Chapter 158
Chapter 158
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 158
Chapter Title: The Tide Turns
-----------------------------------------------------------------
The reinforcements had arrived far earlier than scheduled.
The flagging morale of our forces began to stir once more.
“Push them back!”
“Don’t give them another inch of the wall!”
The commanders’ desperate shouts from atop the walls were now filled with strength.
The soldiers’ answering cries were brimming with fighting spirit.
But that alone was not enough to drive out the enemies who had breached the fortress.
The foes paid no mind to the presence of reinforcements.
They rampaged madly, as if their sole purpose was to tear apart the soldiers before them.
The fortress was still in peril, and it would take more time for the reinforcements to join the battle.
The old knight hesitated for a moment.
Should he join the fight now that his sword was drawn, or should he entrust the fortress's future to the soldiers?
The former option made him worry about the elder-class heteromorphs who would join the fray later, while the latter made him worry if the fortress could even hold out until the reinforcements arrived.
Neither choice was easy.
As he was about to make a decision after much thought…
“I will take the gate.”
Someone stepped in front of him.
It was a low-ranking knight from the frontier.
His iron armor was a crumpled mess, and his helmet was nowhere to be seen, lost somewhere along the way.
But his expression was quite reassuring.
*Nod.*
The old knight sheathed the sword he had drawn.
“I’ll leave it in your hands, Knight Rocarno.”
The frontier knight’s eyes widened.
Was it because of the words of trust, or the fact that his name was remembered?
The old knight couldn't be certain what had moved him so.
“I will defend the gate with my honor!”
All he knew for sure was that the frontier knight would not easily surrender the gate to the enemy.
*Bow.*
After a slight bow, the frontier knight headed straight for the gate.
He then charged at a troll that had just torn through the gate and broken in.
The old knight watched him for a moment before turning his head.
He saw the cadets of Team 3, holding a corner of the collapsed wall.
They were focusing more on holding their position than on recklessly cutting down enemies.
Forming a shield wall to push back the enemy, they looked more like soldiers than squires, but it wasn’t a bad sight.
After all, the number of enemies that could attack at once was limited.
Seeing their skill in deftly managing that number, he felt he wouldn't have to worry for a while.
The same went for the top of the walls.
Of course, he hadn't confirmed this with his own eyes.
He was merely guessing from the fluctuating morale atop the ramparts.
While there was nothing he could do immediately about the western wall, which had already been seized by the enemy, it didn't seem like they would lose any other sections.
The old knight closed his eyes.
The enemy’s aura, as fierce and viscous as a beast's, was still potent.
But the morale of the allied forces confronting it was no less formidable.
He could feel it clearly.
The tide of battle was turning.
The scales of victory, which had tipped completely, were now tilting back toward them.
All these changes had occurred after the reinforcements, who had arrived earlier than expected, made their appearance.
He didn't know why they had rushed here in such a hurry, but in any case, it was a relief that their arrival had revived the army’s spirit.
He closed his eyes and focused on the flow of the battlefield.
So he could charge in the instant an elder-class heteromorph revealed itself.
While the old knight waited for the moment to draw his sword, the reinforcements drew ever closer to the fortress.
“Aaargh! Get off!”
“Dieeeee!”
Exhausted soldiers grit their teeth and thrust their spears and swords.
“Just hold on a little longer!”
“The reinforcements are right in front of us!”
The commanders urged their men on, their voices cracked and hoarse.
“Don’t let your guard down until the very end!”
“Let our guard down? We’re all about to die!”
The Cradle cadets, who had been seeking out the most dangerous spots since the battle began, squeezed out their last ounces of strength to cut down the enemy.
“Guwoooh!”
“Kyaaaah!”
The heteromorphs, their eyes rolled back to whites, scrambled up the walls.
Drool dripped from their mouths; they were the very image of demons.
The battle grew even more intense.
Enraged screams and bloodthirsty roars mingled together.
One side threw themselves forward to kill their opponents; the other threw themselves forward to survive.
Their reasons were different, but the result was impartial.
Corpses piled up, both on and below the walls.
The red blood flowing from the dead pooled and formed streams.
Death, indiscriminate of friend or foe, settled over everything.
“Is that really a thousand? You’re lying, right?”
“Looks more like five thousand to me!”
For the survivors, time passed with cruel slowness.
“They showed up ages ago, why aren’t they joining the fight yet?!”
“Are these bastards crawling here on their hands and knees? They’ll arrive after we’re all dead!”
And just as that cruelty turned into futile resentment…
*Swoooosh!*
Hundreds of spears rained down from the sky.
*Thwack.*
The heteromorphs climbing the walls were each skewered by one to four or five spears, tumbling down just like that.
“Allies are starting to hammer the enemy from outside the fortress!”
The fortress soldiers, who had been desperately waiting for the reinforcements to join the fray, erupted in cheers.
*Thud, thud, thud.*
Through the cheers, a heavy noise echoed.
It was a sound all too familiar to the Imperial Army—the distinctive footfalls of fully armed heavy infantry.
The heavy infantry’s advance was, as always, not fast.
It didn't need to be.
“Kwaaaah!”
The heteromorphs, who had been hell-bent on tearing apart the humans before them, finally noticed the enemy appearing from their rear and turned around.
“Set spears!”
Just as a clear voice, unsuited for the battlefield, rang out, the heavy infantry’s shield wall bristled with sharp points.
