[Vol. 8] Chapter 6: Forest of Death
As she spoke, Leila suddenly turned her head to look at her younger sister. But her sister’s face changed right away. She waved her hands quickly with a troubled look.
“No, no, no! I’m not saying anything. You can tell it yourself, sister. That thing was way too gross. I finally managed to eat something, I don’t want to throw it all up. You guys keep talking, I’m just gonna go hang out over there for a bit.”
With that, Miss Rene quickly picked up her warm bowl of meat porridge and turned away like she was running away. She went straight into the nearby tent, clearly not wanting to join the conversation anymore.
“?”
The dragon girl sitting nearby tilted her head in confusion. But when she saw that Violet didn’t seem bothered, she decided not to say anything either. After all, Rene was part of their group, and they all knew each other well. So Xiao Guang was fine with her being a bit casual around her master.
“Sorry, Lady Violet. Rene was being a little rude. But I can’t really blame her, because what we saw back there was really…”
Leila shook her head with a helpless smile, then continued explaining in a serious tone under Violet’s curious gaze.
“When we arrived with a group of Holy Knights, the evil energy in that graveyard was even thicker than what was reported. From what we saw at the scene, that place must’ve been a new burial site, no older than half a year. And from the start, it was clearly set up for a purpose, most likely for some kind of awful experiment.”
“You mean… necromancy?” Violet guessed, her voice thoughtful.
Leila nodded, then shook her head.
“Yes, it was necromancy, but a kind even more cruel and twisted than usual. They took those already rotting corpses, cut them up into pieces, and then stitched them back together in terrible ways, trying to make undead creatures that were even uglier and more inhuman than the usual stitched monsters.”
“Do you remember the [Blasphemers] we saw back then from the aibus world? I think these people were trying to make something like those.”
“Eww… yeah, that really is disgusting.”
Now Violet understood why Rene had made that face earlier, she really hated dirty and ugly things. Just remembering what those monsters looked like made Violet stick out her tongue in disgust.
These [Blasphemers] weren’t a specific species, nor were they created by the Goddess of Earth, Seth. The word referred to creatures that weren’t born through natural means, but were instead made from hatred and evil energy, beings so wrong that even the world itself rejected them.
They didn’t have a fixed form. Undead were just one of the ways they could appear. But when one of these creatures was filled with so much malice and ugliness that the world labeled it a [Blasphemer], its power would usually be terrifying.
That meant it had already gone beyond normal limits and reached a level where it could start to affect the laws of nature and fate, a level known as “Mythical.” Ordinary beings stood no chance against something like that.
“I was kind of curious and wanted to go check it out myself, but after hearing all that… maybe I’ll pass. So did you manage to catch the ones who did it? Do you know who they were?”
Leila accepted a freshly roasted sweet potato from Mia, thanked her, and sat back down. Then she shook her head again.
“No. They must have noticed the scouts getting close and ran away early. By the time we arrived, all we found were rotting body parts, half-stitched together and incomplete. The whole place was a bloody mess. We had no choice but to burn everything down with fire.”
“But according to Lady Frederica’s guess, this might be connected to a group called the [Sanctum of the Undead]. It’s an evil cult that worships necromancy and dead bodies. Their headquarters is said to be in a small country located between the two big empires. It’s not too far from here. They often do horrible, forbidden experiments that go against basic human morals, so it’s very possible they snuck across the border to do this.”
“Sigh... If things like this can happen during peace time, then if the two sides ever go to full war and the world falls into chaos… I don’t even want to imagine what that would look like.”
Leila let out a worried sigh and muttered to herself. She didn’t speak anymore and just quietly started eating her warm food. It was clear the terrible scene at the grave site had deeply affected her.
“......”
Violet and Xiao Guang didn’t disturb her. They looked at each other silently, then turned to the quiet maid standing behind them.
“Bring the map.”
“Yes, Lady Violet.”
Understanding her master’s request at once, the maid quickly pulled out a leather map from her bag. Unlike the special map made by Sethlin’s people, this one was for the diplomatic group’s travel plans. It focused on the buffer zone between the two empires and only showed part of the Holy Empire’s east and the western lands of the Austre Empire.
At the moment, the planned travel route of the diplomatic group was already marked clearly in red ink. Violet had looked at this map many times before, so she quickly found a specific location she had in mind.
“It should be here, Hellwood Forest. As I thought, we’re already close.”
She tapped a dark area on the map inside the Valandia Province, very close to where they currently were. The priestess nodded thoughtfully.
“Master, do you mean—?”
“I mean, the ones doing these necromancy experiments are most likely hiding in this forest. And chances are, they’ll try to cause trouble along this road we have to take.”
Mia, who had just returned after preparing a late-night snack for Leila and her sister, glanced at the map curiously and suddenly spoke in surprise.
“Eh? Lady Violet, Hellwood Forest… isn’t that the famous [Forest of Death]? We’re actually going through there?”
“Yes. That’s what Frederica planned. The Valandia Province is dangerous everywhere. Compared to some other more troublesome places, this so-called [Forest of Death] is said to be just a normal forest that’s a bit spooky. But now, it looks like it might not be so simple…”
As if remembering something interesting, Violet stared at the map with a thoughtful smile.
Hellwood Forest was called the [Forest of Death], not because it was crawling with undead like the [Forgotten Land] of the Human United Kingdom, but because of a tragic battle that happened there long ago. During the Austre Empire’s early expansion, they fought a final battle in this region against the local kingdom that ruled the land at the time.
It’s said that both sides lost hundreds of thousands of soldiers. The ground was covered in bodies and rivers ran red with blood. The [Battle of Hellwood] was one of the bloodiest in the Austre Empire’s history and became known as a meat grinder of death.
Because there were simply too many dead, and it was raining heavily at the time, making it impossible to burn the bodies, the empire had no choice but to bury all the corpses directly on-site using special methods, to prevent the spread of disease.
And that mass grave… is now known as Hellwood Forest.