My Slave Contract System: Gathering Broken Heroines to Survive.

Chapter 72: Broken sheild.

The Holy Capital of Sanctum was a blinding monument to the gods.

Built from white marble and gilded with gold leaf, the city walls shimmered under the midday sun. It was a place of purity. A place where dirt and darkness were legislated out of existence.

The guards at the Golden Gate stood like statues. Their armor was polished to a mirror sheen, their halberds resting perfectly vertical. They were the image of order.

Then, a horse stumbled out of the treeline.

It was a nightmare of a beast. Its flanks were heaving, covered in white foam and dried mud. Its eyes were wild, rolling in its skull.

On its back sat a man who looked like he had crawled out of a grave.

His plate armor was rent open as if giant claws had peeled the steel like an orange. Dried blood caked half his face. His left arm hung limp, swaying sickeningly with the rhythm of the dying horse.

The horse took three more steps onto the pristine white cobblestones of the entry bridge.

Then, its heart gave out.

The animal collapsed with a heavy thud, throwing the rider onto the ground.

The rider didn’t rise. He just groaned, a sound of wet, bubbling agony.

The guards broke their formation.

"Halt! Identity!" one shouted, leveling his spear, though his voice wavered at the sight of the carnage.

The fallen man lifted his head. His good eye—the right one—focused on the guard with intense, desperate clarity.

"Open... the gate," the man rasped.

The guard stepped closer, squinting. Then, his eyes went wide. He recognized the crest on the shattered pauldron. A golden sun with a sword through it.

The mark of the Hero Party.

"By the Light..." the guard whispered. "It’s Sir Lucas. The Tank."

He turned to the wall, screaming at the top of his lungs.

"Open the gates! Get the healers! It’s the Hero Party! Someone help him!"

Lucas let his head drop back onto the stones.

As the darkness of unconsciousness swarmed him, a single thought, implanted and absolute, echoed in his mind.

Make them believe.

Lucas woke up to the smell of lavender and sterilized magic.

He was lying in a bed that was softer than anything he had slept in for months. The ceiling above him was painted with a fresco of angels battling demons.

He tried to sit up. Pain shot through his chest, sharp and immediate.

"Easy, Sir Lucas."

A hand gently pushed him back down.

Lucas blinked, clearing his vision.

Standing over him was a woman in the white robes of a High Healer. Her hands glowed with soft green light as she knit the last of his ribs back together.

But she wasn’t the one who caught his attention.

Standing behind her, looking out the window with his hands clasped behind his back, was a man in crimson robes.

Cardinal Vane. The Eye of the Church.

The man turned. He had a face like a hawk—sharp nose, predatory eyes, and thin lips that rarely smiled.

"Leave us," Vane said. His voice was smooth, like velvet wrapped around a dagger.

The healer bowed deeply and hurried out of the room, closing the heavy oak door with a soft click.

Silence stretched between the two men.

Lucas felt a spike of fear. Not the fear of a spy, but the fear of a loyal soldier who had failed.

"Cardinal," Lucas croaked. He tried to salute from the bed, but Vane waved a hand dismissively.

"Save your strength, Paladin. You have been asleep for three days. Your injuries were... extensive."

Vane walked to the side of the bed. He looked down at Lucas with an expression that was hard to read. It wasn’t concern. It was calculation.

"Where are they, Lucas?"

The question hung in the air.

Lucas felt the trigger in his mind. The [Slave Contract] didn’t force him to speak like a puppet. It simply unlocked the memories Ash and Echidna had constructed.

Tears welled up in Lucas’s eyes. Real tears.

"Gone," Lucas whispered. "They are all gone."

Vane’s eyes narrowed. "Isaac? The Hero?"

"Dead."

"Mina? The Saintess?"

"Devoured."

"Elias? The Mage?"

"Crushed."

Vane stared at him for a long moment. Then, he reached into his robe and pulled out a crystal sphere. It pulsed with a pure, white light.

A Truth Orb.

"I believe you are in pain, Lucas," Vane said softly. "But the Church cannot operate on hearsay. The loss of a Hero is a catastrophe. We must be certain."

He placed the orb on Lucas’s chest.

"Tell me what happened. From the beginning."

Lucas closed his eyes. The false memory played like a movie reel in his head.

"We... we were tracking the anomaly," Lucas began, his voice trembling. "We found a town. Galdor. It was quiet. Too quiet."

The orb glowed steadily. No flicker of deception.

"Then the ground shook. A Dungeon Break. But not a normal one. The gate opened right in the town square. They poured out... hundreds of them. Rank-A beasts. Obsidian Gargoyles. Shadow Stalkers."

Lucas gripped the bedsheets, his knuckles turning white.

"Isaac... he was magnificent. He slew a dozen in the first minute. But there were too many. They swarmed Elias first. He didn’t even have time to cast a barrier. I tried to reach him... I tried to taunt them off..."

Lucas sobbed, a harsh, racking sound.

"I failed. I am the shield, and I failed to protect them. I saw Isaac fall. A Gargoyle King... it tore his head off. I saw it, Cardinal. I saw the light leave his eyes."

The Truth Orb pulsed. Pure white.

To the orb, and to Lucas, this was the absolute truth.

Vane watched the orb intensely. He was looking for the slightest fluctuation. A hint of hesitation. A shadow of a lie.

There was nothing.

"And you?" Vane asked. "How did you survive when the Hero fell?"

This was the dangerous part. The part where Ash’s script had to be perfect.

"I... I was buried," Lucas said. "I took a hit meant for Mina. It knocked me into a cellar of a collapsed house. The rubble fell on top of me. I passed out."

Lucas opened his eyes, looking directly at Vane.

