Chương 70: 70：Leave No Man Behind

Buck froze. Thinking Soren was displeased that their grave-digging was delaying the retreat, he quickly bowed his head.

"My Lord, it will be done in just a moment. We'll throw some dirt over them and catch up with the unit. We absolutely won't slow down the army..."

"Stop." Buck was stunned, his dirt-covered hands halting in mid-air. Soren's gaze was fixed deeply upon the nine mangled corpses of the fallen soldiers. He raised his right hand, slicing it sharply through the air. Clatter! Gary, leading the nearest nineteen black-armored elites, instantly dropped the half-bundled orc steel plates they were holding and strode forward.

"Wash the mud off them," Soren ordered. The black-armored soldiers didn't hesitate. Pouring clean water from their canteens, they carefully washed the filth from the nine bodies. Then, finding clean cloth among their captured spoils, they wrapped the remains neatly and securely. Afterward, pairing up, the heavy infantrymen hoisted the bodies onto their backs without the slightest hint of disgust.

"My Lord, what are you..." Buck's eyes—eyes so accustomed to the cruelties of life and death—widened drastically. Even his voice trembled. The dozens of veterans behind him also stood dumbfounded. Carrying corpses? Having the most elite heavy infantry carry the bodies of a few bottom-tier, broken soldiers?! Soren turned around, his cold, stern gaze sweeping across the entire army.

"If we bury them here, the carrion rats in the swamp will gnaw their bones clean to the marrow."

"They died fighting for me, Soren. They are my soldiers."

"Carry our fallen brothers. The entire army is pulling back. We are taking them home to Greywater Village!" Buck bit his lip hard, fighting back the tears that threatened to fall. The fog grew ever thicker. The massive procession, dragging over two hundred sets of black iron gear stripped from the orcs, along with Victor and his twelve refugee guerrillas, and Buck's twenty-two surviving veterans, finally returned to Greywater Village. The village gates were wide open.

The elderly, women, and children left at the camp, the goblin scouts, and the regular army veterans who had barely escaped the colosseum and just settled in, were all gathered behind the barricades. When they saw their Lord return not only completely unscathed but also pulling cartloads of orc weapons piled as high as small hills, the entire village erupted into irrepressible cheers.

If those two hundred sets of black iron gear were thrown into the geothermal blast furnace for Old Cook to reforge, Greywater Village's armory would more than double in an instant! Quartermaster Fina Hawthorne lifted her skirts and hurried forward excitedly.

"Lord Soren! You must be blessed by the gods! So much high-quality black iron—I'll have people inventory it and move it to the storehouse immediately..." Soren dismounted.

"The inventory can wait." He didn't even glance at the precious supplies, which were more than enough to arm a small army. Instead, he stood firmly in the small plaza at the center of the village, a patch of dry ground normally used to gather villagers and assign labor.

"Logistics Chief Kyle."

"Here, My Lord!" Kyle's heart skipped a beat as he quickly squeezed out of the crowd.

"Build a pyre right in the center of the plaza. Use the driest birch wood we have. Do it now!" An uproar swept through the crowd. Villagers and veterans exchanged bewildered looks. They didn't understand why, at a time when they should be celebrating a massive harvest, they were building a funeral pyre representing parting and death. That is, until they saw the back of the procession.

Nineteen elite black-armored infantrymen stepped forward, gently laying the nine bodies they carried onto the prepared dry wood in the center of the plaza. The air was filled not just with the scent of pine resin from the torches, but also an unshakable stench of blood and a heavy, somber atmosphere. Soren strode over to a freshly split block of white wood. He drew the bone-hilted dagger from his waist.

In the rigidly stratified world of the Aeresia Continent, when a noble died, priests would chant hymns for three hours, and grand marble monuments would be erected. But when a commoner died, they were just an insignificant statistic. But in his past life, Soren had been an elite modern special forces operator. He knew better than anyone where the core cohesion of an invincible army truly came from. It wasn't bought with gold coins, nor was it forced out through fear.

