The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom Part I

by Kugane Maruyama

  Remedios went back inside without saying anything, her face emotionless.

  Instead, Gustav came jogging toward Neia and the king.

  “Your Majesty, you have our gratitude. Some damage was done, but we’re confident it was kept to the minimum thanks to Your Majesty’s powers. Normally our commander would thank you herself, but she’s upset by the people’s tragic circumstances. I hope you’ll allow me to say it in her place.”

  Gustav glanced at the boy and then lowered his eyes.

  “It doesn’t bother me. Be a comfort to your commander.”

  “I will, thank you.”

  “By the way, what sort of tragic circumstances?”

  “We heard from some that we rescued that the prisoners were getting their skin torn off. It wasn’t subhumans skinning them but demons that Jaldabaoth had sent over.”

  Neia thought Remedios being upset was just an excuse for her rudeness but apparently not.

  As Neia stood there in shock, the King of Darkness cocked his head. “Why were they being skinned? What was the reason? Were they eating it? Like chicken skin?”

  “I have no idea… It doesn’t seem as though the subhumans were involved… Do you have any ideas, Your Majesty? Could it have been for some kind of demonic ritual?”

  “No, sorry. I don’t have a clue, either. Really just no idea. Why would Jaldabaoth do that?” The King of Darkness answered with genuine puzzlement, and they all exchanged glances, cocking their heads. But anyhow, it was the act of a demon. It was entirely possible the purpose was simply a desire to torment humans.

  “…Let’s ask the priests later. And then, Your Majesty, we’re searching around to make sure no subhumans are hiding so we can finish them off. I think it’ll take a little longer.” With that, Gustav set off back toward the gate.

  Then after some time had passed, people started to appear at the gate.

  The prisoners. Like the hostage boy, they were wearing clothes unthinkably threadbare, considering it was winter. The paladin who must have escorted them was visible for a moment at the gate opening and then disappeared back inside. Either there were so few people that they were shuttling them, or they hadn’t finished taking control of the village. Perhaps both.

  With joy expressed in every movement of their bodies, the liberated prisoners walked toward Neia.

  But once they were within a certain distance, they stopped in their tracks.

  They must have spotted the King of Darkness. After a few moments, they started walking again. Maybe they thought he was wearing a mask.

  One of the men rushed forward.

  Running up to them, out of breath, he kneeled before the boy on the ground. No, perhaps it would be better to say that he fell to his knees.

  Then he caressed the boy’s cheek, and when he confirmed there was no life in him anymore, his sobs were practically screams.

  It had to be the boy’s father.

  Neia bit her lip.

  The father cried, calling his boy’s name, and the King of Darkness addressed him gently. “I’m the one who killed him.”

  Neia stared at the king in shock. You’re really bringing that up now?!

  But the wise King of Darkness wouldn’t suddenly broach the topic without some sort of objective in mind.

  “Wh-why would you do that?!” The father looked up with hatred blazing in his eyes.

  And in response, the King of Darkness smiled wryly. “To save the rest of you, of course.”

  “Wh-what?!”

  For just a moment, the father’s eyes brimmed with fear. He must have realized that the king’s face was no mask or illusion. And when his eyes cast around for help, they landed on Neia.

  But before she could say anything, the King of Darkness asked a question. “So let me ask you: Why didn’t you protect your son? He was hauled out before us as a hostage!”

  “I did, but they took him! They’re stronger than me—there was nothing I could do!”

  The King of Darkness put on that wry smile again. “Then I have another question. Why are you alive?”

  That caught the man off guard.

  “I’m asking you why you didn’t die protecting your boy. Lives don’t all have equal worth. I would have thought you valued your son’s life above all from the attitude you showed just now, so why didn’t you put yours on the line for him?”

  The others were watching the conversation unfold from a distance.

  He must have been anxious and frightened and angry at the one who had killed his son.

  “Wh-what are you saying…?”

  “You failed to protect him. Don’t blame someone else for that. It’s your fault for being weak. And it seems like you might be misunderstanding something… I’m stronger than the bufolk, who you said were stronger than you, you know… Given that you’re mourning your son, I’ll tolerate a little mouthing off, but if you go too far, I’ll kill you.” He extended a bony finger and pointed at the man’s face.

  “B-but you’re powerful—you’re powerful and that’s why you can say that! We’re not all strong like you!”

  “No, you’re right. I can say it because I’m one of the strong ones. And you—you’re weak, so of course things are taken from you. It’s utterly natural for the strong to take from the weak.” He surveyed the other people around them. “You all experienced it in there, didn’t you? At the hands of the powerful bufolk?”

  “So if you’re strong, you can just do whatever you want?!”

  “Yes. If you’re strong, anything goes. That’s the law of this world. And it applies to me, too. If I encountered someone stronger than me, I would lose everything in just the same way. That’s why I seek power.”

  Neia understood why the King of Darkness wanted Jaldabaoth’s maids.

