Celestial Fire (3)

“Sir Azadine. As you can see, we are short on cavalry, having come as a mixed force. Of course, I do not doubt the skill of our well-trained knights, but with the battlefield being a forest where securing visibility is difficult, it would be good to have someone who could harry the enemy by swooping down from above.”

Since Azadine had a hippogriff, Aramis was asking him to dive from the sky and rake the enemy’s flanks.

“I will fly in and strike the enemy’s flanks once the cavalry attacks first. A hippogriff, unlike a horse, does not have good endurance, so even simply staying aloft consumes a great deal of stamina. You cannot handle it with the same sense you use for a horse.”

“I see. I do not know much about hippogriffs myself.”

Aramis accepted Azadine’s words readily enough.

‘Good. I was curious about the Celestials’ power anyway, so shall I see what other Celestials are like besides Izmilla?’

Azadine joined the unit led by Aramis and chose to watch how they performed.

To preserve the hippogriff’s stamina, Azadine dismounted and matched his pace to the others. Aramis kept throwing questions at him.

‘How did you obtain a hippogriff?’

‘Why did you leave the Messenger Clan?’

‘How does the Messenger Clan train?’

‘Is it really true, as the rumors say, that the Messenger Clan captures members of the Yaegas God tribe and drinks their blood?’

And so on, the absurd questions continued one after another.

Azadine answered those questions only half-heartedly, but he felt weary.

“When scouts are carrying out a search, I think we ought to be a little quieter. Unless the Bri are deaf, then surely….”

“With this many troops on the move, noise is unavoidable.”

“But if the commander himself chatters, the soldiers will relax as well, start exchanging idle talk, and lose focus.”

Azadine said that, but when he thought about it, it was also a good opportunity. This time, Azadine asked a question.

“Where were you born? You seem to be of quite noble blood.”

“My parents are the Order. I am not really in a position to boast of some family line, the way humans speak of such things.”

“…Are all Celestials like that? I heard that your commander, Karna, is of the Northern Emperor’s bloodline.”

“What? How do you know about Commander Karna?”

“I am somewhat acquainted with Izmilla.”

Though it was thanks to Prince Kalintz that he had learned of it, Azadine named Izmilla, who was a Celestial.

“…So that is why you were not surprised even knowing that I am a Celestial. Unfortunately, when it comes to the Celestials, there is much that must remain confidential. I ask your understanding.”

Aramis had pestered Azadine with questions about the dustiest old matters, yet when asked about himself, he held his tongue.

‘I thought he was just an immature brat, but he does at least know how to keep a secret. Hm?’

At that moment, he heard a disturbance ahead. Indeed, screams rose from the front.

“S-save us!”

“Urgh?!”

They were the screams of villagers. People who had fled from the village were being chased by Bri warriors.

The Bri, having lower bodies like goats or deer, leapt through the brush and caught up with the people in an instant.

A Bri warrior attacked the villagers with a large deer-antler axe and a savage spear made by binding a butcher’s knife looted from humans to a shaft.

The villagers fought back as well, but the Bri warriors were far larger in build and much stronger in muscle, so they were no match at all.

“How insolent!”

Aramis handed his banner to his servant and charged forward on horseback.

—Celestial Encouragement!

He cast a spell, placing an encouragement enchantment upon his warhorse, and drew his sword while mounted. It was a ceramite longsword, a two-handed weapon made for use in ground combat, but Aramis gripped it in one hand and swung it, sending a Bri warrior’s head flying.

“Krrh?!”

The Bri warriors rushed at Aramis. Aramis, unafraid of being surrounded, kept charging forward and cut down every enemy in his path.

‘As a cavalryman, he is quite excellent. The problem is….’

Watching from behind, Azadine coolly evaluated Aramis.

As with Izmilla before, Aramis’s basic skill was not bad either. He was an excellent knight.

But he lacked seasoned judgment.

As a cavalry breakthrough, it was very fine, but if he charged alone like this when there were not many cavalry to begin with, all that would happen was that the enemy would surround him.

Above all, if he was the supreme commander and yet rode alone into the enemy formation, there was no adjutant behind him to take charge of command.

Sure enough, Aramis, who had been rampaging ahead, ended up trapped within the Bri warriors’ square formation and isolated in the middle of the enemy line.

‘Helping would not be hard, but shall I see what he can do?’

Azadine nocked an arrow to his bow and watched the situation.

Aramis, unconcerned whether he was surrounded or not, kept pushing forward, killing the Bri who blocked his way.

But compared to the beginning, he was clearly losing momentum in his breakthrough. In the first place, in terrain thick with forest, it was not easy for cavalry to fully display their penetrating power.

Branches hung at head height from the trees, and the road was uneven. If he ran at full speed and got caught on a rock and fell from the horse, his life would be in danger.

