Chapter 500: Apologize!?
The suddenness of the action was so jarring that it sent a visible shockwave through the Veynar lines.
Behind Sol, the warriors instinctively flinched, raising their bone-shields and gripping their spears tighter, fully believing that the sudden drop in his posture was the wind-up for a devastating, high-speed leaping attack.
When you are standing in a dead zone facing heavily armed warriors who had ignored your pleas for survival, a sudden bow feels more like a drawn dagger than a greeting.
But Vane didn’t move to attack. He stayed bowed, his thick, graying hair hanging toward the white gravel.
Everyone was utterly confused and stunned.
The crushing tension in the air fractured into a million pieces of sheer bewilderment.
Ignoring the rattling weapons and the heavy, panicked breathing of the Veynar warriors, Zharun Chief Vane’s voice boomed across the hundred-pace gap. It wasn’t a roar of aggression, but a deep, resonant tone that carried a strange, practiced solemnity.
"First of all," Vane spoke, his voice easily cutting through the dry wind, "we, the Zharun, would like to deeply apologize."
Huh? Apologize?
The word echoed around the clearing, making the Veynar warriors exchange wild, uncomprehending glances.
The elders, who just moments ago had been cursing the Zharun as betrayers and vultures, leaned over the precipices, their wrinkled faces twisting with even deeper confusion. You don’t march a thousand heavy infantrymen and a pack of Grave-Hounds across a barren wasteland just to say sorry.
"No need to bow," Veylara said, her voice like cracking ice. She didn’t drop her guard for a micro-second, her spear tip still angled directly at Vane’s chest. "Get up and tell us what the matter is. Apologies do not bleed, Vane. Words do not hold the line."
Chief Vane didn’t rise immediately. He kept his spine bent for another long, deliberate heartbeat before continuing, his tone dripping with heavy regret.
"It was entirely our fault for not responding to your call for help sooner," Vane declared loudly, making sure every single Veynar warrior in the valley could hear him. "We failed to respond to your spiritual birds, and we failed to meet your emissaries at the designated valley. But more importantly, we failed to act despite having sworn the Sacred Pact."
At the mention of those two words... Sacred Pact... a collective, silent realization washed over the Veynar ranks.
Sol, analyzing the crowd through his Golden Dominion, felt the sudden shift in the emotional resonance of the elders and the veterans. The simmering rage and the sharp edge of betrayal that had been boiling in their chests suddenly cooled, replaced by a strange, superstitious awe.
In the brutal, primitive place of the Great Orrath, promises were usually as fragile as dry leaves.
Tribes betrayed one another constantly over hunting grounds, river access, and beasts. But the Sacred Pact was different.
It was an ancient, absolute blood-oath. According to the deepest legends of the human tribes, breaking a Sacred Pact didn’t just invite war; it invited ancestral wrath... a total, inescapable curse that would rot the tribe, blind their children, and turn their warriors’ bones to ash from the inside out.
For generations, no Chieftain, no matter how savage or ambitious, had ever dared to openly break a Sacred Pact once it had been formally sworn upon.
Because Vane was openly invoking the Sacred Pact while bowing, the primitive minds of the Veynar elders immediately began to rationalize the situation. He wouldn’t dare invoke the ancestors if he was here to kill us. The curse would wipe out his bloodline.
"Okay. I understand the weight of your words," Veylara said, her tone softening infinitesimally, shifting from absolute, cold hostility to a heavy, calculated wariness.
"Get up, Vane. Stand straight and talk properly. If you honor the Pact, then explain your silence."
This time, Chief Vane rose. He straightened his massive, seven-and-a-half-foot frame, his face displaying weary exhaustion and grim determination.
"Actually," Vane continued, taking a few slow, unthreatening steps forward, his empty hands open at his sides, "we wanted to come as fast as possible.
We had already gathered our warriors and sharpened our tridents the night your first messenger arrived. We were prepared to march and bleed beside the Veynar. But we were struck by our own dire circumstances."
"Oh?" Veylara’s eyes narrowed, the suspicion returning to her voice. "What circumstances are more important than honoring the Sacred Pact? What could possibly keep a thousand warriors locked inside their tribe while their allies are marked for death by the Coalition?"
"Just like your people," Vane sighed, his deep voice carrying a heavy note of shared tragedy, "our tribe was suddenly attacked by a massive beast tide."
A low, collective gasp rippled through the Veynar ranks.
"A beast tide?" one of the elders cliff whispered, his eyes widening with genuine horror.
"It came from the deep black bogs of the southern delta," Vane explained, his hands gesturing vaguely toward the horizon. "Hundreds of frenzy-driven mud-crawlers and two massive, Layer 4 swamp behemoths breached our outer perimeter in the dead of night.
Our warriors had no choice. We had to abandon the designated camp and rush back to our spire to support the inner walls.
It was a massacre. We fought for two straight suns without sleep, bleeding into the muck just to keep our children from being eaten.
But immediately after finally driving the tide back into the deep water, our delayed scouts reported that the Coalition was already mobilizing for an all-out war with you.
Despite our exhaustion, we didn’t rest. We gathered every spear that could still be thrown, and we immediately rushed here to support you and honor the Sacred Pact."
Suddenly, the pieces seemed to fall into place for the Veynar warriors.
The murmuring among the elders grew louder, shifting rapidly from panic to immense relief and understanding.
"So this is why the promised camp was completely empty..." an old shaman muttered, leaning heavily on his staff. "They didn’t abandon us. They were fighting for their own lives against the beasts."
Author’s Heartfelt Note:
Wow, unknowingly we have reached 500! Full 500 Chapter!!!
Man, what an exciting journey it had been!
It has been exactly 230 days, more than 7 months, since we had buckled up and started this journey.
Honestly, I can’t seem to write the complicated emotions I am feeling right now.
So, All I’ll say is that I’m extremely grateful, like really grateful for your continuous support until now, especially the Michael_1989, honestly without his continues financial support, I don’t think I would have persisted like this.
Of course, there are many others too, and I remember each and every one of you. But I still specifically mentioned Michael, because despite his own fair share of difficulties, he made sure to massively support me, and I’m beyond grateful for that.
And of course, with you guys’ persistent support, no matter how bad or extreme the situation was, even from hospital bed, I had been able to write and update daily without missing a single day.
I know there are many shortcomings in the previous Chapters, and I fully acknowledge that and won’t make excuse that it was my first novel or whatnot.
But I promise to work even harder from now, learn from my mistakes and give you guys even batter and exciting story.
So, let’s stay together, explore the world, help Sol conquer even more beauties and continue for long, long time.