The Empty Fort Strategy (1)
After the midnight raid, we were able to link up with the Weistenfel territorial forces not long after beginning our retreat.
“…What did you just say?”
“…All the knights who went with us were annihilated.”
“No, that can’t… Hah…”
Grautal looked as if he had lost the ability to speak. As for me, I no longer had the face to say anything more.
With this, only three knights remained in the entire Weistenfel territorial army.
“I’m sorry. It was my foolish greed that caused this.”
It was a painfully bitter truth.
I had gotten far too drunk on our early victories. Because of that, I made a fatal misjudgment. The arrogant belief that we could hold out until the infantry arrived.
Thanks to that, I missed the timing to retreat and pushed too deep into the enemy formation. In the end, we were forced to face the enemy’s full-scale counterattack head-on, and the knights were incinerated where they stood.
If only, at the very least, I had stopped the knights’ charges midway and worn the enemy down with magic alone.
If I had used our forces like a hammer and the knights like an anvil to strike the enemy…
We might not have achieved such an overwhelming result, but perhaps I could have brought the knights back alive.
“…Enough. What’s done is done. The real problem is our next operation. That plan you proposed.”
Grautal scratched his chin as he continued.
“The Empty Fort Strategy, was it? With our shortage of knights, do we really have the strength left to harass the enemy’s rear again?”
“It will be possible. No—I will make it possible.”
This time, I would lead the operation to a perfect victory no matter what. Even if I had to use every possible means at my disposal.
BANG!
The tremendous noise of a fist slamming down on the desk was followed by the wood beginning to crack. Then—
CRACK! RUMBLE!
With a horrifying sound, the desk collapsed miserably, sending the tactical maps, figurines, and everything else tumbling uselessly to the floor.
“Just what in the hell are you all doing?! Only twenty men at most launch a single raid and we suffer six hundred casualties?! Does that sound even remotely believable to you?!”
CLINK! CLANG! THUD!
Even after smashing the desk, the 2nd Prince showed no sign of calming down. His rage showed no signs of subsiding.
When he had first received the report that their rear had been attacked by unidentified forces in the middle of the night, his heart had sunk. He thought the high nobles of the 1st Prince faction had already made their move.
That damned Count Wint-Hafenal. What happened to “they absolutely won’t come”? Why hadn’t the reinforcements arrived yet? His mind had been in complete panic, wondering if he should flee right then and there.
But the follow-up report said the enemy numbered fewer than twenty, nothing more than a handful of lowly troops.
Right. They were just the lowly spawn of that bitch from the count’s house, born of inferior blood.
Her vaunted swordsmanship and popularity were ultimately worthless before the nobility of true bloodline.
After that, the 2nd Prince had gone to sleep with a wide grin, thinking that the 1st Prince was finished.
Yet when he woke up, this was what greeted him.
Six hundred casualties. Over three hundred of them dead.
Could fewer than twenty men really have done this?
“Y-Your Highness, while it is true we failed to respond properly to the knights’ assault, it appears the enemy had a large number of mages—”
“Don’t we have knights?! The Eastern Knight Order is right here in our camp! What kind of pathetic excuse is that?!”
WHOOSH! CRASH!
Before the noble could even finish his explanation, the 2nd Prince snatched up an expensive glass goblet that happened to be in his hand and hurled it straight at the man’s face, shattering it into pieces.
DRIP…
Whether it was blood or wine, a red liquid trickled down the noble’s face from the cuts left by the glass shards.
“Please calm yourself, Your Highness.”
Count Wint-Hafenal had entered the 2nd Prince’s tent at some point and was trying to restore order.
“Count! What is this?! You assured me the enemy would receive no reinforcements! What the hell is going on?!”
In a fit of rage, the 2nd Prince grabbed Count Wint-Hafenal by the collar, hoisted him up, and began shaking him violently.
THUD!
But the count simply brushed the 2nd Prince’s hand away as if it were nothing, straightened his clothes, and began to speak.
“Your Highness, did I not tell you that the central high nobles would remain neutral in this matter? My words still hold true in that regard.”
“Then what the hell was that raid?!”
“If they were already involved, then it doesn’t matter, does it?”
It was sophistry. Pure sophistry. Yet somehow, it shook people.
As the 2nd Prince listened, he thought that whenever he heard this man speak, he naturally began to think exactly as the count wanted him to.
Seeing the 2nd Prince’s expression, Count Wint-Hafenal smiled faintly.
…That smile felt strangely unpleasant. Even as the 2nd Prince thought so, he couldn’t stop himself from asking the next question.
“…Then tell me. Who were the attackers?”
“The attackers were the knights of Weistenfel, vassals of the 3rd Prince.”
