The Serpent's Breath
To lead the Colonial Empire's great war of conquest to victory, the War Council permitted even the most heinous atrocities, casting aside the barest remnants of ethics and honor. It was this ruthlessness that allowed the Empire to reach its golden age while securing vast territories. The deployment of bioweapons. The dispersal of toxic gas cultivated from deadly bacterial strains. Even the "undying firebombs" perfected by mages exiled from the Magic Towers. Yet, even for a body as ruthless as the War Council, there existed a strict taboo. Demons. Cursed creatures born from the world's deepest shadows. The Council harbored a genuine, deep-seated dread of the demons dwelling beyond the Frozen Lands.
"Arghhh!"
"More blood...! Give us your flesh!"
"Raze the city! Gronashi demands living sacrifices!"
The crimson tattoos covering their entire bodies glowed, multiplying the barbarians' already formidable physical capabilities. Their maces and axes, infused with superhuman strength, were powerful enough to crush steel armor in a single blow. They fought bare-chested, wearing no armor whatsoever. Yet, their skin was so tough and dense that it deflected both sword blades and showers of arrows. To cut off the breath of these resilient barbarians, one needed the sheer cutting power of sword qi unleashed from a knight's blade.
As soon as the invasion of the barbarians and the Frost Wraiths began, Leonora deployed all available knight orders, including the Valtenstein detachment.
"Foborea and Saberd Ridge are both holding strong."
"A small number of barbarians and Frost Wraiths have breached the perimeter, but... none of the strongholds guarding the Great Wall have fallen."
"The problem is Jormungandr! If that deep-sea deluge, the devourer of the snowfields, slams into the wall, even this mountain-like barrier won't be able to withstand it!"
The Great Wall. A legacy of the ancestors who had defended the Frozen Lands for centuries. Had this barrier, built alongside impregnable fortresses, not isolated the madness of the barbarians, the Eisenreich Colonial Empire would have long been swallowed by the world's darkness. The barbarians and the undead, inheriting demonic powers, were nothing short of a calamity threatening the very survival of the Empire. And now, that wall was on the verge of collapsing. Jormungandr. The apex predator that ruled the monsters of the Frozen Lands. The sudden appearance of Jormungandr, whose survival had been uncertain for years, was more than enough to put the knights of Nilfheim on high alert.
"What of the Valtenstein detachment?"
"They should have reached the wall by now."
It would take four days for the knights of the Edelgard family and the Empire's reinforcements to fully assemble in Nilfheim. In the meantime, Leonora had deployed Kailen and the Valtenstein detachment—whom she had briefly sent to Hiemalis—along with nearby knights to the wall. The Iron Bastion. The Great Wall was not a simple, straight barrier; it featured protruding bastions designed to funnel and draw the enemy's offensive. The Iron Bastion, where Kailen and the Valtenstein detachment were stationed, was the most precarious of these protruding fortresses. She had sent the maximum force she could mobilize immediately. Four days. They only needed to hold out for four days. The moment all forces gathered at Nilfheim, they would march out from the wall and sweep away the countless barbarians and undead. Having waited for the moment to avenge her father, the previous head of the family who fell in battle, Leonora's preparations for the counteroffensive were incredibly swift.
The critical variable is Jormungandr. Why would that sea serpent, which has spent its life prioritizing feeding and hiding from the world, suddenly show itself? The barbarians' strength should have been significantly depleted from their constant infighting and tribal wars...!
The barbarians were no simple fools. They were strong, brutal, and endlessly cunning when it came to warfare. They would not have launched a sudden assault on a wall armed with the latest stationary artillery without some sort of plan. No matter how tough a barbarian's skin was, they would be shredded like wet rags under a relentless barrage of cannon fire. The appearance of the sea serpent that devoured the snowfields. The barbarian alliance formed after halting their civil wars. And the demons of the Frozen Lands, whom the Edelgard family had long suspected of pulling the strings from the shadows. Leonora was intuitively certain that the mastermind behind the chaos unfolding at the wall was the very same entity that had brought about the tragedy of the Frozen Lands ten years ago. It was undoubtedly her sworn enemy—the one who had slaughtered her father along with countless knights of the Great Wall.
They were monsters. Nothing but monsters wearing human skin. Even with limbs severed, they lunged forward; even when shredded by direct artillery hits, they kept marching; and even when they fell from the dizzying heights of the wall, they rapidly regenerated their mangled bodies and climbed the ladders once more. The Demon's Baptism. Every single barbarian had accepted demonic power through the medium of their crimson tattoos.
"Chop those barbarians into the smallest pieces possible! I know it's a pain and drains your mana, but it beats the hell out of dealing with them regenerating and coming at us again!"
