Signal Fires and Bad Bargains
Kiada smacked his lips in embarrassment at Johan's jab. He had spoken in earnest, only for Johan to dismiss it as utterly implausible.
Well... I suppose it could have happened.
Considering what Johan had accomplished in the White Kingdom and across the southern peninsula, it would hardly be surprising if word had reached the heathens' ears. Rumors always traveled faster than anyone expected.
"Hmm. If not that, then perhaps it's because the pass matters more to them than the cities."
The enemy hadn't bothered to breach the Vinashitim fortress guarding the south, nor had they sailed in to take the islands along the coast. All of it pointed to one thing — a surprise attack.
The lifeblood of any surprise attack was speed. Strike fast, end it fast. Punch through the pass and drive east to seize the enemy's heartland, and the port cities along the coast became irrelevant. If they succeeded, they could always conquer the coast later anyway!
"Good grief... should I call it audacity, or sheer madness?"
Johan marveled at these people every time he encountered them. He himself would weigh every angle, run the numbers, and only then act with care — while these men charged ahead without a trace of fear.
Granted, Johan had grown bold enough to hurl himself alone into a crowd of dozens of enemies, but that came only after his own judgment and calculation. Other knights leapt in with no such guarantee at all. They simply believed that if God granted them His favor, they would live to win.
"Things have gone sideways, but it's a blessing in its way. If you hadn't been here, my lord, the cities themselves might have come under attack."
Had the coastal cities been sacked or occupied, it would have been a catastrophe for the Republic as well. The trade routes would be severed, and worse, they'd suddenly have heathens marching up toward their own doorstep.
The Republic had spent years sneering at Vinashitim and keeping it in check — but it had never wished for its annihilation.
"If they're not coming for the cities, then as of right now, there's no need for me to move at all, is there?"
"You have no need to move, my lord. It's the others who'll be tearing their hair out."
The Republic, for one, would be in a full panic, scrambling to exchange word with the homeland. And as for the navy stationed on the islands down below — the question of what exactly they'd been doing to let this slip through would be ringing through every council chamber.
Vinashitim, meanwhile, was equally in disarray. Being ambushed like that would rattle anyone.
"Governor. How long until a report reaches us?"
"The report has already arrived, my lord."
Vinashitim's capital sat at the empire's easternmost edge; the governor's city at its westernmost. For a messenger to cross that staggering distance — even galloping along the ancient highways — would take a full week at the very least...
"I see. So they used magic? What kind of mage-tool?"
"Pardon? No, my lord. We used signal fires."
"......"
Vinashitim possessed a systematic, sophisticated beacon system handed down since the days of the Ancient Empire. From that distant horizon, less than an hour after the fighting began, they had received a reasonably detailed report in flames.
Johan turned very red.
No. That's just embarrassing.
He hadn't even thought of signal fires...
"If both the Republic and Vinashitim are sending aid, then there's all the more reason for me to sit tight. Tell the soldiers to rest and prepare for the battle to come."
The Eastern Empire's army was a potential enemy to Johan too.
He bore them no personal hatred — nothing so crude as die, you heathen filth! — but they, on the other hand, hated him first and foremost under exactly that banner. Letting them run rampant this close to home would benefit no one.
The problem was...
I have no intention of leading my own army to the front of the line.
This region had no shortage of people with a duty to answer for it. Vinashitim was right here, the Republic was right here, the petty kingdoms to the north could send reinforcements too...
Among all these many parties, Johan — the one who would lose the least — had no obligation to charge ahead with his forces. If he watched the situation develop and decided, enough of them have gathered; perhaps I'll take a cut of the glory — then he could step in at that point!
"My lord. An envoy has arrived from the pass."
"From the Grand Chamberlain?"
Before Johan could respond, the governor leapt in first. He seized Johan by the hand.
"My lord, you must not be taken in by the Chamberlain's words. He is a cunning, treacherous man!"
"......"
It was genuinely impressive, Johan thought, to hear this from a man who normally spoke so carefully out of fear of Leoanos.
The governor was terrified — terrified that Johan might, by some calamity, march his army out of the city.
As it happened, Johan had not the slightest intention of doing anyone else's job for him, but his reputation had misled the governor. A standard-bearer and knight of the Holy Church would hardly sit idle with a heathen army at the gates, would he?
"You cannot leave! There's no telling when another enemy fleet might arrive! That army itself may be nothing but a feint!"
"If another fleet shows up on top of all this, that just means Vinashitim's navy and the Republic's are both useless..."
"That is an entirely plausible scenario!"
Kiada cut in, dead serious. Really, that was going too far — calling the Republic's fleet useless as well?
"Very well. I understand. No matter how the Chamberlain begs, I won't leave the city without a word to you. Would I break a promise I made in advance?"
"Forgive me, my lord. To doubt you... with the heathen army right there, I assumed you would mount up and ride after them at once."
What does this man take me for?
The Chamberlain's envoy was shown in shortly after. He stood there with a face wound tight as a bowstring, clearing his throat.
"I trust you understand this is a heavy request we bring."
"Listen well, you backward, barbarian mongrel of House Eitz, you half-witted imbecile!"
"...?"
"????"
Those present were more astonished than outraged. It was truly an unforeseen exercise in diplomacy.
"Is this how Vinashitim requests cooperation?"
"Ah — no, my lord. Even I would never..."
"Withdraw from this land at once, or else—"
Johan had no wish to hear the rest. The centaurs came charging in first and trampled the envoys under their hooves. Their hooves had been itching for action anyway, and some contemptible wretch insulting their master sent their fury boiling over.
"Don't kill them. Fall back!"
The centaurs withdrew, snorting and stamping. Johan surveyed the mangled envoys and spoke.
"Carry this back to your master. Tell him he'd best worry about saving his own neck from the heathens before he goes around insulting mine."
The envoys retreated in a daze. Beaten black and blue and having barely escaped with their lives, they couldn't process the words on the spot. Only after they'd made it home did the meaning of Johan's message finally dawn on them.
"It's a shame we couldn't hit the city, truly."
"House Mulk's counsel is never wasted, sir."
Yeheman nodded at his adjutant's words. He was a savage, valiant warrior — but no fool.
When they'd landed and found an army bearing unknown banners barring the way to the city they'd marked as their first target, Yeheman had dispatched men to identify them. The answer: the banners of Count Eitz, the knight of the far west.
Crossing blades with an exceptional warrior to decide a victor was a pleasure in its own right — but Yeheman had work to do. He gave up on the city and turned his army aside.
Food was still plentiful, and the pillaging of the nearby villages had the men's morale riding high.
"Take the pass! Bring down this fortress, and my name shall be carved upon a feat no man has ever achieved!"
The Eastern Empire, like the Holy Empire, was a realm that ran on feudalism. Beneath the Sultan seated upon the throne, a swarm of nobles was tangled together in a web of obligation and ambition.
The Eastern Empire was a brutal conqueror, and it paid its nobles with freshly conquered lands. That payment drove them back onto the battlefield again and again.
Vinashitim was the richest prize of all. The nobles who had rallied their soldiers under Yeheman's banner were blinded by the empire's wealth.
"My lord! Let me lead the van!"
"No — grant me, of all men, the honor of the first charge!"
Yeheman put the eagerly pushing knights at the front. It was only natural for nobles to hunger for the great feat that leading the vanguard would bring.
"You don't mind yielding it, my lord?"
His adjutant asked, puzzled. Yeheman was a warrior obsessed with blood and glory. To hand such a thing to others?
"They won't get over the walls anyway."
Yeheman said it with a sneer at the knights pushing to the front.
The monotheists of the west usually hired mercenaries to fill their ranks, while the dualists of the east conscripted whatever warm bodies they could find. Grab any man off the road, put a club or a spear in his hands, and — presto — you had a soldier.
