Catherine felt that her mana had dropped significantly, so she was now fighting without using any mana at all.
Fortunately, her well-trained body hadn’t been neglected, and even without mana, she could unleash fierce attacks without tiring.
Incredible.
The moment Karl was pounced on by a gnoll and screamed, Catherine had tried to use her mana to save him. Thinking things couldn’t go on like this, she had even considered grabbing Karl and fleeing.
But Karl killed the gnoll with his own strength and broke free.
As if that weren’t enough, he sprang back to his feet as if nothing had happened and continued swinging his sword nonstop, cutting down gnolls.
Unbelievable mental strength, judgment, fighting spirit, and survival instinct.
Cowering in fear would achieve nothing, so he chose to risk his life and fight back to carve out a path forward.
That intent was conveyed clearly.
But there were still too many gnolls, the conscripts were as good as wiped out, and even the imperial soldiers were severely exhausted.
Even Milton and Catherine were nearly out of mana, and Bilford had only just barely recovered some stamina.
Karl’s efforts alone couldn’t turn the tide of battle.
It looked like everything was over.
Even so, Catherine did not use the rest of her mana to take Karl and escape.
It wasn’t because she couldn’t abandon the others, nor because she wanted to respect Karl’s will. Those kinds of shallow thoughts never crossed her mind. It was a calm judgment made as a knight, carefully reading the situation.
“Hold on just a little longer!”
They had already been fighting for a long time. Even so, there was no way to tell how much longer they would have to endure.
In that situation, words like “just a little longer” didn’t carry much weight. To anyone, it sounded like empty encouragement.
“If we hold on just a little longer, reinforcements will arrive!”
Reinforcements… right.
At Catherine’s words, Karl let out a bitter smile inside his helmet.
No matter how capable Harmon was, it didn’t seem likely that reinforcements would arrive already.
The subjugation force had moved too quickly.
Even if reinforcements had set out immediately after Karl left, considering the number of soldiers remaining at the fortress and the supplies they would need to bring, it would take at least another 30 minutes at the very fastest.
Judging by the current situation, in 30 minutes Karl would have long since become a meal for the gnolls and there would still be time to spare.
“Huff! Huff!”
Karl could no longer rally the soldiers with a loud voice like he had at the beginning.
His throat was too hoarse to produce much sound, and with his breathing already strained, trying to do so felt like it would make him collapse.
“Hgh!”
With a weak shout, Karl slashed upward diagonally from the lower right to the upper left.
Thud!
Yelp!
The gnoll’s axe handle was blocked by Karl’s blade, while Karl’s sword carved a long line across the gnoll’s abdomen and chest.
Without retreating, Karl pushed his arms forward against the force of the charging gnoll.
Thanks to the gnoll’s own momentum and weight, even Karl’s limited strength was enough to drive the blade deep into its chest.
Pierced through the right side of its chest, the gnoll gasped in agony, blood bursting from its nose and mouth.
Karl didn’t flinch at the metallic stench of blood splattering against his visor.
The moment the gnoll endured the pain and tried to swing its axe, Karl abruptly lowered his stance.
Whoosh…
The axe passed uselessly over his helmet.
As Karl lowered his body, the hilt of his sword naturally dropped as well. With the blade lodged in place, the widening wound allowed the sword to slide free with ease.
Without stepping back, Karl pulled his arm and freed the blade, then smoothly drove the sword forward from a mid-level guard with full force.
Gurgle…
He cleanly pierced the throat of the gnoll, whose lungs were already filling with blood. The sound of bloody foam bubbling from the wound was sickening.
“Hah! Hah! Sss…! Hoo!”
Karl stepped back, trying to steady his breathing.
His mind continuously replayed the combination movements Catherine and Bilford had taught him, guiding how he should move.
Karl had only learned the basics, and even those combinations were just extensions of fundamental forms.
Yet, proving that fundamentals are fundamental for a reason, Karl was able to dispatch a gnoll wielding an axe with surprising ease.
If anything, it would have been more dangerous if the gnoll had charged him barehanded.
The basic swordsmanship Karl learned was meant for dealing with armed opponents. With the gnoll clumsily swinging an axe like this, it actually made it easier to handle.
Squelch!
Karl charged at another gnoll.
With each step, a wet, sticky sound echoed beneath his feet.
