Chapter 6
Chapter 6
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 2
Chapter Title: You Could Charge In Freely, But... (2)
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Screaming and shrieking ones, those whose legs gave out and collapsed, those standing around in dazed stupor doing nothing.
At this rate, the ones fleeing in blind panic almost looked better off.
The mage corps that had devoured countless allies responded no better than fresh recruits straight out of boot camp.
It wasn't just because they lacked time to rearrange the spells they'd prepared for bombardment.
They'd never gripped a spear or sword, so they didn't know blood ran red. They'd never even worn cheap armor, so they couldn't sense death breathing down their necks.
Behold.
Those pristine palms thrust out as if to block a heavy cavalry charge with bare hands.
That pure white robe without a single common stain.
Callus-free clean palms were the mark of ignorance, and a spotless white robe the emblem of arrogance.
I crushed those symbols of ignorance and arrogance without mercy.
"...!"
The mage struck by my massive warhorse let out a short, strangled scream before tumbling away.
His once-pure white robe was white no longer.
I spared the mage—now draped in filthy red like a burial shroud—a single glance before driving my lance into another.
It wasn't even difficult.
These types, who lurked far from the front lines hurling nothing but bombardment spells, had spectator mindsets toward the carnage they wrought—they'd never witnessed it with their own eyes.
But not anymore.
There were no free spectator seats on the battlefield.
I kept galloping, butchering mages left and right.
At this point, no orders were needed.
The Bluecoats, savagely mauled by the mage corps earlier, wouldn't let a single one of them live even without my say-so.
"Maintain speed! Maintain speed!"
Even so, I kept bellowing at the top of my lungs.
"Keep going! Don't stop—gallop straight ahead!"
I hurled my lance with all my strength.
A guard positioned to protect the mages took it straight to the chest and toppled backward.
The Bluecoats followed my lead, throwing their own lances, shattering the crossbowmen's thin formation.
"Break off! Break off!"
There was no time to tally kills or survivors.
The Winged Hussars were hot on our tails right behind us.
Our speed had dropped after punching through the mages, but they were still at full gallop.
At this rate, their freakishly long lances would skewer our backsides any second.
"Lieutenant! We should turn and counterattack now at least...!"
Jamal shouted with grim resolve.
"Don't stop—keep galloping!"
My answer was the same as always, of course.
"Damn it! Pick up the pace, unit!"
Jamal spat a curse and echoed the order.
Schrelgrad loomed in the distance.
We were almost there.
The problem was their lances would impale us first.
Of course, that wouldn't happen.
Clank.
I raised my visor.
My narrowed field of view snapped open.
Only then did I see the craters gouged into the earth by the mages' bombardment.
"Unit, scatter!"
Right before a hideous crater, I wrenched my horse's head violently aside.
"Scatter! Scatter!"
The Bluecoats bellowed my order at the tops of their lungs, veering left or right as they echoed it.
We barely avoided plunging in, but it was too soon to relax.
This whole area, exposed to weeks of mage bombardment, was the worst terrain imaginable for cavalry maneuvers.
One slip, and we'd tumble into a crater along with our heavy warhorses.
No room for distraction.
And yet, I still glanced back.
-Neighhh!
-Aaaagh!
The Winged Hussars charging with their oversized lances tucked under their arms to smash our rear were losing control of their speed, tumbling into craters one after another.
"Lieutenant! Ahead!"
At Jamal's warning, I yanked the reins desperately.
I skirted the crater by a hair's breadth.
After that, I kept my eyes forward and galloped straight for the fortress without another glance back.
Even so, I kept one sense tuned to the rear: my hearing.
The screams of men and horses never stopped.
But gradually, even they began to fade.
And when they finally stopped altogether...
"Schrelgrad Cavalry! Lieutenant Yannick here! Mission complete—returning!"
The Bluecoats and I had reached the gates of Schrelgrad.
"It's our guys! Open the gates! Open 'em!"
The fortress guards, who hadn't grasped the situation until then, hurriedly swung the gates wide.
We crossed the drawbridge and passed through.
The moment we cleared the gate, I tumbled off my horse like a sack of potatoes.
Thud—I sprawled flat on the ground.
"Ugh."
A groan escaped me.
With trembling hands, I flung off my helmet.
Sweat-soaked hair plastered to my face.
My breath came up to my throat, and my back and neck ached everywhere under the stiff armor.
Even off the horse, the ground still shook.
Everything was a mess.
And yet...
"Puhahat!"
I laughed.
"L-Lieutenant, you're a real madman."
Jamal, sprawled in the same sorry state next to me, said it like he meant it.
He was right.
Even I thought I'd gone insane this time.
"No joke. I've seen plenty of lunatics, but none as far gone as you, Lieutenant."
"High praise indeed!"
The Bluecoats staring at me looked at me like I was truly unhinged.
But I didn't care and kept laughing.
Think about it.
Cavalry are the type who charge into fire pits at the drop of a hat.
Visors down: vision's narrow, sounds muffled.
Everything in that tiny field of view rushes at you like it wants you dead, and you can't even tell if your own guys are keeping up.
No sane man could handle that pressure.
You had to be mad to do it.
Madness made you a proper cavalryman.
"Puhaha—koff."
Laughing nonstop with my parched throat caught me choking.
Right on cue, fortress soldiers brought water.
Gulp, gulp.
I chugged it down, and the coughing finally subsided.
Now I could breathe.
"Wh-what in the world happened here?"
The commander arrived late, having been briefed, and demanded answers.
I hauled myself up unsteadily.
The other Bluecoats followed suit.
Snap.
Heels together, I stood at attention.
Chin up.
Soldiers atop the walls peered down at us.
Not just them.
The fortress troops, roused by the commotion, were all watching us.
"Lieutenant Yannick and twenty others!"
