Paonia
The nearby plains.
They had established their base there.
In particular, the two hundred hunters were monitoring not merely the village itself, but the entire surrounding region.
"More Paonia members joined today?"
"Yes, sir. Since we arrived, roughly seven hundred have come in."
"Leave them. If they insist on gathering in one place, so much the better."
They had cast a wide surveillance net that even accounted for underground routes. Every hole the enemy might use to slip away had been sealed.
Once Lady Alencia joins us like this…
Even after she arrived, an immediate assault would be difficult.
We'll have to evacuate the civilians first.
That would be no simple task either. Organization members could be hiding among the townsfolk. Factoring in the verification work, it would take considerable time.
"Troop status?"
"We're holding only minimal tension, sir."
"Good. It'll be weeks before we fight. Until then, keep the balance between tension and rest."
"Yes, sir!"
But my prediction was wrong.
Instead, the Paonia side marched out of the village themselves.
The nearby plains.
There the two armies faced each other.
Allied forces:
Phalanx — 1,000
Shield-bearers — 400
Crossbowmen — 600
Mercenaries — 300
Hunters — 200
Total: 2,500
Enemy forces:
Infantry — 3,000
Knights — 100
Total: 3,100
"Knights?"
Their armor left no room for doubt.
"How does Paonia field a hundred knights?"
It was far beyond what any single house could maintain.
"Their backer stepped forward, then?"
I had already expected someone stood behind Paonia. A ruined house could never have orchestrated something of this scale alone.
But they actually dispatched a hundred knights?
"Perfect. We wipe them out this time."
"Elwin! This is our chance. Since the enemy came out to us, there won't be civilian casualties."
Grandfather and Uncle were right.
A hundred knights had been unexpected, yet with these numbers we could still win. And if I were truly Elwin, I had to fight. I could not simply watch my mother's enemies walk right up to me.
"Inon. Celion. Philan."
The three mercenary captains stepped forward.
"Take your companies and stop those knights."
"Understood."
Ordinarily mercenaries were weaker than knights. But the men who had come here were the cream selected from three major companies, and they outnumbered the enemy three to one. They should be able to hold.
Leaving the knights to the mercenaries, I called for Hans.
"Hans. Annihilate them. And bring the Paonia family head to kneel before me."
"Yes, Young Lord!"
Steel whispered as Hans drew his sword and raised it high toward the sky. Then he roared.
"Phalanx formation!"
Clack. Clack.
The front ranks of the Phalanx lowered their long spears. In an instant they became a dense, bristling hedgehog.
"Advance!!"
The Phalanx began its slow, measured march. Matching their pace, the rest of the army moved with them.
The moment they entered crossbow range—
"Crossbowmen, load!"
"First rank, fire!"
A hundred arrows arced high into the sky. Before they even reached their apex, the next hundred left their strings.
"Second rank, fire!"
One hundred crossbowmen at a time, firing in relentless sequence so the enemy would never have a moment to breathe.
The arrows that had climbed to their peak turned earthward and poured down onto the heads of the enemy ranks.
"Hmm…?"
The enemy's equipment was ordinary. Swords and shields, yes—but mismatched, inconsistent, nothing suited to a true large-scale battle.
"Then why…?"
They had not even formed a tight wall of large shields, yet the damage was far too light. A rain of a hundred arrows dropped only three or four men. The next hundred felled scarcely more.
"Why…?"
"That's holy power!!"
Inon bellowed the words.
Holy power?
The Holy Royal Empire. Within the Empire, religion and politics held each other in careful balance; neither side could overwhelm the other. The chief reason was simple: their military strength was nearly equal.
The cult could field fewer men than the lords. Fewer knights, far fewer common soldiers. And yet they matched the lords in power.
The reason was holy power—more precisely, the buffs and healing of the priests. A high priest's blessing in particular could turn ordinary soldiers into elites worth ten men apiece.
"Hans."
"Yes, Young Lord!"
"Form the circular formation."
"…Understood! Phalanx—circular formation! Crossbowmen, into the center!"
The circular formation. An extreme defensive posture used only when pressed hard. Its virtue was that flanks and rear simply ceased to exist; every direction became the front.
"Hurry that formation!!"
The enemy moved with startling speed. Swords and shields in hand, they ran like track athletes.
Fortunately the Phalanx were trained elites themselves. Without a wasted step they locked into the circular formation and finished it before the enemy arrived.
Thrust. Thrust.
The Phalanx drove their long spears again and again. With that overwhelming reach the attacks should have been one-sided.
And yet—
"They're still standing after taking spear thrusts like that?"
The spears failed to punch clean through. Only the tip of each blade bit into the armor.
Thrust. Thrust.
