Chapter 588: The River of Blood and Anna
Loren hurried off to find Anna, not bothering much with the small fry. After getting Anna’s information, he left the Guild.
Veronica was still asleep at that moment, sprawling on the bed and murmuring Loren’s name.
“Let’s go, I’ve found where Anna is, we’ll sleep when we get home.”
Where family is, that’s home. Loren’s house might already be gone, but as long as family remained, the house didn’t matter.
And based on what Loren knew of Anna, she would cling to Loren’s house—after all, it might be her only lingering attachment to him.
The houses in the Royal Capital had already been smashed into a huge crater by one of Loren’s super-tier magics. Only the border house remained now, so Anna should be there.
“I advise you not to wake her. If she wakes and sees you killed, she’ll collapse.”
Death suddenly appeared behind Loren, putting a hand on his shoulder as she said this.
“I have urgent matters to attend to right now. Could you wait and come later?”
Loren grabbed Death’s hand and took it off his shoulder.
Death’s hand was a bit cool, but soft.
Faced with Loren’s request, Death didn’t answer. Instead, she swung her scythe in an instant.
Loren’s Intuition gave no warning, so he didn’t dodge at all.
When the scythe came down, the tip of Loren’s hair was cut off. A strand of hair fell into Death’s hand.
Death brought the hair to her nose and took a deep breath.
“……”
Seeing her acting like a stalker, Loren didn’t know how to respond.
“Consider this interest. I will not stop hunting you until you regain your authority.”
With that, Death vanished, and Veronica woke up as well.
Loren summarized the situation for Veronica, then set off again with her.
“Are we finally going to have a real home?”
Veronica had never lived in a proper place since she could remember; she always chose empty, unwanted rooms.
Those places barely kept out the wind. Loren didn’t know how Veronica survived the winters.
So now she was genuinely looking forward to having a proper house, especially one she could share with Loren.
This was the home she had dreamed of: someone to rely on and a roof over her head.
For Veronica, that was enough—it was her greatest dream.
“Mm.”
Loren replied, continuing to fly toward the Gedlan Kingdom.
It seemed the war hadn’t drastically affected daily life for those who stayed, at least not much. People continued their routines, though many able-bodied men were gone, so many women openly came out of other people’s households.
As time passed, internal problems in the country became more apparent.
But these matters were not Loren’s concern; they were the Bountiful Church’s own choices. When you tolerate certain groups to a dangerous degree, you must bear the consequences.
As a result, the Rainbow Plague was already showing signs of breaking out again. The country was busy with war and lacked the energy to “treat” the infected.
This time Loren flew much higher, otherwise he might have collided with an airplane.
Noah’s airplanes had been on sale recently. At Loren’s request, William had lowered the price as much as possible, until almost everyone could afford one.
And airplanes were being used in the war.
Loren could casually snap his fingers and half of the Bountiful Church’s troops would be incapacitated.
He took a moment to test them—the plane’s mechanisms all worked.
A pair of adulterers making out on an airplane were blown away, since they were recklessly piloting; even if their bodies were found, no one would blame the plane.
…
Loren traveled to the Gedlan Kingdom, returning to the place he knew best.
It wasn’t the dead city the Guild had described. The nobles and the Church had left, but many commoners remained; they had nowhere else to go.
Because they didn’t have to pay taxes, some of them were even better off.
With the power of the God of Bountiful Harvest, their crops had long overflowed.
Still, their lives weren’t as ideal as imagined.
Loren arrived at a small border town. Few people lived there; many houses had been burned, and several corpses lay by the roadside.
Seeing visitors, the few survivors hurried into their homes, and even those who collected corpses fled.
Loren didn’t think Anna had done this—if it were Anna, no one would have been left alive.
This was most likely the work of bandits. People had lost the Church’s exploitation, but also its protection; any bandit could pillage at will.
When chaos comes, bandits multiply.
Unless Loren met bandits on the spot, he was too lazy to deal with them.
Loren and these ordinary people were never on the same side. They might respect Loren because of the Church, or despise him for the same reason, despite all the good he had done.
They don’t look at what you’ve done; they look at what they want to believe.
Witches should die, so Loren, who sheltered witches, should die too.
At this point, Loren’s home was within reach. He suppressed his excitement, took a deep breath, and moved forward.
This time he didn’t fly, but walked step by step with Veronica.
“We’re finally back…”
Loren’s pace quickened until he saw a river—a river of blood.
It wasn’t water but blood, flowing fast. The heavy metallic stench made Veronica nauseous.
Loren remembered there had been no river here before; this one was clearly not natural. It didn’t look dug out; it looked as if sliced open.
Not far from the blood river, Loren saw a mound of totem towers; countless desiccated corpses piled up, higher than Uridia Kingdom’s skyscrapers.
Now Loren knew where the blood in the river came from.
The two sides of the blood river showed different scenes. On the other side the land had turned red, scattered with severed limbs, and vegetation was growing thickly.
Not far from the totem towers, Loren’s house still stood, though it was tinged red.
“How many people did Anna kill…”
Holding Veronica, Loren jumped across the blood river.
Most of the corpses on the totem towers were dressed like members of the Church, so Anna had apparently followed Loren’s teachings.
“Ugh…”
The smell of blood here was even stronger, and Veronica retched.
“Careful… ugh…”
Loren sensed something rushing at high speed and hurried to warn her, but the next instant his mouth was blocked.
Not only that, Loren felt his teeth being pried apart. The face before his eyes belonged to a pair of pink eyes.
Tears streamed endlessly from those eyes, warm and wet, falling onto Loren’s face.