Chapter 29: Camp Crisis (1/3)

After Seraphina left, Lina curled up beside Yisela, her small body still trembling uncontrollably from the massacre the Scout Team had described.

“Hey, little servant.”

Yisela swallowed the piece of chicken in her mouth and spoke in a deliberately mature, worldly tone.

“Can you stop shaking? You’re shaking like a sieve.”

“H-Her Highness the Princess!”

Lina sobbed, lifting her head to look at the silver-haired girl who wasn’t actually that much older than her.

“The Saintess has already left! What if those demon beasts really come running over?”

“Tch, what’s there to be afraid of?”

Yisela tossed aside the last chicken bone and raised her hand to pat her own flat little chest.

“Sure, my powers haven’t fully recovered yet, but dealing with those miscellaneous low-level demon beasts is more than enough.”

She deliberately raised her voice a little so the people around could hear.

“Back in the day, this Princess would just slap down a palm strike and kill high-rank demon beasts like flies by the dozens!”

“Just like swatting flies!”

“So just put your little heart back in your stomach and stay put inside the circle of light. With this Princess here to watch over you, there’s absolutely no problem!”

Maybe Yisela’s words had a slight effect, or maybe Lina was just too exhausted. Lina leaned against Yisela’s back, and her breathing gradually calmed.

Just as she was about to fall asleep—

Hum!

In an instant, the holy light formation at the core of the entire camp trembled violently without any warning!

The light wasn’t flickering because someone was attacking it, but because a nauseating dark aura was approaching, and the formation seemed to automatically repel it.

“Huh?”

Yisela snapped awake instantly. She shot to her feet, her crimson pupils fixed on the camp’s gate, hastily built from rough logs and thorny brambles.

“Alert!”

“Everyone, on alert!”

At the edge of the camp, the knights on night watch reacted very quickly. They immediately raised their spears and shields.

Captain Lei Meng—the man with the full beard whom Yisela jokingly called ‘Uncle Bald Knight’—let out a low roar that echoed throughout the camp.

“Form ranks!”

“Priests, prepare the holy light barrier!”

“Don’t let anything get in here!”

“Wha—!”

Lina was jolted awake by the sudden commotion. She rubbed her sleepy eyes, looking at the knights’ battle-ready stance, completely confused about what was happening.

“Your Highness!”

“What’s going on?”

“Is it the demon beasts?”

“Shh—”

Yisela raised a finger to her lips. The look in her eyes was more serious than ever. She didn’t answer Lina. Instead, she twitched her nose slightly, sniffing the air intently.

It was a putrid smell.

A mix of earthy soil, blood, and the stench of rotting corpses.

“This smell is awful!”

Yisela frowned deeply. The odor churned her stomach unpleasantly.

As a member of the silver dragon clan, her sense of smell was far keener than anyone’s. This smell was several times more nauseating than the Black Cat she’d encountered in that alley last time.

At that moment, from the darkness beyond the camp gate, a large group of blurry human figures gradually emerged.

Thick and countless, impossible to count.

“Ah!”

“Look!”

“They’re people!”

“There are people out there!”

The injured villagers in the camp immediately stirred. Their nerves, already stretched taut by fear, ignited with new hope the moment they saw those figures.

The knights, though they hadn’t lowered their weapons, also relaxed their shoulders slightly.

Captain Lei Meng frowned, his hand on his sword hilt, and barked sharply.

“Who’s out there?”

“State your names!”

“This is a sanctuary camp of the Temple of Light. No unauthorized persons are to approach!”

The darkness outside fell silent for a few seconds.

Then, those blurry figures began to move slowly in the dark, step by step approaching the range of the campfire light.

The firelight flickered, illuminating their faces.

They were faces so familiar it could break your heart.

“Dad?!”

Lina, who had been huddled behind Yisela and clutching her clothes, suddenly let out a scream as if her heart were being torn apart.

Her eyes, which had been dull from hunger and fear, suddenly burst with a wild joy. Her little face flushed red with excitement, and she immediately bolted toward the camp gate!

“Lina!”

