Chapter 271
The Western Front ⑧ — A Turning Point
Arrives
Translator : PolterGlast
Elan and his
group, having somehow let Mary and her 10 escort cavalry escape to the
destination embankment, were confronting the enemy army with tragic resolve
alongside the less than 60 cavalry remaining on the spot.
The enemy army surrounding them numbered about 180 mounts;
the difference in combat power was threefold, and total annihilation seemed
only a matter of time.
"Everyone, forgive me. But please, lend me your
strength until the very last man falls! Let us bring a resolution to this
battle to protect the Kingdom! We must keep them pinned down here for as long
as possible!"
The soldiers around Elan nodded silently, and to show
their resolve, each raised their sword high. The enemy cavalry re-encircled
them from a distance as if cornering prey, then nocked arrows on horseback. To
shoot them down one-sidedly.
Seeing this, Elan aimed at the man who appeared to be
the enemy commander, took a stance to charge while deploying earth magic, and
muttered softly.
"Sorry... I can't keep the promise. Sorry, Sa..."
"Scatter them!"
Overlapping Elan's mutter, the voice of a man
ordering a charge echoed from afar. It was 200 mounts led by Mars, the
advance party of the Demon Territory Knights under Takuhir, who
had passed through steep mountain paths aiming for Kleirat behind Lugner's
soldiers.
Mars,
confirming Elan fighting a solitary struggle from a distance, attacked
the enemy soldiers like a raging fire after a swift decision.
"E-Enemy?" "Newcomers?" "F-Fight
back!"
Lugner's
soldiers, who had surrounded Elan's group
and were about to annihilate them with overwhelming numbers, were conversely
flustered by a sudden surprise attack from behind. Moreover, the attackers were
the Demon Territory Knights said to be the most elite in the Kyle
Kingdom, forged over many years by Commander Weiss.
Mars cut through the center of the enemy formation at once, cut down
the man who appeared to be the commander with a single stroke, and joined up
with Elan and his group as is.
"Elan! We also saw the balloon and intend to
have guessed the rough situation. Leave the rest to us. Go ahead!"
Saying so, Mars turned his horse, redeployed to
shield Elan and his group, and charged into the enemy army again. The
enemy soldiers, shaken by the surprise attack and having lost their commander,
were no match anymore and were struck down one after another.
Elan looked
back once, confirmed the situation, and then chased after Mary at full
speed.
Chronologically, this goes back a little in time.
Takuhir and the
others, accompanied by spare horses, were galloping towards Kleirat in a
forced march.
"Report from the lead unit. Confirmed balloon in the sky
ahead of the direction of travel, beyond the pass! Requesting urgent
instructions for the path ahead, they say."
The balloon discovered by the lead unit is likely raised
from near the command post in Kleirat. If raised to a height of 100 m from a command post on high ground, the ground height would
be 120-140 m.
The vastness and size of this world are unknown, but
assuming a planet of equivalent size to Earth, the line-of-sight distance would
be about 40 to 45 km without obstructions, and from us
who crossed the pass, albeit a low mountain, we can see even further.
The Commander and I galloped and caught up with the leading
group.
"Does this mean Kleirat is resorting to the last
resort? The war situation doesn't seem good."
"Yes, likely as you point out, Commander. At this
distance... we'll make it somehow! The advance party led by Mars is
already heading to the embankment, but I will send a support unit of 200 mounts
just in case. We intend to avoid the road along the river, detour from the west,
and come out at their rear; what do you think?"
"Understood. All troops, transition from walk to
canter! We are rushing to the battlefield immediately!"
We increased the marching speed by two stages. Desperately
suppressing the impatient feeling of wanting to go at full speed.
Around that
time, Elan caught up with Mary. He had staked his life to send
her ahead, and she had already arrived at the
embankment with the mechanism and begun her work.
"E-Elan!
You're safe..."
Mary
unintentionally hugged Elan and burst into tears, releasing her
suppressed emotions. Elan gently stroked her head as she sobbed, and
responded slowly with a soft voice.
