Chapter 68: Chapter 68: Oswin Village

The carriage that contains Marquis Bann is quite far from the village entrance because between there are about 700 soldiers. 

Buggy gives cue to the captain with eyes. The captain than orders 2 front leaders,

"You two, summon the villagers, to open the gate."

The two men ride their house to the large wooden door, unmount from their horses and knock the door many times.

The sound of hooves came from this side of the wall, and then a loud voice.

“This one is the envoy of the one of the Great Nobles of Ferelden Kingdom, Bann of  Amaranthine! Open the gate and let us in!”

After a while,  high pitched voice that sounds like young female responds,

"Why a lord from other place come here?" 

The two men look at each other and then look to many soldiers at their back because they doubt this young sounding girl.

"Hey, girl. Please call village chief here." The man impatiently orders.

"Hmm. I am the village chief." The girl answers

"Yes. She is our chief!"

"She is the village chief!"

Afterwards, dozens of different voices from older people are heard. 

"So, we can't open the door to outsider. We are only loyal to the Duke of Arkland." The girl yells.

"Our order comes from His Majesty King Cailan Theirin! He is even higher than Duke. Open the door!" The leaders' voices become hasher.

Then, there are a lot of panic voices are heard from the other side of the wall. The leaders smile as they believe it won't be long before they become intimidated an open the door.

“Why, why do you need to send so many troops to a frontier village like this?”

“Villagers like you don’t need to know about that! This land belongs to the King, and obeying the Prince is the proper thing to do! Or could it be that you’re defying the King ― rising up in revolt?”

As there is no response, The leaders bark,

“I repeat. Open the gate!”

Then, the girl becomes panic.

“My, my apologies! Right now, right now we’re preparing to welcome his Majesty's representative, Lord Marquis! Please, hold on a bit!”

The leader is becoming angry,

“Repeat yourself, woman! Are you in charge of this village? This delay is unacceptable! Do not waste even a single second in opening the gate!”

Then, chit-chat among the villagers are heard from the other side of the wall before the girl retorts

“…Why are you so desperate to get in?!”

The rude visitors fall silent for once, and both sides hesitate uneasily.

“Why aren’t you answering! You’re impostors pretending to be Ferelden troops, aren’t you!”

After that panicked shout, she finally gets an answer.

The leaders outside look again at each other, trying to figure out way to persuade her.

“…the feudal lord, David Lassic is the benefactor this village once, does he not?”

The girl replies with a sharp question,

"Yes. My lord the Duke is our owner. What about him?"

“That barbaric man is now an enemy of the whole Ferelden. As such, we wish to ask you, who are related to him to change allegiance to us. Start by making this village our base.”

This time the conversation becomes a lot louder and clearer to the men outside the wall.

“Should we really open the gate?”

“…But, there’s a lot of them. If we don’t open the gate…”

“If we betray him like this after receiving his kindness…”

“Wait! They said they just want to ask us something. It doesn’t mean we’re betraying him…”

“You think so? It just sounds ungrateful to me.”

“Do you understand? If you do, then open the gates right now! If not, you will be treated as traitors to the Kingdom!”

The girl shouts back something, seems like to try and buy time.

“There-there is cow dung everywhere! W-we can’t let the Marquis walk into a place like this!”

After a brief silence, a calmer voice pierces the air.

“Oh, um. Understood. Then how about this. We will enter instead of the Marquis . We’ll think about what happens later.”

They are not giving any room for excuses.

But, she still desperately tried to buy time.

“S-sorry! The dung’s on my hands! I can’t rub it off! Let me wash my hands and I’ll be back!”

"Heiii! Don't mess with us!" They bellow angrily.

As they know the villagers look shaky in their resolution, they threaten,

“―Citizens of Oswin Village. Because you did not immediately open the gate when ordered, the fact of whether you are loyal subjects of the Ferelden has been called into question. As such, we will take representatives from among you onto the battlefield, where you will convince David Lassic to surrender. You must prove that your loyalty remains with the Ferelden, and that you are loyal subjects!”

“There’s no way I’ll let myself be dragged onto the battlefield to get in Duke’s way!”

“Can’t we just hide in the forest and see how things go before making a decision?”

Loud arguments like these echoes from all around.

However, the one thing they have in common is that nobody wants to do anything which might inconvenience their hero.

Bann’s frustration has reached its limit . He glares at the reporting lord, Viscount Tesh who is on his horse peeking into the carriage's window, with a look usually reserved for an enemy and not an ally.

“Say it one more time, what foolery is this?!”

Bann’s anger overflows with every word he speaks from between the gaps of his grinding teeth, and Viscount Tesh outside his carriage repeats himself.

“My Lord! Oswin Village still has not opened their gates.”

As he listens to the lower noble lord’s calm reply, Bann is filled with the sudden desire to punch him.

However, that would have been foolish. Bann struggles to control the anger welling up in his fist.

This knights serving Viscount Tesh, Captain, Baron Buggy included, nobody here is actually sworn to Bann. In the first place, Bann commanded only a handful of troops. Every man here is under orders from their liege lord, or in the company of their lord. Because of that, he could not strike this anyone while his comrades are watching.

“―Why is that? Why are those peasants in Oswin Village not opening the gate? The land is directly ruled by the royal family! They have a duty to obey me! I order them to open the gate right now!”

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As his frustration built, so did his agitation, and Bann no longer picks his words carefully.

“I don’t get it! Do they take me for a fool? What the hell are they thinking?!”

The villagers are beings far inferior to the even lower noble lords.

These beings are now insulting him.

As that thought came to mind, his aggravation over the past few months ─ all the niggling little things that had frustrated Bann ever since the being ordered around by Marquis Raeven ─ seems to have found an outlet, and it explodes forth.

