War of Rage (9)
War of Rage (9)
There were moments that determined the flow of battle. Just as a great snowball, once set rolling, grew ever larger in size and speed — once momentum was seized, everything moved in a straight line toward victory or defeat.
The central nobles sensed it. They sensed it in the sight of Eugene beating the berserkers into cowards.
"What are you doing? Are you still descendants of the great men of the sea if you behave like this?"
"The souls of cowards shall be driven from the gates of Valhalla!"
King Kruger's personal knights led the charge.
"The count is there. Capture him and it's all over! To the hero who captures the count, I shall bestow half his ransom—no, his entire ransom as a reward!"
"Uwaaaah!!!"
The central warriors, their fighting spirit kindled once more, hurled themselves at Eugene in unison. It was the greatest surge of momentum since the battle began.
"S-stop a moment, my lord!"
So enormous was the bounty placed on Eugene that even his attending adjutant turned back in alarm.
"I have to offer at least that much to make the warriors reckless, don't I? If they don't all rush him together, there's no dealing with that monster!"
Already, one central knight who had been first to charge was cut down along with his warhorse. He was a knight renowned for having won King Kruger's tournament.
"Let's take him together!"
"Sir Charles! You alone can answer that monstrous axe!"
Knights attacked Eugene from three directions. Uniquely, the one at the front was a knight who wielded a two-handed sword from horseback.
"Enemy of the king! Take my blade!"
Charles was a knight of such skill that he could freely handle a two-handed sword from the saddle.
He crushed most foes with the reach and destructive force of his two-handed sword, and against formidable opponents, he drew out openings using a flowing sword technique that deflected attacks with the flat of his blade.
"I acknowledge your strength is greater than mine! But I shall teach you that strength is not all!"
"Skill is a choice, but strength is fate."
Unlike Charles, who shouted at the top of his lungs, Eugene's voice was calm.
Hwooong!
The sound of the great, sharp axe blade rending the wind was chilling, like a ghost's wail.
Contrary to his bold charge, Charles did not dare receive that blow. He twisted his body aside with all his might to avoid it.
Clang!
The axe blade, missing by mere centimeters, sent Charles' helmet soaring high into the sky.
His head was unscathed, but the impact alone left his eardrums ringing and his head aching. Yet the second strike was already flying toward him.
'I can't dodge it!'
Charles gripped his two-handed sword and braced with every ounce of strength he had.
Wham!
The dwarven-forged blade withstood Eugene's cut, but it could do nothing against the kinetic energy. The blade, flung back violently, pierced through its owner's face.
"Sir Charles!"
The two grieving knights spurred their mounts harder and came charging in from both flanks.
"Hup!"
Eugene gripped the axe haft with both hands and let out a short, sharp shout.
Whoosh!
The axe blade whirled through nearly three hundred degrees, and both knights were swept away at once.
"Damn it. That isn't human, is it?"
The warriors in the rear ranks who witnessed the sight began to step backward. The pride of those who had boasted themselves the mightiest in Britannia withered before an enemy who seemed to embody destruction itself.
"His Majesty commands you to go in and fight!"
"Go into that slaughter pit? That is not going to fight — it is going to be executed!"
The place where Eugene fought was not a battlefield but an abattoir. The central soldiers who stepped into that place felt less like soldiers than like naked swine.
In contrast, the southern nobles on the same side felt only wonder.
"Did I see that right?"
A southern squire rubbed his eyes. The sight of a warhorse being struck by Might and sent tumbling, flinging its rider into the air, looked unreal.
"You saw it rightly."
"L-look at that spray of blood!"
When Eugene swung Blackout, it conjured the illusion that a sheet of red silk was snapping in a gale-force wind.
"Smash the central bastards!"
The southern soldiers on both wings saw that sight, and their morale soared.
Even if they were pressed back at the moment, they held faith that the vast warhorse and axe would crush the enemy and come to their aid. That faith gave the soldiers the courage to hold their formations firmly.
'Southern scum, of all...'
'Those bastards... are they really the same meek fellows we knew?'
For the central army, it was infuriating beyond words to see them emboldened by trust in their commander, but the southern assault was so fierce that they had no choice but to fall back.
* * *
The sight of the berserker unit, whose ancestral wisdom had been honed to its limit, disintegrating, and the knights they had believed in being slaughtered in turn — for the first time, King Kruger denied reality.
"You must flee now!"
"And go where?"
King Kruger murmured hollowly. What difference would fleeing make if he lost all political footing?
He was a man who had built royal authority through overwhelming power and terror.
Being driven back here by one stronger did not mean a single defeat. Everything King Kruger had built would collapse like a row of dominoes.