"Sorry for making you worry. Everyone was saved. Lord Takuhir's army is heading this way now,
so let us fulfill the mission we must perform. Mary, the Red Orbs? "
"I released them all earlier. Lord Takuhir...
then what about us?"
"Yeah, all that remains is to claim victory. To that
end, let us make haste!"
The two of them set to work on the task they had been preparing
for ten long months, all for the sake of this very day.
Clarice and the
others were holed up in the Kleirat fortification. Although they had
escaped immediate danger, they were surrounded by over 20,000 enemy soldiers
and continued desperate resistance relying on the second defensive wall.
When a part of the Principality Army that had been adding
fierce attacks in various places retreated and the overall attack slackened, a
brief moment of respite finally arrived for Clarice and Gord, who
were stationed at the command post constantly sending instructions to support
the front lines.
" One of the
enemy units has withdrawn. I only wish we could rotate our troops and give them
some rest... Gord-san, what is the status of our forces right now?"
"Yes. Thanks to the enemy army easing their offensive,
we were also able to evacuate wounded soldiers. Thanks to the large number of Holy
Mages, nearly 2,000 won't be combat-ready for a while, but their lives will
be saved."
"To what extent is
the death toll?"
"The death toll among the noble
allied forces is noticeably high. The 2,000 deployed upstream were almost
annihilated, and the 1,000 stationed in this fortification also suffered nearly
80% deaths."
"Eh? I can
understand the upstream forces, but why the troops here?"
"When receiving the fierce attack of the enemy's Mage
Corps, they ran around in confusion instead of entering the umbrella of
magic or lightning rods... even though I had strictly ordered them
beforehand..."
Yes, for them, this was the first time receiving an enemy
magic attack. Unlike those who received prior training in Ishtar or
those who survived the opening battle. Shaken by the unexpected attack, they
ran in wrong directions, resulting in leaving the defensive umbrella and
increasing casualties.
"Also, the Royal Capital Knights Third Army,
which fought continuously in the most dangerous places and continued to fight
bravely, also suffered nearly 1,000 deaths and an equal number of wounded.
Thanks to being placed in the safest locations, the volunteers have over 1,000
wounded but likely fewer than 100 dead. Of the 2,000 surrendered soldiers
defending the far right wing, nearly 1,000 are casualties. This was the
fiercest battleground, after all."
"I see... the Knights' Third Army and the noble army
led by those eight struggling to clear their names supported us; is that it? I
realize again that we are kept alive thanks to them."
Initially, the military strength defending the base
fortification was 18,000, but due to the enemy army's fierce attacks so far,
nearly 4,000 were casualties, and the wounded had been sent to the rear. Also,
the 2,000 noble allied forces deployed upstream were almost annihilated, and
the 2,000 downstream were unscathed but currently blocked by the enemy army and
unable to get close.
In stark
contrast, by this time, the Fearalt Principality Army no longer had to trouble themselves with fording the river; they
were crossing the bridge freely. Dividing their army into three groups, they
committed two to the assault while withdrawing the third to the left bank to
rest. Even the devastated Mage Corps
had rallied its survivors and completed preparations for an all-out attack.
"Do you think Elan-san and the others managed to pull it off? "
"They surely must have accomplished it. Calculating
backward from the time the balloon was raised, it should be... any moment now."
"It feels like a long wait..."
As if in answer to their conversation, a short while later,
the sound of a bell tolling twice echoed from the distance. Hearing the signal
they had been longing for, the two instinctively stood up and looked outside.
"It's here!"
"Yes, it has come. We must hurry and respond on our end
as well!"
"Yes, relay the order to all locations! Start two
consecutive bell strokes! Strict vigilance! Just a little longer now!"
Summoning messengers and issuing instructions to encourage
allies, the two stared at the river surface. This bell sound was relayed by the
100 people Elan left at various points on the way, waiting dispersed at
regular intervals to relay Elan and the others' news.
And after continuing for a while, the bell sound stopped at
the instruction of the command post. After that, the sound of bells echoed from
afar again. This time, three consecutive strokes with a sense of urgency...
