The Cornflower Witch Chapter 271

Timber Town

In the usually tranquil town, frightened shouts echoed.

“Lord Fletcher, Lord Fletcher has been killed!” The maid opened the bedroom door and was terrified to find that Lord Fletcher, the baron appointed by the Anti Kingdom and the lord of the town, was lying on the bed, decapitated, his blood staining the bed.

At the same time, the town’s guards were in chaos, as they discovered their captain had drowned in the well, leaving them leaderless.

The town was small, and the turmoil quickly spread to the streets. Seeing the Anti soldiers in disarray, someone in the crowd suddenly shouted, “Jabez, Prince Jabez’s restoration army has arrived!”

On one side of Timber Town, a group of people in crude armor, holding weapons, walked and shouted.

“Citizens of Regas!”

“Are you still enduring like cowards?”

“Those Anti mongrels, they steal our grain, defile our wives and daughters, and insult everything we hold dear.”

“Are you going to kneel at their feet forever, begging for mercy?!”

“As low as rats, or as mighty as lions!” These were the words once spoken by King Regard.

Soon, someone on the street responded.

A plump, broad-shouldered bald man rushed out of his house. He wore an iron pot on his chest and wielded an axe in one hand, joining the group.

“Of course, ‘as mighty as lions’!”

Under the influence and encouragement of the emotion, people continually joined along the way. Those Regas men who didn’t act were looked down upon with scorn by those around them, making them unable to bear the feeling, so they also followed the group.

The group gradually expanded. At this point, the chaotic Anti soldiers in the town finally realized something was wrong. Several squad leaders gathered and began to reorganize their troops, calling soldiers to prepare for battle.

“These Regas people actually dare to resist?” The captain, clad in full iron armor and holding a shield and longsword, gazed at the armed Regas personnel approaching from a distance.

“They really think shouting a few slogans will make them knight lords, capable of defeating a hundred. It’s ridiculous.”

The two sides soon engaged in battle. Some Anti soldiers occupied higher ground, firing crossbows, while some hunters also hid in corners, continuously shooting arrows in retaliation, preventing the crossbowmen from fully suppressing them.

In the streets and alleys below, Anti soldiers formed a shield wall to fend off the Regas armed forces, which outnumbered them several times over.

A Regas warrior of the ‘First-Order Blood Law’ charged out from the crowd with a large axe, splitting a shield and tearing an opening for the advancing troops.

However, among the Anti garrison soldiers, there were also warriors with attribute tiers. They quickly took their positions, their blades gleaming with cold light, swiftly cutting down the Regas in front and filling the gap, then pushing the front line back.

The Regas armed forces were in disarray. Members of the Hundred-Eyed Cult, hiding in the shadows, struck. They used pupil techniques from a distance to interfere with the opposing soldiers, causing their minds to momentarily become dazed and their reactions to pause, allowing the Regas people to kill them.

The tide of battle shifted again, with the battle line pushing step by step towards the Anti side.

“Be careful, there are enemies in the dark!” An Anti captain finally noticed something was wrong and roared, reorganizing the entire squad.

A faint silver light appeared on their armor and sides, as several ‘First-tier Castle’ captains formed a small curtain to prevent the hidden cultists from interfering.

The battle once again entered a stalemate.

…

Sylphidya led this Hundred-Eyed Cult team, advancing eastward until dusk, when they reached outside Timber Town.

In the distance, the town was filled with thick smoke and cries of despair. The streets were littered with bodies of both Regas people and Anti soldiers.

“What happened?” The few people at the head of the team questioned, then rushed into the town.

The armed Regas personnel who had previously attacked the strongholds within the town had long since been annihilated. Their bodies lay piled in the streets, but the Anti side fared no better. Many soldiers were also beheaded and impaled, hung in the town square. The few remaining Anti soldiers were covered in blood, their faces contorted in madness as they searched house to house, killing every adult Regas man they found.

At this moment, the two factions in the town had reached an irreversible state of mutual destruction, with no room for reconciliation.

“Stop them.” Sylphidya rode her horse into the town, frowning at the blood and gore on the ground.

“Yes.” The Hundred-Eyed Cult members in the team obeyed, scattering throughout the streets to control the remaining Anti soldiers.

