Record of Wortenia War: Volume 3

by Ryota Hori

  “I’m glad I set this as a condition...”

  Upon hearing Genou’s request, Ryoma set this katana as a bargaining point. He’d thought of it upon seeing Sakuya’s katana, but what he’d been given was of a higher quality than he’d imagined.

  “Still, I can’t exactly trust them over this alone...”

  On its own, he was grateful for their giving him the katana and the spear, as the martial arts his grandfather taught him did make use of katanas and spears. He could use the spears and swords of this world, but he was more accustomed and comfortable fighting with a cross-shaped spear and katana.

  But even with that said, Ryoma wasn’t naive enough to put his faith in Genou just because he gave him things he wanted.

  “Genou Igasaki and his granddaughter, Sakuya... Descendants of Tateoka no Doshu, from the looks of it.”

  There was a text known as the Bansenshūkai, composed during the Edo Period of Japan. It was a ninjutsu text composed by the Fujibayashi clan, one of the three greater ninja houses of the Iga, but it included records of the active Iga school ninjas who were active during the late Warring States Period.

  It included the names of renowned masters, like Shimotsuge no Kizaru and Otowa no Kido. And it also extended to Tateoka no Doshu— otherwise known as Igasaki Doshun.

  Genou made no claims to being part of the Iga school, but judging from his distinctive last name of Igasaki, it was likely he was distantly related to Igasaki Doshun.

  The ninjas of the Igasaki were famous for training their young strictly from infancy, and their skill was acknowledged far and wide. Assuming he could form a relationship of trust with them, it would be a windfall for Ryoma.

  It’d probably be best if I don’t do anything unnecessary until I win the war with Duke Gelhart, though... The question is how much this tactic will pay off...

  Now that he’d used up his ace of the flooding attack, he could only rely on this tactic to swing the tides of the coming battle.

  It’s been five days since Kael’s attack, and Duke Gelhart’s being quieter than I expected. Is my tactic being effective, or is he pulling something behind the scenes...? Whichever it is, there’s still two more days until Princess Lupis arrives. The final battle’s right ahead of us...

  A sunset not unlike any other sluggishly sank below the horizon.

  Now then, how will things go?

  Ryoma wasn’t one to believe in God. But right now, he did want to pray for a victory in the upcoming battle against Duke Gelhart...

  “Are the formations ready?!” Duke Gelhart’s angry shout echoed through his office, with no less vigor than any prior day.

  After Kael’s crushing defeat, Duke Gelhart sent a mobilization order to the rest of the nobles’ faction. In addition to the thirty thousand troops already gathered in Heraklion, he called for them to gather the soldiers scattered across their territories and concentrate their armies in the city.

  The time he’d given for them to do so was two days, but fewer nobles than expected had heeded his call. But it wasn’t just the nobles who were the problem.

  “No, it’s taking longer than expected...” one of his aides reported, prepared for the duke’s rage to rain down on him.

  “Idiots! Why are they taking their time?! It’s been three days since I gave the order! I don’t care if you have to extort the nobles, tell them to be in Heraklion by tomorrow!”

  “But... The problem isn’t with the nobles...” the aide desperately clung to his claims.

  He would be held responsible for any half-baked orders he would receive and fail to fulfill, so if he didn’t inform his master that his impossible requests were exactly that, it would be his head on the chopping block.

  “What do you mean?! What is the problem, then?!”

  Duke Gelhart’s words prompted the aide to fearfully explain the situation, which turned out to be a more severe problem than Duke Gelhart had ever imagined.

  Just what is going on here? Why are the commoners refusing to conscript?! They were promised they could take the gear of any enemies they kill!

  Having heard his aide’s explanation, Duke Gelhart sent everyone away from his room, sinking into his chair gravely.

  No... I know exactly what the reason is. It’s all his fault...

  Ryoma Mikoshiba’s name surfaced in Duke Gelhart’s mind.

