"What do you mean?" because of the rain for several days, the firewood around me was still a little damp. The campfire made a crackling sound, and the smoke was a little choking, so that the group sat in the upwind direction - it was Joshua who spoke, and the orange light of the fire illuminated the side of his face, and the silhouette of the sea and the bridge of his nose made his face look more profound.

"The shaft is of white wood, straight, oiled and fur sanded. Although the arrowhead is only the cheapest short cone, the arrow feather is a better turkey tail feather, with the correct shape and meticulous workmanship. Most hunters use homemade arrows, which are carefully crafted by professional craftsmen, and are obviously not an option for poor thieves. Henry picked up a piece of wood next to him, threw it into the campfire, and continued.

"The group near us looks like a junior mercenary, but they shouldn't be in the same league as the archer. Mira and Amonica next to her both stared at Henry's side face, the sage's expression as calm as ever, but his tone raised a little, showing his seriousness.

"It's a temptation, and some big guy has his eyes on us. The wind suddenly changed, and Mira, who was sitting next to her, was choking on the smoke and coughing, she got up and moved her position, and Amonica next to her took out a cotton cloth and handed her a tear with concern.

"Are you going to come?" Joshua stabbed straight in, without a hint of fear in his tone.

"Well, the cost of hiring archers who can afford this kind of equipment is not low, and I don't know what the reason for them is to target us, but they will definitely come back. Henry glanced around at the three people around him, and then said softly, "It's better to be careful after that." ”

He said this, and Joshua was a little silent, and he lowered his head and stared blankly at the flickering campfire for a long time before he spoke, "If I didn't deal with that man, but left him alive......"

The red-haired swordsman was only halfway through his sentence, and the tall sage next to him shook his head—though he knew Joshua couldn't see him—and continued, "He's just cannon fodder, a little more advanced than those junior mercenaries. Most of the time that person has only a description of the goal, and the specific purpose and reason are unknown. ”

"It's a good thing that you just dealt with him, otherwise with the characteristics of an archer, he could have continued to ambush and track. The bonfire continued to make a crackling, crackling, and the sage ended the conversation with a faint word.

"Let's schedule a shift vigil. ”

......

After nearly a week of rain, at first thankful for a slight cooler, it inevitably starts to bore you with everything after a tireless nagging shrew that makes a constant noise and brings dampness every day and night.

Flint and steel striking a flint that can't be lit dozens of times, firewood that chokes on a cough and emits a lot of smoke when it burns, a night when it's raining but still sweltering and you can't sleep, a cloak of clothes that starts to smell musty because of the constant dampness that makes you feel sick.

And that's not even counting the thieves and wild beasts who take advantage of the drop in visibility, and if they sleep too soundly after dinner, they will probably never wake up again.

Travel in this era is a concept of luxury.

Either you'll have to pay a lot of money to hire guards and retinues or even bring your own carriage and a set of furniture and mattresses, or you'll have to put on your own body and risk losing your life to go out into the wilderness.

In addition to the pampered children of the nobles who want to come out to "have a long insight", in fact, many people will not be willing to travel if they are not forced by life. But then again, in such an era, even if it is an ordinary life, there are only a few people who can spend a safe life.

The concept of "peace and prosperity" is a fantasy for all the people we've met so far, including our Mira, Amonica, and Joshua.

It's a chaotic time, violence and death are everywhere, so even the kindest of archetypes, like our Mira, have a value of "don't hurt others" rather than "avoid killing."

She can't escape the background of this great era, or to put it another way, if she had embraced the kind and forgiving that kind of anachronistic kindness and tolerance for all people, she might have died before she met the sage.

"Kindness" is not the "Virgin" of "universal relief", it is a kind of "mother" who does not use this power to violate others and does not do evil, but has courtesy and respect for others as "people" under the premise that they have the power not to be violated by others.

Kindness is a form of respect, a form of tolerance, but it must also be based on strength and to respond decisively when it is offended.

When necessary, they choose to kill, but they don't live with this idea every day.

The tide of the times is moving our protagonists forward, and perhaps one day in the future, the definition of all this will be different.

On this day's journey, something that they carefully protected, something that glittered in such an era that they tried to preserve. Perhaps, after thousands of years, it will take root and sprout at the moment of a certain spring.

At this moment, what will happen in the future, they still don't know.

Even the experienced sages were not omniscient and omnipotent—in fact, if he were to be asked, Henry would probably be skeptical that the gods were omniscient and omnipotent.

All in all, they are just moving forward towards the front of their journey.

There are two flowers, one on each branch.

The second round of storms in the Soradin Heights at the beginning of July was poised to start, but in addition to the power of nature, other things that are also closely related to people's lives have begun to occur frequently, and they have an impact in various fields, but if we have to say that the most affected are the clergy of the White Church on the west coast, and its subordinate cathars.

The beginning of everything has to go back another three months, to the Five Kingdoms region, which is recognized by the church as a "place outside the law", and does not believe in white churches.

Just like any large organization with tentacles spread over many regions, the events that take place throughout the West Coast are bound to escape the eyes of the White Church as long as they are related to their interests, and based on this fact, the appearance of the demon in the Duke of Monroe's Mansion in April, which shocked many people, the White Church reacted indifferently and obviously incomprehensibly.

