>>5268654>>5268713>>5268728>>5268729Even if most of their corpses are desecrated, and you don't remember a lot of the servant's names, it is a good measure to make a gravestone for them. The new hedges you made could protect them from being defiled in the future, even if someone comes to invade the place.
Borrowing Barnham's men, you ask them to dig some graves in the furthest hedges, opening them up every now and then to consecrate them, as well as the estate with wards. No creature of the God Hand will feel safe living under this household.
"If you wanted me to leave, all you had to do was say so..." Barnham shrugs, deciding to watch from afar.
"LEAVE!" Gunpowder shouted from the top of his head.
"Wait, Barnham. There's something I wish to ask you. Since you sacrificed your brother to become an apostle... How do you feel about him nowadays?" Since the mood is at it's lowest, you inquire about something familiar to him, attempting to graps a better understanding of the Behelit ritual.
"...The way I rationalise his death is that even if I wasn't forced to sacrifice him, one of us would end up killing each other. Power still controls everything on this realm, and if I hesitated to sacrifice him, he would surely do the same to me instead."
"Can you really affirm that? Wasn't your brotherhood a sacred vow to both of you, despite being conjoined?"
"...For the Behelit to work, you must give away the one you cherished the most, correct?" Barnham admits about loving his brother, albeit indirectly. "Though the thought of it has already gone past me. I don't feel anything when it comes to the dead. They're not fighting, they're not struggling, they just became a part of the scenery."
You ponder on how he can feel that way, and how that relates to Griffith. If Casca and Guts survived the eclipse despite being part of the sacrifice, were the ones that he cherished not the both of them, but the entirety of his group?
"Whatever... Hopefully with this, the nightmares will finally disappear." You observe the soldiers digging their way through the garden and removing the Kraken statue to make space for the graves, with you writing a list of the ones you remembered.
While you were doing that in a more private area, you've felt a weird tingle in your nape, implying the nearby presence of a powerful entity. And sure enough, you were greeted by the presence of someone you would never think to find in a million years.
