Chapter 408: Ten Thousand Wraiths
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 408: Ten Thousand Wraiths
Count Molsen was no strategic genius, but he possessed a wide-angle view of the battlefield.
He operated outside the boundaries of his opponent's expectations.
Just as the battle reached its peak, a portion of the Count’s army broke formation. Slipping away through the chaos of combat, they appeared to be nothing more than fleeing deserters.
The Kingdom’s commander saw no reason to pursue them. It was only natural to see cowards bolt when the tide turned, and the Count’s forces were already heavily outnumbered. If they wanted to run, it was a welcome relief.
In other words, they became a detachment that no one bothered to watch.
Grouping in twos and threes, they dispersed and reconvened, guided by a telepathic command echoing in their minds.
‘Find the source of the magic.’
Naturally, their destination was right in front of Andrew. Watching the group of soldiers who had formed this surprise strike force, Andrew spoke calmly.
"Are you sleeping? I think it’s time to wake up."
Even at Andrew’s words, Esther did not budge. Instead, a single trickle of blood ran down the corner of her mouth. It was proof that Esther, too, was fighting her own battle.
Andrew let out a heavy sigh. The situation was a total shitshow. The fighting beyond the immediate battlefield had stopped, and suddenly, these crazy-eyed bastards had popped out of nowhere.
‘Where the hell did they come from?’
It was an entirely unexpected ambush.
‘And why here, of all places?’
This wasn't where the supplies were kept, nor was it where Krang was stationed. Tactically speaking, this location held absolutely no significance.
It had to be because of Esther. Andrew’s thoughts quickly reached that conclusion.
There were over fifty infantrymen, and every single one of them looked formidable. He would have preferred fifty ghouls instead.
"My Lord, their eyes..." the freckled trainee said, taking a terrified step back.
Andrew had noticed it too. Whether from ruptured capillaries or something more sinister, blood welled in their eyes and streamed down their cheeks like tears. Even in the ones who looked relatively normal, there were no whites left in their eyes. They had blood-red sclerae and pitch-black pupils.
A simple change in their eyes, yet they no longer looked human. The sheer intimidation radiating from them was suffocating. Andrew grit his teeth.
‘Should we retreat?’
Though he and his five trainees had formed a defensive perimeter around Esther, fighting here was suicide. But what about carrying Esther and running?
The bastards weeping blood all held their swords low, their thigh muscles bulging as if about to burst. What on earth had they done to make their legs so unnaturally thick?
‘Outrunning them is out of the question.’
It would be a close call even if he fled alone; escaping while carrying an unconscious mage was impossible.
Despite it being broad daylight, the sky seemed to be growing darker. The heat of the main battlefield was right before them, yet a subtle chill crept into the air. No—he had felt something akin to heat just moments ago, but now it felt freezing.
The enemy approached without any formal formation. There was an ancient legend about an angel who wept tears of blood while fighting, and these men looked like the living embodiment of that dark fable. It was said the angel fought at the gods' behest but wept because they did not wish to kill.
Of course, these bastards were the exact opposite. They were monsters who had ingested drugs to push their physical capabilities to the absolute limit.
"M-M-Mage... t-t-tear... k-k-kill..."
The one in the center, the only one not weeping blood, stammered. His speech was frustrating to listen to, but his intent was clear. Their target was the mage.
What was the main army doing, letting these bastards slip through? Did the Captain even know what was happening over here? It was a reasonable grievance for Andrew to harbor.
"My Lord."
One of the trainees called out to him. A rational choice remained. If they fled now, they could survive. He had no formal obligation to protect a woman named Esther.
"If I cannot even protect a single person behind my back, what could I possibly hope to achieve?"
Words the Captain had once spoken flashed through his mind. Andrew reflected on the time they had spent together since he first met Encrid in a moment of crisis. What had he learned from watching that man?
"If I run away because I cannot protect a single woman, how can I ever defend my honor? If I must survive in such a manner, I would rather discard the name Gardner from this day forward."
Rather than run, he would die here.
"P-P-Piss..."
"You piss off," Andrew snapped, cutting off the stammering idiot. "Let's fight to the death."
The freckled trainee nodded, assigning positions to the other four. Andrew stood in the center and swung his sword in a sharp vertical arc. A downward strike—a declaration of resolve.
The enemy detachment charged, drooling alongside their tears of blood.
"Arghhhhh!"
The sound was a horrific blend of a battle cry and a death scream. The opponents were as troublesome as their appearance suggested. Their low-hanging sword swings were fast and powerful; they kicked with bone-shattering force and clawed with jagged fingernails.
Andrew wondered if these things were even human. He wondered if their mothers had actually been ghouls, as the old soldiers' jokes went. A half-human, half-ghoul hybrid—it was absurd, yet such bastards stood right before his eyes.
"Come at me, you miserable bastards!" Andrew roared.
