Bang! Bang!
Soft yet firm knocks echoed from behind the wooden door of the room. Kael, who had just been enjoying a moment of intimacy with Enri, immediately adjusted his facial expression, drawing back the aura of divinity and dignity that was his trademark in public.
Seeing the change, Enri promptly and understandingly hurried to the door to open it.
As soon as the door opened, they both found the village chief standing in the doorway, his face etched with a hint of unease.
"Village Chief, what is it?" Enri asked, though her eyes occasionally darted towards Kael as if seeking guidance.
However, the village chief's gaze was first drawn to Kael, who stood calmly behind Enri. He worried that his careless actions might incur the displeasure of the deity who had just saved them. Nervously, he shifted his gaze to Enri, the sole link between them and this magnificent being.
"There are... there's a group of cavalry approaching the village, Miss Enri. We... we're not sure if they are enemies," the village chief explained in an anxious tone, his eyes pleading with Enri to convey the news correctly.
Of course, Enri understood the village chief's worries and the urgency of the current situation. Their village had just been struck by a terrible disaster, and the Divine One was the only hope and strength supporting everyone's courage. However, she was the only one in the village who had the courage and opportunity to speak directly with the Divine One. The task of conveying information and communicating with the approaching strangers naturally fell upon her shoulders.
"I understand!" Enri said with a firm nod. For the sake of protecting her newly revived parents and Nemu, as well as all the villagers who had suffered so much, she earnestly accepted this mission. "Village Chief, please tell everyone and the messengers to remain vigilant for now. I will follow soon."
The village chief nodded obediently, bowing respectfully to Kael who stood calmly inside the room, then turned around with hurried steps and disappeared behind the door.
After watching the village chief leave, Enri turned back, only to find that Kael had silently floated behind her without her noticing. His sudden presence startled her.
"Oh, my Lord!" Enri exclaimed unconsciously.
"Don't worry, Enri. I will go with you," Kael said in a gentle yet firm tone. He lightly placed his hand on the girl's shoulder, and without her realizing it, his passive job skill, [Holy Light], enveloped Enri's body with a soothing warmth, like the gentle touch of the morning sun, easing the lingering tension within her.
Then, the two figures walked out of the simple wooden house one after the other and headed towards the village entrance, where potential danger was approaching.
By the time they arrived, two groups of people were facing each other at the village gate, and the atmosphere between them felt heavy and tense.
Four Resurrection Angels stood side by side, forming a solid line blocking the village entrance. Behind them, three villagers wearing the stolen armor of the Baharuth Empire knights held longswords in their hands, looking nervous yet vigilant, ready to defend their village once more.
About fifteen meters outside the village boundary, Gazef Stronoff and the elite members of the Royal Knights sat silently atop their restless horses.
Their first reaction upon seeing the line of Resurrection Angels guarding the village gate was one of deep shock.
The summoning of angels was not an unfamiliar sight to them. Not only in the fanatical Slane Theocracy, but also in the Re-Estize Kingdom, priests from the major churches possessed the ability to summon these celestial beings through rituals.
However, the angels standing before them were clearly different from the angels usually summoned by church priests (first-tier summons, level LV1~7), and the aura of power emanating from them felt far more formidable.
Could it be that a bishop from a major church was passing through this village and helping the villagers fight off the enemy attack? This thought flashed through Gazef's mind for only a moment, but he immediately dismissed it as an unlikely possibility.
The members of the major churches in the kingdom usually only waited quietly in their magnificent temples until commoners or nobles came seeking help, and they would only assist in healing illnesses and injuries after receiving appropriate payment. They would only provide charity or free aid for an hour or two on certain days of the year, and would never directly engage in combat like this.
Not to mention, Gazef clearly saw that there were several knights wearing the uniforms of the Baharuth Empire standing behind the line of angels. This puzzled him even more.
From this perspective, it was most likely that members of the Baharuth Empire's church were attacking the village together with their soldiers, but... something didn't make sense.
Gazef scanned his gaze around the village.
If the village had already been occupied by the Baharuth Empire's forces, wouldn't a better strategy be to wait until all the enemies entered the village, then rush out from the darkness and launch a surprise attack from all directions to catch them off guard?
Openly displaying themselves at the village gate like this didn't seem like a clever trap, and Gazef saw no signs of hidden ambushes around the village.
Could it be that they simply wanted to come and inquire about the situation here? Gazef thought with growing doubt.
Just as Gazef was still in the midst of confusion and trying to analyze this strange situation, a small commotion suddenly broke out within the village.
He saw two figures walking towards the village entrance, surrounded by several young and strong-looking villagers. Beside them, angels whose auras felt even stronger and more intimidating followed faithfully.
One, two, three...
"This number..." Gazef roughly counted the number of angels he saw and felt that something was terribly wrong. A faint sense of danger began to creep into his mind.
Because in several villages they had passed through earlier, they had found severely injured villagers deliberately left behind by the enemy, Gazef had arranged for some members of his warrior group to escort those unfortunate victims back to the safer fortress city of E-Rantel. As for the total number of elite soldiers following him on this mission, there were only twenty, while the number of angels standing before him was far greater.
Although the members of the Royal Warrior Corps were personally trained by him and far more elite than ordinary soldiers, Gazef knew very well that they might not be a match for the angels in a one-on-one fight.
Usually, there was a powerful mage or priest who summoned these angels, which meant that the enemy's strength was at least twice the size of his own forces.
