Chương 9: 04-1: The Chapel, Brigands, and the Nun

The moment I burst into the hall, the stench of blood hit me like a fist driven straight into my stomach. I nearly threw up on the spot. Late afternoon sun slanted through the shattered stained glass high above, painting the ruined altar, overturned pews, and the pools of not-yet-dried blood across the floor in a nauseating shade of dark violet. It didn't look like dusk. It looked like a god who'd arrived too late, dropping a cold laugh on his way out. From behind the altar came low, greasy laughter.

Several brigands in crude leather armor, faces thick with stubble, stood in a loose half-circle. At their feet lay the bodies of elderly clergy. Some had been run through the chest. Some had throats nearly severed. One still held his hands pressed together in prayer—as if waiting for a miracle until the very last moment. The miracle had apparently gotten stuck in the mud somewhere along the road.

"Please... the Lord watches over all things..." The voice came from the shadows—trembling, weak, but carrying a stubborn, almost defiant dignity. I shifted my gaze and finally found the source. A girl about my age, kneeling on the cold stone floor. Her white novice's habit had been ripped violently at the shoulder, exposing a stretch of skin so pale it was nearly translucent. Not worker's skin. The kind protected all its life by high walls, incense oil, and attentive servants. To put it plainly—noble skin.

Her golden hair was matted with dust and blood, plastered in tangles against her cheek. She looked utterly bedraggled, but the pride in her bones refused to bow. Both hands gripped a rough wooden holy seal pressed to her chest, knuckles white with the force of it. The air around her trembled faintly—a thin, nearly extinguished blue light seeping from her palms. I recognized that sign. A divine miracle on the verge of collapse. Push her any further, and this chapel might lose its roof along with everything else.

"The Lord?" The one-eyed brigand at the front grinned, showing a row of teeth yellow enough to raise questions about his dental habits.

"Your Lord's probably busy watching these old men lose their heads, sweetheart." He spat on the floor and reached for her hair. Something in my head snapped clean. Honestly, this wasn't my problem. Ever since House Rosa had kicked me out, my life had been complicated enough—cold, hungry, broke, somehow saddled with Jessi whose tongue was sharper than any blade, and Lucas who knew his theory perfectly and almost nothing else. By any reasonable logic, what I needed most now was the ability to walk away from trouble.

But— If I could look at this and keep walking, then I was already rotten to the core.

"Stop!" My shout detonated in the empty hall. Every brigand turned. The girl's head snapped up. Only now did I see her face clearly. Even through the grime and tear tracks, she was striking in a way that had nothing to do with softness. Not fragile beauty—something that retained its sharp outline even cornered, even kneeling in blood. Like a masterwork sword thrown into ashes. Dirty, yes. Still sharp. When her eyes landed on the old Rosa crest on my chest, her pupils contracted visibly.

"Don't come closer..." Her voice was thin enough that a breath might scatter it.

"Leave... this isn't your—""Oh? Another one looking to die." The one-eyed man cut her off, rising with his hatchet, eyes sweeping between my sword and the crest on my chest. His grin widened into something uglier.

"And a little lordling at that. Lucky day—first we find a nun, now a noble brat delivered right to us." The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation. His men laughed along. My grip tightened on the hilt, palm slick with sweat. I was afraid. No point lying to myself. This wasn't the Rosa practice yard with blunted blades and "yield" to fall back on. One mistake, and my guts would be decorating the stone floor alongside those priests.

But strangely—watching this girl tremble with fear while her hands refused to release the holy seal—something in my chest went very still. Like a piece finally sliding into place. I drew my sword. Steel left leather with a clear, ringing sound that cut through the blood-stale air.

"Valuable cargo?" I locked eyes with the one-eyed man and heard my own voice come out steadier than I expected.

"Maybe think about what your head is worth first." The first one to move wasn't me. A brigand on the left rushed in with a short knife, fast as a starving dog. I twisted aside on instinct and drove the point forward. The feeling of steel pushing into flesh was sickeningly real. His eyes flew wide; a pathetic grunt slipped from his mouth as he crashed into my shoulder. I shoved him off with a snarl. Hot blood splashed across half my face.... Well. Saved myself the trouble of washing up tonight.

The second came straight at me, axe swinging overhead. I jumped back—but my heel hit blood and I nearly went down. In that instant, I understood how little elegance mattered in a real fight. No footwork aesthetics, no knightly grace. Just kill or be killed—and a floor slick as greased stone. I caught his axe handle in a desperate block. The impact sent numbness shooting up my arms.

