Chapter 133: For Spring Holds Magic
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 133: For Spring Holds Magic
Andrew and Mac drew their swords.
Between them, Enri worked his shortbow with practiced rhythm, having brought it today instead of his usual crossbow. He loosed an arrow whenever he spotted an opening. When an enemy stumbled too close or collapsed nearby, he finished them by driving a hand axe into their skull.
Thwack!
He couldn't split a skull in a single blow like Rem, but that didn't mean his targets fared any better. A half-shattered helm, blood leaking through the gaps, eyes filled with resentment or despair—to Enri, they looked just like the beasts he used to hunt.
He turned his gaze away. Sentimentality was a luxury on the battlefield.
In any case, that was the extent of Enri’s contribution. Andrew and Mac handled the rest. Though they weren't quite on the level of the core Mad Platoon members, the two were no pushovers.
“You bastards! Do you think the Gray Dogs are a joke?!” one of the enemy soldiers roared.
He was a fierce man who had already cut down several allied soldiers, blood dripping from the tip of his short spear. Andrew stepped forward to meet him.
Five clashes were all it took. Two parries, two slashes, and then a swift, one-handed thrust. To Enri’s eyes, that final thrust looked strangely like Encrid’s.
Mac moved with equal skill, tearing through the enemy while staying faithful to his role: keeping Andrew from overextending.
“That’s far enough,” Mac’s voice rang out.
Whenever he spoke, Andrew stopped dead in his tracks. Then, the man began thumping his chest with both hands.
“Uwooo!”
What is he doing? Why is he roaring? Enri wondered. It seemed Andrew had learned some very questionable habits from Rem.
“Come at me, all of you! You half-baked bastards!”
It was a clumsy provocation, and the chest-beating was bizarre, but a pumped-up Andrew was a force to be reckoned with. From the rear, Enri watched them and the others. Blood splattered across their helmets.
Waaaaah!
The air was thick with battle cries.
“Kill them! Kill them!”
Shouts dripped with murderous intent.
“Ugh, please...”
Whispers grew desperate for life.
In the midst of this killing field, Enri had a sudden realization.
This is as far as I go.
While some cheered at the sight of the Mad Platoon and others were moved by their prowess, Enri saw his own ceiling. He realized this was the limit of his path.
“Uwooo!”
Letting out another beastly roar, Andrew swung his sword. It sliced through the air with a sharp whoosh, cutting deep between an enemy soldier’s collarbone and neck.
Squelch.
He yanked the half-embedded blade free. The enemy’s scream echoed the movement of the steel.
Having realized his limit, Enri wanted to return to being a plains hunter. However, the plains he called home had already become a battlefield. Perhaps returning to the territory and living as the husband of the flower shop widow wouldn't be so bad.
He thought of her—that steadfast woman who had lost her husband to war and was raising her child alone. Enri missed her terribly. He missed her so much he wanted to abandon the battlefield right then and there. It felt right to let his life as Enri the hunter and Enri the soldier end here.
“How sentimental,” Enri muttered to himself, looking out over the battlefield as it raced toward its conclusion.
The enemy commander was fast on his feet, and his judgment was just as swift. At some point, the commander’s flagpole and his personal escort had slipped away. Most of the remaining troops surrendered; only a few continued to resist.
The battle was drawing to a close. Amidst the fading chaos, cheers unlike any heard before tore through the air.
“Long live the Mad Platoon!”
They were the cheers of victory.
*
The Azpen commander was fleeing with his tail between his legs.
Damn bastards.
As a capable commander, he realized exactly how the situation had unfolded. Who was it that had overturned the battlefield? Where did the wind of change begin to blow?
It was that bastard with the axe and a few others. He needed to report this. He had to tell high command that there were individuals among the enemy ranks who exuded an incredibly dangerous aura. Although he had already sent out a carrier pigeon, as the commander who had experienced it firsthand, his final duty was to—
“I thought the sun was going to rise before you got here, you bastards!”
His heart dropped.
A sudden shout erupted from the path ahead. A unit was blocking the rear, fully armed with a chaotic assortment of weapons. They appeared to be an independent detachment.
