Astartes of the Bear School

Chapter 1911. Cleanup
Rodel's situation is not optimistic.

Although only a day had passed since Prince Godwin's assassination, Lann could still tell from Rodel's efficiency and style that the Golden Dynasty was really not doing a good job.

Their response time is slow, perhaps because the people of the Golden Tree have a generally distorted sense of time.

They were not quick to clear the buildings and terrain destroyed in the battle in Rodel, because Rodel's inner city had never been breached.

Rodel's defenses are strong, but his ability to handle internal chaos is weak because it is neglected, untrained, and lacks practical experience.

After Lann was pulled over by Gideon Ofnir to work, his first task was to clear out the ruins and the corpses of the Golden Tree People whose souls had returned to the tree.

But Lan En never imagined that the biggest problem he would encounter when he came to help organize the cleanup of the ruins would be—no one.

The royal city of Rodel is naturally teeming with powerful figures, but with Prince Godwin assassinated just yesterday, most of the knights who were devoted to him and loyal to him have already eagerly joined the ranks of the Spirit Temple Knights, just waiting for the subsequent cursed items to arrive so they can cut off their own heads.

Let the headless soul accompany the shrine, and call upon the soulless lord.

How could these people possibly be in the mood for chores right now?

The Knights of Rodel, who belonged to the royal city, also greatly respected Prince Godwin, after all, he was the undisputed heir apparent of the Golden Dynasty. Therefore, they were also seething with resentment.

On the other hand, the assassination of the prince, a key figure, suddenly brought the situation of the Golden Dynasty to an unprecedented level since its establishment.

Now, almost all of the Rodel Knights, led by Christopher, are on duty day and night on the city walls.

Christopher was the first Rhodel Knight to recover from his acute fear of the [Death Rune] on the night of the Black Knife Plot, and he jumped down from the Golden Tree Cathedral to join the Black Knife Assassins in their attack.

He was renowned among the Knights of Rhodes and a pivotal figure in the Ancient Dragon Cult of the Royal City, hence the title "Ancient Dragon Knight," signifying his profound seniority within the cult.

And what about the people in the city?
They were nobles, border lords, and pilgrims from the Golden Dynasty, people who had neither the strength nor the will to do the heavy and dirty work of clearing the ruins.

So, in the vast royal city of Rodel, Lan En wanted to clear away a patch of architectural ruins and terrain damage in the corner, but he couldn't even find enough manpower.

Fortunately, the Witcher is not one of the Golden Tree People from the Borderlands.

His experience and insight enable him to make good use of overlooked groups, and he acts as a lubricant in the middle, using his social skills to coordinate the operation of all parties.

Finally, after a whole night of the Black Knife Plot, the royal city of Rodel, which could be described as having almost no disaster relief organization, actually began to clear the ruins smoothly!

The golden tree still shines brightly, its fallen leaves like a golden rain. Against the backdrop of the deep blue starry sky, it appears even more radiant.

Amidst the ruins of those dilapidated buildings, hunched and oddly shaped figures were wandering and carrying things.

Those are mixed races.

Their roughly humanoid bodies are covered with scales, claws, wings, tails, and other features of various creatures.

These traits not only made them subject to discrimination during the Golden Age, but also gave them a generally higher physical standard than the people of the Golden Tree.

If the people of the Golden Tree undergo military training or personal exercise, they will certainly benefit greatly from the blessing.

However, if neither a Golden Tree Clan nor a hybrid has trained, the hybrid's body will be stronger than that of a normal person.

They probably do more work than the nobles and lords in the city.

Furthermore, the requirements of the mixed race are extremely low; they only hope to be fed and safe.

Rodel is located at the foot of the Golden Tree, and all life in the border region, including hybrids, reveres this tree of origin of life. It's just that in the past, due to their lowly status, they never had the opportunity to come and pay homage.

Now that they can enter the royal city of Rodel and are so close to the Golden Tree, most of the hybrids are very excited.

Standing on a clearing cleared from the ruins, Lan En watched as the space before him was filled with corpses arranged and covered with golden cloths.

These are the corpses of the Golden Tree people, cleared from the ruins.

Although their souls had already returned to the tree, it wasn't a big deal in the Golden Dynasty. However, Lan En still adhered to his meticulous work style and began recording the number of people who returned to the tree and their identities, as part of the casualty statistics.

These bodies will soon be loaded onto wagons and transported to various catacombs by those huge and sturdy horse-drawn carriages.

Deep within those underground cemeteries, the tombs are connected to the roots of large trees scattered across the border areas.

These corpses will become nutrients for the tree roots.

And once the Golden Tree has sculpted the souls of those returning to the tree, they will be reborn. This is the cycle of life for the people of the Golden Tree.

