Mass release – 3/5
***
Victor opened his eyes.
It was still night.
No, it only felt like that.
It was dark everywhere he looked, and he couldn’t even hear his own breathing.
How could there be no noise at all?
Victor instinctively grabbed the sword and unsheathed it. As he swung his sword, he felt something cut.
His eyes were still dark as if enveloped in a black mist, but his other senses were sharpened.
He focused in all directions.
He swung his blade like a wild beast and cut down those who attacked him, one by one.
Swinging his sword, he slowly realized.
‘Assassins.’
They were clearly assassins, due to their choice of weapon and attack technique.
There were more than one or two. The number of attackers continued to increase even though he swung his sword and slashed his opponents.
He already knew the reason.
He remembered the story of the knights who were slaughtered by assassins in one night.
More and more fear filled his mind.
He shouted out the names of his comrades.
“Brother? Aslan? Chica? Helio?”
But, oddly enough, he couldn’t hear his own voice.
There was no way. Carlz’s words flashed through his desperate mind.
-“It must have been the work of wizards.”
He grew pale when he realized what happened while he was sleeping. Although blind, he had keener senses than anyone else.
He cut through the assassins endlessly. The more blood flowed from his sword, the weaker the magic became. The more they attacked, the faster Victor was. He swung his sword frantically and prayed earnestly in his heart.
‘Please please please.’
The moment the last assassin was killed, the magic was broken.
It was quiet. The slowly rising sun seeped through the large window. Except for the dead bodies piled up around him, the landscape was no different than usual.
Victor ran out of his dorm without having the time to take a closer look. He cried out.
“Helena? Sigmund? Alshi? Where are you?”
He ran to the dorm next door and slammed the door open.
Bodies were scattered all over the floor. There were those who were killed defenselessly in their sleep, and those who wielded their swords and died in combat.
Victor continued to run. He saw those who stood vigilantly and those who fell out of their tents. His colleagues were so dead cold that their eyes were still open.
But there was no time to sit down and close their eyes.
He had someone to protect.
“Brother! Brother Theon!”
Victor cried until his throat burst.
‘This cannot be.’
‘This cannot be!!’
He opened the door to the commander’s quarters.
“Brother!”
“Brother?”
The sun had come up completely.
A dim light filtered through the window. The island was still eerily quiet.
Victor passed a few corpses and walked inside slowly.
Mortheon was there.
With a sword firmly in his hand, Mortheon lay on the floor with his eyes closed. Maps and papers were scattered all over the place. It looked like he had fallen asleep while planning.
Victor knelt down in front of him.
“Brother Theon.”
Mortheon looked very calm, like he was sleeping. Except for the deep stab wound on the side of his neck.
“Oh, no–”
No tears came out. He traced the wound with trembling hands.
His brother’s skin was still warm.
Victor’s whole body trembled.
Suddenly his world collapsed around him and suffocated him, with nowhere to escape.
Victor Morte had failed.
He lost his reason to live. He was unable to accomplish the one task he had devoted his life to.
He lost Mortheon.
“Ahhhh…!!”
He fell over and screamed with all his might.
The island was quiet, as if to mock the fact that there were no survivors.
A thought that had been buried surfaced again.
Victor Morte wanted to die.
He really, really wanted to die.
***
The sun rose carelessly and hung in the middle of the sky.
A rumbling sound was heard in the harbor, but Victor remained stationary.
He stayed perfectly still, even when their playful calls turned into shouts and screams. Victor heard a familiar voice seeking him eagerly.
“Little Duke! Little Duke!!”
“Victor! Where are you?”
Soon, the door swung open.
“Little Duke! You are alive…”
Leonard walked towards him, fell to his knees and stopped.
“Lord Mortheon…”
The low voice trembled.
Victor did not raise his head.
He didn’t want to say or do anything.
He just wanted to go to where his family was.
Other footsteps were heard behind Leonard.
It was Carlz.
He grabbed Victor’s shoulder.
“…Get up.”
The red-haired knight spoke with a dry voice he had never heard before.
“There is no time for this. Go out and fix the situation, give us the order!”
“Carlz, are you really-”
“Little Duke is now the Grand Duke!”
Carlz interrupted Leonard.
The two friends glared at each other.
“There is no Grand Duke, no deputy commander, no chief of staff! What will happen if the Little Duke stays like this?”
“Give him time to mourn! The Little Duke is now…”
“That’s enough. Stop it.”
A hoarse voice croaked out.
Victor stood up very slowly.
He had no strength in his legs and couldn’t think straight.
But he couldn’t leave his older brother and colleagues like this.
He staggered past Carlz, who looked troubled, and Leonard, whose eyes were tightly shut.
When he emerged from the dorm, dozens of knights flocked around him.
“Little Duke, are you okay?!”
“How did this happen? Why, how-”
“Assassins attacked us last night.”
A silence like death washed over them.
Victor explained the situation dryly.
“They used magic to cover our eyes and ears, and when I killed them all and dispelled the magic, no one was alive. Neither the knights, …Theon… nor Brother Theon.”
“…”
“I was there, and I…”
Some knights slumped down on the spot. Many were already beating the ground and weeping.
But the rest were just looking at Victor with red eyes, full of sadness and anger.
“Now what?!”
“Give us an order, Grand Duke.”
Victor closed his eyes.
It was a title he had never imagined he would hear.
Anyone other than Mortheon did not deserve that title.
But he had to fulfill his responsibilities.
He couldn’t die.
The New Grand Duke gave his first order.
“Blow the horn and summon all the Knights of Morte. The corpses of my colleagues cannot be sent to Morte, so they will be burned tonight.”
“We will obey your orders.”
The knights bowed their heads and sobbed.
Victor looked down at the hot sandy beach. He felt choked.
***
The fire burned all night long.
It was a hot fire, but he couldn’t feel it. The tears that flowed down his cheeks were hotter than lava.
Most of those who died were elders, but they were like older brothers to all of them.
Not to mention Mortheon, the master who was always kind to everyone.
Victor stood side by side with his friends, watching the blazing fire.
“What are you going to do now?”
Leonard asked in a hoarse voice.
Victor thought their respectful language was awkward, but he didn’t have the energy to point it out.
Their pleasant days on the estate were like the distant past now.
All he had left was deep-black hatred.
“I need revenge.”
“Your highness killed all the assassins, right?”
“No, it’s not enough.”
The two looked at Victor quietly.
Watching the roaring flames, Victor spoke.
“The people who caused this war, those who sent assassins, and even the hometowns of the assassins will pay the price. Let their lives be destroyed in the same way.”
“Your highness, that is…”
“I know that a knight must neither invade first nor take unjust revenge. But I don’t care about that anymore. The person who taught me that is dead.”
Silence fell.
Leonard seemed to have a lot to say.
Anguish was etched into the face of the knowledgeable young knight.
But Carlz had a very different attitude.
“Is revenge possible? Our military is slow and incompetent. The Southern Kingdom will be able to win at this rate.”
His words made Victor think.
There was always a line he never crossed.
Fearing that his older brother would hate him or that his colleagues would be afraid, there was a line he couldn’t cross.
He always wondered what would happen if he wielded his sword to his heart’s content, but he never did.
But now, he didn’t care.
“Command said that we can’t change the situation by ourselves.”
He slowly turned to his friends.
“But I will.”
They didn’t answer.
They just bowed their heads to their new master.
Victor stood on the beach all night until the flames went out.