The Female Knight Who Somehow Appeared Soaking Wet From Head To Toe Alongside A Former Enemy Was Way Too Cute (1)

“—Well then, goodbye, you two. I’m taking Princess Lilia to the Empire now.”

After declaring that, Zena readjusted the limp Lilia on her shoulder and turned her back on us.

“Wait, Zena! What are you planning to do after taking Lilia-sama to the Empire?”

“I don’t know. I was only ordered to bring her back to the Empire. Of course, it’s none of your business anyway…”

Zena’s eyes shifted toward Nevan beside her.

So everything had been under her orders—or something along those lines.

“That’s how it is. Well then, we’ll be taking our leave, Royal Capital boy. We still have to go collect a few more gifts to bring back home.”

“Gifts—don’t tell me you’re planning to take the other girls too, not just Lilia…!”

As if to say I had guessed correctly, Nevan twisted her face into a grotesque, almost monstrous smile.

She intended to make the large number of Imperial soldiers she had infiltrated as slaves revolt all at once, then use their superior numbers to capture the girls—that was probably her goal.

“Like the Commander and I would ever let you—”

“Ena, wait.”

Ena crouched to leap after the two as they tried to leave, but I immediately stopped her.

“Commander, why are you stopping me!? If we don’t hurry, everyone, Lilia-sama…”

“I want to go after them too. But—”

Steel wires had been stretched between us and them like a spiderweb.

Her presence here had been completely unexpected, so there might already be other traps set as well.

“…Too bad. If you’d kept going, Ena, you would’ve undoubtedly been sliced into pieces.”

“Zena, you…!!”

Ena’s disappointment and rage at being betrayed by the person she had trusted most must have been immense. She ground her teeth so hard that blood dripped from the corner of her lips.

“Goodbye, boy. If you’re still alive, maybe we’ll meet again? Though that’s probably impossible.”

“…Goodbye.”

Laughing loudly, Nevan and Zena disappeared into the depths of the forest.

“Wait, you two…! Damn it, Commander, can’t you do something?”

“If I had my sword, probably, but unfortunately I left it in the commander’s room. What about you, Ena?”

She looked down in frustration and shook her head.

The steel wires surrounded us like a birdcage, leaving us unable to move. And unlike Karen-san, tearing them apart by brute force was nearly impossible.

Which meant our only options were to have someone bring us our equipment from outside, or get help from someone capable of disarming the trap—

“—Commander-sama! Ena-neesama!”

Apparently, luck had not abandoned us yet.

“Noka, you’re safe?”

“Yes, Ena-neesama! I was going to tell the girls in another group about everything when I saw you all here… Is this perhaps one of Zena-neesama’s…”

“Explanations later. Noka, can you disarm this trap?”

“Zena-neesama did teach me a little, so… it’ll take some time, but I can handle something like this.”

Noka immediately circled the perimeter of the trap, located where the wires had been anchored, and began disabling them.

It took only a few minutes for the wires to lose their support and vanish on the wind. However, that had been more than enough time for Nevan and the others to advance their plan.

“Ena, how long does it take from here to the harbor?”

“Even if we rush, it takes more than thirty minutes by the road. If we cut straight through the dangerous part of the forest, I could make it in about twenty.”

That meant we could still barely make it.

I did not know which route Zena had taken, but considering she was carrying the unconscious Lilia and was accompanied by Nevan, they had probably taken the former.

Why the Empire was targeting Lilia and this country, and why Zena, who had originally been born in the Republic, had betrayed us—there were countless things I wanted to know and ask, but now was not the time to think about them.

“For now, we need to hurry. Noka, regroup with the others and evacuate. You don’t have to force yourself to fight.”

“Understood. Commander-sama, Ena-neesama—please be careful.”

With that, Noka immediately turned around and headed back to her group.

I had thought she might be more frightened, but perhaps the fact that she could act for Lilia’s sake meant she had a surprisingly strong core.

“—All right, let’s go, Ena. I’ll support you completely with magic, so don’t worry about anything and just run.”

“Got it. Commander, you’d better try your hardest not to get left behind.”

I immediately cast a leg-strengthening enhancement spell on Ena, and the two of us sprinted at full speed to catch up with Zena and the others.

“This is… awful.”

Those words slipped out of my mouth when I saw how completely the settlement had changed while we were chasing after Zena, who had abducted Lilia.

The explosions must have been enormous, because rubble from buildings was scattered all over the settlement, while smoke still smoldered in various places.

Apparently, the Imperial soldiers had already completed their objective. The only people left in the settlement were a small number of slaves who were not Imperial soldiers, along with elderly women. Most of them had been injured in the attack.

“They even took children whose abilities haven’t manifested yet… What the hell are they doing?”