There was absolutely no chance of winning in a direct battle! Gazef thought bitterly. At that moment, even the idea of a temporary retreat began to flicker in his mind as the only possible option.
The three knights wearing the Empire's armor and the four angels who had previously blocked the way to the village suddenly moved apart on both sides, making way for someone to step forward. Gazef shifted his sharp gaze and noticed the man in the center of the crowd of villagers on the opposite side.
That must be the 'leader' of the other side, Gazef thought, realizing this fact in a flash without needing to think further.
It was clear at first glance that the luxurious white silk robes worn by the other person were not something an ordinary person could possess. The soft golden light enveloping his entire body gave him an aura of holiness and transcendence, as if he were not from this world. His body also floated a few inches above the ground, further reinforcing the impression that he was an extremely powerful magic caster.
Perhaps all the angels gathered around this village were summoned by this person, Gazef had a faint suspicion about this, and his intuition told him that he was facing a force far greater than he had imagined.
At that moment, a middle-aged man who looked to be over forty-five years old separated himself from the crowd of villagers and walked forward with bold steps until he stopped at a position less than five meters away from Gazef's group.
"Who are you and what is your purpose in coming to our village?" the middle-aged man shouted in a challenging tone. Gazef thought for two seconds, carefully weighing his words, then replied in a clear and firm voice, "I am Gazef Stronoff, captain of the Royal Knights of the Re-Estize Kingdom! I am patrolling the villages under the orders of His Majesty the King to suppress the imperial knights who are causing trouble around this area. Who are you!"
Captain of the Royal Knights!
So that's him!
Murmurs and whispers rippled through the crowd of villagers at the gate. Gazef could faintly hear them speaking, but he noticed that the tone of their voices was slowly beginning to fill with anger and hatred, so he secretly increased his vigilance.
Not only the villagers, but even the village chief who had spoken to him earlier showed a deep expression of hatred on his face. He answered Gazef's question in a chillingly cold voice, "We are the residents of Carne Village. As for the imperial knights causing trouble around here, they did come here before, but they have all been judged and punished by the Divine One!"
Villagers and imperial knights had attacked the village, and a god... Gazef accurately captured several keywords in the village chief's words and had some guesses beginning to form in his mind, but he was still not entirely sure what had actually happened.
He hesitated for a moment, weighing the information he had just received, then took two steps forward towards the village chief and asked in a serious tone, "What exactly happened in this village? Can you tell me in detail? I am here to help."
"I have nothing to say to you! You and your troops should leave here immediately and stop bringing further disaster to our village!" the village chief replied with a very poor attitude and a hostile tone. Gazef could easily hear that the village chief was not only displeased with his and his troops' presence, but also held deep resentment and anger.
This made Gazef frown. He couldn't understand why the villagers were being so hostile when he had come with good intentions to help.
The Kingdom Warriors behind him, unable to bear seeing their captain being treated with such disrespect, began to spur their horses forward and spoke in a defensive tone for the Warrior Captain, "You are being too rude to the Warrior Captain! Do you know how much risk the Warrior Captain took to come and save you?!"
"Karon!" Gazef called out in a warning tone, immediately stopping his subordinate from continuing his words. However, neither of them expected that those words of defense would only further enrage the village chief.
The village chief's eyes turned slightly red, and he said in a passionate and accusatory tone, "What risk did you take? Was it because the Slane Theocracy wanted to kill the Warrior Captain, so he had to stay away and let us, powerless civilians, suffer and become scapegoats in their vile plan?"
"Then you can run away and save yourself, Warrior Captain! We don't need your protection anymore!!!" the village chief shouted in a tone full of anger and despair.
Slane Theocracy?
Gazef and his soldiers were utterly shocked when they heard the name of that powerful religious organization mentioned by the village chief.
Although they had anticipated that this mission was a dangerous trap, they had never imagined that this matter would be directly related to the Slane Theocracy, famous for its military power and political intrigue!
If what the village chief said was true, then the situation they were facing now might be far more dangerous and complicated than they had ever imagined before.
…
"Why are you still arguing here?"
The village chief's angry shout was so loud that even Kael, who stood quietly at the village entrance beside Enri, could clearly hear every word he said.
Unlike in the original novel's storyline, the villagers of Carne now clearly knew why their village had been brutally attacked and why their loved ones had been cruelly murdered. They knew that the Slane Theocracy was behind it all.
Although it was understandable that in this matter, Gazef and his soldiers were merely victims of a larger scheme, not the direct perpetrators of the attack.
But the bitter reality that they had suffered this terrible disaster because they were involved in the Theocracy's plan could not be changed. They felt angry and hurt.
If it hadn't been for the appearance of the magnificent deity before them, not only would their deceased relatives not have been resurrected from death, but they themselves might have already lost their lives. So, it was perfectly understandable that they felt angry and distrustful of outsiders, including Gazef and his troops.
Kael himself was slightly surprised to see the village chief's courage in actually daring to shout at Gazef Stronoff, the kingdom's strongest warrior, and the Royal Knights standing behind him. In the original storyline, the village chief did not possess this much courage.
It seemed that, in addition to the bonus of anger from losing loved ones, the village chief must have another source of confidence that made him so bold, Kael thought, carefully observing the situation.
Considering that he was the one who indirectly asked the village chief to negotiate with Gazef and his soldiers, Kael suspected that the village chief's newfound and strong confidence must be related to him and the miracles he had shown.