Chapter 183: Resurrection
The afternoon sun pushed through gaps in the cloud and lit up the streets of the Dragon Kingdom border city in broad, clean patches of light.
The air still carried traces of the dispersing crowd — dust kicked up by the departure, mixed with the smell of flowers and fresh bread — the particular smell of a moment that had just boiled over and was beginning to settle.
Lucian's steps stopped.
He saw Lakyus.
The red-and-white leather armor was immediately visible in the sunlight, her gold hair pulled back into a clean, high ponytail that left the line of her neck exposed. She was standing at the edge of the crowd, looking his way, one hand pulling along a slight figure swathed from head to toe in a red robe.
The same moment Lucian spotted her, her eyes lit up.
Lakyus pulled Evileye into a half-run toward him, her steps light.
"Brother!"
Evileye, being pulled along, was half a beat behind, the hem of her cape swaying. The expression behind her mask was unreadable. The impression she gave was less "came along" and more "was hauled here against all reasonable judgment."
Lucian watched that familiar silhouette cutting through the thinning crowd, and something crossed his mind.
Hadn't he only sent the [Message] to Lakyus yesterday? How was she here already?
"Brother! Are you hurt?" Lakyus pulled up in front of him, her eyes doing a rapid sweep from his head to his feet. When she confirmed he was in one piece, she let out a breath.
Lucian reached up and pressed his hand lightly to the top of her head. "I'm fine. How did you get here this fast?"
This wasn't a lie. The domain's accompanying cleric had treated his injuries the day before — two cracked ribs, fully seen to. He was, by any reasonable measure, fine.
Lakyus blinked. The urgent worry on her face shifted slightly. Something that looked a lot like guilt crept in at the edges. Her gaze drifted sideways. The corner of her mouth made a brief attempt to curve upward and got suppressed.
Lucian's eyebrow went up.
He had sent that message yesterday.
"So..." he said. "From the capital to here. You made it in half a day?"
"Mm."
"That's... quite a journey."
"Mm."
"You left the moment you got the message, didn't you."
Lakyus's lips pressed together. Her eyes had discovered something fascinating about the rooftline of the nearest building.
"I just happened to..." her voice dropped to barely audible, "have nothing going on."
Before he could press further, a voice from beside them cut in — calm to the point of being clinically flat.
"From yesterday afternoon until now, she cast [Teleportation] magic three times."
Lucian turned.
Evileye was standing to Lakyus's side. Same red robe, same full-face mask, the same faint deep gleam visible through the narrow eye-slit. She delivered the information exactly the way she might read a report that contained no emotional content whatsoever.
"I'd been to the Dragon Kingdom before, so the captain decided I was useful. I spent the entire trip casting [Teleportation]. After we arrived in the general area, she was essentially dragging me at a run."
No inflection. No variation in tone. And yet Lucian found himself picking up something underneath it anyway — the particular exhaustion of someone who had been wrung out for an entire day and hadn't been asked once whether that was alright with her.
"I'm sorry about that," he said to Evileye, with genuine feeling.
"It's nothing," she said. Exact same tone.
Lakyus tapped herself on the forehead with one finger, stuck half her tongue out, and looked up at him through pale green eyes that were absolutely full of calculated innocence.
"It's because... I wanted to see you sooner."
The expression was a clear attempt to melt her way out of accountability. And it was, Lucian reflected, more or less working — the mild reproach he'd built up quietly dissolved.
Though, he thought privately — a two-hundred-year-old vampire, and she still couldn't hold her ground against Lakyus hauling her by the arm —
"Sebas," Lucian said, turning slightly, "this is my sister — Lakyus Aindra. And her teammate, Evileye."
Lakyus turned toward Sebas with a polished bow — as the captain of Blue Roses and a daughter of Kingdom nobility, her manners were exactly what they needed to be.
"Sebas-san. Thank you for looking after my brother."
Sebas inclined his head in return, a warm smile settling across those lined features. "Miss Aindra, you're far too generous. It was Lord Lucian who took care of me."
Lucian noted, quietly, that Sebas's gaze didn't linger on Lakyus. It moved on quickly. He filed this away as a small, private relief. Sebas's attention right now was entirely on Touch Me. Interest in anything else appeared to be running at absolute zero.
"Lakyus." Lucian redirected. "You remember what I asked you to come help with?"
The playful little-sister energy settled. The Blue Roses captain emerged in its place — composed, direct, focused.
