13 (49)

“Yes…?”

Louis looked at Mark Jay and laughed.

“Then would there be angels in hell?”

They were moving forward quickly with the troops, and a large number of private soldiers were running toward them from the front. Their equipment was all different. Most had swords, but they were armed with all sorts of weapons, from iron flails and spearheads for javelins to large axes and hand axes. Most of the private soldiers seemed to be former mercenaries.

When he looked at the information windows of those swarming toward them, all of them were suffering from mental contamination. If there had been even a high-ranking priest here, he might have searched for a method, but not now. At the far end of the private soldiers, a middle-aged man with a bewildered expression could be seen. It was Vesk.

Vesk still seemed unaware of what exactly was happening. The black mage beside him screamed at the top of his lungs and pointed at Louis. His soldiers were mostly in a dazed state and seemed like beasts. And in a brief moment, the two sides mixed together. Steel clashed and rang out noisily.

Of course, even Louis was no exception. One private soldier was in the middle of charging toward Louis as well. His eyes were hollow, and he had the face of someone who had taken a whole bowl of drugs. Looking closely, his posture was a complete mess from how excited he was.

The one thing he should have considered fortunate was that he was in a state unaffected by Louis’s mana. Without even the slightest hesitation, Louis cleanly cut down the man who had rushed right up to his nose in an instant.

The longsword drank blood, and one forearm flew through the air with a whoosh. Drops of blood fell over his face with a pattering splash. The man who had been charging in with such momentum let out a groan and rolled across the ground. Seeing him crawl across the ground without even lifting his head, Louis thought he might have finally come to his senses a little. He had a strong urge to finish him off, but he was rather busy.

In front of him, a man with a somewhat steadier posture than the previous fellow was running at him. He had pulled a large axe back, clearly intending to bring it down on Louis in one blow. But he was too slow. When dust rose thickly from the ground with a heavy impact, he had already been cut across the neck and collapsed as if sinking to the ground.

The third man to appear at least held a normal weapon. Thanks to the large man just now, he had already entered close range, and his expression was bright, as if he thought he could strike Louis at any moment.

The instant his shoulder lowered slightly, Louis struck him in the pit of the stomach. He was half-lifted off the ground. The spear shaft that passed beside Louis’s face lost its force and soon made a messy sound on the ground.

The sound of him rolling across the ground followed, but Louis did not deal with him separately. Even though he had taken care of three in an instant, the forces had only just begun to tangle together, so there were still many private soldiers rushing at him.

He thought he would have to cut down about five more before he could see a path. At that moment, with a thud, a private soldier in front of him was sent flying by an arrow that had suddenly come from behind. The steel arrow lodged precisely in his chest had pierced a black, round hole and protruded out the other side. Blood gushed thickly from inside. Judging by his rolled-back eyes, he had died instantly.

After turning his gaze to the right and the side, Louis saw two or three men rolling across the ground in the same way, crumpled as if by the same principle. It was the armed man who had killed his warhorse in one blow during the war and made him fall from his horse. It was Mark Jay. During the war, there had been no one as troublesome as him, but now it was the opposite.

Each private soldier that rushed in was pierced by arrows and sent flying. Soon, Louis had the black mage and Fred Vesk before his eyes. The bloodshot black mage pointed at Louis. He seemed not to know who Louis was. However, Vesk, whose eyes had gone round, muttered in disbelief, “Y-Your Highness?”

“Good to see you. The hour is a bit late, but I heard you were having some fun, so I came by to see if I might enjoy it with you.”

The Vesk Louis had seen not long ago and the Vesk now were somewhat different. The Vesk he had seen in the past had been a coward, but now no trace of that could be found anywhere. Though he was still shocked.

The black mage beside him wore a pitch-black robe that looked as if ink had been poured over it, covering even his face. Such attire was common for mages, but from his body, which had been performing a ritual just moments ago, sinister energy seeped out in waves.

The two were talking quickly. The gist of it was “What do we do?” and “There is a way,” and in between, an arrow was poured in like accompaniment. It belonged to Mark Jay.

A heavy sound closer to an excessively loud “boom” than the sound an arrow should make burst out in front of Vesk. Vesk flinched reflexively. The black mage said in a calm voice.

“A sniper. It seems to be the one who interfered with the ritual just now.”

The one who blocked the arrow was a giant reaching nearly 2.5 meters.

It had a body like an orc. Seeing it up close, it was even larger. Could it even move? It was covered entirely in iron armor to the point that such a question arose. Just as Louis wondered what its voice would be like, the sound it made was “Grurrk.” Even when Vesk shouted, “Kill the king at once!” its answer was still “Grurrk.”

So it was not in a living state. Even if it was alive, it had to be a situation where black magic beyond mental contamination had been applied in a seductive manner. The enemy was not merely playing around either, and aimed for the opening while Louis was observing it this way and that, shooting arrows at him. Just when two choices, either dodge or block, came to mind, a third choice appeared: there was no need to move.

Eight royal guards, including Bud Norman, stood around him as if forming a defensive position and raised their shields, and arrows rained down onto them. After blocking all the arrows, the royal guards shouted all at once, “Protect His Highness!” and charged at the giant.

The royal guards were not weak, but their opponent was bad. Every time the giant swung its iron flail, the royal guards were knocked away one by one. One at a time. It had a speed that was hard to believe from something swinging a weapon while wearing iron armor. The royal guards who were sent flying were lucky if they escaped with fractures, but most suffered fatal wounds with flesh torn away, and in the worst case, their heads were struck and crushed.

Even in the midst of that, Mark Jay occasionally fired arrows at the giant and managed to land two shots in its torso, but each time, it only retreated far backward. It was as if it felt no pain.

