If there was anything more chilling than a battlefield, it was a silent one.
The young bandit, rolling up his sleeves and pant legs, holding a short knife, carefully stepped among the corpses of his former comrades and legion soldiers. Sweat dripped from his face turned away from the sky, his hand greedily groped for pendants and ornaments. He dared not look at the ashen faces and lifeless eyeballs like murky crystal balls.
Whether it was his own behavior of looting corpses or the fate of the dead, the youngling felt guilty. The boy imagined that he was not killing people, nor surviving in the chaotic battlefield. His bent waist and hands were not robbing the fallen, but distributing food and water to the weak. However, that era, which did not rely on harming others to survive, only existed in the sorrowful brows of the elderly and in empty imaginations.
In this way, the boy sought forgiveness from the dead while searching. Even though he knew that this was the only way to survive; even though someone else woke up on a silent battlefield, they would make the same choice; even though the boy could forgive them - he could not forgive himself. The dead never brought forgiveness, and the looting never stopped.
Until a glittering road adorned with precious items soaked in blood led the boy to a carriage stuck in mud.
He opened the door, and the sunlight revealed a pair of bare feet and a piece of dark Toga garment in the depths of the carriage. There seemed to be something glowing inside the carriage. A young female with olive-colored eyes raised her face buried in her golden hair and met the boy's gaze. As the young thief remained speechless, another light source appeared in the center of the darkness, aside from the golden and green. It was a warm orange flame held in the woman's hand, which was so captivating that one couldn't look away.
"Constanz."
Hearing the call, the bewildered boy's shoulders shook. Behind him, from the ridge of a hill, cast several burly shadows. In front of him, the flame in the carriage was still scorching, almost burning his brown eyebrows; even so, he felt a chill in his stomach for the girl's predicament. He whispered, using his lips to urge her to run away, but she continued to devote the pulsing flame heart as if she didn't understand his language.
"Constanz."
The companions shouted again, this time closer. Constanz caught a glimpse of figures coming down from the hill, the clash of weapons and armor hanging from their waists sounding even louder. If he didn't retreat, he would be pushed away. So Constanz stepped back into the sunlight, his expression turning cold and distant.
Soon, the bandits slid down the slope covered in corpses and arrived at the front of the carriage, eager to see what was inside. One of them entered the carriage, grabbed the girl by the ankle, and dragged her out, pulling her to the bloody battlefield. The crowd gathered around her, discussing her identity in a cacophony of voices.
Constanz and the sitting girl locked eyes. He had seen many distressed women and children, as well as many eyes full of fear when they sensed the imminent doom. However, the young girl in front of him exuded a mature calmness and sadness beyond her age, as if she didn't care about her own safety but rather felt sorrow for the flame that had yet to be born in her burning womb.
She looked like a grieving angel, originally assigned to be the rebuilder of the world, but fell into the hands of demons and was defeated by the still shattered world. Rather than feeling sorry for her fate, she sought forgiveness from the gods for failing her mission.
Ash boxes, sword sheaths, coins, and brass-inlaid rabbit feet... even though the bandits searched through the shiny talismans among the corpses, what value did they hold today, after the eruption of the Anganar Volcano and the fall of the Empire? The group all knew it without speaking it aloud. They paid a high price to set the trap, enduring the risk of foul odors and disease, all for the sake of the legendary Flamma Varmah held by the Nine Legions.
It was said that if they broke the virgin who served as the container, they could obtain that infinite power.
"Hey, are you a virgin?"
A bandit disguised as a villager grabbed the girl's abundant golden hair and asked harshly. The girl remained silent, just closing her eyes in pain.
"Athair, look at them, all wearing Purple Cloaks," another bandit kicked the soldiers with his foot and spat on them. "What now, boss?" The group fell into silence, and no one believed that just speaking kindly would make the virgin willingly hand over the divine flame. To confirm the rumors' truth, perhaps the only way was to cut her open and take a look.
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The bandit lifted the girl's golden hair high. The tearing pain in her scalp made her struggle in the air, grabbing her hair with both hands and trying to distribute the weight at the hair roots. The struggle like an animal made everyone laugh out loud. The bandit took out a serrated flesh-cutting knife from his arms, pressed it against the virgin's pale and sweaty throat. As he slowly exerted pressure with his thumb, blood beads squeezed out of the blue veins.
One person in the gang spoke in an excited and trembling voice, asking Athair to stop. Constanz, who was standing by and watching, also looked at the hunchbacked man with a corpse-like face.
The man wiped the sweat from under his collapsed black hair with the back of his hand, scanned everyone with his sharp and timid eyes like a rat. "She is the last of the Legion. Do you think our hatred for the Legion will disappear easily with her death? Think about who killed the livestock, destroyed the crops, and took away the girl? Sean, who burned Eileen in front of you?"
