371. King’s Gate Battle (2)
– Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
The war drums echoed as the enemy’s advance began. Eric looked at the soldiers, their faces pale as they saw the approaching enemy forces. This was bad. The morale of the soldiers had hit rock bottom as they realized that those who had just been slaughtered were the people of Dane.
The cruelty of the enemy commander, who had launched people from catapults for fun, was evoking unprecedented fear before anger. These were the kind of beings who would throw living people for amusement. If they lost this battle, it was clear what would happen to them and the civilians behind them.
In other words, they were fighting a war they had never experienced or heard of before. Since the Celestial War, when humans gained dominance over the Material World, such wars had ceased to exist.
Wars between humans were more akin to conflicts between nobles and soldiers. Civilians caught in the crossfire of war meant starvation on the devastated land or becoming war refugees, not being massacred by soldiers afterward.
But during the Celestial War, in conflicts between races, there were no prisoners or slaves. It was an era where differences in species bred hatred, and in occupied territories, no distinction was made between soldiers and civilians of other races.
This meant that the soldiers now saw their opponents not as humans but as some unknown, alien race. A fear greater than the desire for survival was pressing down on them—the fear of the unknown.
“Snap out of it!”
Eric roared, straightening his sword hilt. Hot breath flowed like a whirlwind from beneath his helmet. He shouted at the terrified soldiers:
“Snap out of it!! They’re coming! Archers! Fire your bows! Don’t stop!”
“Y-Your Highness!”
“Damn it, are you all planning to commit suicide or what?”
Who wouldn’t be afraid? In the first wave of the enemy’s assault, sent as a reconnaissance, the enemy’s numbers already surpassed theirs. The difference in numbers between the enemy and their forces was, by simple arithmetic, dozens of times greater.
This meant that this ragtag militia would have to achieve a kill ratio of dozens to one against the enemy’s elite legion to win.
It was a situation where even discussing possibility and impossibility was difficult. The commander’s gaze was colder than the soldiers’, so the despair felt by Eric and the command staff was of a different intensity.
[There have been battles more difficult than this.]
Abel spoke above their heads. Still burning with anger, yet struggling to maintain composure. The rage of this ancient being alone was enough to infect those around her with emotion.
The soldiers, trembling under Abel’s fury, looked up at her.
[But I am still standing by your side. Your fathers, and their fathers, ancestors, and distant ancestors all lived through such battles. And now you are here.]
Abel looked at the approaching enemy and the commanders laughing beyond them. Her mighty body yearned to take flight and charge at the enemy.
But that was impossible. If she left this place, how long would the children on this city wall last? Thirty minutes? An hour? How long could they hold out in her absence?
Her breath was not infinite. The flames within a dragon’s breath required considerable time to reignite. Even the breath of an ancient dragon, no matter how mighty, could only incinerate a few hundred at once.
Those few hundred would have to be repeated hundreds of times to finally defeat the enemy. In the ancient days when dragons lived and breathed, they were often expended in the wars of races. The influence of individual strength in war always had its limits.
As King Guimerin once said, it takes three thousand elite elves to take down one dragon. A one-to-three thousand exchange ratio might seem overwhelmingly favorable, but it also meant that dragons were not immortal or invincible.
And as an ancient dragon who had flown over countless battlefields, Abel knew how to control her rage. In this battlefield, she had to be the hope of this place.
[Your existence proves the survival of your ancestors. Just as your ancestors crossed through such perilous wars and eras to finally reach you, you will not perish here. The survival of humanity means that humans have always emerged victorious in all those wars.]
In this situation where a few dozen knights, less than ten mages, and a few hundred militiamen had to hold off an army of over thirty thousand, if even hope was lost, they would not even be given a chance to fight.
Finally, the enemy’s arrows began to rain down. The dragon raised her massive wings to shield the soldiers’ heads and glared at the enemy.
[So fight. As your ancestors did. As your descendants will. The trials left in your history will prove your survival. So that your distant descendants can proudly say that you survived and endured until now!]
History, after all, is the sum of survival. Abel’s words resonated deep within the soldiers’ hearts. It was true. Their ancestors had always endured times more perilous than now, and the result was themselves, standing here today.
The fear in the soldiers’ hearts began to dissipate. It wasn’t just because of the dragon’s presence, shielding them from the arrows raining down above.
What replaced the fear was, of course, rage. Endless rage against those lawless, cruel, and vicious enemies. Rage against those who invaded their territory, threw prisoners for amusement, and vowed to slaughter all survivors.
The rage of the living, the rage of humanity, surged. The soldiers gripped their arrows, drew their bows, and poured boiling water and oil down the walls, shouting with fury.
The Battle of King’s Gate, the final battle of the Dane-Phaeirn War, had begun.
* * *
“Look there, what did I tell you!”
Zigismund chuckled as he watched the dragon dare not take flight. Without a complete victory in the magic battle, there was no way to stop the dragon’s flight and flames. Without even Griffinknights, how could they stop a dragon soaring through the skies?
But the dragon could not easily leave the city walls. It was a rational and wise decision, but to Zigismund, it was nothing but meaningless struggle. It only delayed the time of conquest until his mages won the magic battle.
The moment the dragon left, the walls would fall. Without the dragon’s protection, a mere militia could not hold the walls against such numerical inferiority.
But conversely, as long as Abel remained, the walls could not be breached.
It meant nothing. In other words, Zigismund’s siege warfare was nothing more than a meaningless waste of troops for at least half a day.
“However, Your Majesty. As long as the dragon is there, we cannot bring down the city walls.”
“Yes, that’s right. Even if the mages exert their power, they can only make the dragon retreat, not capture it.”
“Wouldn’t it be better to stop the battle for half a day to reduce the loss of soldiers?”
