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Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

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Chapter 146: The Rebellion of the Three Counts (6)

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Ivan had been dozing beside the campfire when he quickly circulated mana through his entire body. Fatigue was fundamentally a problem of the nerves, and techniques that forcibly awakened them could make one forget exhaustion for a while.

Of course, it was not a real solution. The human body could not fully recover on mana alone. Proper rest and calories were essential.

But not now. It was not time to rest yet.

“Are you... all right?”

“For now.”

Terrified, Serthe barely managed to take his hand off his sword hilt before asking. Ivan nodded through his blurred vision.

Three days.

The battle against the Taurus vanguard had lasted three days. To slaughter roughly a thousand Tauruses in that time, he had needed to kill one every four minutes, all while facing the charge of a thousand Tauruses alone.

Every injury steadily reduced his ability to keep fighting. There had been no way to rest, so all he could do was grit his teeth and continue.

Ivan hid his trembling hands as best he could and tore the cap off a healing potion. Once again, the potion spilled over his countless long gashes.

Flesh filled the wounds like crudely stitched cloth. Fundamentally, it was little different from cauterizing wounds to stop the bleeding. He did not even have the minimum calories needed to heal his wounds.

Still, the pain helped drive back his exhaustion. He was fine for now. His arms and legs could still move.

With a gaunt face, he turned his gaze and spotted a familiar knight, the one who had given him a sword several days earlier.

“I can’t return your sword. It broke.”

“How many did you cut down with it?”

“At least fifty.”

“A legend will remain. It is an honor.”

The knight nodded toward Ivan, then gestured for a squire. After taking a longsword from the squire’s pack, the knight approached Ivan.

“I can kneel to no one but my liege and my country, so will you forgive my discourtesy?”

“Discourtesy?”

“My honor cannot outweigh your dedication.”

The knight gave the most respectful military salute possible and offered him the longsword. It was a cavalry sword without much ornamentation, but it had been forged from quality steel and kept in excellent condition.

When Ivan accepted the sword, the barons approached.

“We are returning to our estates. Will you come with us? We need to hold a festival and reassure our people.”

“No, that will be difficult.”

“As expected, you are busy. Right, that could not have been the only order given by the Grand Duke of Etakrikh.”

“That is true, but neither is it time for you to rest.”

Ivan looked over the barons before continuing.

“Do you remember what I told you before? That your lives should be spent somewhere more valuable.”

“You did. But somewhere more valuable...?”

“You must save your liege. Demonfolk alone are not a battlefield worth risking your lives for.”

They had to raise an army in the Grand Duke of Etakrikh’s name and save Saint Matilene. It was essential if all the disorder that followed the civil war was to be settled under Gilles Ver’s name.

As a foreigner, Ivan could not simply pacify this country’s tangled political situation in one stroke. Even in Krasilov, he had barely managed it with the princess’s absolute support and the desperate efforts of everyone in the Counterintelligence Command.

He could not touch the administrative vacuum and resulting chaos that would follow. It could easily be seen as interference in domestic affairs.

That was why Gilles Ver’s name was needed. He had to become a hero. He already was one, but he would need to become even more so from now on.

‘So firmly established that no one can object even if he directly intervenes in the succession to the throne.’

Etakrikh would save this country. It had to be done under Gilles Ver’s name alone, not Ivan’s, a mere foreigner.

“...Our liege? What are you talking about?”

“Saint Matilene is under attack. As his vassals, should you not take up your swords?”

“Did you not say the Grand Duke of Etakrikh was holding back the demonfolk?”

“Why do you think the demonfolk dared cross the Eastern Front in this situation?”

Ivan mounted the horse offered by a squire and settled into the saddle. He buckled on his sword and looked over the barons watching him.

“The nobles of this country joined hands with the demonfolk and raised an army. The Grand Duke of Etakrikh is away from the capital now, so where do you think they will turn their horses?”

“Is that true...? B-but how could they dare...? If they seized the throne by joining hands with demonfolk, who would accept those traitors’ usurpation of the throne? Would the patriots of this country, let alone the alliance, truly allow it?”

“Well, we will have to find out whether they have further plans...”

Would the alliance accept a throne seized through collusion with demonfolk? Of course not. It was an unforgivable betrayal.

Naturally, they would have measures in place for that. Ivan could not know their plans after the rebellion succeeded, and perhaps he never would.

Their rebellion had to end in failure.

Then a cavalryman rode in from the rear with a panicked expression. They went straight to a baron and bowed.

“Troops are approaching from the rear!”

“What? From where? Have they already finished gathering their troops? I thought it would take several more days.”

“No! No, Your Excellency! They are not our troops...”

Speak of the devil. Ivan gave a small snort and waited for the cavalryman to continue.

“They are Count Guillaume’s private troops...! They bear the banner of the House of Orléans!”

“How many? How many did he bring?”

“I cannot say precisely, but there are no fewer than four thousand infantry... I could not count the cavalry!”

“They did not come with friendly intentions.”

Even if they had discovered the demonfolk vanguard’s incursion beforehand, that number of soldiers was plainly excessive.

Four thousand infantry, and if their cavalry complement followed standard Tilles doctrine, at least four hundred riders. Considering the cost of mobilizing a force that large, it was even more suspicious.

It was even more suspicious if they had marched out to reinforce the Eastern Front instead of fighting the Tauruses here, since there would be no reason to turn their troops this way.

The fact that they were advancing directly toward the estate of Vertomang meant they already knew of the demonfolk army and had another objective in mind.

“Does that mean Count Orléans is among the forces that joined hands with the demonfolk?”

“All three counts are.”

“Vermonfort and Grandmartel as well?”

“Yes.”

Baron Serthe sighed and rubbed his face with his hands. Considering the mobilization capacity of those three great nobles, this was like throwing eggs at a rock.

There were five barons gathered here. Even if they called up every tenant farmer during the busy farming season, the largest force they could muster would still be smaller than Count Orléans’s army now approaching.

That was what it meant to be a great count. And those troops would not be tenant farmers, but professionally trained standing soldiers.

Even if they gave everything they had, it would be difficult to face Count Orléans alone.

“Did the Grand Duke of Etakrikh perhaps prepare another strategy? More reinforcements, perhaps...?”

“No. Not that I know of.”

“Then this country truly is finished. It survived even that war, yet in my generation, it ends so helplessly.”

“It is too early to give up.”

Ivan rode closer to the barons. A deep sense of despair hung heavily over them.

Strategy meant nothing against a sufficiently large gap in troop numbers. That was especially true when the enemy had superior troop quality and composition, overwhelming supply capacity, and sheer scale.

That was the problem with civil war.

Even so, it was too early to give up. As long as one lived, one must not stop fighting. A trained agent stopped an operation only in the face of death.

Whenever one could fight, the word impossible was never a reason to abandon an operation.

So Ivan drew his pistol instead. Holding up the sword he had just received, he spoke to the barons.

“If Saint Matilene can hold out until the Eastern Front’s forces hold their ground and the Grand Duke of Etakrikh returns, then we have not yet lost.”

No. There was no guarantee Gilles Ver would return alive, the Eastern Front would not hold, and the Capital Defense Force had already burned to death inside the dragons’ jaws.

But the truth did not matter. Hope was all that was needed.

“If we fight, we will certainly die. If you take up your swords and ride with me now, more than half of you will likely not survive.”

Ivan was not a particularly eloquent speaker. He knew that well.

But he had had many fine teachers. The former king had been a master orator. Having always attended that king at his side, Ivan could imitate him, if only vaguely.

So Ivan looked over the despairing barons and knights and continued.

“But if you give up, there is no chance your country will survive.”

“Even if we fight, is there truly a chance?”

“At least it is not zero.”

“Even if it ends as a meaningless struggle?”

“Then you will be buried with this country.”

The barons’ faces grew harder and harder. Yet Ivan continued in the same calm voice.

“But if you succeed, even if the chance is as thin as a thread, if you succeed, your country may remember your sacrifice. Just as it endured the last thousand years, it may endure the thousand years to come.”

“...”

“Will you take up your swords for a war where death is certain? Or will you lay them down, leave, and live as tenant farmers? Spending the rest of your lives commemorating the anniversary of the day this country died?”

“This will be a battle you may not survive either.”

“Was this not one as well?”

Ivan gestured at the Taurus corpses strewn everywhere. At his words, the barons fell silent and lowered their heads.

Anyone who faced a thousand Tauruses alone had surely prepared for death. Yet why was this foreigner so devoted to Tilles?

And when that foreigner still raised the banner of resistance, could they, vassals of this country with swords in their hands, really let their arms fall limp?

The knights bit their lips and looked at Ivan. The sun had begun to set. The sunset hung at the edge of the sky, staining the horizon red.

Ivan drew his sword, looked back at the knights, and asked.

“Who among us can live forever? But everyone who holds a sword must choose. No matter whose hand kills you, that death must come by your own decision. If you do not intend to fight with your own arms, return home. But if that is not so...”

He turned toward the sunset. With the vast battlefield leading to the Eastern Front behind him, he faced Saint Matilene in the west.

“Let us go, knights of Tilles. Let us die with your country, or die for your country.”

The sunset blazed red behind Ivan’s back. A sunset was the most solemn light marking the end of a day.

Night would soon come. A deep, dark, cold night. Yet did one night not promise the next day’s sunrise?

-Clang!

-Shing...

-Kaang!

The knights drew their swords as soon as Ivan finished speaking. Some pulled down their helmet visors, some drew deep breaths, and some kissed their blades before making the sign of the cross.

Baron Noar rode out before the knights, who waited without a word, and spoke to Ivan.

“Lead the way. We will follow.”

Tilles was a country of knights. It revered not individual bravery, but goodness, virtue, and the duties of knighthood.

Yet paradoxically, the Hero had appeared in Tilles. Through individual courage, but also goodness and virtue, he had proven himself.

The knights quietly gave a military salute. Toward the sunset. Toward Saint Matilene in the distance. And toward Ivan’s back as he led the way.

A Hero was not the strongest person.

A Hero was the bravest one. The one who never stopped, the one who never broke before any duty.

A symbol of hope.

The horses set off slowly at a walk. Then they kicked off the earth in a trot, moved into a canter, and accelerated.

Soon they broke into a gallop. At full speed.

Toward their capital. Toward Saint Matilene. So that the hope standing before them could reach that place.

During the war, it had been said that the mounted charge of Tilles knights did not stop as long as the rider lived. It would be no different now.

Only death could stop their charge.

* * *

And at last, at that moment, Isabelle’s party arrived in Saint Matilene.

It was the fifth day since they had left the Vernini Mountains, and fewer than three days remained before the rebel army of Etouan de Grandmartel reached the capital’s borderlands.

Etouan’s forces, totaling roughly twenty thousand, had forced every estate along their route to submit as they marched on the capital.

The army that would soon arrive now numbered thirty-seven thousand, advancing after surpassing the Eastern Army’s maximum capacity.

It was the largest single legion Tilles possessed at this point.

In contrast, Saint Matilene’s garrison consisted of two thousand five hundred standing soldiers and two thousand remaining members of the Capital Defense Force.

Ep 22. The Rebellion of the Three Counts.

Footnotes:

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