Departure
Departure
The Human Race army's movements looked no different from the day before, yet not a single Demonfolk looked upon it optimistically.
It had dragged on for a full seven years, this war where they couldn't even properly crush a single nation of a race they'd thought was clearly weaker than them. No one was so flower-brained as to believe the enemy attempting a massive counteroffensive toward the territory they'd lost almost at the start of the war would just repeat the previous day's mistakes without some kind of plan.
If even the rank-and-file soldiers knew it, the commander hardly needed to be told. The commander, standing atop the wall and watching the advancing great army, was already convinced that something would be different from yesterday as he asked his adjutant.
"Any other movements in the area?"
"We accounted for the possibility of tunneling, but the detection unit reports finding nothing."
"What about the wyvern knights?"
"Same thing. Still, just in case, we have our own wyverns on standby, but..."
The meaning was that the probability was low. The commander, who nodded calmly even as the catapult stones flying from afar grew larger, lightly waved a hand and gave the order to the mage corps.
The stones shattered, magic detonated, and just like yesterday, arrows rained down.
"Send up the wyverns. Even if yesterday's attack was a greeting to gauge our response, it's suspicious they're moving exactly the same way today. We'll conduct the reconnaissance this time."
"Shall we deploy all of them?"
Unlike the Human Race wyvern knights who required specialized training, the Demonfolk's wyverns were closer to half-wild. Because of this, they were hard-pressed to match the Human Race in fine details, but since they could haul in and use even less-trained wyverns, they had the advantage in raw numbers.
There were forty wyverns in the city once known as the Levien Margraviate. By the standards of Human Race wyvern knights, that would be devastating military strength, but they were all show and no substance—just monsters that followed orders. Barely.
"Half."
That was precisely why they made for a card that could be thrown down boldly. Unlike those of the Human Race, a Demonfolk member's wyvern occupied roughly that level of importance.
Not long after the adjutant hurried down the wall to carry out the order, the assault stopped. Yesterday, the Demon King's Army's attempted magic had been countered, creating a gap, but today was the opposite. Perhaps they had a skilled mage, because our own mages had been sweating blood to barely stop a spell that fizzled and detonated right next to the wall—and using that as a signal, the Human Race army began to kick up a racket.
Thinking it was the siege ram again, the commander looked down at the battlefield, and a sight that made him question his own eyes unfolded.
"...One man?"
A human clad only in simple gear—armor and the basics—was hurtling across the battlefield at a terrifying speed.
Just from his running speed, it was clear he was a knight of considerable ability, but what stood out even more was his armor, weighted for mobility unlike that of a typical knight, and the double-handed axe strapped to his back. The commander, utterly unable to divine why someone would charge alone armed only with something that was neither a threat to smash the gates nor a trick to work mischief on the wall, wore a dubious expression as he ordered the soldier beside him to hand over a javelin.
Arrows wouldn't catch someone of that level. Magic was out since spell interference was being traded back and forth right this moment, with mages hemorrhaging nosebleeds in the effort. To eliminate this unknown, unstable element, this was the best option.
He would kill him in a single strike. With that resolve, the javelin, thrown after carefully calculating the speed and positioning, tore through the air directly at the Human Race knight's head.
-Clang!
And it ricocheted away with the sound of a metal impact that should have been impossible.
He had definitely been running bare-headed, yet in the span of a single blink, he was wearing a helmet. The commander's eyes widened, but faster than that, something unidentifiable shot out from the knight's waist, hurtling forward at breakneck speed.
"Gah!"
Reacting to the long-absent threat of death, the commander ignored the strain on his body and dodged at full power. If he hadn't, the unidentified projectile that shattered one horn protruding from the side of his skull would have pierced straight through his head and flown off somewhere.
Yet there was no time to feel relief.
"Commander!"
"I'm fine! Contain that member of the Human Race! That thing's... wait, Magic Power?"
An intense residual scent of Magic Power.
It was shocking enough to freeze the thoughts not only of the commander but also of the mages who had briefly rotated out for rest and any warrior who'd reached a certain level.
"C-Commander! This is...!"
In the grip of a shock so powerful it blanketed the tension across the entire battlefield, the commander, understanding what his subordinate was about to say, bellowed at the top of his lungs.
"It's Eldmia! That member of the Human Race is 'Little Eldmia'! Alert the inner fortress! This is an emergency!"
The member of the Human Race who had detonated a magic-power bomb inside Itisel to sow chaos, and then smashed to pieces their entire plan to steal the Empire's Star and cut off rear support.
