WeTried Translations

Translator: Nemui

Editor: Nemui

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Friedrich's Battlefield

Chapter 162: Postwar (2)

──────

Bruno survived the decisive battle.

In combat, he fought bravely to the end without fleeing, but he did not show any brilliant achievement that would be recorded. He neither slew a knight or noble nor captured one alive.

As for Bruno himself, he remembered desperately swinging his weapon and wounding enemy soldiers several times, but he did not know whether that directly led to any enemy soldier's death.

After the enemy routed, everyone pursued, and Queen Claudia declared the battle over without allowing them to chase too far, Bruno lost his tension and sat down on the spot. Then a question suddenly came to him.

Had he worked enough to be proud before Werner, who had entrusted him with a sword? Had he been entrusted with a knight's sword and shown work worthy of that sword?

He could not nod with confidence, so Bruno decided to at least do a little more work.

What suddenly caught his eye was a wounded man lying on the battlefield in pain. It was a knight covered in mud and blood, likely wounded during the pursuit.

Bruno stood, ran to him, applied first aid by tying off the wound on the man's leg, then carried the man, whose consciousness was hazy from heavy blood loss, and desperately ran to the camp. That proved effective, and the man survived.

When the man recovered enough to speak clearly, Bruno learned that the knight he had saved was the heir of a certain lord noble house.

Bruno could not judge the quality of metal armor, and when he found the knight, the man was so covered in blood and mud that the crest on his mantle could not be seen. Before Bruno, who was shocked to learn the man was a noble, the knight and his father, the head of the noble house, were deeply impressed. To save a person with all his strength, without knowing that he was a noble and without aiming for a reward, what a noble soul for a mere commoner, they said.

Then Bruno received a small pouch filled with large silver coins as thanks. Even for Bruno, who was now the head of an owner-farmer household and belonged to the wealthy side among commoners, it was a large sum comparable to his yearly income.

Furthermore, when the conscript unit was close to disbanding, Bruno was summoned to the rear of the vast field camp, before the tent where headquarters was located. Along with Bruno, several dozen conscripts were gathered there. All were conscripts who had shown some noteworthy work in the decisive battle.

Once they finished lining up, Queen Claudia Edelstein appeared. As expected, she did not speak to each of them individually, but she praised the work of all the assembled commoners.

Receiving words directly from the queen and being praised by her. For a mere commoner, it was an exceedingly rare honor that would become a lifelong pride.

Then every person gathered was granted the title of honorary knight.

Bruno too was handed a certificate by a royal official. It was not mass-produced plant paper, but parchment with elaborate decorations.

Bruno could now read. The certificate indeed stated that Bruno, a commoner of Volga in the Viscounty of Dofen, was named an honorary knight in the queen's name.

Though it was only a ceremonial honorary title, Bruno had become a knight.

After that, when the conscript unit was disbanded, Bruno parted ways with the people from his hometown returning to the Viscounty of Dofen and decided to go to the royal capital once. He wanted to return the sword entrusted to him by Werner to Werner's family.

When he explained the circumstances, the noble he had saved was again deeply impressed and took care of Bruno's trip to the royal capital. He gave him a letter sealed with the house crest and arranged for Bruno to rely on that house's townhouse in the capital.

Joining the returning column of conscripts from the royal capital, Bruno went to the royal capital for the first time in his life.

First, he went to the townhouse of the noble he had saved and handed over the letter. The squire who managed the townhouse took care of everything. He provided Bruno lodging during his stay and helped him search for Werner's house.

Werner's house was found without much time passing. Bruno returned the sword to his family. Then he told them of Werner's brave final moments. He also attended Werner's funeral, offered flowers to the empty urn, and mourned his death together with the family.

After that, he stayed in the royal capital for several days and enjoyed days there that might be the only ones of his life. He spent some of the reward money and bought souvenirs for his wife and the child in her belly.

Having finished his stay in the royal capital, Bruno set off on the road back to the Viscounty of Dofen.

When Bruno returned to Volga, the residents welcomed him noisily.

