The Good Orc
The Good Orc
"What the hell, why are these bastards acting like this?"
From the moment I'd cut down about thirty of them and pushed forward, the orcs had suddenly grown restless and then scattered in utter chaos, like they were throwing a complete shitshow of a party. They'd started shrieking in clumsy common tongue that the War God and War Goddess were enraged, and it wasn't just one or two of them—it was the whole damn lot.
It wasn't hard to guess what it meant when they floundered trying to flee forward, found themselves trapped, and then tried to bolt back the way they'd come. But every last one of them looked so possessed by a terror that far surpassed any expectation I could have had that I couldn't help but tilt my head in confusion.
"This fucks up the plan."
They were running away too fast. At least half of them were getting out alive. The bastards were even enduring getting cut down by me if it meant they could retreat down the path they'd originally come from—as if a gate really did exist. If I'd been able to use my needles in earnest, I could've taken down a lot more, but with only one body, there was a hard limit to how many I could catch.
A sudden sense of futility washed over me, and I just stood there with my arms crossed. Even then, the bastards had no intention of attacking me—didn't even look at me as they ran—and beyond them, familiar faces emerged.
"Eldmia! What in the world did you do to make them run like that?"
"That's what I want to ask you, Yekaterina. What in the world did you do, how much did you terrify them, that they're all shrieking about the War Goddess being enraged and bolting?"
I didn't know about the War God, but who the War Goddess was, was obvious. It wasn't as if there were no women among the adventurers here, but there was no one more outstanding than Yekaterina. Wasn't she striding over right now, right at the very front of the adventurers who were still trying to bury their blades one more time into the backs of the fleeing orcs, marching along like a damn general?
"I just gave one of them a present, and they started acting like that."
"A present?"
"This."
Laughing cheerfully, Yekaterina tossed something at me. It was her war hammer. The sight of that war hammer lobbed over as lightly as a casual toss sent a hundred thoughts racing through my head in an instant, but for now, I just calmly accepted the situation and sidestepped out of the way.
The war hammer slammed into the snow with a magnificent sound that literally shook the earth. It was so loud that adventurers who had been wondering what was going on snapped their gazes toward it—a sound far, far beyond what I'd anticipated.
That thing is absolutely a magical tool. There's no other explanation. The idea of carrying that and riding a horse is just nonsense without it. I was dead certain that even a knight in full plate armor getting hurled off a horse wouldn't make that kind of sound. Still, I did my best not to let my reaction show and shifted my gaze coolly toward Yekaterina. She was staring at me, looking very surprised.
What? Was that a 'why didn't you get crushed to death?' kind of reaction?
"Huh? Why'd you dodge?"
"Because I don't want to get crushed to death?"
"Eh? Someone of Eldmia's caliber could catch that, couldn't you?"
A perfect-condition, fully-optimized Eldmia might, but right now, if I tried to catch that thing and screwed up my Magic Power circulation, the results wouldn't be pretty.
"My body's not at full capacity, you see."
If my Magic Power flow had been unimpeded, I might've pulled full power and tried to catch it, but the situation wasn't even fully resolved yet, and there was no reason to waste energy like this. I gave a moderate nod and casually asked Yekaterina as she approached.
"What happened to the one who caught this? Did they get crushed to death?"
"No? They withstood it just fine."
Huh. Should I chalk it up to 'an orc is an orc even when it's dying,' or should I just say it's exactly what you'd expect from bastards with physical strength rivaling aura?
Just in case, I nudged the war hammer with my foot. It wasn't utterly immovable, but I felt considerable resistance.
"Mm. I retract my previous statement. I don't think I could lift this even if my body was at full capacity."
"Hahaha! That's weak talk. That's not like you, Eldmia."
"I don't talk weak. I just state reasonable estimates."
I'd sometimes eaten with Gaendal's party and sparred with them, but I'd never known that thing was such an artifact. I made a silent vow that no matter what happened, I must never, ever get hit by that thing, and at the same time, I inwardly marveled at the strength of my needles, which had remained perfectly intact even after punching a small hole in such a war hammer.
In the meantime, Bisquente, who had been riding over from the far end of the village leading the mercenaries like a proper knight, approached us and spoke up.
"Good heavens. I never imagined this operation would work so flawlessly."
Well, even I thought it had worked a little too well to the point of being bewildering. It had to be thanks to Yekaterina displaying martial prowess far beyond what I'd thought possible. Because he'd seen it himself, Bisquente couldn't stop singing praises, saying the hero-tales of the Western Kingdoms hadn't been exaggerated in the slightest. Yekaterina, apparently thinking the praise was overkill, looked quite awkward as she picked up her war hammer and hastily changed the subject.
"Anyway, what do you plan to do? Will we pursue them as they are?"
The orcs' base wasn't somewhere you could reach in an hour or two even by running, so it wasn't something I wanted to recommend, but the field commander was Bisquente, so I shifted my gaze to wait for his decision.
"No. I'm satisfied just forcing them to withdraw. We bought time without a single loss, so there's no reason to overextend. Even if they regroup and come back, it'll take them two days. I've already sent an urgent report that this might be related to a gate, so reinforcements from the capital should arrive around that time."
