Isekai Journey Of The Magic Archer

[Eon's POV: ]

Have you ever wondered, what happens to the battlefield after war?

"Eon, you can start now."

What happens to the dead bodies that are left behind on the barren ground?

To the desolate place that one would never want to revisit again?

The nightmare of a place that has been covered in blood, tears, curses of those who had fought on it, and in our case, with the laughter of the evil that wanted nothing more than the destruction of all that was Present?

What happens to all that?

"Huuuuu…"

What happens to those who were fortunate enough to come out of this hellish experience alive, or what happens to those who are just barely alive to even be considered 'alive'?

What happens to the injured and what happens to those who are left crippled?

[ "We have gathered here, at this moment, to present our prayers to the innocent souls that were lost to evil, last night.

To sing for the brave souls who were once the warriors that protected this city. And common folks who lived here.

To ask the primordial light to guide those souls to the afterlife that they should have, and would have deserved." ]

Have you ever wondered what the battlefield on the dawn after the end of war, looks like?

'I have wondered. And I have seen those dawns, those mornings when the soldiers silently express their remorse for the loss of their comrades, their friends, and their brothers, family.

I have seen the battles being fought with weapons more lethal than swords and magic. Weapons that would not only destroy the living but also the very earth the war is being fought on.'

I have seen the aftermath of those wars. 

What that dark storm leaves behind in its wake.

I have seen it, and I have lived through those days. 

I had come out victorious, or at least alive, out of the most difficult of those times.

'That was practically how my previous life used to be… a continuous, never-ending war.'

I have seen it… and still, now that I am witnessing it again, I can say one thing for certain.

'Even in this world, it's still the same.'

This morning was the same yet again.

'Even though this war was fought with magic and weapons, with powers that were beyond the science and the technological understanding of things from my previous world, this dawn, this morning where the entire city was fast asleep even though the sun had settled on the horizon, all that darkness is the same.'

The soldiers who had fought in that battle had gathered together in a certain place to mourn for the dead.

The commander of the forces who were not present during the time of the battle, the person who was still the most hurt by the loss of the people who could have been saved, the headmaster, was standing before all of us who had fought these battles on his behalf.

'Everyone was tired, injured, wounded… Lord Justin, the head of the Lakmer, was now in a wheelchair from the side effects of using all his powers to sustain the defenses of the city.' 

His wife, the mastermind who had been the one controlling the winds of the battlefield when I was not there, was also completely exhausted from the battle.

So much so that she somehow looked far older than she did yesterday.

The Witch of the North had injured one of her hands badly, and since the attack was a demonic curse, she would need more than a week to make a complete recovery.

The masters of the East were low on Qi, which was a dangerous thing for the material artists since they had to be ready for anything and everything at all times.

President Zodiac and the vice president were both gloomy right now. The atmosphere around them was darker than even what Rein was going through.

The others, though a little different from the others, were the same as well…

'Mourning, sadness, gloom, hate towards the enemy, the guilt, the feeling of being powerless, the relief that all of it was over, the pain in their hearts, this funeral for those who were not even around anymore, and the prayers for everything that was lost to the evil.'

The atmosphere around me was just as heavy as it is when the soldiers are attending the last meeting on the battlefield where their commanders, as well as some other useless bastards, give out words of condolence, and a speech of power.

The only difference here was that instead of a jerk commander, we had a leader who was hurting the most right now and soldiers who had done everything they could even though there was little for them to gain in all of this.

-Swiiiiiiiiiiish…

The morning winds were cold.

-String~.

I was back on my harp, for the last prayers of the day that would show the lost souls a path of light, and bring back those who were still around to their senses.

-String~.

The headmaster will then cast a powerful illusion spell that would make people think everything is going on normally and that the people who are gone now, were either with them or were only not around at the moment… 

'It's deception and something morally wrong, I know, however, for now, it was important for the annual alchemy competition's third and final day to conclude properly before the lords of Lakmer could announce what had happened on this night and what was lost.'

They knew there would be questions and consequences for their actions, but the rulers of the Lakmer and the balancer of the world, Headmaster Merlin, would bear all that responsibility.

He was prepared for that, so…

-Sriting~!

"To the souls who were lost, to the souls who survived, and to all those who fought with us today…"

I present my gratitude and lament.

-Saaaaaaaaaa… 

A last song.

To conclude everything on this battlefield, that had already returned to the perfect capital city it used to be until yesterday.

A city where the roads were empty and the living were nowhere to be seen, but that would change as this song goes on.

-Reeeeeeeee…

The people would wake up from their slumbers, return to their everyday life like every other day, and continue doing things that they should do, and even with a gap in their memories of the last few hours, they would continue their day as they usually do.

Things will continue and the time for the third day of the annual alchemy competition will begin with the final participants who had passed the many challenges to come so far.

The competition would go on, the fifth round would start and finish, the sixth round would start and finish, and before the announcements of the final winners of various awards, there would be a special contest for those other than the present participants to showcase something they thinks is worthy of standing on par with the final contestants.

That would be the third day of the competition which, of course, would impact the entire world to a great degree.

And the announcements right after the events of the competition that, just like this event, would be broadcast to the entire world.

'There would be an uproar in the entire world over this event, and the actions that were taken to conceal the information about the happenings.'

There would be questions that many would want the answers to, details that could obviously not be revealed to the world, and rumors that would become something uncontrollable.

'There were more than three thousand casualties, people will see this fact against the hundreds of thousands of lives that were saved by the combined efforts of all the 'unknown' people who aided Lakmer in this battle.'

There will be many legal trials as well, some genuine while some practically BS political dramas.

Some things will be settled behind the scenes but the principality of Lakmer will undoubtedly face many challenges going forward and in those times of turbulence, only if my resources and I are of any help to them, will the bond between us become stronger.

'However, that is talk for later.'

-Gaaaaaaaa…

The last song of the war, a shorter one than the one that had been played by K and me throughout the night, brought tears to many eyes.

They wept, mourned for the people they had no deep connections to, were concerned how something like this incident could happen to their very own homeland in the near future, and became anxious about how an attack of this scale, was nothing more than a 'testing' of that cult.

'We all know the enemy was not defeated completely, that it was far from being taken care of once and for all.'

We knew this was just the start. 

Start of a bitter relationship with an enemy that threatened not only the stability of this world, but also an enemy that was strong, smart, and crazy enough to be worse than the demons of hell.

'This was only their first move made with the intention of testing their current powers, and, from a good enough look at the results they managed to produce even with us standing in their path, it was obvious they were more than satisfactory enough.'

The mere minions of their cult managed to give a strong fight to the nation-level forces of this world.

Just a collection of crazy bastards that didn't even know who they were doing the things they were doing for, managed to fight and wound the forces handpicked by the sole strongest being on this planet.

'We could only imagine… just how worse of a force was standing behind the true executives of this organization.'

We knew little about the enemy we were going to fight for real in the upcoming future. However, from the threat that we had assessed with this battle, I know one thing for sure now…

'The [Grand conference] will be held soon.'

And, all the major powers of the world will discuss what they have to do with this whole situation.

And, as fate would have it… as the one possessing the most information about the enemy, I will have to lead that conference as well.

And that, different from the meeting we had prior to the battle, would be one of the biggest challenges of this life of mine.