  The aide’s explanation was as such: after Kael’s loss of six thousand men, Duke Gelhart’s forces stood at just below sixty thousand men. That included the territories directly under Duke Gelhart’s control, as well as the conscripted commoners of the rest of the nobles’ faction.

  The problem began with the fact that Heraklion lacked the production capacity to support sixty thousand men. Or rather, any city imaginable lacked such a capacity.

  Perhaps things were different for a country as large as the Empire of O’ltormea, but Rhoadseria’s territories, at least, didn’t have any such cities. What this meant was that their total force of sixty thousand could only be used for a limited time.

  And now, Duke Gelhart had sent a mobilization order to take down Ryoma’s force of a mere two thousand. That was likely because Princess Lupis was approaching Heraklion using the bridgehead Ryoma secured.

  If he was going to send all his forces to clash against the princess, using it to crush the nuisance currently before his eyes felt like a natural progression for the duke, and so he issued his mobilization order. But it wasn’t being heeded.

  The reason it was being ignored was because of a rumor that spread among the commoners, reaching as far as the villages and territories belonging to the nobles’ faction.

  Even now, that bloody idiot Kael gets in my way!

  Duke Gelhart cursed in his heart. His anger was great enough that if Kael was before his eyes right now, he may well have cut him down with his own two hands.

  Ryoma’s flooding attack claimed six thousand out of Kael’s eight thousand men, and exaggerated news of the event had spread to Heraklion and its surrounding villages.

  “Hey! Have you heard? Sir Kael lost!”

  “Yeah, I hear he lost despite having four times the enemy’s forces, right?”

  “Yeah... Apparently most of his men got slaughtered.”

  “Whoa, scary...”

  “Hey, d’you know who the enemy commander was?”

  “Yes... They say it’s some cold-blooded demon named Ryoma Mikoshiba.”

  “The hell?! A demon? That’s ridiculous!”

  “Idiot! You can’t just talk like that! They say he flooded the Thebes to drown Sir Kael’s soldiers!”

  “For real...? Thaumaturgy can’t accomplish such a thing, right...? Can a human even do that?”

  “What’d I tell you? He’s a demon!”

  Those kinds of baseless rumors were spreading like wildfire. The commoners were going around telling stories that would make Ryoma himself laugh out loud had he heard them. The commoners certainly weren’t laughing, though.

  That devil was their enemy, after all.

  “Hey... Doesn’t this sound really bad for us?”

  “Yeah... They say he shows no mercy to his enemies...”

  “I heard he slaughters all his prisoners, too.”

  Truth and lies mingled to form the single image of a devil named Ryoma Mikoshiba. And as those rumors were circulating, the mobilization order was handed down. Most people wouldn’t dare volunteer to become soldiers in that situation unless they were truly and utterly mad.

  And so, regardless of the mobilization order, only thirty thousand gathered under Duke Gelhart’s banner.

  “Blast it all!” Malice spilled from Duke Gelhart’s lips.

  The situation was far worse than he had imagined. He’d had his aides deploy knights to the farmlands and forcibly gather soldiers, but it seemed that gathering the sixty thousand he expected to have would be impossible.

  “Fifty thousand at best... No, under the circumstances, that’s an optimistic estimate... If worse comes to worst, we won’t
even reach that number...”

  If they were to be too forceful with coercing the commoners, they could very well just panic and flee the villages. Such was the extent of the fear which Ryoma Mikoshiba had whipped up within them.

  In terms of quality, he would never be able to gather the sort of knights Princess Lupis had on her side. He absolutely needed the numerical advantage to bridge that gap— but he couldn’t gather those numbers.

  “It can’t be.” An ominous thought crossed the duke’s mind. “Is this all part of the enemy’s plan...?”

  Kael’s defeat was an inconvenient truth, but how did it spread among the commoners in such precise detail? This situation was all too disadvantageous for Duke Gelhart, and if this was some manner of coincidence, he would have wanted to choke the life out of the gods.

  But what if it wasn’t a coincidence? What if the enemy spun their plot not just against the eight thousand before their eyes, but while looking over the situation from a wider perspective? Maybe their objective wasn’t simply to drown his soldiers to death.

