Gathering the Wise and Innocent

In Border Town, there was a school. Though saying it like it was some formal institution for learning, it was mostly something people that could read and write letters made together to teach others.

The government nor local authority had anything to do with its creation.

The school itself had no concrete building, though there was a definite place to learn. With such a small number of reliable educators, the school was practically the teachers themselves.

To be more precise, it wouldn't be an exaggeration that in Border Town, Karl van Bate was the principal, the head teacher, and the school himself.

He had made something normally impossible, possible.

His wife and some others would also occasionally helped. Perhaps it was because the town was small that his idea ran smoothly, and a lot of children, even adults, had benefited from his teaching.

In the Kingdom of Graycastle at the very least, a school was something typically only children of nobles or wealthy merchants could attend. Karl not only made the idea worked in the small town, but he also did not ask for compensation, so people didn't hesitate to try. As a result, a lot of people were very grateful to him, especially the parents of the children he taught.

Since his teaching was genuine, they also earnestly made his life in the town easier. No people around his living tried to make things difficult for him.

One day, Karl van Bate felt a lightning bolt just struck him out of the sky.

Recently his mood had dropped to rock bottom, lasting even after days had passed, and there were many things he couldn't concentrate because of that. His wife had grown concerned about him and asked him to take a rest for a couple of days, but he persisted in opening the school.

He had more than thirty students waiting, all doing their best listening to his lecture. Although he couldn't smile, he still doing his work seriously.

When he finished his lesson, the morning had ended and all of his students, except one, had dispersed.

It was Nana.

Nana Bete was the daughter of a certain noble in Border Town. His father was an admirable person, a rare noble that didn't have the habit of looking down commoners. He was amiable, and Nana who was known to be his little angel was even more so.

However, Nana was someone Karl found with the least chance to ask about the lecture after the class ended. In his opinion, this girl who always smiled would still smile whether or not she understood what he had taught.

Speaking of which, like himself, he noted her trademark smile absented in class. Realising that late made him felt like a failure for busying himself so much to the point he missed something so apparent.

What could make someone like her to lost her smile? Perhaps a family problem? Though she had a lot of classmates at school, being a noble and a kind heart, no one to his knowledge would bother her. So he guessed it was probably a dispute between her family members.

Karl didn't guess for long since she quickly came clean of her own.

With tears dropping down, Nana asked with a sense of desperation.

"Teacher, will I be hanged like Anna?"

Hearing that, Karl paled immediately. It was not out of fear from facing a witch that had a bad reputation as a whole, but from something that crumbled inside him.

What being torn down was his reality.

He always blamed himself for Anna's death all this time. Karl who believed the Chruch doctrine felt it was partially his fault that the town pushed Anna to gallows since he had taught a lot of children and their parents to follow what Chruch told.

Though he rarely interacted with Anna outside of school, he knew how hardworking and earnest she was. Her mother died, and his father turned into a sorry person, but what about her character? She didn't change for the worse, her maturing was something he greatly respected.

How could that kind of girl be an evil incarnate?

Then, could Nana, who was innocent as an infant also be evil?

Before he could calm himself and comforted her, he heard a sound outside of the classroom. He hurried looked at his side and found that, at some point, one, no, two people had been watching them.

Two figures, short and tall, stood by the door. They slowly came inside, ignoring the discomfort of the two inside the room.

The tall figure of a young man gave a faint smile and spoke.

"She will not be hanged."

His voice was clear and crisp like thunder.

Earlier, Anna had described all that she knew about Karl van Bate to Roland.

"He was a good professor." Anna summarised plainly.

From her description, Roland understood that he was a very respectable character. It can be seen from Anna's attitude towards him.

Regarding the witch that almost died at the gallows, although his teaching that included the Church direction made the town's people even more hostile to her, she didn't blame him. Only her luck.

To her, he was probably not just a good professor. This professor was someone highly respected for his wisdom and knowledge, and for the ever curious Anna, he was also a role model that she can learn a lot from, and in fact, the period where she learned from him probably one of the best memories she had.

Even without opening her mouth, Anna's eyes told Roland that she was curious about why he wished to see Karl.

Roland didn't try to hide it but also somehow at a loss to how to explain it.

First of all, he was someone with knowledge of a story parallel to his own. Though it didn't reach far, it was still a source of reliable information for a couple of months from now on.

In that story, the project to make the walls should be still several days from where he was. But even after it started, that story Roland realised the workers lacked in the ability to make a decent foundation. Making a single cottage and town walls required a different set of knowledge after all.

At the rate they were going on, even when the cement production was ready and steady, the walls probably still couldn't be finished when the winter came.

Luckily he was still good. Before long, Karl came out and came clean that he used to be a stonemason, and a reputable one even. It also from him how the other witch being found out in the story.

Knowing all of these, Roland wouldn't leave things out of coincidences. Though Karl probably still came sooner or later himself and perhaps even without him someone would learn the identity of the other witch and reported it to the castle, the faster he brings them in, the better it would be.

Not to mention, the wall project would be better if a capable hand lead it from the beginning. That was also one of the main reason why Roland didn't just immediately order people to prepare digging the trench and collecting necessary materials.

In the end, Roland simply just told truthfully about the history of her professor. Anna understood how knowledgable Karl was; he must be a good stonemason as well.

"Right?" Roland smiled at Anna as he pulled out two coats from his wardrobe. He put one for him and another over her. "Let's go and surprise him."