Chapter Fifteen: Disassembly

How could it be a corpse? Sweyn frowned.

The corpse's hand was bound to a single-shot crossbow, its mechanism reset, but the wooden arrow that should have been placed in the arrow box was missing.

Could the corpse have shot at me?

Judging by its attire, this person seemed to be someone from his own crew.

Sweyn sensed something was subtly amiss. He immediately swung his runic longsword, the glowing blade slicing through the corpse’s waist like cutting through butter, utterly unhindered.

The upper half fell to the ground, igniting; the cut where the blade had touched turned black, and a pungent smell, like burning hair, wafted through the air.

There was no sign of the corpse reanimating. Sweyn believed it was a lure; the real killer of his man was still hiding in the shadows.

“Rat in the gutter,” Sweyn spat.

He judged this person’s ability in direct combat to be poor. If he were strong enough, he wouldn’t resort to such petty tricks—he’d just roll through like a war chariot.

That was always Sweyn’s way. Every time he raided, he’d charge at the front, whether armored knights or mercenaries with tower shields blocked his path. He never flinched, simply crushed whatever stood before him.

He despised those who relied on underhanded schemes; he believed only in strength.

Absolute strength was the path to victory!

He raised his sword, and suddenly flames burst forth from the blade, a pillar of fire several meters long blazing into the night.

Veyd, crouched on the rooftop, saw the flame pillar ascend through the darkness. The cold wind tugged at his hood and cloak, and he couldn’t help but marvel at the extraordinary power of professionals.

Once, Veyd had dreamed of becoming a professional himself. But he never had the talent; he died as nothing more than an ordinary man.

Some things are simply not given at birth, and will never be gained no matter how much one envies, strives, or suffers.

So Veyd learned early to accept reality. He knew that if he wanted to kill that towering Viking, he had to prepare for the possibility that archery would be useless.

That’s why, before shooting, he made some arrangements.

His foresight proved correct.

The pirate leader was a seasoned professional—not some rookie who’d just mastered a couple of combat moves.

Defeating a veteran professional was no easy feat.

Even among declining knightly families, nurturing a veteran professional was a challenge, requiring not only resources but also innate talent.

A professional of iron rank could serve as the pride of a knightly house; a silver-ranked one could rival a captain commanding a thousand troops—meaning, alone, he could match the strength of a thousand men.

Perhaps those claims were exaggerated, but they aptly illustrated the status of powerful professionals in the minds of the people.

They were floods, beasts.

At this moment, a thought suddenly arose in Veyd’s mind.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have come.

How much is a man willing to pay for justice?

Everyone’s answer is different, but for Veyd, that price did not include his life.

Yet his life as a man had long since ended.

He was a skeleton—a dead man who should have been sleeping.

Skeletons and ghosts—things that could move yesterday, might dissipate tomorrow like a breeze, truly becoming dead matter.

If even waking up tomorrow couldn’t be guaranteed, why fear death?

Besides, Veyd believed his chances weren’t so slim.

He gazed at the other end of the fire pillar, where a tiny speck of light floated into the air like a firefly.

That light was more insignificant than the stars above, its glow weaker than a dying candle, yet still it pointed Veyd toward his destination.

“So it’s there...”

Veyd rose, sure of his direction.

The fire’s glow finally illuminated his face.

He no longer hid his presence; he took from his breast a fire tube, crafted from resin, mugwort fluff, and fir bark—a tube he’d scavenged from a pirate’s body.

In the far north, fire sources were indispensable. If conditions allowed, everyone carefully preserved a spark.

The bamboo tube, no longer than a finger, was identical to those Veyd had seen in the wooden cabins.

The principle was simple. He’d used such tubes to start fires before.

One must soak the mugwort fluff and shredded fir bark in saltpeter water for three days, let them dry, coat them with melted resin, and roll them into thumb-thick cylinders.

Before lighting, sprinkle charcoal in the tube for moisture absorption, wait for an open flame to catch on the core, then snuff it, leaving only a smoldering ember. Place the ember in an appropriately sized bamboo tube, cover the mouth with a pierced bamboo disk, seal the tube with wet clay, leaving only a tiny vent.

Made thus, the fire tube could smolder for ten to thirty days, so long as it was maintained, keeping the fire alive.

Just minutes earlier, Veyd had checked the fire tube. Now he opened it, took out an oil pouch, and splashed fuel onto the straw-covered eaves.

He’d already swept away the snow from a patch of the eaves.

Sparks fell like fine sand, and before dying, flashed with heat, igniting the fire.

He’d done the same just now—before firing the arrow from the pirate’s corpse, he’d ignited a flame.

The results proved his theory correct.

The Viking could not sense a corpse with no warmth; he must rely on “heat” to locate his enemy, or perhaps, only in “firelight” did his senses sharpen.

It wasn’t hard to deduce. Pirates all carried oil not by coincidence, but by regulation—a rule set by their captain, their leader.

That Viking, that professional, drew his power from fire.

That’s why they burned houses en masse, instead of sneaking into homes at night and silently murdering villagers in their sleep.

As Veyd lit the fire, the pillar of flame drew inward; the pirate chief had sensed him.

He needed just a bit more time, or he might not reach the rendezvous point.

He controlled his left hand and fired a second crossbow bolt.

His left hand was not connected to his shoulder blade.

More precisely, that arm was separated from him by hundreds of meters.

The detached arm was like a plug-and-play part, fitted onto the pirate’s corpse. He’d chopped off the pirate’s left arm and attached his own.

A skeleton was wondrous; apart from the skull, which housed the soul’s flame, every bone could be removed and replaced.

Provided, of course, that the soul’s flame was used to temper and adapt the new bones—a process akin to oiling a clockwork mechanism, so gears and springs could turn smoothly.

His left hand had long been “oiled”; thus, even at great distance, it could perform any motion a left hand could.

The first crossbow bolt had been launched with a simple device fashioned from elastic bowstring; the second now emerged from the pirate corpse’s sleeve.

Rather than aiming visually, Veyd used the breath of the living to locate his target remotely.

He locked onto that vibrant "fire," pulled the crossbow trigger.

Arrow loosed, he immediately leapt from the eaves, sprinting madly toward the glowing point.