The sky began to part its clouds shyly… and faint rays of sunlight slowly slipped through the smoke and lingering dust in the air, as if trying to sneak down to a land exhausted by war.
On the battlefield, life slowly began to return—but it was a life steeped in silence and blood.
The fortress soldiers bent their heavy bodies, lifting rubble and gathering broken iron and charred wood.
Large wooden carts creaked along, groaning under the weight of stacked corpses. Some were covered with gray cloth, while others were left exposed, telling the stories of their deaths without a single word.
Water was poured over the red earth, mixing with blood and washing it away, as if trying to erase the memory.
The stench of death and burning still clung to the air, resisting the soldiers' attempts to cleanse the place, despite their use of special mixtures—bitter herbs brewed to mask the smell.
