A Nightmare They'll Never Forget
A cold so fierce it was nearly unbearable pressed down over the mountain slopes.
Far from the main force, the Silent Spear unit had already crossed the hills and reached the mountainside. The ground was uneven, littered with ugly outcrops of rock both large and small. Between boulders that rose as high as a man's chest, leafless dry branches tangled together into natural cover.
"...Hah."
Whenever the wind blew, the bare twigs scraped against one another with a dry rattle. Behind that sound, Arteon kept his body hidden in the cover, his back against a rock as he let out a quiet breath. The frigid air sank deep into his lungs before slowly leaving again.
"Lord Arteon."
"A moment."
Arteon cut Isaac short as he approached and spread his senses forward. The entire mountain range registered in layered waves—the shapes of the rocks, the faint tremors in the earth, even the currents of life carried on the wind slowly took form. Isaac simply watched in silence. Just how much could a man perceive once he reached a realm like that?
Arteon focused every scrap of his awareness, gathering as much information as he could.
Already...
The main force had pushed deep into the pass, roughly a third of the way through. Turning the army around was no longer an option. And night was nearly upon them. The sun had almost sunk beyond the hills, and the mountain's shadows were lengthening fast. The darkness that would settle into the pass would be far blacker than anything outside—overlapping with the shadows cast by the hills and ridges until it became a zone of pitch black where a man could not see an inch ahead.
And that is when...
From the Kar Tribe's perspective, it would be the ideal moment to strike. Arteon drew his senses back in and spoke quietly to Isaac.
"Order the entire unit to rest. Once the night is fully dark... we move."
"I'll have everyone rest except those on watch."
Arteon shook his head at Isaac's reply.
"No. Every man, including the deputy commander, is to rest."
His gaze shifted sideways.
"Sentry duty. Kairon and I will be enough."
"...Sir?"
Deep doubt crossed Isaac's face. This was a key position on the mountainside overlooking the pass—a place where the enemy might appear at any moment. Ordering the entire command structure to rest was, by any ordinary measure, hard to justify.
Sensing that look, Arteon turned his head without a word. Where his eyes landed, Kairon sat slumped against a rock, staring blankly into empty air. The moment Arteon's gaze touched him, a clear question mark rose in Kairon's eyes.
"...?"
The shape of his mouth said it plain enough.
What? What? What?
But Arteon ignored the other man's opinion entirely and spoke to Isaac. By then his eyes had settled into something grave and cold.
"If they move tonight... a real battle could break out."
Isaac nodded.
"So recover your strength as thoroughly as you can."
"...Understood."
Soon every soldier was leaning against a rock or lying on the ground, taking their rest. And then...
Pitch-black darkness began to settle over the hills and the entire mountain range.
It was a night when dense darkness pressed down upon the mountain range.
Even the moonlight was trapped behind clouds, bleeding only faintly through, and the deep reaches of the mountains lay drowned beneath a black curtain with no end in sight. Wind scraped low across the rocks; damp earth and a faint metallic scent mingled in the air.
"..."
In that darkness, Barg stared ahead for a long while without speaking. As befit a being marked with seven feather tattoos, his senses far surpassed those of ordinary men. Even in darkness where the eye could see nothing, he could still read some of the currents moving through the mountains.
Durokam approached him.
"Taman."
"The enemy main force's movements?"
"They advanced faster than expected."
Beyond the edge of sight—invisible, yet unmistakable—the Imperial main force had driven hard along the winding path between the mountains at considerable speed. Far faster than anticipated.
I never thought they would push so recklessly...
He had not expected the Imperials to drive this deep into the pass so quickly. At this rate, no matter how rough the terrain, they would reach the very front of his own camp in three days at best—four at worst.
Barg's eyes narrowed.
Within that time... I must make certain they bleed.
Flame flickered in his gaze. But one thing still held him back from striking at once. He asked Durokam,
"You still haven't found their vanguard?"
"...No. There's been no signal yet, so it seems not."
Durokam's expression was faintly frustrated as well. They had handpicked warriors skilled in mountain movement, and still they could not find them. Either the enemy's concealment was exceptional, or...
"Is it possible they never sent a vanguard at all?"
Nothing else could explain remaining this invisible. But—
"No. Absolutely not. Those snake-like Imperial bastards would never advance so recklessly without one."
Barg shook his head at once. When he finished speaking, his eyes hardened even colder in the black dark.
They were certainly hidden somewhere, waiting. And even now, the tips of their blades were surely pointed at some part of his own throat.
Only...
The problem is time...
He could not simply wait forever until the Imperial vanguard was found. Miss tonight's chance, and the enemy would only push inward faster.
Barg let out a short breath.
"Hrm..."
Even though the place was ringed by layers of terrain, he could not simply pour large numbers of warriors into it at random. The nature of the mountains fixed the usable range. And the warriors already lying in ambush numbered three thousand. Forcing still more men in might only hobble his own feet.
Barg's thoughts tangled in complicated knots—then swiftly began to settle.
Even so... I cannot simply leave them.
A clear danger sat in plain sight; ignoring it and marching on was out of the question.
Having reached his decision, Barg spoke.
"A thousand each—toward that mountain and this one. Dispatch the warriors at once."
Durokam asked immediately,
"Then what of the men currently in ambush...?"
Barg's gaze returned to the front.
