Former General Is Undead Knight - Act 4-34 - Judgment③

After the death of Zebedai, Lambert walked in the passage by himself.

He was thinking about what he said a while ago.

『I’ll give you my promise. I won’t kill Zebedai if he turns out to be a man worthy of respect like you. Move aside, Johann.』

That was Lambert’s promise to one of the Four Great Sages who protected Heinstia and also one of Cardinal Zebedai’s subordinates, Johann.

Lambert did fulfill his promise to not kill Zebedai, but he didn’t save Zebedai from his predicament either.

Lambert recalled Johann, who died in the memorial tower that burned to the ground.

「…Sorry, Johann. Things turned out like this in the end.」

In the end, Lambert realized that Cardinal Zebedai was different from Johann.

Johann stuck to his own justice regardless of how he really felt inside. He was completely different from Cardinal Zebedai, who had turned into a demonic avenger.

Since the leader of the inquisition squad, Cardinal Zebedai, had never ever once cared about the kingdom, both the inquisition squad and the kingdom would always be walking in parallel to each other, resulting in the birth of a new tragedy.

Lambert knew that Johann had already realized that fact.

Thus, he insisted on never letting Lambert meet Cardinal Zebedai.

Johann understood that yet kept serving under Cardinal Zebedai, perhaps because that was the only way to counter 『Devil’s Piper』. Or, maybe, he had already become one of the Four Great Sages; thus, he couldn’t back down anymore. Either way, there was no way to know the answer since the person himself had already died.

Lambert kept walking inside the underground passage as he used his undead mana perception.

Whenever he sensed the presence of the people with black robes, he would choose the passage with the least number of people.

He had no intention to fight with them.

After all, these people were fighting to stop Cardinal Zebedai, who fought for his own revenge.

Now that Cardinal Zebedai had died, there was no reason for them to fight Lambert.

Alas, they would still attack Lambert once they met him.

Thus, Lambert chose to avoid them.

Cardinal Zebedai had already died.

And Lambert had already seen enough of Cardinal Zebedai’s motive.

Although his goal was to protect Heintia from the raid of the Eight Wise Men, he had already failed to accomplish his mission since 『Gu』 caused a lot of destruction in the city.

Alas, it didn’t mean that the fight in Heinstia had ended.

The person from the Yutelbe tribe who joined 『Devil’s Piper』 and led the people in black robes seemed to be around in the underground passage too.

And there was a high possibility that said person was one of 『Devil’s Piper』’s Eight Wise Men.

That was a target he couldn’t miss at all costs.

In fact, Lambert had a guess about the identity of the Wise Man hiding in the underground passage.

It was someone whom Lambert had met before.

Alas, he really wished it was just a guess.

He then felt strange mana.

The other party had also noticed Lambert, and yet, they came closer instead of escaping.

The sound of the guqin resounded inside the passage.

Lambert stopped walking and shook his head.

「…I really wished that I was wrong. It was only at this kind of time that my intuition became sharp. No, maybe I should feel ashamed for failing to notice such an obvious fact.」

The sound continued on until the figure of a woman appeared before Lambert.

Baggy leather shoes, gaudy garments, a scarf twining around her head, and eyes that reflected nothing.

「…The moment I saw those people in black robes, the first suspect that come to mind was you.」

The woman squinted her foggy eyes as she looked at Lambert.

But Lambert knew that the woman had not denied him.

The movement of her eyes was the expression of her turmoil and deep affection.

Her facial expression was simply cold and inhuman, thus creating some sort of beauty.

「It’s such an unexpected encounter, Knight-sama. I never expected that I’d meet you in this kind of place.」

She greeted Lambert with her usual cheerful tone as if their meeting was truly a coincidence.

「Unexpected encounter, is it? From the way you speak, it’s as if we happened to have the same goal since before and after that.」

Lambert spoke coldly, grabbed the greatsword on his back, and hit the floor with it.

The impact smashed the floor, creating a small crater around it.

The fragments of the crushed floor were repelled by his Organ armor.

「I was neither joking nor laughing. I’m a minstrel…and one of the Eight Wise Men, Alvana.」

『Rose of Subkingdom』 was a blind minstrel whom Lambert met before along his journey in the current era.

Alvana’s lips formed a self-deprecating smile as she replied to Lambert’s remark.

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