What Cannot Be Helped (4)
"Goddammit. Of all things."
The senior knight in charge of the reserve unit spat the curse through his teeth. A 3rd-grade rift appearing was already burden enough. The things that came boiling out of it were a far uglier problem.
"What will you do, sir? Deploy a strike team?"
The enemy was a pack of 3rd-grade demonic beasts. They could barely afford to meet them as a single massed line — and now someone was talking about a strike team. On any ordinary day that suggestion would have earned a dressing-down on the spot. This time, no one raised a word against it. The things lumbering toward them had to be delayed, and they had to be delayed now.
Goddamn Bull Turtles.
It was impossible to tell whether the creature was supposed to be a bull or a turtle. Perhaps that was what you would get if the two animals ever produced offspring. No — that wasn't right. Anything born of those two should at least still look like an animal. This looked like a pair of demons that had rolled around in hell until they fused into one.
"So your vote is for the strike team?"
"Trying to face them with formation alone is too much."
"It's still far too dangerous."
Their hide was as hard as a turtle's shell, and their strength was a bull's — more than any man could reasonably bear. They were slower than most demonic beasts, which was the one mercy. In a fight like this, that mercy was also the worst of their difficulties. You could lock a formation and hold, and you would still lose the contest of raw force. Then you would have no choice but to send a strike team in from every side and start stabbing. These were not 5th-grade beasts, or even 4th. They were 3rd-grade. One mistake and the strike team itself would be the one that died.
"On any other day we might have waited to see how it developed. This is not any other day."
The senior knight could only groan. Three rifts had opened. They had to break one of them before any of the three broke them. They had to encircle before they were encircled.
"Get the knights ready. If it comes to it, we punch through from the flanks."
A heavy, rolling thunder of hooves and hide drew closer. Once the range closed enough, the order to loose was given.
Arrows tore the air and flew hard — and unlike the volleys falling on the main force, these bounced away as if they had struck stone. A 3rd-grade demonic beast's body was brutally tough to begin with. That these happened to be Bull Turtles only made the hardness worse. They kept shooting anyway. Luck might still open a small wound. Better luck might put a shaft in an eye.
"They're closing."
"Pull the archers back. Knights stand ready. Infantry, form the line — same as always."
He made it sound like nothing. It was not nothing. These were 3rd-grade beasts that even knights faced ready to die. No army, however well drilled, was going to come through without a mistake.
Please. Let as few as possible be hurt, and even fewer die.
The demonic beasts crashed in almost on top of them, and at last the fighting locked together in earnest. The beasts bellowed. The soldiers screamed. It was a collision between things that had to push forward, fill their bellies, and live, and men who could not afford to be pushed back — who had to kill if they wanted to see another day. That raw, mutual desperation occupied the same stretch of ground and dragged the melee on.
The senior knight watched the field and decided to commit the knights. It was a shade early, but at this rate the line would break first. He was just lifting his hand to give the order when a strange sound rolled out from among the Bull Turtles.
He had fought these things more than once. He knew that sound. It was the warning they made when they themselves were under attack. He had not given any attack order. There was no reason that cry should have been coming from them at all.
"Who is it! Who broke formation! I haven't even given the order yet!"
Going off on one's own did not merely get a man killed. It could unravel an entire army and wipe it out. He had told them, and told them again, to obey orders without fail. Who, then, had been unable to wait and gone charging out alone?
The adjutant's next words left him stunned.
"It isn't us! Those aren't our soldiers! Everyone is in position!"
"Then what the hell is—"
The beasts' cries kept changing. At first they had been thick with outrage. Somewhere along the way the bellowing turned mournful.
What? What in God's name is happening out there?
The clash between soldiers and beasts ground on, and at last he understood. Far off, a single man was sweeping through the demonic beasts alone.
In the old days they used to bet on who could kill more. Adel had won every time, and his comrades had resented him for it. Can't you ease up a little? Do you have to grit your teeth through every single one? The one mercy was that Adel himself did not drink, so winning never meant anyone had to buy him a round. Whenever his comrades wanted a drink, they would start a wager on their own.
A 3rd-grade demonic beast's hide was hard to begin with. Among them, the Bull Turtle was harder still. None of that meant a thing to Adel. Hard things broke eventually. If something was too hard to break, you dug into the weak spot instead. No matter how difficult the prey, prey was still prey.
The Bull Turtles felt it — a predator they could not handle had arrived. Save for the handful still shoving at the soldiers, nearly dozens of them wheeled and came at Adel at once.
Two hundred twenty-seven seconds.
In the middle of it he counted the seconds, calm as still water. He could not be late. The timing had to be exact.
