The Barony of Hilpin was a small territory. Even so, the stamina of the imperial soldiers was not something to be underestimated.
Wearing heavy armour, carrying full packs and shields, and wearing helmets, they ran for over thirty minutes, crossing several winding hills along the way.
Thanks to that, they were able to safely reach the “Logpile Village” located halfway between the western forest and Hilpin Castle before Maldin could make his move.
True to its name, the village was protected by thick, sturdy wooden palisades, built from the abundant resources of the forest. On top of them, a vigilante guard stood watch under torchlight, maintaining a strict lookout.
As Karl slowed his pace and approached at a steady rate, cheers erupted from atop the walls.
At that moment, Karl immediately realized that the situation in the Barony of Hilpin was far more serious than he had expected.
It was late at night. Too dark to even identify who was approaching. And yet, the moment people came running in formation, they rejoiced without even confirming who it was.
“We are the imperial subjugation force, sent under His Majesty the Emperor’s command to eliminate the monsters! Open the gate!”
“Duren be praised!”
“We thank His Majesty the Emperor for his mercy!”
Some cried out to their gods, while others shouted with reverence and love for the Emperor.
The gate of the palisade swung open without hesitation.
Mounted on a brilliantly shining white horse, Karl rode in. His red cloak was embroidered with the imperial crest billowing behind him. A hopeful roar erupted from the crowd.
Behind him followed Catherine, Bilford, and Milton on horseback, and then the soldiers marched in step with imposing discipline.
Though there were only thirty-four of them, the fact that they were an imperial force dispatched under the Emperor’s command made them seem like an army of thousands.
“Lady Catherine, have the soldiers rest for a moment.”
“Yes, Sir Karl.”
At Catherine’s command, the soldiers took a break. The dissatisfaction they had shown earlier that day was nowhere to be seen. They stood in perfect order, set down their packs, planted their large shields and spears firmly, and slowly caught their breath.
Even at rest, they did not sprawl carelessly. Their sharpened focus and strict discipline inspired a natural sense of reassurance.
“Who is in charge here?”
“Y-Yes! That would be me! Yes, sir!”
At Karl’s booming voice, an elderly man with pure white hair hurried out from the crowd.
He immediately dropped to the ground and bowed his head deeply before Karl.
In the darkness of night, mounted on a large white horse, wearing a helmet adorned with a red plume and a flowing imperial cloak, Karl’s frail shoulders and delicate features were hidden, making him appear like a commanding general.
It was hard to believe that such a powerful voice and commanding presence could come from such a small body.
“Provide the soldiers with water and food.”
“Yes! Of course!”
Karl first made sure to take care of the soldiers who had followed him without complaint, even after being woken abruptly and still half-dazed. It was completely different from how he had acted on the way here.
“Are you the village chief?”
“Yes!”
Karl spoke arrogantly to the white-haired old man without even dismounting from his horse as if it were only natural.
It was the right decision. If he got off the horse now, his small frame would be exposed. And if he showed too much courtesy, they might grow suspicious or look down on him.
“I am Karl Pelt Hardion, sent under His Majesty the Emperor’s command to subjugate the monsters in the Barony of Hilpin.”
A gasp spread through the crowd, followed by murmurs of shock. But as Bilford, who had been standing quietly behind Karl, shot them a sharp glare with fierce eyes, they all fell silent.
To them, the fact that Karl was the frail Fourth Prince meant nothing. They didn’t even know his name.
But they clearly understood one thing. He was a noble figure bearing the name of Hardion.
A member of the imperial family had come in person! We’re saved!
“I want to hear the full details.”
“Y-Yes…!”
Unlike their earlier cheers of joy, the village chief now trembled, barely managing to respond in a strained voice.
To commoners, the Emperor was no different from a god. Someone to be feared.
To keep the torchlight from revealing his frail body and gaunt face, Karl pulled his cloak tighter and lowered his head, listening silently to the chief’s account.
Because of that, no one could see his expression gradually hardening.
Bilford and the soldiers, however, couldn’t fully hide their reactions. The disturbance showed on their faces.
As the chief spoke, others interjected without permission, adding details here and there. From it all, Karl pieced together the full picture, then fell into silence for a long moment.
As the silence stretched on, the people of Logpile Village began to tremble with anxiety.
Finally, Karl grasped the reins, turned his horse, and looked back at Catherine.
“Lady Catherine. I would like to hear your opinion.”