The bloated man with gray-white beard around his broad chin turned red in his eyes as he heard the familiar name.
"Bontradh, and who took away Benak on her wedding night?" Hearing the name of his fiancée, a young man with flushed cheeks, who had cut open a suit of armor and draped it over his shoulder, could not hold back his rising anger. He walked into the crowd, drew out the sword he had found and shouted:
"Don't you understand yet? The Empire never planned to let her go on the pyre from the beginning. The Empire took away our loved ones just to replace this bitch. What pure virgin? Virgin my ass! A virgin who cannot save people is the devil who harms people."
He spat in the face of the virgin. Athair let go, causing her to fall to the ground, where she was met with saliva and harsh laughter. But the true darkness came from the silence of the men as they closed in. The virgin could feel the malice like a language transmitted between the shadows, carrying with it ugly desires beyond just wanting to kill her - If purity was so important to her, why would the men let her die pure?
The back of her head was struck by the hilt of a sword, causing her to lose consciousness. When she woke up, her eyes were covered by clothing and her mouth was pried open and stuffed with mud and grass. She felt herself lying on a hard ground, with her hands and legs pulled open and held down by someone. She heard the sound of a knife tearing through clothes, and a chill ran through her body. Then came the sound of pants falling to the ground, followed by excruciating pressure, trembling and sweating, and the burning pain of her body being torn apart...
Not far from the ugly violence, young Constanz looked up at the birds flying in the clear spring sky. Judging from their flying patterns, they were all attracted by the corpses. Even if they wanted to fly endlessly in the sky, they had to come down and peck at the corpses in order to regain their strength.
Although he felt guilty, he knew he had to draw strength from the fallen, or else he too would fall.
If his companions had to do it to keep moving forward, then Constanz, who had not lost his wife and daughter, could hardly blame them. However, just as he was overwhelmed by the putrid stench, his thin arm was grabbed by Bontradh, who had lost his fiancée and was now crazed with destroying the virgin's purity.
"It's your turn now, little guy. Don't be afraid, no one will curse you. As for that bitch? She's not a virgin anymore."
Ignoring Constanz's resistance, he forcibly dragged the boy and threw him in front of the carriage. There, several of his accomplices had already hurriedly tied up their pants and were gazing at the hill range to see if there were any curious onlookers.
Meanwhile, the virgin lying on the ground remained motionless, with a ragged toga robe draped over her body. Her exposed lower body was a mess, making it unbearable to look at. Someone kicked Constanz from behind, causing him to prop himself up with his hands. His companions around him saw that he hesitated to act and laughed raucously, stripping off his pants from behind. Constanz looked at the naked woman in front of him, sweating profusely. At that moment, he heard a crow cawing in the distance and looked up at the birds soaring in the sky.
If a bird's guilt could make it fly up to the sky, why can a person's guilt only make them crawl on the ground? Amid his companions' mockery, Constanz couldn't help but shed tears.
He heard a faint cough coming from below, and when he lowered his head to look, he saw the virgin's chest still slowly rising and falling. Moreover, besides her heart, Constanz felt another more resolute force pulsing under her slightly glowing skin. He remembered this warmth, which was identical to the flame she had held in her hands in the carriage. The green eyes, golden hair, and orange flames that shone in the darkness reappeared in Constanz's heart.
As a mortal who had to plunder the weak to survive, he wondered if he was qualified enough to accept a power that far exceeded his own. Just like the boy's fear, as he tried to grasp the divine flame, the flame consumed him along his arm.
"Aren't you done yet? Get lost!"
Fed up with Constanz's hesitation, Bontradh kicked him off the virgin and straddled her waist. He raised his sword in his hand, aimed at the mouth filled with dirt and grass below. Sensing the impending fate, tears flowed from her eyes, which were wrapped in coarse cloth. Constanz urgently shouted:
"Wait, Bontradh!"
"Why protect a woman who can't make you hard?" Cold sweat slid down the young man's forehead as he sported a wicked smile. "Besides, she's hardly a woman, but a vessel in the shape of one, with arrogantly arched buttocks. And after we've broken her keyhole, she's nothing more than a broken box that can't be opened. Do you hear me? A broken box." He spat on the maiden's chest. "When faced with a broken box that can't be opened, what would you do?"
"Chop her up, Bonte!" The accomplice also clamored on the side.
Even though Constanz only experienced a superficial understanding of the power of the divine flame in his hallucination, the warmth still left a deep impression on him. The thought of the easily attainable power and the filthy hands of his companions made him shudder, as did the distance between the sharp edge of the sword and the paper-thin skin.
However, what made him tremble even more was that fate seemed to have rejected this script and had a different plan for the fire's destiny.