The prisoners’ march grew slower as time went on.
It was because they had hit their physical limits.
“The prisoners seem to be getting pretty exhausted. Shouldn’t we be a little more considerate of that?”
“I’ll handle how the prisoners are treated. You need not concern yourself.”
Even at Schneider’s words, Leon firmly refused.
Prisoners are not to be trusted.
Leon’s father, like himself, had once been an expedition leader.
His father had always upheld the belief that prisoners could be reformed, and he had saved many prisoners.
– Prisoners are people just like us. If we can correct their flaws, they’ll be able to make great contributions to society.
But in the end, Leon came to realize that his father had been wrong.
The proof was right there. His father had been killed by the very prisoners he had trusted.
Those bastards aren’t worth fixing.
And so, that’s what Leon believed.
He had lost his father, the very purpose of his life, and he sought to fill that void through his treatment of the prisoners.
Watching them struggle and wither away on the brink of death amused him.
Consumables should die like consumables.
People didn’t place their trust in consumables.
That’s what Leon believed.
***
“So that’s what happened, huh? No wonder he can’t trust prisoners.”
“Haha… I guess so, yeah… after all, we are prisoners…”
Jun nodded as he listened to the story Luke told him. Luke had apparently heard this story long ago from the now-dead Mustache.
Jun handed the dejected Luke a piece of jerky coated with honey and fell deep into thought.
“So he lost his father to a prisoner, huh.”
If that was the case, then there was only one way to resolve this issue.
To somehow make Leon trust the prisoners.
Obvious as it sounded, it was an impossible task.
How could anyone trust a prisoner?
On this particular point, even Jun had no objections. Even Luke, a prisoner himself, admitted as much.
“But the world doesn’t exactly run as simply as black-and-white logic, does it?”
Prisoners?
They had broken the law, so it was only right that they paid the price. That was how society could function.
But human beings were inherently flawed creatures.
And the law was a system created by those very flawed creatures.
Joseph would probably be the prime example of that.
Joseph’s crime was disobeying orders during a military operation.
The reason? He had defied the command to burn down a village suffering from a plague.
Then, was Joseph a criminal?
Yes, he was indeed a criminal.
He had defied a military order. He had broken the law.
But did that mean Joseph was an untrustworthy human being?
Well.
That question probably required a little more thought.
The world was complicated like that.
“How should I convince that commander, who sees the world in such black and white terms…”
It was impossible to make him trust prisoners.
But there was a way to make him trust a person.
Jun decided to entrust that role to Joseph.
***
“Separate the prisoners?”
Joseph tilted his head at Jun’s words.
“Yeah. We need to draw a line between the ones who are completely hopeless and the ones who might still be useful.”
“How exactly?”
“That’s something you’ll have to figure out from here on.”
“You’re really something.”
Joseph grumbled right away, but he didn’t reject Jun’s proposal.
That was because the conditions Jun offered him were just as sweet.
“Did you think getting connected to the Gillen Merchant Guild was going to be easy?”
“Urgh.”
“Still, I’m not going to make you do it empty-handed. Here, take this.”
What Jun handed over was a stamina potion.
It was contained in a small flask. Exactly what the exhausted prisoners needed most at the moment.
“In return, get a firm grip on the prisoners. No matter what happens, make sure they follow you. And if there are any who won’t, weed them out.”
“I’ll give it a try.”
Joseph accepted the task.
But Joseph didn’t bother with persuasion.
He simply beat up anyone who refused to listen.
And for those who did their best during battles, he rewarded them.
“Drink this. It should give you some energy.”
“Ugh… W-What is this? A potion? How did you even…?”
“Shut up and drink.”
“Th-Thanks.”
Even so, there were still some who wouldn’t listen.
But it wasn’t his job to look after every single one of them.
The prisoners were certainly valuable as fighting power…
But from now on, those who didn’t follow orders would only get in the way.
“I’ve seen this before. It’s a method the tribes used on beasts.”
