"Cough... cough cough cough... Impossible."
In the distant basement where Merlin and Priest Andrew crouched, the flames engulfing Camelot City, though hundreds of miles away, were visible in their entirety.
Priest Andrew refused to believe the city's populace trusted Guinevere so deeply. He couldn't fathom that Tristan would abandon his knightly code and personally slaughter civilians for her sake.
Nor could he accept that the Camelot Kingdom had managed to raise such a formidable legion of armored infantry.
It was precisely this iron-clad army that prevented the chaos in Camelot City from lasting even until midnight. The heretical citizens, whom he believed deserved to die, hadn't even reached the 30,000 deaths he had envisioned.
"Heh heh heh, ha ha ha ha, Kuhahahaha!~ Merlin, you've won this time, but this is also my victory."
After tonight, no matter how the Wicked Queen explains herself, some of the populace will still refuse to believe her.
Thus, the seeds of doubt about the Wicked Queen will be sown. As nights like this repeat themselves, even those who still trust her will begin to suspect that she is indeed the Wicked Queen.
Furthermore, after tonight's events, Camelot and the Holy Church will become mortal enemies. Even the moderate fools within the Church will finally understand that Heretics must be exterminated without mercy!
Ha ha ha ha...
Priest Andrew continued to laugh, knowing he had already tested his limits. He was no match for Merlin and had no chance of escaping his grasp.
When Merlin declared he would hand him over to Guinevere, Priest Andrew realized his slanderous plot had utterly failed. His only remaining option was to use tonight's actions and his own death to irrevocably escalate the conflict between Camelot and the Holy Church.
Was he resentful? Of course. But having been defeated by Merlin, he still felt a sense of honor in his defeat.
After all, he had at least forced the Church's hand. Stronger forces would rise to carry out the mission he had failed to complete.
"So, do you truly believe the Holy Church is stronger than Camelot? Since you know me, you must have heard of my prophecy regarding the King of Knights, haven't you?"
The Church crusades against heretics, and Merlin, a half-incubus hybrid and top-tier Grand Mage, naturally appears on their list of heretics.
By prophesying about Merlin, the Church would have inevitably uncovered the truth about him.
Priest Andrew knew two prophecies. The first concerned the Sword in the Stone, and the King of Knights who fulfilled this prophecy was indeed on the verge of uniting all of Great Britain under his rule.
Under Andrew's guidance, the Knights of the Kings who attacked the King of Knights' army suffered disastrous casualties.
Beyond the Sword in the Stone prophecy, Andrew was also aware of another prophecy concerning the King of Knights himself:
The red dragon represents Britain,
The White Dragon represents the Saxons.
Under the leadership of a great King, Britain will gather its strength
And overthrow Gaul and Rome.
Recalling this, the faceless Priest Andrew momentarily revealed his aged features for the first time. He was indeed an old man, already half-buried in his coffin.
Even if this campaign in Great Britain succeeded, his secular Church status would require him to retire upon returning to the Holy See in Rome. His title within the Holy Church, would then pass to the next generation.
"Merlin, are you suggesting that the King of Knights mobilized his forces and chose to strike against Gaul and Rome because of my actions tonight? Hmph, absurd!"
"Oh, absurd, is it? But you know I only ever play the role assigned to me within the Prophecy, don't you?"
This was mere mockery. Merlin had long ceased peering into the future; he simply found Priest Andrew's boisterous laughter irritating.
He knew all too well that his nascent human emotions were growing stronger, as if his half-human bloodline were finally asserting itself.
And indeed, these few words alone had plunged Priest Andrew into a daze, igniting fierce resentment at the realization that everything he had done was part of someone else's 'scheme.'
He wanted to retaliate, but all his Holy Relics had been stripped away, and his Mana was sealed within him, leaving him as helpless as a novice just entering the world of the arcane!
Suicide? Even that was beyond him.
Meanwhile, back in Camelot City, order was being restored through the combined efforts of Guinevere, Morgan, Lancelot... and countless Knights, Academy students, and even ordinary citizens who took up arms in self-defense.
By the early hours of the morning, only occasional incidents of wounded survivors turning into zombies occurred within and around Camelot City, and these were swiftly dealt with by vigilant soldiers.
The cries and wails never ceased.
"Lady Morgan, can't we save those who haven't transformed yet?"
"Quiet! I'm already working on it. Even diluted, the Ancestor Blood Poison remains potent. Once activated, it becomes exceptionally stubborn."
After temporarily stabilizing the situation, Morgan and the mages retreated to the Royal Palace to concentrate their efforts on researching the Blood Poison, desperately trying to develop a life-saving antidote in the shortest possible time.
But as Morgan had warned, the Ancestor Blood Poison was no easy foe to vanquish.
Silence. Stepping out of the laboratory where over thirty mages were working tirelessly, Guinevere leaped to the highest tower of the Royal Palace and gazed out at the refugee camps sprawling beyond Camelot City's walls.
Lancelot, along with the academy students and knights, were working themselves ragged.
They trust me, yet I can't even save the wounded among them? Guinevere murmured, her voice tight with anguish. She vowed to never forget the Holy Church, to never forget the number of lives lost today, and swore in her heart that they would pay for their blood debt in full.
Soon after, the Knights who had ventured out to capture the Living Corpse victims and survivors returned. Leaving aside the Living Corpses, they had actually managed to find two survivors.
All of them were nobles, possessing Mana within their bodies. After their first sip of river water tainted with the Ancestor Blood Poison, they had suffered severe stomach cramps. They had partaken in the Holy Communion that afternoon and returned to their duties, but even when the moon hung high in the sky, they showed no abnormal reactions.
Now, they were immediately laid down on Morgan and the Mages' experimental tables.
After a brief period, Morgan and the Mages' preliminary research results revealed that the Blood Poison reacted with the Mana within the human body, causing varying degrees of abdominal distress in those who ingested it. The Holy Communion itself was harmless.
However, this preliminary understanding was still a thousand miles away from developing a Reversal Potion.
"Wait, so you're saying..."
Instead of leaping from the highest tower, Guinevere learned of these research findings through the Barthomeloi Family Head's Familiar.
In that instant, Guinevere's mind felt as if struck by a hammer. She leaped from the tower with lightning speed and rushed toward the nearest triage area for the wounded.
Moments later, she located a conspicuously injured patient—one the soldiers had already marked for observation—and began channeling Mana into him.
Having practiced channeling Mana into gemstones, Guinevere quickly grasped the technique of infusing Mana into the human body.
As for why these visibly wounded civilians were still alive, and why treatment was delayed until after their transformation—that, of course, was Guinevere's order.
Why had Guinevere issued such an order? It wasn't solely due to Arthas's case; it stemmed from the people's trust in her and her shame at having considered using the Holy Sword to clear the area.
She wanted to give her trusting subjects as many chances as possible, hoping they would survive until Morgan developed an antidote.
They hadn't survived until Morgan found a cure, but they had endured long enough for Guinevere to devise a practical solution.
As she infused her Mana, the wound's decay halted, and the injured man's stomach began to rumble violently.
With this success, Guinevere immediately ordered Morgan and all the Mages to halt their research and prioritize treating the wounded.
She also commanded the Knights to transport the injured to the Royal Palace and house those who had already received treatment in the nearest noble districts.
They worked tirelessly through the night, saving every life they could. By dawn, the lightly wounded who hadn't been treated in time were emitting wisps of black smoke from their wounds under the morning sun.
Meanwhile, with the exception of those Guinevere had ordered to be kept alive for observation, any remaining Living Corpses and Ghouls that had slipped through the cracks were reduced to ashes by the sunlight.