  He wants power to protect his country, to protect the children of his country. So it’s really…all about power…

  “Well, but that’s why you weaklings were sheltering under the supposedly powerful Sacred Kingdom… I do pity you, being under the protection of a nation so weak. If it were my country, the Nation of Darkness, protecting you, this sort of tragedy would never have happened. Why? Because I would have done everything in my power to defend my people and driven the bufolk off.”

  No one said a word.

  The King of Darkness’s perspective was hard-boiled and cruel, but he was explaining this world like it was.

  The only way to refute it would be to appeal to emotions instead of reason. But the greatest emotion they felt toward him—fear—wouldn’t allow it.

  “Th-this guy’s an undead, isn’t he? What is an undead doing here?!” Too frightened of the King of Darkness to say anything, the father turned on Neia.

  But before she could say anything, the king spoke up.

  “That’s obvious. I’m here to save your country. And in reality, you were just saved by this undead. If you don’t like that, then how about trying to rescue your kingdom on your own?”

  At that pronouncement, the man turned to look at Neia, but she couldn’t say anything—because the King of Darkness was speaking the truth again.

  If the humans could have defeated Jaldabaoth alone, the King of Darkness wouldn’t have been there.

  Terrified, the man scooped up his boy’s body and ran away. The people in the direction he fled looked fearful.

  Whether the king was talking to the man’s back or to himself, Neia didn’t know, but she heard him murmur, “If I were weak, I would lose everything, too. That’s why I can never stop seeking power. I have to remember that there must be someone out there as strong as me.”

  3

  After attacking one prison camp and freeing the people there, the liberation army moved on to another camp the next day.

  It wasn’t due to momentum, but rather the pressure of several concerns. One of the biggest problems was, as feared, that there wasn’t actually much food stockpiled at the camp.

  The subhumans weren’t feeding the humans very well, and they had a system of
transporting food over from a small nearby city on a regular basis, which meant very little was stored locally.

  The group of subhumans delivering food from this city were surely functioning as a sort of lookout to check if anything abnormal was happening at the camps. Even if they killed all of them and stole their food, when that group didn’t return to the city, word would get around that something had happened at that camp.

  Naturally, Jaldabaoth would find out right away. And there was a good chance that if that happened, he would come at Neia and the paladins with an army too huge for them to defeat.

  At the end of the post-raid meeting, where she stood behind the King of Darkness and listened without saying a word, waiting through such a long period of disarray that her feet hurt, two plans had been suggested.

  One was to take the achievement of liberating a single camp, evacuate south, and let the army that was supposed to be down there decide what to do next.

  The second was to be more assertive and head to the small city to capture it.

  Both of these conflicting opinions had their issues, but Remedios shouted enough that they went with the latter.

  She had a top secret reason for choosing to storm the city.

  According to a subhuman they had interrogated—and then killed, of course—someone who was perhaps a member of the royal family was possibly being held prisoner there.

  If they really did find some royalty, things could take a turn for the better. Even if the person wasn’t royal, someone with high standing and connections would be plenty good news. They would be able to leverage the debt of their rescue to get the person to put pressure on the Southern Army and request support.

  But there was one question Neia couldn’t get out of her mind.

  “Your Majesty, do you think there’s really a member of the royal family or an influential noble in this city?” she asked as they rode side by side.

  Neia was allowed to ride in order to match the King of Darkness’s pace. Otherwise, her horse would have been taken and put to work carrying luggage.

  “You know, I think it’s a trap. Even if it’s not, there’ll be a proportionally large force guarding the place; there could even be demons. It seems like Commander Custodio and the others understand that. They’re willing to fight the battle anyway. Sometimes you just have to gamble.”

  It was clear that if they didn’t ask for help from the south soon, people would start to die of starvation. Even Neia could see that they wouldn’t be able to maintain the liberation army.

  Eventually the little city came into view up ahead.

  Riding at the tail end of the party, she watched the people walking in front of her.

  They were subjects of the Sacred Kingdom they had rescued from the prison camp. The reason they were armed and marching even though they really needed a rest was that estimates said there were more subhumans in this city than at the previous camp.

  Many of the people were weaker than anticipated, so it was impossible to expect much of them as soldiers, but every little bit helped, so they were mobilized.

  Since it was difficult with Neia’s abilities to keep this many troops safe from the subhuman scouting patrols, they prioritized time and hurried onward.

  But as a result, the army’s exhaustion mounted, and as more time went by, more adults ended up riding uncovered wagons. They were nodding off on that wagon that was bumping around enough to make regular passengers sick, so they must have been unspeakably tired. Meanwhile anyone with the energy to walk was made to do so, including children.

  Priests weren’t accustomed to this much walking and sometimes eyed the wagon enviously.

  Even if we make it there, we’ll have to go straight into combat. Can we really pull it off in this condition?

  In their strategy meeting on the road, it had been decided that they would launch the fight to take the city immediately. There was neither time nor food to lose.

  While it was still bright out, it was too dangerous to attack inside the walls the enemies were manning.

