Chapter 705: A Man Who Walked Alone

Darkness covered the plain in every direction.

It was thick and endless, a black so deep that it seemed to swallow sound itself. No stars hung above it, and no light marked the horizon.

The ridges and trenches rose out of it in jagged silhouettes, and the cold wind that crept between them carried the faint smell of rust and old stone.

Deep within the plain, a small group dragged their bodies toward the camp.

Brandt walked at the front with the Tank slung over his shoulder. The big man’s arm hung limp across his chest, and his boots scraped through the gravel with every step.

Behind him, the Lancer limped along with her spear used as a crutch. The Hunter walked beside her, his empty quiver bouncing against his back.

Lysa leaned heavily on her staff, and the Healer followed at the rear, her eyes hollow and her hands still stained red.

There were only six of them now.

Among the eight, the Swordsman and the Warrior had not made it.

They had been buried beneath a pile of stones at the edge of the plain, with nothing but their weapons to mark the place.

Even so, the others felt thankful for their luck. It was a bitter kind of gratitude, quiet and heavy, but it was real.

Eight people had walked into the dark, and six were still breathing. After what they had faced, that felt like a miracle.

For a long time, they walked in silence, and only the sound of their footsteps and ragged breathing filled the air.

"Do you think he’s going to go there?" the Lancer asked at last, glancing at the Healer.

The question hung in the cold air.

No one answered right away.

The party’s footsteps slowed, and the silence deepened. Various expressions flickered across their faces in the dark.

"I don’t know..." the Healer finally answered, drawing a deep breath.

Brandt opened his mouth to speak, but the words refused to come out. He closed it again and adjusted the Tank’s weight on his shoulder.

The truth was, none of them knew anything about Thoren. They had met him only a short while ago, in the middle of a battle that nearly killed them.

They did not know where he came from, what he wanted, or what he was capable of beyond the terrifying undead that had saved them.

It was impossible to guess what he would do next.

"I think there’s a high chance he’s going to go there," the Healer added, breaking the silence.

The group was not surprised.

They had seen it in his eyes when he asked about the Fallen. They had heard it in the calm, steady way he spoke.

A man who walked alone through a plain like this, with an undead like that at his back, was not the type to turn around and go home.

What troubled them was something else.

"But is he going to be okay?" Lysa said in a low voice. "I think we shouldn’t have told him the direction where we found the structure."

Guilt flickered across her face, and the others felt it too

"I don’t think we had any choice but to tell him," Brandt said after a moment.

The others turned to look at him.

His voice was low and tired, but there was no doubt in it. They waited for him to continue, and the only sound on the plain was the scrape of their boots across the gravel.

"With the strength of his undead, do you think we had the liberty to refuse him? Hmm?"

No one answered.

"It might have looked like he was asking nicely, but he wasn’t. We were exhausted and at our lowest." Brandt shifted the Tank’s weight on his shoulder.

"What do you think would have happened if we had not told him?"

He dropped the question into the dark and looked at Lysa’s face.

Now that he had brought it up, the others began to think it through, and the realization slowly sank in. From the moment Thoren and his undead appeared, they had been at his mercy.

A single undead had broken three Fallen in minutes, and they had barely survived one. If things had gone south, there would be nothing they could do.

As for the thought that they could fight back, that would have been naive. And no one who had ascended to the third floor was naive.

That was impossible.

Every one of them had stepped over hundreds of corpses to reach their current level. They had survived because they were sharp and cunning.

They had understood the situation the moment Thoren asked his question. They had simply chosen not to say it aloud.

"You’re right..." the Lancer said softly, and a deep sigh escaped her lips.

She tightened her grip on her spear and kept her eyes on the ground ahead.

"Still, we must not forget his timely help," she added.

"Of course we can’t," Brandt nodded firmly. "If we manage to see him in the camp again, we must treat him as a friend."

This time, everyone nodded in agreement.

It was a small promise, but a sincere one. Whatever Thoren’s reasons had been, he had saved their lives, and that debt was real. They did not intend to forget it.

For a while, the group fell into silence once more. Each person was lost in their own thoughts as they followed the path toward the camp.

The wind brushed through the ridges, carrying the faint smell of rust and cold stone, and the rhythm of their footsteps settled into a slow, heavy beat.

"What should we tell the Camp Lord when we return?" Lysa asked at last, her voice low.

Her eyes moved from face to face.

"You all know he must never find out about Thoren going to that location."

A grave expression settled over each of them.

The Lancer’s lips pressed into a thin line and Brandt’s jaw tightened while the Healer lowered her eyes. They all knew what the Camp Lord was like.

Every discovery must be kept secret unknown to no one except for those close to the Lord. And now, they had just revealed a potential huge discovery to an unknown person.

"That’s simple," the Hunter said, speaking for the first time in a long while.

His voice was hoarse, and he kept his gaze straight ahead.

"We report everything truthfully, but we never mention Thoren or his undead."

"Right..." The Healer nodded in agreement. "We report everything as usual. The rumor, the Fallen, the structure. We only leave out the part where Thoren and his undead came to our rescue."