At some point, the blood soaking the ground had stopped seeping into the dirt and instead began to pool.
The mixture of blood and soil had turned into thick mud, clinging to his feet and making it difficult to move.
The mud clung heavily, wrapping around his feet, putting strain on his ankles and leg muscles.
The harsh battlefield conditions only made the already exhausted Karl even more fatigued. And it wasn’t just him….everyone else was struggling to fight on the unstable ground.
The same was true for the gnolls. As they tangled together, shoving and grabbing at one another, the mud made from blood stuck to their fur.
It truly was a fight in the mud.
Any justification of serving the Empire’s people, along with notions of honor and authority, had completely vanished from this place.
If hell existed, then surely within it, a horrific war like this would rage on endlessly without ever coming to an end.
Not a single conscript remained alive now. Only a small shield wall of thirty imperial soldiers stood, their spears raised like the quills of a hedgehog, swaying violently.
There was nothing left of their initial solidity. The imperial soldiers, too, had reached their limits.
The shields were too heavy. Even though they were firmly braced at their sides, the spear tips kept drooping like the heads of condemned prisoners kneeling beneath a guillotine.
“Milton! Hah… mana!”
Karl could no longer even form full sentences, but Milton replied in a flat tone, as if he had already given up.
“It’s all gone.”
After saying that, Milton picked up a crude spear dropped by a fallen conscript and began attacking over the soldiers’ shoulders.
Of course, as the imperial physician, there was no way he had been trained in martial combat.
His attacks did little more than mildly inconvenience the charging gnolls.
Still, it was better than nothing.
“Ghk!”
Bilford collapsed to his knees. Inside his visor, his helmet was already a mess of his own vomit and blood from his nose.
There was nothing left to throw up. Only dry heaving remained.
Bark! Bark!
The moment Bilford fell, the gnolls rushed at him with frenzy in their eyes.
Seizing an opening without hesitation. That was the instinct of wild beasts.
Thud! Thud!
“Aaaargh!”
Surrounded in an instant, Bilford was grabbed tightly by his limbs and even his head. He struggled to break free, but he no longer had the strength to even lift his sword.
“Catherine!”
Even with his breathing completely broken, Karl cried out her name like a scream.
But Catherine only turned her head to glance at Karl once, then at Bilford’s situation, and coldly shook her head a single time before focusing on killing gnolls and holding the formation.
Bilford could no longer fight. If Catherine tied herself down trying to protect him, the entire formation would collapse.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
The gnolls mercilessly brought their axes down on the fallen Bilford. But they could not easily pierce the sturdy armor made for an imperial knight’s squire.
After barking a few times, the gnolls shoved their fingertips into the gaps of the armor. They didn’t even think of undoing the clasps to open it.
“Graaah!”
Sharp claws dug through the gaps in the armor and tore into Bilford’s body.
At his scream, the gnolls grew even more excited and pushed their fingers further into the openings. They didn’t even notice their hands being cut by the armor.
“Huff! Huff!”
Karl, hearing Bilford’s pain-filled screams from beyond the imperial soldiers, gasped for breath as he wavered.
Bilford was a valuable talent they could not afford to lose here.
They could not lose a knight who could become the most loyal hunting hound of Aingir, the future emperor, to mere gnolls.
But if Karl rushed out now and died, that would be the end of everything.
Why had Bilford been outside the wall formed by the imperial soldiers until he ended up like that in the first place?
At that moment, Karl realized the fierce assault of the gnolls against their formation had suddenly lessened.
An uncountable number of gnolls had swarmed toward the fallen Bilford.
Bilford had thrown himself out as bait, unable to fight any longer, to buy even a little more time.
“Damn it!”
Karl bit down hard on his lip and cursed.
But there was nothing more he could do. He was barely able to stand, let alone swing his sword.
The overwhelming sense of helplessness threatened to break him.
Is this the end?
Am I going to die here, without accomplishing anything?
– Waaaaaaah!
At that moment, a massive roar, as if it could shatter the sky, erupted from beyond the gnolls.
Startled as the surroundings suddenly brightened as if the sun had risen, Karl frantically looked up at the sky through his visor-obstructed vision.
Of course, it would still be hours before sunrise.
“Reinforcements from Axeblade Village have arrived! Hold on just a little longer!”
Only after hearing Catherine’s confident voice did Karl grasp the situation.
