II. Where Sword and Embers Are Headed (3)
II. Where Sword and Embers Are Headed (3)
The mounted bandits from the Duchy of Rhees were unusual even in their armament.
Every one of them was mounted, and as Jorgen had said earlier, they wore metal lamellar armor as well.
As he urged Boreas on, Keldric considered the possibility that his sword might not bite properly.
The Empire's metal armor styles were fundamentally mail or plate.
Very rarely, lamellar armor made like fish scales circulated, but those were mostly products of the eastern Duchy of Rhees or the Kakar people.
Leather was one thing, but no one readily thought of making lamellar armor—vulnerable to edged weapons—from expensive metal.
The conclusion was that Keldric had never fought an enemy clad in fine metal lamellar armor.
'Leather armor let the sword in well enough, but how hard was metal armor?'
Keldric recalled the cavalry he had fought in Carlton Village.
They had worn tough leather lamellar armor, but Keldric's sword had bitten in fine as ever.
Whether it would be the same this time was uncertain.
However weak lamellar armor was said to be against cuts or thrusts, if it was made of metal, that was another matter.
Keldric cast aside his tangled thoughts and adjusted his grip on his sword.
"Boreas! Faster!"
As if answering Keldric's urging, Boreas raced forward like the wind.
A shwik-shwik—the sound of the wind slicing like a blade—brushed past Keldric's ears.
The distance was closing quickly, but the mounted bandits were still threatening the villagers with their long spears.
The sight of several villagers already fallen met Keldric's eyes.
The situation was urgent, and Keldric was still far away.
"Look this way—!!"
So Keldric simply bellowed a shout.
The ringing voice echoed in all directions. The villagers who had been confronting the mounted bandits with crude wooden spears wore startled expressions.
The same was true of the mounted bandits who threatened them.
The mounted bandits, who had turned their horses' heads in surprise, saw Keldric charging at them with a murderous momentum and hastily kicked their horses' bellies.
NEEEIGH!
The bandits' horses began to move, snorting white plumes of breath.
Keldric took careful note of the mounted bandits as they began to spread out in all directions. The bandits from the Duchy of Rhees certainly had an exotic appearance.
The mail aventails hanging below their helmets covered their napes, and beneath the lamellar armor protecting their torsos, they wore gambesons embroidered with peculiar patterns.
Because their faces were entirely covered by mail coifs, the only exposed flesh was their eyes.
'Troublesome.'
That made it difficult even to target their faces.
Keldric knew his own strength was great, but he was not certain it would pierce through metal mail coifs or lamellar armor.
"Sir Keldric! We'll keep the bastards busy!"
Jorgen, who had arrived belatedly from far away, shouted.
When Keldric looked that way, sure enough. Jorgen's Ram Mercenary Company had formed a circular formation.
At the center were Alisa and eight mercenaries with bows, while the remaining twenty-five mercenaries each held their own weapon and set up a round shield wall.
The sight was so like a hedgehog that it seemed quite difficult for cavalry to approach.
They had claimed to be seasoned against cavalry, and that was no empty boast.
The mercenaries with bows drew their bowstrings. Soon a few arrows flew towards the mounted bandits, but the arrows did not land even near them.
It was not much help, but it did at least divide their attention.
As the cold wind whipped ceaselessly, Keldric glared at the mounted bandits who had begun circling around him before he knew it.
In the clash against cavalry at Carlton Village, Keldric had fought defensively.
If Keldric had gone on the offensive, and the cavalry had ignored him and charged toward the manor house, there would have been no way to stop them.
But now the situation was different.
"Hiyah!"
Keldric did not hesitate and urged Boreas on.
Boreas, whose breathing had grown rough, dashed forward again, spraying foam in excitement.
When Keldric on Boreas bolted out like lightning, the mounted bandits shouted to each other in unintelligible words, apparently somewhat thrown off.
As if they had never imagined Keldric would rush straight at them.
A moment later, several of the mounted bandits circling around turned their horses' heads toward Keldric. Their number was two.
Keldric gripped his sword tightly in his right hand.
'A spear would be nice right about now.'
The mounted bandits all carried long spears. By comparison, Keldric, armed with a sword, had the shorter reach.
Still, Keldric did not think he would lose.
"Be careful!"
At the same moment Alisa's sharp voice rang out, two mounted bandits who had split from the main group charged sequentially at Keldric.