"...Have they entered the ambush line we laid with certainty?"
"Drawing them a little deeper would be safer, but the head of their main force has already fully entered the range of our warriors' positions."
"..."
A brief silence. Barg narrowed his eyes and traced lines through the terrain in his mind again and again.
"Very well. The additional warriors will comb the surroundings thoroughly. And they will maintain perimeter watch against any possible enemy attack."
Then, low and heavy, he added the final order.
"The warriors in ambush... will strike their main force."
At those words, Durokam's eyes turned razor-sharp in an instant.
"I will carve into their bones exactly how dangerous this place is."
Cruel killing intent slid across Barg's face. Whatever preparations the enemy had made, he meant to make them pay the price for this reckless advance.
And no sooner had the order fallen than the Kar warriors standing ready moved swiftly and stealthily toward the mountains.
Darkness settled over the slopes. A terror in which nothing could be guaranteed pressed down. Barg murmured as if declaring it aloud,
"Tonight, I will gift those bastards a nightmare they will never forget for the rest of their lives."
The moment darkness fully blanketed the mountains, every man of the Silent Spear snapped alert and went taut with tension. No one spoke, yet every one of them knew by instinct that the first battle of this war was about to begin.
"..."
Arteon kept his body low between the rocks, staring through the distant darkness beyond the mountain as if he could pierce it. The dark meant nothing was visible to the eye—yet,
"...They're moving."
A faint disturbance brushed across his skin in the air. From the wide net of mana he had spread, a thin response registered. Only one thing differed from what he had expected.
"What is it?"
"...It doesn't feel like the ones in ambush."
The movement's origin lay toward the Kar camp itself. Not the warriors lying in wait along the ridgeline, but another force newly dispatched. And their numbers...
Roughly... six... no, nearly a thousand?
Arteon's brow furrowed. Kairon asked at the sight,
"Don't tell me you actually felt them moving?"
"Faintly. Beyond that mountain—I felt them moving."
"...You monster."
Just how far did this man's sensory range reach? Kairon himself had reached the realm of a 5-Star warrior... and still Arteon's senses always ran one step—no, two steps—ahead of his own.
Just how far does that awareness stretch...
A strange sense of defeat, along with an indescribable heaviness, brushed across his chest for an instant.
Then cautious footsteps approached from behind. It was Isaac.
"Preparations are complete."
There was not the slightest tremor in Isaac's voice. Without turning his head, Arteon asked,
"Major Tylern on the opposite ridge?"
"Standing by slightly to the rear. The moment we move, he will enter simultaneously."
Arteon gave a slow nod. Yet if the rear-guard warriors were moving while the ones already in ambush still held still...
Are they hunting for us?
In that moment, Arteon gleaned a scrap of information about the Kar commander on the other side. To show this kind of cautious movement rather than the headlong aggression typical of the Kar Tribe meant the man was both thorough and well-informed about his enemies.
The original plan had been dangerous, but simple: use their own main force as bait, draw out the ambushers, then strike them from behind. Now the situation had twisted in a subtle way.
Arteon spoke low.
"We wait... and once the ambushers move first, we deal with these ones."
From here on, it was a pure contest of timing. How many warriors lay in ambush, he could not know. What was certain was that completely avoiding a clash with the main force was impossible.
While the main force holds...
Lines of the battlefield layered themselves in his mind.
...sweep the flanks and the follow-on forces clean, then finish the ambushers completely as well.
The risk had clearly risen. But if it succeeded, they would annihilate not only the ambushers he had originally planned for, but the newly reinforced Kar troops as well—all in a single net.
Arteon turned his head slightly toward Isaac.
"Relay the situation to the main force. As fast as possible."
"Yes, sir."
Isaac dropped low without a heartbeat of hesitation and slipped away to the rear. Once his form had been completely swallowed by the dark, Arteon's right hand moved to his waist.
Shing.
A soft rasp of cold metal spread through the air. At that sound, Kairon's eyes changed completely. Every trace of his usual lightness vanished, leaving only the pure gaze of a warrior.
Arteon spoke quietly.
"First battle. Live up to our master's name... and show them."
Kairon lifted one corner of his mouth in something like a snort.
"Hmph. Just don't screw up yourself."
The tone was light, but the sincerity beneath it was heavy and sharp. Kairon knew Arteon's strength better than anyone—knew just what kind of unimaginable monster this man was.
The entire Silent Spear unit waited for the order with even their breathing held tight. The mountain range was so eerily still that even the sound of the wind grated on the ear.
How much time passed?
The Kar force that had been advancing as a rear detachment suddenly halted. Then, slowly, they spread out with their backs to one another, beginning to form a loose ring around the area. At a glance, it was a formation meant for perimeter watch.
And in that instant—
Ssssssss.
Other presences that until moments ago had been soaked into rock, brush, and shadow all twitched as one. The Kar warriors who had been lying in ambush. As if rising from the earth itself, they peeled free of the darkness and began to take form one by one.
Arteon's eyes flashed.
There they are.
Without a sound, he raised his right hand. He bent the wrist by the barest fraction and extended two fingers forward; the officers at once passed the command down through the ranks.
Arteon lowered his body, pressed himself to the outline of the cover, and slid forward like water. Behind him, wordless, the Silent Spear followed.
And before long, the spearpoints of the Empire were already stretching toward the Kar Tribe.