"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
The heavy, violent banging on the door echoed, the impacts causing dust to rain down from the walls inside.
Outside, an arrogant and domineering voice followed.
"Open up! Purification Committee business!"
"Listen up in there! You've been reported for harboring remnants of the Witch King's faction! Open up for inspection immediately, or we'll kill you without question!"
Bach's voice was sharp and smug, as if he could already see the family kneeling and begging for mercy.
The father clenched his fists tightly, veins bulging on his forehead with rage.
The mother's face turned deathly pale in an instant. She subconsciously pulled Lacey behind her, her body trembling slightly.
Lacey reacted at once, instantly snapping into a battlefield mindset.
He listened intently. The footsteps outside were chaotic and heavy. There were at least twenty or thirty men, all wearing armor and carrying weapons.
With his current strength, taking them all down was somewhat unrealistic, but he could certainly tie them up for a while to buy some time.
Lacey immediately lowered his voice and turned to his parents. "Father, Mother, you leave through the bedroom window. I'll hold them off."
"No!"
Unexpectedly, his usually gentle father flatly refused him.
"I'm not leaving." His father shook his head.
[After hearing your father's refusal, you immediately explain to him that you are confident you can hold off the guards and that nothing will happen to you.]
[Your father tells you that a family of three is too large a target. You can hide for a while, but not forever. He doesn't want his family to be hunted like stray dogs, forced to live a life of hiding and running.]
[As a teacher at the academy, as a subject who once lived under the rule of His Majesty the Witch King, he only wants to face death with dignity.]
[Your mother takes your father's hand, clearly agreeing with him.]
[You find this somewhat incomprehensible. You repeatedly try to explain to your father the principle of "lose the land to save the people, and both will be preserved; lose the people to save the land, and both will be lost."]
[Your father ignores you. He retrieves the Medal of War's Flame from under the bed and places it in your hand.]
["My son's medal should not be covered in dust."]
[Your father says he has lived long enough. With a son who makes him so proud, he has no regrets even if he dies now.]
[He tells you that no matter what, you must not hate the country, must not hate Leithanien. It is merely sick. If you have the chance in the future, please, cure it.]
[Your mother embraces you one last time. She hopes you can forget all of this, marry a good woman someday, and live a long, peaceful life.]
[You promise her through your tears.]
[Your father hands you the valuables he has gathered and pushes you toward the bedroom.]
[You take one last look at your father's determined back and your mother's tear-streaked face, then, without hesitation, you leap out of the bedroom window.]
[The moment you land, a loud crash echoes from behind you. The guards have smashed the front door open.]
[Immediately following is your father's full-throated roar, piercing the night sky.]
["Long live His Majesty the Witch King!"]
["Long live Leithanien!"]
[The roars pierce the night sky, and then, they stop abruptly.]
...
[You have become a wanted man.]
[The next day, the town's notice board is plastered with your portrait. Above it, written in large, blood-red letters: "Lacey, remnant of the Witch King, put up a desperate resistance, murdered members of the Purification Committee, and fled to escape justice." The bounty is so high it makes every idler in town see red.]
[Your parents are charged with "harboring a criminal and openly supporting a despotic tyrant." They are executed publicly, their bodies left hanging high on the gallows in the square as a warning to all dissidents.]
[You hide in the slums for three days and three nights.]
[After the grief comes overwhelming rage.]
[You understand that simply killing Bach is meaningless. He is just a dog unleashed by the new regime. Kill him, and another will take his place.]
[What you must do is sever the hand holding the leash, to make everyone see what kind of master it serves.]
[Theoretically, that is what you should do.]
[But the torment in your heart will not allow it. No matter what, Bach must die.]
...
One month later, in a border town, inside a tavern called the "Black Rose."
A man with a sallow face and a scruffy beard sits in a corner, silently drinking the cheapest, low-quality ale.
He is dressed in rags, looking like a down-on-his-luck mercenary. No one would connect him with the "war hero" on the wanted poster.
This man is, of course, a disguised Lacey.
For the past month, he has wandered the town, watching how Bach and his Purification Committee tyrannize the people.
Under the guise of purges, Bach has been amassing a fortune.
Nearly every merchant in town with any wealth has been extorted by him under various trumped-up charges.
The townspeople, simmering with anger but afraid to speak out, secretly call him "Bach the Butcher."
Public resentment has reached a boiling point. It needs only a single match to ignite the entire powder keg.
Lacey knows that he must be that match.
His gaze sweeps across the tavern.
The tavern owner is a middle-aged man named Hans, once a close friend of his father's. The two often drank and played chess together.
After what happened to his father, Hans was the only one who dared to go to the square and collect his parents' remains.
This is someone he can win over.
Lacey carries his mug and sits down at the bar, feigning nonchalance.
"Another one, bartender." He deliberately lowers his voice.
Hans looks up, his clouded eyes sizing him up for a moment before he refills the mug without a word.
"The town's been quite lively lately, hasn't it?" Lacey says slowly after taking a sip of his drink.
Hans freezes, casting a wary glance at him. "Careful what you say, stranger. Words can bring disaster."
