Bear School Astartes-Chapter 867 - 850: Death

They’re rather polite.

This made Lann breathe a sigh of relief.

Maybe this group of people were just naturally taciturn before.

The Demon Hunter thought optimistically.

These people are tall and thin, looking like malnourished skeletal figures.

But judging by height alone, they can indeed maintain eye level with Lann.

This group of lumberjacks, probably about a dozen, the one who tipped his hat to greet Lann should be a small foreman, as he stepped out, many of the lumberjacks focused their gaze on him.

After taking off his straw hat, the foreman’s appearance wasn’t far from what Lann imagined.

Rough and messy hair, with a steaming damp heat from work.

Sunken, even hollow, cheeks.

"I’m a lost traveler, I can’t even tell if it’s morning or afternoon after a nap."

Lann said naturally, as he took out a loaf of bread from the Alchemy Pouch at his lower back and handed it over.

"Could you help me out? This place is unfamiliar, and it’s quite distressing."

The foreman looked at the loaf of bread in Lann’s hand, then raised his eyes to look at Lann himself.

Finally, he pulled out the towel hanging around his neck, wiped his grimy hands, and took the bread.

Turning around, he called out: "Alright, let’s take a break and eat something."

This was the first time Lann heard them speak after arriving.

Stiff and dry, not just the voice and vocal cords. Lann even felt their thinking was turning slowly.

"This is the Punishment Forest. And now it’s... morning... no, afternoon...?"

The foreman, with stiff arms, motioned for his group to sit and rest before introducing to Lann.

But as he spoke, he seemed to lose track of time himself, adding hesitation to his stiff and dry voice.

This made Lann narrow his eyes slightly.

From the way the foreman called his companions to eat, he should at least be a normal person with emotional intelligence and leadership experience.

But so far, neither his actions nor his speech... even someone with Tang’s disease is better than him.

What’s going on?

"Punishment Forest?"

But Lann didn’t openly express his true confusion, instead he first asked about this place name.

Punishment, also known as impalement.

It’s an ancient term, in layman’s terms—piercing punishment.

A punishment with great disparity in severity, minimum being a quick and clean stabbing to death. And the maximum...

Like the Passion of Jesus, first nailing the limbs before stabbing to death. Or as in dark legends, the spearhead is inserted from below, then lifted upright, using gravity to slowly pierce through the entire body and out the mouth.

"You don’t know? Oh... right, you’re a traveler."

The leading lumberjack, like his fellows, sat on the ground with the bread Lann gave, their chopped wood placed beside their feet.

The bread Lann gave was large, even after being divided among nearly ten people, each had a piece about half the size of a palm.

Thick and solid, very filling.

These lumberjacks were working hard, their hair plastered to their foreheads with sweat.

But for some reason, this group each dressed themselves tightly.

Even in exposed areas, only the wrists and ankles were visible.

Lann saw they kept wiping sweat, yet no one untied their collars to cool off.

"Aren’t you here to observe the fire transmission ritual? Under this Punishment Forest is the infamous Ash King [Pharland Undead Squadron], left at the ruins of Fort Fran."

"This forest and the Undead Settlement on the mountain behind are the Duke of Ulster’s fief."

Lann feigned a look of sudden realization.

The other side suddenly spilled out a lot of information, and Mentos was organizing it with Lann.

’Fire transmission ritual’, sounds like a ceremony of fame and scale, attracting many to travel long distances to witness.

’Ash King’, seems to be a title, along with ’fire transmission ritual’, ’fire and wood’... Lann guessed, perhaps the host of this ritual?

’Pharland Undead Squadron’, ’Duke of Ulster’... these were mentioned by the lumberjack foreman without context, leaving Lann at a loss for their meanings.

He only knew this world still had a hierarchy, and where he stood was a duke’s fiefdom.

It seemed even as Lady of the Lake said, this place’s very essence differed greatly from other worlds, yet some things still felt familiar.

Lann wasn’t expecting to learn too much from the lumberjacks anyway, so after figuring out the way to the Undead Settlement, he didn’t ask further.

The name Undead Settlement sounded odd, but a place pursuing ’longevity’ as a feature might indeed have such a nickname.

After all, it’s a settlement, surely with more people than the forest, and potentially more information.

Lann was planning his future actions in his mind.

Meanwhile, these lumberjacks seemed not to have had a decent meal in quite some time.

Lann watched them devour the brown bread he gave like hungry wolves.

He couldn’t figure out how the Duke of Ulster managed to keep a group of lumberjacks focused on work when they hadn’t had a proper meal.

But soon, Lann had no time to dwell on it.

"Uhghhh!"

A lumberjack grasping a piece of brown bread stuffed into his mouth seemed to choke on it, the bread too dry and solid, lodging in his throat.

His eyes bulged from his already gaunt face like a frog’s, while his face flushed, with long slender hands helplessly flailing in the air.

The lumberjacks around him quickly stuck their bread in their mouths and freed up their hands to help him.

Lann noticed the anomaly and rushed past the lumberjack foreman to offer assistance.

But within those few steps, the man fell utterly silent.

Lann was dumbfounded.

In his understanding, choking on food should take at least ten minutes before reaching a life-threatening point.

So he hadn’t hurried, taking three seconds to walk those four or five steps.

Yet just three seconds of suffocation... and he was dead?!

Even though the deceased was so emaciated he looked like a desiccated corpse long overdue for burial, this was too fast.

What troubled the Demon Hunter even more was: in the face of their companion’s sudden death, including the lumberjack foreman, everyone at most was momentarily surprised.

Then they seemed indifferent, no longer concerned with the matter.

The lumberjack who had held a piece of brown bread in his mouth earlier sat next to the corpse and resumed eating.

The Demon Hunter slightly creased his brow, while his left hand discreetly settled on the hilt of his sword, retreating slowly.

"Buddy, one of your men just died."

As Lann retreated slowly, he stopped by the sitting foreman, casting a sidelong glance down, speaking in a strangely casual tone.

"Isn’t death a big deal? Why don’t you seem to care?"

"Death... big deal."

But the foreman seemed to struggle with Lann’s words.

He repeated Lann’s words laboriously.

"Seems... a big deal. Yes, someone died, a big thing indeed."

"But why... can’t I care?"

The foreman’s expression was as bewildered as his words, like he was confused by his own speech.

And in the next moment... "Pfft!"

A sharp wooden spike suddenly rose from behind the foreman, stabbing into his emaciated body!