"If you dare take one more step forward, I will... I will stab you to death!"
In the bleak cold wind, an attendant gripped a makeshift iron spear, glaring fiercely at the refugees emerging from the Black Pine Forest.
The group was quite large, mostly comprised of adults with weary expressions, and the rest were elderly and children on the brink of death.
The leader of the refugees was a man in his thirties.
He wore a simple gray robe, his figure tall and thin.
"Sir, I just beg you for a chance to meet Lord."
Bloodshot eyes, he took a step forward and tore down the sun emblem hanging from his chest, his voice hoarse beyond compare:
"I am a Sun Praise priest, I can bring your lord the truth!"
Faced with this seemingly madman, the attendant felt a chill in his heart.
He was used to bullying the obedient poor, usually just needing to wave his weapon for them to fall to their knees, trembling.
But this man seemed different from the poor...
While he was at a loss, a voice came from behind: "Go report this to Lord, Bill."
Bill turned around, finding it was the straightforward Jay.
The young man said seriously: "I'll keep watch over them."
Bill felt relieved, glaring fiercely at the man before hurriedly leaving.
The refugees built a few bonfires beside the pine forest.
The weak flames could hardly dispel the cold in the air, weak coughs sounded one after another as the man walked slowly to the center of the group.
He hadn't slept for three days and nights.
But he didn't dare close his eyes.
Suddenly, a child next to him whispered faintly.
"Uncle Sean... It hurts..."
The child had his eyes tightly shut, face an unnatural pallor, and the next moment he curled up in pain, coughing up dark blood.
Sean's steps faltered for a moment.
He looked at the dying child and took a prayer book with a sun pattern from his clothing.
Sean began to pray quietly, and gradually, the sunlight around him seemed to grow thicker.
He reached out during the prayer, preparing to grasp the formed beam of light to drive away the shadows in the child's body.
The blood vessels in his eyes grew denser.
An indescribable weariness surged over him, he immediately bit his scarred tongue, and this time, a string in his mind snapped.
Sean was momentarily dazed and briefly closed his eyes.
At that moment, he saw the sky and earth painted a dark red.
One grotesque, twisted blood-red eye after another surrounded him, deeply embedded in the children's faces, blinking manically in the crimson world.
The next moment, these eyes turned into hideous mouths filled with dense teeth, then curved upward.
They were mocking uninhibitedly.
"Go away! Get away from me ah ah ah ah ah!!!!"
Sean let out a blood-curdling scream, his eyes snapping open.
The child beside him had fallen into a coma, his emotionless mother carefully wiping the blood from his lips.
Sean collapsed dejectedly.
"You have prayed too much, priest," an old man softly advised: "Sleep, we can still hold on."
Sean shook his head, picking up the fallen prayer book and staggering to his feet once more.
"I will not abandon you, we'll be alright."
He panted, repeating the extremely hollow lie: "Someone will believe us..."
The refugees around showed eyes of grief.
On this journey, half of them had already succumbed to disease and cold, yet no lord was willing to take them in.
Not long ago, noble knights from Camelot brought the 'prophecy' to the ears of every noble:
Princess Olivia sought power and status, selling her body for foreign assistance and using despicable means to imprison Prince Ryan, who was wholeheartedly for the people.
This act undoubtedly betrayed the supreme Lion's Heart Glory, therefore...
——'The Lion-Hearted Ancestor King is destined to unleash a crimson calamity upon the world.'
With the knights' arrival, the dreadful prophecy truly came to pass...
More and more commoners were infected with the Blood Plague and were forcibly expelled from their homes by local nobles.
At the same time, the Lion Heart Knight Order started hunting all marked sinners in the name of 'justice.'
Like specters, the heroes trailed the fleeing, and once they caught their target, they would not hesitate to behead the sinner and burn their remains with sacred flames.
This cruel execution spared neither the old nor the young.
·
The sky grew dim, night was falling, and a layer of frost had formed on the ground.
A carriage stopped in the woods outside the town.
To nobles, the poor were nothing more than extremely cheap resources, but to Lin Lan, he needed enough labor to support Seagull Town's development plans.
But the attendant Bill told him that these refugees were peculiar folks, so Lin Lan decided to come and see what was going on for himself.
In full view, the young lord with gray hair and eyes stepped off the carriage and gazed at the restless crowd.
The next moment, Lin Lan's gaze fixed on their gray-white faces.
He furrowed his brows.
The Blood Plague spread faster than he had anticipated.
The Lion Heart Royal Court wished to drag everything into the Abyss, and it seemed more likely that the Eldest Prince was manipulating the Blood Plague.
Even with the Alliance's support, the Second Princess had not achieved a complete victory, the forces behind the Eldest Prince were still in motion.
On this invisible battlefield, no one had ever cared about the lives of commoners.
The people of the Lion Heart Kingdom had neither the protection of the Alliance's laws nor the jurisdiction of the Empire. In the face of power struggles, their lives were as light as leaves falling from trees.
In his thoughts, Sean struggled to muster his strength and stepped forward.
"Honorable Lord, I beg you to extend your hand to those children."
He knelt on one knee before the young lord, doing his utmost to show his humble attitude.
"Even if they're all infected with the Blood Plague?" Lin Lan asked bluntly.
"Lord, I am willing to reveal the evil truth of the Blood Plague to you!" Sean said anxiously: "They are actually —"
"Quiet, priest."
At that moment, Lin Lan interrupted Sean coldly: "Do you want to kill more people?"
Through Wendy's father's notes, he had already learned that one way the Blood Plague spread was through the so-called 'truth.'
But the priest seemed unaware of this.
Unknowingly, he had become a breeding ground for the Abyss.
"Come with me first."
In Sean's bewildered gaze, Lin Lan turned and gestured for everyone to follow him: "I have arranged a place for you to stay."