At this point, the surviving members of the Hundred-Eyed Cult in the town joyfully ran out and knelt before the demon contractor. “My lord, you’ve finally arrived.” After his explanation, Sylphidya and the team finally understood why all of this had happened.

“Katchis has discovered the cult’s stronghold, we must return quickly to reinforce them.” An elder cultist suggested.

“If the cult leader has issued such an order, the situation must be utterly dire.”

Sylphidya dismounted and stood before the bloodstained and corpse-strewn street, her heart heavy.

Reading descriptions of tragic scenes in history books and experiencing them firsthand were completely different. An inexpressible melancholic sorrow accumulated in her heart.

She instructed the members of the team to properly settle the residents of the town and left some personnel to temporarily take over the chaotic town.

As Sylphidya prepared to leave, someone brought a special box. Upon opening it, inside was a small scepter, an investiture document, and the seal of Timber Town’s mayor.

“What is this?” Sylphidya was a bit confused.

“This is something Prince Jabez prepared, a symbol of the counterattack and the bugle call for independence,” a cultist explained to Sylphidya.

Looking at these items, Sylphidya shook her head. She could understand the Regas people’s desire to restore their nation, but she also knew that this desire and idea had been exploited.

Now was far from the time to restore the nation, and all they were doing was buying time for the cult leader in the valley.

If they truly wanted Jabez, or the Regas royal family’s wishes to come true, what needed to be done was not just to incite and instigate these commoners to go forward, but to truly lead an army to defeat the Anti army. Only then would everything fall into place naturally, instead of like today, where so many innocent people shed blood and sacrificed their lives.

Putting these items back, Sylphidya prepared to remount her horse and leave.

“My lord, my lord.” A stumbling figure, his face covered in blood, ran out from the town street, waving a tattered Regas flag.

On the blood-stained swallow-tailed banner, a crude cyan cedar tree was embroidered, its stitches a bit crooked, looking somewhat comical.

Yet, this very object was held like a treasure in his hand, dragged by bloodstains, fluttering little by little in the wind.

“My lord.”

He gasped, reaching Sylphidya, kneeling on the ground, his dark eyes looking at the girl on horseback, surrounded by the crowd.

“You must be here to save us.”

“This is the pride of our Timber Town. We… we… defeated those Anti people. We are all strong-willed, mighty as lions Regas people.” As he spoke, warm liquid flowed down his face, wetting and staining the blood and dust.

Clarity and filth mixed, his eyes filled with supplication, as if he had undergone countless hardships, finally completing his parents’ request and yearning for a bit of approval and praise.

“I…” I am not the Regas royal family, nor a noble who can represent them. Sylphidya couldn’t bring herself to say such words.

She knew that these people had shed too much blood and sacrificed too much for that illusory goal. This was almost the only wish of the remaining survivors to live—hoping that this effort, this pride, could be recognized and seen.

But could this plea truly be answered?

Not to mention whether Jabez had the potential to be a wise ruler, the members of the Hundred-Eyed Cult were certainly not genuinely helping the Regas people restore their nation. They were merely using these innocent people to achieve their own desires and goals, and they hadn’t considered the probability of success or how many people would die in the war after instigating attacks and resistance.

No one cared about their lives or deaths—the Anti people didn’t, the Regas royal family didn’t, and the Hundred-Eyed Cult cared even less. Only they took the inspiring slogans seriously and, for those illusory slogans, shed all their blood and sacrificed countless lives.

They were truly foolish, so easily instigated, plundered, and deceived, marching towards swords and spears.

However, looking at the kneeling figure, at his eyes still awaiting approval, Sylphidya could not bring herself to expose or blame him.

The young girl closed her eyes slightly, her voice slightly distorted as she slowly replied.

“I see. You have all done very well. You are the pride of Regas, lions of the mountains, evergreen and indestructible like cedars.”

With these words, the stumbling figure smiled, slowly falling back in contentment, the swallowtail flag still clutched in his hand also plummeting into the mud, concealed by the filth.

A long time later,

A fair and flawless hand picked up the blood-stained and dirty swallowtail flag from the mud, gently blowing away the dust.