chapter 14.1

The sky above them was cloaked in heavy gray clouds, moving sluggishly as if mirroring the silence hanging between them. A gentle breeze swept through, carrying the scent of damp earth from the rain that had fallen the night before. Their horses moved at a slow, steady pace, the rhythmic sound of hooves blending with the rustling leaves swaying in the wind.

Since leaving their last resting place, Arwen had been lost in thought. Occasionally, she cast a glance toward Alcard, who rode ahead, his expression unreadable as always. Finally, she broke the silence, her voice soft yet tinged with curiosity.

"Alcard," she called, her voice barely louder than the wind. "I've been wondering... what happens when an Outcast fails their mission?"

Alcard didn't respond immediately. His gaze remained fixed ahead, as if weighing his answer carefully. After a brief pause, he finally spoke, his tone even and unshaken.

"If it's a mission against monsters or anything in the South, failure usually means death."

Arwen frowned, her expression shifting from curiosity to unease. "Death? You mean they're killed by the monsters?"

"Yes," Alcard answered simply. "Any mission involving a direct confrontation with the creatures from the South carries immense risk. If an Outcast fails, it only means they weren't strong enough to survive. Weakness has no second chances in our world."

Arwen remained quiet for a moment, letting his words sink in. She had always imagined the lives of the Outcasts to be dangerous, but hearing it from Alcard himself—the raw finality of it—made it far more real.

"What about other missions?" she pressed, wanting to understand more. "Ones that don't involve fighting monsters, like capturing bandits or political tasks?"

Alcard gave a slight nod, acknowledging the relevance of her question. "Those have different consequences. If an Outcast fails such a mission, they won't be executed immediately. But they're punished in other ways. Most commonly, they're denied Bloody Potion for a certain period. In more severe cases, they're imprisoned."

Arwen's brow furrowed. "Being denied Bloody Potion… isn't that dangerous?"

Alcard's gaze remained on the road ahead, but there was a subtle shift in his expression—a flicker of something buried deep within. A memory, perhaps. "It's worse than you can imagine," he replied, his voice quieter but laden with meaning. "Once someone relies on Bloody Potion, their body can no longer function normally without it. If it's suddenly withheld, they suffer excruciating pain. Their bodies weaken, they convulse, and in some cases... they lose their sanity."

A shiver ran down Arwen's spine. "That's... horrible," she whispered. "And yet, you all endure it?"

Alcard nodded. "We have no other choice."

She swallowed, but another thought plagued her mind. "If someone loses their mind from being deprived of the potion, why not just let them die?"

For the first time in their conversation, Alcard let out a small smile—one that wasn't amused, but tinged with something melancholic, almost resigned. "Because even though the world has cast us aside, we do not abandon our own," he said, his tone softer than usual. "We may no longer be part of Middle Earth, but among ourselves, we are still family. Even those who fail remain one of us."

Arwen fell silent. She hadn't expected to hear the word family from an Outcast, not after everything she had learned about their brutal existence. Yet, beneath the hardship and the relentless struggle, there was something unexpectedly profound about their bond. The Outcasts suffered, but they weren't alone.

"But how do they endure?" she finally asked. "Living like that... it must be unbearable."

Alcard inhaled deeply, letting the quiet stretch between them before he answered. "We endure because we have to," he said simply, though there was weight in his words. "Becoming an Outcast isn't a choice—it's a sentence. But rather than let that sentence destroy us, we choose to survive together. Because in the end, no one else will care for us but ourselves."

Arwen stared at him, absorbing every word. The Outcasts lived through hell, yet they possessed something the noble class never truly understood—loyalty that couldn't be bought, a brotherhood forged not by gain, but by necessity.

Their journey continued in silence, the gray clouds above making the day seem darker than it should have been. Their horses' hooves clopped steadily against the uneven road, the only witness to the conversation that had just taken place.

Perhaps their path was still long, and perhaps the answers they sought were yet to be found. But with each passing conversation, they stepped closer to understanding one another—and perhaps, toward uncovering a greater truth about the world they lived in.

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