I cleared my throat briefly and reported.
"We annihilated five supply convoys and burned twenty-seven wagons loaded with supplies!"
Loud enough for every soldier to hear.
"We smashed the mage corps and dealt heavy blows to the Winged Hussar cavalry!"
So the commander could report exactly what he wanted.
"Zero friendly losses! Operation a success! Reporting to the commander thus!"
I bellowed it to the whole fortress.
"What...?"
The commander gawked at me and the Bluecoats, dumbfounded.
"Cavalry! Salute the commander!"
Whether he did or not,
"For Thracia!"
I snapped a crisp salute.
"......"
A moment of silence.
"Waaaaah!"
Then the cheers erupted.
**
Moved to the commander's office, I explained the operation in detail, and the commander listened with that same stunned expression throughout.
"So the supply convoys were just bait from the start to lure the enemy—the real target was the mage corps, right?"
I snapped my heels together in reply.
"What if the Winged Hussars hadn't stepped in?"
"I'd have kept hitting supply lines until they did."
"You might've gotten surrounded... No, pointless question. The results are right here—hypotheticals don't matter."
I snapped my heels together again.
"Five supply convoys, two hundred infantry, twenty-seven supply wagons, plus wiping out the mage corps and hammering the Winged Hussars."
Impossible feats for a single cavalry platoon, he murmured.
The commander's face still lacked any sense of reality.
"I don't even know how to report this without getting called insane. Truly astonishing. Never dreamed you'd pull it off like this."
"All thanks to Your Excellency's faith and full support!"
"Spare me the bootlicking. I'm not riding your coattails for glory. I'm not that rotten. I'll report it straight. The high command can decide."
The commander shook his head, and it didn't sound like lip service.
For me, whose retirement hinged on medals and merits, there was no reason to refuse his goodwill.
"I misjudged. Thought it was half-made-up to distract the masses, but it feels understated now."
When he was buttering me up about Gaillard's miracle and my rep in high command to push my back.
But his sincerity now stemmed from his stake in my even rosier retirement prospects.
"If your report's really true, I can finally sleep soundly tonight without bombardment worries."
The commander waved me off.
Time to go.
But I didn't leave right away.
"What? Forgot something in the report?"
Straightened my posture, took a breath.
"I have a proposal, sir. Urgent matter."
"...What?"
"We should capitalize on this momentum and switch to offense!"
The commander's face went blank.
**
"I approve the operation you devised."
Permission came in less than half a day.
Evidently, my feats impressed him more than expected—much faster than I'd hoped.
"Advance!"
At dawn, our infantry regiments marched out of the fortress.
Toot, toot.
They advanced straight on the enemy, and the Astoria forces beat their drums, calmly countering.
Early on, things stayed evenly matched.
But that didn't last.
Our infantry began to falter.
Then, at some tipping point, they started getting pushed back.
As we yielded ground, the enemy pressed relentlessly.
They seemed intent on storming the fortress to avenge yesterday's humiliation.
A fool's dream.
"Waaah!"
"Kill the Astoria bastards!"
Our troops sprang from blind spots and craters everywhere, ambushing the Astoria lines.
Per my proposal, infantry companies had sneaked out under cover of night, buried themselves in the craters like corpses, and waited.
A drop in the bucket against legion-scale forces, but enough to sow chaos in the Astoria ranks.
With our guys popping up all over, stirring pandemonium, the enemy's tight formation loosened.
Once cohesion cracked, the rest snowballed.
The battle devolved into a melee naturally.
A chaotic brawl with magic off the table for both sides.
To repeat: Thracia troops ranked among the continent's elite individually.
In this kind of messy close-quarters fight, they were undeniably the strongest.
Thrum, thrum, thrum.
Urgent drumbeats sounded, and the Astoria forces broke and ran every which way.
"The Astorians are fleeing!"
"Victory for ours!"
Cheers echoed across the battlefield.
Barred from the fight by the godawful terrain, I'd watched from the walls.
Quietly, I rode out of the fortress.
Heading south, I linked up with the Schrelgrad cavalry platoons I'd sent to the rear earlier.
We picked a spot and lay in ambush.
Target: the enemy guerrilla unit harassing our rear.
By now, word from Schrelgrad would've reached them—they'd be scrambling to withdraw.
Whish, whish.
At a Bluecoat scout's signal, I straightened from my horse's neck.
"......?"
"...!"
Beyond the tall grass—head-high on a man—wide-eyed Astoria troops stared back.
Hello. Took you long enough. Been waiting.
I greeted them in Thracia tongue they couldn't understand and dug in my spurs.
Snap, snap.
Seeing our Bluecoats popping up everywhere, they paled and rushed into battle prep.
But we struck first.
"Charge!"
The Bluecoats trampled the guerrilla unit.
Once, twice, thrice...
Stomped and stomped, crushed them mercilessly.
Total victory, needless to say.
"Lieutenant Yannick and fifty others! Enemy guerrillas fully annihilated—returning!"
Back at the fortress, report done, I finally tried to get proper rest.
Then...
"An Astoria herald's at the gates!"
Company arrived.
Under a white flag, right up to the fortress, the enemy herald shouted in halting Thracia.
"...Lieutenant."
"Yeah."
"They're asking for you?"
Jamal, peering over the wall like any soldier, said out of the blue.
"Who commands the cavalry here!"
The herald called out clearly right then.
"Not me."
Cavalry commander meant at least a mid-grade field officer—leagues above a junior like me.
So it couldn't be me.
...That's what I thought.
"Thracia's cavalry leader who toyed with the valiant Winged Hussars and slaughtered loyal Astoria mages!"
Until the herald started reciting my feats in that broken Thracia.
"The great Astoria Commander-in-Chief has a message for you!"
What in the fresh hell is this?