The heteromorphs that charged recklessly were instantly impaled on the spears and died.
“Maintain formation! Keep advancing!”
“Hup, hah! Hup, hah!”
The heavy infantry continued to advance.
The heteromorphs that had been clinging to the walls and wailing began to break away one after another.
There was no need to struggle up a wall when prey was within arm’s reach just by turning around.
It was, in a way, natural that the heteromorphs, consumed by bloodlust, chose the closer meal.
Unfortunately for them, however, the heavy infantry were by no means easy prey.
They were the finest elite soldiers of the 13th Legion, hardened by numerous large-scale battles and brushes with death.
They learned this fact as their bodies were pierced and slashed by spears.
In an instant, dozens of heteromorphs were slain.
Most were smaller types that had been pushed aside by other species and hadn't even gotten a chance to climb the grappling hooks, but the number of medium-sized ones was not insignificant.
“Why is it so easy?”
“Is that even possible?”
The Cradle cadets, finally able to catch their breath, watched the scene with wide eyes.
The enemies they could barely defeat with all their might, even with the support of the fortress walls, were being cut down with such ease.
It was a sight so unbelievable that their own struggles felt futile.
In the past, they would have just scoffed and moved on.
But now was different.
“So that’s the power of a shield wall…”
“They can even divide roles like that.”
None of the Cradle cadets were ignorant of how the Imperial Army fought.
But simply knowing the theory and witnessing it firsthand in battle were worlds apart.
“I think they fight better than us.”
At someone’s murmur, the cadets frowned.
In terms of individual skill, the cadets were overwhelmingly superior.
There was no need to even consider their backgrounds.
Any Cradle cadet had the skill to face ten soldiers alone.
Even against an enemy in formation, they would at least not lose.
However.
“I wonder if a single team of cadets could handle a centuria.”
They couldn't be sure about the follow-up question.
No, to be honest, they were skeptical.
Ten cadets versus one hundred soldiers in a shield wall.
If they met on the battlefield, the cadets’ defeat would be certain.
They wouldn't even be able to approach the formation, let alone break it, and would end up skewered on spears like kebabs.
A train of thought led to a single hypothesis.
What if that centuria wasn't made of ordinary soldiers, but of squires?
What if a hundred knights moved as one like that?
How much power would they wield on the battlefield?
*Thump, thump.*
Just imagining it made their hearts beat faster.
It would be a lie to say they hadn't been dissatisfied with the Cradle’s changed educational policy until now.
Engaging in brawls like common soldiers was an unbearable dishonor for a squire.
That was why, even after seeing Team 3’s performance in the team-based mock battles, their minds were only slightly swayed.
They had only grudgingly followed the Cradle’s new training methods.
But not anymore.
“Hup, hah! Hup, hah!”
The sight of the soldiers advancing shoulder to shoulder was different from what they had imagined.
They didn't look like low-class brawlers, nor did they look dishonorable.
“That’s… pretty cool.”
On the contrary, there was something about it that made their hearts pound.
But to admit it right away felt like a blow to their pride.
“You idiots! Is this the time for chatter?!”
So they decided to mend their wounded pride by cutting down the enemies before them.
But even as they fought a desperate battle against the heteromorphs, they couldn't help but keep glancing at the heavy infantry’s fight unfolding below the walls.
* * *
“The brats had better be watching.”
While commanding the heavy infantry, I continuously monitored the situation on the walls.
I hoped that the brats, stubbornly clinging to their bizarre obsession with one-on-one duels, would learn something from watching the heavy infantry fight.
It would slightly increase their chances of survival in the horrific war to come.
If I could wish for one more thing, it would be for them to spark a small change in this world's atmosphere, so rife with vanity and pretense.
Thirty-odd talents, carefully selected from all over the Empire, should be enough to become that small spark.
But that was a story for the more distant future.
“Fire Pouches, ready!”
For now, ending this battle was the priority.
At my command, the soldiers took out their Fire Pouches in unison.
If I had my way, I would have surrounded the entire area around the walls with a barrier of fire, but our supplies were insufficient.
I had tried to use them sparingly, but oil wasn't infinite, and it couldn't be helped.
“Ready on one, throw on three! Mind your spacing when you throw!”
For now, the best I could do was to hound the soldiers, hoping to achieve the maximum effect with the few we had left.
“One, two, three!”
As soon as the order was given, the soldiers threw the Fire Pouches.
*Fwoosh.*
A wall of flames erupted between our forces and the enemy.
“Pikemen! Thrust!”
The city-allied pikemen, who had been waiting in the rear, stepped forward in unison and thrust their pikes over the flames.
I had no idea how many of those thrusts would reach the enemy.
But it wasn't a major problem.
If they didn't connect, they just had to keep thrusting until they did.
The role of these conscripts was simply to keep the enemy in check so our flanks wouldn't be exposed.
Now was not the time to go all out, but to wait.
The enemy, having lost their base and thoroughly enraged, would be looking for an opportunity somewhere.
To take revenge on us for burning their home to the ground.
In the first place, their choice of an all-out assault instead of a retreat was likely a ploy to lure us in using the fortress as bait.
But they wouldn't know.
That the very moment they were waiting for was the same one I was waiting for.
From here on, it was a battle of patience.
The one who plays their hidden card first is the one who's ruined.
I waited and waited.
“Elder-class heteromorph has appeared!”
At last, the enemy played their hidden card.