The Battle of Albredo, Part 1
The army of the Drail Kingdom, under the command of its Third Prince, marched northwest. Three days on foot from Drail itself—a day's march of roughly thirty kilometers—put them some ninety kilometers out.
Drail and the Zahed Empire to the north were as good as blood enemies. The feud reached back a hundred years.
As Zahed began to lose its strength, movements for independence rose in every region. At the empire's southern edge—grassland, desert, and the frontier beyond—three powers declared themselves sovereign: the Kingdom of Kaisen, the Kingdom of Kovarod, and the Duchy of Lorca.
The Zahed Emperor flew into a rage at kingdoms and a duchy proclaiming independence on his frontier, and he mustered a great host to crush them. But the imperial army was already in decline, and the nobles who propped the empire up never properly answered his call. In the end the empire scraped together a vast body of mercenaries to put the breakaway states down. Thirty thousand of them.
Thirty thousand imperial guards and thirty thousand mercenaries crossed grassland and desert to punish the newborn kingdoms and the duchy. Leading a grand army across the steppe was no easy thing. The grueling march never stopped, and at last, with the grasslands nearly behind them, the imperial host took its final rest.
And that night.
Jackal Drail—captain of the Red Dragon Mercenary Company, himself called the Red Dragon—led his mercenaries against the imperial army. They cut down the commanders and officers in their sleep and put the empire's provisions and supplies to the torch.
At the same moment a coalition of twenty thousand from the three states stormed the camp. The imperial army, milling in panic, collapsed where it stood. Most of them died. The survivors were dragged off as slaves.
Captain Drail pressed north, pitched his camp in what is now the Albredo region, and declared the founding of the Drail Kingdom together with a league among the other three states. Zahed, stabbed squarely in the back, proclaimed vengeance on Drail—but at that very moment the Kingdom of Burgos, which faced the empire across the northern border, invaded, and the plan had to be set aside.
Hans, who had been rattling all this off with great enthusiasm, said, "The accepted story is that the King of Drail had already made his deal with Burgos. Otherwise, fangs pulled or not, who'd have the nerve to stick a knife in the empire's back?"
"Figures."
Coalitions and betrayals sprang up everywhere. In another world that reeked of the Middle Ages, all the more.
So this was Albredo. Open grassland, and a fortress seated on a hill coming into view—the gateway of the Drail Kingdom, and its line of defense. We had arrived.
The troops made camp outside the fortress. The prince and the rest of the high command, of course, had quarters set aside within the walls, but even the king's own guards were sleeping in the open. There was no reason to look after mercenaries and slave soldiers.
Each company found its own place to lie down. The larger bands pitched tents and even raised fences. The smaller ones simply clustered off to one side, lit fires, and sat around them—or rolled themselves in blankets and dropped straight onto the ground.
The Marcus Company was a small outfit of about thirty, but their supplies weren't bad, so they put up their own tents and got a campfire going. I set up a bivouac for our Sahara Company nearby as well.
According to rank, naturally. Most of it was my private tent, complete with a shower and a latrine. Next came Maximus, who at least had the relative comfort of the Humvee's cargo bed. After him, Number One and Number Two got a tent. Last of all, the IS trainer I'd dragged along was tossed a single blanket and ordered to stand watch through the night.
Once the camp was ready, the command staff gathered for the first council. A mercenary would ordinarily have had no right to attend, but I held the title of baron, and I was a mage besides, so I was allowed into the operational meeting.
Inside the tent turned into a council chamber, the Third Prince sat at the center of the high seat, and Viscount Malic, beside him as staff officer, presided.
"The enemy's core is the private troops of six great nobles, Count Ymir of the Zahed Empire among them. Their strength is roughly six thousand. The regulars are the nobles' household soldiers; the slave troops are estimated at about twelve hundred."
Hans had been right after all. They were citing the number of slave soldiers from the very first breath. This battle had the look of a show: inflict a suitable amount of damage for the sake of appearances, then withdraw.
"The enemy refused the offer of peace carried by His Highness the Third Prince's envoy. The only road left to us is to show them our will in blood. The slave soldiers will form the van, light infantry the center, and the mercenaries will stand on either flank. The knight order and the cavalry will wait in the rear and strike wherever the enemy leaves a gap."
The obvious thing, dressed up as strategy. Spend the slaves, throw away the mercenaries, and bring the kingdom's own troops home as intact as possible.
"The magic corps will open the attack. Lord Valeric. Are you prepared?"
Valeric was a mage out of the court, and he led the magic corps.
"I will break the enemy's edge with powerful magic."
Meaning he meant to spend the other side's slaves.
"The enemy will certainly employ the heretical arts peculiar to Zahed. I ask that you prepare for that as well."
I'd heard it from Hans. The Zahed Empire held the faith of Zahed—their one and only god—as the state religion, and kept a great many of its priests. Whenever battle came, those priests took the field, aiding their own soldiers and, against the foe, sowing confusion or striking outright.
"Battle is tomorrow morning. Until then, each unit will stand by according to the formation. That is all."
The council ended in a one-sided notice, and everyone drifted off toward wherever they were meant to be. In the meantime I approached the mage called Valeric.
