Chapter 98: Nolan the Nobody Part 7
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“Hey!” shouted a soldier. “Stop! That’s not the way, Go back, soldier?”

Another soldier came and stopped the soldier with a pull on his shoulder. The soldier watched the man walked away from the ridge leading the pale mountain.

“Stop, don’t you see who it is?”

“Oh, that Old Nolan?” he said. “Where’s he going...oh?”

“Shit, man, I heard he buried his unborn child and then the next day he buried Lady Ciara. Did we even recover her body?”

“No, she was burnt away by the pale mountain monster,” the soldier said. “Still, are we going to not to stop him?”

“You want to stop him?” he said. “Man’s broken, eyes dead like a bleak walker. I think he’s the only one of the original guardsman of throes that is still alive. Imagine that, still alive with everyone else dead, now his reason for living just vanished, what a poor man, but who didn’t lose something?”

“Yeah, still, I don’t want to bury my child, and then my wife in succession. I don’t think I can take that as well. Still, should we really let him go? Old Nolan’s got a good arm, and he’d be a good asset for us.”

“No, we just have to leave it to fate.”

***

“Hey, see that?” the soldier said.

“See what?”

“There, among the bleak walkers.”

“Isn’t that Old Nolan...and damn he really got older than the last time we saw him, ten years was it?”

“Yeah...I thought he died somewhere but that old man sees like he’s still clinging to the world. Thought he’d be long dead.”

“Ay, he got a cold look on his eyes,” the soldier said.

“They say that the bleak walkers walked while seeing the illusion of those that they have lived with. Every single day, those eyes would remind them of why they still walk the bleak path.”

“Why would you succumb yourself to that suffering?”

“Maybe because it would allow them to see those that they’ve lost? Old Nolan probably wants to remember them badly, and he might have become a bleak walker so that he can fight better. See those runes?”

“Yeah, they are inscribed to make themselves stronger, and they say that the current head can conjure illusions since he has the sigil on both eyes. So when you talk to them, don’t try to look them in the eyes, they can control it, but sometimes they just let go of that control.”

“You really have a lot of knowledge about them bleak walkers.”

“Not really, I just was thrown into a deployment with them once. Bastards fight with a death wish, and they have a lot of ways to kill you with that single-minded edge they have on them. Seal you with runes, or make you magic-less if they hit you with their phantasmal. Do you know that old man in front of them? That one with the lion mane?” he said.

“I see him, what about him?”

“That’s the White Lion, the oldest Bleak Walker you’ll meet in this era. He’s alive because of those runes, and I heard that he has the eternal hawk now on his eyes.”

“The eternal hawk of memory, vision, and rebirth. The being that focuses on one’s goal and continues forward despite it all. They say that the Eternal Hawk represents themselves as messengers of the spirit world, so having them definitely means that he has possessed it has learned powerful lessons and has expanded their knowledge and wisdom,” the soldier added.

“I see. Glad that we have like that on our side. Still, they are so few them compared to the last.”

“They don’t really care about strategy,” the soldier said. “They act as scouts for us, but, they never really try to live on that badly. Problem with them is that they do not cherish their life, and death is mercy for a bleak walker, but I think that most of them are stubborn to their fault. They want to die but they wait for it. They would heal their wounds, get back up, and try fighting despite the way forward would lead them to the bleak path.”

“I don’t understand them,” the soldier said.

“There was an Old Bleak Walker who said that they have a tradition that they would never let go,” he stared at the bleak walkers marching to the dark like moths to flames. “Never go gentle, my friend, the darkness crawls and creeps, but never go gentle, rage, flail, bite, do not flinch when darkness stares, and if it is your time, and when the Lady of Death reaches for an embrace, take it, cherish it, and rest your weary head on her chest. But until then, do not go gentle to that tunnel of light, not until you have done thy best.”

“I like that,” the soldier said. “Gives me hope.”

“Hah,” the soldier chuckled. “If that old bleak walker heard that from you, he’d be rolling on his grave, he said that it was never about hope, it’s about your own hands clawing to where your goal is. No matter what, all of us return to Death’s embrace, and I think there’s beauty on it.”

“Man, you are getting weird when talking about them.”

“Hey, I find them interesting, not to mention Old Nolan is with them now. Honestly, he calls himself Nolan the nobody when he doesn’t even realize that he had a reputation for being called the Nolan the stubborn. I mean, who would make the Burnt Woman fall in love? Who was the weakest that would outlast the strongest of the guardsman of throes? Look at him, the light on his eyes are broken, but he stills moves forward. That’s Old Nolan for you, always goddamn stubborn to his core.”

The soldiers watched the bleak walkers walk deeper to enemy territories. The bleak walkers abandoned their banners, forsaking it, and instead of fighting so that the light’s army could push and deal with the Overlord of the Demons. The two soldiers fought as well, their final vision was the back of the bleak walkers facing the horde, unbroken, unbent.

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