officially became a knight and had his own fiefdom, he might develop a romance, or even a marriage, with a lady as in the stories.

He had seen those women during some outdoor activities, standing far away in undisturbed safe positions, watching the various game hunted by young noble heirs from the hunting grounds, conversing and commenting elegantly in low voices, their light laughter like bagpipes and harps drifting on the scented wind.

The gowns they wore were cut from bolts of fabric of various materials and dyes, vibrant and rich in color, puffy and majestic.

Like elves in the forest, once seen, it was hard to look away from those magnificent silhouettes; the fine powder scent drifted into his nostrils, and in this lonely night, it made him want to offer the fragmented lines he had heard from a bard.

【It is a star, it is a full moon, it is...】

Brett reached for the belt he had just fastened and loosened the quick-release buckle.

A majestic figure slowly approached, its asymmetrical color design surpassing all masterpieces of tailors and dressmakers, possessing extraordinary beauty...

"What in the world is that?!"

With the buckle undone, he drew another throwing axe from his waist and threw it with all his might, embedding it deeply into the multi-layered, crown-like head of that thing; a handful of unreal, indescribably colored smoke erupted from it, and the smell of dust became abnormally strong.

Brett retreated toward the camp, but while he was momentarily distracted, a similarly colorful figure had silently appeared in the shadows of the trees to his side and tackled him to the ground.