Noble V: Greylancer

by Hideyuki Kikuchi

  “They will be disciplined upon their return,” Mircalla answered as if she’d predicted it all along. Then she informed her top brass.

  It would have been only natural for the fifty unit commanders to storm into headquarters in a fit of rage.

  However, when only two officers had come to register complaints, Greylancer let slip a bitter smile. “So our morality has slackened to this.”

  Mircalla smiled. “I pray it is only our morality.”

  “What else—”

  “Our souls.” Mircalla laid a hand on her generous bosom. “Would you mind if I sighed?”

  “It doesn’t suit you.”

  Mircalla waved her hand in the air instead.

  An aerial schematic of Mayerling’s castle appeared.

  “Such an elegant castle,” said Mircalla, making no secret of her admiration.

  “Indeed. Noble castles have typically been rustic. However, everything about House Mayerling is unconventional.”

  “And what do you make of that?”

  “Make, Commander?”

  “It is an act of defiance against the Nobility. Vlijmen Mayerling’s father, Ryan Mayerling—he, too, was a nonconformist. A human sympathizer. He began this travesty of abolishing every tribute but one, demanding only a blood tithe, which he did not drink directly from humans himself.”

  “I am aware.”

  “Then are you aware of the Privy Council’s plot, Lord Greylancer?”

  “I have heard whispers, yes.”

  “If they are allowed to liberate even the Frontier, this world will essentially fall into the hands of the Privy Council. You and I both know, the Sacred Ancestor entrusted us with overseeing the Frontier fearing this very outcome. We must carry out his will if this planet falls to ruin. Why would Chancellor Cornelius covet control over the Frontier, rather than the world, at the expense of the Sacred Ancestor’s will? And so suddenly?”

  “Why indeed,” answered Greylancer, even as he wondered just what Mircalla and Zeus were plotting. He felt a smile escape his lips. The Noble was not averse to intrigue. In fact, if overseeing the Frontier had taught him anything, it was that chicanery was part of the Nobles’ natural disposition. “Commander Mircalla,” said Greylancer. “What is Zeus—”

  “Commander,” interrupted a mechanized voice.

  “What is it?” asked Mircalla blankly.

  “We detected ten explosions two thousand meters below ground.” The voice reported the coordinates and continued, “It is thought to be the location of Lord Krolock’s Landross.” Mircalla closed her eyes, while Greylancer let out a sigh. “A massive unidentified body is ascending from the explosion. It’s burrowing this way. At its current course, it will surface in the middle of Lord Greylancer’s encampment at 19:19.”

  Greylancer cocked his head down at the gold badge on the collar of his cape. “This is Greylancer. Inform the men to fall back ten kilometers east within four minutes. Transfer weapons and provisions by 19:18. But if it cannot be done, abandon all equipment.”

  Mircalla directed her wan countenance toward her second in command. Try as she might, the duchess could not hide her shock. “A Noble the likes of Greylancer giving an order to abandon weapons and flee? Do my eyes deceive me?”

  “I am not entirely certain myself,” he answered morosely. “Commander, you should get yourself to safety immediately. Whatever this thing is will surface in the midst of our troops, but it may still be capable of laying waste to the entire army.”

  “Yes, I am aware.” Mircalla rose to her feet with a grace that would elicit any watcher’s sighs.

  Within three minutes, the army had retreated to its designated position.

  The earth ruptured, and the gargantuan ground dweller revealed itself before the eyes of the terrestrial world.

  Whether its morphology was suited to surviving underground was questionable.

  When the creature emerged fully from the ground, it stood two hundred meters tall and three hundred meters long, with plates made of bedrock covering its beetle-shaped body. An avalanche of dirt and gravel spilled down from between its densely packed plates, snapping the trees below like toothpicks. The two protuberances on the sides of its head appeared to be eyes that had atrophied from disuse. The prolegs lining the ventral part of the abdomen gripped the ground.

  General Yunus, Greylancer’s second in command, had pulled back the barrier along with his men, so that it cornered the creature against Mayerling’s barrier behind it.

