The Tragedy of Dagran and Layna (4)
The monsters arrived far sooner than expected. Yet it wasn’t an impossible situation. Thanks to the countless drills they had conducted in preparation for this very day, and because the defensive towers and siege weapons had been given top priority in production, they were able to hold out for a long time.
In short, it was a battle against time. If they could just hold until reinforcements from the capital arrived, they would be able to repel the monster horde without catastrophic losses.
I must stop them here at all costs!
If this place fell, the nearby villages and the city just fifteen minutes away would be reduced to ashes. The scale of the damage would grow exponentially. That was why Dagran mobilized every available hand and began a desperate last stand.
Oil, fire, ballistae, boulders, trap formations, explosives—everything they could use was thrown into the fray. As a result, despite tens of thousands of monsters swarming them, not a single one broke through. No monster could scale the walls he had built.
“Kurruruk… kruk…”
But that lasted only for a moment.
When the demonic beast Ekayan—a monster that had grown by devouring the darkest negative energy from the Shadow Forest—appeared, the tide of battle turned rapidly against them. Worse still, this was one of the variant strains fused with evil spirits. The worst of the demonic experiments had finally arrived.
—Shaaaaaah!
It spewed acid. The range alone easily exceeded ten meters.
“Kuaaaaagh! Gaaaaaaaah!!!”
Yet the true terror of the creature wasn’t simply the acid it spat. It was the contagion. The parasites swimming within the acidic fluid would burrow into melted flesh, turning victims into zombies. Once infected, a person would lose control of their body to the parasites after just three minutes and become violently aggressive. They would bite their own kind, tearing open wounds so the parasites breeding inside them could spread.
“Uwaaaaaagh!! W-why—?!”
Because this variant was something they had never encountered before, chaos inside the walls escalated in an instant. While treating dwarves hit by the acid, the patients suddenly turned and attacked the medics. The medics then attacked other soldiers, and the parasites spread like wildfire.
“Retreat!”
The walls were breached in no time. Ordinary people who had never trained in mana had no way to stop parasites that burrowed into their bodies.
“I have to go!”
Meanwhile, Layna, who had been resting in a nearby residence, shot to her feet. The horrific screams had reached even here.
“You mustn’t! M-Master ordered you to rest…!”
The servants tried to stop her. Layna was four months pregnant. Dagran, who treasured both her and their unborn child above all else, had repeatedly begged her to remain safely inside the residence. He had promised he would resolve this crisis himself.
“But… the screams outside…”
Layna found herself torn. She was worried about the child in her womb, yet she was equally terrified for her husband who was fighting alone out there. She couldn’t bring herself to make a rash decision.
In that time, Dagran made a grave choice. He decided to kill the infected soldiers. To suppress this outbreak, sacrifices were unavoidable.
“To the infected… fire the flamethrowers.”
After retreating to the second defensive line, Dagran gave the order to gun down the infected who charged alongside the monsters. Among them were friends he had shared drinks with and loyal subordinates he had cherished. His heart felt like it was being torn apart, but the catastrophe that would follow if this line fell was too obvious. Swallowing his tears, he had no choice but to kill them.
“Kieeeeeeeee—!”
But hell had only just begun.
The variant Ekayan, born from demonic experiments, began gathering the infected and reclaiming the parasites from their bodies. The backs of the infected’s heads split open as masses of parasites burst out and slithered into the creature’s sticky maw. The more it absorbed, the larger Ekayan grew, spewing even more horrifying acid. This was on an entirely different level from before.
“…It seems I must prepare for death.”
The worst variant born of demonic hands. To stop that calamity, he would have to throw his life away without hesitation. The longer this dragged on, the more infected there would be, and the stronger the monster would become. Even if it cost him his life, he had to kill it.
“Gather every last bit of explosives.”
Dagran devised a plan. He would bury dozens of tons of gunpowder, lure the beast into the center, and detonate it. Though the blast would collapse dozens of meters of surrounding ground and cause countless casualties, there was no other way.
“Issue the evacuation order. Have all troops fall back to the third defensive line.”
Having resolved himself to die, Dagran withdrew every soldier to the third line. Then he gave a short but intense speech that lasted barely two minutes. He told them that if they let the monsters pass, the parasitic infection would cause unimaginable casualties, and the aftermath might even reach their wives and children. Therefore, they would bury their bones here with the resolve to die.
“We shall obey!”
“Let’s go out in a blaze of glory.”
“Kuk… Ending our lives with a massive explosion? How romantic.”
Every dwarf’s eyes blazed as they pledged themselves to Dagran’s will. He was the rising leader poised to become the next king of the dwarves. Most dwarves revered the man who had forged the Holy Sword.
With burning hearts, they began preparing for a desperate final stand.
“Fuck. We’re completely screwed.”
However, Kroto, Eguwa, and Arjie felt none of that resolve. They had zero intention of dying here.
“Evacuate all the women and children!”
At that moment, Dagran issued the evacuation order. In preparation for such a disaster, he had built a safe underground tunnel route. The moment Kroto heard the order, he rushed over in a panic and begged to be included in the evacuation column, claiming he was a man of the Empire.
“…Aren’t you knights?”
