Chapter 16: The Idyllic and Devilish Countryside

  As the nobleman's entire retinue rode calmly on horseback toward the manor, still several hours away, Nikodem Rudnicki chatted with Justinian.

  "These are all the lands that have fed my family for centuries. It is not much, but it allows for the export of grain to several infernal dimensions," he said modestly of the vast expanses of farmland stretching before them.

  "Indeed, it looks like a humble and worthy occupation," the human said ironically, which immediately made the nobleman laugh.

  "And what can you tell me about yourself?" To tell the truth, he was very curious.

  The average life of the nobility in the 66th dimension of hell was quite boring, so any visit from guests was a great event. And what an event it was when that guest was a human cultivating devilishness!

  "I ended up here against my will. The place where I lived was attacked by bandits, and Ignatius's intervention saved me."

  "Ignatius the Empty-headed?" replied Rudnicki, laughing out loud at the mention of infamous mountain lord.

  Justinian nodded at him with a sad look in his eyes, a reminder of the unpleasantness he had experienced whenever he revealed where he came from.

  "And what do you plan to do next? I understand your internship as a judge was no accident?"

  The boy told him of his desire for revenge, as well as the technique stone that required contemplation on "solving matters in a way appropriate to human faith" in order to progress, which had led him to assist the voivode.

  "Ha, well then, that works out perfectly. As a nobleman, I have never failed my guests, and I know that I will be able to help you as well," the pot-bellied devil announced, twirling his graying mustache.

  "Meaning?" Justinian asked politely, though he did not have high hopes for his stay here.

  "Wait and you will find out. Perhaps quite soon," the Sarmatian replied with a mysterious smile, then rode off to give new orders to his servants.

  They traveled like this for another two hours, until Nikodem Rudnicki suddenly changed the direction in which the caravan was to go. Now it seemed he was heading for one of the borders of his territory.

  They stopped at one of the beautiful apple orchards, a few minutes from the edge of the noble's land. Everything here was wonderfully cared for—undoubtedly the work of the servants, who, thanks to being watched over by the magnificent noble brethren, lived productively, despite existing on the brink of starvation.

  Evidently, they did not embody the devilish virtues either, as, encouraged by whips to work hard, their limbs and bones were twisted.

  Dismounting his horse to pick one of the beautiful apples, the nobleman Rudnicki summoned one such low-born scoundrel and ordered him as follows:

  "Ride to my neighbor who lives west of here and send him my greetings. Tell him I have returned from my pilgrimage and would be happy to tell him about it over some good quince liqueur."

  The servant, repulsive to the noble's sight, nodded and immediately set about his task. Justinian, meanwhile, could already feel a hangover coming on at the announcement of another boisterous feast.

  Another hour passed until the crooked messenger returned, and during that time, the noble lord treated Justinian to some of the finest apples in his beautiful orchard.

  "My lord, I have done as you commanded."

  "And what were you told?" Rudnicki asked, graciously bestowing his noble gaze upon the low-born peasant.

  "I was told to piss off," the servant replied with a serious face.

  Justinian furrowed his brow, while the nobleman himself burst into loud laughter. He had evidently expected a similar reaction.

  "Did it look like he had guests? Perhaps he was preparing to leave?" he continued to question the servant.

  "The farm seemed quiet, with no preparations for a journey, and they clearly weren't receiving anyone of importance," the low-status devil answered honestly.

  "Excellent, excellent," the pot-bellied nobleman clapped his hands lightly and threw the servant a coin for his trouble, which he greedily snatched. Then Rudnicki turned to the retinue waiting nearby:

  "You heard, you scoundrels! That scoundrel Borowiak is sitting at home unprepared! It's time to show that rascal he's no different from a bare-arsed noble and take what is ours!"

  Hearing this, Justinian had a very bad feeling. Before his eyes, the servants, as well as the nobleman's son, began to draw their weapons and roar aggressively, like wolves at the call of their pack leader. Then the nobleman with the big belly roared once more:

  "Everything you take from the enemy and from Borowiak's larder will be yours!"

  This produced an effect of absolute frenzy in the assembled retinue. Zeal filled their gazes, and some began to lick their lips. Unlike the devilish nobility, who lived very well, their servants often didn't have a penny to their names. Such opportunities were one of the few occasions they could actually make a fortune.

  Rudnicki laughed with satisfaction, then drew his saber and began to charge toward his neighbor's border. His servants galloped right behind him, all to the loud clatter of hooves.

  "What is this villainy now?!" Justinian clutched his temples as the ever-serious Franciscus rode up to him.

  "A hellish foray," he announced without much emotion. In his hand, he held a notebook in which he was meticulously recording all the recent events.

