Your Courage and Fearlessness Are Mine

When Komoro pushed open the door, he saw the young girl's corpse. Her skin was deathly pale, utterly bloodless. Her frail body lay collapsed on the ground, so delicate that it stirred pity, yet it possessed a strange kind of beauty.

Quite a few villagers had followed Komoro over. At the sight of the girl's corpse, they cried out in shock. As the village chief's granddaughter, she had been exceptionally beautiful and the dream lover of countless young men. Yet now, she had died just like that.

She had once been Komoro's dream lover as well. But when he saw her corpse now, he felt neither regret nor sorrow, only deep fear. It was his most unbearable memory, his cowardice and wretchedness laid bare before him once more.

Sure enough, the girl's corpse spoke in a strange tone. The dead spoke again, but it was not her who was speaking.

"Heh heh heh! Komoro, you have disappointed me greatly. There are still people who dare defy my will!"

"Negary, please forgive our ignorance and foolishness! We would never dare defy your will!" Komoro hurriedly dropped to his knees. Led by him, the villagers also fell to their knees in terror and confusion.

"You may not dare, but someone does. He intends to seek help from the heretical Divine Grace Church and defy me. Ignorant people, since you do not yearn for my Glory, I can only grant you plague."

"Please forgive us, Negary! Who would dare commit such a damnable act? Please tell us who this sinner is!" Someone shouted madly, "He is the village's sinner! We will never let him go!"

After the village chief had neglected the Negary Messenger and been bitten to death, and now that the corpse had spoken, these villagers fully believed in Negary's existence. How could they not fear the plague to come? Panic began to Spread through the crowd.

"In that case, if you can offer him to me, I may give you another chance." Speaking through the girl's mouth, Wang Yuan said slowly, "That sinner is the man named Jacques Dacmi."

"Hand him over. Let my messenger take him away, and I may consider forgiving you this time."

"Then choose: plague or sacrifice. This is your final chance." After saying those last words, the girl closed her mouth. Wang Yuan watched the villagers' reactions.

"Do we even have a choice?" Komoro stood and declared loudly, "For his own selfish interests, Jacques betrayed the faith of us Kexi People. He is not only the sinner of our village, but the sinner of the Kexi People as well."

"To protect the village, we have no other choice!"

"This kid is growing up." Wang Yuan watched Komoro's performance.

Under his guidance, Jacques was completely abandoned by the village. A large crowd surged toward Jacques's home. The masses were inflamed now; even the few rational people could do nothing. Under the threat of plague, the majority had gone mad.

"I'll wait two days before leaving to seek help from the Divine Grace Church." Jacques held his wife's hand. "Before that, I need to send you somewhere safe. It's far too dangerous for you to remain in the village."

"Jacques..." Isabella had just begun to speak when all kinds of noise erupted outside. Many voices were shouting, demanding that Jacques be handed over in exchange for the village's peace.

"How could this be?" Jacques's face hardened. He quickly grabbed the knight's sword hanging on the wall and faced the people who burst through the door. He looked at the young man leading them—Komoro. Everything had begun after his return.

"Jacques, you wish to seek the heretical Divine Grace Church's help, and you have angered the great Negary. To prevent the village from suffering plague, for the safety of the entire village, please put down your weapon and stop resisting!" Komoro said as sternly as he could, but the corners of his lips involuntarily curled upward.

Komoro... he was already enjoying the feeling of being controlled by Wang Yuan. Before, he had merely been an ordinary youth who had just joined the hunting party. But now?

Even Jacques, captain of the guard, praised by the entire village and highly likely to become the next village chief, was utterly incapable of resisting before him.

Jacques gripped his sword, his knuckles turning white from the force. Was Negary truly that powerful? He had only made his decision not long ago, yet he had already been exposed.

He looked at the villagers closing in around him. In the past, their eyes had held praise and admiration, but now they held more hatred and fear.

What made it even harder for Jacques to raise his sword were the looks in some people's eyes. Their eyes were pleading.

Please put down your sword.

Please stop resisting.

Please become the sacrifice.

Please sacrifice yourself for the village!

Jacques's hand holding the sword gradually weakened. He knew that he could not resist. Turning around, he saw Isabella looking at him through tears, faintly shaking her head as though she wanted to say something.

He smiled and stopped his wife from speaking. He pointed at her belly, his eyes filled with tenderness, then turned to Komoro. "I can stop resisting and let you do with me as you please. But my wife is innocent. All the sins stem from me. Please spare her."

Komoro's expression changed slightly. He glanced at Isabella's swollen belly, moved his lips, and said, "Negary's command concerns only you, the sinner. We have decided to deal with you at the big tree behind the village. Come."

"Understood." Jacques looked back at his wife, then followed the others to the large tree behind the village. His hands and feet were bound, and he knelt on the ground. Yet even while kneeling, his back remained perfectly straight.

Two crows flew over from afar and pecked at Jacques's body without hesitation. All the villagers knelt down. Jacques did not look at the crows, but at the golden-haired woman in the distance, weeping and praying.

Tears streamed down Jacques's face. He did not fear death. He simply had not yet seen his child born, had not yet stayed with Isabella until death. Yet he was about to leave first.

As his blood flowed away, Jacques's vision began to blur. He seemed to see a scene before him: Isabella holding the hand of a golden-haired little girl. The girl resembled her mother; both were so beautiful.

Wang Yuan floated not far from Jacques. This man truly possessed qualities worthy of praise. If given the chance, perhaps he could have become a great hero renowned far and wide. But life never had any ifs.

"To step forward in the face of hardship is courage. To face death without fear is fearlessness." Wang Yuan watched Jacques gradually die from blood loss. "I witnessed your death."

A huge mass of white vapor and cool energy surged toward Wang Yuan.

"Your courage and fearlessness are mine!"

At around one in the morning, when I was nearly done writing, my computer froze and everything I had typed was lost. So I wrote until two thirty in the morning and finally finished it again. Since Xu Ming worked so hard, could you please bookmark it and give it a recommendation vote? If possible, having it included and recommended on a book list would be even better.