With the exception of the ordinary peasants and toilers, who have turned their ears to what was going on outside the window, and which separated the two territories only after a few discussions were put to the back of the window, the vast majority of whom did not really learn about what was happening at Monroe until June or July from the refugees in exile - and forgot about it in a blink of an eye.

But the White See, who is - or at least they claim to be - "the first line of defense against evil in human civilization", reacted calmly when they learned of the demonic movement in the Monroe area: they did not organize knights to meet the darkness and save the light, they did not call on people not to be afraid to go forward, as the legend suggests, they did not make any spectacular statements or speeches - in fact, they did not publish any news about the demons in the most unusual way.

Is it the fear that people will panic because of this? Is it that the current White Church does not have the strength to strangle the demons? and the people who are aware of these things in some parts of the West Coast are beginning to have doubts in their hearts.

Ever since mankind had such a thing as history, these evil ghosts have always whispered in your ears like our shadows, and they exist in this world with every life, and they cannot come into this world, because some great and extraordinary power has cut off these evil beings. When the White Church rose to power, they were given the name "Demons" and were used by the Church to claim pure evil and chaos, the greatest fear imaginable by humanity.

Looking through history, traces that belong to these guys are everywhere. Some of the ancient books and many legends that have been left behind have made scholars and magicians aware of demons, but the person or organization that knows the most about demons is naturally the church itself, which has fought against them for many years.

-- It's not easy to summon them. Any experienced mage or advanced scholar who has read thousands of books will tell you that even an experienced and high-level dark mage with plenty of mana and a lot of spellcasting materials cannot guarantee that he will be able to successfully and efficiently summon a large number of demons for servitude. Humans are always stupid and foolish to think that they can control everything, and many disasters related to demons in history have often originated from someone who thinks they can control demons.

Struck with awe.

The Duke's family, a not-so-powerful kingdom, managed to summon a large number of cheap but loyal demon hounds - this is not too familiar to scholars familiar with the relevant history, it is obvious that a certain high-ranking demon lord has taken the initiative to settle in the world after using these small tricks to make those humans think they are in control of the situation, and if it succeeds, it will inevitably bring bloody wind and blood to this world.

Who had succeeded in stopping this guy, the advanced scholars and mages who were hiding somewhere but were not ignorant of the world were curious, but they were more interested in the White Church, which should know more than them, why didn't they react to it?

Questions, swirling in the hearts of these gray-haired old men who had lived in seclusion. But the White Church could not have failed to react to this, and in fact, in a place they did not know, this ancient organization, which had an extremely well-developed root system like the trees of the arid region, and which was intertwined in many places, had undergone tremendous changes in the space of three months.

First, many regional archbishops were forcefully replaced.

It was astonished to find that many of the clergy they knew with were replaced by new people who had come out of nowhere, who were very high-spoken and sharp-minded, who seemed very proud and confident, and who were the vast majority of them quite young.

Things gradually heated up, and in the middle of May, the first Kia attack on humans occurred in a remote town in the Soradin region.

Rumors of these creatures are not uncommon on the West Coast and even in all parts of the continent of Rigal, but as the human sphere of influence has expanded, they have increasingly hidden in the inaccessible wilderness, and even if they encounter humans, they should keep their distance as much as possible, as there are easier prey in nature.

Attacking humans means getting revenge on many of the same tall and strong creatures.

Beasts can understand this, and so do subhumans with higher intelligence, so in the past, unless humans have offended their territory, they would never have clashed with humans - but in this case in May, it was the subhumans who invaded and plundered their villages. In connection with the appearance of demons before, some people who were very concerned about the movement of the church began to think about it carefully.

In the splendid literature and historical records of the Laman Empire, there are many theories about various creatures, and some scholars have mentioned the concept that demons, through their own persuasion and some spiritual interference, can make human beings become more obedient creatures to their own desires, becoming chaotic and greedy. However, there are many records and legends that once had a larger and more powerful spirit of warriors or heroes who were able to resist the charm of demons and maintain their hearts.

――What if you think about this example the other way around?

A subhuman who also possesses intelligence and desire, but whose spirit is purer and more primitive than that of humans. What would you do if you were bewitched by a demon?

What happened in Monroe was not a single case from beginning to end, but a beginning for a series of things.

On May 19, 1330 in the Divine Calendar, when the second Kia attack occurred in another village in the Soladin region, the ignorant people did not mention it for the time being, and the white church, which had been watched by some people, finally had a movement that they could also see.

If you don't make a sound, it's a blockbuster.

Signs of armed members of the Knightly Cathar setting out for the wilderness began to be witnessed by people everywhere, ignorant civilians did not know what was happening, and those who followed the White Church could only guess in vain that there was a change of power within the White Church on the West Coast.

The sudden and frequent expeditions of the Knights of the Cathar, who had been serving only as the guardians of the Holy See for many years, all hinted at a change in some of the policies of the Holy See.

What exactly they are for, what they want to get, we don't know at the moment.

But what is certain is that this will inevitably ripple over a wide range.

Time passed slowly, and in the blink of an eye, one step was taken, and it came to July, which was not much different from June. The ground was damp and soft after days of heavy rain, and a line of knights in cloaks with emblems on them ran wildly along the way.

And the direction it is taking is exactly the same as that of our sage group. (To be continued.) )