A leader of the 100 man escort unit turned to answer after killing a monster that was present here.
".....Yes! Of course."
Originally, it was a guard attached to prepare for a counterattack from the enemy elite. It was only natural that powerful mages were stationed for the counterattack.
"I see. Well then, call for fire magic."
"Y-yes!?"
The outrageous words of the looters caused a commotion around them.
"Set it on fire?"
"It's true that the undead are vulnerable to fire......"
"Then the precious wheat is going to......."
"What are you thinking, captain!"
The captain grabbed one of the ears of wheat that was nearby and displayed it to the others.
"This wheat can’t be eaten anyway! It grew in the field where the undead horde was buried. Of course it's tainted with poisons and miasma."
"Ah......!"
The peasant soldier who had just been saved by the captain had a look of understanding in his eyes.
He remembered the conversation he was having with the other soldier just before the revenants attacked. The wheat stalks were blackened, as if they were diseased, which was not typical of wheat from Arquell known for their bountiful harvests. It had been poisoned by the undead.
On closer inspection, the ones that the captain grabbed up and the ones that were growing in clusters all over the field had sinister black spots on them. The poison of the undead was spreading and there was no way they could feed their troops with it.
"Besides, I don't think we can leave such a large number of monsters behind. Right now, they're just a bunch of rotting dead guarding their territory, but if any of their intelligent brethren join them, who knows what could happen?"
There was no way anything good could come from leaving the monsters on their own. If they could kill them now, then now was the best time to kill them.
"It's a waste of time, but I guess we have no choice...... Mage Squad, set them on fire!"
"Y-yes!""
Ten of the mages began to chant. However, there was a hint of frustration on their faces. It's no wonder. The mages, who were generally inferior in physical strength to the warriors, had taken the trouble to join the army, even crossing unfamiliar mountains to participate in the war. And yet, the job they were tasked with now, while having empty stomachs, was to light up the fields. Their pride as men, educated at the academy, must have been deeply hurt.
Nevertheless, if that was the most efficient way to dispose of the herd of undead, they could only endure it. Monsters must be defeated. Especially the undead, who cursed the living and could multiply with each kill. That was the common sense of this world.
"......Fireball!" "Flame Lance!" Heat Wind!"
Even the use of magic in these situations shows the character of the mage. There are those who just use low-level magic to create the fire. There were those who were venting their anger and so, used mid-tier magic when it was unnecessary to do so. There were also those who put thought into their spell and chose a weaker spell but with a wider area of effect.
Anyway, the mages' spells manifested and ignited the field.
"――Orghhh!?"
"ARRRGGGGGHHH! ARRRGGGGGHHH!!!"
It swallowed the swarm of revenants into a sea of flames.
"Okay, it's working! No, it's working extraordinarily well!"
"Suck it, you rotten bastards!"
"Time to go to hell, you sons of bitches!"
The soldiers shouted with joy as the silhouettes of the dead crumbled into the flames.
However, the expression of the captain and his subordinate commanders was not good.
"......Order the mages. Prepare wind magic. Change the direction of the wind to spread the fire and burn the village to the ground."
"......Yes!"
They spread the flames further and tried to burn down the uninhabited village as well. The soldiers looked at the captain curiously.
With a grim expression on his face, the captain preemptively answered the burning question his men might have.
"Revenants are not the kind of undead that grow in large numbers like this. Sure, they increase in number by adding those they kill to their ranks, but they're slow-moving and have no interest in anything outside their small territory."
"But it's actually a large amount of—"
"Nonsense! That’s why I’m telling you, their numbers were artificially increased!"
The captain's angry voice flew at the unsuspecting soldier.
Artificially increased? The horror of such words caused the soldiers to open their eyes widely. Undead monsters that desecrate the living and defied the teachings of the church had been intentionally created? Was such a thing possible?
While many of the soldiers were stunned, the captain continued his explanation.
"Recall what we saw as we surveyed the uninhabited village. There were half-eaten meals left on the table, and no particular signs of a struggle. Wasn't that right?"
"Y-yes. But what does that mean—"
"Don't you get it yet? ......If one of the villagers had become a revenant and attacked his living companions to increase their numbers, it would be strange if the house wasn't in greater disrepair!"
On hearing that, that was indeed odd. The revenant's attacked by using their limbs. They lacked precision since they had lost their intelligence. If such a thing were to run rampant through the village, it would definitely leave traces of its victims' blood or destroyed items scattered around. At the very least, there would be no clean dishes left on the table.
"That means that this herd of revenants was made by someone who attacked the villagers and used them as material. And someone intelligent enough to leave no trace of them in the village, and powerful enough to kill the villagers in their entirety, without letting them escape or leaving any trace of them."
The possibilities that were suggested were spine-tingling. Even in a remote farming village, the mastermind had wiped out the entire population without a trace and turned them into undead. What kind of being would have that kind of ability?
It could be a powerful and insane necromancer, or it could be a highly intelligent undead. Either way, it was a formidable foe that must remain guarded against.
The soldier questioned fearfully.
"You think it's still hiding in the village?"
"Well. As long as it didn't show up during the investigation, it might have already left the area. But that's not impossible. There might be a hidden room somewhere in the buildings, and it might be hiding in there...... Considering that, since the village is uninhabited anyway, it's better to burn everything just in case."
The captain looked at the village with a discouraged expression as the flames spread and burned. The stern look in his eyes seemed to indicate that he was trying to find the culprit who had laid this trap for them.
※ ※ ※
"Oh......, what a terrible thing to do, soldiers from my old homeland, St. Gallen. They burned down a whole village of poor villagers who were trying to protect their fields."
A sinister silhouette laughed in the middle of the village, which was doubly red from the sunset and the flames.
A tall and lean person wrapped in a cloak was tiptoeing while looking afar. His face was beautiful and even noble, but his mockery tinged expression betrayed all of that . Even in the twilight of the day, the inhumane whiteness of his skin gave a creepy feeling rather than beauty.
It was, as it were, a malicious caricature of the aristocracy. They were depicted as blue-blooded monsters who feed on the blood of the people.
He was a vampire. A vampire was an undead aristocrat, a monster with a beauty that was twice as horrifying as its beauty.
His name was Charl Franz Schmidt, also known as Opus 04. He was the fourth accursed masterpiece created by the devilish alchemist.
"But this. Was what the master planned, I remark."
What appeared from behind him without a sound was a beautiful but unusual woman with platinum hair and golden eyes. Or something like a woman.
Her beautiful face was like a statue that had been finely carved by a divine artisan, but her expressionless face was like a statue itself. Her thin, supple, even soft body was actually made of the strongest metal in the world. The earflaps that extended upward like horns were man-made sensory organs that surpassed even the hearing of wild animals.
Opus 05, Fem. She was a golem created with lost technology, and a fighting machine that used weapons created with unknown technology. Like Charl, she was one of the "masterpieces" created by the heretic with "unorthodox methods."
"Reporting. Our guests from the west. Have arrived on schedule."
Fem put her hands over both of her weirdly shaped ears. She used them to pick up and listen to conversations as far as kilometres away.
"Look, the village is on fire!"
"The army over there…… it’s St. Gallen!"