Though the subjugation force’s formation was solid, it was far inferior to Axeblade Village, which held out behind wooden palisades. As a result, most of the gnolls had swarmed toward the subjugation force.
In that gap, the village’s forces, having killed or driven off all the gnolls attacking them, opened their gates and rushed out to rescue them!
“Catherine! Bilford!”
Karl shouted, his voice completely torn apart.
But before he could even finish speaking, Catherine had already used the last of her mana and leapt into the pack of gnolls swarming Bilford.
“Victory is right in front of us! Hold on just a little longer!”
Karl’s throat was too damaged to properly produce a voice.
Yet throughout the battle that was so long he could no longer tell how much time had passed…the imperial soldiers had clearly heard Karl’s voice.
“Kwaaaah!”
Lacking even the strength to respond in crisp unison as before, they simply roared like beasts with everything they had left.
They squeezed out the last of their strength, raising their shields and thrusting their spears.
“We have to rescue him!”
“Waaaah!”
The forces from the village charged bravely toward the rear of the gnolls that had surrounded the subjugation force in a ring.
Five cavalrymen took the lead, galloping fiercely before hurling their javelins with all their might.
Thud! Thud!
The gnolls struck by the thrown spears collapsed helplessly.
Trampling over them, the cavalrymen pulled out the spears hanging from their saddles, braced them tightly at their sides, and lowered their stances.
“Chaaaarge!”
“Uaaaaah!”
Despite having only five light cavalry, who were vulnerable in close combat, they launched a fearless lance charge at a large number of gnolls!
Startled by the erupting shouts and the thunder of pounding hooves, the gnolls turned back in alarm.
The five light cavalry rode almost knee to knee, pressed tightly together, aiming their lances as one with unwavering resolve.
Since light cavalry did not normally perform lance charges, it was difficult to perfectly match their speeds, and their formation spread and broke apart front to back.
However, with the infantry’s torches at their backs, the charging cavalry appeared as a single massive black shadow.
To the gnolls, it looked as if a gigantic monster with dozens of legs was charging straight at them.
Yelp! Yelp!
Terrified, the gnolls began to flee in panic.
As one of them ran, the others who believed that a huge creature was attacking them from behind began to scatter and run as well.
Thud!
Boom!
Ignoring the fleeing gnolls, the cavalry slammed hard into the rear of the group that had yet to grasp the situation.
First, the lance tips drove deep into the gnolls’ backs.
However, with their lack of proficiency in lance charging and without even hooks to secure their spears at their sides, the light cavalry could not pierce through and kill multiple gnolls at once.
Instead, what they could do was let their highly agitated warhorses slam into the gnolls’ backs, delivering tremendous impact.
The gnolls, struck from the rear, fell into confusion and looked around, only to spot five large cavalrymen on horseback thrusting their spears with their torsos upright, along with infantry charging in with torches.
“Waaaah!”
As the village forces, their morale surging, roared at the top of their lungs and charged while wildly waving their torches, the gnolls panicked and fled.
Not only the humans, but the gnolls as well were utterly exhausted.
In fact, the gnolls were even more fatigued.
Though strong and agile, gnolls did not have great endurance.
Because their bodies were covered in fur, they had to release heat by sweating through their palms, soles, and tongues.
On top of that, having rolled around on a battlefield turned into a muddy mess of blood, their fur was caked with mud, making it difficult to move.
“The gnolls are fleeing! Victory is ours!”
“Waaaah!”
Karl lifted his visor and shouted with all his strength.
The muffled sounds that had been pressing in on him from inside his helmet suddenly crashed over him all at once, as if the world itself were shaking.
Karl thought the sky, brightened by the torches, seemed strangely bright.
Then, as his vision turned completely white, he realized it wasn’t the light of the torches but a sign that he was about to lose consciousness.
He tried to brace himself with his sword, but it had already slipped from his grasp and was buried in the mud.
Within the white haze of his vision, the faint scene before him spun rapidly.
Splat!
Karl collapsed sideways like a lifeless log, unable even to withstand the impact.
And so, after enduring what felt like a scene from hell and fighting through it, he was unable to savor the moment of victory.
For a brief moment, Karl thought he heard countless voices calling out to him.
He also felt many hands carefully supporting him.
Even as he was held up by the imperial soldiers, their touch filled with respect, Karl could not regain consciousness.
Everything drifted away.
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