Even before reaching the camp, Baron had already learned the identities of the refugees from the chatter between the coachman and the groom.
They were a mix of wretched souls: families who couldn’t afford the ’fog-clearing fee’ and had their hos destroyed by Beasts, the sick who were cast out of their villages, and villagers who had fled after their hos were overrun by Beasts or the Immortal Church.
The Immortal Church: a cult that worshiped the Immortal, one of the Ancient Gods.
It was also through this conversation that Baron finally identified the god whose scent—a mix of blood and decay—he had caught earlier that evening.
The Immortal Goddess. She was one of the Ancient Gods, the master of the Immortal Law, who had been slain by the Great Lord during the Second War of Law and buried in the Land of the Forsaken.
The Church that worships her is the Immortal Church, and its followers are called the Undead.
’Sounds like a villain just from the na.’
Baron heard the Wandering Knight let out a low, cold chuckle. "Refugees aren’t necessarily as easy to deal with as those Demon Hunters."
Sure enough, as if on cue, the refugees’ expressions changed the mont they clearly saw the nun’s habit Olivia was wearing. A spark of interest ignited in their eyes.
One of them, a middle-aged refugee of about thirty, glanced over at Baron—who was washing down a piece of bread with mare’s milk—before slowly shuffling toward Olivia.
After mumbling for a long mont, he slowly reached out his hand to the Little Nun and said,
"Sister, I’ve been hungry for so long. Can you share a bit of your food with ?"
Olivia took in the man’s appearance: his clothes were shabby, his skin was sallow, and his eyes were devoid of light.
Her heart swelled with pity, and she picked up her bowl, which held mare’s milk and a piece of bread.
Baron glanced over sideways but didn’t intervene. He figured that, true to form, the Little Nun would offer a prayer to that poor bastard the Blood God, and then hand out her mare’s milk and bread.
She was a Nun from the Church, after all. And no matter which Church a Nun belonged to, their doctrine was bound to include sothing about loving all mankind, sacrificing for the greater good, and all that.
’Otherwise, there wouldn’t have been so many of those comics about Nuns and Demons back in his previous life.’
The other refugees clearly thought the sa. Seeing what was happening, they began to stir, one after another, and shuffle closer.
An old woman held out her hand. "Sister... have rcy..."
A child pleaded, "Sister... I’m so hungry..."
Baron and the Wandering Knight watched in silence. The other Demon Hunters were watching too, smirks of cynical amusent playing on their faces.
’Would the Nun give her own food to these refugees?’
At their words, an expression of sorrow, like that of a wounded fawn, appeared on Olivia’s face. She clasped her hands together and prayed piously,
"Oh God, please, save these people."
The mont she spoke, the Wandering Knight let out an unreadable, cold laugh, and Baron sighed in resignation. One of the Demon Hunters, recognizing Olivia as the Little Nun from earlier in the day, yelled out mockingly,
"So it’s the Nun who lost her two bay horses! Hey, Sister, I’m feeling awful lonely over here. How about you ’give’ a little ’alms’ with your body, huh? Just a little will do."
Amidst the jeers, the refugees mumbled thanks for the Little Nun’s ’benevolence’ as they surged forward to snatch the bowl of mare’s milk and bread from her.
Soone grabbed the bowl first. The refugees began to curse, their anger flaring, only to see it was the very Nun they had just been praising.
Olivia t the refugees’ bewildered stares, offered another pious prayer, and then, to everyone’s utter disbelief, drank the mare’s milk with the bread soaked in it.
When she was finished, she elegantly wiped the porcelain bowl with a handkerchief and handed it back to Baron.
After a mont of stunned silence, the refugees erupted in anger. "Why? Why, Sister? Why wouldn’t you help us?"
The Little Nun looked sorrowful and said apologetically, "God says that if you cannot give to everyone, then giving to no one is the truest form of charity."
Baron raised an eyebrow.
’Well now, this Blood God fellow has so interesting ideas. If you could just ignore the deranged cultists from the Mad Blood and Blue Blood factions... right, can’t ignore them.’
The refugees started cursing. They clearly didn’t dare direct their anger at the Little Nun, having recognized Baron as a Demon Hunter. Instead, they turned on each other, blaming one another for coming over and trying to get a piece of the action.
The old woman spat curses, the child wailed in frustration, and the middle-aged man who had first approached now muttered bitter curses against heaven and earth.
This ti, the Wandering Knight didn’t sneer. He just let out a short, unexpected grunt. He then pulled a piece of bread from his coat—one that looked less like it was from last week and more like it was from the last millennium—broke off a piece, and washed it down with so water.
But this ti, when the surrounding refugees saw the black bread in his hands, they rely snorted in disdain, as if disgusted by how dirty it looked.
Baron found the scene fascinating. ’The starving looking down on soone who had food. Just another one of this world’s strange phenona.’
The Little Nun leaned in and explained in a low voice, "Mr. L, do you see the dark cape beneath that Knight’s pauldron?"
Baron looked. A long, crimson-black cape flowed from under the Wandering Knight’s right pauldron, marked with several deep, rich streaks of red.
It made him instinctively think of a blood-soaked battle standard on a chaotic field, leading a tide of armored cavalry in a howling wind—a magnificent, exhilarating sight.
And yet, the way the surrounding refugees looked at the Knight was deeply unsettling to Baron.
Their gazes held none of the respect or awe one might show a Law Enforcer, nor any of the sympathy one might have for a fellow unfortunate. They simply stared with a numb mixture of fear and disgust.
As if they were looking at a skeleton draped in human skin.
"That blood-red cape and the Blood Pattern on his face are the marks of a Blood Loss Knight. It signifies a Knight who has no faith, no followers, and no chivalry. They are unacknowledged by the gods, and have even been abandoned by their own Contractor."
"Legend says that wherever a Blood Loss Knight appears, that place incurs the wrath of the gods and is struck by disaster. That is why people fear them."
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