  It was better to approach the enemy at night, but humans were at a disadvantage since they couldn’t see in the dark. Especially for citizen draftees who had only received basic combat training, night fights were very dangerous.

  Considering that and other factors, the plan was to attack while it was still daylight.

  Up ahead, ranks began to form. The forward-most line was composed of the paladins, and behind them came regular subjects carrying a wooden barrier they’d built from broken-up prison camp houses. Last were the priests.

  The operation was the same as the previous raid: Angels would keep the soldiers on the wall busy while the paladins brute forced their way through the gate. The role of the common people was to add numbers and mass, mainly to show the enemy how many they were as a show of force. They were instructed to avoid combat, but that if necessary, they were to fight in teams to outnumber their opponents.

  “Now then, let’s see what they can do…,” the King of Darkness murmured idly.

  He would be observing, not participating.

  Really, they wanted his help taking the city, but no one had been able to bring it up in the meeting. He must have felt their imploring eyes and ignored them. Now he was at the farthest point in the rear.

  The battle began just like the previous one.

  Though the city was small, it was still the biggest one in the area, so the gate had a grate reinforced with iron that could come down, as well as a brattice. Not only that, but the walls were made of stone instead of wood, which meant its gate and walls were sturdier than the previous village had been able to build for its camp. Still, the little city’s population was less than ten thousand, so the walls weren’t tall or thick enough to be considered truly formidable.

  One could say it was a pain for the attackers and a worry for the defenders.

  Remedios led the paladins in a charge, and the angels attacked the subhumans up on the city wall.

  But here and there, angels took hits from the subhumans, turned to particles of light, and vanished.

  They were up against the bufolk like at the previous prison camp, but as they were defending a city instead of a simple village, they posed a greater threat here.

  One with a splendid spear stood out in particular, though he concealed himself behind a parapet. He seemed to be the one slaying many of the angels.

  Then he howled a battle cry.

  It was probably some sort of skill, but it didn’t affect the angels or the paladins trying to bash through the gate. It was unclear whether the area of effect was just small or if it was a power that affected allies only. But it was probably a good idea to remember that he had a skill.

  Below, the two sides were clashing fiercely at the gate.

  Behind the grate—from inside the city—the bufolk were thrusting their spears, but knights blocked those attacks with shields that had spikes on the bottom, defending their allies working the battering ram. Remedios was even slicing the protruding spears apart.

  Boiling water poured down from the brattice, and the steam rose back up. But the paladins had anticipated this sort of attack, so they had preemptively cast Fire Energy Protection. It bothered them about as much as a splash of water.

  Of course, it was winter, so once the temperature of the water dropped, it would present a different issue, but for the time being, they were fine.

  If it had been boiling oil instead of water, they might have had trouble keeping a grip on their swords, but perhaps oil was too valuable to the subhumans; they didn’t use that type of attack.

  The slowly advancing commoners put down the wooden barrier they had brought from the previous camp and used it as a shield. Really, something metal would have been better, but they hadn’t been able to procure those materials, so this was the best they could do. It wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing. Behind their barrier, they began hurling slings. They aimed at the subhumans the angels were fighting. Granted, they weren’t us
ed to combat, so they hit the angels just as often.

  That amounted to friendly fire, but the angels had resistance against physical attacks, so it wasn’t an issue. Of course, the damage was only reduced—they weren’t completely immune—but the rocks the people were slinging didn’t cause that much damage to begin with. Ultimately, the subhumans they were aiming at were hurt more.

  Each time an angel was defeated, the priests summoned a new one and sent it to the front line. Though there weren’t large numbers of them, since fresh, uninjured fighters kept being added, the gradual decline of subhuman resistance was visible even from where Neia was watching.

  “…Huh. I guess assuming the enemy has cast a defensive spell and pouring cold water instead would be more useful. In the winter cold, their body temperatures would plummet in no time… And usually they’d have protection against fire, not chill.” The King of Darkness seemed to be matter-of-factly analyzing the battle in a low voice.

  Neia had no idea how to reply. No one had died yet, but some had sustained serious injuries in this fight; how could she just say, Yeah…?

  “So you don’t want to fight? With the bow I lent you, you could probably do pretty well.”

  Neia’s role was to attend the King of Darkness and be his shield, so she wasn’t ordered to participate in combat.

  But—and she had this feeling last time as well—he seemed to want her to use the bow.

  He wants me to use the weapon he lent me? I could try shooting from here, but I would hate to miss the first shot I take with it…

  As Neia was about to answer after mulling it over, a roar went up from the gate. It appeared the grate had gotten bent out of shape.

  The roar must have been cheers from the paladins and shrieks from the subhumans.

  When the gate broke, the paladins flooded in.

  With Remedios showing off her skills, the stunned bufolk would only become more panicked.

  But then the paladins fell back as a murmur went through the group.

  With her sharp vision, Neia could see what was happening between the gaps in the crowd of knights.