Racing toward them from the opposite direction, Keldric did not reduce his speed.
As a rule, victory in a fight between cavalry turned on who struck first, and Keldric, who had the shorter reach, had instead chosen the method of rapidly closing the gap.
And that method worked perfectly.
Keldric twisted his entire body to the right to evade a spear, then swung his sword with the added acceleration the instant he returned his body to its original stance.
CRUNCH!
With a heavy, brutal sound, the mounted bandit who had been jabbering away fell silent in an instant.
Fragments of shattered metal scales flew through the air. The mounted bandit, deeply slashed across the chest, advanced a few more steps while still mounted before falling helplessly into the snow.
But Keldric did not stop there.
While Keldric's right hand swung the sword, his left hand parried another spear thrust from a different direction and then seized the bandit by the scruff of his neck.
"Hup!"
When Keldric exerted his strength, the mounted bandit was lifted clean out of his saddle as if plucked.
"...?"
The mounted bandit who had lost his horse in an instant stared at Keldric with flabbergasted eyes.
The eyes visible through the eyeholes of his coif trembled mercilessly.
Toward the space between those trembling eyes, Keldric pulled his head back sharply and then rammed his helmeted head straight in.
WHACK!
With a dull thud, the iron helmet the bandit wore crumpled hideously. Blood soaked out from the eyeholes.
It seemed all but certain that, unbeknownst to all, the head inside had met the same fate.
The bandit's body, hoisted aloft, trembled briefly before going limp.
Keldric hurled the bandit's now-lifeless, dangling body far away. The corpse flew a long way before it touched the ground.
'Mad bastard!'
And Jorgen, watching the scene, was horrified.
Even when Keldric had boldly charged ahead, he had been terribly worried.
But after Keldric had clashed with the mounted bandits just once, that worry had long since ceased to matter in the slightest.
'Lifting a man like a child...'
Alisa, who had been preparing her magic, was equally horrified.
However strong a knight might be, hoisting a full-grown man in metal armor with one hand was beyond common sense.
And on top of that, the armor the mounted bandits wore had been utterly shattered by a single sword stroke.
Jorgen watched Keldric who sat nobly astride his horse and swallowed dryly.
He had been feeling a faint sense of closeness toward Keldric, who had listened to him well just moments before, but a knight was a knight after all.
The distinctive lethality emanating from Keldric was no different from the other knights Jorgen had met.
"Hoo..."
Meanwhile, Keldric, who had instantly slain two mounted bandits, let out a cool breath.
The mounted bandits still circling around had fewer in number, but their ferocity was undiminished.
If anything, as if enraged by the deaths of two comrades, they kept hurling unintelligible words at Keldric.
"They're coming!"
Jorgen's cry struck Keldric's ears. Several mounted bandits had shifted their target toward the clustered mercenaries.
Just as Keldric was about to turn his horse's head toward them, he suddenly sensed a chilling aura and hastily ducked his torso forward.
WHOOSH!
The sound of air splitting and a short javelin passing over Keldric's head occurred almost simultaneously.
Keldric urgently pulled his reins toward the direction the javelin had come from.
Beginning with that single javelin, the number of mounted bandits who charged at Keldric while hurling spears had somehow grown to five.
In addition to their long spears, each of the mounted bandits had several javelins slung across their backs.
Keldric clicked his tongue briefly and kicked Boreas's belly once more. The surrounding scenery began to race by.
Conversely, the mounted bandits charging from the opposite direction while throwing javelins grew closer in an instant.
One of the javelins flew toward Keldric's front.
Evasion was difficult. Keldric struck it aside with his sword.
Sparks flew briefly, and after dodging two more javelins, Keldric at last struck away with all his might the spears of the mounted bandits who had closed to point-blank range.
Three spears aimed at Keldric's chest broke helplessly.
Immediately after, Keldric plunged straight into the mounted bandits' formation.
The mounted bandits whose spears had broken drew their javelins in reverse grip and rushed at Keldric.
Keldric's sword flashed several times, and three mortally wounded mounted bandits rolled across the snow.
Kagagak!
"...?!"
But at some point, Keldric realized that his sword could no longer pierce the mounted bandits' armor.
Having struck metal armor and blocked javelins head-on, it was only natural that the edge had dulled.
The mounted bandits were not fools either.
Realizing that Keldric's sword had dulled, they simultaneously lunged at him.