Weistenfel? Those scraps following the 3rd Prince caused that mess last night?
“That rat bastard, the 3rd Prince!”
He had already known that his younger brother, who did not share the same lowly blood as the 1st Prince, looked upon him with displeasure. He knew the 3rd Prince had thrown in his lot with the 1st Prince. But to go so far as to send his own vassals to interfere with him?
The anger he had been suppressing over this betrayal by his own blood finally boiled over.
“That son of a bitch deserves to die! I’ve never once thought ill of you, my own brother, yet you stab me in the back like this?! Aaaaaaargh!”
The 2nd Prince seemed to have completely forgotten that he had just referred to the 3rd Prince’s vassals as scraps and the 3rd Prince himself as trash.
Yet now he twisted the truth, denouncing the 3rd Prince as if his younger brother had committed some unforgivable betrayal by opposing him.
“How can the only brother who shares this noble bloodline side with that worm-blooded 1st Prince and betray me?! This cannot be! Such a situation must not exist! Aaaargh!”
CRASH! SMASH! CLANG! SHATTER!
The 2nd Prince rampaged through the tent, destroying everything in sight as if he wanted to erase it all from existence.
After watching for a while, Count Wint-Hafenal finally grabbed the 2nd Prince by the shoulder as if he could no longer stand it.
GRIP!
“Your Highness, that is enough. Any further and this behavior will be unbecoming of one who seeks the throne.”
His grip was strong and unyielding.
It was a completely different demeanor from the usual frivolous, clownish behavior he displayed. The power in that hand still carried the strength of a man who had once roamed battlefields as a knight—a middle-aged man whose grip still held unbelievable force.
“R-Right. I… I must have lost my reason for a moment due to the shock.”
Whether it was the pain radiating from his shoulder or the instinctive wariness he felt toward Count Wint-Hafenal, the 2nd Prince regained his senses. He even forgot to use his usual arrogant first-person speech.
“I shall continue with the report.”
Count Wint-Hafenal resumed speaking as if nothing had happened.
“The 3rd Prince’s vassals and the conscripted soldiers from his territory will be coming as reinforcements, but there is no need to worry greatly.”
Pat, pat.
The count lightly patted the 2nd Prince’s shoulder as he continued, treating him like a child.
“Everyone knows how destitute Weistenfel under the 3rd Prince is. Moreover, after last night’s raid, the majority of their already scarce knights have been confirmed dead. The remaining remnants are hardly worth concerning ourselves with, wouldn’t you agree?”
As the 2nd Prince listened to the report, he suddenly wondered if these words were truly meant to reassure him.
Regardless of the 2nd Prince’s doubts, Count Wint-Hafenal’s explanation continued.
“The only unusual factor is that they have mages under their command… but aren’t they the ones who must defend the castle? What difference could one or two mages hired to tear down walls possibly make?”
Count Wint-Hafenal spoke with absolute confidence.
The raid last night? He dismissed it as nothing more than the result of carelessness and the knights’ reckless charge.
After all, what kind of firepower could mages used for siege warfare produce besides one big shot? Just like the mages on every battlefield up until now, these would be no different.
“Furthermore, I hear they are all fledgling mages who haven’t even properly reached the 3rd Circle. At best, there is one 3rd Circle mage, and their leader is apparently a 4th Circle mage? A mage from the knightly Sternfeldt family is quite the oddity, but it doesn’t seem like it will pose any real problem.”
On top of that, even their level of mastery was low.
Considering that mages normally hired for sieges were usually 5th Circle or higher, these were mages of absurdly low rank. They were nothing more than wandering vagrants who participated in dungeon relic excavations or monster subjugations.
Well, that was probably why they had ended up employed by a noble in the countryside rather than joining the Magic Tower.
Count Wint-Hafenal simply could not imagine a proud high-ranking mage willingly staying under a noble’s employ.
“In the end, our forces still outnumber them by nearly double. Their troops are split between the castle and the area below it, making it difficult for them to exert their full strength. And the majority of their reinforcements are peasant conscripts. It’s almost laughable.”
Despite his words, Count Wint-Hafenal let out a soft chuckle. It was clearly a laugh born of contempt for the Weistenfel territorial troops.
“Then, Your Highness, please rest well and compose yourself. We will be marching again soon, will we not? I look forward to seeing you in proper form when that time comes.”
Having said all he needed to say, Count Wint-Hafenal offered a bow—or perhaps a sneer—and left the tent.
“Y-Yes… I shall do that.”
The 2nd Prince could do nothing but stare at his retreating back.
All that remained in the tent was the desolate mess he himself had created in his rampage.
Soon, an eerie silence settled over the 2nd Prince and everything around him.