Klaus did not have everyone leave together.
"Boer, Glock, seal off the scene. Search the workshop too."
The two accepted their orders and headed back with the Night Watchers stationed on the perimeter.
The rest escorted the surviving Grey Covenant members back to the Branch.
Nine's body and head were placed in separate insect cocoons and dragged along at the rear by Leike's Swarm Insects. J and Q had their limbs wrapped in insect bodies and were half-dragged, half-carried away. Lu Yuan personally carried the Seed and the Wooden Man, while Jie's head remained in the Attendant's hands.
No one spoke along the way.
The Guardian did not come with them. After the battle ended, the old man's hunched figure vanished alone into the night in another direction. No one tried to stop him.
Adrian walked in the middle of the group. He glanced at Nine, wrapped in an insect cocoon, then headed over.
He crouched and pressed his right hand against Nine's severed torso. His palm glowed faintly, the light so gentle it was almost imperceptible. Yet Nine's mouth, which had stopped moving, twitched again, and the bodily fluid seeping from the wound congealed.
"Still alive after losing its head. The life force of Glazed Water Transcendence is really something." Adrian stood and dusted the ash from his hands. "But it won't last much longer if we keep dragging this out. Put a blessing on it first. Don't let it die on the way."
Lu Yuan looked at him. An Archbishop placing a life-sustaining blessing on a Fourth Order Eerie Transcendence from the Grey Covenant was an abnormal sight anywhere.
But no one objected. The living were worth more than the dead. Everyone understood that.
It was still dark when they returned to the Branch.
Margaret had completely returned