  The creature charged forward, as was its instinct, crashed against the barrier shielding the Greylancer forces, and was repelled back. Rather than maneuver laterally, which was clear of obstacles, it continued to face off against the invisible wall.

  A white mist began to emanate from the creature’s flanks.

  “What is that?” asked Mircalla from the newly transferred headquarters.

  “Those rocky plates on its exoskeleton are no ordinary scales,” Greylancer answered. “They’re likely vibrating plates for moving through the earth. If I’m right, this is about to get interesting.” The Noble let slip a grin.

  “I fail to see the humor in this.”

  Before Mircalla had scarcely finished, a mechanized voice reported, “Commander, our barrier is weakening!”

  Stunned, Mircalla let out, “No! Can the creature be…?”

  “It’s emitting an oscillatory wave used to crush gravel and rock as it burrows through the earth. It might be more powerful than the gravitational barrier can bear,” explained Greylancer, amused. This unfamiliar creature was a precious plaything that made the warrrior’s heart dance with excitement. “When the barrier is destroyed, deploy air chariots. Attack the creature from behind.”

  “From behind?” Mircalla asked.

  “Yes.” The Noble’s eyes gleamed. “The barrier is weakening.” He eyed the holographic screen projected in the air, where the creature charged the invisible barrier again, broke through, and scuttled toward the Greylancer forces deployed before it.

  Air chariots shot into the air as if to escape but quickly circled back and dropped several black objects at the moving target’s abdomen.

  A dimensional corrosion bomb hit one of the rock plates and opened a hole about ten meters in diameter, which grew gradually larger.

  The bomb was designed to rend a hole in the dimension and drag its target into another dimension. No monster had the means to escape it.

  “It’s glowing again,” said Mircalla, to which Greylancer nodded.

  The creature was wrapped in a dazzling white light. After a moment when the glow dissipated, the gaping hole in the creature’s abdomen had stopped expanding.

  The oscillation wave had halted the dimensional corrosion.

  “This thing is too dangerous,” said Mircalla, shaking her head.

  “Wait.”

  As if prompted by Greylancer’s voice, the massive creature, weighing perhaps tens, if not hundreds of thousands of tons, spun 180 degrees in the other direction.

  Mayerling’s barrier now loomed before it. The creature began to glow again.

  “Look, not even Mayerling’s barrier will slow it down.”

  With the creature’s every advance, the ground sank around it, destroying buildings nearby.

  This had been Greylancer’s strategy all along—to attack the creature from behind to trick it into believing that the attack was Mayerling’s doing and to coerce it into destroying the barrier.

  “Now, Commander!”

  Mircalla gave only a curt nod. “Mobilize the entire army toward the breach point!”

  The army generals had already been briefed in the event of a full-scale offensive.

  Beneath the moonlight, the counterinsurgency forces commenced their advance.

  Mircalla blinked her eyes in astonishment.

  A single chariot shot into the sky over Mayerling’s dominion as if in want of the first strike. Just who was—?

  Mircalla glanced to her right.

  Her s
econd in command had vanished.

  †

  Bathed in moonlight, Greylancer raced the air chariot toward Castle Mayerling.

  The wind lashed his face like a sea of whips. The Noble had no use for a barrier. Clashing against the elements headfirst was how Greylancer took the fight to the enemy.

  He made visual confirmation of Castle Mayerling. No antiaircraft fire or intercepting vessels. Even as he suspected a trap, Greylancer thought, The Devil may care, but I alone shall be the one to perish.

  “Full ahead!”

  No sooner had he shouted these words than Mircalla’s face floated up before him on the chariot’s monitor. “The operation has been called off, Lord Greylancer.”

  “What?” he blurted out.

  “Mayerling’s generals have officially abdicated. The battle is over. Redirect your efforts to destroying the subterranean creature.

  “Mayerling’s dominion is now under the control of the central government. We must eliminate any threat ravaging the territory. When that is done, you will accompany me to the surrender agreement.”

  “Understood.”