"Hands shaking like that, and you think you can play hero?"

"Still better than walking around with a face like a moldy potato." I kept talking while driving my knee hard into his gut. He folded with a grunt. I pulled the sword free and slashed sideways—a flash of red, and he dropped like a felled log.

"Useless!" The one-eyed man snarled and came in himself. He was nothing like the first two. Steady footing, brutal precision, relentless pressure. Every strike drove me back, battering my arms numb. Metal screamed against metal in continuous chains. At this rate, he'd grind me down piece by piece. Then pale blue light flared behind me.

"Move... aside...!" The girl forced the words out through clenched teeth. The one-eyed man cursed, clearly feeling the unstable divine resonance building. That moment of broken focus was all I needed. I poured every scrap of fury I'd been carrying since my brother kicked me out straight into one swing. The blade swept upward in a diagonal arc. He never got his eyes back to me before his throat opened in a deep red smile.

He staggered backward, both hands clamped to his neck, staring like he couldn't fathom dying to some ragged noble brat. But confusion didn't help. He hit the floor hard. His hatchet clattered against stone. Silence dropped over the hall. Only my ragged breathing, and the slow drip of blood from my blade.

"... Is it over?" Her voice was barely there. I turned. The girl in the novice's habit swayed as if something inside had finally given out. I caught her before she fell. Her shoulders were absurdly slight—through torn fabric, I could feel bone. I pulled back instinctively, then draped a strip of relatively clean altar cloth around her.

"Don't speak yet." I kept my voice gentle.

"You're safe." She looked up at me, eyes still wary but the unbearable tension beginning to release. After a moment, she dipped her head slightly.

"... Thank you, milord." Even gratitude delivered like a lesson in court etiquette. I checked for survivors, then crouched to retrieve her holy seal. The wooden cross was cracked at the edges, stained with blood. Her fingers still trembled as she took it, but she pressed it carefully to her chest like it mattered more than her own life.

"What's your name?" I asked. She hesitated, measuring the question.

"Erina," she said softly.

"Just... Erina will do." Just Erina will do. Clear enough. The real cards were staying close to her chest. But because I'd just saved her life, she'd offer me something to call her by. I let it pass.

"I'm Cedric." The moment those words left my mouth, they sounded absurd even to me. All along this journey, I seemed to be constantly introducing myself to strangers—either saving someone, causing trouble, or both at once. If Jessi were here, she'd probably flash that infuriating smile and say: "Little lordling, exactly how much do you love picking up stray trouble off the roadside?" Honestly, I was starting to wonder that myself. The wind outside the chapel was colder than within.

By the time I helped Erina down the broken steps, the sky had darkened considerably. Parked beside the crumbling stone stairs was a carriage that had absolutely no business being near a ruin like this. No—calling it a carriage was underselling it. It was more like a small house that had learned to move. Deep blue lacquered panels were bordered with fine silver filigree. The wheel frames were specialized hardwood banded in metal.

Along the side panels ran intricate patterns I couldn't read—clearly not the work of any ordinary craftsman. The window frames were polished black oak; the door handles gleamed, catching what little evening light remained. Even caked in mud and spattered with blood, it radiated one unmistakable message: I am expensive, and you are not the kind of person who touches me. I stared at it for a few seconds. Then looked down at the brigand corpses at my feet. Even an idiot could piece it together: stolen property.

"That's..." Erina started, then stopped, as if she'd caught herself saying too much. I glanced at her sideways. She bit her lip slightly and finally murmured: "It can't stay here." Brutally honest, at least. What followed wasn't heroic in the slightest—just exhausting and deeply unpleasant. I searched the bodies for coin pouches, daggers, identification tokens, and anything bounty-redeemable. Then came the part I'd rather not describe: collecting proof of identity from the dead. The details aren't worth recounting.

You don't call that heroism—you call it premium nightmare material I never wanted to revisit. By the time I was done, standing there holding a burlap sack, I felt like the most ridiculous person alive. Back when I trained with swords at House Rosa, I'd imagined glory meant flowing capes, anthems of praise, and medals. Instead: soaked in blood, gripping a sack of heads, with a mysteriously well-bred fake nun at my side. If my beloved eldest brother could see me now, he'd laugh first—then pretend he'd never met me.