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◈ The Medieval Heretic King is Too Good at Developing ◈

Chapter 10: The Siege of Sternberg (4)

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As the church's heavy oak doors drew nearer, the noise leaking from within became clearer.

They were not pious voices raised in prayer.

Children crying, frightened adults murmuring among themselves, and the occasional groan of pain.

It was an ominous sound, born from the fear of hundreds gathered in one place.

I stopped Sir Kuno as he moved to open the door first.

"I'll open it myself."

Creeeak!

The old hinges screamed.

In an instant, the noise inside fell silent as though it had never existed, and hundreds of eyes turned toward me at once.

The church was utter chaos. Wounded people lay groaning before the altar, while terrified residents packed tightly between the pews, clutching bundles of belongings.

Every kind of emotion swirled in their eyes. Fear, resentment, resignation, and the faintest thread of hope.

Rather than going to the altar, I approached a woman trembling in a corner with a child in her arms. When she saw her lord approach, she pulled the child closer in fright.

I spoke as gently as I could.

"Do you have any drinking water?"

The woman merely shook her head, unable to speak.

I untied the waterskin at my waist and handed it to her.

"Give it to the child first."

"Ah... th-thank you, my lord..."

The woman accepted the waterskin with trembling hands. That one small act seemed to ease the frozen air in the church, if only a little.

I did not head for the altar. I had no intention of preaching from a high place like a priest. Instead, I walked down the church's central aisle.

With every step I took, the residents filling the church made way for me as though Moses himself had parted them.

I stopped in the middle of the church and took a slow, deep breath.

'Can I persuade them?'

...No. I couldn't afford weak thoughts like that. I had to make it happen.

Otherwise, death was the only path left.

I shouted in a clear voice loud enough for everyone to hear.

"Raise your heads! My people!"

Murmurs spread like waves.

"We won! Did you see it? Did you see how those arrogant heretics burned, screamed, and fled before us? God is with us!"

The residents' expressions brightened, and hope slowly appeared on their faces. Yet I raised a hand to stop the cheers that were about to erupt.

I had given them hope. Now it was time to show them reality again.

"But this is only the beginning! Furious over today's defeat, those heretics will climb these walls tomorrow with even greater hatred!"

The church was once again seized by a frozen silence. The small spark of hope that had just risen died as though doused with cold water. The fear of death spread across their faces.

I continued shouting.

"If the walls are breached, the men will be butchered, your wives and daughters will be dragged away like dogs and violated, and your children will become slaves! Is that what you want?"

I struck my chest with my fist and shouted.

"I don't!"

"There is no longer any distinction between soldiers and residents! We are all Sternberg's shield and sword! If we cannot fight and win, every one of us will die beneath those fanatics' blades!"

I pointed toward the altar, where the wounded lay.

"Women, tend to the wounded! Boil clean water to disinfect their wounds and prepare cloth for bandages! Your warm hands can save a dying soldier!"

Then I looked at the able-bodied men trembling without weapons.

"Men, help the soldiers repair the walls! Carry the fallen stones and mend the broken palisades! Every stone you stack can stop an enemy arrow!"

Lastly, I looked at the frightened children hiding behind their parents' clothes.

"Even those children have work to do. Carry messages through the castle and bring water to the soldiers. That alone will be a great help!"

The light in their eyes was changing little by little. A faint glow began to return to eyes that had been filled with helplessness and resignation.

Pointing at the church's thick walls, I shouted at the top of my voice.

"Tear down this church if you must and bring its stones! Strip the roof and break up its tiles! Take out every pot and boil water, piss, shit, whatever you have! When the enemy clings to the walls, pour everything we possess over their heads! We must fight to the end! Only then can we live to see tomorrow!"

At last, I looked over all the residents and shouted.

"I, Ulrich von Sternberg, swear that I will fight at the head of your ranks and defend this place until the final moment! So stand and fight with me, your lord!"

When the speech ended, a suffocating silence followed.

In this age, residents were the lord's property. When their lord ordered them to do something, they simply obeyed. If a lord wanted something, all he had to do was command it.

They had never seen a lord appear before them in person, ask them to fight alongside him, and appeal to them with such passion.

Then it happened.

An old farmer in the corner raised a clenched fist into the air. Then he shouted until his throat nearly burst.

"For the lord!"

That cry was the signal. Flames began to kindle, one by one, in the eyes of the hundreds who had been paralyzed by fear.

They were flames of rage and madness, the last flames kindled by people with nothing left to lose.

"For the lord!"

"Kill the Hussites!"

"Waaaaah!"

The old man raised his cane, the blacksmith his hammer, and the women whatever they could grasp while holding their children close. Their cheers thundered through the church.

I answered their cries.

"Fight! For Sternberg!"

"For Sternberg!!"

The church was swiftly drowned in cries of rage and determination.

That night, Sternberg Castle did not sleep.

Children carried stones in their small hands and stacked them atop the walls. Women boiled water in every cauldron and changed the wounded soldiers' bandages.

The men melted down farming tools to forge crude spears, and some even tore down their own homes to build defensive palisades on the walls. Even the wounded swallowed their groans and rose, saying they would carry stones if nothing else.

The line between soldier and civilian vanished. There was only Sternberg, united as one.

