next day.

The wagon troop carrying Saint Clare, me, and the Eurem Holy Knights immediately hurriedly accelerated the horse’s pace towards the forgotten village.

Including the existing twenty-two Eurem Paladins, a saintess and an escort knight, and carriage drivers, about twenty-five to thirty people were moving together.

It wasn’t that there were no members of the Holy Knights who could drive a wagon, but there were enough reasons to hire a mercenary to operate as a wagon driver.

Each and every one of them is at least an expert level, but it would be a loss if they were not able to demonstrate their skills on the field because of fatigue after having them drive for nothing.

In particular, as they had to travel for two days, securing sleeping time in the wagon was not an option, but a necessity. During camping time, you’ll have to stay vigil to prepare for wild beasts or thieves.

All wagons were moved by forming a group of 4 members of the Holy Knights.

The carriage that Saint Claire and I rode was no exception.

A young man presumed to be a new sword expert, and a female paladin who seemed to have a little more time than that, were the rest of the wagon that Saint Claire and I were riding.

“I am Jordi Gelin, a member of the Eurem Holy Knights.”

“Likewise, I am Monua Lel of the Eurem Paladins.”

After saying that, Jordi and Monua introduced themselves as first-year and third-year sword experts, respectively.

As for when he joined, he added an explanation that Jordi was the youngest and Monua was the youngest of the female paladins.

It was an understandable decision to make the youngest members of the Eurem Holy Knights me and Saint Clare’s comrades-in-arms.

It must have been that he was concerned that a needless conflict would only arise if he tried to get a paladin with a half-year gap to act with Saint Clare.

Even if you put aside St. Claire, the representative figure of the Orthodox Church, there might still be people who feel a little displeased with me.

I won one victory in a simulated match against General Douglas, so I proved my skills to be fair, but of course, that alone was not enough to make me fully acknowledge myself.

Being an expert was usually a level that was evaluated as fast just by barely winning it right before graduating from the academy.

Excluding the extra years I experienced in my previous life, judging by my age in my second life, I would have been nothing more than a rookie who hadn’t even graduated from the academy yet.

Of course, it wasn’t enough to make me look back at only one or two couplets.

At least, he probably thought that the story would go well with a young paladin who was the same age as me and still had the passion to grow.

I was not at least uncomfortable this way, so I expressed my gratitude to Captain Douglas from the bottom of my heart.

“This is Saint Clare’s escort knight, Conrad Perdalos. We wish you well on this journey.”

After shaking hands with Monua and Jordi, the three of us, excluding Saint Clare, decided on an appropriate order of vigil.

At first, Jordi and Monua talked about standing on their own, saying they didn’t care, but considering that they would have to act together in a forgotten village two days later, that was obviously a bad plan.

If I was alone while everyone else was on vigil, my sincerity would probably be questioned.

Saint Claire might think that she had no choice because she had a position, but at least it made sense for me to stay vigil with them.

After completing the first day’s movement while having appropriate conversations during the day, the day ended with camping on the flat ground following the instructions of Captain Douglas.

The order of the vigil had already been decided in the carriage.

Of course, Monua, who shares the same tent as St. Claire, would be the first order of the vigil.

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Jordi was next, and I took the final order.

I went into the tent and asked for a short break, and after a few hours, I woke up a little quickly to the sound of someone waking me up.

“Lord Conrad, it’s shift time.”

“… Good job, Sir Jordi.”

From the darkest hour just before the dawn sun rises until the sun rises.

It was a short vigil lasting about two hours at most, but in many ways it was enough time to organize my thoughts alone.

Until it was decided that the Dark Church’s minions were mixed in the Eurem Paladins.

⁎ ⁎ ⁎

It wasn’t until the first day when he exchanged swords with Captain Douglas that he began to suspect that there was a traitor within the Eurem Holy Knights.

It was not that I was particularly suspicious of Douglas, but it was the result of an objective judgment in a different sense.

Douglas, who shared the sparring, was a considerable skill. At least to the extent that it belongs to the upper ranks among sword masters.

Of course, since he was one of the emperor’s three swords, it was natural, but after facing each other in person, he was convinced.

If it was the Eurem Holy Knights of the previous life, they surely had the power to subdue ‘that guy’.

At the very least, even if not all of the Eurem Paladins, Captain Douglas was undoubtedly able to deal with the leader of the Dark Church hiding in the forgotten village one-on-one.

The Vampire King, Count Bryne Paula.

It’s not a guy who has risen to the rank of the 4th Demonic Pope, but if you look at the danger, it’s safe to say that he’s just below that rank.

If you only look at the influence excluding personal power, it’s about the same as Seely Willy.

The situation would probably be a little different if you went into actual combat, but the individual’s power itself wasn’t that strong.

In the previous life, there was a ghoul unit made of the Eurem Paladins under him, and because of that, it was quite difficult to kill him.