Stable reincarnation.

For many lives across the world, religious fantasy is the only way to cope with the unknown and nothingness after death. But at the crossroads, death is not an unknown, but a certain future.

This sense of peace is a luxury. Lan En walked among the bodies lying flat and covered with sheets, with several perfumers with him, writing and drawing on their hands, recording the information of the deceased.

The people he organized this time were mainly transferred from the Perfumers Association after communicating with them.

After all, in the royal city of Rodel, it was under Torisha's influence that perfumers began to see hybrids as a source of helpful labor, rather than something they didn't want to touch, something filthy and disgusting.

Before we knew it, the person had arrived.

The hybrids cleared the ruins, and the sounds of bricks falling and colliding, as well as large pieces of debris being lifted and carried away, could be heard constantly nearby.

Meanwhile, Torisha was trudging through the ruins towards them, her steps uneven.

Her thick cloth cloak and apron were very practical in this environment, as they wouldn't normally get bumped or scratched.

The face shield also serves as a dust-proof mask.

"I've held off another group of people!" Torisha cheered eagerly before she could even walk from the ruins to the flat ground where the bodies were laid out.

She waved and walked towards Lan En, as if she had done something big.

“Phew! I used the lines you told me to tell them, and then,” Torisha walked over, catching her breath but still sounding cheerful, “and then those residents who didn’t want the hybrids in Rodel were all shut up! How amazing, Lann!”

The Witcher was not surprised by this.

He was still looking at the information on the corpse on the ground.

“The people of the Golden Tree have a very high opinion of themselves,” Lann said lightly. “It’s normal for them to look down on, or even despise and be wary of, mixed races. But at this time, we have to put them on a pedestal.”

"Then emphasize how serious the problem is, how ugly it will become if the corpses and ruins are not dealt with. Rodel is right at the foot of the Golden Tree, so it would be best to also bring up the issue of respecting the Golden Tree."

"They can't do it themselves, but the work is there and they can't just not do it. What else can they do? They just say a few nice words and that's it. They should still let the bastards into the city."

The script that Lan En instructed Torisha to use wasn't complicated; it was easy to understand. Anyone with a little management experience should be able to do it well.

But to get someone as inexperienced as Torisha to drive back the protesting Golden Tree people really shows her skill.

Unless there is an accurate analysis of the collective psychological profile of the people of the Golden Tree, this effect cannot be achieved at all.

Torisha's eyes, behind her veil, still held a hint of excitement and elation, as if she had accomplished something big.

The scene of corpses scattered everywhere and dilapidated buildings should have evoked feelings of sorrow and grief, not to mention that Torisha herself possessed a kind heart that cared even for hybrids and children of ominous signs.

But this is the border region between the Golden Age and the present.

So even standing amidst the corpses, Torisha could still chat and laugh casually with Lann, without showing any signs of distress.

She even kicked the arm of a corpse on the ground with her toe.

"These people really don't mind the long wait," the perfumer complained. "One arm was crushed into a pulp, and they just committed suicide. Wouldn't it have been fine if we had just treated them?"

“Perhaps,” Lan En glanced at her sideways, “that’s why you don’t want to treat me? After all, a perfumer’s treatment requires a course of therapy. An arm crushed into a pulp… let’s not even talk about whether it can be healed, the recovery period alone is painful enough, isn’t it?”

The people of the Golden Tree have a low tolerance for pain, after all, they have lived in the Golden Law era for so long.

Rather than facing the painful and itchy recovery period of a comminuted fractured arm, they preferred to return to the tree.

Another theory is that Lan En thinks they probably don't have much confidence in the perfumers' healing abilities.

Perfumers' healing techniques mainly rely on perfume powder, which is quite effective for internal medicine, but it is not immediately effective for external injuries.

Moreover, given the circumstances surrounding the Golden Dynasty, it's hard to say how much practical experience the perfumers actually have.

Everyone wants to encounter a skilled and experienced doctor, but no one wants to be a case for a novice doctor to practice on. However, practical experience cannot appear out of thin air.

A novice doctor can't just accumulate low-level experience points forever and eventually level up to become a skilled doctor in one go.

Real-world conflicts are always so difficult to resolve.

While there are quite a few Red Dewdrop Cup Bottles, they are far from being available to everyone.

However, the people of the Golden Tree are indeed quite exaggerated.

Lan En also looked at the roadside where he had walked and saw several corpses still covered in dust from the ruins.

Among these unfortunate people of the Golden Tree, only a small minority were directly killed by the falling trees. The majority, unable to bear the injuries and pain, took their own lives, a staggering proportion.

(End of this chapter)