If they were abducting even children who could not be counted as fighting strength at all, then apparently the Empire did not particularly value these girls as soldiers.

“I’m worried about the other settlements too, but… for now, we’ll have to leave those to the other girls. It’s not like they’re weak.”

It was only makeshift training, but under Karen-san’s and my instruction, they should have at least learned the basics of group combat, so they would not go down easily. For now, we simply had to believe in them.

After casting healing magic only on the severely injured and finishing their first aid, I was about to return to our original route when a certain group blocked our way.

“I knew you’d come, brats—just like Zena said.”

“Nevan…”

Standing at the center of a group of several dozen Imperial soldiers was Nevan, who should have been accompanying Zena until just moments ago.

Zena must have predicted this outcome and left her behind to delay us—but either way, she remained a dangerous opponent. The soldiers accompanying her were probably all highly skilled as well.

Two against many. And this time, they even had a commander who used magic.

Even if it had been Karen-san and me, the outcome could have depended on the circumstances, yet this time I had to fight with Ena as my partner.

With our coordination and communication still incomplete, it was obvious that our chances were poor.

If only we had even one mage who could deal with Nevan, this would be considerably easier—

“Commander, what should I do?”

Yet Ena showed not the slightest fear even in the face of this situation and simply asked me for orders.

The only thing in her head was probably, “No matter what, break through here and reach Zena—and Lilia.” Naturally, I felt exactly the same.

No matter how bad the situation was, just fight anyway—that was an old saying passed down through Black Hawk.

“Let’s go with 【Whirlwind】—Ena, can you take Karen-san’s place?”

“—Of course. I’ll show you a much more satisfying way of fighting than that old hag ever could.”

We would use the same method Karen-san and I had developed after deepening our bond to the point of becoming lovers—it was obviously reckless to anyone, but forcing our way through this encirclement left us no other choice.

“—Let’s do this!”

“—Now go! My adorable little dolls!”

Nevan opened her spellbook and began chanting, layering two, then three enhancement spells onto the armed soldiers around her.

Attack, defense, and perhaps a boost to fighting spirit. Just having someone in the rear providing support drastically increased the threat posed by the enemy.

“—Take this!”

Naturally, Ena struck first. She did not have her usual weapon and was using a wooden sword borrowed from the settlement, but I had strengthened it with magic enough that it could clash evenly with metal.

The sound of metal colliding with metal rang out, followed by the impact.

“—They’re so damn hard!”

Ena had enough raw strength to wrestle head-on with Karen-san, but this time the enemies were armed and reinforced with enhancement magic, so she could not simply blow them away.

Which meant it was my turn to push myself.

“Ena, ignore them and charge straight toward Nevan! I’ll somehow erase the enhancement magic!”

“Erase it…? Mm, got it! I’m counting on you!”

Ena had frozen for only an instant when she collided with the enemy, but apparently trusting my words, she immediately dove back into their range.

“I just hope this works…!!”

Ena dodged an attack, slipped inside a soldier’s guard, and swung her wooden sword toward the now-exposed torso.

“How stupid. No matter how many times you try, you can’t overpower my enhancement magic—”

But contrary to Nevan’s words, the blow Ena unleashed with all her strength lifted several surrounding soldiers into the air, and then—

“Take thiiiiiiis—!!”

The moment she roared, several of the soldiers surrounding us were sent flying in every direction along with a shockwave like a sudden whirlwind.

“—Impossible!? My magic was definitely active… What did you two do!?”

I had simply imbued her wooden sword with my dispelling magic, but there was no reason for them to know that.

However, each time the dispelling magic canceled one enhancement spell, its effectiveness gradually diminished, so I had to pour a considerable amount of magical power into it. Naturally, that meant I exhausted myself much faster.

Incidentally, when I did this with Karen-san, she could mow everyone down even without that sort of assistance. Karen-san really was incredible.

“Amazing… so this is the Commander’s…”

Ena herself seemed surprised by how effective it had been. Perhaps from excitement, her cheeks were faintly flushed.

“Don’t stop, Ena! There are still enemies!”

“R-right, sorry, Commander! I’ll do better next time, so I’m counting on you!”

Their supposedly ironclad formation had been forcibly pried open by sheer strength, and obvious unrest was spreading through the enemy side. We could not let this chance slip away.

“Get the hell out of our way—!!”

With her fighting spirit rising even further, Ena’s performance truly resembled that of a warrior worth a thousand men. My assistance played a large part, but when she got going like this, she might genuinely become impossible to stop. She probably possessed talent comparable even to Lilia’s.

