In the reception room of Count Bona’s mansion, the fireplace was burning brightly.
Marquis Ravencrow sat like an uninvited, malicious guest. Even though he was led to the most magnificent seat, he didn’t show a hint of a good expression.
Bona first used the excuse of not being in the mansion to hide from him for half a day.
When he truly couldn’t hide anymore, he hurried over to meet the Marquis.
“Your Grace the Marquis personally pursuing the cult remnants is truly hard work!” Bona’s face was piled with an impeccable smile, personally offering a steaming cup of mead infused with precious spices. “Dust-laden from the journey, I have already ordered people to prepare hot water and…”
Ravencrow didn’t take the cup of wine; his gaze fell straight onto Bona’s face.
“Returning to my castle, I will naturally rest. But right now, I am here to seek answers. My soldiers are buried here; I need to immediately understand the specific circumstances of the day they died in battle, including every single detail!”
The hand holding the wine cup trembled imperceptibly. Bona gave two dry laughs, taking the opportunity to place the wine cup aside, his movements appearing slightly hurried.
“My Lord, I don’t understand what there is to investigate. My Lord’s subordinates were brave and fearless, but suffered a fierce counterattack from the cult priests, thus none survived. These are all facts written in the report long ago.”
“None survived?” The Marquis snorted coldly. “Cult remnants fleeing in panic like rats could silently arrange a trap capable of wiping out the entire pursuit team in your territory?”
Bona hurriedly lowered his head: “It was my dereliction of duty, subordinates negligent in precaution. I am willing to apologize and compensate for my fault.”
Saying this, Bona handed over a gift box prepared long ago, fully stuffed with gold coins.
Marquis Ravencrow didn’t expect Bona to take responsibility and offer compensation so straightforwardly.
But he came this time determined to figure out how his confidant died here so inexplicably.
“Where are those soldiers of yours who participated in the battle? I want to question them!”
Bona nodded repeatedly, rubbing his hands: “Understand, completely understand! It’s just… the incident happened suddenly. Several captains responsible for on-site command at the time were also mostly injured and need time to gather. How about this, you settle down first, I will arrange it immediately, guaranteeing that everyone present at the time will come report to you!”
“How long will it take?”
“Very soon! Very soon!” Bona hurriedly promised. “You are exhausted from the journey, please have some tea and pastries first; I will go urge them right now!”
The next few hours felt like dancing on a red-hot iron plate for Bona.
First, he personally supervised the servants serving the most exquisite tea and pastries to the Marquis and his personal guards. Every pastry was accompanied by his lengthy and meaningless introduction, attempting to delay time with trivia.
Ravencrow just sat silently, not touching the food in front of him, his gaze always nailed to the Count, as if wanting to see through what exactly Bona was calculating.
When the Count attempted for the fourth time to use a newly discovered set of giant beast skeletons to start a topic, Ravencrow stood up suddenly.
“Your Grace the Count.” His voice wasn’t loud but instantly silenced the chattering Bona. “Three standard hours. Where are the people I want to see? Or do you need me to personally go find them in your military camp?”
“Coming… coming soon!”
Just then, messy footsteps came from outside the door. Over ten soldiers wearing the Count’s private army uniforms walked in with their heads lowered.
Only then did the Marquis let Bona off.
The questioning began quickly, from the specific time and location of the ambush, the number and characteristics of the enemies, the spells used, to the combat process, how they responded, and why the pursuit squad fell into a trap and was completely wiped out…
Initially, most of the soldiers’ answers were fairly fluent, generally matching the report Bona submitted previously.
But as the Marquis asked in more and more detail, the soldiers’ answers began to become hesitant and vague, even contradicting each other. Ravencrow’s brows knitted tighter and tighter. He didn’t get angry; only the light in those light brown eyes grew colder and colder. Before asking even half the people, he suddenly raised his hand, terminating the questioning.
“Enough.” No emotion could be heard in his voice. “All of you, step down.”
