Astartes of the Bear School

Chapter 2058 2030. Impalement Punishment

"Whether or not Messermo has a way out, it seems to be the only clue we can find right now."

Lan En concluded.

"You said that Messermo was sent to the Shadowlands to fight the Horned People, and now we've seen the Horned People's miserable state. He was ruthless, and it looks like he won. So the expeditionary force should now be the largest force in the Shadowlands."

"Since we're in the Shadowlands, we'll have to make contact with them sooner or later."

"Alright, Melina. Tell me which way to go."

Lann's logic was sound, Melina agreed.

However, his tone was clearly mocking, which displeased Melina.

However, even though 'Little Wooden Head' was unhappy, he didn't really show it; he just kept his head down and didn't say anything.

But his hands weren't idle. He shook the reins of the spirit horse Toret, and the strange horse, which was also a soul entity, quickened its pace, ran ahead of the Qilin, and turned onto another road.

We did encounter other creatures along the way.

It seems that the Shadowlands are a very gloomy place because they are sealed away and were once a gathering place for the dead.

But life did not end.

And as Melina said: the creatures here are even more powerful than elsewhere.

A loud 'clang' resounded like thunder, causing Margarita and Velvet Ball, who were sitting on horseback and watching the spectacle, to instinctively shrink their necks. The Qilin, however, was completely unafraid of the thunder; on the contrary, it continued to paddle with its four hooves moving, but turned its head as if watching a show.

The thunder didn't come from the sky, but from a flock of seven or eight wild sheep.

Wild sheep are nothing special, but the leader of this flock is.

The sheep was covered in golden wool and was at least two or three times larger than the other sheep, with a shoulder height of at least two meters.

Moreover, it seemed to have been startled by people running across the road.

The sheep curled up into a ball and rolled away in a strange posture.

Along the path it rolled across the ground, golden lightning crackled and exploded a dozen times.

The sheep in the border area also know this trick, but most of them can't generate lightning; they just roll around in a ball and don't have the size of this sheep.

This is the origin of the name "Battle Ash - Lightning Sheep Ball".

Some bored individuals in the Knights of Rodel imitated the appearance of sheep and created this War Ash.

"Hey, Qilin." Lan En patted the neck of the ancient dragon from the New World, "I think you're really capable of learning the [Lightning Sheep Ball] technique you wanted!"

"Huff, huff!"

"Oh yes, yes, yes! I can learn! I'll learn it and then I'll teach you how to use it, okay? I can learn, I can learn~"

The unicorn's thick, soft lips flapped and drooled as it exhaled.

Lan En wanted to punch it on the head.

Besides sheep, the Shadowlands are also home to hybrids and demi-humans; there are birds in the sky and traces of giant crabs and squid in the water.

In terms of ecology, it is not much different from the border area.

What truly makes this place feel like a repressive hell... is ultimately people.

Led by Melina, they left the cemetery plain and passed through a relatively vibrant green forest, where they were met with scorched earth.

On both sides of the road, two rows of drab, gray military tents were crammed together.

The once brilliant gold thread patterns on those tarpaulins have long since faded and become dull under the weight of time and dust.

Seemingly due to prolonged and continuous scorching, the ground was baked into a mixture of charred black and yellowish-brown, appearing dirty and messy.

Moreover, tiny, snake-like flames burned continuously on the ground in a crawling manner.

Melina stopped ahead, and Qilin followed suit and stopped behind.

Lan En lowered his head, watching the sparks on the ground alongside the ancient dragon from the New World who had stretched out its head.

The flame was a dim, fading dark red, not bright at all, and it looked as if even a tiny spark could produce three times the amount of black smoke.

In addition, its burning motion is as agile as a swimming snake.

Although they hadn't met many times, Lann recognized it without Melina even having to say a word; it was still Messermo's flame.

Even on a random stretch of road that has no strategic significance, there are remnants of his flames... Could it be that this guy burned every inch of the Horned People's land?

But what's even more eye-catching are not these flames.

Instead, it was the long spears, their tips pointing skyward, that stood upright in the camps on both sides.

Each spear was pierced by a horned human whose body was so emaciated that the outline of his bones could be seen, and whose head had many horns.

The spear pierced the horned man's lower body, gravity causing them to fall naturally and pushing the spearhead deeper and deeper. Finally, it broke through the skin at the other end of his body, revealing its tip.

Their bodies grew elongated from the strain of injury and gravity, but the pain caused their muscles to spasm, making them want to curl up. Ultimately, they were frozen in a distorted state, impaled on guns.

The withered hands and jagged horns pointed to the sky, as if crying out their pain and innocence to some higher will or being.

“This is…” Melina murmured softly, her face expressionless, ““【The Piercer】, Messermo. His most frequently used punishment. Also, the origin of his name.”