He had already been slashed in the thigh, and his leg wouldn't move properly, but what did that matter? It was at that moment of desperate endurance that the world shook.
Crash!
Andrew thought a catapult stone had flown in from nowhere. Blood was pouring from a gash on his scalp, obscuring his vision and painting the world red. From the periphery, he saw a chariot charging relentlessly.
On closer inspection, it wasn't a chariot, but a person. She battered the enemy with a flat mace in her left hand and crushed them with a broadsword in her right.
‘Red potato.’
Andrew thought the nickname to himself as he stared at the mashed enemy soldiers. He had reached his limit long ago; help had arrived just as he was about to kick the bucket.
It was Teresa, the half-giant female warrior.
Beside her came Dunchabel. Holding scimitars in both hands, Dunchabel rampaged like a crazed shaman. The curved blades in her hands slashed, stabbed, and whirled, battering the enemy into pieces. Ruthlessly slaughtering the detachment, they leaped to a halt right in front of Andrew.
"Hey, you alright?"
"You look so beautiful to me right now," Andrew said, wiping the blood from his eyes.
"I've always been beautiful."
"The other one looks even more beautiful," Andrew added, gesturing over Dunchabel’s shoulder.
Teresa’s shield and sword were moving like a meat grinder. The word 'merciless' was meant for moments like this. The massive female warrior, whose sheer scale distorted one's sense of perspective, crushed, smashed, and shredded over a dozen enemy soldiers in an instant.
To anyone else, she was the furthest thing from 'beautiful,' but Andrew was entirely sincere. These two had saved his life. He could have said far more than that.
Andrew collapsed to the ground.
Just before setting out toward the Count, Encrid had sent Dunchabel and Teresa to Esther. The fact that Esther had sent an astral projection to speak to him meant she was in a situation where she couldn't come herself. And that, in turn, was evidence of a dangerous situation.
It was a judgment made through reason, not mere intuition. That was why Dunchabel and Teresa had come here.
Of course, in the midst of this, Dunchabel had looked at the Count and felt a sense of shame alongside an instinctual dread. Teresa was irritated because she felt her own skills were still lacking. Yet, in such a state, they had found someone who needed them and had saved him.
Looking at Andrew, the two of them felt their moods lift slightly.
Cough!
Just before Teresa and Dunchabel completely wiped out the remaining ambushers, Andrew saw Esther cough up blood. She opened her eyes briefly.
"Lady Witch?" Andrew called out, but Esther did not reply. She closed her eyes again.
Something had clearly gone wrong.
*
Rejecting the Count’s mana that had pushed her out, Esther opened her eyes once more in the inner world. She saw something like black soot spreading outward, centered around the Count.
‘I’ve been bested.’
To be precise, it wasn't so much that she had been outplayed, but rather that it couldn't be helped. Her opponent was a prepared mage, and Esther had not yet fully recovered her mana. Had her Spell World been intact, she wouldn't have suffered this even if she had seen it coming.
‘So what?’
Esther had seen a man who refused to give up, and she had learned from him. Furthermore, Esther knew her own lofty pride all too well. Her self-esteem, bordering on arrogance, would not allow her to back down like this.
‘Did you think I would retreat?’
She could not tolerate leaving the board set up by that mage bastard of a Count intact. If overcoming it head-on was difficult, she would simply use another method.
‘A backup plan.’
Of course, this required a few prerequisites. For starters, the source of that soot—the entity generating the mana—had to be beaten half to death or killed outright.
‘Enki will do it.’
A mage’s speculation is a prophecy—a conclusion drawn by weighing the circumstances. But what Esther said to herself was no prophecy. Nor was it a mere wish.
It was faith. It was the trust built by watching how a certain man lived his life. Enki was a man who did what he set out to do.
Believing so, Esther prepared her backup plan.
*
The Count did not vent his anger. Throwing a tantrum just because things didn't go his way was something only a child would do.
‘Can I not handle the problem that has arisen?’
‘I can.’
‘Has the plan gone completely awry?’
‘Hardly.’
His cold intellect quickly cooled his irritation. Though he was angered by the distortion of the magic circle he had prepared, this much was still sufficient. He couldn't swallow the entire kingdom in one go, but he could end a single battlefield.
‘But didn't I originally need an intact kingdom?’
This was an endeavor born of a lust for power. As he tried to recall his past self, another version of himself asked:
‘Does that matter?’
The Count replied.
‘No.’
Whether it was black or white, a throne was a throne.
Increase your thralls. Stain the world.
After murmuring the words in his heart, the Count chanted spell after spell, using the prepared magic circle as his foundation. In truth, it was a spell that another self within him had been chanting continuously since the very start of the battle.
Whether because the ambush had failed or not, the mage who had interfered with his Spell World was still alive. Well, that was a problem for later. For now, weeding out the souls of those approaching from ahead took priority.
