Chapter 58
The sky was getting increasingly brighter.
By the time dawn arrived, everything in the Jackalan Tribe that succumbed to the fire had burned to ash.
A thick burning stench permeated the place as black smoke billowed in the air.
Charred, curled bodies were seen strewn about. They looked as if they were poor victims of a great fire. For the Swadians who had been setting up camp not far away, every single one who died deserved it.
For the sake of the Oasis Lookout’s safety, the Jackalans had to die.
It was a slaughter carried out between different races. For the sake of the survival of one’s own race, the other one had to go.
It was truly that simple.
Inside a tent, Kant woke up. Given that he had not even slept for two hours, he was still very tired. However, it was not the time to rest. He still had many things to take care of.
He lifted the drape in the tent and went outside.
“My Lord.”
Two Swadian Men-at-Arms were standing guard outside his tent. They bowed slightly and greeted their lord respectfully.
Clad in cavalry mail armor from top to bottom, the two men made quite a bit of noise when they moved. The warhammers strapped to their waists had a spike on one end, which enabled the weapon to easily punch through an enemy’s armor and helmet. It was truly a formidable armor-piercing weapon.
“Yeah.” Kant nodded.
The Swadian Men-at-Arms were his most elite troop class, but there were only 41 of them. Yet, these mounted units, who were clad in armor from top to toe, were effectively capable of serving as tanks. If they went on a frontal charge, they could easily run over up to 500 Jackalans.
Furthermore, he also had 46 Swadian Footmen right behind them. They also wore mail armor, which enabled them to fight with the Swadian Men-at-Arms as infantry units.
If there were 200 more Swadian Militia members behind and Kant struck the Jackalan Tribe with such a force, in accordance with the strategy that had taken place before dawn, the casualties would have been significantly lower. This current lineup of forces would have allowed him to easily crush the Jackalans’ psychological defenses faster.
In the era of cold weapons, heavy cavalry units served as the key to making someone a king on the battlefield.
“Where is Firentis?”
Kant slightly frowned as he looked around the camp.
He asked the footmen, who were patrolling while holding their heavy spears, “Have any of you seen Firentis?”
“Lord Kant, he is currently patrolling the area with the Sarrandian Horsemen.”
The footman who took the lead bowed respectfully and replied, “We found tracks of Jackalans. They seem to be the ones who managed to flee in the attack. They probably came back here to take a look thinking that we had all left.”
“Is that so, huh?” Kant nodded and said, “Stay sharp, and keep your eyes peeled.”
“Understood.” The footmen bowed.
Kant waved and dismissed them, gesturing for them to continue patrolling. However, he took what that footman said to heart.
While the attack on the Jackalan Tribe had been a success, and better still an epic victory, Kant knew that the achievement was gained by crushing their forces instead of actually killing every single one of them.
Then again, having one’s forces crushed and having one’s forces entirely wiped out did not actually make much of a difference on the battlefield.
A group of scattered soldiers was hardly considered a fighting force, just like how cattle about to slaughtered were no longer considered livestock.
Such beings were reduced to food. In his case, they were reduced to merit in combat.
Gallop sounds were quickly heard from the faraway dunes. Firentis led the remaining five Sarrandian Horsemen back to the temporary camp.
“Halt.”
Firentis pulled his reins and bowed to Kant, saying, “Good morning, My Lord.”
Kant nodded and replied, “Morning.”
He looked at Firentis and the five Sarrandian Horsemen. A frown appeared on his face as he said, “Something tells me that you guys ran into those filthy primitive beasts when you were patrolling.”
The linen robes covering their armor had blotches of blood on them, making the fact easy to tell.
Firentis did not bother hiding it and said, “Scattered groups of Jackalans were seen when the sun just came up. We drove quite a number of them off and prevented them from gathering again to ensure that they were not trying anything funny at our camp.”
“Good work.” Kant smiled and voiced his approval.
While the job was simple, it was still quite bloody.
Firentis and the Sarrandian Horsemen, who were once Desert Bandits, likely showed no mercy to those scattered Jackalans. The riders only had to hit those creatures harder to ensure they stayed where they were for good.
