A Nomis horse.
Only a corner of it is exposed on the ground, and more parts are buried deep in the soil. There was a fallen tree on top of it.
Ella looked disgraced and used a branch to push away the soil, and painstakingly dug a small hole under the big tree. The gold coin lost its support and fell into the pit after being pressed. Ella picked up the gold coin with two fingers, blew the mud on it, and put it into her pocket.
Most of the members of Abraham's ancient church died at the hands of Jochebed. Habiba is missing. She could not move the unconscious Gottfried by herself. Although she also tried walking to nearby towns to seek help, no one wanted to talk to him because she was penniless.
She was tired and hungry. Fortunately, there were many carcasses of animals burned to death in the woods. Ella dug out some food that was not too burnt and could barely satisfy her hunger.
The day passed with no sign of Gottfried waking up.
So Ella could only start collecting the gold coins buried deep in the soil as mentioned at the beginning. Those are Semitic relics. Although there are no bones left of them, their clothes and other things have been well preserved. It's just that these things were buried very deep when they were blown by the storm in Jochebed, and it was very difficult to dig them out.
Ella needs these things now more than the dead.
On the second day, Habiba's voice came from the distance: "Apprentice! Apprentice! Scream! I'm here to save you! Master has a unique skill of pretending to be dead. You only need to learn a few If you succeed, you can survive...Apprentice! Apprentice! Come out quickly! I still have half a roast chicken here!"
Ella listened and quickly responded loudly. After a while, a group of Semites came clattering over. Habiba was walking at the front of the crowd, nibbling the half of the roast chicken he just mentioned with relish.
"I saw that the situation was not good, so I ran to Flanders to find help. I knew that there was a village there where the Ancient Abraham Church gathered. But when I got there, I found that there were not many magic people there. Fortunately, Jochebed They have been killed by the members of the Abrahamic Orthodox Church, so there is nothing left for us to do.”
Habiba threw the chicken bones back and glanced at Gottfried lying on the ground.
"What happened to my apprentice?"
"I don't know...he has been unconscious for more than a day."
"Has he fainted? That's okay. When I get back, I'll splash him with cold water and he'll get up."
Ella began to wonder if Gottfried was Habiba's direct disciple.
After reporting the deaths of the others, the Semites who had followed Habiba quietly dispersed and collected the remaining clothing of the deceased in the forest. They piled the collected clothes together, then gathered around the clothes, bowed their heads and began to pray.
Their prayers were so unclear that Ella only understood one sentence:
“Blessed are you who go to meet the true judge.”
After the prayer, they loaded the clothes into a cart. Habiba said that this was to bring them back to the gathering place of Abraham’s ancient church for burial.
This surprised Ella again: "They and these dead people should not know each other, right?"
"It's all the same," Habiba said, "these who died were the rich, and the ones I brought were the poor. But whether rich or poor, we members of the Ancient Church of Abraham are homeless. "
As Jochebed said, the Count of Île-de-France did not actually have an spy. This group of members of the Ancient Abrahamic Church walked straight along the road to Flanders without encountering any questioning along the way.
Ella planned to go to the port in Flanders to board the ship and return to Stade by sea, so she followed them. Everyone was silent along the way as they were carrying the belongings of the deceased.
They soon arrived at the village where members of Abraham's ancient church gathered. It is built in a very remote hill, far away from the cities and villages where the Alemannic Federation people live.
Suddenly, someone in the crowd screamed, breaking the silence of the team. He pointed with trembling fingers at the small village in the distance - which was engulfed in a sea of fire.
The crowd became commotion, throwing down their carts and rushing toward the village. They dug out buckets, washbasins, and even wooden bowls from places that were not on fire, stumbled to wells and rivers, filled them with water, and stumbled back to pour water on the burning houses.
Ella stood there blankly. She had vaguely noticed one thing - although the fire was so strong, there was no cry from the village.
The fire burned from noon until night before it was finally extinguished. Ninety percent of the houses were destroyed by fire. People walked silently among the scorched coals, looking for their loved ones.
The good news is that those who remained in the village appear to have evacuated elsewhere and there were no casualties.
Among the few houses that survived, there were several large characters written in red paint on the wall of one:
"Go to hell, demons!"
"Devil...?" Ella asked cautiously, "Why is it a demon..."
"A few days ago, people nearby dreamed of the scene of the burning village of Jochebed. Jochebed, like us, is a Semitic." Habiba's tone no longer had any lightness in it, "Actually, We are not very popular in the Alemannic Federation.”
"I dreamed about that dream too, but it wasn't you who did it! Why would they do such a thing!" Ella shouted, "I will take you to the local lord and ask him to avenge you. Let those who Those who burned your village will be punished!"
"It's useless. The lords even ignore the people of the Alemannic Federation, let alone us? Besides, we Semites are not within the legal protection scope of the Alemannic Federation."
The speaker sighed, picked up the little food his family had left, and said to the others: "Let's go, it's time to build a village somewhere else."
Others followed his example and found the remaining useful things among the ashes.
"Your village was burned down for no reason! Are you just going to tolerate it?" Ella shouted.
"You can't help them. This is our life." Habiba sighed, "Who allowed our country to be destroyed more than 1,500 years ago? A race that has lost its country can live as a slave. It’s already a blessing.”
“Isn’t the Tianfang Empire the country of your Semites?”
"That is not our country... From top to bottom in the Tianfang Empire, from the elderly to the children, everyone has gone astray in their beliefs."
"But we are not afraid." Someone said from the side. "There will be a savior who will take us out of our suffering - this is God's promise to us."
Ella suddenly understood why they prayed like this to their dead compatriots:
——"Blessed are you, going to see the true judge."
Barcelona's Restoration Diary
