As Richter entered the village, the barbarians slowly gathered around. They greeted him as if he were an old friend.

However, a few of the barbarians sent wary glances toward Erich. Richter patted the head of a barbarian child who had run to him and spoke.

“Were you surprised?”

“It would be a lie to say I wasn’t. So, this must be the secret of that damned 6th Fortress. But tell me, where on earth did these barbarians come from?”

Even as Erich spoke, he could make an educated guess concerning their identity.

They had much slighter builds than barbarian children, yet, for human children, their heights were unusually tall for their apparent ages.

They must be mixed blood—half-barbarian, half-human. Richter handled the children clinging to him with ease.

“It was in the earliest days, when I first came here. We were exhausted from repeated battles and asked headquarters for a retreat, but were denied every time. Still, whether by fate’s perverse sense of humor, I found something like a bond growing even on the battlefield.”

“… Don’t tell me you started a family with the barbarians?”

“Don’t look at me like that. I didn’t abduct anyone. It turned out that a group of our men had hidden a small barbarian tribe and were caring for them. At the time, I hesitated.”

Richter continued.

The issue hadn’t just been about hiding a band of barbarians. To make matters worse, what Richter witnessed there was a barbarian woman already visibly pregnant.

All members of the Watch who guarded the Great Wall took vows: the vow of celibacy—to have neither wife nor child; and the vow of abstinence—to keep away from drink and lustful urges.

Of the two, the vow of abstinence was often broken, but the vow of celibacy was observed with the utmost strictness.

True, there were rare exceptions, like Barnes, but that was exceedingly uncommon.

Ironically, the main reason Barnes hadn’t been acknowledged as human within the Watch was because he’d kept the vow of celibacy.

Yet, this barbarian village, by its very existence, was a blatant violation of that vow.

At the time, Richter’s duty was clear.

He was meant to punish those who’d disobeyed the rules and to deal with the barbarian refugees as well.

Yet, Richter said that, in that moment, he felt as if he’d discovered a new breakthrough.

Back then, the 6th Fortress was nothing but a den of despair: soldiers constantly used up in skirmishes, morale always at rock bottom, the fortress itself on the edge of collapse.

But what, Richter thought, if these men were bound by the ties of family?

A dove whose nest is behind her will fight desperately, even with a hawk flying down.

Similarly, couldn’t members of the Watch, with their families tied to their backs, find it impossible to desert the fort or turn their backs to the enemy and flee as if it were all someone else’s problem?

And so Richter made his choice: to accept them, and make the entire 6th Fortress complicit.

In the meantime, more children were born; more barbarians settled in.

Suddenly, Erich remembered that these people had been struggling with chronic supply shortages.

‘So that’s what this was all about.’

Most likely, the 6th Fortress had been sharing its rations with these people.

If the food meant for ten soldiers was feeding twenty mouths, chronic shortages were simply inevitable.

Erich slowly nodded.

“I think I’m starting to get it now. Why you protect the 6th Fortress the way you do, and why the shortages were so severe. But this ‘curse’—what exactly is it?”

Joseph had mentioned it, but Richter hadn’t quite taken the talk of a barbarian ‘curse’ seriously. Still, it seemed that Richter had witnessed its effects firsthand.

“Lois. Come here.”

Rather than answer directly, Richter called a young barbarian over and revealed the child’s forearm. Following the veins, the skin was tinged a deep, reddish hue.

“Those born as mixed blood like this suffer from such an illness. The corruption spreads the longer they live, and soon enough they’re overcome with fever and die, one by one.”

“So you believed this was a curse? Who told you that—?”

“We tried everything we could think of. And that’s when I found a barbarian shaman. He said it was a curse placed upon the bloodline of half-bloods.”

Erich frowned. The idea of a curse upon a bloodline seemed outlandish. But this was a land farther removed from civilization than any other; perhaps, for them, the explanation was convincing enough.

Yet, suddenly, a name flashed through his mind. Erich spoke it aloud.

“Was that shaman’s name Karga, by any chance?”

“You know that name…?”

For Erich to say that name meant only one thing: they had been tricked. Bitterness flickered at the edge of Richter’s mouth.

Meanwhile, for Erich, all the dots began to connect.

He also knew that within the barbarians, there was a faction allied with the dead.

‘Karga. He’d united with the dead.’

And here, of all places, were Shaman Karga and Joseph, talking about a curse in barbarian blood, scheming together to turn all the fortress’s soldiers into the dead.

At this point, believing that there was no connection between the two was more far-fetched than the alternative.

At that moment, Richter exposed the back of his neck and spoke.

“Do you see?”

“That’s….”

On Richter’s neck, a blue vein ran vivid and conspicuous. This meant the blood of the dead was consuming him—and nothing could be done for him now.

As Richter fastened his armor, he spoke.

“At least it hasn’t spread to my face yet. But below the neck, it’s almost completely taken over.”