As befitted a well-bred noble, Bisquente knew when to be satisfied with a reasonable margin and pull back. If he'd said to pursue them, I would've had to bring up the fact that there was no shaman or chieftain present and offer a negative opinion—that saved me the trouble.
I'd been watching a mercenary beside him blow a horn to call the adventurers who'd scattered into the forest, and this time Laika came bounding over from far away.
[Master! Asilie's safe! She said she's going to follow the orcs and observe a bit more before coming back!]
Hm, was Laika low on Magic Power? The little dog's speech seemed a bit sluggish. Still, the amount of Magic Power I supplied Laika was well within a strain-free range, so I scooped Laika up and injected some Magic Power. Laika looked at me with instantly brightened eyes.
[She said that most of the fleeing orcs are more intact than expected and the numbers are high, so it'd be better to monitor the situation rather than return right away! Fortunately, they're not scattering in every direction, so there's no risk of being tracked in return!]
A companion dog that could speak, didn't need to be housebroken, didn't need to be washed, and didn't even shed fur—truly, the perfect creature!
I stroked Laika, who'd perfectly fulfilled the role of a messenger dog, and returned to the village.
◈
Once again, it was around dinnertime when Asilie returned. Preparations to celebrate today's victory were in full swing at the village hall, so her report, which I heard once again alongside the key figures gathered at the pantheon, was far from optimistic.
"I'm pretty sure their chieftain is a very old shaman."
Yekaterina, who had been granted a seat at the table in recognition of her contribution to today's battle, and I both let out low hums at the same time. Kal Guls, looking puzzled, asked a question.
"Is it that big of a problem that he's a shaman?"
"That's part of it, but the problem is that he's a 'very old' shaman."
"...The fact that he's aged is the problem?"
"Because with orcs, you could write 'old age' and read it as 'survival.'"
Even without that, they were bastards whose physical bodies weakened far less with age than humans did. If he'd been a warrior with no other abilities, you could call it a significant, undeniable penalty—but if the opponent was a shaman, the story changed.
The fact that an orc shaman was acting as chieftain meant he was a battle-shaman, like a battle mage. It meant he'd smashed the skulls of his rivals and run his tribe all the way until he got old.
"Orcs do respect shamans, but that's strictly in the realm of 'respect,' not reverence. They're the types who consider even throwing stones to be a coward's act, so there's no way they look favorably on sorcery. The fact that a bastard like that is acting as chieftain—a position you can only reach by achieving feats worthy of reverence—means..."
"It means he personally split skulls with that axe decorated in bones and feathers. And on top of that, he also knows how to wield powerful sorcery."
When Yekaterina finished what I'd been saying, Kal Guls and Siel finally let out low hums alongside us.
Sorcery was tricky. The power invoked by borrowing the strength of souls and spirits was more within the domain of Divine Power than Magic Power. Because of that, unlike commonly known magic, it regularly manifested genuinely bizarre and unheard-of phenomena.
A caster might gain the strength of every beast they'd slain in their lifetime and display monstrous power, or use vengeful spirits to slowly gnaw away at a victim's life force, casting hexes and curses.
Naturally, such power couldn't be wielded without a price, so shamans among monsters—already unsystematic by nature—were invariably short-lived. Therefore, the chieftain Asilie had reported back on was an orc who, for an orc, was extremely high-risk.
"Based on what Asilie said, he's definitely a 'named' one. He might actually have come from the Great Grasslands beyond the Western Kingdoms. At the very least, there's no way a named orc like that could've set up shop in Itisel."
To begin with, the region barely had any orcs, and the kingdom had been conducting fairly thorough purges under royal authority. No matter how chaotic the territories had become due to the war, this wasn't the kind of place where a bastard like that could just pop out overnight.
I couldn't be certain, but there was a high chance that even my Magic Sight wouldn't be able to sever or confirm their sorcery. From my standpoint, this wasn't something to treat lightly.
"It seems waiting for the capital's reply was the correct answer after all."
Bisquente, who'd been listening to our discussion with deep contemplation, let his expression relax and smiled. It looked less like a genuinely relaxed or optimistic smile and more like an attempt to lighten the mood.
"Threatening as the bastard may be, he's a shaman, so he shouldn't be capable of teleportation. The fact that they might replenish troops through a gate is a bit worrisome... but since we too are certain to receive support from the capital, I don't believe this is an endlessly precarious situation. For now, I think it would be best to shake off today's fatigue, mingle with the others, and give them a sense of relief."
How about we shake off our fatigue, and with clear minds, meet early tomorrow to ponder this matter? Bisquente, sweeping his gaze over us as he said that, was every inch the noble.
He'd learned how to handle people. That was why he clearly delineated reward and punishment while also striving not to waste the time he'd bought. What I liked most was that he properly understood the importance of rest—a rare sight.
No matter how easy the battle was, a battle was still a battle, and everyone gets tense. There was still a grace period before the fleeing orcs reached their base and before their chieftain could react accordingly, so we actively agreed with Bisquente's opinion and decided to rest.
I could ponder things while I ate and rested anyway.