The dam burst in an instant.

“Traitors! Traitors, all of them! I declare that everyone in Oswin Village is a traitor!”

The shout sparks a surprised commotion from the men who had heard it.

“A moment please! If you do that─” Viscount Tesh and another noble lord try to talk him out from the window.

The furious Bann glares at the panicked men who has replied.

If they designate the village as traitors, they would need to exterminate each and every last one of them, then burn the village down until no trace of its existence remain.

But so what?

Marquis Bann has given his orders, and he could not understand why his subordinates are not following them. Could it be that these men of the lower noble lords are looking down on him and thus refuse to obey his orders?

“So what if I do?! Allowing them to live after disobeying a Noble's command is a sin!”

The royals and Nobles would be looked down upon if they spare commoners who rebel against them. Not killing them would eventually result in a loss of their authority.

Even on the nobles’ own territory, once any of their serfs rose up in revolt, they would undoubtedly be destroyed. These knights of the noble lords should have known that much.

“Please wait, my Lord! The war with the federation is coming soon. If we kill citizens of the King’s demesne, it will negatively affect the morale of the entire army! I also pray you will look at the fortifications ranged against us. There is no way this is an ordinary village. Although the villagers are not numerous, trying to break down the gate with brute force will be difficult in the extreme. If that is the case, we should handle the situation peacefully and ask them their reasons for not opening the gate after things settle down here.”

“…Ask them nicely, then. But I want a few of them to swing for this.”

“…It can’t be helped. After all, they did keep the gate shut in defiance of your orders, Lord Bann.”

“I’ll see them hang from the gates! They shall be made into examples for the others!”

“It is as you say.”

Marquis Bann gazes at Oswin Village.

As the other noble lord said, the sturdy gate was set into thick curtain walls. Given that the village is right next to the large forest, this might even have been intentional. However, from the way the watchtowers are placed, it resembles a fortress more than a frontier village.

Bringing it down would take a long time.

Over eight hundreds of soldiers are lined up in front of the gate, shouting at them to open up.

If one listens carefully, one could hear the same sounds in the distance, from the rear gate.

These shouts are like sparks from a flint, which relit the dark, sticky flames in Bann’s heart. He is no longer acting rationally.

“Oi! Fire the flame arrows!”

“F-flame arrows?!”

“That’s right. Who knows how long this is going to take if this keeps up. You listen and you listen well, we don’t have time to waste on this village any further! It would be one thing if you could open that gate in a few minutes that would be fine, but you can’t, can you?!”

Viscount Tesh bites his lip and nods.

“Threaten them with flame arrows. The time for playing childish games like standing outside the wall and shouting is over. Now we show them how adults do things!!”

As the the assembled noble lords stare, open-mouthed and dumbfounded, a man stormed up from his side.

“To think you would disobey Marquis Bann… I can’t believe you’re one of the noble in his faction. My lord, will you permit my men to carry out that attack?”

It is Baron Buggy. Behind him were several of his fellow brown-nosers.

Bann is glad that such foolish men could be useful at times like these. No, he is a noble as well, and if a village in his fief has dared rise up in revolt, he would probably have done the same thing as well. He might even understand Bann’s position.

“…Really now. Then I order you to make it so, Baron. Fire flame arrows at the village… no, this way is better. Target the watchtower. That ought to avoid casualties, right?”

“Ohh! Such a merciful decision! As expected of Marquis Bann! Then, you have but to watch us!”

The leaders give the archers hand signal to launch attack. Fire is ignited on the arrows.

"Shoot!'"

Dozens of arrows fall like rain onto the watchtower. The crisp sound of arrows piercing into wood filled everyone’s ears.

The watchtower begins to burn..

The thatched roof caught alight in an instant and turns into a fire which got fiercer by the second, and the roof collapses..

Everyone in the village could see the destruction of the tower, no matter where they are. Wails of sorrow rise from the other side of the wall. 

The leaders grins as they believe the villagers' heart would be weaker, forcing to open the door.

But soon the sound of wailings disappear.

The invaders keep raining burning arrows over the other side of the walls. 

Weirdly, there is no scream or steps inside. It continues for quite some time. 

One side of the gate opens slowly.

“As I thought, we should have used the flame arrows from the beginning. Well, the follow-up flame arrows were wasted…”

Bann’s face twists in displeasure. They have wasted too much time. In order to make up for the delay, the men would need to be force-marched. But that is unavoidable.

This is all the fault of the lower noble lords’ men. If he has not given the order to use flame arrows himself, who knows how much more time would have been wasted?

Bann looks to the sky, cursing his misfortune for being saddled with incompetent underlings.

He considers the time that would be needed later ― the first thing being how long it would take to hang the villagers.

He would hang them on the village’s walls, to show everyone the final fate of anyone foolish enough to defy one of the great nobles.

Next, he has to find anyone who has close ties with David Lassic. That might take longer than stringing the villagers up.

“Damn. I should have brought an interrogator along. We’ll offer to spare the lives of anyone who cooperates… the problem is the children…”

There is no point in letting them live. To begin with, children could not live without their parents, so hanging children with their parents is a form of mercy.

“Is there enough rope for all of them? If we could get some from the village, that would be good…”

The soldiers slowly advance to the gate. Pride filled Bann’s chest as he sees the royal flag advancing at the head of the column. 

The soldier holding the flag enters the gate ― and is then flung back out.

The royal flag which he is holding flutters to the ground.

Shortly after, a group of strong looking warriors  that has sent them flying loom in the opening of the gate.

"That are official soldiers of Arkland.!" One of the front leader mutters with his eyes go wide.

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