“Get back here!”

Yisela reacted very quickly. Her tail whipped out like a rope, instantly wrapping around Lina’s waist and yanking her back.

“Let me go!”

“Your Highness, let me go!”

Lina struggled desperately, her face red with excitement, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“That’s my dad and mom!”

“Standing out there are my dad and mom!”

Yisela held Lina’s arm tightly, her brows knitted. She spoke in a low, stern voice.

“Are you crazy?”

“Didn’t you just say you saw your parents get killed by demon beasts with your own eyes?”

“Those are corpses!”

“How could they be standing out there!”

“They are my parents!”

“They are!”

Lina cried and shouted, pointing toward the gate.

“Look!”

“The one in the gray clothes is my dad, and the one next to him with the red headscarf is my mom!”

“I can’t be wrong!”

“They aren’t dead!”

“They came to find me!”

Yisela followed Lina’s pointing finger and looked. Her brows instantly twisted into a tight knot.

Something wasn’t right.

Wasn’t that man in gray clothes grinning way too wide?

His mouth was almost split open to his ears, but he was still trying to maintain a strangely eerie, kind smile.

And that woman with the red headscarf, though she wore the clothes Lina described, her eyes didn’t blink under the firelight. Her pupils were mostly white, like a dead fish’s eyes.

“Those are fakes!”

Yisela stared hard at the outside, her gaze shifting from doubt to certainty.

“Lina, listen to me. Those are definitely not your parents.”

Yisela grabbed Lina’s shoulders and forced her to look into her eyes, her tone very serious.

“Trust me. As a dragon, my nose is very sharp.”

“Those things out there give off the smell of dead people.”

“It’s a disguise!”

“I don’t believe you!”

“Let me go!”

Lina couldn’t listen to anything anymore. Her eyes saw only the figure with the red headscarf at the gate.

“I want to go to my mom!”

While Lina cried out, the injured villagers in the camp also got a clear look at those figures outside.

“Oh my god!”

“Isn’t that our old man Li?!”

“My child!”

“My little treasure is in that crowd!”

“Dad!”

“Mom!”

“You’re alive!”

In that instant, the camp erupted like a boiling pot.

Those who had endured despair now saw their long-lost family. All rationality and warnings from the Patrol Team were thrown to the wind.

Dozens of injured villagers pushed past the knights who blocked their way, crying and shouting as they charged toward the camp gate.

“Move aside!”

“Open the gate!”

“That’s my family!”

“I want out!”

“I want to find my son!”

“Help!”

“Sir Knights, let us out!”

The scene instantly spun out of control.

“Everyone, stop!”

“Fall back!”

Captain Lei Meng roared. He and dozens of knights pressed their backs against the camp gate, using their shields to hold back the frantic crowd.

“Don’t open the gate!”

“The scouts said the demon beasts out there have tactics!”

“This could be a trap!”

“What trap?!”

“That’s my own mother out there!”

A burly villager madly shoved against the knights’ shields.

“You heartless tin cans!”

“What do you know?!”

“Move aside!”

“Or I’ll fight you!”

The crowd’s emotions were on the verge of collapse. They would rather believe those were their living relatives than believe they were man-eating demon beasts.

Yisela was caught between the crowd and Lina. She stared at those figures approaching ever closer, and the stench of corpses grew thicker, making it hard for her to breathe.

“—QUIET!!!”

“Everyone, shut up!!!”

Yisela stood at the very front of the crowd. Her small body erupted with an astonishing presence.

She didn’t use magic, but inadvertently, a pressure from the depths of her bloodline—the unique dragon’s might of the silver dragon clan—came crashing down like an invisible heavy hammer, slamming into everyone’s hearts.

The noisy crowd felt as if an invisible giant beast had choked their throats. The air froze instantly.

Even the frantic burly villager felt his heart clench, his movements freezing mid-air.

Yisela’s gaze swept across every frantic villager and finally locked onto the face of the burly man trying to open the gate.

“No one is going out.”

“Those standing outside are not your family.”

“I can smell it. They’re monsters that specifically eat idiots like you.”