Chapter 292
Chapter 292
The Iron Emperor — Chapter 292
Chapter 96: Scattering Blossoms
Public Marquis's horse began to move forward slowly.
With that, the entire army started climbing toward the hill in ordered ranks. The general assault had begun.
Despite already suffering over ten thousand dead, Public Marquis had ordered a full frontal attack.
"Purge the heretics' blood!"
Public Marquis's sword slashed through the empty air, and the soldiers' roar erupted. His resolve was unshakable. Had Palaka Fortress's defensive capability weakened even slightly, he would not have pressed this hard. It was precisely because the defense was outstanding that he had started pushing through by sheer force.
Giving the enemy even the briefest moment to regroup would clearly result in even greater losses, and he had judged that reaching the capital was all that mattered — even if it meant taking a certain level of casualties.
The soldiers of Palaka Fortress, overwhelmed by the sight of dozens of wizards arrayed in formation, fired their bows in desperation. But none of their arrows could penetrate the shields of the frontline wizards who had been engaged from the start.
"Oum Sala Umtaa..."
Behind the shield-casting wizards, those chanting in low, subdued tones looked like grim reapers themselves.
The moment the long, drawn-out incantation ceased, spheres the size of human heads — wrought of ice and fire — began vying to take shape in the sky.
"Now!"
At the signal from the lead wizard, the shields were dropped in unison. The instant the shields vanished and arrows surged toward the wizards, the shout from the second row rang out.
"Slow!"
Everything before the wizards slowed down.
As if time had been granted only to the arrows, they drifted in slowly — ever so slowly. Behind them, the final work of the wizards in the last row, who had conjured the spheres of ice and fire, began.
"Ice Ball!"
"Fire Ball!"
The ice spheres flew in first, the fireballs following in their wake. And the moment time resumed its normal flow, the wizards slipped back behind the shelter of shields deployed anew, watching the results of their barrage with arrogant eyes.
As the ice and fire hurtled down, the soldiers atop the walls of Palaka Fortress began to descend into panic.
The wizards who had been waiting on standby swiftly found their positions, but their faces had turned pale blue, unsettling even those watching.
"No matter what happens, we must hold them back!"
Count Trenis pleaded desperately with the wizards, his voice raw with urgency. At that instant, counter-spells began unfolding against the incoming spheres of ice.
"Protect from Ice!"
A barrier specialized to neutralize ice energy manifested first. Then, behind it, another barrier was woven into being.
"Protect from Fire!"
The moment the blue and red barriers were fully raised, a colossal collision of forces, warping the very principles of the world, erupted.
BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM!
"Uwaaaah!"
"D-danger!"
Once the sound that tore at eardrums had passed, Count Trenis opened his eyes and was utterly dumbfounded. Through the dense steam, a section of the fortress wall had crumbled before his eyes.
Even more devastating was that the few wizards they had were annihilated without a trace.
Still, because they had thrown their bodies into the defense, it had likely ended with only a partial collapse.
"I entrust the command to you."
When Count Trenis turned his head at the voice from behind, he cried out in shock.
"General Geolmurang!"
Geolmurang had five Hwandudaedo arrayed around him—at both hips, across his back, behind his waist, and in one hand.
Count Trenis hastily seized hold of him. He himself was a man who would have no regrets dying here, but this man was different. He believed Geolmurang was not someone meant to die in this place.
As if understanding Count Trenis's heart, Geolmurang gently removed the hand gripping his shoulder and slowly spoke.
"For Great Gauri, the defense of a fortress begins now."
With those final words, Geolmurang ran toward the collapsed section of wall without a backward glance.
* * *
One side of Palaka Fortress, once as impregnable as an iron wall under magic, had finally crumbled. A fortress built in the Gauri style, with stones interlocked against one another, might have withstood it — but an ordinary castle raised by conventional means could not endure the force of magic.
"It's collapsed!"
"Kahaha!"
"Let's get in there!"
Soldiers drunk on the madness of war began scrambling over the collapsed wall.
"Hold them!"
But the Roselin soldiers were not about to stand by and watch the Holy Empire troops pour in. Losing here was as good as death anyway. The Roselin soldiers fought desperately to hold the breach while Holy Empire soldiers forced their way inside.
Yet the feet pressing inward outnumbered the hands holding them back.
"Kuaaahk!"
The spears of the Holy Empire soldiers stabbed through and burrowed into the belly of a Roselin soldier. The faces of the Holy Empire soldiers flickered in his vision.
It was unjust.
He swung his weapon, but there was no strength left in him, and two more spears plunged into his body.
"W-worthless... worse than goblin shits."
He wrenched out the last of his strength, craving at least the satisfaction of a single curse. A Holy Empire soldier, incensed, swung a mace as if to finish him off.
Slice!
A streak of light flashed past the Roselin soldier's eyes.