“What method?”
It was a conversation between Maya and Aiden, who had been watching from the side. Eleanor, standing nearby as well, joined in.
“Taming. You feed them if they obey, and if they don’t, you turn them into minced meat.”
Jun and Joseph had begun training the prisoners.
***
“Stop.”
At Jun’s command, Schneider and Leon raised their fists.
It was the signal to halt. The group came to a standstill in the middle of an empty wasteland.
“What’s going on?”
“It’s witchcraft.”
There was nothing but barren land all around.
But Jun could clearly see traces of witchcraft.
It was a barrier.
After traveling for fifteen days, they had finally reached their destination.
Jun and his party successfully encountered the first medium. The orc shaman Barbata.
[Fire Ball]
As the fireball shot forward, ripples of achromatic energy spread through the empty air, extinguishing the flames.
“Hmm. A barrier. And a very solid one at that.”
Schneider’s face twisted into a grimace.
Barriers, by their nature, often resulted in heavy casualties once breached.
It was best to avoid exhausting their forces before they had even confronted the Orc Lord.
If only I still had my equipment…
Unfortunately, all the gear capable of countering witchcraft had been left behind.
In the end, they had no choice but to go in and deal with it directly.
“Shall we send the prisoners in first?”
“Hmm…”
Just as Schneider was about to respond to Leon’s question, Jun stepped forward first.
“Would you mind waiting a moment?”
“Hmm? Jun. Do you have an idea?”
Jun was the leader of a mercenary group and a mage with a wealth of knowledge, but Schneider was skeptical of Jun having some expertise in witchcraft as well.
In fact, it was a perfectly reasonable assumption.
After all, magic and witchcraft were entirely different fields.
“I have some knowledge of witchcraft. Let me take a look.”
“…Is that so?”
Instead of answering directly, Jun focused his gaze on the spell spread out before him.
It’s a completely different kind of spell from what the Old Crone used.
Whereas the Old Crone’s witchcraft had mostly centered around curses and spirits, the orc shaman Barbata’s witchcraft appeared to specialize in barriers and reinforcement.
What kind of structure is this built on?
To everyone else, it might have looked like nothing but an empty wasteland, but to Jun’s eyes, the distinct flow created by the witchcraft energy was clearly visible.
I can see it even better than before.
Back when he faced the Old Crone, he had only been able to vaguely sense the flow.
Now, he could clearly see the current of energy itself.
Are the orcs inside acting as the mediums? What an incredibly selfish technique.
Since the mediums were located inside the barrier, the only way to destroy it properly was to enter it from within.
On top of that, he could see the flow of the spell shifting from moment to moment.
So the point of entry changes depending on the shifting flow of the spell.
There was a real chance that the group of nearly thirty people could end up scattered in all directions.
Jun explained what he had realized to the others.
Of course, charging in recklessly would be nothing short of suicide.
They’d be picked off one by one by the orcs inside.
“What if we all held hands and went in together?”
One of the prisoners suggested that. It wasn’t a bad idea, but doing so increased the likelihood that the spell would forcibly reject them.
“What about hitting it with an external shock?”
Schneider spoke as he clenched his gauntlet.
It was a surprisingly tough response for a scholar, but Jun shook his head.
“The spell is unbelievably sturdy. Hard to believe it was made ages ago. It’s useless.”
Schneider had shown overwhelming physical force while they were escaping from the Ancient Temple. But even that strength wouldn’t be enough here.
On top of that, the moment he used that technique, he would be left unable to fight for a while, which meant the cost would be far too great.
“Then what do we do?”
“I’ll break it.”
“Huh? What are you talking about? You just said that’s not possible.”
That’s right. One overwhelming strike wouldn’t be enough.
“Everyone, step back.”
In that case, he just needed to dismantle it with his magic.
***
“Maya, can you see it?”
“I can see it.”
“Keep pointing at it with your finger.”
“Got it.”
