Arthur walked in silence with Isaac while he observed the lively streets, ones that he once knew to be a home to many, now turned into a warzone as he breathed in the dust-filled air. Houses that barely held up before were now a distant memory he recalled through their scattered rubble all across the streets; echoes of a world well out of his reach.
Dead eldrites of all shapes and sizes littered the streets, burning in a flame gathered around a wooden stake that flickered in his brown eyes, leaving him speechless. Arthur looked ahead and watched Isaac walk in silence and paid no attention to the gruesome sight that encompassed their surroundings.
"What in Sabaoth's name happened here?" he asked, though his question was left to hang in the air, just like the dust.
Annoyed by the only response being the crackling of fire and an eerie, quiet, high-pitched noise that came from the burning eldrite flesh, Arthur observed the rest of what he once called home.
"Save your energy by not asking questions that you can easily get the answers to," Isaac replied after a while of silence. "This is all you'll be seeing from—"
"Mister Ulger!" Arthur yelled, interrupting Isaac as he stared at the body of the old man just barely peeking from under rubble.
He ran ahead but was immediately met with Isaac's iron grip, feeling as though his shoulder was about to be ground into dust.
"What are you doing?" he yelled in a mixture of pain and anger as he stared back with glaring eyes.
"I'm the one who should be asking," Isaac's gruff voice replied, staring back with a frown, forcing Arthur to drop to his knees. "What are you doing?"
"I know that man! I need to—"
"I said save your energy, boy! Get a grip! You're not a little boy anymore! You're a man! Use that head of yours, and you'll know he's beyond any aid you can offer!"
"And how would you know!? By Sabaoth, he might still be alive!"
"And by the same Sabaoth you follow, he is dead!" Isaac yelled, before shoving Arthur onto all fours as he added:
"Go and find out if you so desperately wish to disappoint yourself... my apprentice."
Without hesitation, Arthur ran over, heaving the large piles of debris from Ulger's body, praying he was still alive.
But as he slowly removed the last bit of debris he stared with bulging eyes, a burning sense of adrenaline, and ragged breaths. Ulger, who was missing the entirety of his body from the waste down, lay with his intestines trailing out in a pool of blood.
Arthur dropped to his knees, sinking with a sense of dread, before throwing up at the fetid stench and sight.
"I told you," Isaac said as he waltzed over, drawing Arthur's attention immediately, "he's far beyond your help. That same Sabaoth you place so much hope in willed such an ill fate for this old man." He tossed a white cloth, staring deep into Arthur's trembling eyes as he added:
"Now clean yourself. I don't care who you think needs help, or what you think about my orders. You're going to learn a harsh truth that the dead are lucky to escape... You will listen to everything I tell you. Do you understand?"
Arthur stared back for a moment before averting his gaze as he clenched his jaw and clasped fists, slowly nodding.
"Then get up and start moving. We don't have time to waste because of your ignorance. You're going to find many others you once knew in that exact state, if not already devoured entirely." Isaac quickly stood up and walked off to the side, adding:
"Toss the body into the fire."
"W-what?" Arthur asked, his voice quivering at the thought, his brows struggling to remain on his face, and his body quaking with despair.
"I said toss the body into the fire... Would you rather have him lay on the ground like this?"
Finally understanding what he meant, Arthur hesitantly stood up and picked up what remained of Ulger, tossing the corpse into the nearest pyre. He tried to watch, but he ultimately averted his gaze. Isaac, however, grabbed him by the head and forced him to see it to the end.
"Watch, boy," Isaac said, staring into the fire that demanded more corpses as Ulger's body disappeared into the mix of countless others. "This won't be the last time. Watch, so that you may harden that heart of yours."
***
Hours would pass by, with their journey finally entering the late afternoon, and Arthur would maintain the silence as he grit his teeth. His aching feet had him debating if he should ask Isaac for a break, but even though he didn't have many interactions with his master, he knew very well how Isaac would respond.
And even so, he wanted to drop down to the ground and rest, despite the daylight still being present. It didn't matter that his brown, laced boots, were designed to comfort the wearer across long distances, for the rubble beneath his boots caused much irritation.
"Isaac," Arthur called out, deciding to ease into the question. "How long will it take for us to reach Central Erthyl?"
"About a week by foot," Isaac replied. He stopped as he came across an intersection, checking both sides to make sure that no person or monster was around, continuing onward upon confirming the coast was clear.
"Can we take a break?" Arthur asked, mimicking Isaac's head that darted side to side like a bird's whenever he came across an intersection.
Isaac sighed, shaking his head. "It's only dawning upon me now that you truly have no idea what it is to be a pilgrim, do you?"
"N-no, I don't."
"To be a pilgrim means to sacrifice any false delusion of respite you once held." He looked back as he added:
"We live up to the name quite literally. Pilgrims devote their time travelling beyond the safety—or whatever name you want to give such falsehood—that you so badly wanted to stay in."
Not caring enough to decipher the words, Arthur asked:
"Does that mean we can't rest?"
"Yes."
Arthur winced at the confirmation. Although the work he had to do while under Sir Bertrand was quite physically demanding, never had he walked rubble-filled streets for hours on end, especially with the looming fear of death around every corner.
'How is an old man like him with just a giant bow and a few giant arrows supposed to fight back against an eldrite?' he wondered, staring at Isaac for a bit, before he shook his head and looked at the ground. 'This is hopeless.'
And in the short moment that he looked down, he found himself walking into Isaac, stumbling back as he asked:
"Why did we stop?"
Isaac's brows met in a thick dark line as the wrinkles around his eyes creased. He quickly looked around and muttered to himself before saying:
"Stop talking and keep an eye out. Listen for anything and everything."
He started walking again as he slowly took out an arrow from its massive quiver, using all his might to hold it.
Confused by the old man's words, Arthur felt his pulse growing, following as he quickly peeked to his right and left.
To the right was nothing but the same old buildings and statues that adorned the streets, and to his left, much the same. Unlike further out, the closer they drew to Central Erthyl, the more the buildings retained their structure, and the cleaner the streets were of rubble, with only barrels loitering around some buildings.
'Just what am I supposed to be watching for?' he wondered as he felt his pulse in his throat and ears.
He looked around again, drawing his brows together as he took notice of some houses painted in a fresh coating of blood, dripping from the edge of the rooftops. The blood-tinged air quickly, pungent and enough to make one feel as though their lungs withered, plagued his nose.
'Perhaps it's just what was left behind by the eldrites,' so he thought, just barely stopping himself from stumbling into Isaac again, who stood still and twitched his fingers he held at his side.
Isaac studied the surroundings as he pondered on the sight, thinking:
'Blood, but no bodies... By the way it's dripping to the ground, the bodies must be up there... and if there are dead bodies around untouched structures...'
He raised his brows, throwing his gaze back at Arthur as he whispered:
"Get in a barrel!"
Arthur raised a brow, as he countered:
"What? How am I supposed to help when I'm in a barrel?"
Behind his facemask, Isaac snarled, though his deep frown betrayed his hidden expression.
"You there!" yelled a raucous voice, ringing in the silence like a trumpet.
They both found their gazes snapping onto the centre of a rooftop with brown shingles, where a lone man leaned back against the large steeple with his arms crossed as he added:
"Hand over your money and weapons or die."