They were not allies. Definitely not. The eagle emblem engraved on their right shoulders was unmistakable.
“We lost even without those guys on the field?” the commander muttered self-deprecatingly. His escort surrounded him tightly, but they were at their limit.
“The Frontier Slaughterer bastards.”
The enemy was Naurilia’s pride, the combat unit known as the Frontier Slaughterers. They had bypassed the main battlefield to lie in ambush in secret—a detachment sent to flank, disrupt, and whittle down the retreating enemy while crushing their morale. A move that would have been meaningless had the Giant’s Strike succeeded was now a fatal blow.
The Border Guard was actually quite dumbfounded themselves. Originally, they were supposed to raid the rear and slowly harass a retreating army. But what was this? The enemy had returned to them like a pack of hunted wild dogs.
There was no time to ponder the details. The Border Guard Captain did his job. Upon confirming that Azpen’s rear was exposed, he had scrapped the raid and switched to an ambush. He had intended to march back to the main army if the enemy didn't show, but since they had arrived right on cue...
“Wipe them all out.”
A death sentence fell from the Captain’s mouth. The enemy commander and his escort resisted, but the outcome was written in stone.
“Retreat! Retreat!” the commander shouted, charging forward himself.
It was an impressive sight. To charge into certain death while ordering a retreat meant he wanted to save even one more of his subordinates. Proper respect had to be shown.
The Border Guard Captain stepped forward.
Whir! Whir! Whir!
In his hand was a flail, its chain wailing as the iron weight at the end spun into a blur.
“I’ll send you off gently.”
The Captain did exactly as he said. The fight was short. One had become a commander through sheer martial prowess; the other was a specialist in using his head.
Whoosh.
The iron weight fell in an erratic, unpredictable trajectory.
Crack!
The Azpen commander’s head shattered, spraying blood and brain matter. That was the end of it.
“Aaaargh!”
It didn't take long to clean up the remaining stragglers.
Thunk!
With an axe buried in the head of the last enemy soldier, the battle was over. It was a scene truly fitting the title of the Frontier Slaughterers.
Leaving the slaughter behind, the Captain spoke.
“Return to the main army.”
The Border Guard quickly made their way back. They had intended to force a retreat or cut off supply lines, not shatter the enemy commander’s skull. How had the battlefield turned out like this? A mix of wonder, curiosity, and anticipation spurred their steps.
And what they finally saw there... were their allies roaring in victory.
It was a total triumph, with the traces of an overwhelming push visible to anyone. And there was no need to ask who stood at the center of it. To a man, they were the ones who had shattered the blades the enemy had prepared on every front.
The unit led by that man. The name of that group erupted amidst the cheers.
“The Mad Platoon!”
“Mad! Pla! Toon!”
“You crazy bastards!”
Battalion Commander Marcus did not stop the cheering. No, he made sure everyone knew exactly who the heroes of this battle were. He had the messengers shout the name of the Mad Platoon.
Amidst the cascading cheers, Encrid and the Mad Platoon stood tall. A circular ring of soldiers formed around them. Torres watched them, looking at Encrid’s face as he thought, It really is a gathering of lunatics.
Was there anyone sane in that group? And though no one would admit it, having experienced it firsthand, Encrid was also a madman. There were many reasons, but the biggest one was simple: Just getting along with those crazy bastards is proof enough of his madness.
Especially since he seemed to fit in so perfectly.
*
The Elf Company Commander muttered as she watched the cheers and the flow of the battlefield.
“Spring holds magic.”
Spring, the season of gentle breezes, had returned. The battle, which had begun at dawn, ended around noon. As the sun passed its zenith, a warm wind blew.
Spring. Like a flower born in winter that raises its head in the thaw, there was always magic in the warm breeze that followed the biting wind. Before the magic of spring that heralded a new beginning, a man who embodied that magic stood tall, bathed in the army's cheers.
The Elf Company Commander’s gaze followed him.
Encrid.
The face of the man leading the Mad Platoon entered her vision.
*
Encrid enjoyed the cheers.
Not bad.
Having people shout his name and call for the Mad Platoon felt right. He knew who had changed the tide of this battle. It was the work of his men.