  The castle keep drew closer up ahead.

  Saying nothing, Greylancer turned the chariot around and set course for the subterranean monster. The look pasted on his face had far surpassed anger; he wore an expression only of blank indignation.

  2

  Once a surrender agreement had been reached, the top commanders besieged Greylancer with questions.

  The brunt of their censure was directed at the fact that Greylancer had killed Mayerling and concealed his death and for his daring to go against the war council’s decision and act alone.

  For the former violation, Mircalla explained that Greylancer had been acting on her orders. As for the latter, it was decided that Greylancer would be disciplined pending the Privy Council’s deliberation.

  After enduring the litany of charges against him in silence, Greylancer rose from the table, shot a vicious look that nearly drained blood from the faces of the self-satisfied generals, and exited the chamber. Outside, he caught up with General Berneige, a commander in Mayerling’s army, as he was preparing to return to the castle.

  “Where is Mayerling’s tomb?” Greylancer asked.

  “Oh, do you wish to lay some flowers?”

  Greylancer bared his fangs. “A true warrior would take no pleasure in such a gesture from the enemy.” Then he lowered his voice and said, “There is a matter I wish to look into.”

  “He lies in the basement altar of House Mayerling inside the castle.”

  “Very well. I shall be there in an hour’s time. I pray the door will be open.” Greylancer’s eyes glinted with a look of resolve.

  †

  Never had the burden of war been so light on the attacking army, and never had there been a more dissatisfying end to fighting.

  As fortunate an outcome a bloodless surrender was, a battle was an opportunity for warriors to win both distinction and reward. Had the castle fallen, they were also free to plunder its spoils. Since time immemorial, it was an unwritten law of war.

  Yet this engagement had provided no such opportunity. The enemy commander had been defeated before battle, and his surviving generals could do little more than fight back tears and their own bloodlust to honor their master’s orders of an unconditional surrender of the castle.

  Naturally, the generals of the counterinsurgency forces had directed their ire at Greylancer.

  Plenty of past commanders who’d found themselves in the same circumstance had been assassinated. That Greylancer had not suffered the same fate was a testament to his might.

  An hour later, Greylancer had set foot inside the catacombs. Aside from the chief steward ushering them inside, the Noble brought with him only one companion—not a soldier but a protégé he’d taken under his wing.

  Moonlight shone down upon the spacious floor, the stone cobbled walls and extravagant coffins each taking up space in numerous depressions in the walls.

  The moon, stars, and sky above were all holographic projections.

  Greylancer asked the steward leading the way, “Would you say your master was a vain man?”

  “Gracious, no!” The blond-haired steward shook his head. “Lord Mayerling never expressed interest in worldly acquisitions. If by chance you are referring to the coffin, his lordship was merely honoring the wishes of his father.”

  “So it was his old man who was vain.” Greylancer tapped one of the coffins with his silver lance.

  Because they were blessed with agelessness, few Nobles ever died.

  Though ancestral coffins lined the catacombs after the burial methods of human noble houses, the coffins were nothing more than decoration holding not a single corpse. That Greylancer felt compelled to ask after Mayerling’s vanity spoke to just how many Nobles were given to such an unnecessary practice.

  “This way,” said the steward at last, a bit crossly, after escorting Greylancer and his companion in silence. Stopping, he gestured toward the door ahead. “The tomb of the last head of House Mayerling.”

  When Greylancer opened the door, a cavernous chamber more spacious than the last spread before him. This is no illusion, thought the Noble.

  In the center of the marble floor roughly two hundred meters ahead lay a coffin atop a bronze altar encircled by four candle stands. Orange-colored flames danced in the reflection of the surface of the coffin.

  There was a scar where Greylancer’s lance had pierced the lid.

  “I can go no further,” said the steward. “When your business is done, please see yourselves out.”

  Leaving the escort at the door, Greylancer and his retainer passed through the doors of the chamber.

  The Noble took about fifty strides toward the altar and stopped.

  Blue shadows descended from the ceiling, intercepting Greylancer’s advance.

