Volume 16

by Reki Kawahara

  However, he found the integrity knights to be much more troublesome than magical beasts after the fighting began, barely slipping from their encirclements despite how many charged forth. Ten would be blown away with the explosion from a single fire arrow and even normal arrows flew true, to a horrifying extent, towards their heads and hearts.

  Now then, what to do?

  The conclusion Shibori reached after some thinking could not have been any more simple or cruel.

  He would continue having his soldiers charge forward until the enemy knight’s arrows ran out.

  That said, the soldiers sent ahead without a plan were in no mood to simply “go with it”, naturally enough. There was a fair amount with intelligence surpassing Shibori and though they went with his orders, they contrived whatever gimmicks they could.

  They began lifting up corpses from their fallen comrades and hiding in their shadows or staying a fair distance from the knight while strafing left and right.

  Deusolbert should have seen through such a naive plan at once if he had his usual temperament. However, the screams from the guards whose strength left them shaved away at his calm without his notice. The goblins benefited from how the war started at evening as well.

  The enemy was taking awfully long to fall.

  By the time Deusolbert noticed that, his stock of more-than-enough iron arrows was nearly exhausted.

  “Goood, good, looks like he’s finally out of arrows.”

  Shibori scraped the nape of his neck with the backs of the two machetes against his shoulders as he snickered.

  The tragic display of the countless corpses of his race, too, failed to instigate much influence on his mind. He inherited that tenacity from his ancestors who had lived through the old «age of blood and iron» which could have been no more appalling.

  It appeared a whole third of his allies were done in, but there still remained over three thousand soldiers. If they obtained plentiful meat and land after invading the white iums’ lands, they could replenish their race all they liked.

  However, they had to produce significant results to expand their territories. They would first have to take care of that integrity knight in red armor.

  “Alright, let’s go, all of you. Surround that archer and drag him down. I’ll take his neck off myself.”

  Shibori instructed those forming a barricade around himself, his close aides who were both brawny and boorish, and slowly stepped forward.

  “…I slipped up…”

  Deusolbert let out a deep groan.

  He had finally realized those enemies erratically moving through the darkness and those scarecrows improvised from raised corpses.

  After bringing down those manipulating the scarecrows by aiming at the feet rather than the heart, the right hand searched through the large quiver behind and grasped only a fruitless emptiness.

  Without arrows, the Conflagrant Flame Bow, a divine instrument, was no different from a plain longbow. Though it was possible to produce arrows from metallic elements with sacred arts, that technique could only be used in a one-versus-one where he had the chance to recite the art. In the first place, almost all of the space sacred energy should have been absorbed by the integrity knight standing by in the sky, leaving the atmosphere dry.

  Grinding his teeth as he hung the Conflagrant Flame Bow on his left shoulder by its string, Deusolbert drew the longsword from his waist once more. It was in that precise moment that he spotted a party rapidly approaching through the darkness from in front, with sizes rather large for goblins. Their outfits differed from the small fry he faced off until now. Their chest to around their hips was covered in plate armor and riveted leather belts wrapped about their brawny arms. They held thick, large hatchets that seemed fit to sever even cows in their right hands.

  Deusolbert confirmed another goblin approaching from behind those seven—with a frame that exceeded even orcs in terms of height.

  Judging from the cast iron armor shining with black luster, the two large hatchets hanging from his hands, and the vivid, decorative feathers swaying on his head, he figured there was no mistake that he was the army’s commander.

  The goblin general’s two eyes shining red under his bulging brow collided with Deusolbert’s pair of eyes and the surrounding air creaked in that instant. The swords and machetes striking against each other without pause on the front lines gradually petered out and came to an eventual stop. Both the guards and the goblins gained distance from each other without further words and watched the two generals’ confrontation with held breaths.

  Deusolbert held back the numerous approaching guards with his left hand. Brandishing the sword in his right hand without letting down his guard, he questioned in a deep and seasoned yet distinct voice.

  “You are one of the ten lords of the Dark Empire… the goblins’ chief, huh?”

  “That’s me.”

  The large goblin responded with his yellowed teeth showing.

  “Chief of the plains goblins, that’s Shibori-sama to you.”

  Deusolbert steadied his breathing, rough from the long, fierce battle while gazing straight towards the enemy general.

  —If I defeat this general and those close to him, the goblin army would lose its will to fight, even for a moment. If we take the initiative and push the lines back, we would accomplish our role as the vanguards.

  Even if he could not use his Conflagrant Flame Bow.

  Even if it was eight on one, he could only aim for a certain victory now. He would prove the integrity knights’ strength, said to comparable to a thousand, here and now.

  “I am the integrity knight, Deusolbert Synthesis…”

  Shibori’s vulgar cry cut his sonorous voice short as he tried to state his name.

  “Hold there, who cares about some ium’s name?! You’re meat, meat stuck on that head I’ll be taking!! Get to it… all of you, get him!!”

  Uu———raaaaaahh!!