“How much have you used, exactly?”

“I can’t even remember anymore. Maybe not as much as you, but in this fortress, I’m the only human left who can properly wield a sword.”

Richter smiled with self-deprecation.

The fact the fortress had survived so many barbarian assaults, and that the men trusted Richter so deeply—yes, it was partly because he’d given them ‘family,’ but more than anything, he’d always taken the lead, blocking every threat himself.

Those wounds had always been healed with the blood of the dead.

“You said that once your power’s invaded the vital areas, there’s nothing that can be done, right? I dared to hope for a while, but it seems that hope was misplaced.”

“So, you wanted Joseph to find a way to stop the curse?”

“Exactly. I didn’t know if it was real or not. But this fortress can’t function without me.”

Erich slowly nodded.

No commander would want to come to a fortress like this.

Richter must have been preparing for what would happen after he himself became one of the dead.

Erich’s arrival at the 6th Fortress meant the main forces would soon follow.

Richter had grown anxious, and with the three threats—the barbarians, the deserter among the dead, and Joseph—he had decided to deal with them before the main force arrived, borrowing Erich’s strength.

At least, Erich figured, he could relieve Richter of one worry.

“You don’t need to worry. The curse will weaken and disappear over time. The necromancer who cast it is dead.”

“Are you sure?”

“I swear it on everything. In fact, I could handle it myself.”

A smile broke out across Richter’s face.

From what Erich could tell, this curse of the dead was in principle not much different from the blood of the dead invading a body.

Just far weaker, infesting only the surface.

Erich’s power could already remove the invasion of the dead’s blood; by the same principle, he could also remove this curse.

“That’s a relief. Truly a relief.”

“But the main forces will never tolerate their existence, you know that?”

“I’m aware. What do you think? Could you accept them?”

Erich’s eyes narrowed.

To break the Watch’s ancient tradition—in the position of someone who had commanded and led here for so long….

‘Even I am torn.’

On a personal level, Erich found himself sympathizing with their plight. But he thought as a former commander.

He more than anyone knew the consequences the breaking of the vow of celibacy had brought.

In the first place, the Watch hadn’t had any vows at all.

It began when the lords of the Empire, inspired, vowed to build and protect the Great Wall.

But as years passed and children were born, they started fighting for power.

A fierce civil war ensued within the Watch, until finally, they reached an agreement.

Those who guarded the Great Wall would take vows of celibacy and abstinence.

The people Richter wanted to protect were, in essence, breaking that tradition, and Erich couldn’t easily make a decision.

“… I really don’t know what we should do with them.”

“I never thought you’d say yes. But if you were me now—what would you do?”

“If it were me, I’d send them away.”

“In the middle of a battlefield?”

“They originally lived in the forest. I don’t think it would be a problem for them to return. But if they stay here, there will be trouble.”

“… After I die?”

“That’s right. Maybe you can hide them for now, but not for long. Sooner or later, their existence will be discovered.”

Richter fell into deep thought. The problem was, Erich’s words weren’t wrong. Even without being told, he already knew.

He didn’t have long to live. And once he was gone, the barbarians he’d been protecting in the 6th Fortress would face death.

Richter finally spoke.

“I’ll think on it a little more. At least until the main force arrives.”

“You can’t take too long. By now, the main host must be passing through the central region.”

“… You’re right. Maybe this is just my own selfishness.”

Erich looked at the children hiding behind their mothers. What sin could they have committed, after all?

‘… At the very least, I should heal them before sending them away.’

Just in time, Erich had gained new strength—the power to remove the taint of the dead.

This curse would eventually fade on its own, but there was no reason for the children to suffer in the meantime.

So Erich intended to propose healing them to Richter.

“You may not be sending them away immediately, but I will at least do what I can while I’m here.”

“And what is that?”

“To heal them of the curse.”

Richter nodded slowly. Erich approached one of the frightened barbarian children.

Though he wasn’t used to dealing with children, he held out his hand.

― Fwoosh.

A soft, golden glow shimmered. The child, who had never seen such light in their life, was instantly mesmerized by the flame.

The Empire’s people had once mistaken it for the power of Incensus, so bewitching a child was nothing.

Erich laid his hand on the child. Though the child grimaced in brief pain, peace quickly returned to their face.

‘… The curse is fading.’

Erich could see it clearly. The aura imbued with the power of the flame was washing away the curse of the dead.

But then, in that moment—

Erich’s eyes narrowed.

Because he noticed a distinctly different reaction from when he’d healed those infected by the blood of the dead.

The golden aura clinging to the dead’s cells blackened, carbonizing and transforming into something new.

The curse was not merely burning away; it was changing into something iridescent and wondrous. After a moment, Erich finished the healing and withdrew his hand.

‘This is… unbelievable.’

Eyes wide, Erich tried his best to suppress his astonishment. There was a familiar aura emanating from the now-healed child.

————-= Clacky’s Corner ————-=

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