A blade shimmering with cold blue light slid into a seam in the shell that even the knights did not know existed. Blood sprayed. Another demonic beast left the world. He let two charging beasts rush past him as if they were nothing, caught the next one by the skull, threw his body with it, and drove the point cleanly through the eye of the one coming in from behind. There was no roar and no scream. The sword had gone straight into the brain. It died on the spot.
Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill.
With every death the killing intent thickened. What he wanted — what he truly wanted — was to butcher every last one of these filthy things in front of him. Not this tidy business of finding a weak point and ending them clean. He wanted to take the legs off, gouge the eyes out, split the bellies while they were still alive. He wanted to wring every drop of blood from the bodies, pile the corpses into a mound, and make a pool of what came out. Fifth-grade or first-grade, small or large — a demonic beast was a demonic beast. The only good demonic beast was a dead one. Kill. Kill. Kill—
You can take it easy.
Sien's voice rose suddenly from somewhere deep in him. She had said it as casually as she could manage, but Adel was no fool. He knew she was worried about him. She, too, had suffered a terrible tragedy because of demonic beasts. Her hunger for revenge would have been greater than his, not less. So why had she said that to him? Why not kill them all — why take it easy? What, exactly, had she been afraid of?
You understand, don't you, Adel?
The moment he had looked into her eyes, he had known. He would have no choice but to answer. More precisely, he would have no choice but to give her the answer she wanted.
...As she said. I don't need to kill them all.
There was her request, and there was the promise he had made. There was also a simpler truth: if he did everything himself, they would have nothing left to do.
This is precious combat experience. Every time I run wild, I take that away from them.
The way to fight better was to fight more. This was not his battle. It was theirs. These were the people who had taken up spear and sword to protect Lichtenauer land and Lichtenauer lives. He had no right to ruin a fight that sacred.
Or so Adel told himself, hanging a reason on what he was doing. As for the nameless feeling that kept pushing the killing intent back, he chose to regard it as nothing more than curiosity toward Sien.
He cut, and cut again. He struck, and bone gave, and hide split. Moderately. Not too much. He pressed the killing intent down and let himself lean, just a little, on that warmth he could not name.
"Wh-what in the world is that..."
"That's impossible."
The men watching had nothing left to say. The line was beginning to shove the beasts in front of it back. Knights had gone in and were hammering the flanks. And still, most of the demonic beasts had their attention locked on a single man — a man who seemed to welcome them, and who was turning them into well-worked meat with a force that did not belong on a human field.
"Th-that young man... he isn't — is he?"
"That's him. The attendant they appointed as the family head's escort."
"Is that even a person? Even our knights couldn't—"
The knight's mouth snapped shut. The man who had been butchering demonic beasts was suddenly coming straight toward him.
"Five hundred twelve seconds... five hundred thirteen seconds..."
"...I beg your pardon?"
"I'll be taking my leave."
Why he was counting, where he thought he was going, what in heaven's name he even was — they wanted to ask all of it. Not one of the knights called out to Adel, or tried to stop him. They could only stare, some blank, some already sliding toward awe.
The ground that young man had swept through had already become a complete victory for the reserve unit.
Adel swung into the saddle and drove hard for where Sien had been. A moment later he was at her side. On any other return he would have spoken — told her he was back. Even Adel could not open his mouth so easily now.
"The left! The left is about to go. Pull the center out at once and send them in support!"
"Yes, my lady."
"The 4th-grade rift is weakest at the center. Shorten the front if you have to — concentrate everything there. If the center breaks, it's finished. All of it!"
Not far from the main force still locked in combat, Sien was pouring out orders without pause, holding the battle together by sheer will.
"...Adel."
"Lady Sien."
"The reserve unit?"
"It is nearly finished. Once they clear the field, form ranks, and return this way, they will be here in thirty minutes at the latest."
The good news put a smile at the corner of Sien's mouth. The smile became a sigh, and the sigh became fury.
"Ah—!"
Before her order could even reach them, the allied flank folded. The center, thrown in at a run, barely managed to plug the gap — but several soldiers were already cut off, ringed by demonic beasts.
"Aaaagh!"
"Aaaah!"
There was noise everywhere. Sien's ears heard only the screams of the men the beasts had surrounded. Those terrible, wretched voices were unbearably clear.
Steel rang as she drew. She was already gathering the horse to ride for them when Adel, close at her side, caught the reins.
"Let go, Adel."
"..."
"I have to go. My people are being hurt over there. They're dying."
"..."
Even through that desperate plea, Adel did not release the reins.
"Let go of me, Adel! I—"
If dying in the fight was the duty of those who stood at the front, then taking those deaths fully into one's own eyes — accepting the result, answering for it, reflecting on it, and seeing that it did not happen again — that was the duty of the one who commanded.