The soldiers felt as if granted a general amnesty, hurriedly bowing and retreating, leaving with hasty footsteps.
Bona tried to squeeze out a relieved smile: “Your Grace the Marquis, you see, the situation is just like this…”
Ravencrow didn’t even look at him, turning to one of his personal guard captains, his voice pressed very low but enough for the Count to hear clearly: “They all colluded on their testimonies; can’t ask out the real things.”
Bona’s smile froze stiffly on his face.
Ravencrow turned back to him, this time with no politeness at all in his gaze.
“Since living people can’t be asked anything, then go see the dead, see the battlefield.” He led his personal guards toward the door. “Now, immediately, go see their corpses and the combat site. Your Grace the Count, you don’t need to follow; my people will find the way themselves.”
The Marquis’s personal guards were extremely efficient. Very soon, they exhumed the corpses of the pursuit team soldiers from that grave pit outside the city.
“My Lord,” the personal guard captain knelt on one knee, his voice full of anger, “most of the fatal wounds… came from behind! Caused by close-quarters surprise attacks; front-facing combat scars are actually very few.”
Immediately after, another personal guard presented an item wrapped in cloth—a broken sword found inside a soldier’s body. It wasn’t hard to identify that this was the standard-issue sword of the Count’s private army.
Ironclad evidence.
The Marquis’s face darkened to the extreme, yet there was still one point he hadn’t figured out.
That was, where did Count Bona get the guts to do such a thing?
One must know, slaughtering Empire soldiers wasn’t just offending him, a Marquis; this was completely heading toward betraying the Empire!
If Bona were a border lord, the Marquis might consider the possibility of him rebelling and defecting to humans or dwarves.
But for a Count whose territory was completely within the Empire, taking such a huge risk to rebel, what was it for?
Just then, a mage who went to the excavation site warehouse to check combat traces ran over.
“Any discoveries over there?” the Marquis asked.
“Most traces were cleaned up; not much meaningful information. But this subordinate has other discoveries! That large-scale magic array in the excavation site—judging by the rune sequences and node connection methods it uses, in my view, it is definitely not a detection-type magic array.”
“Not detection-type? Then what is it?”
Unfortunately, without detailed layout blueprints, the mage could only determine this much information.
However, this was undoubtedly important information.
Connecting to the fact that Bona killed his soldiers, the problem very likely lay with that magic array in the excavation site. His people probably discovered something!
Marquis Ravencrow made a prompt decision: “Go, to the excavation site!”
However, when they rushed over, what they saw was the scene of the subordinates left behind here lying in pools of blood.
Bona stood in the middle, looking up at the half-set setting sun in the distance.
“Bona!” Losing several more personal guards, the anger in Marquis Ravencrow’s heart had reached its peak. “If you like looking at the sky, take a few more glances. You will never have the chance to see things again! Before I escort you to His Majesty, I will let you experience one step ahead what ‘living is worse than death’ means!”
The Marquis’s strength was originally the strongest present, and he had his personal guards by his side. Bona, a watered-down Count, had absolutely no chance of winning.
The sun finally set. Bona looked back at Ravencrow and laughed: “I look at the sky not because I like it, but because the time has finally come.”
As Bona’s voice fell, the magic ritual spreading throughout the entire giant beast skeleton excavation site lit up faintly. With just the initial activation, everyone present felt a heaven-shaking and earth-shattering tremor.
This wasn’t truly heaven-shaking and earth-shattering, but the space was vibrating!
“You… what exactly is the magic array you arranged here?” Ravencrow questioned, leading the charge. “Destroy that magic array!”
Bona ignored him. Even as Ravencrow’s sword edge approached, he only raised his hands, eyes full of satisfaction and joy: “Finally, completed the Lord’s entrustment!”
At this time, the Knight Puchi was wrapping Lord Yellow Codex and sprinting wildly toward the north. Separated by a vast distance, they could still see the dazzling brilliance formed by the convergence of mana above the Giant Beast Bone Field.
(End of Chapter)