"The soldier resurrections?"
"Yes." He nodded, his expression matching hers in seriousness now. "We lost a fair number on this campaign. Most of the bodies are intact — [Resurrection] should bring them back. But..." He paused. His gaze dropped slightly. "There's also a child."
"A child?" Lakyus blinked.
"I'll explain on the way. Let's see the soldiers first — the bodies have already been prepared."
She didn't push for more. "Alright."
He turned to Sebas. "Sebas, I'll take Lakyus to handle the resurrections. You've worked hard enough — go and rest."
Sebas gave a small nod. His focus was already somewhere else. "Of course, Lord Lucian."
"Touch Me..." Lucian took a moment with the words. "I'd appreciate it if you could keep an eye on him."
Sebas's eyebrow moved — barely, almost nothing. "...Yes." His voice came out just a shade lighter than before. "That's exactly what I should be doing."
Lucian turned and led Lakyus and Evileye toward the garrison.
They'd made it about ten steps when Lakyus lowered her voice beside him.
"Brother. Is Sebas-san carrying something?"
"Yes," Lucian said. "There's someone he's worried about."
Lakyus's ear shifted slightly. A knowing look settled over her face. "Oh?"
"It's not what you're thinking. An elder's concern for someone younger."
"How do you know what I'm thinking?"
"Because every time you make that face, your head is full of nonsense."
Lakyus pouted. She didn't argue.
The garrison sat on the western side of the city — a stretch of relatively open ground, with low stone buildings arranged in rows along the dirt road. Clothes hung drying under the eaves. Most of the soldiers had dispersed to rest by now. Only the sentries on rotation and a few logistics staff were still moving through, sorting through supplies.
Adjutant Gerhart spotted them from a distance and came over at a quick walk. His eyes moved across Lakyus and Evileye, and he recognized the woman in red-and-white armor almost immediately.
"Miss Lakyus?" He couldn't quite contain the surprise in his voice. "You're here too?"
Lakyus gave him a polite nod, her expression settled into the correct professional warmth. "Adjutant Gerhart. It's been a while. I'm here to help."
Something visibly relaxed in him. He stepped to the side and gestured. "This way. The bodies have been kept in the warehouse. We've been using ice magic to preserve them — prevent any deterioration."
The warehouse was small. A thick plank door sealed off the outside air and light. When it swung open, the cold came out first — a wall of it, carrying the smell of damp stone and a faint underlying trace of blood and ice.
Groans and coughing rose from around the warehouse, one after another — bodies wrapped in light beginning to wake. Lakyus moved between them, checking each one, confirming the wounds were fully closed. Every time a soldier sat up or made a sound, some of the tension in her brow eased.
But some of the bodies were too damaged. For those, she could only look, and quietly shake her head.
"I did everything I could, brother." Her voice was steady, but carefully so. "Those few... the wounds were too deep. Several vital organs completely destroyed — that's beyond what [Resurrection] can do."
Lucian's gaze settled on the ones still lying silent. A beat of quiet.
"...I understand," he said. "They didn't die for nothing."
Lakyus gave a small nod. She left it at that.
Then rapid footsteps from outside the warehouse. "Lord Lucian!"
Touch Me's voice. The boy arrived at the entrance at close to a run, out of breath, his gold hair blown into a mess.
His eyes went past Lucian's shoulder immediately, sweeping the interior with a desperate urgency — and dimmed just as quickly.
"Lord Lucian... Leno, is she—" His voice got smaller with each word, as though some part of him already knew that small chances rarely found their way to people like her.
Lucian was quiet for a moment. Then he said to Lakyus: "There's one more."
Lakyus had already taken in the boy's pale face, the fists clenched tight at his sides.
"Over there." Lucian looked toward the far corner of the warehouse.
A single plank bed, set apart from the others, pushed closer to the interior wall. A small figure on it, completely still.
Lakyus crossed the room. She lifted the white cloth covering the girl and revealed a young face — gold hair pressed flat against her forehead, a wound at the side of her neck already dried to dark red.
Lakyus's gaze rested on the wound for a moment. Then it moved across the girl's face. Her brow drew in slowly.
Touch Me stood a few steps back, both hands clasped together in front of him, like someone waiting for a verdict to come down.
There was nothing left in Lakyus's eyes but undisguised regret.
"I'm sorry. This child's HP is too low — she doesn't meet the threshold for [Resurrection]."