Chapter 64: The Knight’s Elegy – Prologue
October 19, 1189, Holy Wall.
As the dawn broke, the light pierced through the dark night, illuminating the land. A colossal wall, grand as a dragon, stretched across the rolling hills.
On one side lay withered mountains and desolate plains, where countless golden screens divided the area, blanketing it. The First Knights Order and the Faith Organization had their tents scattered across the wasteland, remnants of last night’s bonfires still lingering. The golden-armored knights had long awakened, many flocking towards the wall, their shouts mingling in the crowd, making the whole area feel busy and chaotic.
In stark contrast, the other side of the wall was dead silent, a marshland devoid of life, the endless scorched earth of Cartelgarin.
That terrifying, lifeless black land was shrouded in a grayish-black fog, with thousands of thick black roots breaking through the fog, twisting and creeping from the murky, bubbling mire, as if they were creatures from the depths of the abyss.
Numerous roots had already pierced through the gigantic Sin Barrier covering the Holy Wall, even penetrating the wall itself, the ends severed by sharp instruments, resembling the uneven stumps of countless demonic arms probing into the pure land. Black dead smoke rose from the roots and branches, tightly enveloped by the golden shields, its presence unmistakably bearing the scent of d*ath.
Saint Margaret emerged from her tent, her weary face lifted towards the scene beyond the wall, murmuring, “At this rate, the Chaotic Tree will break through the Holy Wall ahead of schedule…”
“Make way, make way! Don’t block the road—”
Nearby, knights hurriedly escorted a cleric gnawed by dead smoke. One of his legs was already lopped off, crudely bandaged, and he looked like he had long since slipped into unconsciousness. They came down from the Holy Wall, anxiously shouting, racing toward the medical camp behind where many more warriors had suffered from the corruption of defending the wall. The anguished screams echoed day and night for the past two months without a moment’s pause.
Stomp, stomp, stomp…
Hiss—~
The sound of iron hooves rushed in among the chaos, mixed with the horned horse’s neigh. The bald Pope Knight Isaac halted next to Margaret, dismounting from his beast, nodding at her, “Your Grace.”
“How was last night?”
Margaret asked, her expression serious. The Saintess Class nearby had already begun preparing breakfast, but it seemed no one had the appetite.
“Nothing much happened all night. Right before dawn, a few thicker roots suddenly moved. d*mn it! Luckily, the Faith Organization reacted quickly, and we only lost a dozen or so; no fatalities.”~
The rough knight approached the saintess, scratched his bald head, and spat on the ground: “Pfft, that damned tree is slowly getting used to the intensity of the Sin Barrier; even I can see that! This is no way to go. All our defenses are being whittled down bit by bit… I ask you, Your Grace, have you contacted the Holy City? What’s holding up the Pope’s reply?”
Margaret lightly shook her head: “I’ve sent three secret letters already, and Commander Seattle sent two as well. It’s been over a month now; not just the Pope but even Commander Romani has gone silent.”
“What’s going on?” Isaac furrowed his scarred face. “Is someone intercepting our messengers?”
“Not likely.”
Margaret replied: “At a time like this, who would do that? The Second Knights Order has no reason to; even Simon from the Underground Prison has no reason to. Archbishop Pusius, who usually opposes the Knight Corps stationed at the Holy Church, has even started urgently recruiting knights for us. Unless the Holy City has been breached by St. George, otherwise the message should have arrived long ago. Whether it’s reached the Pope’s hands, that’s another matter.”
“What do you mean?” The bald knight didn’t quite get it.
“My Saintess Class sent me a reply before reaching the Holy City, and I received it just yesterday. They were still twenty kilometers away from the Holy City at that time, yet felt the powerful residual waves of a divine miracle from afar. They mentioned that the energy of the miracle radiated from the direction of the Holy City, unprecedentedly vast. That couldn’t possibly be St. George’s doing; it’s too quick. I suspect something has happened in the city.”
Isaac narrowed his eyes: “…That thing deep in the prison?”
“I’m not sure.”
Margaret shook her head again: “But the situation may not be optimistic; we need to prepare for isolation.”
“Are you kidding? Is something else going on…?”
As they spoke quickly, accompanied by their retinue, they headed towards the Holy Wall. Isaac, gripping the beast’s reins, irritably slapped his bald head: “How can you stay so calm about this… I’ve had a bit of a headache these past two days. Commander Seattle is even more anxious; he didn’t sleep a wink last night and early this morning he went with the Faith Organization up north. The north side of the Koster Wall is in the worst shape; the black smoke seeping from the wall needs a lot of clerics and knights to stabilize it, but we’re short on personnel right now…”
He paused: “Archbishop Pusius is recruiting church knights across half the Western Continent. What’s the progress? When’s the first batch of reinforcements arriving?”
“Very soon, within ten days.”
“Ten days? Who knows what’ll happen then…”
“The newly summoned knights will come in batches; the current number reported is around seven thousand, with two thousand eight hundred in the first batch I’ve confirmed with the archbishop. If that’s true, it’s good news, but my biggest worry is that most of these people are untrained. They might have wielded swords a few years back but have no clue about Chaotic Power. When they see the situation here, new problems are bound to arise…”
Clearly, Isaac shared the same concerns as the saintess. He fell silent for a moment after hearing her, his expression suddenly sharpening: “d*mn it, they’re all cowards, not daring to set foot here. Especially those wretched bastards from the Fifth Knights Order; as soon as they heard something was up at the Holy Wall, they scurried off to the edges of Ethanbel! And the Holy Church is useless, unable to command anyone, just trying to trick a bunch of clueless newbies into coming here… What the hell are we doing? What’s the church doing? If something really happens, where the hell would they hide?!”
“And that old b*stard St. George, he’s like a tumor, a thorn stuck in our throats! This is a critical moment for humanity’s survival, and he knows everything! But what’s he doing? Making our lives harder and eyeing the next Pope’s seat! d*mn it, the Williams Family, aside from Commander Nick, what a bunch of rotten scoundrels…”
As the man vented his frustration, the group following him kept their heads down, silent. Saint Margaret listened quietly, her thoughts drifting to the brilliant golden light that had bloomed above the Holy Wall. Suddenly, she furrowed her brow as if sensing something, halting her steps and turning her gaze to the distant left.
Buzz—
A brilliant light shot up from the wall, blindingly bright, soon raining down like droplets, enveloping the area two kilometers away near the Koster Wall, where Commander Seattle of the Grace Scale Division was located. Margaret froze momentarily, and Isaac abruptly stopped his complaining. Both turned to look in that direction.
In the next moment, a fierce wind roared, and countless towering trees burst forth from the wall and ground as if formidable tentacles from the abyss, instantly tearing apart a large portion of the Sin Barrier, demolishing the city wall, mingled with a storm of dust and dead smoke. One of the most robust roots shot up towards the sky from the ground, resembling a gigantic Chaotic Tree as huge as the Holy Wall, dragging a sound akin to a beast’s roar as it crashed down onto the still-collapsing wall below—
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!!!
In that instant, the heavens and the earth trembled.
