Chapter 406: Two-Pronged Retreat

The battle ended without a single casualty on either side.

It was something of an anticlimax. Lyon had deployed so many legends. Why retreat despite suffering no meaningful losses to their combat strength?

That was how it looked from the outside, at least. After all, Cyril Roland and his company hadn't lost so much as a hair. The celestial warrior had been destroyed, and they'd expended some power, but nothing more. There was nothing stopping them from continuing the fight.

And yet they had chosen to withdraw.

It ran counter to everything Lyon stood for, especially its tradition of fighting to the last. The Radiant General's reputation was likely ruined; the reception waiting for him back home would almost certainly be grim.

But that wasn't what occupied Cyril Roland's mind. He pulled his forces back, though not all the way. They dropped anchor about a hundred kilometers from Ambrose's Coin Island,.

They neither retreated fully nor pressed forward. They were stuck, much like Cyril Roland's thoughts.

Every Lyon soldier felt the same.

After that bewildering battle, they each had to confront the same question: had the Holy Light truly sided with the undead?

If not, how were they to explain the mysterious paladin? How were they to explain that unassuming stroke cleaving the celestial warrior in two? How were they to explain the celestial warrior seemingly recognizing the paladin? Where did any of that leave them?

The only explanation that fit was that the Lord of Dawn had sent that mysterious paladin to aid the lich.

But accepting that explanation would drive every Lyon soldier to the edge of madness.

The god they had given their devotion to, sending his own emissary to help the undead? It would make everything the Lyon Empire had done for generations a farce.

There was no getting past it. Cyril Roland's mind was a swamp of confusion, with nothing solid for him to stand on.

When faith was his armor, he could be fearless and unstoppable. But upon discovering that the faith itself might be flawed, all that remained was bewilderment and despair.

This was the fatal vulnerability of the devout.

This time, even the perpetually level-headed Lucas, the Glorious Shield, had no answers for him.

On the battlefield, Lucas had been able to put it out of his mind, to will himself into a state of deliberate un-knowing. But away from the fighting, he was as devout a follower of the Lord of Dawn as any of them. His composure was cracking too.

Even so, he was still the calmest person on the ship, which was why, when he looked out at the uncertainty written on every face around him, he said, "Whether that lich was genuine or not, there's one pressing question in front of us right now. Do we admit defeat and turn back, or do we press the attack again?"

Cyril Roland looked up at his old friend with an empty gaze. "I can't even find a reason to raise my sword. How are we supposed to attack that island again? What if the lich truly is the Lord of Dawn's chosen?"

Lucas said through his teeth, "Then we must leave. Make the call and make it now. The Empire will receive word soon enough. If we don't head back now, what will happen to our supplies? I don't have answers any more than the rest of you do, but we can't starve to death out here on the open ocean."

Lucas's words got quite a few soldiers nodding. Whatever the truth turned out to be, survival was paramount. There were no answers to be had at the bottom of the sea.

But then someone else spoke up. "If we go back like this, how do we explain ourselves? We can't even explain how we lost."

Tradition dictated only two outcomes for a Lyon crusade against the undead: victory, or grievous defeat with heavy losses.

Fighting to the last was the Lyon way. No soldier present lacked the courage to die. But what would the people of the Empire think of them if they returned unscathed and unbloodied? Heading back like that might as well be death for their reputations.

Cyril Roland exhaled slowly. He stood and addressed them all. "If what that lich said is the truth, then there is something badly wrong with the Empire."

Had the late Leonine General Roger Ángelo truly committed the atrocities he was accused of? If the Empire had known, why had it never acted?

Was the justification for invading the Unholy Kingdom and the Orcish Highlands truly what the dispatches had claimed? Did the Unholy Kingdom truly worship evil gods and conduct sacrificial rituals in bulk? Were the orcs really running large-scale slave raids on human settlements?

Were those reports genuine?

Going further back, had the desert dwarves truly committed crimes heinous enough to justify seizing half their territory?

On what grounds had they leveled charges against the lich? As he himself had said, everything he had done was in service of saving the world. What crimes did that leave him with?

The old Cyril Roland would never have questioned what the Empire published.

How could information confirmed by both paladins and priests be false? These were matters reported to the Lord of Dawn in prayer. How could a god stand by and ignore them?

But if it were all a lie, why had the Lord of Dawn not withdrawn his favor from Lyon? Why were there still so many paladins and priests in the Empire gaining rank and power?

It made no sense. Cyril Roland had stopped caring about his reputation. He needed the truth.

