Chapter 251
Chapter 251
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 251
Chapter Title: 72. Land of Knights (1)
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Hansen was a fresh-faced newbie who had just become a full-fledged Ranger.
But he was also famous enough in Winter Castle that pretty much everyone knew his name.
It wasn't because he was all that great or had accomplished anything remarkable.
It was all because of one single remark.
"If I become a Ranger, I plan to kick Yorden's ass!"
When the recruiting officer asked for his motivation, he had simply repeated the plea from some soldier(?) he'd met in the east.
In his innocence, he couldn't even imagine the massive backlash that one sentence would unleash.
"What? Kick Yorden's ass?"
"Tie him upside down and give him a good three days and nights of it!"
He'd even spouted off things he hadn't been told to say, shouting it all out brashly like that.
Right after, he learned the truth.
The nameless guy he'd met in the east wasn't just any soldier—he was a Ballerhard Ranger. Ballerhard Rangers were among the kingdom's elite troops. And the name "Yorden" he'd badmouthed, assuming it made him the Rangers' mortal enemy, was actually Winter Castle's most senior Ranger.
And the words he'd blabbed so carelessly were like a magic spell that summoned the harshest winter blizzard.
By the time Hansen realized all this, a brutal winter had already crashed into his life.
"You think you'll even get close to Company Commander Yorden's ass with that attitude!"
The instructor treated him with extra special attention.
"No matter what anyone says, Company Commander Yorden is Winter Castle's top veteran Ranger! At this rate, you won't kick his ass even in a hundred years! At least resolve yourself to the level of saying you'll grab an ogre's ass!"
During the grueling training, the instructor never left his side for a second.
"You? The gutsy kid who said he'd kick Company Commander Yorden's bare ass?"
"We haven't had anyone decent lately, but finally, a promising one shows up. I'll handle you personally. What does that mean? I'll whip you into shape myself until you're actually useful."
Even the Rangers who'd heard the rumors came to the training grounds, volunteering as instructors without being asked.
Thanks to them, he quickly picked up the basics of being a Ranger and was appointed as a full Ranger in record time.
"Congratulations. You're one step closer to your dream of stripping Company Commander Yorden naked, hanging him upside down, and relentlessly kicking his ass for three days and nights."
By then, Hansen was so worn down he couldn't even bother correcting the rumors that he was bulking up over time.
The only consolation was escaping the hellish three months of intensive training.
He was wrong.
The real hell started then.
As a full Ranger, he climbed Winter Castle's northern wall for the first time.
The wind and cold up there were incomparably fiercer than down below—bad enough to kill you just enduring it. And then, right on cue as winter hit, monsters swarmed in.
What started as dozens quickly swelled to hundreds.
"Fire!"
Hansen fired his crossbow at the oncoming horde.
At first, that was enough.
The hundred or so monsters didn't even reach the wall before the arrow barrage wiped them out.
But as time passed, things changed.
The monster numbers crept up, soon hitting hundreds. Among them were ogres and trolls that Rangers' crossbows alone couldn't handle.
When monsters finally reached the wall and started pounding the gate, Hansen completely lost his nerve.
"Why aren't we firing the dwarf-made iron cannon or whatever! Isn't that what it's for?!"
"Do you know how much a single iron cannon shot costs? You don't waste that on trash like them."
As he screamed in terror that the gate was about to break, a veteran Ranger beside him replied indifferently.
"Don't panic. It won't break. And even without the cannon, there are plenty of ways to deal with them."
No sooner had the Ranger spoken than a massive boom erupted.
Hansen whipped his head toward the sound and froze. Flaming ogres and trolls were screeching and thrashing about.
"Looks like the White Night Tower mages stepped up first this time. The spear cavalry's gonna get some action."
As he stared blankly, he heard the veteran Ranger chuckling.
Only then did Hansen notice the black-armored spear cavalry mounted and waiting to charge.
"Get your head in the game. We have to handle whatever the mages don't."
Once the siege-ram monsters were crippled by magic, smaller ones started scaling the walls.
He loosed arrows until his fingers bled.
Days like that dragged on all winter.
Some days the mages handled it; others, the Black Spear Cavalry intercepted the big ones.
And Hansen wrestled nonstop with whatever they missed, day and night.
He fought just to stay alive, over and over.
"Tough, huh? Tough it out. If you die here, all that special prime burial real estate I promised goes to waste."
The veterans spouted gut-wrenching nonsense beside him, but it barely registered.
Before he knew it, winter had passed amid the frenzy of battle.
The ordeal that had made him wish for death was finally over.
"Ha. Lived through it again."
"Don't make a fuss over this much. Back in our day..."
As he gratefully reveled in the end of a winter he hadn't even noticed ending, the veterans doused him with cold water.
"Sure, the walls are crawling now, but back then we were so short-staffed we couldn't rotate and had to eat and sleep up here."
"No dwarves, no iron cannons."
"Mage support? Dream on."
"At least last year's monsters were way down, even if they've picked up some this year."
"Still nothing compared to the old days."
"True that."
The veterans grabbed Hansen and rambled on about Winter Castle's countless past wars.
Among them, the Warlord War was fairly well-known in the kingdom. But fights with the undead or the Overlord War were new to him.
They were pretty shocking and exciting stories, but that was it.
Like every young person, Hansen dismissed them as old folks' war tales.
They just didn't hit home since he hadn't lived through them.
"Compared to our time, today's wars are child's play."
He even started resenting the veterans for downplaying the winter he'd barely survived with everything he had.
It felt like they were belittling his desperate efforts.
Just a little while ago, he never would've shown that resentment.
But after brawling with monsters, Hansen had grown surly. He pouted openly at the veterans' bragging.
He'd suffered enough to want to die too.