It came from a martial spirit called: "Leave no man behind." In this otherworldly realm where human life was treated like dirt, if you treated the lowest-ranking soldiers as actual human beings, they would swear allegiance to you as if you were a god! This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. Wood chips flew. Soren applied pressure with his wrist, the sharp blade making a steady scraping sound against the hardwood.

Hundreds of people in Greywater Village formed a wide circle. No one dared to make a sound. The only things that could be heard were the crackling of the torches and the soft carving noises as their Lord personally crafted the wooden markers. Even the deeply reclusive and withdrawn mage, Victor, stared blankly at the back of the man carving the wood. His scarred, battered heart felt as though it had been struck violently by a sledgehammer.

"Names," Soren asked, without turning around. Buck's lips trembled violently. He took a step forward and roared through a choked sob:"Ranger! Thomas!" Swish. Soren carved the first name.

"Private! Gil!" Swish. The second wooden marker took shape. Nine wooden tombstones were personally planted by Soren at the very front of the pyre. Soren stood up. He turned around, facing these hundreds of people, each carrying their own endless pain and troubled pasts. He raised his hands and unfastened the chinstrap of his helmet. Click. Soren removed his helmet, tucked it under his left arm, and bowed his proud head. Clatter! A unified, resonant crash echoed out!

Sixty-four heavy infantrymen of the First Spearhead Battalion removed their full-face black iron helmets in perfect unison. Following them were Gary, Ein, Meyer, and Kyle. Then came Old Blacksmith Cook and the goblins. Then the reserve Wolf Riders. Then the seventy-six veterans from the colosseum. Finally, every single villager present. Hundreds of people surrounded the bodies of nine ordinary soldiers, mourning in absolute silence. The silence lasted for a full minute.

When a torch popped with a sharp crack, Soren suddenly raised his head, his piercing gaze sweeping over every face in the crowd.

"This world is sick! The nobles tell you that your lives are worthless, that you are nothing but dogs meant to die for the wine on their tables and the taxes of their domains!"

"But in Greywater Village! Right here!" Soren pointed firmly at the ground beneath his feet.

"From today onward, the rules will be made by me!"

"In my army, no soldier who bleeds for the brother beside him will ever be forgotten as a mere number!" Soren violently drew the longsword at his waist, pointing it straight into the endless fog.

"As long as I, Soren, draw breath! Even if what lies ahead is a mountain of blades or a sea of fire, even if we must die in this stinking swamp, I will lead our brothers to charge in! We will bring back the bones of our fallen, exactly as they are, to lay them to rest! They will receive the utmost reverence of this entire army!"

The seventy-six regular army veterans—men who had watched countless comrades butchered like pigs in the bloody colosseum, men who had long been tortured into numb, cold-blooded husks—suddenly felt boiling, muddy tears well up in their eyes. They gripped each other's arms tightly, their bodies trembling violently.

Buck and his remnants—the tough bastards who had suffered the shameless betrayal of Viscount Blake and believed they no longer had a place in this world—now dropped to one knee in unison, pounding their fists into the dirt until the ground thumped! Victor hugged his mentor's skull to his chest, two trails of clear tears rolling down his cheeks. Even Old Blacksmith Cook and the goblins, who were universally viewed as lowly creatures, were so deeply moved that they prostrated themselves on the ground.

"For the Lord! Slaughter the orcs!" It was unclear who shouted it first. But immediately after, a tsunami of roars tore away the humiliation that had been suppressing these human hearts, flipping the world upside down!

"Soren!! Soren!!" As they looked at the pyre about to be lit, they felt no fear of death. Instead, they felt that if one day they too lay there—if this great commander before them personally carved their tombstone, if they were mourned by everyone—it would be the absolute highest honor of their lives. If that was death, what was there to fear? The pyre was lit, flames soaring into the night sky. After the funeral ceremony concluded, the logistics personnel went to boil hot porridge and inventory the equipment.

Meanwhile, Soren quietly returned to his wooden command post, built high in the branches of a massive tree. Inside, a single candle flickered on the wooden table, casting a warm halo. Outside, a light rain patted against the banana leaves on the roof, making a soft rustling sound.

"Renn, Buck, Victor." Soren stood before the table, looking at the three top-tier talents he had just salvaged from the brink.