  If Justinian had any doubts about what a hellish foray was, they were cleared up very quickly. For practically the entire retinue of Nikodem Rudnicki drew their weapons, including pistols, muskets, and sabers, and... began to besiege the nearby manor of the neighboring nobleman, Borowiak.

  "Come out, you Borowiak scoundrel! You owe me money!" shouted the leader of the raid, the pot-bellied Rudnicki.

  From inside the manor, around which the servants had set up makeshift barricades from chests and furniture, an indignant howl was heard:

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  "What the hell are you talking about?!"

  It undoubtedly came from the throat of the terrified host. He truly had no idea what his damn neighbor was on about.

  "About the fact that from now on, you're to pay me on sight!" Rudnicki shamelessly and immediately shouted back.

  He laughed loudly as he did so, as if he were having the time of his life. Ordering his servants to fire upon the estate, he sought out the wide-eyed Justinian in the crowd.

  "Come here, my dear sir! How do you like our humble noble tradition?!" he called out cheerfully, slapping the boy on the back.

  Justinian not only didn't know what to say, but he simply... had tears in his eyes.

  'Is the desire for a peaceful life in justice so much to ask?' he thought, complaining in his heart about his malicious fate. Apart from revenge, he was a peaceably disposed man, and now he had been made a member of a gang.

  What's more, it seemed that everything had conspired to throw him into ever more horrible situations.

  As the poor man whimpered in his soul at the cruel reality, his surroundings descended into ever-greater chaos.

  Bullets whizzed by, and he had to retreat so as not to be hit by one by accident. It so happened that he then ran into Franciscus, who was watching the battle as if seeking inspiration to become a poet.

  "Can you explain to me what this is supposed to be?" he asked, drowned out by Rudnicki laughing nearby. The young devil, himself a little overwhelmed by the escalating chaos everywhere, began to explain.

  "The nobility once received a special privilege of assembly from the voivode. When cases in the courts drag on and cannot be settled amicably, they take legislation into their own hands and enforce the verdicts by force*!" he shouted, ducking as musket shots flew nearby.

  "And this is supposed to be such a case?!" Justinian shouted back at him, terrified by the battlefield.

  "The custom has become a bit deformed over the years and now serves as entertainment when circumstances allow. Boruta usually turns a blind eye to it if he doesn't catch someone in the act and there are no serious injuries," explained Franciscus, experienced in the rich events of his uncle's life.

  Meanwhile, the battle raged ever more fiercely. Rudnicki's servants reached the promised granary and quickly began to carry out whatever they could grab.

  Of course, seeing such insolence, the nobleman Borowiak was immediately offended, losing all face in this ghastly disaster. He desperately tried to call on other neighbors for help or notify Boruta, but evidently, the voivode was busy, as he did not respond in any way.

  If the nobleman had known that the dimension's ruler was currently swamped with matters accumulated over the last week of feasting with Rudnicki, he would probably have been paler than a corpse.

  He could not tolerate such behavior, however, so he gritted his teeth and quickly launched a counterattack from his manor to stop the brazen plunder.

  "Get them!" he yelled, stressed.

  He calculated internally that the "Orphan," due to his great strength, would probably not participate in the battle directly to avoid escalating the matter.

  'He probably just wants to impress his son, or his servants,' Borowiak guessed. 'In that case, the forces should be even...'

  Soon, both sides were engaged in a pitched battle, to the great delight of Nikodem Rudnicki. Sabers clashed here, someone was knocked over there. The roar of gunfire deafened the air as one servant lost several fingers, and another an entire arm. The devils, however, did not seem to care much and fought in their element.

  Even Justinian was hit a few times by stray gunpowder, and now his face was black with soot, and blood was slowly trickling down his temple. He tried not to get involved in the fight and to protect Franciscus, but the chaos was simply too great.

  Then, at a certain moment, when he saw two of Rudnicki's devils nearby attacking a woman with sabers, something inside him simply snapped. In anger at the terrible customs and simply having had enough of it all, he let out a loud roar and... leaped into action!

  Using his 3-mark cultivation base, he attacked with the Iron Hand of Justice the saber that was about to cut the she-devil across the back. He pulled the girl herself towards him with his other hand to shield her from the second blow!

  "ENOUGH!" he shouted, shattering the saber to pieces and taking the second blow on his cultivation-strengthened shoulder. The saber did indeed pierce him, but only slightly, so his life was not in danger.

  The shout he let out was so thunderous that the entire battlefield... fell instantly silent! Even Rudnicki stopped laughing, and everyone was now looking at the young man, who... looked like a true devil!

