Chapter 49: Chapter 49

The battle inside the sentry post was over, but for the other six squads in front of the sentry post, it had not yet ended. Those squads lacked a strong main attacker like Ron, and were currently locked in bitter combat.

Ron took the opportunity of returning the sword to ask Morris, “Instructor, can we go outside and help?”

“Do you really need to ask me this question?”

Morris’s words made Ron freeze for a moment, but he quickly caught on and immediately notified his companions, “Eat something, replenish your water, then go outside and help!”

“Yes.”

The Blood and Fire Squad found their water skins and food pouches that they had set down earlier on the ground inside the sentry post. After hastily resupplying, they headed back outside.

This time, Ron was holding his own sword, and that familiar sensation of it being an extension of his limbs returned. While observing the situation on the field, he quickly spotted a target and said to Justin and the others:

“Go help Squad Twelve! They’re about to lose their footing!”

Squad Twelve’s full name was the Twelfth Squad of the Recruit Training Camp. Their captain, Charles, had barely exchanged more than a few words with Ron, but having trained in the same training ground for a month, they more or less knew a bit about each other.

Choosing to help Squad Twelve, aside from the fact that their situation was genuinely dire, was also heavily influenced by Ron’s personal favorable impression of Charles.

Since he had to help someone anyway, he naturally chose to help the person he found agreeable first.

…

“Charles, hold on, we’re here! Our squad will attack from his right rear, watch your positioning!”

Ron shouted loudly and led the members of the Blood and Fire Squad into the fray. Similar to the enemy they had just slain themselves, the enemy Squad Twelve was facing was also extremely troublesome.

Fortunately, it had already been worn down over a period of time, and its condition had begun to decline. If Squad Twelve could hold their ground on their own, they might have been able to dispatch this enemy without Ron’s help.

But there were no “ifs”!

Now that Ron had arrived, the situation was vastly different. In just two exchanges, Ron’s sword tore open the skin on the enemy’s flank. The two squads then alternated their attacks, continuously enlarging the wound from the opening Ron had created.

Even though the enemy’s condition had declined, its inherent physical attributes hadn’t weakened much. The skin and muscles, in particular, remained exceedingly tough.

Only the membrane was different. Perhaps because it needed to transmit force to maintain both toughness and strength simultaneously, now that the enemy’s condition had deteriorated, its mastery over force was a shadow of its former self. At this point, the membrane could only lean toward the toughness side.

Under the repeated cutting of the Blood and Fire Squad and Squad Twelve, this enemy ultimately ended up just like the previous one, entering a temporary state of feigned death due to the loss of its heart.

Next came decapitation for a complete kill, but Ron didn’t perform this step himself. Slaying a kin, or at least an existence that outwardly resembled a kin, served as a significant tempering experience for the members of the Twelfth Squad as well.

…

Just like helping Squad Twelve, Ron didn’t rest again afterward. He continued to deploy repeatedly, establishing advantages for the other squads, and even creating opportunities to completely slay their enemies.

In the end, the seven squads completely killed all seven enemies with the cost of just one person injured and unconscious!

But this merely marked the end of the apprentices’ battle.

At the edge of the battlefield, the Knights and the remaining enemies were still locked in a standoff. At this point, Ron once again witnessed the black qi in the hands of the elderly-looking enemies. It was not an illusion; it genuinely existed.

And it wasn’t just him; even the other apprentices could see it.

In contrast to the black qi was the wolf pack the apprentices had just slaughtered. The corpses, which had initially been freshly bleeding, had withered and decayed into rotting remnants of bone and sinew.

The black qi in the enemies’ hands was clearly being drawn from those wolf corpses. No, if what Ron had seen at the very beginning wasn’t an illusion, then the enemies had first injected the black qi into the wolf corpses before drawing out even more from them!

“Negative energy? Or dark magic?”

For a moment, countless conjectures flooded Ron’s mind. He clenched his fists secretly, never expecting that magic actually existed in this world! If possible, he actually would have preferred to walk the path of magic rather than the arduous path of a Knight.

Of course, this was merely the path of magic as he fantasized it to be. In reality, regardless of which path one chose, reaching the summit was utterly impossible without putting in far more effort than one’s peers.

Still, the purely “mental labor” path of magic that existed in his imagination was more to his taste.

“Who exactly are the enemies?”

Looking at the two sides confronting each other in the distance, Ron murmured to himself. Just then, a familiar voice sounded from behind him. At some unknown point, Morris had also stepped out of the sentry post.

“Those are Wastelanders! They are the kingdom’s enemies! And our enemies!”

“Wastelanders? People of the wilderness?”

Ron strained to find the meaning behind this term from his memories. But if that were the case, weren’t these so-called People of the Wilderness also human?

It was just that the humans of the Sis Territory were more akin to an agrarian civilization, while the People of the Wilderness were more like nomads.

Did the two sides truly need to fight to the death the moment they laid eyes on each other?

Ron didn’t understand, and the other apprentices who noticed Morris’s voice were equally baffled.

“Instructor, are the People of the Wilderness also human?”

This was something not only Ron wanted to know, but the other apprentices as well. Not only had they just fought them, they had even slain seven Wastelanders who were very likely actual children.

Everyone felt a bit uneasy in their hearts. Even if they were enemies, if the enemies were also human, the feeling was altogether different.

“They are human!”

Morris’s voice was cold and firm, seemingly devoid of any of the concerns Ron and the others harbored.

“Why?” Ron asked.

Why must people of the same kind slaughter one another? Why must the two sides inevitably be hostile? Why hadn’t they been told this information beforehand?

A multitude of doubts condensed into a single, emotionally charged “Why,” but Morris merely chuckled in response. “Can humans not slaughter one another? Let alone the fact that they are the enemies of all civilization, the enemies of all Order.

“Within the Kingdom of Helios and even across the entire continent, anyone who kills Wastelanders is not only guiltless, but credited with merit!

“This was originally supposed to be your final lesson in training, but as luck would have it, this Wastelander tribe happened to migrate near the Sis Territory and was discovered by us. So Young Master Waynes decided to move your final lesson forward.”

So that was how it was!

However, Ron still felt deeply dissatisfied that the territory hadn’t informed them of the relevant details in advance. He didn’t reveal these emotions too much, though, and instead continued to ask:

“Why call them the enemy of civilization, the enemy of Order? Does it have to do with intelligence?”

“No. What you just faced were merely premature Wastelander infants, force-grown through sorcery. Wastelanders who grow up normally possess intelligence no less than ours. The reason they are considered the enemy of civilization and the enemy of Order lies more in their extreme rejection of civilization and Order.”