…
Closing the door behind him, Peter twisted his neck to survey the village. It lacked the always-present hustle and bustle. Today, it was eerily quiet as Peter's ear failed to pick up any sound. Bodies littered on the streets, instead of people walking around doing their business.
Peter wrinkled his nose, feeling the stench of rotten bodies. So many bodies were laid in front of him, humans and monsters alike. As far as his gaze travelled, only death greeted him. Only corpses.
Shaking his head, Peter moved to the nearest house. Even inside, signs of struggle and clash were displayed. Scattered and broken furniture, half-eaten pieces of someone unrecognisable. Peter clenched his palms in anger before he took a calming breath and relaxed them.
'What is the point of getting angry now? All the perpetrators are dead already,' he sighed, expelling his anger. Undying Vitality flared, soothing his taut nerves. "I came here with an objective. Better to focus on that," he murmured to himself.
Ignoring the state of affairs inside the house, Peter started to look around. He searched each room for survivors. No one was found with a beating heart. Left disappointed, he changed his objective. Knowing very well that travel required resources, he started to gather whatever money he could find, taking it with him as he exited the house.
The search for survivors continued. As time passed, it became clear that no survivors were remaining in the village besides them. Faced with such a reality, Peter started to pull the human corpses out of houses and gather them in a pile. Whenever he would encounter a house without any living people inside, he would drag the human carcasses out while cleaning the house of small valuables. Dead did not need money.
In the end, Peter didn't find a single living human in the entire village. All that he found were the bodies of people he knew and cherished dearly, mangled so badly that he had difficulty identifying them. Left disappointed and grieving, Peter made his way towards the barns where farmers kept their horses and domesticated animals like sheep.
With a destination already in mind, Peter needed a carriage for the journey. All his relatives from his father's side had long died before he was even born, but his grandparents from his mother's side were still alive.
Peter recalled seeing Mariah pass letters to the travelling merchants whenever they visited. Unable to hold his curiosity, he ended up asking her about the letters. Mariah was happy to tell him about her parents. They lived in the commercial capital of the eastern front of the kingdom.
'In such an important city, there would surely be someone who could solve mother's afflictions,' he thought while opening the barn.
"Whoa," he quickly stepped aside as frightened sheep rushed to step outside of their confined environment in a swarm. Once they were gone, Peter looked inside to see a few sheep and kobold corpses. He cranked his neck to watch the rest run around on the grass fields and breathed a sigh of relief.
'Thankfully, kobolds were not able to kill all the animals inside in time before Deathknell killed them,' he thought, walking inside.
Horses neighed anxiously to make their displeasure known from their stables. Unlike the sheep, they were tied and locked, making it impossible for them to escape. Peter glanced at them and noted that only half a dozen horses were left alive. A few of them had marks on their bodies from failed attempts at escaping.
While remaining in front of their gaze, Peter approached them. He waited for them to acknowledge him before raising his palms to caress their necks. Without their presence, Peter would have had to pull the carriage by himself. Thankfully, these animals had much better luck than the humans who lived in this village.
Only a few died, and the remaining either sustained minor injuries or were left unscathed. Besides them, in a corner, Peter noticed a coop housing chickens.
'These poor creatures will die from starvation if I don't release them,' Peter thought, opening the fences for the chickens and the horses. 'Their caretakers are already dead.'
"Shhh… It's alright. Everything is fine," Peter said, stroking the nape of each of the horses that still lived. "The bastards are done being taken care of. You all are fine," he grabbed their reins and slowly took them out. Once outside, Peter set them free to roam and graze.
They whinnied before nudging Peter's tiny frame with their heads. Peter chuckled and caressed their manes, while the sheep bleated in greeting. Once they all calmed down to some degree, Peter left the horses and sheep in the grass field to graze before bringing food to the chickens.
He planned to take only a pair of sheep, two pairs of hens, and all the horses with him. That still left close to fifty sheep and dozens of chickens in the village. Peter was sure that someone would come to check on the village in the next few days, so as long as they were allowed to graze on the farmers' fields, they would live.
'That only leaves a couple more things to take care of before we can move,' he thought, with a gloomy expression.
…
Leaving the animals behind, Peter made his way towards the forest with his trusty sword and a shovel in the back tied with a rope. A look at the sky revealed the orange ball of fire still right on top of him. He followed the trail of hundreds of footsteps in reverse.
'I need to confirm it with my own eyes,' he thought, with a heavy heart. 'What happened in the forest? How can I leave without being sure of Dad's demise? What if he is just injured and waiting for someone to rescue him?'
In one way, it was the easiest journey Peter made inside the forest. Kobolds had stomped all the bushes on their path to the village and forced any creature to withdraw from the area.
In another way, it was the hardest journey Peter made inside the forest. The farther he travelled inside, the more his chest tightened with worry. With stiff shoulders and a tensed jaw, Peter forced himself to march deeper. The hope inside his heart flickered, fighting not to be extinguished.
The sight at the end of his journey left him speechless. Numbness spread from the tip of his toe to his head as Peter observed the signs of carnage before him. The remains of the brutal last stand lay on the forest floor in the form of hundreds of kobolds and more than a dozen humans. Peter fell to his knees, breath turning irregular.
Peter broke down in a fit of sobs and heaving, getting on all fours and repeatedly punched his left fists into the ground as tears fell from his eyes. He didn't want to believe it, but the truth lay right in front of his eyes. Still. Broken.