Bruno's bravery in the decisive battle, his action of saving a noble afterward, and the fact that he had been named an honorary knight by the royal house had already been conveyed by those who returned ahead of him. Everyone praised Bruno, who had returned as truly Volga's hero.

His wife was crying. More than the honor her husband had obtained, she seemed relieved above all that he had returned alive. Compared to before Bruno left Volga, the swell of her belly had become much more noticeable.

"...After becoming an honorary knight, I understood."

After returning home and settling down, Bruno murmured.

"Even this honorary knighthood is more reward than I deserve. It is something I can be proud of for the rest of my life, and I had rare experiences too, but once is enough for something like this. My current place suits me, and it is all I can manage."

Once, when everyone in Volga had fought the bandits, Friedrich had said he would recommend Bruno for knighthood depending on his work. Bruno had been delighted, but that had been a lie.

He was glad it had been a lie.

Even though he was treated favorably as a benefactor, speaking before nobles was terribly nerve-racking. The tension when standing before Her Majesty the queen was even more intense. He thought his heart would leap out of his mouth.

It was the second time for him, but life-or-death battle was still frightening. He could not possibly think of making that his lifelong work.

If Friedrich's words that day had not been a lie, and if Bruno had mistakenly been knighted, he surely could never have kept up with that position.

Thinking that Friedrich placed himself in such a world every day made Bruno frightened. Friedrich had become a soldier and lived on the battlefield, and now as a count, he lived in the society of royalty and nobility. Bruno was forced to realize again that Friedrich was in a different class from him. Even standing on his head, he could never compete.

"That is fine, is it not? I love you as you are now... Welcome home. I am truly glad you are safe."

Held gently by his wife and feeling her warmth, Bruno felt peace.

He could not imitate a hero. He did not need to. An owner-farmer of a country town. That was enough for him.

A quiet life was best. Volga, peaceful enough to be boring, was best.

......

The former knights of the old Bachstein Duchy army, who belonged to the Bachstein Regional Defense Battalion, were recognized for their lionhearted work in the decisive battle against the Kingdom of Arelia and were knighted again.

As the foremost among the knights who were knighted again, Franziska received words directly from Queen Claudia at the ceremony. The queen mentioned her achievement of knocking an enemy knight down, taking his horse, encouraging everyone, and cutting into the enemy formation. Franziska learned that the queen had understood her fierce struggle.

"...Our honor truly has been restored."

On the road home to the Bachstein region, Franziska murmured while feeling again, through being on horseback, that she had returned to being a knight.

The period when she had been stripped of her knightly status had not been very long. She had been blessed with a chance to gain achievements and had been knighted again far sooner than she had expected. Even so, it had still felt like a long wait.

"Being knighted for having your back kicked is a slightly complicated feeling, though."

"What, are you still holding a grudge?"

"Of course. When I think Her Majesty might have seen how ridiculous I looked..."

Speaking jokingly beside Franziska was Knight Roman. In the previous decisive battle, Franziska had used his back as a foothold to leap at an enemy knight on horseback, and he still complained about it like this.

"It is fine. In the end, you returned to knightly status, and beyond that, you were even promoted... Unexpectedly, perhaps Her Majesty knows about the hardship you have gone through."

With the reknighting, Franziska was entrusted with one company of the Bachstein Regional Defense Battalion. Among the former duchy army knights, she had obtained the highest position for now.

And Roman officially became her adjutant, placing him in a position with command authority second only to hers within the company. One could say that as an officer, he had become "more important" than in his days in the duchy army, when he had been an ordinary knight.

"Hahaha, then that is fine... Anyway, when we get back, we visit the graves?"

"Yes, first of all."

Egmont, Franziska's father, and the knights of the duchy army who had died during the ducal house's rebellion. They were the first ones they had to tell. That they, who had once taken the wrong path, had returned to the correct one and recovered their honor.

Beneath the military flag of the Kingdom of Edelstein, Franziska and the others advanced on the road home.

......

"What do you think?"

"...Well, somehow, they are at about seventy percent of their prime."