  Deusolbert took on the seven elite goblins jumping forward with brutal war cries on his own.

  They should have simply continued that boorish war if they lacked the pride of swordsmen so. Proposing this shame of a duel was just—

  “Ridiculous!!”

  Before picking up the whip, the spear, or the bow, every integrity knight was an experienced swordsman.

  Not even a single being there could perceive the motion of Deusolbert raising the longsword in his right hand overhead and swinging it down.

  The slash at godspeed drew a dimly white streak of light. A faint noise rang out as the large hatchet raised by the leading goblin was split into two.

  That was a moment before that goblin was cut into two from the crown of his head to his stomach, fresh blood gushing out everywhere. However, the knight was gone before that spray reached.

  Deusolbert carried out his next attack, having moved to the second before the first even noticed his own death.

  It was not some consecutive sword technique like those of Knight Fanatio or the rebels he had once fought against. Those were repeated single slashes in the old style of sword techniques executed from the traditional stance.

  However, Deusolbert’s skill was polished through a near infinite number of months and years, to a practically divine level. Only the upper ranks among the dark knights and pugilists could react against that single strike.

  In actual fact, the second, cut from the left at nearly the same time as the first, had perished with his plate armor severed along with his heart by the time he began swinging down his large hatchet.

  The overwhelming power difference was evident in everyone’s eyes.

  However, the elite goblins showed no hesitation. Chief Shibori, too, was a superior being that inspired fear in them and they did not even consider opposing his command.

  Two who circled around from Deusolbert’s side, bathed in the blood sprays from their own race, assailed him from both the left and right.

  The experienced knight showed not even the least panic and first c
ut into the left goblin from below and drew that into an arc into the right goblin from above. The single immediate motion that ended the enemies on both sides was truly on the level of divinity.

  Three remained; no, four if the general was counted too.

  Would they come all at once or one after another?

  Avoiding the spurts of blackish-red blood with a jump back, Deusolbert prepared his next attack.

  The fifth naively slashed at him from the left of his vision. He saw no light reflected off blades from any other direction.

  “Nuhn!”

  He sliced horizontally with the sword on his left with that curt yell. The tip cut a silver arc and sank into the enemy’s right.

  Both of Deusolbert’s eyes opened wide in that moment.

  A large hatchet had stabbed through the enemy goblin’s chest from behind, right as he had slashed, and flew towards him.

  The massive blade scattered all around the fresh blood from its still breathing comrade as it closed in towards Deusolbert’s throat.

  He could neither dodge nor block it with his sword.

  Having judged so in an instant, the left forearm he raised collided with the tip of that large hatchet, producing dull light.

  A numbing, intense pain. Though he had somehow endured with his reddish-copper gauntlet, the blow spread through his bones from his flesh.

  “Ku… oohh!!”

  Blowing through his surprise with a shout, Deusolbert forced the enemy’s blade to glance off towards the left. A cracking noise rang throughout his body, informing him of the broken bones in his left arm.

  That was no more than a single arm!!

  With the slash stopped with his mustered up spirit, Deusolbert charged straight in just like that. Stabbing through the sacrificed fifth’s stomach, his sword reached the overlapped sixth’s body.

  However, the feedback was shallow.

  He had to quickly withdraw his sword, gain some distance, and link that into his next attack.

  Deusolbert pulled the sword out at once, sweat rising onto his brow without his notice.

  The fifth slumped over, dead, and beyond that, he saw—

  The sixth and seventh throwing their large hatchets away and leaping at him with their arms spread out at a height equal to crawl across the ground.

  And there existed no stance fit for attacking an enemy in that position within Deusolbert’s style.

  Falling into a momentary rigidness, the knight’s two legs were grabbed simultaneously by the two goblins. Incapable of dealing with their dreadful physical strength, Deusolbert fell onto his back.

  His two widened eyes perceived Shibori, the enemy general, jumping forward with his large frame and two battle axes brandished while showing a brutal joy.

  —In such a place, against goblins?

  —It’s impossible for I, Deusolbert, an integrity knight, to face defeat here.

  «Impossible».

  That thought could prove to be a dangerous poison for one’s mental state the more stubborn one was. Though he remained above falling into a berserk state like Sigrosig, Deusolbert’s motion came to a complete stop within his numbed consciousness.

  The knight could only watch on as the lethal blade loomed closer before he heard—

  A scream, hoarse from exhaustion but valiant all the same.

  “Esteemed knight———!!”

  A single guard charged towards the enemy general and his fiendish features. That was that young guard commander. That youngling whose name he had not even heard yet raised the greatsword his two hands held up and carried out a slash from above with all he had.

  In response, the enemy general swung the battle axe in his left hand as though it was a bother.

  Gagiin!! A dull, shrill metallic noise rang out.

  Though it paled when compared to the enemy general, the guard commander had a large build and wore heavy armor, but was blown away like a paper doll, rolling two, three times across the ground. That physical strength overthrew the gap between their technique, speed, and equipment all too easily.