Men who should have dropped after two or three hits required more than ten deep stabs before they finally fell back.
"Hold the line. Crossbowmen, keep firing! Shield-bearers, fill every gap!"
"Th-that…"
The priest groaned as he watched the field.
He had been told Elwin's troops were elite. But true elites belonged to the cult. Soldiers blessed by a priest became several times stronger—and he was no ordinary priest, but a high priest.
"Just how poorly did you train these men!"
He glared at the Paonia family head. Failing to overwhelm ordinary soldiers even under a high priest's blessing was proof that their base physical condition was wretched.
"They specialize in stealth and intelligence work. They're not suited to large-scale battle like this…"
"Why didn't you foresee it would come to this? This is exactly why the Empire cast you aside and your house was destroyed!"
The Paonia family head flinched. That history was the family's rawest nerve.
Clench. Unclench.
He opened and closed his fist out of long habit until his mind settled. They were in the same boat as the Moon Cult now. Only victory would let them survive this crisis.
"Aren't we still superior in stamina?"
A high priest's blessing raised strength, endurance, and agility across the board. In a prolonged fight that advantage should tell.
"Of course we are. We'll win in the end. I'm simply furious we can't crush them outright."
Not only his own holy power, but that of every priest present had been poured into the troops. The results still left him unsatisfied.
Ten minutes. Twenty minutes.
One full hour.
For that long hour the fighting raged without pause—and the side that began to tire was not Elwin's army, but the buffed soldiers.
"Why… how can this be the result…? Could there be Earth priests over there? Do they have priests of their own?!"
"At this rate our men will break first! We must send the temple knights now!"
"…"
He had wanted to spare the temple knights if at all possible.
"No choice, then?"
The priest turned his gaze toward the waiting temple knights.
After an hour of grinding close combat, the shape of victory and defeat slowly began to emerge.
"A priest's buff is truly terrifying."
The Phalanx—arguably the strongest formation in a frontal clash—had been held for a full hour by ordinary infantry.
"First rank, fall back! Second rank to the front!"
Those men excelled not only in attack and defense but in raw stamina as well. Had the Phalanx not rotated ranks, their own endurance would have collapsed first.
Armor, training, formation—every advantage we hold, and one priest's blessing still made them our equals in numbers.
It drove home again that this was another world: a world where mana and holy power truly existed.
"Young Lord! The enemy knights are moving!"
One hundred knights. Almost certainly one hundred temple knights—Sword Experts who also wielded holy power. Looking at Inon alone was proof of how much stronger such blessings made a man. These would be no easy opponents.
"Inon, Celion, Philan. Don't overreach. Fight as defensively as you can."
"Understood. Innocent Mercenary Unit—sortie!"
"Leave it to us. Salamander Mercenary Unit—sortie!"
"We'll be careful. Chase Mercenary Unit—sortie!"
Three hundred mercenaries charged the temple knights.
Mercenaries three hundred versus temple knights one hundred.
Both sides thundered toward each other. When the distance closed enough, aura bloomed along every blade—mercenary and temple knight alike. Up to that point they were equals.
Then the problem appeared.
"Ugh…"
Brilliant light wrapped the bodies of the temple knights.
BOOM!
BOOM!!
At the last instant the mercenary companies angled their charge. They avoided a head-on collision and instead scraped past, combat exploding along the glancing line.
Even so, the first clash unhorsed more than twenty mercenaries. Most lay where they fell, too badly hurt to rise. Only three temple knights were thrown—and every one of them stood again.
"Inon! Buy time!"
That first exchange made the truth plain: three hundred mercenaries could not defeat one hundred temple knights.
"Crossbowmen! Massed fire on the temple knights!"
Crossbow bolts would never pierce the knights themselves. But the horses they rode…
The mercenaries opened distance. In that gap six hundred arrows poured toward the temple knights. The knights blocked nearly every shaft.
Nearly.
A dozen arrows still found horseflesh. Three mounts went down hard.
"Crossbowmen, load!"
"Crossbowmen, fire!"
"Crossbowmen, load!"
"Crossbowmen, fire!"
They hammered the temple knights with relentless volleys and brought down nine horses in total. Not a single knight fell.
"Young Lord! The temple knights are charging us!"
Abandoning pursuit of the mercenaries, the temple knights wheeled and drove straight at the Phalanx.
"Phalanx formation! Hold the line!"
Thudududu.
Thudududu.
The closer the knights came, the louder the thunder of hooves grew.
Then—
BOOOOM!!!
BOOOOOM!!!
The deafening crash of iron on iron rolled across the field. The great cloud of dust raised by the cavalry charge slowly cleared.
"What the… fuck?"
The curse left my mouth before I could stop it.