"Winter is coming soon. If we hold fast relying on the castle walls, we can resist. Norrington Castle is solid. With the stockpiled provisions, we can hold out until next year."
Holding out would not exactly produce a solution, but to stay here was certainly the end.
"There! There is that Kruger wretch!"
At the shout of a southern knight, killing intent sharp enough to make the skin prickle turned toward them. At its center was Eugene atop Might, drenched in blood.
"Your Excellency! Please make a wise judgment!"
The distance between the two sides was but a few dozen meters. As King Kruger considered fighting as a warrior, his vassals urged him with desperate faces.
"His Majesty's great cause was within reach! You... I shall most certainly..."
Bjorn, King Kruger's captain of the guard and the mightiest man in the central region, hurled himself at Eugene.
[Kuooooh-.]
And he was seized in Hell Spirit's teeth, his cry turning into one ghastly scream.
Those exposed to that wave felt their will to fight plummet sharply. Even King Kruger.
Had he been in top form, he would have endured it. But his ambition was crumbling in real time, and he was already under extreme stress.
"Retreat! Sound the retreat!"
King Kruger turned his horse's head and fled toward Norrington Castle.
* * *
"Shall we pursue?"
"There is no need to capture him. Focus on harrying and whittling down those who retreat with him as much as possible."
"Leave it to me, Sir Knight."
Rex gave a mounted salute, recalling the rules of engagement drilled into them before the battle.
"They'll withdraw while maintaining some defenses, so if we push too hard to catch them, we'll take losses too."
"Even so, is a wretch like Kruger not worth the cost?"
"In any case, he is a man who has sown grudges on all sides. Now that the army sustaining him has been annihilated, the whole world will seek to kill him even if we leave him be."
So Rex's horse archers harried them, clinging like evil spirits.
"Kill all who do not surrender!"
Eugene led his vassals and finished off the central soldiers left behind on the field.
Ordinarily, Eugene was someone who distinguished quite carefully between when to kill and when to take captives. If necessary, he could even beat opponents down with the flat of the blade and capture plenty of them.
But in this battle, he cut down everything in his path without distinguishing between knights and nobles.
'The numbers of the central nobles must be reduced as much as possible.'
The central region differed from others where Britannian ethnic identity ran strong. It was a region difficult to assimilate, having actively intermixed with the Vikings.
Some fiefs even ran almost entirely on a raiding economy.
Only if the lords were greatly diminished on the battlefield and the central region was thrown into chaos by sudden successions would the governance afterward grow easier.
"Surrender! I surrender!"
"Please, stop!"
The axe stopped dead.
"Hah, surr... hic!"
A noble, before whose helmet the axe blade halted some ten centimeters away, raised both hands with a face near to tears. Amid the sound of weapons dropping on all sides, the central army declared surrender.
"Collect the banners!"
At Haind's command, soldiers went about gathering the scattered noble corpses and family banners.
As nobles equipped with fine armor and warhorses and protected by soldiers, surprisingly few entered battle prepared to die.
They were given ample time to weigh whether to keep fighting or to surrender.
The central nobles seemed thoroughly terrified of Eugene, who had shattered such common sense and cut them down without distinction.
* * *
In the rear of the Central Army, Baron Bout, who guarded Norrington Castle, stamped his feet in agitation.
"Kruger's army has already collapsed?"
Though he had already informed Eugene of his intention to surrender, the details had not yet been fully settled.
High-stakes surrenders were often not settled by a single letter.
A noble's title, territory, hostages to secure trust, a jointly signed pledge if other lords were joining the surrender, and even compensation.
Since there was no small list of matters requiring mutual negotiation, several rounds of correspondence were necessary. Yet with no time to properly prepare anything, the outcome had been decided.
"My lord, Sir Beric is protesting, asking how long he is to be left to starve. You must decide at once!"
"Ughh."
To replenish forces, knights who had received King Kruger's conscription orders were roaming the east, forcibly dragging men in.
Currently, several knights, including Beric, and some three hundred conscripts had entered the castle.
-Why are you dawdling? I must get to King Kruger at once!
-P-please wait just a moment. There is a problem in the kitchens at the moment...
Knights whose stomachs kept rumbling were protesting to the steward. Baron Bout had made excuses and given them neither food nor supplies.
What if Baron Bout's intention to surrender to Eugene were discovered? Beric's party, being loyalists, would immediately draw their blades and attack.
He had to ambush them now, before they understood how the situation was turning, and either kill them or take them prisoner.
"Sir Beric is on the verge of forcing his way into the kitchens. Shouldn't we at least give them something to eat first...?"
