Chapter 336
Chapter 336
Iron Emperor — Chapter 336
"Don't let a single one of them slip back!"
"Uwaaaah!"
As the soldiers answered with a roaring battle cry, Buru swept his great axe in a massive arc from left to right, skimming just above the ground. Heads flew off along the axe's path, bouncing off the earth like balls.
The enemy, driven back in flight from the position Buru held, began hammering one section of the barricade. The shield wall that had held to the last shattered, and a hole tore open in an instant.
"Damn."
Avilrun was the first to move when he saw it. Buru called out to him in greeting.
"Gandengi! You fill your quota?"
"Hup!"
Instead of answering, Avilrun brought his axe crashing down.
Crunch!
A tremor ran from Avilrun’s axe haft through his palm and all the way up his arm. Another enemy soldier was dead. After confirming the kill, he shouted.
"Just filled it!"
"That so? Then you're Black Armored Ghost Cavalry now!"
Hearing Avilrun's yell, Buru shouted back with a broad grin, as if congratulating him. Then he pulled something from his waist and threw it.
"General, what are you trying to hand over in the middle of this—!"
Avilrun, who had been grumbling, promptly shut his mouth.
A breastplate, scarred and battered all over. It must once have been white, but now it was stained crimson.
Avilrun raised his head blankly and stared at Buru. Buru brought the great axe smashing down from overhead with all his strength and shouted.
"This belonged to Cheon Yuhwa, that bastard. Now you wear it!"
"......."
Damn it. Giving him gear from a dead man....
He wanted to say it was bad luck...
Tears welled up.
"Tch, what’re you sniveling about in the middle of a war for?"
Even seeing Avilrun shed tears in the middle of battle, Buru merely muttered. Tears ran down Avilrun’s face, but he was smiling as he carefully strapped the breastplate he had received firmly across his chest.
"Guess you won't be grumbling about getting something with no owner left now, huh."
After snatching up a rolling helmet and hurling it into the head of a charging enemy soldier, he took a moment's respite and glanced up briefly at the sky.
As if checking whether someone was watching....
'Just give it away, damn it!'
"Yeah."
Buru nodded, as though conversing with someone.
One, then another.
When enemies lunged, he drove them back; when he saw an opening, he brought the great axe down. As he swung without pause, the cold pale sky gave way before the rising sun and turned hot and blue.
"Battering ram!"
Someone's urgent voice rang out. The sharpened end looked as though tree sap were still dripping from it — it had clearly been prepared since morning.
"Stop them! Bring logs, I said!"
The instant dozens of battering rams struck, the barricade shuddered. Several soldiers threw their bodies against the back side where the rams were pounding, straining with all their might. It would have been ideal to brace it with logs, but if they'd had anything to brace it with, they would have made the barricade stronger in the first place.
KABOOM! CRRRACK!
"Th-the barricade!"
The sounds of timber twisting and warping came from every side. Geom Muhyul turned with a grim expression.
"Can't be helped, can it."
As Buru snorted a laugh and tossed the words out, Muhyul ducked his head slightly and rallied the soldiers again. And the moment they struck once more, the barricade, teetering on the brink, at last began to collapse.
"Pull back and resist!"
As the Gauri soldiers fell back, the enemy surged forward to fill the space.
"Kuhahaha!"
Then a booming laugh shook the battlefield.
Atop a building, as if putting on a show, Buru snatched up a thick scroll and made as if to tear it in two with both hands.
"Don't tell me! There's something else here!"
Avilrun, alarmed, hastily began pulling back from the barricade. The Gauri soldiers were no different, retreating with bewildered looks. But the ones more startled were the Holy Empire soldiers.
"Troops, fall back!"
"It's dangerous, get away from the barricade!"
In an uproar, the Holy Empire soldiers clambered back over the barricade they had fought so hard to cross, fleeing with even greater momentum than when they had stormed over it. The shock of the walls collapsing the day before had done this to them.
Watching them, Buru ripped the scroll apart with force and bellowed.
"Now's the time! Everyone, get the hell back!"
"......."
"......."
Watching the torn paper flutter away, the soldiers of Gauri and the Holy Empire shared the same thought.
'We've been had.'
It wasn't a magic scroll. It was just paper.
* * *
"Damn it, resorting to cheap tricks like that!"
While Earl Pelloman burst out angrily, Marquis Luchia instead seemed to calm as he spoke.
"I'd say this is nearly over. To think a man who appears to be a high-ranking commander would stoop to such a trick just to buy time."
"Indeed, it may well mean they have nothing left prepared."
Marquis Luchia's words allowed Earl Pelloman to quell the anger that had briefly flared.
"Even so, breaching their defensive line took too long. Finish the mop-up before sundown."
"Understood."
At Marquis Luchia's remark, Earl Pelloman lowered his head, his face reddening slightly.
The enemy was now only a little over three thousand strong.
Taking this much time despite that was inexcusable. Now even the enemy's advantages were gone. Earl Pelloman drew his longsword and once more shouted the order to advance.
* * *
"They're over there!"
