CHAPTER 521: EPILOGUE 12 (2/2)
(TL: He listed more lines from the same song, but I’m not sure I want to include even more material of a song. Sounds like future trouble to me. Doesn’t add much to the story anyway.)
The song kept playing while zombie after zombie dragged itself out of the nearby foliage, seemingly drawn to the song itself. In all likelihood, the song had somehow enthralled these dead creatures. As the zombies mindlessly stumbled towards Nicole, they didn’t seem threatening as you would expect from a horrific dead creature. Instead, they just seemed a little silly…
Faced with approaching zombies, Neneth definitely wasn’t about to sit idly by either. Even in her worn out state, she still forced herself to her feet for another mighty swing of her giant sword. Sword wobbling a little, she barely managed to bifurcate the incoming zombies.
“Phew… I’m tired… I just want some meat right now…”
With Nicole out of the picture, the fact that Neneth was able to hold out for so long was remarkable. Being tired was only to be expected. Aques Lumen knew he mustn’t waste any further time. As he got closer, Neneth noticed his presence as well. She hastily raised her head to see who it was approaching them, and found it was an ally.
She wiped the sweat off her forehead before giving a little jump of joy. “Teacher! We’re here! Neneth’s here!”
Ever the energetic child, she always put forth her best. Whether it was battle, protecting her comrades, or even calling for help, she would always be the center of attention…
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“What happened to Nicole?” Even though he already knew the gist of what happened, he still felt the need to hear the story from Neneth herself, seeing as asking Nicole was out of the question.
“Neneth doesn’t know as well…” The joy on her face immediately disappeared. “She was already like that when Neneth found her…”
There wasn’t much information to be gleaned from her words. Even so, that further reinforced his opinion that Ferti’nier was telling the truth…
She must have injured the younger brother she had been looking for all this while… even though that younger brother is no longer the same…
Aques Lumen motioned for her to stay still for now, then walked up to Nicole. He first reached out for the recording crystal, in hopes of discovering the truth of that enchanting voice and the enthralled undead.
Yet the moment he got close to the crystal, Nicole, who was basically no different from a zombie till now, finally moved. She instinctively huddled into herself, pressing her head into the recording crystal, burying it out of sight.
Even if she hadn’t said a word yet, her actions rang clear. She was still there, but her heart was mostly dead at this point.
Aques Lumen knew then how deeply wounded his favored student was. One wrong move might even end up turning her into an invalid… not that she wasn’t one already…
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At this point, the amount of surviving undead was still high. Even though their victory was secured, the stragglers of the horde was an annoying matter that still had to be solved. Now, he had a traumatised student to deal with as well -truly a headache.
“Look after Nicole, Neneth. We need to get out of this area first.” Then without waiting for her response, Aques Lumen took off. He had already scouted the area with his senses: the undead were all but gone. As long as they followed in his footsteps, there shouldn’t be any enemies.
Still, Nicole’s complicated situation and the fact that a horde of undead suddenly appeared to destroy a village weighed heavily on Aques Lumen. That horde wasn’t just a couple thousand strong, it was in the hundreds of thousands! Such a horde appearing in a human kingdom without warning was in no small part due to the lord of the land’s negligence.
The more he thought about this, the angrier he got. He gazed icily in the direction of the ruined village, temper at its breaking point. “The nobility just gets more corrupt by the year… seems like someone must really pay the price before they learn their lesson!”
A leaf fell off its branch at that point, carried by the winds of death… a storm was about to approach the humans…