  What if the man who spread that rumor was Ryoma Mikoshiba himself?

  “No... It can’t be... That’s not possible! If that were the case... he’d have to be some sort of devil who can see the future!”

  Gelhart brushed off the terror starting to creep over his mind. But his heart surely feared Ryoma Mikoshiba— and that fear would go on to change Ryoma’s own fate.

  Chapter 4: Those Who Struggle

  “Sudou... I’m begging you, please help me...”

  As the sunset’s red glow illuminated the room in Heraklion’s castle, Duke Gelhart bowed his head before a man whose face was obscured with a hood.

  “Please raise your head, Sir Duke,” a dignified response came from beneath the hood. “I am not worthy of having someone as lofty as you kowtow before me...”

  That said, any courtesy this man showed was certainly hypocritical.

  “Please! You’re the only one I can turn to!”

  It was an attitude one would never expect out of Duke Gelhart. Sudou was sneering at him from beneath his hood, though, because he knew exactly why Duke Gelhart was maintaining such a modest approach.

  The reason could be traced back to the events of that morning.

  “You’re asking me to hand command of all the nobles’ faction’s military to you? What’s gotten into you, Hodram? Have you gone mad?!”

  Duke Gelhart’s shout echoed through the room as he eyed General Albrecht with bloodshot eyes. And it wasn’t his usual anger, which was often steeped with irony. True wrath, steeped with murderous intent, emanated from the duke’s body like fire.

  That anger was natural, however. General Albrecht’s demand was simply that preposterous. The general, however, showed no sign of impatience. Despite his status as a guest, he grandly demanded Duke Gelhart handed over command of the military, which was very much the core of one’s might and authority, entirely to him, but his eyes were as calm as a still spring.

  “Of course. With your command, we would end up losing a war we should, by all accounts, be winning. Do you not understand this, Duke Gelhart?”

  “You bastard! I sheltered you after you fled, and this is how you repay me?!”

  This meeting was for them to decide their future course of action, but had by now become an arena for the duke and general to vie for the right to lead.

  “But we shall certainly win without a doubt if I take the lead. Sorry to say, but you are not the right man for this role, Duke Gelhart. Diminutive though my skills are, would it not be better if the reins were handed to me?”

  Duke Gelhart initially thought to give him the right to command part of his soldiers, and to make good use of him. General Albrecht, however, saw no point in having someone with no actual experience in the lead to begin with. Taking command on his own would be more efficient.

  Soon after the council began, General Albrecht rejected Duke Gelhart’s proposal, which complicated the meeting.

  “Preposterous drivel! There are plenty of experienced warriors under Duke Gelhart’s command! There’s no need to relinquish command to you, General!”

  “Oh? That’s the first I’ve heard of such experienced warriors. But I have heard of... What was his name again? The one who lost despite having four times the enemy’s numbers...? Oh, yes, Kael. I know him quite well indeed.”

  General Albrecht’s face contorted with mockery. The aide who had called for the General was at a loss for words. It was true that Duke Gelhart didn’t have a commander more skilled than Kael.

  “Th-That’s...”

  “To begin with! I believe that the fact Duke Gelhart has placed such an incompetent commander in charge of his army calls his own abilities into question. Is that not so?”

  “What?!”

  “The nerve!”

  Duke Gelhart and his aides flared up upon hearing General Albrecht’s audacious statement.

  “Oh? I merely speak the truth, and still you grow angry? This only proves how pathetic a man you are, honorable Duke Gelhart!” said General Albrecht, his tone absolutely rife with contempt for the duke.

  Hypocritical courtesy? No... It was nothing more than outright scorn.

  “You bastard... What are you thinking?” Duke Gelhart asked.

  Why? How can he afford to act so confident...? All he has under his command is two thousand knights. I have twenty thousand, though they’re currently in position... Why?

  True, his situation was unfavorable because of Ryoma Mikoshiba’s actions, but he couldn’t see what General Albrecht’s justification for acting so aggressively was.