On the outskirts of the royal capital Sankt Waltrude, during formation movement training for the whole Ferdinand Regiment, battalion commander Oliver exchanged words with Yarg, one of his close aides, while watching the cavalry unit's movement.

Throughout the war against the Kingdom of Arelia, the Ferdinand Regiment had suffered extremely heavy losses. Key officers who had supported the regiment, such as previous regimental commander Matthias, cavalry battalion commander Baron Eugen Stamitz, and infantry battalion commander Barthold, had fallen, and the veteran soldiers who supported the regiment had died in battle as well.

Most of the replacements filling those holes were young novice knights who had been educated but lacked actual battle experience, and recruits whose ability was only slightly above amateur, whose only virtue was their motivation. Having fought through the previous decisive battle had made them somewhat better, but they were still painfully unreliable.

The Ferdinand Regiment, which was far from its prime in terms of proficiency, had to be trained by officers like Oliver and veteran soldiers like Yarg. While the peace gained through victory continued, they had to once again obtain full capability as a rapid-response unit.

That was precisely why, now that the short rest period after the war had ended, training was being held every day.

Once the formation movement was complete, Oliver and Yarg joined the other battalion commanders and the regimental adjutant Gregor. Each shared impressions and identified problems.

Incidentally, regimental commander Friedrich was absent, having gone to the royal castle for other work. For that reason, Gregor was currently commanding the training.

"As expected, the recruits' movements are still poor. That is all there is to it. They are dragging down the whole."

"Nothing can be done about that. We have no choice but to repeat it until they get used to it."

Infantry battalion commander Rudiger murmured with a severe expression, and the other infantry battalion commander, Knight Thomas, answered. Thomas, who had newly become battalion commander after Barthold's death, was older than Rudiger. His subordinates trusted him deeply, and he had already become an important member supporting the regiment.

"Regarding the cavalry unit, I am concerned that the newly joined knights tend to spread out. They are probably afraid of making contact with allies when packed together, but that reduces the destructive force of a mounted charge."

"Would it be all right to take a little more training time by battalion? As for me, the movements of the new archers... especially the ones from hunter backgrounds, concern me. Because they are not used to long-range arcing fire, the way they set their angles tends to be rough. At that rate, in a real situation, they might accidentally shoot into an allied formation."

Oliver gave his opinion, and archer battalion commander Romilda followed.

"Then we will temporarily split by battalion. Infantry and cavalry will work on improving proficiency in unit movement, and archers will work on improving proficiency in volley attacks. In the afternoon, we will once more train for full-regiment battle and formation movement... Lord Hosenfeld is scheduled to return by evening. Let us aim to show a certain result by then."

Gregor closed the discussion that way, and the battalion commanders returned with their aides to their own subordinates.

Oliver too headed toward the cavalry battalion with Yarg. Among the knights gathered by platoon, he first called out to his own direct platoon.

"We will run for a while and repeat course changes several times to get the newly appointed knights used to moving with the whole battalion. Gather the novices at the rear of the formation for now and have them learn how their seniors move. Surround their left and right with the direct platoon and get them used to galloping in a dense formation. I leave the very rear to Gunther. If anyone loses nerve in the density and tries to spread outward, warn them from behind."

"Leave it to me. If I give them one shout, they will listen right away."

When Gunther answered, laughter rose from the knights of the direct platoon. Yarg laughed loosely as well, and Oliver gave a wry smile.

Gunther, tempered on the battlefield and now a full-fledged knight, seemed to be a clearly frightening senior to the novice knights because of his stern face and huge build. To Oliver, he was a reliable subordinate who kept giving the novices a sense of tension.

"That is the spirit. I am counting on you... Then, send word to each platoon. Form ranks at once."

The knights answered with salutes and ran to the other platoons.

While waiting for the ranks to form, Oliver looked back. He could see the long walls of the royal capital, and the majestic royal castle towering on the plateau.

The Ferdinand Regiment, and the kingdom army, would continue to fight as the sword of the royal house and the shield of this country. They would inherit the will of the late seniors and fulfill their duty.

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried