Open the Gate
"Wrung a troll's head off by hand? What in the world..."
When one of the vassals spoke up in sheer disbelief, Golen flushed red. Honestly, even to his own ears it had sounded a bit absurd.
But a man who knew shame and knew when to back down would never have tried to steal his nephew's lands in the first place. Golen dug in his heels.
"I heard it plainly. The travelers who came to our lands knew of it, and the pilgrim priests passing through knew of it as well."
"And you would trust gossip spreading among the lowborn and the ignorant? Do not be swayed by idle rumor, my lord. What if the rumor was spread by our enemy himself?"
Golen ground his teeth at the vassal's words. He had heard it directly from a high-ranking envoy of the Order, but he could hardly admit that here.
'Idle rumor, he says! The nerve of men who know nothing!'
Golen, who had received letters from both the Order and Johan himself, had been brimming with expectation ever since he first heard the tales of Johan. Johan was the savior who would make their dreams and ambitions come true.
Granted, the part about wringing a troll's neck with his bare hands might have been an exaggerated rumor.
But every rumor carried a kernel of truth.
If a story like that was spreading far and wide, surely the man had joined the troll hunt in person and earned the feat himself.
That was enough. For a man of his youth, more than enough.
Together with his brothers, Golen prayed and prayed that Johan would hurry and enter the castle, that he would seize Izelia and drag her away.
"However remarkable that young knight may be, he cannot breach the walls of Cari Castle. We have the castle, and we have soldiers."
"Can we hold out that long? The enemy came too quickly. We are barely prepared..."
"Will reinforcements not come?"
"Reinforcements? If our own vassals had fought properly in the first place..."
The outlandish rumors floated up by the Asada family's kin were dismissed, but the truth remained that the vassals themselves were divided.
That was how great a shock Johan's lightning advance had delivered.
Before their council had even concluded, an army had arrived and pitched camp right outside their walls.
Perhaps because of that, some argued for holding out behind the castle walls — but nearly as many argued for attempting negotiation. Stand trial before the Order, they said, and there would be a chance to bribe or persuade the judges.
When that opinion surfaced, Golen and his brothers smiled slyly. It had been worth spreading the refrain of we must negotiate, we must stand trial before the Order again and again.
"Can we not launch a surprise attack?"
"Lord Chamberlain, I beg you, restrain yourself! If you fall, this fief is finished!"
Izelia had been trained as a knight, but she had no experience of large-scale battle. Her career had consisted mostly of suppressing bandit gangs and culling monsters.
If she rode out on a raid and was captured, the fief was done for.
"Very well. I understand."
Izelia nodded. She was inexperienced, but she was no fool who could not grasp what her vassals were telling her.
"A solid castle."
Cari Castle did not stand among the nearby villages and towns, but at some remove from them — atop a sheer rocky cliff overlooking the coast.
As a result, there was only one approach: straight up the front. The walls were no laughing matter either, and in terms of pure defensive strength, the place was genuinely impressive.
'Raids must be common around here.'
There was only one reason to leave the sizable towns alone and build a castle apart, up on a cliff like this.
Come to think of it, the Asada family itself had originally come over from the Eastern Empire as a family of heretics. A strategic chokepoint on the sea routes was, inevitably, a prize that many eyes coveted.
Hadn't Johan come coveting it too?
"It seems our time to shine has arrived."
The dwarf thousand-commander McCalde spoke up. He and Johan had grown close almost immediately — McCalde was a distant kinsman of the dwarves of the Barpa family.
Dwarves were loyal to a contract once made, so their reliability went without saying.
Among them were siege-engine engineers as well, and they were already gathering materials nearby, hard at their preparations.
"Give the word and we will begin construction."
"No. I have no intention of attacking head-on. Let us wait a little."
"As you command."
The dwarves asked no questions. An order given was an order obeyed.
'The soldiers on those walls look to be in fine condition.'
In truth, the mere fact that a garrison of several hundred had been stationed there in peacetime was remarkable. Soldiers were, as a rule, men who loafed around eating bread when there was no war to fight.