Because of him, the Demon King's Army had lost an entire magic corps—mobilized for the bomb's production—and had been forced to stand and watch as special forces operatives, painstakingly infiltrated into the Empire over years, were utterly destroyed.
"The siege ram doesn't matter! The side gate! Deploy to the side gate...!"
The commander's words jammed in his throat as he tried to issue orders to stop Eldmia, who had already crossed the battlefield in an instant, vaulted the moat, and made to reach the wall. He'd only hesitated for a brief moment, but the bastard had already fully crossed the field, cleared the moat, and planted himself on the fortifications.
In that fleeting instant lasting no more than a few seconds, every kind of speculation churned through the commander's mind. His brain generated countermeasure after countermeasure, but the action Eldmia took upon reaching the wall rendered all of it useless, delivering to the commander an uncontrollable rage.
"You son of a bitch, where does the Human Race even find these goddamn monsters?!"
As if it were the most natural thing in the world.
The monster began running up the vertical wall.
◈
The sudden throw of the javelin had sent a chill down my spine.
An attack so fast it was nearly impossible to predict and react to was something I hadn't experienced since that lunatic attacked the academy in the Empire. Our one-track-life elf blacksmith's attacks were fierce, sure, but those were limited to what was manageable—she always tailored our spars to my level.
For a split second, I'd agonized over whether to slow down and dodge, but in the end, I chose to trust the earring helmet and push forward.
The bastard had hurled that spear accurately at my head, even predicting my speed and distance while I was running at full tilt. If I slowed and dodged here, what followed would without a doubt be a spectacular javelin show and a hailstorm of arrows.
Fortunately, not only did the helmet perform its role perfectly, it also gifted me absolute confidence in its capability. I'd honestly even considered that the impact might disorient me momentarily, but the javelin that glanced off the helmet left only a very light shock and a noise behind.
This was what people meant when they talked about beautiful performance. Thanks to it, I had the breathing room to confirm just who had thrown that javelin at me, and without sparing any Magic Power, I launched a great needle straight at the bastard.
I didn't particularly expect him to die from it. The one who'd launched such a threatening attack at me was more than likely capable of dodging my attack.
The needle was nothing more than a stalling tactic. Whether he dodged it or got unlucky and took a wound, I only needed to use that opening to close in on the wall. A sound of something smashing apart came from atop the wall, followed by the bastards' shouts, but tensed up as I was, focused on running, it didn't fully register to my ears.
The only thing I caught was something like my name? It seemed my notoriety had already spread.
While that was threatening intel, from an operational standpoint, it was a good sign. It meant the bastards could no longer just blindly ignore me running up their wall. And sure enough, the moment I used my needle to start my wall-run, countless arrows poured down, targeting me.
Unlike running across the open field, arrows raining down on my head were threatening, but still within the level of what I could handle. Thanks to that, my ascent was far smoother than my sprint across the battlefield. Upon climbing up, I pierced the skull of a member of the Demonfolk who was leveling his bow right at my face, and then I was on top of the wall.
"Get down!!"
Simultaneously, a shout clearly not directed at me rang out as a javelin flew in. This time, anticipating the attack at the exact moment of my landing, I handled it without much difficulty. But having drawn my axe to block it, I couldn't help but be shocked once more.
It was heavy—the javelin thrown by that knight in the west didn't even compare. The impact was so intense that it was hard to believe I'd taken a similar hit before with my helmet on and felt almost nothing. I was honestly shocked by the fact that taking it with the helmet like last time would've resulted in less shock than this block with my axe. I looked toward the far end of the wall, and past the Demonfolk who were staring at me with tense faces while drawing their weapons, my eyes landed on a member of the Demonfolk with one horn shattered.
That was the commander. Now that I was up here, I could clearly feel his Magic Power, distinctly superior to the other Demonfolk.
-Fweee!
This wasn't a duel but very much war, so I skipped the self-introduction. The mood around here told me I was already known, anyway.
Those who were going to live would live, and those who were going to die would die. As I suddenly let out a whistle, my needle pierced the heads of the bastards who, unable to process the situation, showed only confusion.
The Demonfolk archers on the wall were apparently small fry, unable to mount a proper defense, and in an instant, five or six fell dead or were knocked off the wall. Bewilderment and fear spread across the faces of the surviving soldiers. Noticing this, the half-horned one twisted his face in a fearsome grimace and began charging toward me.
"Keep the field suppressed! This bastard is mine...!"
-...You fucks!! It's time to get slaughtered!!
At that moment, I heard Ranje's roar echo from the battlefield, signaling the breakthrough of the siege ram unit.
And I threw the axe with all my strength at the half-horned bastard who appeared to be the commander.