Chapter 74
Chapter 74
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 74
Chapter Title: 24. Half, and Half (2)
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Contrary to their fears, the Orc King who arrived at the front lines remained eerily quiet. He didn't show himself on the battlefield or lead the orcs in any special way.
The Orc King did absolutely nothing.
He simply existed there.
And that alone changed everything.
The orcs up until then had been brave and ferocious, but they weren't monsters devoid of fear. Yet after their king arrived at the front, they became monsters ignorant of both fear and pain.
They fought like berserkers.
They didn't care if an arm or a leg was severed. Even riddled with dozens of arrows, they pressed on to swing their swords and axes.
The kingdom's soldiers had barely been holding them back before.
Before the rampaging orcs, the soldiers died helplessly one after another.
The lords' heavily armored infantry were swept away first. Then the spearmen were massacred.
The knights charged in to push back the front line somehow, but it wasn't enough.
With only four hundred knights—exhausted to their limits—it was impossible to fully stop the two thousand orcs that had already crossed the bridge.
The soldiers meant to support from behind froze in terror, unable to move. The nobles who should have led them were paralyzed by the Warlord's presence from across the river, doing nothing.
Even the Second Prince's efforts, which had so effectively rallied the troops at the vanguard until now, fell flat this time.
The soldiers were utterly terrified, their formation collapsed. Orcs pouring through the gaps caused casualties to multiply exponentially.
A few brave commanders rushed about trying to regroup the men, but they only became targets for the orcs.
Realizing that shouting out loud made them instant targets, the commanders fell silent.
Without orders, the soldiers milled about in confusion, and the links between units were completely severed.
Absurdly, soldiers ended up isolated right in the middle of their own lines.
But this ridiculous situation was no laughing matter for those involved. In the melee, soldiers kept dying.
The front line's total collapse was only a matter of time.
That was when the kingdom's Silver Lion stepped forward.
The clear, uplifting aura he emitted calmed the soldiers' panic. But regaining their senses alone couldn't reverse the tide of battle.
In the end, only when the Silver Lion joined the fight personally could they barely stabilize the situation.
That day, the central allied forces suffered far greater losses than in the previous ten days combined.
The heavy infantry legions were annihilated, the spearmen massacred. The archers, caught up in the fray, took heavy casualties too.
But the most heartbreaking blow was the fallen knights.
One hundred and forty-two knights perished that single day. One knight order was completely wiped out, and the remaining one lost half its number.
It was the cost of pushing back the orcs without infantry support.
"We never should have fought them in this open plain instead of a fortress from the start!"
"We need to pull back the troops now!"
The nobles who had boasted just days ago that this was a natural fortress capable of holding off several times their number in enemies now cried out in panic.
"If we retreat from here, the center will end up like the north! Where do you suggest we fall back to?"
"Tyrien Fortress isn't far. We can hold them there."
"Foolish talk! How can we know if the orcs will head for the fortress or go elsewhere?"
"Then you want us all to die here? Not me! I'll take the dishonor for now and plan for the future!"
Watching the nobles raise their voices, Maximilian pressed a hand to his forehead.
Seeing them act as if defeat were already sealed made his head spin.
He had thought they could hold. With what they'd accomplished so far, they could endure a few days even with the Warlord's arrival.
He was wrong.
The mere presence of the Warlord cast a shadow over the battlefield, terrifying the central soldiers. He had risked his life, shouting himself hoarse to rally them, but to no avail.
Maximilian was struck anew by how valiant Winter Castle's soldiers had been—and how utterly lacking he was compared to his brother.
If his brother had been here, the front wouldn't have crumbled this fast.
Self-loathing crushed Maximilian.
But now wasn't the time for recriminations.
At this rate, they'd collapse completely tomorrow.
If the Silver Lion, Count Richter Richten, hadn't intervened, they wouldn't have lasted today.
"Tomorrow, I'll fight alongside the knights from the start."
The Old Knight spoke as if reading his innermost thoughts.
It was reassuring, yet unsettling at the same time.
The Warlord at Winter Castle had roared repeatedly to flaunt his might. But today's Warlord was unnaturally silent. He had done absolutely nothing.
Unable to comprehend it, Maximilian pondered deeply.
If Count Richter Richten had sensed the Warlord's presence, the creature must have sensed him too.
Perhaps the beast was sizing them up, uncharacteristically cautious.
Wondering if they were an easy soup to gulp down or a scalding one that would peel the roof of its mouth.
If so, he had to prevent the Silver Lion from stepping in. If they didn't show their full strength, the Warlord's probing would drag on.
But holding the line without the Silver Lion's help was impossible.
No matter how he racked his brains, no solution emerged.
And so the day passed without any answers.
The next day, before dawn, the orcs attacked fiercely again. Thanks to the Silver Lion standing at the front with the knights, they repelled them.
The day after, and the one after that, they barely held the line the same way.
And then the fifth morning dawned.
The orcs massed across the river looked no different, nor did their own exhausted troops.
The only change was the eerie silence that had settled over the river.