"Good day."
"Hm? Who are you?"
"Baron Terra, taking part in this campaign."
I'd used the surname Terra, easier on the tongue, in place of my Korean name.
"Ah. I've heard. You lead the Sahara Company. They told me you were a mage."
As expected. Whether it was the barony or not, his manner softened considerably.
"That's right. Which is why I have a separate request regarding this battle."
"A request? Of what sort?"
The great plain where the battle would be fought. On either side of that vast expanse the two forces had drawn their lines and stood facing one another.
A look at the far side showed they'd packed the vanguard with slaves as well. The difference was that, unlike us, there was no one over there who looked like a mercenary. Hardly a surprise. After taking a knife in the back like that—and even now at war with the land of the Mercenary King—they had no reason to trust hired swords.
With both camps locked in confrontation, Viscount Malic climbed the platform raised at the center, lifted an amplifying horn, and shouted.
"Today we fight the wicked kingdom that threatens our land and our people, and the dogs of that kingdom. This evening we shall revel in the joy of victory—severing the dogs' heads, and chewing their blood and their flesh!"
"He who slays an enemy knight or mage and brings the head shall have ten gold coins. He who slays or captures an enemy commander—one hundred gold coins! He who brings us the enemy's supreme commander shall be raised to the nobility, and shall have one thousand gold coins!"
At the words one thousand gold, a roar went up as one.
"Woooo—!"
"A thousand! Let's make our fortune in one stroke!"
"What's their supreme commander even look like?"
"No idea. Not like any of us are gonna catch him anyway."
They weren't wrong. The enemy's supreme commander would be someone on the order of our own Third Prince, buried in the safest place in the army behind layer on layer of guards. Catching him meant punching through the middle of those six thousand. You'd have better odds winning the lottery. A promise with no chance of being kept could afford to be generous.
Not that it mattered either way. Viscount Malic turned and looked back at the Third Prince. Eyes tense, the prince gave a nod. Confirming it, the viscount filled his lungs and bellowed.
The words were hardly out of his mouth before the trumpeters blew the advance as one. The standard-bearers at the front lifted their banners and started forward. Behind them the slave soldiers, packed in a muttering mass, froze in terror and shrank back. The light infantry posted directly behind them leveled their spears and advanced. With spearpoints coming at them from the rear, the slaves had no choice but to shuffle forward, step by reluctant step.
Thoom. Thoom. Thoom. It was nothing more than walking, but once several thousand men began to walk, the ground gave off a faint, continuous shudder. The mercenaries on both wings started forward with them.
The Marcus Company were mounted to a man, so they had been placed in the rear with the cavalry. And through all of it I stayed exactly where I was, in the same posture, flat on my belly.
It was a spot I'd gotten by asking the mage Valeric. On the right of the central host. Atop a watchtower three meters high that I'd had the slaves build.
I'd brought it up while I had Valeric in front of me.
"My magic has a rather particular character."
"A particular character?"
"Yes. It's specialized for long range."
"Long range—how long?"
"Three hundred meters is comfortable."
Valeric looked faintly startled. Ordinarily a spell's reach scaled with the mage's level. Three hundred meters meant a mid-grade mage of the Sixth Circle or higher. Valeric himself was Fifth Circle, and the distance at which he could reliably land a spell was only a little past a hundred and fifty meters.
"That isn't to say my level is high. The most I can use are Fourth Circle spells."
That was simply the grade of the magic items I had on hand.
"In exchange, one of the items I carry is capable of attacking at range."
"Ah. So that was it."
"Which is why I wondered if, once the fighting starts, I might be posted somewhat to the rear. Then I could use the item at full effect—and that would help the battle, wouldn't it?"
And that was how I came to lie alone on a watchtower set apart from the lines, looking down over the battlefield. I climbed up, threw a camouflage cloth over myself that I didn't even need, spread the sandbags, laid the sniper rifle across them, and surveyed the whole formation. Beside me Maximus lay prone as well, a great steel shield strapped to his back. I'd ordered him to cover me with it if things went bad.
And now the battle had begun. Seeing us advance, the enemy host, too, began a slow advance of its own.
A medieval battle—the first I had met since coming to this other world. The curtain rose on the Battle of Albredo.
The palace of Drail. The First Prince's office.
Alonso Drail, eldest son of the third King of Drail, sat across from the chancellor, drinking tea. The First Prince spoke.
"It should be about time for it to begin."
"Set your mind at ease. Viscount Malic will see to it."
"I expect so. He is your man; how could he do otherwise? More to the point—still nothing from the Knight Commander?"
"He is terribly rigid. And he is not even knight-born, at that."
"Hmph. Had we only brought the knight order over to our side, there would have been no need to make this affair so complicated."
At the rebuke the chancellor bowed his head.
"I am sorry. The fault is my insufficiency."
"I am not unaware of the pains you take on my behalf, Chancellor. But is this a matter undertaken for that one man alone? Is it not to preserve the peace of our kingdom?"
"You speak truly."
"We share a border with the vast empire of Zahed. Shall we feud among ourselves and split apart? In a time such as this, power and strength must be gathered into a single place. Not the slightest force may be allowed to leak away."
"A most just observation."