But Dagran had no intention of letting them go. He could not send those repulsive creatures with his wife. There was a chance they might harm his pregnant wife out of lingering grudge.
“Fuck!! I’m a knight of the Empire!! Why the hell should I die defending your kingdom?!”
“…You swore an oath when you came here. Protecting us is your duty. Fight to the end.”
“……”
Dagran refused to yield. He even warned that if they disobeyed his orders, they would be imprisoned under dwarven martial law. Since being locked in prison would mean certain death, Kroto and his group pretended to obey for now.
“Enemies incoming!”
After the brief speech ended, monsters that had broken through the second line began pouring in. Following Dagran’s orders, some soldiers held the defensive line while others prepared to pile up the explosives and activate the formation.
“The evacuation order has been issued! Everyone, evacuate immediately!”
At the same time, the civilian evacuation order was given. A soldier ran through the streets shouting for everyone to head to the underground passage.
“W-what about Dagran? Where is my husband?”
For Layna, it was devastating news. The situation was dire enough to warrant an evacuation order, yet her husband was nowhere to be seen. The soldier spoke with a face that looked like he was barely holding back tears.
“Lord Dagran… has chosen to remain here.”
“…What?”
She couldn’t accept it. Layna grabbed the Holy Sword resting on its stand and rushed outside. Her attendants hurried after her, trying to stop her, but it was useless.
“N-no… Dagran… My Dagran… I can’t live without you—urk!”
Then the morning sickness hit. White vomit spilled onto the snow. Her gaze fell to her own belly. Four months pregnant. Her stomach had already begun to swell noticeably.
“My lady! You mustn’t! Fighting in your condition is too dangerous!”
Tears streamed down her face. With a heart full of grief, Layna looked toward the defensive line where screams continued to erupt. She wanted to run there right this instant, but there was a child in her womb.
Then the soldier spoke with a trembling voice.
“Lady Layna. Please protect the evacuation column! Most of them are women and children. Lord Dagran… asked me to tell you. He wants you to be their knight… not his.”
The soldier held out a letter. It was filled with Dagran’s hurried, scrawled handwriting. Words of apology, love, and the hope that she would survive and find happiness.
“Ugh… uuuu… huuuuuuuu……”
Layna broke down in sobs. Clutching the crumpled letter, she beat her chest with heavy thuds. But it lasted only a moment. Soon she composed herself, stood up, and whispered quietly.
“I cannot… tarnish my husband’s honor…”
The reason Dagran had lived as a recluse for so many years was because he had been branded a liar. She could not ruin his great cause for the sake of her own selfishness.
And at that same moment, Dagran gave the detonation order. He had successfully lured Ekayan into the heart of the explosives.
“Activate the formation!”
……But nothing happened.
The explosives were piled high, yet there was no explosion. It was because of Kroto and his group. They had taken advantage of the chaos to kill the dwarf in charge of the formation and sabotage it.
“Fuck! Run, now!”
While Dagran’s forces stood stunned, Kroto and the others began to flee. They even went so far as to block the retreat entrance so no one could follow them.
“Th-the formation! It won’t activate…!”
In the meantime, monsters were surging forward like a tidal wave. At the same time, Ekayan continued absorbing parasites from the infected, growing even larger. With no other choice, Dagran had to switch to a backup plan. Since the formation wouldn’t work, he began throwing bombs with lit fuses.
KWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANG—!
An enormous chain of explosions. But compared to what the formation would have produced, it was pathetic. The ground barely shook, and only part of the third defensive line collapsed. It was nowhere near enough to bring the earth down.
“Kieeeeeeeeeee—!”
Therefore, Ekayan was still alive. The plan to wipe out the entire area along with the monster had failed.
“Everyone, protect your families! Protect your families!”
The defensive line had been breached. Monsters were racing toward their loved ones. Dagran and the surviving dwarves ran with all their might toward the underground tunnel.
But by then, Kroto and his group had already reached the tunnel first. While Layna was gathering and leading the refugees, they had sprinted ahead at full speed, killed the guards, and opened the gate.
“Close it! Close it, damn it!”
They smashed the external control device that could open and close the door, then slipped inside the tunnel. Using the internal controls, they sealed the gate shut. They had taken over the underground passage before the refugees could even begin evacuating.
“Fuck! Kroto! We’re trapped in here!”
However, there was one problem. The underground tunnel had been built with multiple gates to divide it into sections. In other words, Kroto and his companions were now completely trapped from both front and back. Even if they reopened the door, monsters swarmed outside. There was no way out.
“Lady Layna! The entrance—!”
Just then, Layna arrived. She examined the shattered control device and the stab wounds on the dead guards, then ground her teeth.
“Those worthless pieces of trash!”
A red haze rose from her body. Pure hatred and rage. The ones who should have been defending the walls had instead killed the guards and shamelessly hidden here. They had sullied her husband’s noble sacrifice.
“Grrrrrr!!”
But the situation did not allow her to punish them. Monsters had broken through the defensive line and were closing in.
“Fiore!”
“Olbar!”
Yet they were not alone. The surviving soldiers were also joining to protect their families. And among them was Dagran.
“Layna!”