This cruel and bloody scene made Lan En and his companions, who were walking in the middle of the road, lower their voices.

However, the slight sound of hooves and vibrations seemed to elicit a reaction.

"Kara!" "Ee!"

The horned man, which was hanging on the spear and could basically be considered a desiccated corpse, suddenly trembled, and the horn on his head slightly collided with the spear shaft.

Margarita, who had never witnessed such a scene before, couldn't help but let out a low scream as she was already on edge from witnessing the impalement.

Margarita realized once again what a horrific scene it would become when a world was rife with war yet no one died.

Her scream seemed to awaken the horned people, and immediately, the horned people, who looked like mummies, all began to rustle and squirm on the gun barrels on both sides of the road.

Its decaying, dry vocal cords also emitted a painful, hoarse wail to the heavens.

"Ah! Ahh!!"

Even in their wailing, their voices were completely powerless.

A group of corpses were howling.

Margarita suddenly grabbed Lann's arm tightly.

The Witcher himself frowned as he looked at the horned people who were still impaled on gun barrels to this day.

"Does your brother really enjoy torturing people?"

Lan En asked Melina in a somewhat stiff tone.

The girl shook her head and said nothing.

Her memories of Messermo were unclear, and she had never seen him before, so she could not make a judgment.

Furthermore, who knows how long he'll be banished to a place like the Shadowlands, and who knows what Mathermo will become?
The howls of the mummies naturally attracted the attention of the people in the military camps on both sides of the road.

Groups of soldiers stood in the camp, watching Lan En and his men ride by on the road through the gun barrels with mummified corpses stuck in them and the tattered tents.

These soldiers also bore the marks of time's decay and the grime of soot.

They looked at Lan En and his companions with surprise and shock, but their faces seemed stiff as if they hadn't made any expressions in a long time.

The contrast between his eyes and expression was very strange.

Some of the soldiers, holding weapons, tried to come forward, but were silently stopped by the others.

Lann noticed that the soldiers who followed Messermo on his expedition to the Shadowlands had equipment that was very different from Rodel's.

Longswords were rare; most weapons were one-handed axes. Shields were not knightly shields, but rather round shields.

Logically, they should have been sent by Rodel to the legion led by Messermo.

These people didn't have much of the chivalrous spirit of Rodel; they were more like barbarian warriors.

Under this strange gaze and atmosphere, they passed through the camp of the Mesmer soldiers and continued along the road.

Along the way, they also passed a stone bridge spanning the river. According to Melina, the river under the bridge was the Airak River that she had mentioned to Lan En when she talked about the Blue Coast.

Not long after crossing the stone bridge, they arrived at a fortress along the road.

Because it was the place where the golden meteor directly struck, even though the meteor fell very gently under the arrangement of the supreme will, it still smashed the boundary into an impact landform.

Not to mention the Shadowlands, which are the direct landing points.

The entire land was crushed by the immense pressure of that year, turning into a patchwork of high and low sections.

The fortress before us, though towering and quite large, was still shrouded in the shadow of the massive cliff behind it.

Melina said that the land behind it was huge, a small continent, called the Shadow Altar.

The Altar Plateau is where the Golden Tree takes root, while the Shadow Altar is where the Shadow Tree, which spirals and intersects with the Golden Tree, takes root.

The city of Ensis before them was a strategic stronghold situated between the Shadow Altar and the Cemetery Plains.

When they arrived at the city gate, Lan En was still frowning and pondering the piercing punishment he had witnessed.

Not only along the road, but also at the gates of Ensis City, stood at least dozens of spears that had been used to carry out piercing executions.

In Lann's interactions, although the golden demigods were a mixed bag, there were cruel people like Rajard, and people like Godwin who could be considered perfect.

However, basically, Queen Marika's biological children can still communicate with him.

Not obsessed, nor seeking the bizarre.

This is also why, when Lan En first learned of Messermo's identity, his first reaction was whether he could communicate with him.

But what if Messermo, as Queen Marika's child, was a sadist obsessed with impalement...?

Therefore, my 'communication' with him would probably not be very pleasant.

The iron gates of Ensis City were tightly shut. Lan En and his companions noticed that, besides themselves, there were several other people standing in front of the city gate, talking to a mountain demon who appeared to be a gatekeeper.

"Open the gate, guard," the man at the gate said in a deep voice from under his helmet to the mountain demon. "We have to go back to the Shadow Altar."

But the mountain troll said matter-of-factly, "You have to show me your pass, Black Knights."

"Don't be so rigid. I fell directly off the Shadow Altar. They jumped down to find me. Where would they get a pass?"

The mountain demon shook his head: "Rules are rules."

As they were talking, they both looked toward the direction from which the sound of approaching hooves had come.

(End of this chapter)