Chapter 8: Life and Death Choice

The tent holding the bodies of the Guards was situated far at the other end of the camp.

Captain Alice had gone off to find a place to change her clothes. Up until just a moment ago, the female Swordsman had still been wearing the blood-stained military uniform she had died in.

Evidently, she had tolerated the stench of blood on herself for far too long.

Thus, Xiahou Yan and Master Laurie walked side by side through the camp.

The moon shone brightly, the stars were sparse, crows flew southward, and a cool breeze gently blew.

If he were still on Earth in his previous life, Xiahou Yan would have thought that such a romantic scene was the perfect setting to take his women for a stroll under the moonlight.

But now, the person walking beside him was actually a shriveled old codger whose robes gave off a foul stench.

The Lord felt a sting in his nose.

However, the foolishly oblivious Master Victor Laurie clearly hadn’t noticed the Lord’s melancholy in the slightest.

Carrying a lantern, the old codger hummed a popular violin tune from the Imperial Capital while looking around at all the various items in the camp, making Xiahou Yan suspect whether the guy was still trying to find that Yellow Book of his.

Just as the Lord’s frustration was about to reach its peak, Master Laurie suddenly asked, "Lord Eliot, have you considered the suggestion I gave you earlier?"

The Master’s tone was uncharacteristically low.

Xiahou Yan knew what the Master’s "suggestion" referred to. He shook his head and said, "Master, I know you want me to abandon the citizens and escape the infected zone alone under the protection of you and the Guards, but I must refuse this proposal. There are still five hundred of my citizens here. What kind of Lord would abandon his own people to flee for his life?"

Upon hearing the Lord’s answer, Master Laurie didn’t continue trying to persuade him as he had expected. Instead, he steered the conversation in an unexpected direction.

"Lord Eliot, do you know the history of this infected zone beneath our feet?"

"I don’t," Xiahou Yan answered truthfully.

During geography lessons in his childhood, his private tutor had once told Eliot Igor that the Southern Empire contained a desolate infected zone swarming with zombies. However, regarding the origins of this infected zone, all the history textbooks remained strictly tight-lipped.

He never would have thought that one day, he would personally step into this infected zone with his citizens.

"That happened over eight hundred years ago." Master Laurie gazed at the distant starry sky, his eyes looking far away. "There was a peerlessly brilliant Necromancer who attempted to improve the Resurrection Technique within Undead Magic to conquer humanity’s greatest enemy—death. Yes, he tried to do exactly what you achieved tonight: resurrect a human who retained their consciousness from when they were alive, rather than a mindless zombie."

Xiahou Yan pursed his lips and didn’t speak, but he vaguely realized that he seemed to have done something incredibly monumental...

"Without a doubt, that Necromancer failed." Master Laurie gave a bitter smile. "According to legends, he lost his life in his own experiment, and the Netherworld Magic Power leak caused by his Necromancy Experiment infected the town he lived in and continuously expanded outward. Any living creature touched by this Netherworld Magic Power was turned into a highly aggressive, immortal zombie, and the first to bear the brunt were the townsfolk of that very town."

The two just happened to walk into an open area in the camp. Master Laurie pointed toward the west.

"Look, the ruins of that town are located twenty miles to the west. If we went there now, we might even still be able to find the house where that Necromancer lived eight hundred years ago—provided you aren’t chewed down to a skeleton by the zombies in the town ruins first."

Xiahou Yan imagined the scene of a horde of zombies grabbing a living person and gnawing on them wildly, and for some reason, he felt a little hungry.

He really missed the lamb spine soup back on Earth.

Master Laurie, unaware of the Lord’s homesickness, continued his tale, "At that time, that town was the territory of a noble Count. Overnight, almost all of that Count’s citizens turned into the walking dead. He gathered the remaining few hundred surviving townsfolk and hid in the castle with them. But the zombies clawed at the castle gates day and night; it was only a matter of time before the castle was overrun by them."

A classic zombie siege... Xiahou Yan smacked his lips.

"Back then, almost everyone in the castle had fallen into despair. However, that Count thought further ahead than the others. He realized with absolute clarity that someone had to notify the Magic Association of everything happening here before the Netherworld Magic Power continued to spread. Otherwise, the people of this single town wouldn’t be the only ones to suffer."

Master Laurie’s mouth had gone a bit dry from talking. Xiahou Yan unfastened the canteen at his waist and handed it over. The Master thanked him, unscrewed the cap, and chugged wildly before panting and continuing, "Before long, the Count made a decision that no one could have anticipated. At night, he secretly opened the gates and let the zombies into the castle. The starving zombies quickly devoured the survivors taking refuge in the castle, but the Count himself managed to take advantage of the window when the zombies were busy feeding to ride out of the town alone on horseback."

Seeing Xiahou Yan dumbfounded, Master Laurie said faintly, "Just like that, at the cost of hundreds of townsfolk, the Count became the sole survivor of the town. He rode all the way to Academy City and reported the Netherworld Magic Power leak to the Magic Association. The association urgently dispatched five Grand Mages, and only by joining forces did they manage to restrict the expansion of the infected zone. It is safe to say that without that Count’s timely warning, the area of this infected zone would undoubtedly be much larger than what we see now."

"Are you urging me to follow that Count’s example," Xiahou Yan stared into Master Laurie’s eyes, "and abandon my citizens to escape alone?"

"I’m not urging you to do anything," Master Laurie shook his head. "But I feel it is necessary for you to know a historical fact. Due to his contribution of delivering the timely report, that Count was not only spared from imperial punishment but was actually promoted to a Duke. Shortly after, His Majesty the Emperor also bestowed upon him another fiefdom—the capital of that fiefdom was named Eagle’s Rest Castle.

"Lord Eliot, this Count I am speaking of was named Henry Igor. He was the very ancestor of your Igor Family and the pioneer of the Igor Family’s glorious history. All the wealth, honor, and shelter your family has enjoyed for the past eight hundred years are entirely thanks to him."

Xiahou Yan was completely stunned.

"I know you want to use Undead Magic to resurrect Captain Alice and the other Guards so you can lead everyone out of the infected zone," Master Laurie said earnestly. "But the number of soldiers Count Henry Igor had under his command back then was more than a hundred times what we have today! Even so, they couldn’t escape the zombie tide alive!

"Lord Eliot, even if you can resurrect all the fallen again and again, your Magic Power will eventually be depleted one day, while the zombies are endless! What you are attempting is a hopeless gamble!"

Master Laurie patted the Lord’s shoulder and said softly, "Lord Eliot, the vast majority of these five hundred people in the camp are destined to die in this infected zone, but you still have a chance to escape. Just like your ancestor, the choice you face is simply whether to let one person live on alone or let everyone perish together. And this is the simplest choice there could ever be."

Xiahou Yan felt a wave of suffocation in his chest. Seeing a tent labeled "Morgue" appear around the corner, he interrupted Master Laurie as if grasping at a lifeline: "Master Laurie, let’s go test the Resurrection Technique first. As for your suggestion that I leave my citizens behind and flee for my life alone... please let me think about it some more."

Master Laurie gave him a deep look, then silently stepped forward two paces and lifted the tent flap for the Lord.