The veterans snorted at him.
"This cheeky punk's talking like he's got it easy."
"What's easy about it? No time to eat, fighting for my life."
"That's exactly what makes it easy."
"What the hell does that..."
Hansen, who had defiantly lifted his chin and pouted, froze.
"Back then, we didn't have time to fight for our lives or grit our teeth through the pain."
The veterans' eyes were chillingly cold, unlike before.
"We just died before we could."
Those short words hit like a ton of bricks.
Hansen couldn't muster a retort.
"Anyway, enough gloomy talk!"
One veteran clapped, forcing cheer. The others chattered loudly as if forgetting the exchange.
Only Hansen stayed silent, gauging the mood apart from them.
"Wait, why'd we even come to this guy again?"
"Something we needed to tell him, I think."
The veterans scratched their heads after rambling.
"Oh yeah! Hansen, you! The acting lord wants you!"
They beamed like they'd just remembered.
"The acting lord?"
"Yeah. Said it's urgent, go quick."
"When'd he call?"
"This morning."
Hansen looked up.
The sun had long passed noon and was way past its peak.
"Damn it! Telling me now?!"
Unlike the screwloose Rangers (except in battle), the acting lord was a strict one.
Mess up, and he'd catch hell for their nonsense too.
"Where?!"
"Around now, probably the office."
Gritting his teeth at their casual reply, Hansen bolted.
"N-Northern Wall, 9th Company, 3rd Platoon Ranger Hansen reporting as summoned!"
Gasping at the office door, a heavy voice from inside dwarfed the Rangers' frivolity.
"Come in."
Hansen flung the door open.
A one-eyed middle-aged man at the desk straight ahead greeted him with a stern face.
"You're late."
As he opened his mouth to excuse himself, Acting Lord Kuen Lichtheim spoke first.
"I heard you wandered the kingdom with your pack before becoming a Ranger. That right?"
"Not the whole kingdom, but I roamed the east and central regions for about four years."
"Never been to the west or south at all?"
"I have, but not enough to call it wandering everywhere."
The acting lord smiled satisfied.
"Perfect."
Hansen had no clue what that smile meant.
But the one-eyed knight had no intention of explaining.
He just waved him out.
Hansen learned the reason the very next day.
"Ranger Hansen. As of now, you're no longer with Northern Wall 9th Company, 3rd Platoon. You're assigned to the dispatch heading central. It's a long way, so gear up solid."
"Conscripted?"
"Looks like the lord requested more troops. Problem is, everyone who knows the roads went with him last time. Minus company and platoon leaders who can't leave, the rest are northern hicks who've never left the north."
"Guide, huh."
The knight nodded.
Hansen was stunned but inwardly cheered.
A chance to leave the freezing, barren Winter Castle? He was thrilled. Escape the chatty veterans? He'd take any role, even worse than guide.
"Prep by when?"
The knight said the dispatch leaves in a week.
Hansen prepared to leave at once.
"Special prime burial spot and everything. Huh? Even watched so you wouldn't die. Don't look that happy."
His barely hidden glee and humming irked the veterans, who glared.
"Graveyard? What prime spot? Never asked for it."
He shot back without flinching.
The Rangers looked baffled at his complaint, muttering things like, "Weird. Everyone's dying to get on the north wall."
Hansen knew they weren't lying.
True to their word, this insane fortress's soldiers itched for the harshest posts. A bizarre mindset he couldn't fathom.
But now it didn't matter.
He was finally saying goodbye to this hellhole castle.
The lord's forces had been in the central region for half a year already. With luck, he could settle there too.
Then he'd meet that steel knight again. Hansen snorted, grinning like a fool.
The Rangers pointed at his head, twirling fingers.
Finally, departure day came. He slipped out of Winter Castle amid the dispatch knights.
"Something tells me that punk'll catch His Highness's eye."
"My battlefield-honed instinct says his future's just like Yorden's."
The veterans' cryptic whispers following to the gate felt ominous, but the unease vanished like a lie at the sight of southern landscapes so different from the daily desolation atop the walls.
Hansen hummed as he guided the dispatch.
Just before crossing the bridge linking the Raintes River to the central region, northern knights joined.
Winter Castle's group led them across.
Three more days brought them to the gateway city in Count Branburt's territory.
The citizens welcomed the northern troops enthusiastically.
Amid the cheers, he overheard that survivors of the past Warlord chaos still remembered the northern reinforcements' aid with gratitude.
"Long live the Ballerhard Rangers!"
The citizens shouted the Rangers' name louder than any knight order's.
Hansen felt a strange emotion.
He couldn't pin it down precisely, but it wasn't bad.
Walking the main avenue amid the welcome with the dispatch, Hansen suddenly stopped.
His eyes caught a large poster on the wall beside the road.
『To all who have accumulated mana in their hearts: Come to me without hesitation.』
Without the gleaming golden emblem below, he never would've paused at such childish grandeur.
A roaring golden lion emblem.
Astoundingly, the tacky phrase fit for a third-rate mercenary band was part of a royal proclamation.
Not just any royal decree, but:
『Any knight shall be appointed to the newly formed royal direct Blood Lion Knight Order and employed heavily. Any non-knight shall have their qualities assessed and a path to knighthood opened. -Idrian Leonberger.』
It was a proclamation issued by Crown Prince Idrian Leonberger, the Leonberger royal family's pride, the Lion of the North, in his own name.
He had no idea why Idrian Leonberger chose this moment amid the current turmoil for such a call.
From the surrounding chatter, he reached one conclusion.
"Word's spread not just in the kingdom but beyond."
"Owners of Mana Hearts, once dismissed as has-beens, are flocking in droves."
The whole world was abuzz over the crown prince's proclamation.