“Lord Kant.” Firentis turned around and asked, “What should we be doing next?”
“Next?”
Kant frowned, thinking that the matter needed careful consideration.
Kant looked up at the blackened, charred ruins before him. Black smoke was still rising into the air. The disgusting stench of burned things wafted throughout the area. Kant said, “Let’s search the battlefield.”
While all of them were regular humans, they were still warriors with steely hearts.
They were used to the charred stench of war, especially since it was common throughout the Continent of Caradia. As such, none of them felt anything much about it. They had no problems continuing to search the burned ruins.
The sight of charred dead bodies was not something that would make them sick.
Only poor children had such reactions. The charred bodies were not all that different than burned chicken to the warriors.
Kant gave the order to search the battlefield.
The forces on standby immediately made arrangements. The 46 Swadian Footmen went up first. They stepped on the charred things and bodies, as well as flipped the still-burning ashes with their weapons about without paying any heed to the warm ruins. They need to find out if there was anything of value left behind.
The 41 Swadian Men-at-Arms led their horses as they gathered.
If anything unforeseen were to happen, the heavy cavalry units were able to quickly react. That was because of the experience they had gained fighting in many battles.
The search was a quick one.
There was no way anything of value in the Jackalan Tribe, which was already reduced to charred ruins, would have been spared by the fire.
There were only old broken urns, bones that somehow were capable of resisting the fire, rocks, and similar trinkets left in the ashes of the ruins. The search revealed that the Jackalan Tribe hardly even had iron items with them.
“Hey, what’s this?”
However, several Swadian Footmen seemed to have found something interesting.
They stood at a site of the ruins that seemed more elevated than anywhere else. They flipped the ashes away with the heavy spears in their hand. They quickly discovered something solid getting in their way.
They looked at each other and put their spears aside. They brushed the pitch-black dust and ash off without paying any heed to the residual heat. The entire pile of ash seemed to have suddenly lost its support and collapsed, revealing a 6-foot-wide hole in the ground. Clear splashes of water were heard as the fallen debris collapsed.
There was water inside the hole.
The footmen were very surprised, especially considering where they were currently located.
They were in the Nahrin Desert. It was a barren, dry place where water was a scarce resource. Yet, splashes of water were heard from inside that hole. It was clear that the hole was an incredibly rare water supply point in the desert.
In other words, it was a well.
The footmen quickly relayed the news to the ones behind them.
A well was an important discovery.
The importance of the news was on par with having discovered a mountain pile of silver or gold coins.
Kant reacted calmly to the news. He had been expecting to find a well somewhere in there anyway. When he came to scout the place the first time, he had seen the Jackalan shaman arranging for members of the tribe to get their daily fill of water. He had long speculated that there was a well somewhere in the tribe’s primitive camp.
While water was a scarce resource rarely found in a desert, that was not to say that there was no water in the desert at all.
Furthermore, given how there were hardly any plants found and water vapor at the surface was scarce, the underground water reserves were likely incredibly massive. That was why oases existed in deserts. They were peculiar environments made possible by underground water reserves emerging to the surface.
When Kant approached the well, a dialog box was suddenly seen on his retina.
[Ding… Side Quest assigned]
[Side Quest: Mysteries in the Well]
[Quest Reward: Posthouse x 1]
[Introduction: Gleaming water is seen in the well, but your eagle-like eyes seem to have discovered something at the bottom of the well. While you are unable to see what is down there, you are still able to sense a mystical aura emanating from it. You are determined to take it.]
3
The system had given him another side quest.
Kant frowned slightly and felt the introduction to be a rather exasperating one. Eagle-like eyes were something that he did not have.
Regardless, he walked up to the side of the well and peered inside. The water was indeed gleaming, and there seemed to be something reflecting light from the bottom of the approximately 16-foot-deep well.
Kant squinted to take a better look.
He actually found something at the bottom of the well.
He took a closer look and found that the thing seemed to be a golden disk. However, it remained obscure he could not truly make out what it was.