  “I want to win this war, and I am only doing what is necessary to ensure that outcome.”

  I understand that much... But that can’t be all there is to it!

  Looking at things impartially, General Albrecht’s claims were justified. There was no doubting that, in terms of capability, General Albrecht was the best man for the job. But...

  “I agree with General Albrecht’s opinion!”

  Duke Gelhart’s conflicted thoughts were disturbed by a call from one of the corners of the room.

  “““What?!”””

  All eyes in the room focused on one man.

  “Did you not hear me? Then I shall say it again! I concur that all rights of command should go to General Albrecht!”

  The conference room went completely silent. No one could find the words to respond to what had just happened.

  “What is the meaning of this?” Duke Gelhart growled in a cold, quiet voice. “Are you betraying me... Kael?!”

  Of all people, it was Kael, the one who had given Albrecht the pretext to delegitimize the duke, who spoke up in the general’s favor. It was impossible for Duke Gelhart to suppress his anger.

  “What are you saying, milord? I am simply acting to see that my duties are fulfilled in the best manner possible!”

  “What...?” Duke Gelhart was taken aback by Kael’s borderline aggressive words.

  “To begin with, you only accepted me because you respected my talent for command, and I’m not acting out my role of ensuring you win this war, milord!”

  Kael then paused, looking around the nobles sitting in the conference room.

  “So, if we’re to beat an enemy even I couldn’t defeat, we’ve no choice but to hand command over to a general more experienced than myself!”

  “K-Kael... How dare you!” Duke Gelhart realized Kael’s intentions.

  The bastard is trying to strike while the iron’s hot and get in Hodram’s favor! I’ve been had... I shouldn’t have let him attend this meeting!

  He’d realized Duke Gelhart didn’t trust him after his earlier defeat and acted out of self-preservation.

  This was truly a careless mistake. Duke Gelhart decided to give up on Kael upon learning of his defeat, but he didn’t imagine Kael would be aware of that. The duke’s tendency to get as much use out of him as possible granted Kael a chance to turn things in his favor.

&nb
sp; Blast it all! Why did I call Kael here?!

  Duke Gelhart’s gaze bored into the aide sitting beside him. But this was the duke’s fault, after all. When his aide proposed to punish Kael, he said he would deal with him later on, but he never gave the order to withdraw his authority. And what became of that?

  Despite being treated as having been punished, he was given the same treatment as before, in which case he would naturally be present in an important discussion with General Albrecht regarding their future policy.

  “Oh! So you’re Sir Kael...! My, I suppose one shouldn’t rely on rumors after all. I never expected you’d have such clear ability to assess the situation!”

  “Your kind words are not worthy of being bestowed upon me.”

  General Albrecht had done nothing but mock Kael earlier, but now his tone was the direct opposite of that, and despite having heard the general speak foul of him, Kael didn’t seem to mind.

  “I see... If Sir Kael says so, I have no option but to concur with his words.”

  “What!”

  “What is this foolishness... Count Adelheit! What are you saying?!”

  Yet another one of Duke Gelhart’s men spoke in approval of General Albrecht’s taking command of the military.

  His aide’s face turned white. Hardly surprising. Count Adelheit was the second most important man in the nobles’ faction. In other words, the man who served as Duke Gelhart’s right-hand man for years approved of General Albrecht’s opinion.

  “My apologies. Duke Gelhart... Please, do not think ill of us over this. We are responsible for our vassals... We cannot afford to sit idly by and let death claim us.”

  His tone made it clear it was a grave choice he had to bitterly make, but it did nothing to silence Duke Gelhart. The man had leeched off Rhoadseria for decades. Responsibility for his vassals? Duke Gelhart knew full well Adelheit felt nothing of the sort.

  But him appearing to be a kind-hearted, apologetic old man who made a pained decision certainly did silence everyone around them.

  This is... already done for...

  While his heart was seething with enmity and rage, his mind clearly perceived the situation. With the second most-powerful man in the nobles’ faction being in favor of General Albrecht, the duke’s opinion wasn’t worth anything.