"When I woke up... it was night. The beasts had moved on. The town was dead. I dug myself out. I found... pieces of them. I gathered what I could. But I had to run. I had to warn you."

Vane stared at him. The orb remained steady.

Slowly, the Cardinal removed the orb from Lucas’s chest. The white light faded.

Vane sighed. For the first time, he looked tired.

"A Dungeon Break," Vane muttered to himself. "A tragic, unavoidable natural disaster."

He began to pace the room.

"This is... inconvenient. But manageable. If Isaac had been killed by a Demon Lord, or worse, a rogue human, it would show weakness. It would cause panic."

Vane stopped and looked at Lucas.

"But a horde of monsters? An ambush? That makes Isaac a martyr. He died protecting the realm."

Lucas watched him. He felt a strange dissonance. The Cardinal wasn’t mourning the death of a person. He was assessing the value of a dead asset.

"What happens now?" Lucas asked.

Vane smoothed his robes.

"We prepare a state funeral. Empty caskets, of course. We will declare a week of mourning. And then... we will summon a new Hero."

Vane looked at Lucas with a new interest.

"You are the sole survivor, Lucas. The man who walked out of hell to bring us the news. You are a symbol now."

"I don’t want to be a symbol," Lucas said bitterly. "I want to go back. I want to kill every beast in that forest."

"And you shall," Vane promised. "But not yet. First, you must heal. Then, you must be debriefed by the Holy Council. They will want to know the location of this Dungeon Break."

"It’s in the Western Wilds," Lucas said immediately. "Near the border of the Beast Lands."

This was the second part of Ash’s plan. Misdirection.

Bastion was in the South. Ash was sending the Church’s armies in the complete opposite direction.

"The Western Wilds," Vane mused. "Troublesome terrain. But we will burn it to the ground."

Vane walked to the door. He paused with his hand on the handle.

"Lucas."

"Yes, Eminence?"

"Did Isaac say anything? Before the end?"

Lucas hesitated. He searched the false memories.

"He said... ’Tell the Church I did my duty.’"

Vane smiled. It was a cold, satisfied smile.

"Perfect. That will look excellent on the memorial stone."

Vane left the room.

As soon as the door clicked shut, Lucas slumped back against the pillows. His heart was hammering against his ribs.

He had done it.

He waited for a moment, making sure he was truly alone.

Then, he focused his mind. He reached out to the dark, violet tether that existed in the deepest corner of his soul.

Master, he thought. They believed it.

[Bastion - The Throne Room]

Ash was sitting on his throne—a reconstructed high-back chair made of black stone and cushioned with velvet.

He was reading a report on grain production when the notification popped up.

[Slave Contract Alert]

[Subject: Lucas]

[Message Received: "They believed it."]

Ash smirked. He dismissed the window with a wave of his hand.

"Good boy."

Standing next to the throne, Raphael looked up from polishing her scythe.

"The spy was successful?"

"Better than successful," Ash said. "He’s a national hero now. The ’Sole Survivor.’ The Church is going to pin a medal on the chest of the man who is going to destroy them."

Ash stood up. He walked to the window overlooking the city.

Below, the sounds of training were louder than ever.

In the main square, fifty men were moving in unison. They were shirtless, revealing bodies covered in black, vein-like tattoos—the mark of the [Sin-Soldier] class.

They were lifting massive stone blocks, running sprints with iron chains, and sparring with a ferocity that was bordering on inhuman.

Satanachia was walking among them, screaming insults and swinging a wooden training sword that hit like a steel mace.

"Faster, you maggots! You call that a punch? My grandmother hits harder, and she’s a cloud of gas!"

Whack.

A soldier took a blow to the chest that would have shattered a normal man’s ribs. He merely grunted, skidded back two feet, and charged back in, his eyes glowing with faint red light.

"The first batch is operational," Ash noted. "Level 15 average. High pain tolerance. Absolute obedience."

"They are ugly," Raphael commented. "But effective."

"Valac is already working on the second batch," Ash said. "We’re refining the process. Lower mortality rate. Higher stats."

He turned back to the room.

"The Church is going to look West. They will send their armies into the swamps and forests of the Western Wilds chasing ghosts. That buys us time."

"Time for what?" Raphael asked.

"Time to expand," Ash said.

He walked over to the large map of the continent spread out on the table.

He placed a black chess piece on Bastion.

Then, he looked at the neighboring territories.

To the East lay the Iron-Blood Dukedom. A territory known for its mines and its brutal, independent mercenaries.

To the South lay the Endless Sea, a source of trade but also pirates.

"We have an army," Ash said. "But an army needs to eat. It needs to fight. It needs to level up."

He pushed the chess piece toward the East.

"The Iron-Blood Duke has been harassing our supply lines for years, thinking Bastion is just a weak slave outpost."

Ash’s eyes glowed with violet mana.

"It’s time we introduced ourselves."

[New Quest Generated]

[Conquest: The Iron-Blood Dukedom]

[Objective: Seize the Copper Mines of Oakhaven.]

[Enemy Strength: 500 Mercenaries (Level 10-20).]

[Reward: Territory Expansion, Experience, Resource Monopoly.]

Ash smiled.

"Prepare the legion, Raphael. Tonight, we march."

Raphael bowed, a cruel smile matching her master’s.

"It will be a pleasure to harvest, My King."

Author’s Note:

The deception is complete! The Church has swallowed the bait hook, line, and sinker. Lucas is safe (for now), and the Church’s gaze is turned away from Bastion.

This gives Ash the perfect opening to start his expansion. The training montage is over. It’s time to see what these Sin-Soldiers can actually do in a real fight.

Next arc: War with the Iron-Blood Duke.

Things are about to get messy. Thanks for reading!