  The two eyes of the demi-human shone red and narrowed. Releasing the murderous aura of a beast’s, he leapt and swung up the axe in his right hand as though to put an end to the guard commander who had yet to stand up.

  —No.

  —I cannot allow any further casualties as a knight, and as their commander!

  The momentary thought stabbed into Deusolbert’s stiff mental state like a bolt of lightning.

  There was not enough time to shake his legs free from the two elite goblins binding them, stand up, and move before the guard commander. Throwing the sword in his right hand would only serve to delay the same conclusion by seconds.

  Before he could consider what to even do, his two hands swung almost automatically—carrying out what he had never thought of prior.

  Nocking the longsword in his right hand as a replacement for an arrow onto the bowstring of the Conflagrant Flame Bow he wielded horizontally, he fiercely tugged at it.

  The heavy resistance felt as though he was pulling on a rope fastened to the great earth. The intense pain practically wiped his consciousness blank from the roots.

  However, Deusolbert let a groan escape amidst his clenched teeth and pulled it to its very limit. Taking up a posture to fire, he yelled.

  “Come, flames!!”

  The divine instrument responded to its owner’s will even without reciting its art.

  The energy from the flames emitting from all over the bow surpassed all previous manifestations of his armament full control art.

  Though the longsword nocked onto the bow could not compare to a divine instrument, it was a named good produced personally by the highest minister. It possessed a priority on an entirely different level from the mass-produced steel arrows. The sacred energy contained within its blade transformed into flames without moderation.

  The full body armor on Deusolbert, with its supposed resistance towards heat, turned red hot at once.

  The two goblins clinging onto his legs let out shrieks as flames started spouting out from their eyes and mouths, burning them, before they could react accordingly.

  The enemy general, turning back upon noticing the abnormality, widened both eyes from surprise and anger as he tried to hurl the axe in his right hand.

  However, that was too slow—

  “—Burn down to ashes!!”

  Shouting so, Deusolbert released the bowstring. Shot forth with a roar, the longsword flapped its crimson, blazing wings as it soared straight. It appeared just like the Conflagrant Flame Bow’s original self—the phoenix that lived in the oldest volcano of the south empire.

  “Graahh!!”

  The enemy general let out a groan as he crossed the two large axes before his body. The phoenix clad in flames struck the heart of that for an instant.

  The large, pig iron axes vaporized all too quickly with a hiss.

  And their owner, Shibori the chief of the plains goblins, skipped through the usual processes of combustion, immediately turning into black charcoal— He crumbled into pieces right after and vanished without a trace.

  Having witnessed their general’s horrifying death, the goblin soldiers turned around at once and began fleeing. However, over three hundred soldiers could not escape the phoenix’s inferno and disappeared into cinders.

  * * *

  The distress both Fanatio in the first unit, middle, and Deusolbert in the right flank went through.

  Instructing the second unit in the rear, the commander of the Human Empire Defense Army, Bercouli Synthesis One, clearly knew of those as well as the chaos the left flank under Eldrie’s command experienced from that smokescreen.

  However, he did not take even a single step.

  The first reason was his trust in the knights and guards brought up under his personal care. The second reason was how the Human Empire could not send out its second unit either, with the main force of the enemy’s ground troops, the Order of the Dark Knights and th
e Pugilists’ Guild, yet to make a move.

  And the third reason was the possibility of a surprise attack, something he could not help but worry for, with his knowledge of the Dark Territory beyond everyone’s.

  Or in other words, the enemy’s might in aerial warfare.

  In this world where the art for flight did not exist—save for the one recorded in the index only Highest Minister Administrator could call out and was lost forever with her death, to be specific—the few «dragon knights» among the Order of the Integrity Knights and the Order of the Dark Knights possessed exceptional war potential. Freely soaring through the skies beyond the reach of swords, they could raze infantry with the knight’s arts and the dragon’s heat rays.

  However, they could not be rashly let out onto the war front due to that value of theirs. If they sent theirs out before the enemy and any fell from the off-chance of an art or arrow from the ground, they would be ladened with a tremendous disadvantage from that very point.

  As such, Bercouli retained all flying dragons aside from «Amayori», ridden by Alice, in the rear of the battlefield and trusted in the enemy to do the same. Hence, the surprise attack he fretted over would not come from dragon knights.

  Aside from them, the forces of darkness held an aerial force that they monopolized.

  They were repulsive, winged monsters termed «minions». Created from clay and other materials by dark arts users, they possessed no intelligence and could understand only certain basic orders.

  In truth, Bercouli had heard from Alice that the highest minister had created and researched into those same minions in secret. However, it seemed even the highest minister hesitated in deploying the repulsive minions as they were to the Axiom Church. He could only feel it a pity that she had not changed their appearances into something fitting in time before she departed, but there was no use in crying over spilled milk.

  Due to those reasons, Bercouli felt it necessary to prepare for minions launching surprise attacks from the skies. And in this situation with the flying dragons held back and the ascetics unit tied up with healing, he was the only option left for aerial defense over a vast area.