At that moment of alarm, Keldric seized his sword by the blade in a reversed grip and swung it like a hammer.
"Aaaagh!"
The crossguard of the sword lodged neatly into one mounted bandit's eyehole.
Whatever the difference in language, a universally understood scream naturally erupted.
Keldric immediately released his grip on the sword.
At the same instant, another mounted bandit seized Keldric's arm as if trying to grapple him bodily. The intention was to unhorse Keldric.
"Huh?"
Keldric did not make any particular counterattack.
He simply, with his arm still seized, swung his arm in a whoosh—just like that.
The mounted bandit, taken clean off his feet and sent flying, slammed into the snow.
Keldric quickly moved there and pulled on Boreas's reins.
CRUNCH!
When a warhorse brought its forehooves down on a man's chest, there was no way he remained alive and well.
Having dispatched the mounted bandits in an instant, Keldric turned his direction toward where the mercenaries were.
"That's..."
There, flames were flickering as if dancing.
☩ ☩ ☩ ☩ ☩ ☩ ☩
Fire was a double-edged sword.
It brought comforting warmth, but sometimes returned as the demon of tragedy.
Alisa had devoted five years to bending that lethal fire to her will.
When she closed her eyes, the sight of her family and her house being devoured by flames was still vivid.
That fire had taken everything from Alisa. Yet Alisa was now struggling, instead, to control that very fire.
"My Lady Wizard! The bastards are coming!"
Jorgen, standing on the front line with his shield, shouted urgently.
True to his words, the mounted bandits who had formed a wedge were already charging within arm's reach.
"My Lady Wizard!"
"Be quiet!"
Alisa tried to rally her concentration as much as possible, but Jorgen's booming shouts were a hindrance.
Only after she had snapped at him did silence fall. Alisa closed her eyes again and focused.
As a rule, the environment was the most fundamental foundation of magic.
If the environment was one where fire could not easily catch, working magic was that much harder, and conversely, if fire could easily catch, the constraints on magic lessened.
The surroundings were blanketed in snow. From within her clothes, Alisa drew out a fist-sized lump of charcoal.
This was her catalyst for magic.
The last thing needed was a flash of imagination and intellect.
The pounding of hooves was noisy. Alisa quietly opened her closed eyes.
The sight of the mounted bandits who had already approached right before her met Alisa's eyes. Her eyes busily sought a heat source.
Fire could arise anywhere, in any environment, so long as the minimum conditions were met.
For instance, the frictional heat generated where skin and horse made contact as the horses ran.
Recalling that, Alisa crushed the charcoal. It did not shatter into pieces but scattered like smoke as a black powder.
An environment blanketed in snow, a catalyst that readily ignited, and an ignition point forced into being.
It was extremely inefficient, but the minimum requirements to work magic had been met.
"Get back!"
At Alisa's sharp cry, the mercenaries recoiled in fright. One side of the solid shield wall collapsed in an instant.
Seeing that, the mounted bandits swarmed toward the gap as if sensing an opportunity.
And that was precisely the move Alisa had aimed for.
FWOOSH—!
Flames erupted simultaneously from three or four horses. The blazing fire devoured the horses, melting the surrounding snow.
"Aaaagh!"
The mounted bandits, startled by it, tumbled from their horses in the confusion.
Already burdened with heavy armor, an unexpected fall was fatal to them.
The mournful screams of horses being roasted alive rang out.
The charging mounted bandits' fighting strength was instantly halved.
That also meant the remaining half was still moving in fine shape.
Alisa collapsed to the spot with an utterly exhausted expression. The rest was the mercenaries' task.
"Fuck, kill them all!"
"You sons of bitches! Do you know how much hell you've put us through!"
While the mounted bandits, thrown off by the magic, were being stabbed by the mercenaries' spears, Alisa, her face drenched in cold sweat, turned her head toward a single direction.
The knight with the enormous build, Keldric, was there.
Having slaughtered a total of seven mounted bandits in the blink of an eye, and staring at the flames as if taken aback.
As she stared blankly at Keldric's grisly figure, spattered with blood, Alisa burst out in a hollow laugh without realizing it.
"Ha, honestly..."
She had barely managed to deal with four using magic, while that knight had taken on seven alone with preposterous strength. And he did not appear to have a single scratch from it.
"Utterly ridiculous."
Just as she said, it truly was utterly ridiculous.