Moreover, the Bri’s leaping power was extraordinary. When a Bri warrior kicked off the ground, it sprang up to the height of Aramis’s head on horseback. Their physical ability was on a completely different level from that of ordinary human soldiers, who would simply collapse in a heap if trampled.

As Aramis was striking at the Bri soldiers on the ground and had not yet recovered his sword, Bri warriors who had launched themselves into the air swung their deer-antler axes at his head.

A truly desperate moment! But Aramis only snorted.

“Hmph!”

Radiant white wings extended from Aramis’s back and smashed aside the charging Bri warriors. Then he cast a spell, began attacking the Bri, and started rescuing the villagers.

“…Good!”

Azadine loosed arrows at the Bri, attacking them, and gave orders to the other knights.

“Cavalry! Split left and right, attack the Bri, and rescue the villagers! Infantry! Center forward!”

“Why should we listen to you—”

“Firewinter! Come here!”

At Azadine’s call, the hippogriff came forward with a growl. The horses were startled by the hippogriff’s approach and sprang forward.

Only then did the knights divide to left and right and form a charging formation. Azadine too advanced while shooting arrows to support Aramis.

The Bri, whose formation had already been broken apart by Aramis’s breakthrough, were swept away without being able to put up much resistance.

The Bri’s physical abilities were clearly superior to those of humans. But the weapons they carried were no more than deer antlers, obsidian, or farm tools looted from farmers, merely makeshift substitutes, and could not compare to the arms of properly equipped soldiers.

Whenever they clashed with metal weapons, it was always the Bris’ weapons that broke, and most attacks were stopped by the armor the soldiers wore.

Moreover, the soldiers Aramis had brought were quite well trained, which made that contrast stand out even more. They knew how to fight in a way that made the most of their own strengths and brought out the enemy’s weaknesses.

The Bri, unable to hold on any longer, began to retreat.

“Do not let those accursed things live!”

Aramis continued the pursuit, striking the fleeing Bri from behind.

But the Bri moved faster than humans, so unless one was mounted cavalry, it was impossible to chase them down.

After pursuing them for some distance, Aramis had no choice but to halt his horse before the underbrush.

“M-my heavens!”

“It is an angel!”

“An angel has saved us!”

The village refugees gave Aramis, who had rescued them, a truly thunderous ovation.

“Do not be afraid!”

Aramis answered the people’s cheers by raising his sword high and making his wings shine.

The burning ceramite longsword and the translucent white wings, gleaming like shards of glass in its firelight, were so much like a scene from an old tale that they overwhelmed the people.

Among the refugees were even those who threw themselves upon the ground, bent their knees, prayed, and worshipped him. A being with angelic wings, one who had inherited the bloodline of angels, had burst forth like a scene out of an old story, saved the people, and driven away evil fiends, so in a sense it was only natural that they were all moved.

‘Indeed, so this is the power of the Celestial Fire Knights.’

Watching the excited people, Azadine smacked his lips. Unlike them, he coolly evaluated Aramis’s abilities.

To begin with, he did not like the command.

It was fine that, as commander, he charged into the enemy line himself. Their force was so small that there was little point in having their strongest knight merely carry the banner and stand idle.

But if that was the case, should he not have clearly designated someone to take over command afterward?

Since there was no one else, Azadine had been forced to take over the follow-up command, but naturally Aramis had not formally transferred command authority to him, so the knights had resisted.

In the end, Azadine had to use the hippogriff to drive them into motion.

If he had not worked hard to support him from the rear like that, then no matter how much of a Celestial Aramis was, he would have had a hard time isolated in the middle of the enemy line.

‘Well, he more than earned his keep simply by having skill, the will to save people, and the sort of appearance that belongs in an old tale. Expecting him to display seasoned command on top of that would probably be asking too much, would it not?’

As Azadine was thinking that, Sir Sutton, the knight of this region, began speaking with the refugees.

“Sir Aramis!”

“Yes. Sir Sutton. What is it?”

“The Bri are said to be raiding and plundering the village granary. As we thought, those bastards are after food!”

At present, with Fimbulvert under suspicion, the Rescue Knights Order was demanding grain requisitions from place to place. And the Bri had taken advantage of precisely this opportunity to begin organized food plundering.

Fimbulvert would be harsh even on monsters, so they were probably trying to secure as much food as possible beforehand.

But, stated the other way around, that made them a fatal threat that humans could never allow.

‘They are moving according to a rather long-term strategy. That is how I should see it.’

That was how Azadine assessed the Bri for beginning their raids at this time, but Aramis answered at once, without deliberation.

“Good. We go to rescue them at once! We will retake the village and drive out the Bri!”

When Aramis declared that they would retake the village, the villagers fell into an absolute frenzy of excitement.

Aramis turned his horse back around and came over to Azadine.

“Sir Azadine. Will you join us as well?”

“I have no particular appointment elsewhere, so I will join you. The Bri’s movements concern me as well.”

Azadine decided to stay with Aramis in order to observe his character further.