"Cough, wh-who..."
The blade that had carved the incoming mace away went on to sever every spear shaft embedded in the Roselin soldier's belly. Then, in an instant, it slaughtered the owners of those weapons as well.
"G-Gauri."
Men clad in armor fashioned from scales entered his vision.
Geolmurang caught the Roselin soldier as he crumpled and struggled to speak, easing him down slowly to the ground.
"Now rest easy."
"Heh... heheh. Thank...."
For whatever reason, the Roselin soldier smiled as he let his head fall.
"Hooohp."
Geolmurang closed the eyes of the Roselin soldier who had departed with a smile, steadied his breathing, and rose to his feet.
Before him, the two comrades who had been dispatched with him were pushing the Holy Empire soldiers back outside the breach.
Under the overwhelming martial supremacy of the Gauri warriors, Holy Empire troops were being reaped like sorghum stalks, toppling this way and that.
In the end, the Holy Empire soldiers were driven back outside the collapsed wall, staring at the three Gauri warriors with terrified eyes.
"In the space of a moment..."
One Holy Empire soldier muttered in disbelief. In a mere moment, thirty men had died beneath the blades of just three warriors.
"Warrior of the Great Gauri, Daehyeong Geolmurang."
"Warrior of the Great Gauri, Balwisaja Yangdeok."
"Warrior of the Great Gauri, Balwisaja Igi!"
There were only three of them, yet they stood like a wall of iron. Under the crushing pressure, the Holy Empire soldiers found themselves stepping backward before they even realized it.
"Come at me. I will show you what war truly is."
Geolmurang spoke, his voice carrying an ominous chill.
"Attack!"
The moment a knight's roar erupted from the rear, the battle resumed. And so, too, did their solitary siege defense.
Despite one section of the wall having collapsed long ago, the fighting continued unabated. Meanwhile, Public Marquis, who had ridden his horse up and was surveying the state of the battle, tilted his head at the strange spectacle.
"Huh, what in the world are they doing over there?"
His gaze was fixed on the very spot where the wall had collapsed. Yet, instead of surging in through the breach, his soldiers were stupidly throwing ladders and grappling hooks against the adjacent sections of wall.
And at the breach itself, although soldiers were gathered in a dense black mass, weren't they utterly failing to enter?
"It seems the enemy resistance is fierce."
"Hoho, be that as it may, does it make any sense that so many men cannot break through there?"
The noble who had answered stepped forward again under Public Marquis's rebuke and saluted.
"I will take my knights and settle the matter."
"Haha, Baron Pau. Then show me what you can do."
"Trust me. Let's go!"
Baron Pau saluted Public Marquis once more, then led his dozen-odd knights in a charge toward the collapsed wall.
"...."
Public Marquis's face was deeply creased with a frown.
"Preposterous."
When there was no further word from Baron Pau, who had led the knights out first, Baron Lueng in turn led more than twenty of his own knights charging out. Yet still, after a long while, there came no news at all.
By now, the walls had been almost completely secured. Roselin soldiers were scarcely visible, and only the banners of the Holy Empire fluttered.
And yet, wasn't the clamor of soldiers still ceaselessly ringing out from the collapsed section of wall?
"I will go see for myself."
He could no longer trust anyone he might send. In the end, he personally took his escort knights and approached the site of the problem.
"Hiiik! It's a monster!"
"...."
Public Marquis stared at the Holy Empire soldiers fleeing past him with a baffled expression. What kind of monster could make them ignore the commander-in-chief himself?
The marquis and his escort knights pushed through the clamorous cluster of soldiers and steadily advanced.
* * *
"Uwaaaaah!"
The blood-drenched Holy Knights had even hurled away their shields and were charging in, swinging their longswords like madmen.
"Hooohp!"
Geolmurang's body seemed to dip slightly — then his Hwandudaedo surged upward from below.
Slice!
"Keuaaahk!"
The sword-arm of the foremost Holy Knight flew into the air. Geolmurang stepped one foot forward and brought the rising Hwandudaedo slashing down, drawing a red line from the left shoulder to the right hip of the Holy Knight charging behind. Fountains of blood erupted.
"Huff, huff. Who's next?"
Geolmurang heaved ragged breaths. Beside him stood Yangdeok and Igi, their eyes bloodshot red, leaning on their weapons like canes.
One of Igi's arms was nowhere to be seen, as if torn away somewhere. Yangdeok had three or four arrows dangling from his back and thigh. Geolmurang, too, had taken a couple of arrows, of course, and the Chalgap that had once shielded his upper body had long since been ripped away like a tattered rag.
Seu-euk.
When Geolmurang and his companions took a step forward, the frozen Holy Empire soldiers recoiled in alarm, some even landing flat on their backsides as they scrambled backward.
Just then, the ranks parted, and Public Marquis emerged.