Karl still addressed Catherine respectfully. But his voice was no longer gentle as before.
It was firm. The voice of a commander listening to a subordinate’s assessment.
“If the situation is truly that dire, it would be best to abandon the village, retreat to the castle, fortify our defenses, and wait for reinforcements.”
At Catherine’s cold, pragmatic words, murmurs spread among the villagers.
It was as good as saying it didn’t matter if everyone here died.
“If that were the case, I would have continued playing the fool. Set aside my personal safety and make a decision for the greater good.”
Karl lifted his chin confidently as he spoke. The red plume on his helmet swept back with force, flashing with a brilliance that demonstrated his authority.
“Then we must prevent them from leaving the Gnoll Forest and scattering. Once they get out of the forest, they’ll be impossible to control. We should join up with the forces at the front and subjugate the gnolls with the force of a wildfire.”
Matching Karl’s commanding presence, Catherine made a firm decision, as if drawing a blade, and offered its hilt to him.
“Good.”
Karl nodded heavily, then turned his horse again to look down at the trembling village chief lying prostrate before him.
His face, cast in shadow, carried far more authority than it naturally should have.
“We will advance toward the forest. If the forward troops have been isolated for a long time, their supplies must be running low.”
Karl pushed his mind to its limits. He could leave everything to Catherine and resolve things easily. But then all his effort would be meaningless.
Recalling the countless pieces of knowledge he had read in the imperial archives, Karl continued after a brief pause.
“By the authority of His Majesty the Emperor, I hereby enact conscription. Gather men and horses, and load supplies.”
“…B-But!”
“By the authority granted to Sir Karl by His Majesty, this is a just and lawful conscription. Move at once.”
Before the flustered chief could protest, Catherine rode forward and spoke firmly, her voice ringing like steel.
Until now, she had stepped back to follow Karl’s lead, but now it was time to act as his knight.
At her words, Logpile Village fell into fear.
They had just refused conscription from a member of the imperial family acting under the Emperor’s command. The entire village could be wiped out.
“Sss… haah…”
Karl sat atop his large horse, looking down at the terrified villagers scrambling into motion. The faint tremor in his breath did not go unnoticed by Catherine and Bilford, but they chose to ignore it.
I’m not Ilias.
Karl muttered inwardly.
And these people are not the sword and staff of House Beria, with its vast wealth at its disposal.
In the original story, the monster subjugation that Ias resolved effortlessly using the power of House Beria…
The returning Ilias had said it was “nothing special”.
Out of all possible tasks, why had Emperor Madius chosen something as trivial as monster subjugation to empower the original Ilias and now Karl?
…I could die.
A chilling fear crept over Karl.
Here, where he had been pushed by Madius, beneath the dark night sky, he could feel an inevitable death slowly lowering its scythe toward his neck.
The Barony of Hilpin was a small territory.
However, mere gnolls should not be capable of posing such a threat.
Under normal circumstances.
Bilford had reported that two villages near the western forest had been wiped out.
But according to what he heard in Logpile Village, all nearby villages had already fallen, and the survivors had gathered at “Axeblade Village”, the starting point on the path from the forest to Hilpin Castle, barely holding out in a desperate defense.
Wasn’t that essentially saying they were collapsing helplessly, unable even to properly grasp the situation from the castle?
At last, the larger picture began to take shape.
Maldin and the other nobles of the Hilpin barony were hiding something. That was why they had deliberately downplayed the scale of the gnoll outbreak.
Perhaps when they first made their report, it truly hadn’t been a big deal. But now, the situation had deteriorated into something so horrific that the entire territory stood on the brink of destruction.
Even so, the nobles of Hilpin had lied to Karl, the imperial prince and commander of the subjugation force sent by the Emperor, trying to keep him from taking action.
Why?
Running away is the right choice.
Karl thought calmly.
If he wanted to survive, he needed to leave this land immediately.
Hilpin Castle was not safe either. There were the gnoll attacks, but also no telling what schemes those insidious nobles who had dared mock the Fourth Prince acting under the Emperor’s command might be plotting.
However, I cannot run.
Even so, Karl had no choice but to stake his life and dance once with death.
If he were to return like this, Madius’s test would end in the worst possible failure.
And that would mean he was as good as dead.
He would be abandoned by Madius and later purged by Eingir when he ascended the throne. No matter where he ran, no matter how long he fled, Eingir would never let Karl go.
And Cecile, left behind in the imperial palace as a hostage, would not survive either.
