FL - Chapter 99: Order

Women and children fled screaming as the bandits attacked. Elderly refugees were knocked from the food line, and panic swept the camp.

At that critical moment, a warhorse exploded out from behind the command tent.

The rider wore a crimson cape. He drove his boots into the horse's flanks and charged through the crowd, crimson Battle Aura pouring from his shoulder to the tip of his sword.

"Anyone who dares steal grain—death without mercy!" His voice rolled like thunder through the chaos, stunning every soul present.

Two more riders followed. The three Crimson Tide Knights fanned out—one in front and one on either flank—trapping the bandits in a semicircle at the camp's edge.

"Charge them! There are only three!"

At the shout, the bandits raised their axes and blades and rushed the riders.

Then they learned firsthand what the gap between a knight and an ordinary man truly meant.

The lead knight raised his longsword and swung in a single sweeping arc. Three bandits who had rushed to the front were cleaved in half at the waist. Limbs spun through the air wreathed in flame-tinged Battle Aura. Blood splattered across the mud, thick with the stench of iron.

"What the hell?!" One bandit barely opened his mouth in shock when the second knight spurred forward in a thrusting charge. The warhorse's forehooves rose high. The momentum sent the man flying ten yards backward. Seamlessly, the third knight's sword drove through the chests of two more beside him, then ripped free in a spray of blood.

A longsword whipped sideways. What remained of a body crashed into a fourth man trying to press forward. The knight pivoted and carved another bandit from shoulder to belly in a single stroke. The corpse hit the ground in a ruin.

"Run! Run!!"

Someone had finally grasped the truth. To them, these knights were nothing short of monsters.

Too late.

The three knights spurred their horses forward. Amid the roar of Battle Aura, the hunt began. Every swing came with an explosive crack of power, cleaving flesh and bone as cleanly as splitting firewood.

One bandit tried to scramble over a wall. A sword pinned him to it. Another dropped his weapon and fell to his knees, begging for mercy. No one listened. A warhorse's hooves crushed his spine.

Within minutes, more than twenty of the thirty-odd bandits lay dead. The knights deliberately spared the remaining seven, bound them hand and foot, and dragged them to a clearing outside the camp.

That very evening, a simple wooden platform was erected in the camp square.

Torches blazed, flooding the clearing with light.

Seven bandits knelt tightly bound upon the platform, ash-faced and trembling. Nothing remained of the vicious men who had threatened other refugees at blade point.

More than one hundred people crowded around the square. Most had only just escaped starvation and war. Their faces remained exhausted, but anger held every back straight.

"Everyone else works honestly and you people think you can just steal grain?!"

"We barely caught a glimpse of decent days and they want to wreck it? Execute them!"

"Lord Louis would never tolerate criminals!"

The presiding judge read the sentence aloud. "Under the laws of Crimson Tide, the crimes of grain robbery, assault upon a camp, and deliberate infliction of injury are unforgivable. The sentence is death!"

The crowd answered not with protest, but with relieved approval.

A few of the seven began to wail and beg. Some tried to offer excuses. Some pleaded for mercy.

"Spare me! I—I was just following them to watch! I didn't rob anyone!"

"I have an eighty-year-old mother at home… please, please don't kill me!"

One of the younger bandits thrashed desperately, tears streaming down his face. "I—I swear I'll turn over a new leaf! I'll become a new man!"

A Crimson Tide Knight stepped forward, his expression utterly blank. "Forgiving you is the Dragon Ancestor's business. My job is to send you to meet him."

He drew his sword and advanced, step by step. "Carry out the sentence."

A flash of the blade. A head flew. Blood soaked the yellow earth.

The sword fell seven times. Silence held the square.

When the last head dropped, someone—no one knew who—shouted first.

"Well done!"

"Yes! They deserved to die!"

"Finally. No more worrying about someone stealing our gruel."

Cheers rose one after another. Some even pressed their palms together and bowed their heads toward the crimson banner.

From that day forward, no one in the camp ever dared lay a hand on another's food again.

Louis had issued explicit instructions: when bandits attacked, leave several alive for public trial and execution.

"The war just ended. It's time to set the rules," he had said.

He wanted every last person to see it with their own eyes: on his land, robbery and murder were capital crimes.

Registered refugees who worked honestly now received three meals a day, clean straw mats, woolen blankets, and shelter from the open sky. That modest security was the life they had dreamed of.

Under the direction of craftsmen sent from Crimson Tide Territory, semi-sunken dwellings rose one after another from the earth.

Ian was among the first group of carpenters assigned to the construction. The work was exhausting, but his heart was at ease. The foreman distributed meals on time. In the evenings, he could sit by the fire and listen to someone strum a lute and sing.

Mia continued to recover. Color returned to her cheeks, and though still thin, she could walk on her own and even scamper through the camp. She followed Ian everywhere, gathering scraps of wood beside the worksite or poking pebbles with a stick.

The workers, seeing how sweet and well-behaved she was, often teased her into conversation and slipped her little treats.

"This little lass of yours—she works harder than her father," someone joked.

Hearing it, Mia blushed red and ran off.

Ian cracked a grin at the sight. But a wetness rose in his eyes. Watching his daughter's lively little figure, he felt the knot in his chest finally loosen.

Only days before, Ian had woken throughout the night to check whether she still breathed. Now he no longer needed to beg for food or scour the mountains for a scrap of medicine.

The gruel was plain, but there was always enough to fill the stomach, and a bit of pickled vegetable on the side. The shelter was humble, but it kept out the wind and rain—there was charcoal for warmth, a blanket, voices to talk to.

Ian cradled his coarse ceramic bowl and gazed at the rising cooking smoke. In his heart, he whispered the words: *Thank you, Lord Louis.*

Ian was not alone. Across the camp, food, work, shelter, and safety restored the refugees' will to live.

"Follow the rules, and you'll be fed. Be willing to work, and someone will protect you."

The words spread through the camp as a simple creed, validated by everything the refugees had witnessed and received.

Bit by bit, this belief took root in the wreckage left by war, putting out quiet shoots.

Above them, the crimson banner flew in the morning light, its golden sun bright against the shadows of the ruined land.