Chapter 177 - Alienation (1)
“You’re not doing what you were told to do.”
Henry tossed Kamsadia’s severed head to Hector, who was right in front of the swamp.
The head was pale and bloodless.
Feeling a bit awkward, Hector scratched the back of his head as he looked at Kamsadia’s head, and said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t expect him to suddenly disappear like that.”
“At least I caught him, but what would you have done if my plan had fallen apart just because of this one guy?”
“I-I’m sorry.”
Hector was still under the impression that Klever had died because of him, and ever since then, he had been too disheartened to talk back to Henry.
“What about the others?”
“I’ve dealt with all of them, except for this guy.”
“The Etherwether army as well?”
“No, they’re still…”
“With your skills, you had more than enough time to deal with everyone. Just what were you doing in the meantime?”
“T-that’s… Because it’s been so long since I’ve fought, I wanted to enjoy it a bit… H-ha, ha…”
Hector felt even more discouraged.
At first glance, it seemed like they were having a normal human conversation. However, they were surrounded by one thousand five hundred dead soldiers of the Shonan army, all killed by Hector.
Henry pressed Hector again.
“We don’t have time. Deal with them right away.”
Hector turned his back, unsheathed his sword, and approached the stinky swamp.
The swamp still had a terrible stench and it was bubbling. Beyond that, there was a huge mountain of stones, towering as high as the walls of the gorge.
This was Hector’s doing.
Right after being summoned by Kamsadia, Hector had broken down parts of the gorge around the swamp and blocked the rear end of the gorge to easily deal with the Shonan army. Afterward, he had driven the Shonan army into the swamp and killed every single one of them.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
Hector still used the two-handed sword that Henry had given him a while ago. He swung it like a longsword and began warming up.
Henry asked, “What are you doing?”
“I’m warming up.”
“You don’t even have muscles, so why are you warming up?”
“Oh, you’re right.”
Hector still retained some of his human habits. After all, some of them had been with him for decades, so this wasn't something that could easily be fixed overnight. That was why he still did things like warming up from time to time.
“I’ll be back.”
“Okay.”
Hector enveloped himself in Aura, and quickly jumped over the swamp and over the mountain of stone.
“An enemy?”
“Who the hell is he?”
“H-huh?”
“Ahhhhh!”
Bone-chilling screams echoed over the mountain of stones, but they quickly died out.
After a while, Hector returned over the stone mountain without a single drop of blood on his body.
* * *
Honkkkk!
As the sun went down, the horns rang from each camp in Thern, signaling the troops to stop the battle because the sun had set.
Eisen smiled in satisfaction at the better-than-expected outcome of this battle.
“Haha! Well done, Ryan! We won today thanks to you!”
“I’m flattered, Marquis.”
Ryan, the promising mercenary, had defeated the genius knight.
As a result, the Shonan army had taken the lead by winning their first battle. At the end of the first battle, the Shonan army had ended up with only seven hundred casualties, while the Etherwether army had suffered nearly twice as many casualties, reaching one thousand three hundred deaths.
Eisen walked toward the camp with light steps. He thought that when he arrived back at the camp, Henry, his reliable adviser, and Kamsadia, his outstanding thousand-man commander, would be waiting for him with news of victory.
However, that was not the case at all.
“What?”
“All the soldiers, including Kamsadia, were wiped out in the gorge.”
It was none other than Henry himself who reported the dire situation in a despondent tone.
Henry showed Eisen Kamsadia’s severed head.
“How could this have happened…”
With one thousand five hundred soldiers, Kamsadia had been given half the number of troops that had been deployed to the plain. Thus, how could there not be a single survivor among them?
“I knew things would get bad, which is why I intentionally assigned that many soldiers… But don’t worry too much, because I still won the battle in the highland,” said Henry.
Henry delivered the bad news first, and then the good news after. This way, Esien wouldn’t be affected too badly by the disaster in the gorge. It was a common strategy used by quick-witted people.
In addition, Henry made it sound like he had known that the battle in the gorge was going to be difficult by using the word intentionally. Henry did this just in case Eisen wanted to ask about the particular details of what had happened.
“...Yeah, you’re right. Even though I lost Kamsadia and a lot of soldiers, I’m glad that at least you won.”
Eisen was surprisingly broad-minded.
‘As expected, he’s just letting it go.’
It was certainly tragic that one thousand five hundred soldiers and one thousand-man commander had perished during battle. However, their deaths had not been caused by assassinations or raids. Rather, they had died an honorable death during the Fief War.
Henry changed the subject so that Eisen wouldn’t get more curious about the losses faced in the gorge.
“That’s not all. There wasn’t a single death or injury during the battle in the highland.”
“What? Not a single one?”
“That’s right.”
“How’s that possible? You only had three hundred soldiers.”
“A monster appeared.”
“A monster?”
“Yes. Technically speaking, there was a high-level spirit egg near the highland, but the other army messed with it and consequently infuriated the spirit.”
Henry quickly gave Eisen the explanation he had carefully prepared in advance.
Nadasman also supported Henry’s answer, given that he had witnessed the situation as well.
“...As expected, you had a plan all along!”