The orc shaman Barbata’s spell wasn’t the kind that involved offering sacrifices to some absolute being, like the Old Crone’s spell.
Instead, Barbata himself played the role of receiving the sacrifice directly.
The mediums of that spell are the bodies and souls of the orcs.
In other words, it meant that even Maya could see the flow of souls surrounding the barrier.
“They’re moving from over there to here, like this.”
“That’s it.”
Jun didn’t have the ability to see souls, but he could sense the flow of magical power moving with a distinct pattern in the direction Maya was pointing.
The number of souls Maya pointed out was twenty-five in total.
Jun memorized every single flow and began to chant his spells.
[Multicasting]
[Detecting Target]
[Rapid Casting]
[Wind Cutter]
At nearly one-second intervals, blades of wind were summoned and tore through the flow of the barrier.
No matter how solid and intricate it had been, once the flow began to break, the whole thing was bound to collapse.
Only twenty-five seconds.
That was all it took for Jun to tear apart the souls maintaining the barrier.
“Wh-What?!”
Someone pointed their finger at what had just been an empty, desolate field.
And then, like a mirage, something began to gradually reveal itself in the space where nothing had been.
It was a huge stone structure. Something that looked like a coffin.
***
“Heh…”
Since the death of his assistant of ten years,
Schneider had outwardly maintained a calm demeanor, but every night, he found himself thinking of the time he had spent with Braight.
Despite his lacking talent compared to others, Braight had always moved forward with persistence and resolve.
But there had always been a sense of urgency within him. And that was what ultimately ruined everything.
Was it because of someone like me that you made that choice?
Jun was an exceptional mage. At least to Schneider, Jun was a remarkable individual.
He wasn’t arrogant despite his abilities; he was always cautious, and he constantly absorbed everything around him.
Naturally, Schneider had thought of him as a talent so great it was hard not to feel greedy for him.
Perhaps Braight had felt even more despair and urgency seeing the way Schneider looked at Jun.
But what good is any of this now?
Even with Jun’s impressive feats, Schneider could no longer simply rejoice as he once had.
He was a scholar, a recorder of events.
And this incident, too…. if he survived and returned, he would reveal it all truthfully to the outside world.
Even if that meant tarnishing the name of his assistant.
But still, Braight. Even so…
I will make sure your mistake doesn’t grow any larger. That is the only thing I can do for you now.
In front of the tightly shut doors of the coffin-like stone structure,
Schneider’s fist shattered the door in a single blow.
From within the building that was untouched by sunlight for ages, dozens of pairs of glowing red eyes burst forth.
“Orrcutas Bahal… Daru Ba Hargon…! Hargon Bahal!!”
Roughly translated, it was a chant that praised the god of the orcs while simultaneously exalting their returning hero Hargon.
The one who had shouted those words was the orc shaman, Barbata.
“Everyone, prepare for battle!”
***
– Orcutas Bahal!
– Hargon Bahal!
The inside of the building was filled with darkness.
Even at a glance, the number of glowing red eyes visible inside exceeded fifty pairs.
They were elite orc warriors who had once stood beside the Orc Lord to challenge the world.
Just before those creatures burst out of the stone building—
It was Jun who fired the opening shot of the battle.
[Earth Burst]
Boom-Boom-Boom-Boom—!
He channeled the mana he had been gathering all along into the ground, then detonated it all at once.
The orcs standing above the ground were struck by the explosion and fell from the impact.
However, unlike the gremlins he had once fought, these orcs withstood the flying debris from the blast.
Kuuooooooo――!
They converted their pain into rage and were just about to charge—
Rummbbllleee—!
Due to the [Earth Burst], the ground shook, and the ancient building that had sheltered the orcs for centuries collapsed.
“Fall back!”
At Leon’s command, the party retreated, while a few orcs that had already emerged were blocked by Aiden and Maya.
Clang—!
The total number of orcs that barely made it out of the collapsing building was around a dozen or so.
Those creatures swung their glaives, which had been forged through proper blacksmithing techniques.