One, two, then three—she knocked down the swarming Imperial soldiers one after another and rendered them unable to fight. Their number, which had easily exceeded a hundred, fell to fifty, then thirty, and finally—

“That’s the last one—!!”

After neutralizing every enemy standing in our way, we finally reached Nevan.

All that remained was to blast away the woman behind this entire incident—

“—Roar, Thunderbolt!”

Just as we caught sight of her, a flash of offensive magic burst from her spellbook, and a violent crack of lightning spread through the entire area.

However, I had expected this. I immediately deployed an anti-magic shield and completely blocked the spell.

“Defense, offense, support, and even some mysterious power… Boy, what exactly are you?”

“Who knows? As far as I’m concerned, I’m just an ordinary rank-and-file knight in one squad.”

Nevan had already used her last resort, so she had no moves left. Ena only had to knock her unconscious before she could cast another attack spell, and it would be over.

“—Sorry, but this ends here. We still have things we need to do.”

“Prepare yourself, Nevan!”

We had handled the battle well, but there was no denying that she had delayed us. Desperate for time, we immediately lunged at her so we could move on to the next objective.

At that exact moment, something grabbed my leg.

I thought it was another trap Zena had prepared in advance—but when I looked down, I doubted my own eyes.

“Aaaah…”

The soldiers we had defeated—the soldiers who should have been unable to fight—were trying to attack us again.

“No way! We completely knocked these guys out… They shouldn’t be able to move!”

Before I knew it, multiple soldiers had wrapped themselves around Ena’s legs as well.

“Why are these guys—”

As dozens of soldiers once again swarmed toward us, Nevan smiled triumphantly.

“Oh~? Didn’t I say earlier~? ‘My little dolls’—”

“Those lifeless expressions… Nevan, don’t tell me you…”

“That’s right, boy. I’m a necromancer—the people here, and all the humans I sent in as slaves, are corpses. Little dolls who move exactly as I command.”

Necromancers were people who used magic designated as forbidden in the Royal Capital, using their own life force as a catalyst to manipulate the dead at will. That was probably why Nevan looked considerably older than normal.

The Empire had people who were not even allowed to exist in our country—that alone showed just how incomprehensible the eastern nation truly was.

“—Phew, I was wondering what would happen for a while~… but now the tables have turned. You two mocked me~… so I’m gonna fucking kill you! Prepare yourselves, you little shits!??”

Nevan’s eyes bulged as she opened her mouth wide and screamed abuse at us, then began preparing another incantation.

The chant was far longer than the one for Thunderbolt—it was probably strong enough to easily turn this entire area into a sea of flames.

“Damn it, let go! Let go, you…! Commander, can you… can you do something…?”

“Sorry. The enhancement spells along the way, and especially the dispelling magic… I don’t think I have any strength left…”

“Actually, me too… the backlash from your enhancement magic… I think I got carried away and pushed too hard without thinking ahead.”

We desperately tried to shake off the dead soldiers clinging to us as though determined to drag us down with them, but Ena and I had already overstrained ourselves too much to deal with this many all over again.

Was this checkmate—?

“Goodbye, you shitty brats—have fun screwing each other in heaven. Though I’ll add your corpses to my collection, so who knows if you’ll even get there?”

Laughing in certainty of her victory, Nevan was just about to unleash her spell at us—

【—Don’t move. And shut up!!】

“Ah… agh…!?”

The instant a vaguely familiar voice rang out, Nevan dropped her spellbook and stared in shock at her own condition, unable to utter a single sound.

“Tell me, little 【doll-player】 from the Empire—do you understand what you were just trying to do?”

A third person wearing Black Hawk’s mage robes had intervened in our battlefield like a savior. Her hair was slightly longer, and she wore some strange eyepatch over her left eye, but there was no mistaking her.

The ability to semi-compulsively force someone to obey simply by looking at them and issuing a command—I knew only one person capable of such a power.

“That boy is ‘my’ boy. Would you mind not killing him and making him yours without permission?”

“—Henri-san…?”

“Long time no see, boy. I’m glad to see you’re doing well.”

It was Henri-san of the 【Mystic Eyes】, who had once taken Karen-san hostage and barricaded herself inside Black Hawk, and who had since been imprisoned in the Royal Capital’s dungeon.

“Commander, who is she?”

“She’s someone I know, technically. But as for why she’s here…”

“—Then allow me, as captain, to explain that.”

And the person who answered that question was, just as expected, the one I had thought it would be.

As always, she was someone who never failed to rush to my side whenever I was in danger.

“After various twists and turns, Henri became a member of Black Hawk—I see we made it in time, Haru.”

“…Karen-san.”

Karen-san appeared from behind Henri-san looking exactly as she had when we parted the other day—but—

Karen-san, why are you completely soaked from head to toe?