  His face was all sooty and covered in blood. A saber protruded from his side, and his face was twisted in a terrible rage. He looked as if he wanted to attack anyone who did not obey his demands.

  For a time, no one dared to say a word. Finally, however, Nikodem Rudnicki was the first to speak.

  "Hahaha, you heard the young judge! Enough of this fun, we're returning to our humble corner!"

  The clamor immediately rose again, and the devils took the plundered items, but no one fought anymore. Justinian, having calmed down a bit, breathed a sigh of relief and also mounted his horse. He was a little bothered by the fact that the girl he had just saved seemed to be staring at him as if he were a picture and... as if she were glued to his arm.

  'I'm surely just imagining it,' he thought, however, finally pushing her aside.

  The nobleman Borowiak watched the scene with mixed feelings, for this girl... was his daughter!

  While Rudnicki's retinue was returning to his lands, Ignatius the Empty-headed was going through a difficult time. He had been sitting on his mountain for a long time, meditating and wondering if he was becoming paranoid.

  'Maybe that trap was here before?' he tried to think positively.

  But no matter how he tried to convince himself, it seemed more and more to him that... someone was after his life!

  'But who could want such a thing?' He even began to list in his memory the families of all the she-devils he had seduced in the past, but he didn't think that was the actual reason.

  'Especially since, for the last twenty years, I really haven't had any way to get on anyone's bad side.'

  Reflecting on his memories of the Kingdom of Peace, he came to the conclusion that if anything, he had reasons for revenge on someone, not the other way around. But as he considered the matter from this angle, a strange thought appeared in his head.

  'Who exactly were those bandits who set fire to the kingdom?' From what he remembered, it was located almost in the very center of a large and safe continent. Even if it was weak in itself, it was hard to explain how they had suddenly appeared there out of nowhere.

  'Something here stinks very badly,' he thought with a horror rarely seen in him.

  Thinking about the problem so intensely that he felt dizzy, he finally just sighed pitifully. It was then that, by complete chance, his gaze fell upon the symbol of the supposed cult from the tomb, which Justinian had drawn on the ground earlier.

  'Isn't that...' he furrowed his brow, and a drop of sweat appeared on his forehead.

  From this particular angle, the strange sign began to remind him of something!

  At Rudnicki's court, of course, the atmosphere was excellent.

  "We showed that buffoon!"

  "That old hag at home will finally stop nagging me at home when I bring her the spoils!"

  "I really laid into that old gardener!"

  The servants were celebrating. The nobleman himself, as usual, was also in a champagne mood. He was already quite drunk when he caught sight of Justinian slipping outside.

  The young boy sat on the steps of the house and watched the stars, which were particularly beautiful at this late hour in hell.

  He thought about the events that had befallen him since he had arrived in this world and fought against the conclusion that was forming in his mind. A conclusion that contradicted what he had believed his entire life. This conclusion said that the world was not even half as just as he had once thought it to be.

  "And what are you staring at those stars for, young man? They're just ordinary rocks very far away, not magical lights for making wishes," the annoying voice of Rudnicki reached him.

  Justinian looked at him but had no strength to stumble over his words now. So he remained silent.

  "I heard from Boruta about what happened to you. Do you really believe that even if you get your revenge, it will make the world just?" Of course, a moment after mentioning the name accursed in hell, he immediately spat to avoid unnecessarily provoking the world.

  They were silent together for a while, until finally, Justinian asked.

  "What else is left for me? Is it wrong that I would want a better world for everyone?"

  Rudnicki whistled mockingly:

  "There's nothing wrong with a man tilting at windmills... after all, it's his life, and no one forbids a fool from wasting it."

  The irony was painful for the young man, who could only grit his teeth. Another moment of silence followed, after which the devil finally sighed and said:

  "You need to get it into your head that if you want to change anything in this sad world, you will need strength, and extraordinary strength at that." Here he hesitated, as if unsure whether to continue. "The path that leads to it can easily lead to your death. But by training with me, you can take the first steps on it."

  Having said that, he pulled an old, strange-looking pipe from his pocket and threw it to the boy.

  "And this is my gift to you to begin your stay."

  Justinian caught it before it hit the ground and, upon first contact, felt... an incredible surge of energy! As if from the very touch, the world had become a better, more beautiful place, and the desire to fight for justice had entered him.

  "The seller said it belonged to some doctor of philosophy," Rudnicki added, trying to remember the name of the supposed owner. "I think he called him Glos? Gloos? Pangloss!" After which, he smiled, shrugged his shoulders, and returned to the feast, leaving the boy alone with his thoughts.

  Thus began the period of Justinian's education under the nobleman Rudnicki.

  *regarding foray explanation - this is an actual historical Polish custom from XVIth century.