The retainers, including János Hunyadi, could only marvel. Even with an enemy at their gates, they had never seen residents so willingly act on their lord's command.

But that fire would not last long. The last remaining food went to the soldiers and able-bodied men, while everyone else eased their hunger with boiled water.

From the enemy camp, the sound of hammers echoed through the night.

Burning with revenge, they were building a new siege weapon.

* * *

The Hussite camp, after its defeat at Sternberg Castle's walls, was utter chaos.

The wounded groaned in pain everywhere, while medics moved constantly among them, wrapping bandages and setting broken bones.

Yet despite their efforts, soldiers whose entire bodies had been burned by the mysterious flames were dying with nothing to be done for them.

Their screams, torn from them amid the horrific pain of melting flesh, seemed to burrow into the bones of the surviving soldiers.

Acrid smoke still rose from the remains of burned wagons, and the air reeked of charred flesh and blood.

Mikuláš of Hus's command tent.

The mood inside was even heavier than outside.

Mikuláš paced through the tent like an enraged beast, unable to contain his fury. The scar on his face made him look even more hideous as his face twisted with anger.

Hynek Krušina of Lichtenburg, on the other hand, sat calmly in his chair, stroking his beard. His eyes coldly calculated the losses on the battlefield.

Bang!

Unable to endure it any longer, Mikuláš slammed his fist down on the table.

"Damn it! What disgrace is this? Held at bay by a fortress guarded by nothing but a brat! The army of God, toyed with by a heathen's sorcery!"

Unbearable fury and humiliation filled his voice.

Krušina spoke quietly. Unlike Mikuláš's passion, his voice was as cold as ice.

"Brother Mikuláš, calm yourself. Anger will not solve this situation. We must assess it with clear heads."

"Calm? You expect me to stay calm in this situation, Lord Krušina? Our brothers burned alive beneath those walls! It was not ordinary fire. It was demonic fire, cursed magic!"

"Magic..."

Krušina did not deny Mikuláš's words. He too had clearly witnessed flames that defied common sense.

Fire that exploded upon touching water. It sounded like something out of an alchemist's ancient tome.

"Whether it is magic or a new kind of weapon, what matters is that we suffered losses far greater than expected. More than a hundred are dead, and the wounded number twice that. Above all... the soldiers' morale has collapsed."

Krušina's gaze turned toward the entrance of the tent. The soldiers' groans and cries still drifted in from outside.

"Their fighting spirit is not to be underestimated. There were only a few dozen soldiers in the castle, yet their resistance was like facing hundreds of elite troops. And if the residents who fled into the castle join them..."

"Residents? What can a bunch of farmers possibly do?"

"Desperation can make the sickle in a farmer's hand sharper than a knight's sword, Mikuláš. They will do anything to survive now, because we have given them no way out."

Krušina paused before cautiously offering his opinion.

"In my view, pressing the attack recklessly would be foolish. We should pull back, restore our formation... and send a messenger to General Žižka to request reinforcements. That would be wise."

"What?!"

Mikuláš's eyes widened in disbelief.

"You dare call that a proposal? Are you telling me that I, Mikuláš, should shamefully ask General Žižka for reinforcements because I cannot handle a single brat?"

"This is not a matter of pride. It is a strategic judgment. Or we can keep the castle surrounded and wait for them to starve. The food inside must be limited. Time is on our side."

The moment he heard those words, Mikuláš's patience finally ran out.

Grinding his teeth, he seized Krušina by the collar.

"Lord Krušina! Is it because you are a noble that you think of war like bargaining between merchants? We are waging a holy war! We are judging those filthy heathens in God's name!"

Mikuláš's eyes were bloodshot.

"How can a warrior of God turn tail before the enemy and wait for them to starve to death? That is not the way of a warrior! It is the way of cowards!"

"Let go of me, Mikuláš."

Though Mikuláš had him by the collar, Krušina spoke coldly without the slightest sign of agitation.

Mikuláš roughly released him. He resumed pacing the tent, breathing hard.

"The general is focused entirely on taking Plzeň. We cannot burden his great campaign for the sake of one small castle on the frontier!"

Mikuláš gave a chilling order to the adjutant outside the tent.

"At dawn tomorrow, we launch a full assault."

Krušina sprang from his chair and objected.

"Have you lost your mind? The soldiers are exhausted, and we have not even figured out the enemy's weapons! What can we possibly do in a single night..."

"Tonight, we will build a new Siege tower. It will be high enough that their cursed fire cannot reach it, and layered with wet hides so it cannot catch fire! Tomorrow morning, we will lead with that Siege tower and scale the walls!"

Mikuláš's plan was simple and reckless. But his resolve was as hard as stone.

"This is an order, Lord Krušina. Your Prague Alliance forces will take part in this attack as well. If you refuse, I will consider you a filthy noble who has betrayed God's warriors."

Krušina said nothing more. He silently rose and left the tent.

Looking into Mikuláš's crazed eyes, he knew any further attempt at persuasion was meaningless.

Left alone, Mikuláš picked up his war hammer.

Wiping the hammer, caked with blood and grease, with a cloth, he muttered in a low voice.

"Tomorrow, I will crush that brat's head with this hammer myself..."

His murderous vow spread through the cold night air.

Footnotes:

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