Karl had no choice but to move forward.
“Th-The, uh, preparations are complete…”
Karl looked down at the man who approached him, speaking in a servile voice.
“Are you the one responsible for accompanying me?”
“Yes… I am the captain of the militia…”
“That’s enough. From this moment on, you are a supply officer attached to His Majesty’s subjugation force.”
“Huh? Ah, yes!”
A supply officer of the Emperor’s subjugation force!
At those words, the man’s previously slumped shoulders straightened and lifted with pride.
Karl did not want to feel any unnecessary guilt by learning the militia captain’s name, so he cut him off.
And by placing a meaningless title upon him, Karl instilled a sense of responsibility. With just a few words, he made a mere militia captain from a rural village take charge of and steady the ragtag conscripts.
“The soldiers’ gear…”
Drawing on his past military experience, Karl was about to order the soldiers’ equipment loaded onto carts. But something felt off, and he trailed off, glancing subtly at Catherine.
With a firm gaze, Catherine signaled that it should not be done.
“…The soldiers will carry their own gear. Endure a little longer.”
“Yes, sir!”
The imperial soldiers responded in booming voices.
By now, they regarded Karl as their unquestionable commander.
“We march! Open the gate!”
At Karl’s command, the western gate opened, and he led from the front, urging his horse forward at a slow pace.
If it were only imperial soldiers, they could have increased their speed, but it was impossible for villagers like these to keep up with a faster march.
It did not take long for the pitiful subjugation force, composed of only a handful of soldiers capable of fighting properly, to leave the village.
There weren’t many supplies either, and it was hard to say whether they would manage.
“Lady Catherine, why did you have the soldiers carry their gear?”
Once they had left the village, Karl approached Catherine and asked quietly.
Catherine answered in a resolute voice.
“The value of one well-trained soldier exceeds that of a hundred recruits. When the time comes, we must be prepared to abandon all of them if it means saving the soldiers. There will be no time to unload supplies from carts then.”
It was a chillingly cold statement. Yet it was also true. Karl nodded slowly, his face slightly pale.
After watching him for a moment, Catherine added quietly,
“And you must never mistake weakness for kindness. If you entrust them with supplies, they may rummage through them and steal valuables or simply run off with everything.”
“I see. Understood. I’ll keep that in mind.”
For some reason, Catherine’s words put Karl slightly at ease.
Finding that feeling rather strange, he carefully reflected on the change in his state of mind.
“Haha…”
As Karl lowered his head and let out a small laugh, Bilford blinked and looked at him cautiously.
“Sir Karl, what is it?”
Without realizing it, Bilford had asked Karl that question.
For a subordinate to dare question even the smallest action of his lord was a grave act of disrespect.
Only after speaking did Bilford realize his mistake; he flinched once at Catherine’s sharp glare, and then was startled again by Karl’s response.
“It’s just that… I find myself rather pathetic.”
“……”
“Lady Catherine, thank you. But you won’t need to do that anymore.”
“I overstepped. My apologies.”
“No.”
Unable to grasp the situation, Bilford could only watch cautiously.
With his lips pressed tightly together, Karl stared into the distance…so far ahead that nothing could be seen beneath the pitch-black darkness.
I pitied their lives.
Karl examined his own thoughts once more.
Catherine realized that and gave me a reason that would keep me from suffering when they die.
Catherine had said that even if they were weak, they were not good. She had spoken of them almost as if they were wicked.
So that when those innocent people were slaughtered under Karl’s command, he would feel less guilt.
Karl already knew what the rational choice was. That was why he had instinctively hesitated to load the gear onto the carts.
And yet—
Pathetic! I can barely even protect my own life!
Karl harshly lashed at his own weakness.
Pity, compassion, guilt.
Those pleasant-sounding words were luxuries reserved for the powerful.
Or for those who had fallen to the very bottom, clinging to life while comforting themselves with such sentiments.
Karl was powerless. And yet, he had no choice but to keep moving forward.
For him, such emotions were not just a luxury. They were a sin.
The mission is to subjugate the monsters. Nothing else matters.
Karl set his objective firmly.
Kill the monsters and resolve the situation. Pass Madius’s test and claim that power.
For that, he would make whatever ruthless decisions were necessary.
As the number of trees gradually increased, the branches hanging over the road began to block the moonlight.
Karl’s figure moved deeper into the darkness until at last he disappeared into the distance.
Once again, it felt as though the scent of blood lingered in the air.
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