Like the castle's very structure, it had to mean raids were frequent in this region. And if so, it made sense that those soldiers were well drilled.
Storming the place now — smashing the gate with the battering ram, setting ladders against the walls, and pressing a rolling assault alongside the trebuchets — would not have been a bad plan.
But the one in a hurry was not Johan. It was the other side. And Johan had plenty of cards up his sleeve.
"Send men to the nearby villages and towns. Tell them to pay us protection tribute. And do not forget to make it clear that if a single supply cart reaches the castle, I will not forgive it."
"Yes, sir!"
Seal off the castle's entrance, then sit back and wait while drawing supplies from the surrounding lands. Johan was the sort of man who, the more advantage he held, the more stubbornly he could wait.
It was not the kind of shrewdness and endurance one expected from a young knight. The war-priests recorded every detail of it and reported upward.
When the party holding the advantage sits still, the party holding the disadvantage only grows more anxious. With the army entrenched and simply waiting outside, the mood inside the walls turned eerie.
The envoys sent out had not returned. Unless they had been seized, one had to assume the vassals were simply watching and hedging their bets.
"And Marquis Crucho? And Viscount Ginolene?"
The Marquis was a faithful servant of the Emperor, and Viscount Ginolene governed the Emperor's southern territories as his proxy. Both were potential sources of aid from the west.
"Neither has any strength to spare, they say..."
"......"
Neither marquis nor viscount had any room to maneuver. Both were pouring fortunes into the Empire, sinking deep into debt to do it. On top of that, mercenaries had gone rampant through their fiefs, like men gone mad.
It was in the midst of all this that Golen and the other Asada kin had pressed them hard, insisting that the Order moved against Izelia because her crimes were denounced — punish Izelia alone and the matter will be settled — and so the decision had been made.
For now, they would stand aside and watch!
From the marquis's and viscount's standpoint, so long as a vassal lord paid his tribute, a little power struggle within his own house was something they could turn a blind eye to.
"We will attempt negotiation."
"...Very well. Do so."
Izelia spoke with an expression heavy with fatigue. She had never been trained to rule in the first place.
And since the Count's death she had been locked in strife with his kin, holding out by sheer stubbornness — of course her spirit was worn thin.
"Should we not wait until they send an envoy?"
"You are still saying this? They have no intention of sending one. They mean for us to go to them first, do they not?"
Johan's host exerted pressure by doing nothing at all. Under that pressure, even the loyal vassals were beginning to waver.
Johan went about the countryside like a lord in truth, meeting village headmen and priests alike. A few silver coins were quite enough to win their hearts. They knelt before him and pressed their foreheads to the ground.
The petty bandit gangs and monsters in the vicinity became targets as well. Nothing more than goblin and kobold dens, for the most part, but Johan swept them away without a trace, alongside the eastern warriors.
"An envoy has come, sir."
"Later than I expected. Are the Asada kin among them?"
"Yes, sir."
"Keep the envoys waiting. Bring the kin to me first."
Gulp—
Golen swallowed hard as he walked between the encampments. He had seen mercenaries before. Unlike the hapless louts who could barely keep a full set of armor on, every mercenary here was a well-armed veteran.
Walking through the camp as the envoy of a hostile faction, he was drenched in hostile stares, showered with jeers and mockery. It was impossible not to feel the tension crawling up his spine.
'Stay calm. However fearsome his reputation, he is still just a boy of a knight.'
The name was terrifying, to be sure — but he was still a young knight. Given the chance, Golen was confident he could play him like a fiddle.
"!"
The moment he stepped into the tent, Golen felt his breath die in his throat. The company seated within that wide canvas was fearsome in every direction, and each in its own way.
A knight who looked like a butcher. A warrior of the savage eastern tribes of the north. A wizard who radiated something distinctly unsavory. And sprawled at the very center, a monstrous wolf.
"A... Asada's Golen... my lord."
He had intended to stride in with his head held high, but his body reacted on its own. He could not even meet Johan's eyes. Some nameless pressure bore down on him.