They’re heavy…!
Each of them had bulging arm muscles as thick as Aiden’s waist.
In pure strength alone, Aiden was being overpowered.
But Aiden didn’t panic.
He had already received advice from Jun about this, and he had experienced firsthand in the field that charging head-on with strength against enraged orcs was a bad idea.
He took two steps back and activated the artifact he had received from Jun in the past, [Salamander’s Blessing].
Whoooosh—!
As Aiden’s mana was imbued with the fire attribute, crimson flames rippled and left trails along the path of his sword.
The lingering traces swirled chaotically, obstructing the orc warrior’s line of sight.
Two other orcs charged in from right behind him, but instead of retreating, Aiden boldly pushed forward.
[Charge], [Bash]
His target was the orc he had first crossed blades with.
Just as the other two tried to react and block Aiden’s charge, Maya made her move.
From directly behind Aiden, Maya leaped out like a shadow, holding two daggers in her hands.
Thud, Clang!
One of them failed to notice Maya’s movement, hidden by Aiden’s position, and took a dagger to the eye. The other managed to block her strike but failed to keep track of Aiden’s movement.
Splat!
Aiden’s sword sliced through the throat of the orc in front of him.
Even though orcs had muscles as hard as stone, they couldn’t stop a sword infused with aura.
Soon, the creature’s blood burst out like a fountain, soaking Aiden’s body.
“Hoo…”
Two leaps.
Putting distance between himself and the charging orcs, Aiden exhaled deeply from the depths of his lungs.
A faint trace of blood shimmered in his breath.
The artifact and his armor, the “Destroyer’s Leather”, activated by absorbing the blood of the orc warrior.
An overwhelming surge of power engulfed his entire body, and a destructive instinct surged to his head.
Suppressing that sensation with sheer willpower, Aiden’s eyes took on a menacing crimson glow.
It resembled the orcs’ berserk state.
“Right.”
“Then I’ll take the left.”
He focused the overflowing strength into his legs.
[Charge] activated again.
This time, even the orc warriors briefly lost track of Aiden’s movements.
Crunch!
Only after the chilling sound rang out did the orcs realize one of their own had fallen.
“Hoo…”
The creature collapsed, and the crimson breath Aiden exhaled grew even denser.
***
“As expected.”
Jun, who had been watching Aiden’s battle, nodded in satisfaction.
The Destroyer’s Leather.
It had once been an artifact-type armor that Jun had given to a warrior character he had raised.
Each time an enemy was defeated, it accumulated one stack, and the more stacks it gained, the more explosively the user’s physical abilities increased. The maximum number of stacks was five.
Of course, it wasn’t without its drawbacks.
Techniques that enhanced physical abilities in that way inevitably came with strong side effects.
However, that part had been manageable thanks to Eleanor and Jun’s potions.
It was a classic artifact suited for efficiently dealing with mobs.
On the other hand, it looks like Maya is struggling a bit.
Due to the nature of the Ancestor-Worshipping Tribe, their ability to handle magic was inherently weak, so that part couldn’t be helped.
Instead, Maya harassed the orc warriors thoroughly with Acanthus Fangs.
She aimed for their joints or severed tendons to keep them from rampaging freely.
On top of that, if she let her mind go even slightly, she would blend into her surroundings and use [Spirit Dash], making her the kind of enemy Jun would never want to face if he were an orc.
Besides, Maya was designed as a boss-fight character from the start.
Taking that into account, it was clear that Maya was doing her best.
Grrraaaagh—!
Around that time, orcs began to pour out one by one from within the building that had collapsed due to [Earth Burst].
Unfortunately, not many orcs had died in the building’s collapse.
“Du ba herba. Da tukhan!”
The orc shaman Barbata had also survived.
“Lands Development Unit, charge.”
At Leon’s command, the unit members let out curses as they charged forward.
Following that, Eleanor’s blessing and Jun’s enchantments took effect, and the real battle began.
Leave a Reply