Soldiers' Doubts

Dawn was just breaking, and the outline of the abandoned castle flickered in and out of view through the morning mist.

Ron stood by a window on the second floor of the main building, watching the people in the courtyard begin to stir. The soldiers had already completed their night watch rotations. The Fiona archers were maintaining their equipment, the cavalrymen were feeding their horses, and the refugees huddled in one corner of the courtyard. Some cradled bowls of hot soup, while others were still asleep.

Erwin came up from the stairwell, carrying a wooden board with a crumpled sheet of paper pressed beneath it. He paused at the doorway for a moment, seemingly considering his words, then stepped inside.

"Your Highness."

Ron turned and looked at the gaunt scholar. Erwin had changed clothes, apparently stripped from some corpse. They were a size too large, but at least he was no longer wearing that tattered robe.

"Just call me Ron."

Erwin adjusted his glasses. One shattered lens had been removed, leaving only a monocle lens. He looked even more like a down-and-out scribe.

"Ron, I owe you my life." His tone was calm, without any dramatic display of gratitude.

"I have nothing of value on me to repay you. My notes and manuscripts were all taken by those bandits. Even if they were recovered, they would be of no use to you."

Ron said nothing, waiting for him to continue.

"But I can help manage the camp—inventory supplies, register personnel, and handle the accounts." Erwin paused.

"Until you find a proper quartermaster, I can fill the position. I need no additional pay. A share of food will be enough."

Ron looked at him for two seconds.

"Deal."

Erwin seemed to breathe a sigh of relief. He opened the wooden board in his hands, revealing a sheet filled with dense writing.

"Then I'll report on the supplies." He cleared his throat. "Last night, I inventoried the camp's granary, armory, and stables. We have enough food to feed everyone for twelve days.

"If the refugees are included, that will drop to seven days. There are quite a few weapons, but their quality is poor. Most are crudely homemade, and fewer than a third are usable. There are fourteen horses—six warhorses, and the rest are packhorses."

Ron listened and nodded. His system panel already held those figures, but he did not interrupt Erwin. He understood. Erwin needed to prove his worth.

"One more thing." Erwin raised his head, hesitation in his eyes.

"While sorting the supplies, I found some... rather unusual things."

"What?"

Erwin took a scrap of cloth from his breast pocket. A small piece of an emblem was embroidered on it. Ron accepted it and examined it. Golden thread had been stitched into deep blue fabric, the needlework fine and exquisite.

"This was torn from a soldier's cloak?" Ron asked.

Erwin nodded. "While I was helping move supplies, one of the soldiers—the tall one with brown hair—caught his cloak on a nail sticking out of a crate. This piece tore off. I meant to return it to him, but then I saw the emblem."

He pointed at the golden lion.

"I know most northern heraldry—the white eagle of Redania, the lily of Temeria, the black eagle of Aedirn, the longship of Skellige... but this, I have never seen before."

Ron did not answer.

Erwin went on, as though a floodgate had opened. "Your equipment as well. The armor is standardized, cold-forged lamellar, finely made. It is unlike any common pattern I have seen.

"I have seen Nilfgaardian black plate, Redanian studded leather, and Kaedweni scale armor. Yours resembles Skellige lamellar somewhat, but the details are completely different.

"Skellige armor plates overlap horizontally. Yours are arranged vertically. And the quality of this metal... I cannot be certain, but it does not look like any ore commonly found on the Continent."

He stopped and looked at Ron, seemingly awaiting an explanation.

Ron handed the cloth back to him. "Have you asked them?"

Erwin froze for a moment. "Asked who?"

"The soldiers."

"I..." Erwin hesitated. "I don't dare. They..."

He did not finish, but Ron understood. Erwin was still somewhat afraid of the soldiers. Twenty-two silent iron cans covered in blood were not people an unarmed scholar would casually strike up a conversation with.

"Have them tell you."

"They'll tell me?"

"They will if I say they will."

Erwin opened his mouth, but ultimately did not press further. He put away the scrap of cloth, nodded, and turned to head downstairs.

The morning mist gradually dispersed.

Ron climbed the stone steps onto the battlements. The camp had been well chosen—the abandoned castle stood atop a low hill, giving it a broad view of the distant fields and scorched farmland.

A small river lay to the east, thin mist drifting over its surface. A dirt road wound southward into the distance. It was a typical lord's estate layout.

Karl stood on the wall, leaning against a crenellation as he polished a shortsword in his hand. Hearing footsteps, he turned, then immediately stood at attention.

"Your Highness."

Ron walked to his side and leaned on the crenellation, looking out.

"Karl, how long have you been following me?"

Karl thought for a moment. "From Praven until now... including my time in the army, nearly three years."

"Three years." Ron repeated softly. "What were you doing three years ago?"

"Stationed at the Empire's border, fighting the Khuzait," Karl said, his tone as casual as if he were talking about what he had eaten that day. "I was an ordinary cavalryman then. Later, I was selected for the central legion and transferred under Your Highness's command."

Ron nodded. Of course he knew. The memories implanted by the system had told him so, but he needed to hear Karl say it himself, to confirm what those memories were like in the soldiers' minds.

"Your Highness." Karl hesitated, lowered the shortsword in his hand, and turned to face Ron directly.

"Yes?"

"We... where are we?"

His voice was quiet, but there was something in his tone that had been suppressed for a long time. It was not fear or anxiety, but a profound confusion.

Ron did not answer immediately.

Karl continued, almost speaking to himself. "It was summer when we set out from Praven Harbor. The fleet's banners snapped in the wind. When the storm came, I was on deck. I watched giant waves swallow the ship beside us. Then our ship tilted. I was thrown out and slammed into the railing, and then... then I arrived here."

He raised his head and looked toward the distant fields.

"This is not Nords. The Nords coastline does not look like this. Nords has snowy mountains, pine forests, and fjords. Here... there is nothing. Only burned forests, swamps, and muddy ground."

"Your Highness, where are we?"

Ron fell silent for a moment.

"I'll have Erwin explain it to you. This afternoon, gather everyone together."

Karl looked at him but did not ask further.

"Yes," he said.

That afternoon, in the main hall of the camp's main building, twenty-two soldiers stood in three rows.

Erwin stood before them with a wooden pointer in his hand. Beside him was a wooden board bearing a crude map.

He had drawn it in charcoal. The lines were crooked, but the general outline was accurate enough: the Pontar River, Vizima, Oxenfurt, Novigrad, Velen, and the Yaruga River.

"This is where we are now." He tapped a small area in the lower right corner of the map with the pointer. "Velen, the northwestern province of the former Kingdom of Temeria."

The soldiers listened quietly. No one spoke.

Erwin continued, explaining the history of the north, then Nilfgaard's invasion, the war, and the current standoff. He spoke slowly, pausing now and then to observe the soldiers' reactions and make sure they did not look confused.

After explaining the basics, he set down the pointer and adjusted his glasses.

"Now, I need you to answer one question."

He looked at Karl in the front row. "Tell me, where do you come from?"

Karl glanced sideways at his companions, then turned back. "Calradia."

"Calradia." Erwin repeated the word, seeming to search his memories for it, but he clearly found no matching information. "Is that the name of a kingdom? Or a continent?"

"A continent," Karl said. "The continent of Calradia. We are people of the Empire, belonging to the Calradic Empire. The entire continent of Calradia is ruled by the Empire."