Eisen smiled with satisfaction and stood proudly as he looked at the other thousand-man commanders. He looked at them that way because, during their strategy meeting, all of them had disagreed with Henry when he said that he would fight the battle in the highland with only three hundred soldiers.
“You all heard right? This is the kind of person my adviser is.”
“Ahem…!”
No matter the process, the results had turned out to be great, so no one had anything to say.
In addition, Eisen believed that the gorge would have been penetrated right away if Henry hadn’t deployed that many soldiers there in the first place.
Their meeting soon finished.
Tomorrow’s battle would start again when the sun rose to its highest point, so there was no need to hold the next strategy meeting right now.
After the briefing meeting, all the commanders went back to their camp.
They had gained the upper hand in the first battle, and thanks to that, the morale of the soldiers had risen. Thus, Eisen rewarded the soldiers with a grand dinner in order to maintain their fighting spirit.
The excitement-filled atmosphere persisted, but as night fell, the soldiers fell asleep one after the other after a long, exhausting day. This applied to those who were on night watch as well.
Groups two and three were the most exhausted of them all. Both night watch groups had only been sleeping for around two to four hours at a time because they had to constantly wake up and rotate to keep an eye out for their enemies.
‘I should start moving now.’
Everyone had passed out from fatigue, and this was the moment Henry had been eagerly waiting for in order to proceed with the thing.
Before carrying out his plan, Henry summoned Elagon inside his camp.
Elagon had turned back into an egg.
Waled’s explosion had injured Elagon so badly that it even stopped his rage. Henry had been worried, but it seemed like this hadn’t affected Elagon’s evolution process, which was a relief.
‘But just in case, I’ll give him some mana.’
According to Syred, the additional supply of mana didn’t significantly affect the spirit’s evolution process. However, this didn’t mean that the spirit didn’t benefit at all from the mana. It was just that it didn’t have a big impact.
‘Also, I made good use of him, so it’s natural that I give him this kind of reward.’
This was a reward for Elagon’s hard work.
Henry placed his hand on Elagon, and the egg cracked with a bright flash of light.
Elagon was warning Henry.
‘I’m sorry.’
Oong!
Henry felt bad that he was bothering Elagon when he was already injured. Nevertheless, he injected the mana into his egg.
‘It’s done.’
Henry had injected a moderate amount of mana.
He dismissed Elagon and then summoned Klever, who was still recovering.
“Klever.”
- Yes, Master.
“How are you feeling?”
- Thanks to your care, I’ve almost fully recovered.
“Really? So that means I can summon you whenever I need you.”
- Of course. Your wish is my command.
Klever had recovered just in time, and Hector was also waiting outside their camp. It was the perfect time to proceed with his plan.
“Armor on.”
Znggg!
Now that he had thoroughly checked everything, all that was left to do was to actually get going.
Henry wore the Colt Armor to increase the efficiency of his magic.
“Hide.”
Shhhh.
This magic enveloped him like armor, and the word hide contained many spells. Henry soon transformed into darkness itself, gaining the ability to walk around right in front of others without being seen.
“Fly.”
After concealing his presence, Henry flew into the air until he was high enough to survey the entire Shonan army camp from just a glance.
“Fire Arrow, Invisible.”
Whoosh!
Fiery arrows materialized in the sky, but instead of just one arrow, Henry had created hundreds of fiery arrows.
However, despite the countless fire arrows, the sky still remained dark as Henry had cast Invisible, another concealment spell, on the arrows.
‘Hmm.’
Henry put all of the fiery arrows in the sky on stand-by, and slowly looked at the camps that looked tiny from his point of view.
‘As expected, the camp where the supplies are stored would be the best option.’
Henry was planning to set on fire the camp that had several days’ worth of food, weapons, and emergency medical supplies in the middle of the night.
The reason for this was simple.
The Fief War agreement clearly stated that neither side could target the enemy's supplies or engage in nighttime raids.
‘What’s the point of having such agreements when their goal is to kill each other…’
Henry thought it was ridiculous that this battle was considered honorable in the first place when both sides were fighting for their lives.
However, this contradicting agreement allowed Henry to come up with a good excuse for his actions.
If both of those rules stated in the agreement were broken at the same time, the honorable battle was bound to turn into a dirty fight, which was exactly what Henry was aiming for.
Henry spun his finger in circular motions like a conductor. All the invisible red arrows then scattered around and moved in a long line similar to a shoal of fish.
Henry continued to spin his finger, and the countless arrows also moved around accordingly.
He was calculating the perfect trajectory to make it seem that an enemy had actually attacked them with arrows during a night raid.
‘Over there looks good.’
After a while, Henry managed to find the right trajectory in order to cause confusion.
He shot countless arrows in that direction, and just before the arrows reached the ground, Henry brought them back up and fired them into the supply camp.
Snap!
As soon as the fiery arrows shot toward the supply camp, Henry stopped moving his finger, and snapped his other fingers to undo the invisibility spell he had cast on the arrows.
Whoosh!
Hundreds of arrows suddenly appeared out of thin air and poured down like a waterfall on the supply camp of the Shonan army.
“F-fire!” cried out a soldier on night watch.
As the fire broke out in the middle of the night, Henry’s secret annihilation plan had been set in motion.
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