The villagers emerged one after another from their damaged homes, looking at the entire village billowing with black smoke, their faces devoid of sorrow.
Instead, there was an unspeakable numbness, bewilderment, and even despair.
Old Hans, seeing everything before him, tears streaming down his face, knelt helplessly on the ground, pounding the hard earth with his fists.
Everything he owned had been stolen by the bandits.
A villager sat slumped by his doorway, his eyes empty, repeatedly muttering, "It's gone... it's all gone... everything's gone."
"They said," a young man's voice broke the silence, trembling uncontrollably, "They said they'd come back next time..."
People looked at him, but no one spoke. Fear enveloped everyone's hearts, but even more quickly, despair set in, because everything they had was stolen. They might not even survive until next time.
"All my food was stolen!!!"
"What are we going to do? We'll starve to death!!"
"We can go find Lord Arthur! His kindness will surely help us!!!"
Arguments, cries, and desperate wails mixed together. These poor people saw no way out.
"Clip-clop! Clip-clop! Clip-clop!" The sound of horse hooves came from outside the village.
The crowd was suddenly startled by the sound, and everyone showed expressions of fear. Each hoofbeat seemed to land on their suspended hearts.
But when the troop of riders appeared in sight, the villagers' fear dissipated. They seemed to have found their backbone, and people rushed forward with tears in their eyes. It was the Lord's army!
Leading them was a robust middle-aged man, riding a tall warhorse, clad in leather armor and a leather helmet. His weather-beaten face was now full of fortitude; it was Lucien.
Lucien reined in his warhorse, looking at the countless villagers who came to meet him. Thinking of Lord Arthur's instructions, the muscles in his face instantly tensed. His eyes swept over the devastated village, billowing with black smoke, and his eyes reddened deeply.
"Still too late!!!!" A roar burst from Lucien's mouth, filled with undisguised rage. "Damn these bastards!"
"When I catch them! I'll bury them all alive!!!"
Lucien dismounted swiftly and decisively, his boots hitting the ground with a reassuring sound. He strode quickly toward the villagers.
"Ahem... ahem... I... I am Lucien, an officer under Lord Arthur." Lucien's voice, though loud, was somewhat faltering. "Tell me!!!! Did those bandits come here!!!!"
Although the villagers found the officer's tension a little strange, they still knelt deeply before the dozen or so riders, weeping bitterly.
The crowd's lips trembled, their voices chaotic, unable to form a complete sentence for a long time. They constantly pointed at their smashed doorways, then at their burned huts, then at their livestock pens, and then just cried incessantly.
Lucien walked to a charred roof beam, reached out his gloved hand, and gently touched it. He turned around, looking at the suffering villagers.
Lucien's fist slammed hard onto a charred wooden post. Wood splinters flew, and the already ruined building instantly collapsed.
Lucien took a deep breath, steeling himself, to add more impact to his upcoming performance. His previous display had been somewhat of a failure.
"We were still one step too late!!!" He lowered his head remorsefully and roared, his voice filled with self-reproach and anger. "Damn it!!! Damn it!"
This punch seemed to strike every villager's heart. All their doubts, unease, fear, and despair vanished with that loud sound and the arrival of these riders.
The Lord's officer, like them, was angry about this disaster and those thugs.
"Everyone dismount!" Lucien ordered his soldiers behind him. "Help the villagers, check for the injured, and put out all these damned fires!"
The fear that had been suppressed all night finally found release. People cried out, having finally found someone who could help them, someone to confide in.
"Sir! Those bandits stole all our grain! All our livestock!"
"Everything we had is gone! We're going to starve to death! Please! Talk to Lord Arthur! Help us!"
"Sir! They said they'd come back!"
"Save us! We can't just wait here to die!"
"Please, Sir!"
"Save us!"
Cries and pleas rose and fell.
Lucien stood silently there, patiently listening to everyone's cries, his tightly drawn face furrowing deeper and deeper.
Only when the crying had somewhat subsided did he sigh heavily: "Alas, this band of wandering bandits didn't just plunder your village."
"Don't worry, the other villages have all received supplies from Lord Arthur!"
"The kind Lord Arthur will not abandon you. Seeds, grain, livestock—you'll even have more than you did before!"
The villagers were stunned, or rather, shocked. Tears streamed down their faces, followed by countless words of thanks, spoken all at once. People prayed to the old and new gods, having never seen such a benevolent Lord.
"But..." Lucien's "but" made everyone's hearts leap into their throats again.
Old Hans asked tremblingly, "But what, Sir?"
Lucien's gaze swept over the desperate faces of the crowd. He was about to recite the lines he had been memorizing for days. He raised his hand and pointed in the direction of Arthur's temporary castle in the distance, then pointed to the ground beneath his feet.
"Lord Arthur's land is too vast, and your villages are too far and scattered." His voice conveyed a deep sense of powerlessness. "Those damned bandits are like wolves in the wilderness, so cunning, always attacking isolated travelers."
"If we guard this place today, they'll attack other villages tomorrow."
"We simply don't have enough people."
Lucien seemed to be talking to himself, and yet also explaining to everyone:
"I can leave five people here, or ten."
"But the other side has over twenty! I can't let my brothers die for nothing along with you!"
Lucien's words were like a basin of ice water, extinguishing the villagers' newly ignited flame of hope.
He was right. Lord Arthur's territory was so vast, with so many villages. Their small village was like a grain of sand in the desert, and without much value. How could Lord Arthur protect them at all times? The hope that had just risen instantly turned into a deeper despair.
"Then... then what should we do?" A villager in the crowd asked, his voice choked with tears. "Is there really no way out? Are we just going to wait to be slaughtered like pigs by those bandits, those beasts?"
His choked voice, his despair, infected everyone. In the dead silence, people began to sob again.
Lucien looked at the villagers, remaining silent for a long time, laying the groundwork for his next words. Just as the villagers' hearts were gradually sinking to rock bottom, he finally spoke:
"Perhaps there is a way."
"Lord Arthur, he actually foresaw all of this."
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