The sight of the barbarians attempting to conquer the dizzying two-hundred-foot height of the wall brought to mind army ants relentlessly swarming their prey. Kailen swung his twin swords, slicing the barbarians who managed to scale the wall into ribbons before kicking them back down. The sound of them hitting the ground was drowned out. The fierce clashing of metal. The howling shriek of the freezing wind. And the thunderous roar of artillery fire raining down like a storm of fire upon the barbarians. Even a moment of silence was an unaffordable luxury. Kailen exhaled a breath of white mist as he surveyed the battlefield. Despite only a handful of knights being stationed at the fortress, the sheer height of the wall allowed them to barely hold off the massive horde.
*Crack!* A skeleton with glowing blue eyes crawled over the wall. Kailen delivered a swift kick, shattering the undead's skull.
"Delion! What's the enemy count at the fortress?!"
"It's nothing but boneheads as far as the eye can see...!"
Kailen shouted to the knight observing the ground with a telescope from the wall's spire. The knight replied in a voice completely overwhelmed by despair. An unfathomable horde had gathered. It was likely an army numbering in the tens of thousands. The undead. An army of the dead liberated from mortality, a weapon specialized in grinding down an opponent's forces through endless attrition. To counter this overwhelming human wave tactic, every single knight of the Frozen Lands stationed at the Iron Bastion had been deployed. Meanwhile, as if mimicking human warfare that prioritized efficiency and victory, the undead kept their siege towers and battering rams stationed at the front, sending only skeletons forward to prolong the war of attrition.
Are they planning to weaken our forces to the absolute limit through a one-sided war of attrition, and then drive the final nail into our coffin with the siege towers and battering rams...? Those brainless barbarians are surprisingly clever. Where on earth did they even get siege towers and battering rams? It takes high-level engineering to build those, which is way beyond those muscleheads.
He didn't know. There was no clear information. Not the exact size of their forces, nor the nature of the power granted by the demons, nor even the identity of the commander-in-chief leading the barbarians and the undead. When dealing with the Holy Empire, Kailen had held them in the palm of his hand from start to finish, playing them like a fiddle. But now, he was forced to fight a desperate, uphill battle against an unidentified army with every disadvantage stacked against him.
"Rosalyn! What about the evacuation of the villagers?!"
"They have all safely arrived at the shelter!"
The Iron Bastion had taken in the nearby villagers in preparation for the barbarian invasion. Counting the elderly, women, and children, the number exceeded two hundred. If the fortress fell, it would be the end. They would be slaughtered to the last soul. The barbarian and undead horde surrounding the fortress remained shrouded in mystery. However, judging by the movements of the forces besieging the Iron Bastion, it was easy to see that their immediate goal was the complete eradication of civilized humanity.
"What in the world is that...?"
As Kailen took a step forward, gripping his hilt, the snowfields began to tremble. It was a violent, ominous tremor. Kailen and the Valtenstein detachment felt a desperate threat looming within the shaking earth. They witnessed a shadow swimming through the mountain slopes, shattering the eternal snows that had stood for eons. The ground shook violently amidst a hazy frost storm, throwing the knights on the wall off balance.
*Rumbleeeeeeee!!!*
What was that ridiculous monster? Without a doubt, it was a creature unlike anything they had ever seen. Jormungandr. A sea serpent covered in countless obsidian scales. Through the thick frost storm, they caught sight of the hideous head of the sea serpent, its sharp fangs bared.
*Skreeeeeeech!!!*
The massive sea serpent coiled itself along the snow-covered mountain ridge. Then, unhinging its flexible jaw, it began to condense a deep jade-colored mana. There was no mistake; it was preparing to discharge a massive blast of magic. With its head reared back and aimed directly at the fortress, Jormungandr resembled a railway gun from the American Civil War, brought forth solely to pulverize an impregnable stronghold.
"Everyone, get down!"
Kailen roared. At the same time, he pointed the tip of the Black Star Sword directly at Jormungandr.
"Commander!"
"Commander Valtenstein!!"
Kailen stared at the brilliant jade radiance that dyed the vast snowfields in a pale blue light. Standing atop the high rampart, he lowered the tip of the Black Star Sword, waiting for Jormungandr's strike. If he retreated, they would die. If he failed to redirect it, they would die. For the Valtenstein detachment. To protect the soldiers and the villagers of the Frozen Lands. And to fulfill the command of Leonora, who had always trusted him unconditionally. The jade breath gathered in the hideous sea serpent's maw reached its limit. Keeping its head locked in place, Jormungandr unleashed a straight beam of frost-storm energy.
"Swallow all magic into the dark abyss."
⟨ Morion ⟩
Absorb and release all magic. That was the power of a Morion. The jade light Jormungandr had condensed was a torrent of pure mana. Realizing this, Kailen made the bizarre, outrageous decision to counter the giant serpent's bombardment head-on.