“Haha, my lord. If the soldiers stop advancing, wouldn’t the dragon have no reason to stay on the city walls? Does that mean you will personally block the dragon when it flies over our heads in anger?”
At Zigismund’s words, the generals fell silent. Only then did they understand Zigismund’s strategy. He was pouring troops into the dragon’s mouth to tie its feet.
Soldiers in the front lines were dying from the dragon’s wrath. Soldiers fell to boiling oil and arrows, and others were struck down by knights and militiamen on the city walls.
Thousands of troops were being slaughtered. Just to breach a city wall defended by a few hundred. All that death was merely a means to buy time. The generals swallowed their fear as they looked at Zigismund.
Their king had no human heart. His reptilian-like red eyes glowed with madness and delight. The king hummed a tune, swallowing wine as he enjoyed the screams of his soldiers.
* * *
“It’s almost done.”
Fernandez smiled bitterly as he watched the dying soldiers at the foot of the mountain. King’s Gate stood like a breakwater against a tidal wave, precariously but firmly holding back the enemy’s relentless assault.
Phaeirn’s forces were launching seemingly meaningless, attritional attacks at intervals. Instead of advancing the entire army, they were sending only about a thousand troops at a time.
This was, of course, to avoid the dragon’s breath causing massive casualties. And this was all happening within the predicted range from start to finish.
By controlling the enemy’s advance speed, ambushing the fastest units, eliminating key personnel, and making the enemy waste time chasing the illusion of “bandits,” they were buying time.
At the same time, they guided Dane’s refugees to flee to Altberth, avoiding the “bandits,” and eliminated threats along the way one by one.
Considering King Vicente’s return and its speed, they carefully orchestrated the timing of the Altberth siege and the king’s return. Like a spider weaving its web, they made the enemy expose deeper, more fatal gaps—
So they could act more boldly, ensuring their perfect victory.
“But Your Excellency, even if we hold out for half a day, wouldn’t we just be exposed to the mages’ assault?”
“Hah, half a day? Who said that?”
“Your Excellency said the magic battle would last half a day…”
“Yes, Phaeirn’s combat mage unit must have estimated this power difference to last half a day.”
Fernandez spoke as he observed the battle unfolding beyond the mountain ridge. Kirhas tilted her head at his words.
“Kirhas. Do you think only knights were sent on Vicente’s expedition? Of course, most of the Round Table’s magi went with them. On the other hand, Phaeirn brought its full magical forces. How could the magi left in Altberth’s defense hold out for half a day?”
If it were a clash of equal forces, they could fight for half a day, even three days and nights. Phaeirn and Dane were fundamentally strong nations with little power difference. But with Dane’s minimal forces and Phaeirn’s full strength, the battle couldn’t be evenly matched.
Three hours? No, even one hour would be hard to hold. Magical power doesn’t scale linearly. With double the troops, the gap increases exponentially. That’s how magical battles work.
Yet holding out for half a day was a long time, only possible when two nearly equal forces clashed. Half a day was enough time for two non-magical armies to determine victory or defeat.
But Fernandez was meticulously coordinating every moment of this battlefield. From start to finish. From Vicente’s return to Phaeirn’s main force gathering and the Altberth siege.
Half a day wasn’t the time needed for Dane’s magical forces to lose.
“After half a day, when the magic battle begins, Abel will retreat, and the refugees will flee into Altberth’s outer walls to prepare for the final battle. Phaeirn’s main force will set up camp on the plains below Altberth and begin the siege with proper siege weapons.”
“…And then…?”
“And by then, Vicente will arrive on the battlefield. Half a day was just the time needed for Vicente to arrive. Against the backdrop of Altberth, he will appear in the most desperate battlefield, become a hero, and perish. All the people will see it, and now I will break through their defenses.”
Fernandez quickly gestured to the beastman as he continued. Magic flowed through his arm, joining the magical battle in the sky between the two groups. Whenever Dane’s magi were pushed back, he subtly disrupted Phaeirn’s magic.
It had been months since he started developing his magic circuits after obtaining a new body. Though his magic and circuits were too weak for grand spells, he could still manage counter-spells with this little power.
While he couldn’t crush enemies with magical projectiles, focusing on counter-spells to create mutual destruction was entirely possible. Making Phaeirn’s main force believe “we can win in half a day” was easy.
With Vicente’s dramatic exit, smoothly transitioning the throne to Eric, and miraculously saving the refugees to break through, Eric could now stand as the absolute monarch of the new Dane Kingdom.
A mere teenager could claim more legitimacy and authority than any monarch in the material world. Even if the kingdom later became a province of the empire, the boy would never be accused of selling out his country.
He would become a perfect puppet. Fernandez smiled bitterly as he intertwined his fingers to weave magic. From the start of this war until now, he couldn’t shake the feeling of being tightly entangled with fate.
As humans waged war on the ground, mages fought in the heavens.
In both his past and present lives, he was nothing more than an old dark mage weaving schemes underground, a spider pushing heroes into traps.
Eric, with Abel’s help, cutting down enemies and rallying his subordinates, looked radiant and majestic. In contrast, hiding in the mountain shadows, deceiving two legions—what did that make him?
Watching the birth of a hero who would go down in history, Fernandez smiled self-deprecatingly for the first time in a long time. The smile he often wore in his days as an old dark mage.
As the fifth wave of attacks ended and the next battle began, Fernandez straightened his back and withdrew his magic.
“Vicente has arrived on the battlefield. Let’s retreat.”
“Yes, Your Excellency.”
Watching fireballs fall on King’s Gate, Fernandez mounted his horse. It was the moment the first offensive spell since the war began struck Dane’s camp.
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