"Absolutely not! Are you telling me to violate the custom of hospitality?"
As long as they surrendered offering their castle and supplies, Eugene would treat them generously. But the stigma of a traitor would follow them for the rest of their lives in noble society.
And the thought of being branded a wicked man who had cast aside all human decency on top of that was something he did not even want to imagine.
The custom of hospitality was a value held important in all regions, but in Britannia, where the old ways were cherished, it was nearly a matter of faith.
"Then make your decision quickly. Sir Beric may grow suspicious if this continues."
"Damn it..."
The baron made his decision. Siding with King Kruger against the Southern Army at this point was madness.
"Attack! Deal with the knights and then seal the castle!"
"Understood. Everyone, follow me!"
"Yes!"
The knight handed out dozens of crossbows he had prepared in advance to the defenders, then rushed forward with the spearmen at the head of the charge.
Watching them go, Baron Bout bit his fingernails. His wife quietly approached, drew his hand away, and held it to her bosom.
"You did well, dear. There is no better choice than this."
"Right? That must be it, right?"
The baron showed his tearful face only to his young wife, with whom he had a considerable age difference.
His wife was pregnant with the baron's child. Even if he himself wore the stigma of a traitor, he wanted his child to enjoy a safe life.
"Aaaagh!"
"You, you filthy traitors!"
The noise of battle resounded from the inner courtyard due to the garrison's surprise attack.
The loyalist knights and soldiers who had been scattered and taking their rest were cut down unilaterally.
They were exhausted from gathering conscripts, keeping watch over them, and marching. They had no means to withstand the bolts and spears fired from all directions by the garrison familiar with the castle's interior.
"Bleurgh!"
Beric, who had killed two spearmen in an instant even with three bolts embedded in his body, vomited a mouthful of blood.
He could not believe that a life of nearly thirty years of diligent training was ending so futilely and despicably.
"You disgust me! And you still call yourself a knight?!"
"A knight merely follows his liege's orders. I serve Baron Bout, not a tyrant."
Beric, who had been pouring out curses, was beheaded by the baron's knight.
"Clear the bodies later. Split into groups of three and drag out anyone who might be hiding. You two, tell the defenders on the wall to raise the white flag."
"Understood!"
The baron's knight closed Beric's eyes, which had remained open in death. It was an age in which being a good knight was difficult, whatever one might say about being a good vassal.
* * *
The central nobles who surrendered with their lives intact were only a handful.
"He, he truly was a monster, it seems."
They feared Might, who was eating a dead horse nearby.
Riiip!
Chomp, chomp.
The mouth tore away the tenderest belly skin and swallowed it like a squash leaf. The teeth jutting from it were more vicious than a lion's.
"That thing can fit in that mouth."
"Tsk. Being the same horse, does it have no sympathy for its own kind?"
The low-ranking soldiers and mercenaries clicked their tongues with regret. That was because a warhorse that died in battle was a kind of special ration.
This was something not even nobles could carelessly interfere with, like the right of serfs to glean grain after the harvest.
For it had been said since ancient times never to meddle with the eating and drinking, especially of warriors who had just fought to the death.
"Captain. The meat is perfectly fine, though?"
"Oh!"
Fortunately, the favorite part of Might was not the flesh. Since it mostly slurped down the horse's innards, the share of meat for the Southern Army remained almost untouched.
The vassals, who had even finished the battlefield cleanup over the course of a day, fully accepted Eugene as their liege.
"In the history of Britannia, there has likely never been a victory this perfect."
"Glory to His Excellency, who drove out the tyrant and brought justice!"
The central region rallied by King Kruger had possessed demonic strength. In the battle that day, the southern nobles all became convinced.
'Had we fought under Viscount Winchester's command, it would be our corpses rolling on the ground.'
They understood why Kruger had proclaimed himself king and launched a tyrannical occupation campaign. He had the power to suppress dissent, so he aimed for a swift, decisive victory.
Then what of this young ruler, who had crushed such a man head-on through sheer force?
"King Kruger has committed a great sin against the history of Britannia. He deserves the death penalty."
"Even if Your Excellency carries out the sentence and takes his territory for your own, none would dare oppose it."
The vassals knelt and counseled Eugene.
While many spoke such words out of true loyalty and respect, there were also those whose eyes sparkled, expecting the crumbs that would fall.
"King Kruger shall receive the punishment of death, but I have no intention of destroying his family line as well. I shall set right the noble laws he has broken."
"Your Excellency. Might your mercy not be excessive for such a worthless wretch?"
"Truly, how righteous you are!"
Unlike the vassals who felt regret for various reasons, those faithful to tradition were deeply moved.
