Since the original had done all the legwork of social favors, maybe Field could turn it to his advantage down the line.
"Haha, Baron Bull and his son are famously — er, forgive me, I've said too much." Kao shut his mouth in a hurry. Bad-mouthing one noble in front of another was a good way to shorten your life, even when the noble before you was famous for being a meek coward.
It was exactly that kind of meddling that had cost him his future and gotten him exiled to the North — stumbling onto a noble's affair when he'd had no business poking around.
Field wanted to press him, but just then he noticed something on the little map in his mind: a patch of red skull markers had suddenly appeared, racing fast in his direction.
"Hsss — could someone be coming to welcome us?" He said it lightly, but Field was no fool. A skull marker was surely nothing good. He quickly sent a manservant to fetch Connor.
"Haha — forgive my bluntness, but the baron is simply seeing ghosts!" When Connor heard the manservant's faintly anxious report, he laughed it off with open scorn. "This is behind the walls of Kashan Fortress — the sturdiest link in the Empire's whole defensive line. If there's danger even here, I'll eat every last lump of dung my warhorse drops!"
In Connor's mind, Field had long since been stamped with the label: a desperate man's last, futile thrashing.
"Tell your baron — the journey to the Nightfall Territory is overseen by both the law and the family. He can't go losing his nerve and turning back at the last minute. That's beneath a noble's character."
Hearing Connor's aggressive lecture, the manservant lost his confidence and could only return to report.
Field merely said, "Oh," and told the slaves to slow down.
Connor, mounted, was forced to take the lead at the front of the column.
"Coward! Hard to believe the count sired anything so spineless." Connor sneered under his breath.
But very soon, his face turned utterly grim.
Because Field ran into the "locals" who'd come to welcome them so warmly.
"Roooar!" A weird, screeching cry carried over.
"So they're here?" Field gave a soft laugh. "Looks like someone's having horse dung for dinner today."
Amid a chorus of alarmed cries, Field rode past the slaves blocking the road and saw row upon row of grayish-white eyeballs. Corpse-fiends in peasant garb came charging full-tilt in his direction, and ahead of them ran a dozen or so ordinary humans. Even from a hundred meters off, the chill of their killing miasma and the reek of rot slammed straight into his face.
These rotting corpses were exactly what the Northern Province produced!
"What's going on? We're not even at the North yet — how are there monsters?" Cavalry captain Connor spat and cursed his luck under his breath. Just when the job was about to be done, an accident had to ambush him. "Mount up, knights! Prepare for battle!"
What made it more galling was that he'd just finished mocking Field moments ago.
Connor raised his lance, every fiber of him unwilling — but if he shirked his duty, his shot at the upper class was finished for good.
The twenty cavalrymen instantly fell into a single line, spurred their horses up the high ground to the right, then used the downhill slope to build speed and charged headlong into the corpse-swarm.
"Better to rely on yourself than beg help from others." Field felt his own nerves tighten. He fixed a long, hard stare on the snapping, clawing corpses, then shouted to the slaves behind him, "Chain the wagons together! Any man with the guts, take up a tool and fight with me! I'll reward you by your performance!"
The slaves didn't budge, only cowered behind the wagons, shaking — or begging for a miracle.
"Don't count on those wretches." The steward's legs trembled so hard it was as if a little electric motor had been stuffed inside them. He was scared half to pissing himself! He clutched at Field's robe and quavered, "My lord, let's flee for our lives — er, I mean a strategic withdrawal. No need to bother with these dirt-legs. If they die, we just buy more."
Field pried the steward's hand off and frowned. "If a little thing like this scares you stiff, you're better off not going to the North at all."
You think I want to?! The count picked me out by name! Kao wished he could ascend to heaven where he stood, his face flushed a deflated red.
"Huh? Are there enemies?" Ashina hopped down from the wagon. Days of recovery had pulled her out of her gaunt, sallow state; the places that ought to fill out had filled out without reservation, plump and fair. Were it not for the slave brand and the maid's dress, she'd have looked every bit a noble young lady.
"My lord, I — I'll do my best to protect you!"
Ashina raised her little pink fists and planted herself, quivering, in front of Field, shaking like a kitten in a cold wind.
"It won't come to that." Looking at Ashina's wolf ears, flattened back into "airplane ears" with nerves, Field didn't know whether to laugh or cry — but he was gratified all the same. The meat and bread hadn't gone to waste, then.
Not like certain hateful so-and-sos, who ate his food and held a grudge against him for it besides.
"Help! Save us!" The peasant running out front spotted his saviors and flung himself over, bawling for his parents, dragging the corpse-swarm gathering in behind him.
"For glory!"
Once they'd closed to a certain distance, Connor's cavalry launched their charge. Roaring their war cry, they thrust their three-meter lances out to full reach, driving straight into the snarling, clawing horde.
"Shunk! Shunk!"
A string of teeth-grating, flesh-piercing sounds rang out as seven or eight corpses were tossed skyward on the lances and dropped to the ground like ruptured sacks. Corruption had turned their blood purple, and it sprayed out for free, soaking the ground into a sticky paste.
That was only the appetizer. After the lance charge, the cavalry wheeled in place, and with chain-flails and sabers swinging fast from the saddle, the rotting corpses fell like cut wheat amid blossoming sprays of blood. Some were knocked down by the warhorses and had their chests stamped open under iron hooves. It was a slaughter.
The corpses that slipped through slammed headlong into the wagon-wall Field had assembled, their rotted brains now mere decoration. They had no grasp of tactics at all — some even gnawed and clawed at the wooden wheels.
"Mama!" The slaves shoved at one another, hemmed in within the wagon ring, packed so tight there was no breaking out.
The steward fared no better; his faucet failed outright, and his trousers were soaked through.
"Fuck — a pack of cowards."
Afraid as he was, Field wasn't anywhere near that bad. It probably had to do with all the apocalypse novels and zombie films he'd loved before crossing over.
"Looks like I'll have to handle it myself."
Field didn't have a single soldier under his command. The rotting corpses were quick and feared neither death nor pain, but their dull, witless movements weren't unbeatable. He had no choice but to step in personally; at least this body had learned a few basic combat techniques.
With a low grunt, Field seized the moment as a corpse shoved against a cart, drove his longsword into its neck, then wrenched hard to the side. The corpse's head flopped down against its chest like a branch struck by lightning.
"Ugh~"
The reek of rot and fermented filth surged up his nose without mercy, and Field nearly threw up. But somewhere inside, a faint thrill stirred — in his soul, a warlike blood ran in Field's veins.