Chapter 1287 - 861: The Future

Chapter 1287: Chapter 861: The Future

Inside the town meeting room.

Mayor Wendell quietly listened to Captain Gertei, the complex expression on his wrinkled face revealing his thoughts.

Gertei continued speaking without pause.

"Stop focusing only on the present, stop dwelling solely on the past, otherwise you will only live worse and regress.

"Look forward, compare today to yesterday, compare this year to last year.

"Civilization always moves forward, only by moving forward can things get better and better. If we stop or even regress, aren’t we wasting the efforts of our ancestors?"

As a Level Three Warrior who had clawed and fought his way through the battlefield, he didn’t understand grand doctrines, yet Gertei’s words were like a stone cast into a calm lake, stirring ripples.

"Look forward... compare to yesterday..."

He muttered to himself, his rough fingers unconsciously rubbing the coarse grain of the table.

Indeed, the Rabbit Race always reminisced about the glory of their ancestors during the early days of the Empire, or comforted themselves by comparing their misery to their past slave days.

Compared to back then, they are already better off now, using this mindset to comfort themselves and escape from the harsh reality.

Yet they never dared to think if tomorrow they could have half a loaf more bread, or if their houses could be better fortified.

The "better life" Gertei spoke of seemed like a mere fantasy to the turnip roots.

Wendell’s thoughts darted like a startled rabbit—as he suddenly realized why the Night Watchers could spread like wildfire for decades.

The organization to which this man in gray robes belonged was initially just a shadow in widespread rumors.

A prince named Kana, exiled from his nation, supposedly could not bear the curses and reforms of the Royal Family and nobility on the common people and defected decisively from his country.

With only his knight by his side, they crossed many cities, pursued by numerous enemies. At that time, the prince’s strength was minimal, yet he persevered and reached elders who shared his thoughts.

For a once notorious and frivolous prince, the elders, who were then resisting evil, naturally did not believe him.

They placed him at the rear, protecting him as their last blood relative.

Yet even in the rear, the prince developed, having seen through the whole war situation, pragmatically finding a way out, and even establishing contact and forming a deep friendship with the dwarf tribes in the mountains.

According to some rumors, that prince grew at an extraordinary pace and for the sake of righteousness, helped the dwarves eliminate a traitor, supposedly one of the Evil God’s original apostles.

They say the prince was very young at that time and not very powerful.

The dwarves claimed that Prince Kana was blessed by the Mother Goddess of the earth.

They affectionately called him the "Evil Breaker" then.

The elder’s failure and far-seeing preparations for a retreat became the only surviving path.

It’s said Kana already had the reputation of a prophet at that time.

Leading the refugees, they headed downstream.

Then he established the Night Watchers, then only a few people strong.

Back then, they already had a clear goal to save the world.

Thinking about it feels absurd, almost like a myth.

But with Kana’s rise to divinity, perhaps it truly became a myth.

Then, along with the remaining soldiers and the newly established Night Watchers, they built a base in a barren, dangerous wilderness.

Those hearing this without knowing the later developments would think it’s merely a crazy story.

But not only did the Night Watchers survive, they grew like the wildly growing roots of a thorn bush, piercing through the wasteland of the old order.

Wendell’s cloudy eyes flashed through scenes pieced together from rumors, having never witnessed them himself but marked by every campfire night’s idle talk.

Prince Kana observed the final royal family’s maniacal rituals upon the crumbling walls of his former capital, yet turned to embrace that cursed land.

The Holy Light Church initially scoffed at them but could only stand shoulder to shoulder with these "traitors" when the Evil God’s minions tore through the city.

The most astonishing part was the Evil Rat War on the Lebia Continent, spanning years—when everyone thought the land had fallen into a grinder of flesh and blood, the Night Watchers, just as mortals, reclaimed it inch by inch. Even rumors claimed their fallen could resurrect to fight again, eventually forcing the Evil God to fall and expel them from this world, allowing light to pierce through the darkness.

These are scenes pieced together from various stories.

The truth in them only the Night Watchers know.

But being so widely spread, there must be much truth in it.

"Living legend..." Wendell’s throat felt dry.

He had seen young clansmen starry-eyed before Kana’s silhouette on the Adventurer Guild’s posters, the youth speaking of the Night Watchers as if describing a divine kingdom floating in the clouds.

No wonder!

Unlike the Empire’s nobles who levy blood taxes, the Night Watchers open free night schools everywhere, take in commoners as apprentices, even sending elites like Gertei to root out rabbit mud-flat villages like turnip roots.

Wendell’s hand trembled slightly over the old knife scar on his arm—the Night Watchers offer not hollow promises but land where turnips can be planted, a well that does not freeze, a pack of youngsters trained to glare back at wolf riders.

Even those sniffing imperial commanders don’t dare to openly obstruct the Night Watchers’ "meddling," fearing it may incite rebellion among the Beastman Warriors at the front lines.

Gertei’s voice pulled Wendell back from the tidal wave of thoughts.