To have won such a great victory and glory, yet not be swayed by greed and still guarantee the noble rights of the aristocracy!
Naturally, Eugene had his own reasons.
'The central region is difficult to rule directly.'
Unlike the commercially vital south and the fertile east, the central region was barren. It was also a place where an exceedingly rough and exclusive culture flourished through its fusion with the Vikings.
It was land that offered little to gain yet was difficult to govern. For such places, it was easier to win over a trustworthy local and put him in charge.
'Kray will handle it well.'
Eugene intended to kill King Kruger, strip the eldest son of his position for his complicity, then install Kray in his place.
After a brief rest and regrouping, the Southern Army began its pursuit.
It was an easy task, for they only had to follow the trail of harassment Rex had left in his wake. Shattered wagons and the arrow-riddled corpses of the central army stretched on without end.
"It is over."
"..."
The captive central nobles hung their heads at the gruesome traces of the pursuit.
Enemies on all sides, their provisions seized, and their army scattered like grains of sand. Even if the king had escaped to the central region, it was now meaningless. Holding out within a castle would be impossible as well.
"It is over."
Varda spoke the same words.
Because she was on the victor's side, the emotion in the words was joy rather than despair, though they also held a trace of complicated feeling.
"I've stained your hands with too much blood and death."
"Is that not what it means to protect one's family as a noble? Whether it is Kruger or a lord who surrenders under the stigma of betrayal, it is the same. Only their methods differ from mine."
"You are an honorable knight. You cannot be compared to such a tyrant."
"There are no absolutes in governance."
Eugene pressed Varda's clasped hand to his cheek. Might tactfully closed the distance between the two.
"I have a long time ahead to live as a monarch. I cannot remain only a just and valiant knight forever. At times, I will have to take on the aspect of a vicious villain as well."
Eugene paused for a moment and smiled bitterly.
"Or else, recruit such a villain and quietly observe from behind while pretending to be clean."
Through interacting with various nobles and studying their histories, he had learned vividly just how many hideous things lurked in the shadows of noble families.
And just how cruel nobles had to become to protect their families.
Frankly, Eugene himself was not confident he could find a better way if he found himself in such a situation.
"Right now, I have many good methods permitted to me, but I do not know the future. If it becomes necessary on a path with no other way, I will willingly become a monster."
"If such a situation comes, I too shall protect your honor with all my strength."
"How?"
Eugene smiled warmly. Though it was a story with no real solution, he was grateful for the consideration she showed him.
At times like this, the fact that Varda was his wife, that they were married, truly hit home. She was, one might say, an absolute ally who would take his side no matter the situation.
"The lowing of well-fed cows and fields of a good harvest. If the people are surrounded by such things, they will have no interest in the cruelties carried out in secret."
Her golden eyes, glowing like twilight, fixed upon Eugene.
"You excel beyond anyone in eliminating enemies, while I excel in enriching the land. If all enemies vanish from the world and the people eat well and live well, who would complain of it?"
Varda's white hand extended forward, releasing magical power. Ahead of her lay two Central Army corpses on the ground.
Rustle.
The underbrush and moss scattered sparsely around rapidly flourished and covered the corpses. The shape was like a coffin gifted by nature.
"A dignified and romantically packaged form of composting."
"I can do the same in politics. As your wife, to protect your honor."
Eugene regretted that they were in the middle of a march. Perhaps because of the embarrassing words she had spoken, Varda, whose ears had turned red, changed the subject.
"What will you do when Count Kruger is captured?"
"The vassals have suggested several proposals."
Eugene unfolded his fingers one by one.
"To impose the blood eagle punishment in kind, to quarter him and hang a piece in each region of Britannia, or to bind him naked to the rack and invite the western and eastern nobles to take turns striking him with rods."
"Methods that, while satisfying for them, would damage your dignity."
"And they would also be bad for my relationship with Sir Kray, who is to become the new administrator of the central region."
Outwardly, as a knight, Eugene expressed fury at King Kruger's atrocities, but deep inside he bore no particular personal grudge. This was a side of him that Varda, who shared his bed as his wife, knew well.
'How should I dispose of him?'
Eugene's deliberation was resolved by the messenger Rex sent.
"We have found King Kruger's body. It is reported that after his defeat, scattered guerrilla units of the Eastern Army fell upon him."
The body of King Kruger, laid before Eugene a short time later, had fourteen arrows sticking out of it.
"He was struck many times."
Four arrows were embedded in his face alone, leaving it hideously contorted. It was a strange expression, as if in agony, or as if shivering in extreme cold.
In that face, Eugene glimpsed the trials the people of the central region would endure in the days to come.
End
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