"You may raise your head at ease."
"Th... thank you."
Golen took a deep breath inward and steadied himself.
"It is a true honor that you have come. We had been despairing over how the wickedness committed by the elf of the Blua family was to be judged..."
— Grrrr.
The wolf rumbled. The young knight reached out and soothed it.
'Is it hungry?'
"...I could not be more pleased that the Order has sent you. Glory to God!"
"Glory to God. Now — why does the Count's proxy not show herself?"
"Is it not obvious? She is a shameless creature without a shred of decency, and she is holding out! You must lead your soldiers in yourself and punish her, my lord!"
"The walls look high, the approaches look narrow, and the soldiers look well trained, from what I can see."
"?"
"You mean for me to march my men into a place like that?"
"Ah... n-no, that is not what I meant. I only meant that with you and your soldiers, it would surely be enough..."
"If the elf of the Blua family receives proper judgment, then this county will be yours to govern, I take it."
"No, my lord! Naturally, my nephew will..."
Everyone in the tent snorted. A laugh that said what nonsense. Golen burned with humiliation hot enough to boil his blood, but he swallowed it. It was his loss to mourn, after all.
"And even if I do fight, I walk away with nothing to show for it."
"...We will do our utmost to provide suitable compensation..."
"Enough. I will tell you how it will be, so listen well. Go open the gate."
"Wh-what?!"
Golen went pale, as if an arrow had come flying straight at him. From the castellan down to the common soldiers, the castle's defense was under Izelia's direct command. How, under their very eyes, was he supposed to open the gate?
"My lord, the situation inside the castle is..."
"I do not care to know. Order or no order, I have no wish to see my soldiers hurt. If you want to watch Izelia stand trial, then you will open the gate. Am I understood?"
Johan behaved exactly like a mercenary captain desperate not to take a loss. Golen was thrown into confusion — but at the same time, he felt relief.
When an opponent acted this transparently, it was comforting. At the very least, there seemed to be no other scheme hiding beneath the surface.
"But..."
"Open it. Answer me. Am I understood?"
"Y... yes, my lord. I will find some way to open it."
Cowed, Golen withdrew without managing a single word of protest.
And he truly did find a way to open the gate.
Two days later, at dawn.
Johan was leading his elite through the castle gate.
The envoys who had come to the camp were treated to hospitality and lay sprawled in drunken sleep, while Golen — who had returned ahead of them — worked on a handful of file-leaders and somehow managed to get the gate open.
The instant the signal flew, Johan crashed through. He secured the gate itself beyond any doubt, then summoned his soldiers.
As the dwarf cohort advanced beating the drums of their race's own making, and every manner of uproar broke out at the gate, the soldiers elsewhere in the castle froze in shock.
"We must close the gate!"
Izelia came sprinting from a distance, soldiers streaming behind her. Already dozens of men stood in formation by that gate. Several file-leaders had turned traitor and taken their place among them — and Golen's face was in their number.
She ground her teeth and roared.
"Traitors! I will cut you all down!"
"Th-that is the elf of the Blua family! She is the one you must seize, my lord!"
Johan nodded. With the gate flung wide and fully secured, the rest of the soldiers arriving was only a matter of time.
"Let's go."
At Johan's word, his horse surged forward with a snort and a thunder of hooves. Felln, seasoned now by long years at Johan's side, no longer startled at anything short of catastrophe. Even with dozens of soldiers rushing to meet them, there was no check in its pace.
"You bas— guh!"
An elf knight spat curses at Johan and went flying. The soldier beside him, leveling his spear, was flung aside with him. A third, raising his shield and drawing his shortsword, was launched into the sky.
Johan plunged into the enemy line with nothing but a single blade and a single horse, and crushed their formation flat. Before him, hardened soldiers dissolved into a scattering rabble.
"D-damn it all... that's not a man, that's..."
It was as if some unseen giant hand were sweeping aside everything that drew near Johan.
Before he knew it, Johan realized there was no one left in front of him. He had punched clean through the enemy line.