Their quality, consequently, ranged from excellent to worthless. The army's size was staggering, but Yeheman knew perfectly well that fewer than half its soldiers were worth anything at all.
"Those men exist to wear down the garrison behind those walls. That alone is enough! Once the men inside are exhausted, cowed, and starving — that's when I and my true warriors step in."
Had the leading knights heard it, the words would have enraged them — but Yeheman felt no responsibility whatsoever toward the knights here, just as they harbored no loyalty toward him.
These were men gathered from here and there for one purpose only: to plunder each other's prizes.
"Sound the horns! Send them forward, again and again! Cut down any man who runs!"
"Don't be afraid! Pour fire and thunder down upon those heathen dogs!"
Leoanos roared as he paced the ramparts. But his face was etched with exhaustion he could not hide. That was how ferociously the enemy kept coming.
Quality aside, numbers were a weapon in themselves. The assaults came on so relentlessly that the defenders' arrows were running out, and the men on the walls were numbed past the point of terror.
"Lord Leoanos. The arrows are gone. The eastern wall has collapsed, and the engineers are refusing to attempt repairs."
"When does relief arrive?"
"......"
Leoanos clawed at his own hair. The situation was suffocating beyond bearing.
Damn it all — I never should have insulted that count!
These heathens wanted something entirely different from any enemy he'd faced before. He could feel it in their assault — the iron will to take this fortress no matter how many corpses it cost.
He had underestimated Johan. But who could have guessed the count's place would be taken by a heathen army?
Every instinct screamed at him to flee at once — but that would be political suicide. He had already blundered once; if he ran now, after that...
Relief was all he could cling to, and there was no telling when relief would come. Whether the Emperor would truly commit his forces was doubtful in itself.
Aid from the Republic or the petty kingdoms — or failing those, from the nearest army of all, Count Eitz's — seemed the most plausible path. Anything, before those heathen dogs.
...The problem was that he had, of all things, recently insulted Johan.
No matter how gracefully he phrased the request, no matter how generous the terms he offered, the count's heart would not be easily moved.
"Send me the head of the envoy who visited him. Tell the count there has been a misunderstanding!"
Leoanos racked his brains for a way out. Under cover of night, a secret agent pocketed a fistful of gold, cut off the head of the hapless — and entirely innocent — envoy, and went running.
Johan accepted the gold and sent back word that he would consider the matter of troops.
Leoanos dispatched a second secret agent. The missive showered praise upon Johan's achievements, sang again of his honor, and assured him that if he led his army into the field, his renown would echo for all eternity.
Johan pocketed the gold a second time and sent the man back.
Leoanos sent a final agent: let us bind ourselves in marriage and alliance. If the noble whom the Chamberlain backed should one day become the new Emperor, splendid territories would fall into Johan's lap — and with them, the most noble and purest office in all Vinashitim, or so the Chamberlain insisted.
If gold and honor moved him not, then he would try stoking the man's ambition. And if this too failed, Leoanos planned to slip out of the pass with a handful of his men.
But mercifully, relief appeared on the far horizon.
"We're saved!"
A cheer broke out among the defenders. The exhausted and the wounded wept openly, offering thanks to God. Leoanos, too, let out a long breath of relief.
"Though, Lord Leoanos — to the Count, you truly..."
"Did you truly believe I'd give it? He lacks both the standing to demand it and my intention to grant it. What can the count do once he learns he was deceived?"
At Leoanos's words, the chamberlain nodded with a look of relief. Conceding so much to a foreigner was unthinkable.
"Er... the banners..."
"?"
Leoanos climbed the wall and narrowed his eyes. At the far right flew the banner of Count Eitz — bearing the emblem of the Holy Church.
And to the left, the banner of the Republic. So far, so comprehensible. The Republic committing forces made sense.
And in the center flew a banner bearing a dragon.
The banner reserved for the Emperor alone.
"......"
Unable to process what he was seeing, Leoanos froze where he stood.