Elise and Yu stood facing each other; both of them staring at the headless body in between them. Their thoughts were in turmoil for different reasons.

"Elise," Edward gingerly touched his daughter's shoulder.

She did not respond until Edward pulled her into his arms. Only then did the tension that held her released. Her body shook with sobs, her cheeks wet with tears.

"Shh… it's okay," Edward stroked the back of Elise's head, consoling her.

The others trailed behind. Gino gulped and averted his gaze. Greysen, now conscious and with his sword, frowned. Cenric made sure that there was no more danger before he cautiously approached Yu.

"That's my sword, I believe," Cenric said with a guarded expression.

He had witnessed the entire exchange between Yu and Fulton. Before he could recover from the shock, another incident shocked him further: Yu had executed the pleading slave in cold blood. His shock quickly morphed into caution and suspicion. Cenric and Greysen would have been hostile if not for the light of resonance that shone when Yu first grasped Cenric's sword. It was a prove that Yu did not have evil intentions despite his seeming ruthlessness towards the enemy.

There were many questions left to be answered but getting the boy to calm down was their priority.

"Yu," Cenric called out to the dazed boy again. He motioned towards his sword.

Yu looked up, seemingly at a loss of what to do.

"I…" he trailed.

"It's okay. Just put the sword down. I don't want you to hurt yourself," Cenric persuaded.

Yu looked down to the sword and realized that his knuckles were white. His nails dug into his palm and drew blood. He tried to unclench his fingers but they failed to respond to his brain. In the end, he just stared blankly at the hilt of the sword.

Noticing this, Cenric cautiously stepped forward with his palms facing outwards.

"It's okay. Yu, I'm coming to you, alright?" After making sure that Yu would not suddenly lash out, Cenric reached the latter and held the boy's hand firmly-- but gentle-- in his.

One by one, Cenric unclenched Yu's frozen fingers and recovered his sword.

"There. We're all good. Everything's okay now," Cenric said while he patted Yu's shoulder.

While he was doing that, he signaled Greysen over with his eyes.

Feeling surprised, Greysen his finger pointing at himself and mouthed, "What? Me?"

Cenric frowned and nodded, then gestured with his chin for Greysen to come over. He wanted the towering knight to take care of the listless boy because he had to investigate the room of the dwelling. Whatever that had happened in there caused such a bloody scene. He had to make sure that everything was completely safe for the others.

It was not the best choice, but they had no other options. Edward was preoccupied with Elise. Gino was just a kid that was equally shocked. Besides, the person that was gentle and kind from their team was dead. The only person left was Greysen. Cenric's heart dropped at the thought of Lana. They would have to take care of her body later.

It was not ideal for one person to investigate an unknown place but Cenric had used his heightened perception and made sure that there was no one else inside. There were no magical fluctuations that could indicate magical traps. However, it was still risky as he did not know of any mechanical traps set inside.

Greysen begrudgingly obliged and stepped over to relieve Cenric.

"Thanks," Cenric said.

"You owe me one," Greysen grumbled.

"Nay," Cenric chuckled, "You owe the boy one."

Cenric shook his head, stepped over the splintered door and into the room. Greysen saw his back disappearing into the darkness.

Greysen turned his head back to Yu and scratched his head. He had a problem-- he had no idea how to console a shell-shocked person. He thought for a bit and cleared his throat.

"Alright boy, why don't we go to the side and take a sit?"

He was met with silence. Yu's gaze remained at the headless body. However, his eyes stared into nothingness.

"Hey, can you hear me?" Greysen waved his hands in front of Yu.

Still, his actions were met with more silence. Greysen groaned. He disliked taking care of others. It would be great if being a knight meant chopping through hordes of enemy. He thought for a bit and gave up. With one swift move, grabbed the boy and swung him over his shoulder.

Yu yelped and struggled at the sudden manhandling. Greysen ignored him and deposited the struggling boy onto the ground like a sack of potatoes. Yu landed hard on his back and rolled from side to side, groaning. He finally stopped on his side, breathing through clenched teeth. Greysen clicked his tongue and watched the boy with his hands on his waist.

Slowly, Yu sat up, his hand on his back. He glared at Greysen.

"There, there. Everything's okay now," Greysen crouched and patted Yu's shoulder-- copying Cenric's words from before. However, it sounded like he was mocking Yu. The boy stared at Greysen without another word.

"Are you hurt anywhere?" A familiar gruff voice asked.

Yu turned to see Edward. He shook his head.

"Let me take a look at you," Edward said. He bent down and lifted Yu's shirt to expose the latter's back.

"Hmm… it's just a bruise. No broken bones."

Yu nodded.

"Hah! As if he'll get broken bones from that," Greysen scoffed.

Edward narrowed his eyes, "The liana monster threw all of us to the ground-- hard. It doesn't hurt to be too cautious."

