Athena's enormous divinity purified the entire land at once and cut their works short.
What should have been taking a few hours was finished in a matter of seconds.
After overseeing a few things, everyone retreated to the barracks, to wash away the exhaustion with a nice good sleep.
The next day, as soon as Alex woke up he decided to go to the affected city to take a tour.
There were chances of some undead or creatures of darkness still hiding there.
The main things had been sorted out but the cities that had been destroyed due to the undead rampage had still to be taken care of.
Alex, with his squad accompanied by Morderk, decided to visit.
Athena and Christina wanted to accompany him but Alex asked them to rest properly because they still needed to work.
If the situation was severe, Athena and her team would need to purify the city to make it habitable, which she cannot do for now due to heavy exhaustion from using the grand spell yesterday.
Both of them tried to go on board with Alex which ended in both of them getting locked up under Albert's supervision.
The sight of Athena and Christina pouting was a sight to behold. Alex wished that he had a camera to record the precious moment but alas.
Alex coaxed them a bit and asked them to take care of the three and if possible try to dig out some information.
...
Riding on the horse, Alex asked Morderk about the cities.
"Morderk, what's about the casualties?"
Morderk gave a sympathetic gaze and turned to look at Alex, "Your Majesty, the casualties were quite big this time."
"One of the cities was a major city with a population of over 80,000 while the other two have around 20000 each."
"The ones who could fight, sacrificed their lives to make time for the other to flee and it was due to their persistence that there had been several eyewitnesses and we were able to act in time."
"Act in time? Do you think this is called acting in time?" Alex's voice hardened as he stared at him.
"Aren't there any soldiers stationed here?"
Morderk shook his head.
"We are at the edge of Amidon which had been neglected for years. The growth of this place has come to a standstill and except for the bigger city which had mercenaries, the smaller one doesn't even have many awakened ones."
"It was already good enough for a few people to come out alive," Morderk answered.
Alex fell into deep thoughts after hearing his explanation.
The entire atmosphere became silent. Except for the grooves of the horse hitting the ground, no one made even the slightest sound.
The Knights riding beside Alex stared at him who looked ahead with serious expressions.
As Alex asked Morderk about the place, he came to know that there were no proper training facilities and no proper communication in this place.
The roads weren't linked and one had to travel by going around.
He kept a note of the things he had to do once he met Catherine.
All the work and construction were centralised in the higher towns and cities so the borderlands are still in a mess.
There was an urgent need to extend the range of their work so that incidents like this don't happen in future or at least, there was enough manpower to provide support and relief immediately.
Alex and his squad finally arrived at the edge of the city of Middleton.
"Neighhhhhh!'
" Neigh!!!"
The horses that had been calmly darting forwards suddenly stopped in their tracks and started to emit a bestial scream of fear.
"What happened!"
The Knights tried to calm down their agitated horse but they seemed to be afraid and nervous due to some reason.
Alex's eyes furrowed and he raised his chin and the outer edges of the city reflected in his eyesight.
His breathing stopped for a moment, as he saw the gates of the ruined city covered with moulds and a dark green moss-like substance.
Alex got down from the horse and decided to survey the place on foot.
He left ten knights to take care of the horse and the remaining forty would accompany me.
"Uncle Morderk, you have to guard me properly, I will not fight myself except for serious cases," Alex whispered to Morderk who gave a sceptical look at Alex and nodded his head.
Alex knew that Morderk thought his words as a joke but he wasn't lying. The more he pushed himself, the more he would suffer and the more his recovery would be delayed.
Due to the extra heroism shown by him yesterday, he lost another two vitality points.
The only reason he could walk was that it seemed his body had become numb to soul-wrenching stinging pain.
Alex, who was in deep thought, was startled by the screams.
"My God! What is this?"
"It looked like a rotting prison of hell!"
The knights covered their noses as they came near the city gates.
They froze for a moment as they entered the city and were greeted by a gruesome sight at the gates.
More than, dozens of corpses were lying on the road.
The pool of red blood from their bodies had become a thick puddle and the red liquid seemed to have got a darkish tint due to being left open.
There were scattered pieces of human meat, limbs, and rotting corpses rolling here and there.
The shops at the side were broken with people present with a jaw wide open as they died due to the fire burning them.
Inside the city, the entire place looked dark, bleak and desolate.
More than that, Alex was more worried about the dark green moss that seemed to cover the entire city.
It was odd for a city that had been destroyed four days ago to be covered in moss when it wasn't even any rainy season.
But as he explored more, he came to know that what he thought of as moss was something more sinister than he had imagined.
