Chapter 45: The Demon’s Throb (Part 2)

Gloomy negative energy spilled out, accompanied by a throb that only Dean could sense; the feeling was like holding a beating ice cube in his arms. Such a feeling was absolutely unpleasant for any normal person, and Dean was no exception.

However, to hide it, he pretended nothing was wrong as he took off the armor of the bandit leader in front of him and checked for other gains. For a Magic Weapon like the [Demon Blood Dagger], which clearly had special functions, Dean did not want to share it with others if he could help it.

After all, the special function of this evil Dagger was truly horrifying. This destined the user to be misunderstood. No matter what your purpose was, you could not separate yourself from evil. The Divine Church would spare no effort to hunt down and destroy such evil people or objects.

And in Vauban County, the influence of the Divine Church was not the greatest, but it was not small either.

In fact, on the entire Goedz, except for White Night, the presence of the Divine Church could be seen everywhere, only varying in amount.

Therefore, Dean would absolutely not choose to fight the Divine Church head-on right now.

The hatred between the two sides was unavoidable.

But Dean still possessed his reason.

Dean endured the cold of the negative energy filling his chest and abdomen, silently squatting there. Only after the other Militia in the cave had moved out all the food and supplies did Dean drag the Corpse again. He chose a corner that could not be seen from the outside at all and took out the [Demon Blood Dagger].

A scarlet light appeared on the twisted blade, breathing as if it were alive, making one’s heart tremble.

Dean held the handle straight and inserted the twisted blade, which looked like a goat’s horn, into the Corpse before him. Silently, the blade of the Dagger went straight into it.

Then, the negative energy, which had been extremely full, rapidly decreased at this moment, while a smell of sulfur became stronger and stronger.

When he smelled the sulfur, Dean was certain that this [Demon Blood Dagger] had a connection with Hell. Even if it did not come from there, it was made by a Devil; after all, only objects tainted by a Devil would have the smell of sulfur.

As for Demons?

These chaotic existences had an aura that felt more like cold ice yet burning fire. In short, it was just like their own chaos.

Buzz!

With a slight trembling sound, the [Demon Blood Dagger] inserted into the Corpse seemed to wake up from sleep. The scarlet color, originally only on the blade, covered the body of the half-Barbarian bandit leader almost instantly. Then, this Corpse, far stronger than a normal human, began to wither at a speed visible to the naked eye.

In just the time of two breaths, only a dry Skeleton remained.

Not only the flesh and blood, but even the skin was devoured by this evil Dagger. And through it all, Dean watched everything before him calmly.

He was already prepared for the devouring of the [Demon Blood Dagger].

As for whether there would be condemnation from his conscience for doing this?

If the target were someone else, Dean might have had some. But for this half-Barbarian bandit leader, Dean felt at ease.

After all, the innocent people who died at his hands were enough for him to suffer such retribution.

Of course, Dean also admitted the evil of the [Demon Blood Dagger], but to increase his Strength in the short term, even if it was evil, Dean did not mind. He would not deliberately distort a fact, nor would he make excuses for himself.

And the only thing Dean could do was to not deviate from his original heart: not to point this Dagger at innocent people.

[+0.02 Strength]

When everything settled down, such a prompt appeared on Dean’s character panel. Dean was not surprised by this. Sibul’s Strength was obvious to all, so reaching ‘Knight-rank’ was not strange at all. Calculating based on ‘Knight-rank’, one percent of that would make 0.02 Strength just right.

As the prompt appeared on Dean’s character panel, the [Demon Blood Dagger] returned to normal again. The negative energy was completely restrained, and the scarlet on the blade disappeared, as if it had fallen asleep again. After tucking the [Demon Blood Dagger] into his clothes, Dean stepped hard and crushed the Skeleton in front of him.