  Four men and two women dressed like farmers. Given how they had swooped down from a ceiling beam a hundred meters high, they were not human.

  “Half-humans.” Greylancer’s eyes burned crimson. “Who alerted you to my coming?”

  Their answer was an all-out attack.

  The four men attacked with swords, while the two women took aim with stake guns. The half-humans had chosen not to open with a projectile attack, knowing Greylancer’s lance was fast enough to strike down their bullets. They held back, waiting for an opening, as the four men charged headlong into what would certainly be their deaths.

  One half-human woman aimed for Greylancer’s companion standing next to his master.

  But the gunpowder in the flash pan of the companion’s flintlock rifle ignited first.

  A report from the woman’s gun followed, sending a stake whizzing toward the target at five hundred meters per second. If neither could evade the other’s bullet, they would both surely be hit.

  Neither shooter had time to react.

  The gunner’s bullet hit the stake in midair and shattered it.

  In the next instant, the gunner drew the flintlock gun from his waist and drilled a bullet between the woman’s eyes.

  The woman’s head was thrown backward as she fell on her back, smoke smoldering from the bullet hole dead center.

  The second woman aimed at the gunner next. The sharpshooter dove to the ground and rolled several times even as he took aim with a four-barreled pepperbox. A more developed weapon than the flintlock, this gun had a percussion cap.

  The hammer ignited a charge. When the gun fired, however, the woman had already taken cover. The bullet missed her by meters.

  Meanwhile, Greylancer, casually parrying the four swords arrayed against him, beheaded two of the men with a single swing of his lance.

  The third man had leapt over the sideways swing of the lance and threatened to strike down Greylancer from above, while the fourth had ducked and now skittered on his knees toward the Noble.

  Neither had expected the lance to reverse course.

  Rather than continuing its
sideways trajectory, the lance sprang back in the opposite direction and skewered the half-human bearing down overhead and plunged into the fourth man’s back, pinning him against the floor.

  Greylancer fixed an amused look on the man thrashing and screeching like an insect on the ground, and called out, “Gallagher.”

  “I have disposed of the rest.” The gunner finished reloading his gun and rifle and rose from his knee. This man, giving Greylancer a curt nod, was none other than the gunner whom Greylancer had captured after foiling his attempt to assassinate Mayerling only several days ago. “But these are not half-humans…”

  The half-human attackers, save the barrel-chested man skewered by Greylancer’s lance, had melted into puddles of glowing pale blue ooze. After giving up their human hosts, the OSB had returned to their original forms.

  “I detected no one, much less the likes of you, following us. You must have been waiting for us here.” Greylancer twisted the lance. The OSB still keeping the form of the barrel-chested man writhed in agony. “Answer. Who told you of our coming? Why do you wish us dead?”

  The man did not answer. The Noble gave his lance another twist.

  “Beats…me…” the man finally sputtered. “The boss…told us…to ambush you…here…is all…” he answered in the rustic manner of a farmer. The OSB always borrowed the memories, and thus the language, of the beings it possessed.

  “Who is this boss you speak of?”

  Silence.

  Greylancer twisted the lance.

  And then a scream.

  “Rafa … I … don’t … zunzun … know … shiga … ri …” So unbearable was his pain that the OSB had forgotten its adopted memories, its words no longer of this world.

  Its screams, too, ceased to sound human.

  Do you continue to twist and plunge the lance into the victim’s stomach to divine the truth, dear Greylancer? The Noble smoldered with a look of rapture, relishing the sight of the man struggling to swallow its last breaths.

  “That’s quite enough.”

  Greylancer whirled in the direction of the voice. He had not sensed the arrival of a new presence. Gallagher remained down on one knee and jerked his rifle up to his shoulder, shaken.

  “What brings you here, Chancellor Cornelius?” Greylancer asked coolly. The figure in white robes and dark gown standing before him was indeed the bearer of that name. Since the councilors had not taken part in the counterinsurgency, the chancellor’s presence confirmed Greylancer’s suspicions. “So you are behind this intrigue.”