Holy Empire soldiers rounded an alley corner and came charging, pointing fingers. But before they could fully close the distance, Gauri soldiers on a rooftop hurled the earthenware jars they normally used in the fortress down onto the enemy's heads.
Crash!
"Aaagh!"
"Watch above!"
"Who's taking their eyes off the fight!"
Eulji Buru plunged into the midst of the confused Holy Empire soldiers. First he kicked the one whose skull had been caved in by his axe, sending the corpse flying, then drove his fist into the jaw of the one behind who had been looking up.
Crack!
With the sound of a jawbone shattering completely, the soldier who took the punch went spinning through the air and tumbled out of the alley. Seizing the spear shaft of an enemy soldier startled by the sight, Buru yanked it firmly and at the same time brought his great axe smashing down.
Squelch!
"Keeaaaagh!"
As both arms that had held the spear shaft were severed from his body, the man screamed like a madman and fled, spraying blood in all directions. The enemy soldier's two hands still clung tightly to the spear shaft.
"Wh-what the!"
A Holy Empire soldier who had just rounded the corner saw his comrade running wild, spraying a fountain of blood. Buru sneered and swung his arm with all his might.
"What d'you mean what, you're dying, that's what!"
Whoosh!
"Hurk!"
By the time the soldier turned his head at Buru's distinctive accent, the blade of the spear, still bearing two hands, had already plunged into his torso. He let out a wind-leaking scream and went flying, skewered on the spear, pinned into the opposite wall. Impaled on the spearhead, the soldier thrashed for a moment, then his head dropped with a shudder.
"Kuh!"
Whizz-whizz-whizz!
"Uwaaagh!"
When a sudden scream rang out from above, Buru snapped his head up. There, the Gauri soldiers who had been diligently throwing down objects in support were slowly falling, arrows studded all over their bodies.
"Gr-Great General, get clear...."
The Gauri soldier squeezed out that final warning with the last of his strength. Then his chest stopped moving.
"Son of a bitch."
A curse left Buru's mouth unbidden. Then, from around the corner — still out of sight — came the violent clash of weapons and a steady stream of familiar, profane abuse.
"You goddamn bastards! I said come at me one at a time! Ha! You goblin-looking son of a bitch! Who's the piece of shit throwing sand in this situation!"
A man who yakked on without tiring. A hint of gladness flickered across Buru's face.
"Gandengi, you were still alive!"
"Gr-Great General? Were you hoping I'd be dead!"
Avilrun’s voice carried clearly around the alley corner, still strong despite everything.
As Buru listened to Avilrun's voice and scanned his surroundings, a massive pillar caught his eye. Gauri soldiers who had already met their deaths were draped atop a building that looked to be about five mir high. He eyed the pillar before him and drew in a great breath.
"Hup!"
KABOOM!
A thunderous roar rang out, enough to render the din of clashing blades meaningless. Avilrun, just emerging around the alley, flinched at the sudden burst of sound. But more than the roar, what seemed to leave him utterly dumbfounded was what Buru was doing right now.
"Wh-what are you doing right now...."
"Stop flapping your gums and get over here!"
KABOOM!
At the same moment, another thunderous roar.
"Do you think that's a tree! You think chopping it with an axe'll make it — gaaaagh!"
CRRRRASH!
Unable to finish his sentence, Avilrun covered his head and dashed over beside Buru. And as if right on cue, one building collapsed, raising a massive cloud of dust.
"The path's blocked!"
"Go around the back!"
"......."
Avilrun ignored the Holy Empire soldiers shouting from the far side of the blocked path. Then Buru’s voice jolted him.
"What d'you mean, can't be done. Let's fall back, quick."
Even as he ran desperately in the direction Buru led, Avilrun could not help but think of Buru as a monster for the axe blow that had brought down a whole two-story house.
* * *
The relief force of just over ten thousand had, before they knew it, swollen to twenty thousand. Along the way, troops that had joined them from various fortresses and castles had gathered. In any case, compared to the defenses of Gaemun Mountain Fortress, the other castles were all but empty shells.
Why would Buru fight there at the risk of his life?
Why did Jin-cheon always press forward to fight...?
This reality underpinned those reasons. The vanguard of the twenty-thousand-strong force that had been racing like mad gradually slowed, and orders were relayed to the rear.
"Halt!"
"All units will rest here!"
"Everyone dismount the wagons, wrap yourselves in your blankets, and get some rest!"
At the commanders' shouts, the soldiers jumped down from the wagons that had been carrying them and huddled together in clusters.
"Daedaero, why do you halt the soldiers' march here!"
Geum Yu, who had spurred his horse from the rear, asked in an impatient voice. Dae Mu-deok, even at his pressing question, merely replied with a composed expression.
"The soldiers are exhausted."
"Yet, Daedaero, is Gaemun Mountain Fortress not urgent! Did you not hear the words of the wizards who escaped the fortress this morning!"
As Geum Yu's voice grew increasingly heated, Mu-deok raised a hand and cut him off.
"It is precisely because I heard them that we must rest here."
"Why!"
Geum Yu’s face twisted, and his voice trembled as he asked why once more.
"Do you not know what we have come here to do!"