In fact, the Skeleton of Sibul, the half-Barbarian bandit leader, was as fragile as if it had weathered a hundred years of wind and frost. Dean used no effort at all to turn these bones into a pile of bone powder. Then he mixed it with mud from the damp part of the cave and covered it. Even the best tracker in Vauban County would not be able to find the problem.

Carrying the deformed Armor, Dean walked out of the cave. At this time, the Battlefield had not been fully cleaned, and the Militia were still busy. In fact, the extra food and supplies became the objects of the Militia’s focus; they had simply bundled the food and placed it on the horses’ backs.

However, clearly, their horses were not enough. There were still one-third of the food and supplies placed aside.

“Ike, discard the extra food!”

Dean gave the order very decisively.

“But, Regiment Commander, this is food…”

The skinny Militia Captain was clearly a bit reluctant.

“We have gone deep into the border of the Snowplains Dense Forest. Although we are still far from the Core area, we cannot deny that this is a bandit den. Can you guarantee that after carrying so much food, you can still handle a sudden attack? Or… do you still have the Stamina to handle it? It is more than thirty kilometers back to our outpost!”

Dean patted his Militia Captain and did not continue speaking. The clever latter did not need Dean to point it out again.

With a reluctant sigh, the skinny Militia Captain signaled his subordinates to abandon the food and supplies that the horses could not carry.

Although the young Militia were a bit reluctant, they had heard Dean’s words earlier. After weighing the pros and cons, abandoning became the best choice.

However, even abandoning was not done cleanly.

Dean watched his Militia Captain hide the remaining food and supplies in the cave again and could not help shaking his head. Although there were many hiding places inside this cave, there were only two exits. Moreover, if a dozen people searched carefully, there would be no secret places here at all.

And for the border of the Snowplains Dense Forest, where many bandits gathered, a dozen people were obviously not rare. It did not require those notorious bandit groups at all; some small bandit groups would be enough to complete such a task.

Therefore, Ike’s behavior was fundamentally useless.

However, Dean did not say much this time; after all, one needed to experience things to understand the difference.

When the skinny Militia Captain finished everything, and another Militia Captain reported no abnormalities, Dean led the two teams of Militia on the return journey.

Unlike the trepidation when they came, the Militia, who had now won, all wore smiles of their own. Some were even discussing the reward from the Lord Baron.

It was not until Theron shouted to stop them that these Militia stopped, focused on the road, and watched their surroundings.

Regarding this, Dean first nodded with satisfaction, then shook his head helplessly.

The satisfaction was naturally for Theron, the young man with ‘Knight qualifications’.

The helplessness was for the members of the Knight Order right now. They might not have any malice, but they could not become the soldiers Dean needed.

At least, except for a few people, most of the rest were not suitable.

But, even if they were not suitable, they were among the few men Dean had.

“We must recruit more soldiers!”

This thought had appeared before, but it was temporarily shelved because of Dean’s subsequent plans. Now, Dean thought of it again.

And clearly, the best source of soldiers in the Tier Territory was naturally those excellent hunters.

However, similarly, inviting them to join was absolutely not a simple matter. After all, as the best hunters, they were almost the leaders of various hunting teams. Although they could not be considered truly high-ranking or powerful, they gained a lot after every hunt.

Simple bribery would not work at all.

As for paying a greater price?

It was clearly not suitable for Dean at this moment. What he needed was a group of soldiers capable of fighting well, not greedy Mercenaries. Once such a style spread in the Military Camp, it would clearly be detrimental to future development.

And putting aside the excellent ones, what remained were some less excellent ones.

Turning these less excellent ones into excellent ones would require quite a long time.

And coincidentally, what Dean lacked was time. After all, the Blood Moon War would not wait for Dean to finish his preparations before starting.

In the end, the problem returned to the original point, making Dean, who was sitting on the Warhorse, unable to stop himself from letting out a long sigh—

“Time, Gold Pulton…”

Dean chanted in a low voice. At the same time, in Dean’s mind, he searched for feasible plans one by one.