"I'm just a mercenary passing through. Heard some rumors about the town and got curious, that's all." Lacey smiles, pulling a gold coin from his tunic and placing it on the bar.
"I hear that Lord Bach just got himself a brand-new land-vehicle last month. Quite the spender, isn't he?"
Hans's expression shifts. He doesn't reply, nor does he touch the gold coin.
"I hear he made his fortune by 'purging' the Witch King's remnants?" Lacey continues, his voice low but clear enough for Hans to hear.
"It's a great time to be alive, isn't it? Just slap a label on someone, and you can get both fame and fortune."
"What are you getting at?" Hans's voice deepens, his hand already stealthily reaching for a short club beneath the counter.
Lacey pays his small movements no mind, instead turning his gaze to a painting on the tavern wall.
It's a landscape painting of a sea of lily of the valley flowers outside the town. The workmanship is poor, but there's a signature in the corner.
It was his father's work.
"I knew a man." Lacey's gaze seems to pierce through the painting, seeing into the past.
"He was a good man, an honest and dutiful music teacher. His only crime, perhaps, was that he respected, from the bottom of his heart, the king who once protected Leithanien."
Hans's body jolts. His grip on the club loosens, and he stares intently at the scruffy man before him.
"He also had a son. A soldier. He'd been to the battlefield, killed men from Gaul, and bled for this country."
"But in the end, for such a minor crime, his entire family was destroyed."
Lacey slowly turns his head, his eyes meeting Hans's directly.
"Tell me, is that fair?"
Hans's lips tremble. He remembers his old friend, remembers the two poor souls hanging from the gallows.
"It's not fair..." he rasps out the words.
"So, we have to do something to make it fair." Lacey's voice has a strange magnetism to it, as if it could ignite the flame in a person's heart.
[The Art of Language]
"We?" Hans gives a bitter laugh. "What can we do? Bach has dozens of men, all well-equipped guards, and he's backed by the nobles..."
Lacey pushes the gold coin toward him. "A single spark can start a prairie fire."
"Bach's doom will begin with a painting."
He lowers his voice and lays out his entire plan.
As Hans listens, his eyes grow wider and wider, his expression shifting from initial terror to hesitation, and finally, to a fanatical resolve.
When Lacey finishes, Hans remains silent for a long time. Finally, he snatches the gold coin and clenches it tightly in his palm.
"Let's do it!"
[With the help of your father's friend Hans, you contact several other townspeople who have also been persecuted by Bach.]
[There is a blacksmith whose shop was stolen, an old tailor whose daughter was assaulted by Bach's men, and a retired veteran who was publicly humiliated by Bach.]
[Hatred is the best adhesive.]
[After hearing your plan, these people join without hesitation.]
[As you unite them, you feel an invisible power flow into your body. Your thoughts become clearer, and your strength grows.]
["United We Stand"]
[Three days later, a piece of graffiti appears on the wall of the town hall. It depicts a fat man with large ears, closely resembling Bach, kneeling naked on a giant moneybag. His mouth is stuffed with gold coins, and his face wears a greedy, foolish grin.]
[Above his head, a line of large, bright red words reads: "Bach the Usurper, the Parasite of Leithanien!"]
[Bach is enraged by this and begins searching door-to-door.]
[Bach's guards become more brutal than ever, barging into homes at will, ransacking them, and beating anyone who resists.]
[These high-handed tactics push the townspeople's resentment toward the Purification Committee to its peak.]
[People begin to secretly call the mysterious graffiti artist the "Painting Hero," regarding him as a hero of the resistance against Bach.]
[You can clearly feel the effect of United We Stand being activated like never before.]
[Your five senses grow sharper, your mind becomes clearer, and your physical abilities are enhanced across the board.]
[You realize the time has come.]
[The next night, according to the plan, a group of people feigns an arson attempt around the eastern granary, successfully luring Bach and most of his guards away.]
[Seizing the opportunity, you sneak into Bach's office and retrieve his ledger and other incriminating evidence.]
[The following day, Bach holds a public trial in the central square, intending to sentence some of the "Painting Hero's" accomplices he has captured.]
[Just as he is about to declare them "guilty," you lead a group of people into the square and reveal the ledger and evidence to the public.]
[It contains details of Bach's misdeeds, including using the new policies as a pretext to confiscate shops, fabricating evidence to frame people, and soliciting bribes using his position.]
[The crowd instantly erupts in fury. A wave of voices floods the square as the people repeatedly chant, "Kill the parasite!"]
[Seeing that the situation has turned against him, Bach tries to flee, but it's too late. He is surrounded by the enraged crowd.]
[At this, Bach yells to you that your parents' deaths were not his fault, that he was merely acting on the request of a count and had no wish to provoke you.]
[Hearing these words, you fall silent.]
[You realize that ever since you left the academy in disgrace, your parents had been doomed.]
[You remain silent, choosing not to stop the furious mob.]
[Even the guards do not intervene, for they too are people of this town, and their families and friends are among the crowd below.]
[In the end, Bach is torn to pieces by the crowd. You have avenged your parents.]
[But your heart is calm. You know very well that while this town may have been cured of its sickness, Leithanien as a whole is still mortally ill.]
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