Edward then checked Yu thoroughly to make sure that he was really fine. While he was doing that, Yu saw Elise and Gino sitting some distance away from him. Elise's eyes were red and she was sniffling. Then, their gazes met. Elise immediately hid behind Gino as if scalded by boiling water.

Yu felt a pang of sadness in his heart. He did not expect Elise to react this way. However, after a few moments of thought, he felt that it was only natural. He had beheaded the slave in cold-blood. He was a killer.

Gino said something to Elise, trying to persuade her. However, Elise shrunk back farther behind him. Sighing, he turned back to Yu with an apologetic face. Yu shook his head, indicating that he did not mind.

"Edward," Cenric called from the entrance of the room. His voice was level, but his face was pale.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"You said you are a village healer, right?"

"Yes. What's wrong?"

"Come here. I need your help," Cenric beckoned for Edward to follow him into the room.

The two men left and disappeared into the dark room but not before Edward reassuring Elise that he would be fine. The dwelling returned to its silence once more.

"Hey kid," Greysen nudged Yu with his foot, "Fancy moves back there."

Yu gulped and remained silent.

"It's hard to believe that you grew up as a simple village boy in the outskirts. It's impossible," Greysen added. He paused and gauged Yu's response.

Yu lowered his gaze and stared at the ground.

"If not for the sword resonance, we won't be sitting here chatting. You'd be dead," Greysen said, his voice grave.

Yu wanted to ask about sword resonance, but he stopped at the second sentence. He looked at Greysen with a blank face.

"I'd say that you're an exceptional Farling spy. You hold your lies well, you barely react when I threaten you, and you fight well-- except that the blessed sword accepted you. Why is that so?" Greysen asked rhetorically.

"Fortunately, it can only mean one thing: that you don't hold evil in your heart," Greysen sighed before he continued, "And I can only trust the judgment of the blessed ones-- that you don't mean us harm."

Yu remained silent as he was once again engrossed in his thoughts. He thought over Greysen's words: that he did not mean harm and that he did not hold evil in his heart. However, he killed in cold blood. No-- more accurately, he did not feel when he killed.

'Was that evil? What is evil?'

Seeing Yu once again with a blank stare, Greysen misunderstood that Yu was troubled with guilt.

"Kid, what you did was necessary. It was either us or them. As for the slave… Well, he was the slave of the mage. So, he who is in service of evil deserves to die."

Yu frowned. He recalled Jop's words. The slave had no choice but to follow the orders of his master.

'Did he deserve death?' Yu thought.

"… but he killed the children…" Yu mumbled. He felt something stir in his heart. The images of the dead children flashed in his mind. He clenched his eyes at the memory.

"What!? Killed the children!? " Greysen exclaimed.

Yu flinched at the sound of Greysen's booming voice.

"You mean… in there…?" Greysen pointed to the dark room.

Yu nodded.

Greysen frowned and thought for a moment.

"Then, he deserved it. You did the right thing," Greysen said and patted Yu’s shoulder.

Yu looked back down to the ground. He was not so sure about that.

*****

Back in the dark room, Cenric and Edward looked at the cage in front of them, at a loss of what to do. At least twenty humans sat cramped together in the cage, covered in filth and excrement. Flies buzzed and darted close to the filth that soaked the prisoners. Their eyes were devoid of life despite their slow breaths. Some sat upright while some lay on their sides; their bodies piled above one another.

"What do we do with them?" Cenric asked.

"There's nothing we can do. Their spirits are broken. Even if we preserve their lives…" Edward's voice trailed. He did not continue but Cenric understood what he meant. However, Edward did not want to give up.

"Perhaps there's a way to reverse the effect. If we know the method used to break their spirits, there just might be a way--"

"There is no way. Broken spirits can't be fixed."

Edward sighed. He knew in his heart that there was no hope.

"What do we do with them?" Cenric asked again, not exactly expecting an answer.

He thought hard for a solution. They could leave the prisoners here and call for reinforcements. However, it would take almost two weeks for the reinforcements to arrive. While waiting, the prisoners would be exposed to danger from wild beasts. Most importantly, they lack food and would starve to death.

There was, however, another option that neither Cenric nor Edward wanted to take, if at all possible.

Edward kneeled by the open cage once more and looked at the prisoners. He had checked on them but he wanted to make sure that his diagnosis was true. Then, a tiny figure caught his eye. He did not see the figure earlier because it was almost hidden under the other bodies. The lack of light did not help their situation either. Despite that, Edward ignored the filth and buzzing flies and parted the sea of bodies to reach the half-hidden figure. He dug his hands under and pulled it out with a grunt.

A skinny body emerged. Edward could feel the bones beneath the skin in his hands. He squinted under the dim light and saw that it was a girl. Unlike the other prisoners, her eyes were screwed shut, her breathing rapid and shallow. Edward brushed his hand over her forehead and felt it burning.

“This is…?” Cenric asked, puzzled by the sudden development.

“A sick girl. It’s too dark in here. I can’t examine her properly like this,” Edward said and carried the girl out of the room that reeked of death and decay.