"Reporting!
Red Orbs are flowing into the basin! And now, three consecutive bell
strokes have started!"
"Transmit to the whole army! Three strokes for
evacuation order! Hurry!"
Simultaneously as Gord shouted upon receiving the
report, all bells within the fortification began three consecutive strokes. As
if sounding a massive alarm...
The forces commanded by Clarice and the others
received the notice from evacuation preparation to evacuation start and moved
to high ground all at once.
Shortly after, the gentle river flow visibly increased in
speed, and eventually, a muddy stream accompanied by a roar assaulted from
upstream. It was an instantaneous change that left the Principality Army
soldiers no time to predict anything.
"W-Water! Help me!" "Water attack!"
"No good... can't make it."
The dam that
Elan and Mary had breached upstream was now unleashing months of accumulated
water into the river basin in a single, explosive burst. The river swelled in
the blink of an eye. Caught in the sudden surge, Principality
soldiers lost their
footing and began to be swept away in
various places. The raging
torrent swallowed not only the dry floodplains but even the first defensive line
situated on lower ground, submerging embankments and defensive walls until only
their very crests remained visible.
Yes, there was a reason Elan took this measure. The
first time he showed his existence value as a Mage was during the great
flood starting with the overflow of the Org River 10 years ago. At that
time, faced with the flash flood caused by the bridge collapse, he strongly
felt the magnitude of nature's power and his own powerlessness.
And the previous year, when visiting this land for the first
time, he felt the potential danger lurking in this land and the possibility of
a trap using water flow, and proposed it to Takuhir. It can be said that
Elan's past experience and repentance, and the construction knowledge
and construction supervision experience he learned afterward, became the base
of this operation.
Marquis Scuria, surprised by the roar echoing around,
hurriedly climbed to high ground and looked over the river and floodplain,
losing his words.
The floodplains on both banks that spread before his eyes
until a moment ago had sunk into the raging torrent,
and many soldiers who had gained a
foothold on the enemy camp on the opposite bank and were attacking had also
disappeared.
"Wh-wh-what on earth!"
"..."
The Marquis couldn't utter words following that. And Lugner,
who was beside him, also couldn't speak due to shock.
Until a moment ago, his army's victory was imminent. From there on, using the surviving 50 members of the Mage Corps,
they would crush the enemy's catapults and further inner positions with
concentrated fire. Once those threats were gone, they would rush in at once and
capture it. It was at the very moment they were
discussing such plans that it happened.
"R-Report! Our troops... they've been swallowed by the
muddy torrent... more than 10,000 are..." "
"I can tell just by looking! It’s not just a matter of
10,000! It’s the 14,000 who were in the middle of the attack—isn't it almost
all of them?! "
The Marquis
hurled his aimless fury at the messenger who brought the report. However, after
this, they were about to be knocked down even further into the depths of
despair.
Suddenly,
just as an eerie sound like tearing air reached their ears, thunderous sounds
echoed around the 7,000 troops waiting far behind the left bank's levee—a
position they had thought was a safe zone. Violent clouds of dust rose up,
completely obscuring the area.
The attack,
launched from the upstream left bank at a distance too great
to confirm visually, shattered the surrounding trees and gouged the earth. Hundreds of metal spheres, each possessing enough power to drag
multiple soldiers into the fray, rained down all at once.
The metal
projectiles inviting them to death not only
scraped the earth but ricocheted in all directions and rampaged.
And when the
dust finally settled, a gruesome spectacle, too horrible to behold, lay spread
across the area.
Thus, the battle later called the Second Battle of Kleirat
concluded.
The Fearalt Principality rebel army that invaded the Kyle
Kingdom, totaling 30,000, and the Kyle Kingdom rebel army of 8,000
centered on the two Marquis families of the Restoration Faction, were defeated
suffering damage close to total annihilation.
All due to the astonishing tactics of the Kyle Kingdom Army, which inflicted over 20,000 casualties in a mere fraction of time...
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