When only two or three of the brave royal guards were left, and Bud Norman, who had tried to save a comrade, was cornered by the iron flail, Louis moved urgently.

Clang!

The flail was deflected by the longsword, and the space between the giant’s helmet was briefly visible. A helmet splattered here and there with blood. Two emotionless eyes. ‘So soldiers can be used like that too.’ If there were soldiers who felt no pain, they would exert tremendous power on the battlefield.

The question was whether they still had enough intelligence left to understand tactics. From behind him, Bud Norman said, “Y-Your Highness, it is an honor. As a royal guard, I have committed a sin worthy of death.” When Louis glanced at his face, he looked so moved that he seemed ready to kill himself at any moment.

Louis had saved him, so if he died again while claiming he had committed a sin worthy of death, that would not do. In any case, the black mage’s frantic shouting was noisy. He was asking where in the world there could be a king who could block Giant Jenny’s attack. As expected, all things had names. This giant, an inhuman human, had the pretty name Jenny.

He could not believe it until he stripped off the armor, but somehow, there seemed to be a fair chance that its gender was that way. Thinking it might be good to ask once, Louis asked Jenny what he was curious about.

“Grurrk.”

As expected, the answer was grurrk. Bud Norman seemed shocked in a different sense, and Louis wondered for a moment what that grurrk had been answering, but no answer came to mind. As expected, the simplest solution was to beat the black mage with a wooden sword and then ask.

As Jenny’s attacks grew fiercer, Louis began to receive them one after another. After blocking about six consecutive strikes, he glanced to the right. Mihoff, who had cut down dozens before he knew it, had turned in his direction to help him. Just as Louis was thinking about how to counterattack, Jenny suddenly lost balance.

It had been struck in the side by Bud Norman. Jenny collapsed to the side. Crunch. The sound of something breaking was vivid. It was a private soldier crawling on the ground. Bones had burst through his flesh and were sticking out.

After watching that sight for a moment, Louis quickly climbed onto Jenny. He held his sword upright and stabbed diagonally into Jenny’s neck. If it had been an ordinary human, this attack would have killed them, but Jenny was still squirming. For a very brief moment, greed arose in him, but he soon shook his head. If he created this kind of military branch, the Holy Knight Order would probably stalk him for the rest of his life.

‘Ah, right…’

Come to think of it, if Duke Rose Christopher was backing Vesk, he simply had to report him to the Papal Court. Whether he followed black magic or not did not really matter. It would not be bad to attack Duke Christopher at the same time, taking advantage of the chaos caused by the Holy Knight Order’s intrusion. His territory was fertile.

“Be careful!”

A sharp voice was directed at Louis. When he wondered what was wrong, two hands were rising in front of his eyes. Jenny, who he had thought was dead, was still alive. But the hands that had risen halfway suddenly snapped off. They had not simply stopped there. They had truly been severed. Mihoff, who had approached before he knew it, asked Louis.

“Are you all right?”

Mihoff’s face had flushed red, as if he was extremely surprised. He seemed to want to say something more, moving his mouth slightly, but he stopped there. Louis briefly nodded and put strength into the hand gripping his sword. With a thud, Jenny’s neck, which had been putting up slight resistance, separated from the body.

“No!!! My masterpiece!!!”

Savoring the black mage’s scream, Louis opened Jenny’s helmet with his foot. The face was patched together in a way that could not particularly be defined as either male or female. Soothing his regret, Louis looked around at the scene that had become a battlefield.

The close battle had lasted only a short while; the odds had been tilted from the beginning. Beneath a huge tree on the left, private soldiers were gathered in a cluster, kneeling with their heads lowered. Louis’s soldiers were pointing swords at them. They were prisoners.

He turned his gaze toward the direction where wailing could still be heard. The black mage was unable to come to his senses, perhaps because he felt so wronged. Behind that black mage, Vesk was running away in a hurry.

Louis approached the black mage first. He was just about to escape on a horse. He had half a foot in the stirrup and was barely climbing up when an arrow suddenly lodged in his right shoulder. He rolled across the ground, and perhaps because of the pain, he began sobbing terribly.

“Why… When others were in pain, you were not like this, but now that you are the one in pain, you feel like dying? If you open your mouth, I will cut out your tongue.”

Louis placed his blood-soaked longsword against his neck. The black mage, who saw with both eyes a few drops drip onto the ground, covered his mouth. Soon, he became quiet. The black mage struggled to breathe, as though choking on Louis’s mana.

Whether he trembled or not, Louis kicked his body. His body lifted briefly, and the sound of bones breaking rang out noisily, perhaps because two or so ribs had snapped. The black mage rolled across the ground twice like a frog and then collapsed.

“Is he dead?”

When Bud Norman asked that, Louis answered, “No way,” with an expression asking if Bud really thought he would grant him that. Now he turned his gaze to catch the final remaining bastard. The world was pitch-black, but torches were burning here and there.

In the middle was the headless goat statue. Its head had rolled down below. Of course, its eye had been destroyed. Bloody water was flowing from the hollow hole. It would have been nice if it had gotten back up, attached its head again, and livened things up, but judging by how it did not move at all, it seemed to have returned to its warm home in shock.

There were about eight victims in total. Five people lay on the flat altar made of movable marble, and all five were already dead. Three had had their hearts extracted, and two had had their throats cut and their blood drained. No, their blood was still draining.

Unlike the quiet Mihoff, Mark Jay ground his teeth in anger and said.

“If you intend to execute Marquis Vesk, please be sure to entrust that mission to me.”

As if unwilling to lose, Bud Norman, whose face had flushed red, also said to Louis.

“I would be honored if you entrusted that mission to me.”