He set her down under the sun rays that shone through the hole in the roof. The girl's face was caked in filth. Edward wiped her face with the edge of his shirt.

"Does anyone have water?" he asked aloud.

"Here," Greysen tossed a water pouch from a pack.

Edward caught the water pouch and rinsed the filth from the girl's face. It revealed her youthful face. He also rinsed her body, exposing her bare torso. Gasps sounded behind Edward.

"Father, is she...?" Elise asked. Gino and she had walked over to her father when she saw him walk out of the room with someone in his arms.

Edward frowned and did not answer Elise. He looked at the wound on the girl's abdomen in horror. It was a long, diagonal gash under her left breast that exposed the red, swollen flesh inside. Some of her flesh was discolored. Foul-smelling greenish-yellow pus oozed from the wound. Worst of all, it was teeming with pulsing maggots that crawled in and out of the burrowed flesh.

The skin on the back of Elise's head crawled at the sight of the maggots. Despite that, she knelt beside her father, intending to help. The stench wafted into her nose and she gagged.

“How is she?” Cenric asked.

“Very sick. Her wound is badly infected.”

“Any chance for her to have avoided the procedure to break their spirits?”

“It’s hard to tell without her awake, but there is a chance if she was unconscious during the procedure,” Edward sighed. His did not hold his hopes high.

“I’ll try my best to help her.”

"But father, we've lost our medical supplies," Elise said while covering her nose and mouth.

"We have some basic supplies in our pack," Cenric said and called out to Greysen to pass their supplies.

Edward thanked them and got to work. He laid out the supplies and frowned. They were meager-- just some bandages and herbs to prevent infection. It was to be expected, however, since they had a mage that could cure wounds in a few minutes. Nevertheless, Edward got to work by removing the maggots.

Yu sat in a corner and watched the different activities unfold. Greysen went to Cenric and both of the knights started discussing their findings and next steps. Their voices were low but some words were loud enough for Yu to catch the gist of their conversation. He also watched the knights’ different expressions. Cenric was calm for most of the time but Greysen would get agitated during certain parts of the conversation.

Greysen pointed towards the bog and the room. Then, his head gestured towards where Yu sat. Yu alerted at their gestures just in time for the two knights to look at him meaningfully. He kept a poker face but his heart pounded hard against his chest. They knew that he lied about his identity. Yu did not know what to tell them.

‘Should I tell them the truth? Even so, would they believe me?’ he thought.

Yu could only hope that they would not arrest him for espionage. Greysen’s words from before about sword resonance gave him hope. He retracted his gaze and turned to the side. Lana’s body, her face covered with a cloth, laid in a corner. There were barely any traces of blood on her white robes. Her blood was sucked dry, leaving her skin wrinkled and leathery.

A sudden realization struck Yu saw Lana’s body. The strange energy that surrounded the area was gone. It had disappeared without a trace. This puzzled Yu.

‘When did it disappear?’

Yu was not the only person who noticed the disappearance of the strange energy. Cenric was equally puzzled. However, he had a hunch to what had happened.

“Argh, what a headache. I didn’t sign up for this,” Greysen grumbled as he ran his fingers through his hair.

“What are you talking about? You signed up for this when you joined the institution,” Cenric said.

“It was a call to duty,” Greysen crossed his arms.

“Still, you had a choice,” Cenric sighed and continued, “Enough of this empty talk. This is the best choice. We’ll take the girl, if she survives, and leave the rest.”

“You mean, kill the rest.”

“... yes.”

“I hope that there isn’t much backlash from the others,” Greysen cautioned.

“It’s my decision. My responsibility.”

“I wish Lana was here so she could think of something else,” Greysen muttered.

Cenric breathed out an extended breath when he heard Lana’s name.

“There are no other options. She would have come to the same conclusion,” he sighed again. His lips tucked into a straight line when he thought of Lana. She was his responsibility too.

Edward was working on the unconscious girl when he suddenly stopped.

“What’s wrong, father?” Elise asked, puzzled that her father stopped suddenly.

Upon closer inspection, he realized that the edges of the wound had black tendrils that streaked away from the wound. Edward paused mid-way. It was the second time in the day that he felt helpless.

“It’s corrupted,” Edward whispered, barely audible.

The already dispirited atmosphere dropped even further after he said that. Any hopes for a survivor were dashed. It was as if he announced her death sentence.

“Would magic save her?” Elise thought and asked.

“Yes, but--”

“There’s no one that can use magic here,” Cenric concluded.

Elise looked up at Cenric, then to her father. She stole a peek at Yu before looking back at the girl again. Memories of Lana performing magic replayed in her mind. She repeated Lana’s instructions in her heart. The nights where she secretly tried to harness magical energy came back to her. She felt that she had almost grasped the magic.

Her breath hitched as she mustered her courage. She gripped the edges of her skirt and took a few deep breaths before she stated her intention.

“I-I’d like to cure her with magic,” Elise declared, her eyes bright.