In other words, the current Brine Paula, who did not have the strongest troops in her hands, could defeat it with the power of the Eurem Holy Knights.

It would be acceptable to sacrifice one or two people, but it was absolutely not at a level where even if all the Holy Knights were annihilated, they would not be able to inflict proper damage.

Therefore, the assumption that the Eurem Paladins were weaker than expected and were defeated by them is ruled out.

The remaining number of cases is when the Eurem Holy Knights lost their vigilance against a vampire who could win enough.

Or, it was only when everything went wrong due to the traitor within the Eurem Holy Knights.

Of course, the reason why I can be sure that there is a traitor in this order is because I know the outcome of my previous life, so I couldn’t tell anyone else about this speculation.

In a situation where you don’t even know who the traitor is in the first place, you can’t open your mouth recklessly.

I had to know and deal with this situation on my own. Completely excluding the help of Saint Claire or other paladins.

The problem was that there was still not enough material to figure out who the traitor was.

In fact, the one who was most suspicious at first was, of course, Douglas himself.

He was a skilled person who could handle not only one brine Paula, but also dozens of minions under him.

Although I prepared thoroughly and took an unexpected gap and won one win against him, in other words, he was a person who had no chance of winning at all without such skill.

So, if you think about it in the simplest way, there was a high possibility that he was already Brine Paula’s minion.

At the same time, if you think about it the other way, the possibility of not being the case was also the highest.

The biggest reason was that the picture itself, in which a person with skills as strong as General Douglas, becomes Brine Paula’s minion without special circumstances, was not drawn at all.

Of course, I also thought about the case where he made Douglas, who was relatively weak, into a minion and waited for him to rise to the leader of the Eurem Paladins.

Even if I thought about it a little, I could figure out that it was an absurd possibility.

There are advantages to becoming an immortal by becoming a minion of a vampire, but there are also obvious disadvantages that result from that.

The moment you become an immortal, all the muscles in your body are activated and your level rises, and you can get a body that never ages.

On the contrary, since the physical condition is also fixed according to the moment of becoming an immortal, further growth is impossible.

It is impossible to raise the body’s ability beyond the level that has been temporarily raised, and even stop aging and become fixed as a body that does not age.

Considering these things, the possibility that Captain Douglas was an Undead was infinitely close to zero.

Among the sword masters, if his skills were high enough to rise to the level of the Emperor’s 3rd sword, it meant that he had been constantly training even after he reached the master’s level.

If he had reached the level of a sword master with the body of an undead, it would have been impossible for him to grow up to the point where he could rise to the third sword of the emperor.

In addition, I was able to see wrinkles that showed the traces of time in my appearance.

It was an absurd assumption that he had the power of an undead to prevent aging.

‘And again… .’

Although I can’t remember the names or appearances of the ghouls that were created as other paladins from previous lives.

At least he had memories of dealing with the ghoul created by Douglas.

If you think about it from Brine Paula’s point of view, there would be no reason to create a ghoul close to inferior compatibility by killing a minion that is already the same as your own limbs.

In addition, through two days of camp life, several of the most influential paladins were culled.

After the leader, the most likely candidate would be one of the new paladins.

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Jordi, Monua. Or other paladin members who have not joined for 5 years.

Since they haven’t fully developed their talents yet, it must have been a suitable prey for a vampire to use as a minion.

It wasn’t long after he joined, so there was a high possibility that other Paladins couldn’t figure out his body not growing or aging.

In fact, considering that, even Jordi and Monua, who use the same carriage and tent now, belong to dangerous people.

Even if either of them were really the vampire’s minions, they wouldn’t pose a threat right now.

Count Bryne Paula must be planning to make all of the ‘Eurem Paladins’ his minions.

He probably doesn’t want to cause trouble while leading the Order of the Holy Knights to his stronghold.

That meant they were safe, at least until they entered the Forgotten Village.

… Even if Jordy and Monua were really his minions.

Of course, the best thing would be, of course, if neither of them were traitors, but it was only a shallow hope.

“… It’s not easy.”

Although it was a short-lived relationship, it was always an act that made me feel very unpleasant to kill someone I had a close relationship with for any reason.

During dinner at the second campsite, I had a proper conversation with St. Claire, Jordi who was eating stew with a spoon across from me, and Monua.

“Prince Conrad is quite good at cooking, too.”

“… yes what Somehow I got used to it.”

“The last time we were camping, Jordi prepared a meal, but Prince Conrad and the saintess wouldn’t know how terrible it was. Barely stir-fried oats in lard is served as porridge. .”

“Sir Monua! Didn’t you say that you couldn’t help it because there was no milk at that time!”

“Mr. Jordi, it’s good to have dried beets with you just in case. If you add sugar beet to any dish and stir-fry it together, you can enjoy the umami and sweetness… .”

Listening to the peaceful mealtime conversation, I made a quiet wish in my heart.

I hope that the situation where I take the lives of these two people will never come.