Rem had killed the giant. Audin had broken the enemy’s formation. Sachsen must have done something as well—though he hadn't heard the details yet, he was certain of it. On top of that, he and Ragna had carved through the elites on the right flank. The ten mercenaries who used killing swords as their weapons would have slaughtered their allies if left unchecked.
We did well.
It wasn't bad at all. Enjoying these cheers was perfectly fine.
“Feels good?” Rem chuckled from beside him.
“Yeah.” Encrid was honest, as always.
“Seriously, you’re such an easy man to please,” Rem grumbled, giving up on teasing him. Why did the kid have to admit it so easily?
Just then, the others returned.
“Two men under Andrew, reporting back.”
No matter how much Rem beat him or Audin threatened him with "gentle" words, Andrew was proud to be a squad leader of the Mad Platoon. The blood splattered on their helmets made it clear they had fought fiercely.
Encrid nodded.
“Did you go and take some commander’s head? Or maybe a giant’s balls?” Having failed to tease his platoon leader, Rem shifted his target to Andrew.
“I think I cut down two hundred men with my own hands instead of a giant.”
It was a bluff. Anyone could tell it was a bluff. But since Andrew knew it, and everyone listening knew it, it wasn't unpleasant to hear. The atmosphere within the platoon was strangely warm.
“Bullshit,” Rem chuckled and let it go.
Ragna was also calm, as if he had vented whatever had been boiling inside him. He was in his usual relaxed, languid state. Above all, even Sachsen was smiling. As for Audin, there was no need to even mention him. He was the kind of man who would look like a holy paladin if only a halo shone behind him. He gently looked around, and even though he held a club stained dark red, he looked entirely at peace.
Krais watched everyone from the side and thought, How did we get this result?
Deducing the cause from the effect was one of Krais’s habits.
Did it start with that sparring match?
Krais prided himself on having the sharpest intuition in the platoon. He had sensed a strange air ever since the sparring matches that began after Encrid’s return. Rem, Ragna, Sachsen, Audin—the atmosphere around the four who formed the core of their martial power had changed.
Had they gotten into a better mood? Simply put, yes. But looking deeper, it felt as if some deep-seated congestion had been cleared. From a single sparring session? The same sparring they did every single day?
No.
He had watched his platoon leader fight Frok. And then he had seen him bite off the enemy commander’s ear. Whether that technique was the Valen-style Mercenary Sword or something else didn't matter. Krais had watched his platoon leader for a very long time. And the same went for the others.
Growth. And a meteoric one at that.
Even though they knew he would never be able to reach their level in the end, they had helped him because they knew their platoon leader would struggle desperately without ever giving up. They wanted him to stand, walk, and run.
Yet, every single member of the platoon knew. They had seen countless people fail to overcome the limits of talent. No matter what Encrid did, it was ultimately impossible for him to stand beside them.
But what about now?
“Good work, everyone,” Encrid spoke, standing before the entire platoon.
Looking at his back, Krais felt a lump in his throat. He was the same platoon leader as always, yet entirely different. The afternoon sunlight, the warm wind, the scent of the battlefield, rusted iron, the stench of blood, and the fragrance of death—everything mingled before receding.
Krais admitted to himself that he was intoxicated. Just looking at Encrid made him feel as if he had been hit by a charm spell. It had to be the magic of spring. Just like the saying passed down across the continent:
“Spring is bound to hold magic.”
The gazes of all the platoon members grew similar as they looked at Encrid. And it wasn't just them. The gaze of Battalion Commander Marcus, who had been watching from the side before approaching, was much the same.
“Raise your voices!” the battalion commander shouted, walking over with heavy steps. Marcus smiled at Encrid. “Cheer for the greatest hero of this battlefield!”
Between the sharp, thunderous cheers and the shouts calling for the Mad Platoon, the battalion commander’s words spread far and wide. A roar loud enough to shatter the spring sky erupted.
Uwooooah!
It was the cry of those intoxicated by the joy of victory and the magic of spring. It was the joy brought by triumph on the battlefield—and ultimately, a cheer for the man who had carved it out for them.
Encrid quietly savored the sound. It wasn't bad. It really wasn't bad.