The Count raised the hand holding his staff. As he pointed the staff forward, something like black soot began to spread from its tip.
The sky, which had been broad daylight despite the gloom, began to turn even darker. From behind the Count, dark clouds resembling the chair he sat upon began to roll in. The heavy clouds, devoid of even a single rumble of thunder, were ominous just to look at.
The dark sky blocked out the sunlight. It seemed poised to paint everything in black.
"W-What is that?" A Kingdom soldier looked up, startled by the bizarre sight.
The black sky gradually expanded until it touched the ground. A portion of the soot crept forward and brushed against the soldier’s arm. It must have happened because the dark clouds were so thick. Yes, that had to be it. But how could such a shadow exist when there was no sunlight?
His cold reason said so, but his instincts screamed otherwise. The soldier tried to brush off the soot touching his arm, but it spread rapidly, soon seizing his limbs.
"Argh..."
Soon, he felt something else intruding into his body. It was nothing physical.
Give me your body.
It was a wraith invading his mind. The soldier’s eyes glazed over until only the whites remained, and he began to drool heavily. Seeing the result, the Count laughed.
"Try and withstand my Ten Thousand Wraiths!"
His voice echoed across the entire battlefield, brimming with confidence. The overlapping voices mercilessly shook the minds of ordinary humans. The soot itself was a wraith that drained human vitality.
The densest parts of it reached the five who were approaching the Count.
Encrid heard someone whispering to him.
Give me your body.
Before he could even reply, his Will of Rejection reacted reflexively. Soot like this couldn't stain his resolve in the slightest. The wraith was repelled by his Will.
...Give me your body.
Bounce.
...
The wraith turned away from Encrid.
A wraith approached Rem as well, but Rem knew how to deal with such entities. Still, he had no desire to touch such an unpleasant fluid. It was like seeing a rotten egg in the midsummer heat—you simply didn't want to lay a finger on it. After all, wasn't it human nature to pinch one's nose at a foul stench?
And so, Rem swung his axe.
Whoosh.
Along the vertical path of his axe blade, the wraith’s will dispersed. Since he still possessed the sorcery power obtained from the Immortal Madman, cutting down a wraith was hardly even worth calling a trick. Even without sorcery power, it was something he could have pulled off using some cheap trick.
Ragna ignored it. The wraith clung tightly to Ragna, but it received no reaction whatsoever.
Give me your body. Can't you hear me? Give me your body.
Ragna ignored it consistently, and the wraith eventually gave up. Even if it wouldn't listen, it had to receive a reaction for the wraith to do anything. No wraith could pierce Ragna’s rock-like resolve.
Sachsen, who was following slightly behind the group, felt the approaching wraith and dodged it. The soot seemed to spread without leaving any gaps, but if one looked closely and felt it, there were plenty of places to evade. It wasn't all that difficult. Even if he couldn't dodge, it didn't matter. If things went south, he could just use a straw doll artifact. Inside Sachsen’s coat, there were a few items he had prepared just in case.
Audin accepted the wraith. He alone showed benevolence and tolerance.
‘Welcome, for the Lord awaits.’
What a pitiful soul. He would embrace it. To think it could not rest in peace even in death. He felt like crying. Indeed, a small tear welled in the corner of his eye.
Within Audin lay hidden divinity. It was merely bound by a restriction. The wraith eagerly burrowed into Audin, only to encounter a mass of divinity bound by that restriction. It didn't even have time to scream. It was instantly obliterated, sent straight to the Lord’s side.
For a wraith, this was the most horrific death possible. There was a reason divinity was the natural enemy of undead and wraith-type monsters. Divine power inflicted the most agonizing pain upon them.
Of course, Audin knew this well.
‘For He said that pain must be endured on the path to the Lord’s side.’
He did it knowing full well, out of his profound consideration for the wraith.
The Count frowned as the momentum of the five approaching him did not diminish in the slightest. Not only that, but there were those resisting his 'soot wraiths' all over the place—around that fellow Krang, and several others besides.
"Impudent bastards..." the Count muttered, waving his staff.
If he couldn't break their minds, he would simply tear their bodies apart.
"Let's see you block this as well."
He commanded, and from the base of the chair where he sat, figures using the black soot as flesh rose along the path of his staff. They were Wraith Soldiers. Manifesting the wraiths in reality, connected to his Spell World, their numbers reached ten thousand.
A black wave had suddenly formed, blocking the path of Encrid and the Mad Company. Encrid did not hesitate, even when looking at the vast, dark wave.
Who was the most skilled at this kind of battle?
"Rem."
The crazy axe master.
"...I'm not really in the mood, but..." Rem saw the approaching horde of wraiths and recognized that they had to break through. So, though he didn't like it, he spoke up. "Let's form a battle formation."
It was a suggestion to line up for a specific purpose. It was a phrase that truly did not suit the Mad Company.