"Lord of Dawn, hear the prayer of the lowly. Grant your lost and wandering faithful a direction to follow."

Cyril Roland prayed with greater sincerity than ever before in his life. The other Lyon soldiers joined him: every one of them a devout believer in the Lord of Dawn, and every one of them desperately in need of guidance.

Such was the meaning of faith.

The collective will of ten thousand souls gathered into a current, pressing through the veil between the mortal world and the divine realm and reaching toward the domain of the Lord of Dawn.

At last, a single impression descended from above, entering every mind at once.

The Lord of Dawn did not answer their questions. He gave them only a directive: "If you seek the truth, go to the other side of the Lyon Empire."

With the divine oracle given, the prayer drew to a close. Every face on the ship wore an expression of confusion.

What did "the other side of the Empire" mean?

Cyril Roland looked across to one of the figures on deck: the blonde Elizabeth Morrison, a legendary priest. Of everyone present, she was the most skilled at interpreting divine oracles.

Elizabeth's features pinched together helplessly.

In the past, she would have been able to offer an interpretation immediately. Now, with her own faith shaken, she had no confidence that she could read into the Lord of Dawn's words accurately at all.

Cyril Roland said gently: "Don't worry. I'm just as lost as you are. But the fact that the Lord of Dawn still sent us an oracle means he hasn't abandoned us. Elizabeth, whatever we've done wrong before, this is our chance to make it right."

The words steadied her more than she expected. He was right. There was still a chance. The Lord of Dawn had not given up on them.

Elizabeth composed herself, then addressed the group: "This oracle has no clear parallel in our texts. It is, in fact, unusually direct. We simply need to work out what 'the other side of the Empire' means, and the rest will follow. As I see it, there are two possible readings.

"The first is the desert: territory the Empire has only recently taken. If the Empire truly committed unforgivable acts during that war, the newly occupied lands are where we would most likely find the answers we're looking for. It is, quite literally, the Empire's other side. The lands it has newly conquered, so different from its heartland."

The reasoning was sound. Unlike Lyon's established territories, the desert was the Empire's newest frontier, its other face.

Cyril Roland nodded, then asked, "You said there were two readings. What's the second?"

Elizabeth hesitated. "The second... may be nothing more than a personal feeling. I can't offer a convincing argument for it. And if I were to actually pursue it, I'd very likely be accused of treason on the spot."

"Treason?" Cyril Roland's brow furrowed. Something in her tone triggered a thought. "You mean, the other side of the Empire is Allen Watson?"

Elizabeth gave a reluctant nod. By now, all of Lyon knew that Allen Watson had placed himself in open opposition to the imperial family.

Allen had once faced charges of treason. He had subsequently distinguished himself at the battle of the Unholy Kingdom, saving Lyon's forces and personally holding off the githark pursuit.

It should have been the perfect opportunity to return to the fold, but Allen had not taken advantage of it. Instead, he had made a very public point of opposing the Lyon royal family. The lich's claims about the Leonine General's massacres were apparently something Allen had raised before as well.

But the Leonine General was already dead, and most people had let the matter drop. When Cyril Roland heard about it, he had only a vague impression of the matter and was too caught up in his own affairs to dig deeper. He had written it off as Allen playing politics against the imperial family.

But the evidence the lich presented seemed to align precisely with what Allen Watson had said.

Looking back, a great many loose ends began to connect.

Allen Watson had once been the lich's captive. Had he learned the truth about the Empire during that time? After his escape, he had become the Silvermoon Knight's student and the youngest legendary paladin in the Empire's history, a limitless future seemingly assured. And yet, at that precise juncture, he had chosen treason.

Even then, the timing had struck Cyril Roland as strange. Allen Watson's father was the High Inquisitor. Allen himself had distinguished himself on the battlefield time and again. Why would a man like that betray the Empire?

There had to be more to it. And looking at it now, all of Allen Watson's actions pointed toward a single explanation: he had discovered what was wrong with the Lyon Empire long before anyone else.

He wasn't committing treason. He was fighting to set the Empire back on course.

But Allen Watson's position was sensitive right now. Cyril Roland had just lost a battle. If he sought Allen Watson out without any official authorization, his behavior would almost certainly be read as an act of betrayal back in the capital.

He turned it over carefully and finally gave an order. "We'll split up. Elizabeth, take your contingent to the desert. Gather intelligence on the war, and determine whether the Empire committed acts of massacre during that campaign. I'll take the others to find Allen Watson. I'm hoping to hear the truth from him directly."

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