By the time Meli woke up, it was already night.
A bright moon hung high overhead, barely illuminating a small area nearby.
Meli touched the top of his head and found what seemed to be dried blood. He looked around in confusion.
The fog had long since dispersed. Somehow, he had survived, and his equipment was still with him.
Had the White Calamity overlooked him?
After turning around and looking in every direction, he saw no sign of his horse, but he did spot a corpse.
After scrutinizing it under the dim moonlight for quite some time, Meli recognized it. It was his captain. All the weapons had been stripped from his body, even his clothes had been taken, and he lay naked in the woods.
This... Didn't the White Calamity leave no corpses behind?
Meli wanted to see what wounds his captain had suffered, but it seemed that before dying, the captain had also charged wildly through the woods for quite a while. His body was covered in scrapes, and in the darkness of night, it was impossible to tell which injury had killed him.
Under other circumstances, Meli would definitely have taken some pleasure in the man's misfortune. But he had no mind for that now. In a panic, he loaded powder into his pistol and headed in the direction opposite from where the captain's body had fallen.
Since the captain had rushed into the woods, the way out should be behind him.
He was right.
Along the way, Meli came across several more corpses. Some were completely naked, while others still had some equipment on them. Without exception, they had all fallen while running toward the woods.
It had not taken long to enter, but getting out of the forest took Meli a full half hour.
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