"What's this? Why's it so quiet?"
"They gonna skip today?"
The knights up front exchanged words in subdued voices.
At that moment, someone shouted.
"Cover your ears!"
And with that, a horrific roar erupted from across the river.
**
"Krrgh."
With a gurgling rasp, the orc warrior dropped to his knees. Blood gushed from between the fingers clutching his throat.
Drip. Drip.
The orc warrior, staring at the blood pouring from his own body, lifted his head. A cold-faced man looked down at him and reversed his grip on his sword.
"Krr."
The orc warrior reached out.
Thud.
His iron grip, which could crush a human neck in an instant under normal circumstances, couldn't even grasp the man's cloak and slipped away.
The man gazed at the dark green hand touching his body, then brought his sword down. With a sickening squelch, the blade sank into the back of the orc warrior's neck.
The orc shuddered and slammed face-first into the snow.
The man shook the blood from his blade and straightened up.
Surviving orcs were visible. But their numbers were few, and dwindling fast.
And finally, the orcs' screams fell silent.
"All orcs inside the castle have been eliminated."
"What about the interior?"
"Knights are searching now."
At those words, the man—Vincent Ballerhard—surveyed his surroundings.
Blood-soaked soldiers and knights watched him. The fervor in their gazes urged him onward.
Vincent ascended the castle wall steps.
Upon reaching the top, a knight handed him a pole wrapped in bundled cloth, as if waiting. Vincent took it wordlessly and thrust it into the wall's socket.
With a small snap, the cloth unfurled from the pole. A timely gust made it billow proudly.
Flutter.
In the center of the blue banner appeared the emblem of three overlapping shields.
The Ballerhard family's symbol: Triple Shield.
Vincent stared at it briefly, then stood at the wall's edge and looked down. Bloodied knights and soldiers gazed up at him with resolute faces.
"Men of Ballerhard!"
Meeting each gaze in turn, Vincent bellowed.
"I have returned at last!"
A declaration like a roar.
"And we have reclaimed it!"
Soldiers and knights shouted as one.
"The shield that blocks the blizzard stands eternal!"
Vincent responded.
"Winter shall not come again!"
"Wooooaaah!"
Soldiers and knights roared.
Some wept uncontrollably, others laughed brightly and kissed the wall. Still others squeezed their eyes shut and held their words.
Their expressions varied, but the emotion they shared was one and the same.
Joy—the elation and gratitude of recapturing their stolen fortress.
"Hm."
The northern lords watched the Ballerhard men cheering.
How deep their grief and resentment must have been at abandoning a castle guarded for centuries. How immense their joy now at reclaiming it.
They couldn't even join in the victory cheers.
All they could manage were perfunctory words of congratulations—and even those were hard to voice.
They had no face to show.
The fortress standing tall on the frozen tundra bore the scars of battle, frozen in place. Fragments of frozen corpses littered the ground everywhere.
An arm—clearly discarded mid-meal by orcs—still clutched a sword. A severed head's bulging eyes glared at something unseen.
The entire wall was stained red.
No one could fathom how long they had fought or how much blood had been spilled.
"Let's go."
Count Shurtol, his face grim after hesitating, led the lords up the steps to the wall.
Upon reaching the top, a knife-like wind clawed at their faces.
They could scarcely open their eyes. The howling wind was so fierce it deafened them.
And the cold—indescribable.
Yet no one complained of the chill.
The walltop was strewn with more corpse fragments from the orcs' meals.
Shredded armor remnants and broken spears lay scattered. Frozen ladders and wall hooks were countless.
Vividly, one could picture them fighting desperately against the black tide of orcs below. The monsters' roars and soldiers' screams seemed to echo in their ears.
They fought in a place like this.
In this unrelenting gale and cold that was hard to endure even for a moment, Winter Castle's soldiers had battled orcs for months.
Waiting for reinforcements that never came.
"I was just about to head down anyway."
As they stared blankly at the scene, the Lord of Winter Castle approached.
"Congratulations on recapturing Winter Castle."
"Congratulations."
The startled lords reflexively offered their felicitations.
"Thank you."
At his curt reply, the lords fell silent and bowed their heads.
They knew full well they were in no position to receive thanks.
The Lord of Winter Castle regarded them impassively before turning his gaze beyond the wall. The lords followed his eyes northward.
A pristine snowfield met jagged mountains—like a painting. But within that picturesque landscape teemed horrific monsters.
That was why the Lord of Winter Castle and the lords had come north instead of south. They couldn't leave Winter Castle's gates open after orcs had breached it once already.
[I'll give you a chance to make amends.]
The First Prince had declared this their final opportunity.
[Aid in recapturing Winter Castle and defend it alongside Count Ballerhard.]
They had successfully reclaimed the castle. Now their remaining task was to hold off the monsters. And it wasn't just those descending from the mountains.
[Ensure not a single orc that passes here sets foot on the mountains alive.]
With one command from the First Prince, a fortress once tasked merely with defense became an execution ground for the routed remnants.
One where executioners eager to grind up convicts awaited.