by Ennki Hakari
Houwe moved forward with his original plan and split his men into seven platoons to enter the town and save as many of the mountain people as they could.
“Everyone ready? Don’t harm any humans…at least, not those who don’t deserve it! We’re here to rescue our comrades. Strike down anyone who gets in your way! And whatever you do, do not forget the way of the warrior! Now, goooo!”
With the chieftain’s orders issued, platoon commanders took their men off into the town.
The town itself was rather large, and its roads relatively wide, but due to the sheer amount of space taken up by the massive driftpus, the platoons also included dismounted troops to search houses and alleys.
Houwe’s platoon waited at the town’s perimeter, to keep an eye on the mounts left behind and to protect any of the escaping mountain people while they waited for the warriors to return.
I’d figured Houwe for the type to lead from the front line of a battle, but, considering most of the tiger clan wanted to fight in the front, his ability to stand back and watch things unfold was probably what had led him to become the leader of the largest clan on the prairie.
I gave my regards to Houwe before heading off to join the battle with Ariane, Goemon, and Chiyome. We’d be going in on foot to support any tiger clan platoons that ran into trouble and to wipe out any enemies that stood in our way.
These were not orders given to us by Houwe, but rather the job I gave us myself. Put simply, we were going to search the town for enemies then take them out. So pretty much what we always did.
“Well, let’s get going. Ariane, Goemon, Chiyome…ready?” I looked back at each of them, one by one. “This is basically the same as when we freed the beast people from the slave market.”
Ariane had her hand on the Sword of the King of Lions that hung from her waist, her golden eyes squinting as she looked at the town ahead.
“Hmph.”
Goemon brought his metal gauntlets together with a loud clang before casting a glance over at Chiyome.
Chiyome nodded and let out a deep breath.
“I can’t say that I’m totally okay, but I’ll do whatever’s needed of me.”
“Kyii!”
Ponta offered its own cheerful mew from where it sat perched atop my head.
“I’m really sorry about all this. If I hadn’t come here seeking that red nail we found back in Plymouth, we wouldn’t even be here.”
Goemon shook his head. “No need to apologize, Arc. Had we not come here, we would not have learned what happened to our lost brother. I owe you my gratitude.”
“I… I see.”
Chiyome’s ears twitched at Goemon’s comment. Assuming that Chiyome’s friend had led the dark giants all the way here, it was highly likely that he was somewhere in town.
I wondered if that was what was on Chiyome’s and Goemon’s minds.
“Well then, let’s get going! You know the drill!”
Everyone moved close to me and put their hands on my back and shoulders. It had become like second nature to all of us.
“Dimensional Step!”
An instant later, we found ourselves inside the town, on the other side of the shattered wall.
There were no signs of life coming from any of the buildings near the wall. The townspeople there had probably run as soon as the giants broke through.
I could hear the roar of fires blazing, their tendrils licking high into the sky all around us.
Amid the roar, I could also hear the sounds of fierce fighting and screams.
We made our way down the road using Dimensional Step.
Since much of this route was blocked by wreckage from the collapsed houses lining the road, the mounted warriors weren’t able to head directly down the paths the giants had taken.
As Houwe had pointed out earlier, rescuing all of the enslaved mountain people was likely impossible, due to the sheer size of the town.
But even so, as one who was once a human myself, I couldn’t just leave these murderous giants to their own devices. First off, I needed to find the dark giants in the first place. After that, I doubted anyone would mind if we killed them.
If the original report was correct, there were still around twenty left.
“Picking up anything? Goemon? Chiyome?”
I looked back at the two of them. They simply shook their heads.
Thanks to their ninja training, I was relying on their extraordinary senses to locate any survivors, but it was clearly no easy task.
Back in the Rhoden capital, the Jinshin clan had already identified its target, so it was only a matter of carrying out the plan. Relatively simple by comparison. Out here in Tagent, however, we didn’t have the benefit of any advance reconnaissance and had no idea where anything was located.
We’d need to find a lead that we could follow.
After several more teleports, we found ourselves standing before a large, open space.
In the middle of the square stood a decorative stone fountain. All of the surrounding houses were in flames.
Nearby, I found several humans who’d escaped here for safety.
Around the survivors stood a group of guards, dressed in light armor and armed with shields and spears, engaged in violent combat with another group of soldiers, dressed in full body armor made of dull metal.
“What’s going on here? I thought the town was being attacked by giants!”
Ariane shook her head at this, puzzled at the sight unfolding before us.
I glanced back just in time to see one of the guards use his spear to score a direct hit on a soldier’s helmet, knocking it right off his head. The helmet hit the ground with a loud clang and rolled.
However, the soldier didn’t seem fazed in the slightest, and continued pressing in on the guards with his sword.
Now that the helmetless soldier’s identity had been revealed, a cold chill ran up my spine.
Its face was that of a skeleton, not dissimilar from my own.
“Ariane, that’s me! I wonder if all of the soldiers are just like me too?”
“They can’t be! If they were all like you, then…well, they probably wouldn’t have made it this far.”
Ariane was always the wet blanket that dampened my enthusiasm.
“But still, something strange is going on here. Those soldiers are definitely undead.”
Chiyome carefully inspected the soldiers, narrowing her eyes and giving the air a brief sniff.
This only made the whole situation even more confusing.
Why were there fully armored undead, and why were they wielding human weapons?
If there had been just a few of them, a simple explanation, like a dead soldier being buried with their armor and weapons, could easily explain it. But there were at least ten that I could see, and at least ten more were flooding out of the destroyed houses and making their way here.
“Now isn’t the time. We need to help the guards. We can look for answers later!”
I pulled the Holy Thunder Sword of Caladbolg off my back and lunged into the fray.
The humans took one look at me and, figuring I was one of the skeleton soldiers, readied their shields and spears.
I wasn’t in a position to explain to them who I was. Besides, they weren’t entirely wrong on the skeleton point.
I gave the human guards a wide berth and focused on the skeleton soldiers, swiping down with a heavy blow.
The air whistled as my sword flew through the air, cutting through armor like paper and sending fragments of metal and bone raining down onto the pavement.
The skeletons’ armor were made of relatively light metal that put up little resistance. It might have been able to stand up to an average sword or spear, but in the face of the mythical-class Holy Thunder Sword of Caladbolg, it was like they were wearing cardboard.
“I thought we’d be hunting giants, but here I am fighting my skeleton brethren…”
I complained to myself as I swung my sword once more, knocking back
another soldier with a loud clang, sending pieces of bone flying every which way. Its armor collapsed in a neat pile.
All twenty skeletons were reduced to literal bones faster than a ramen joint could get the bowl from their kitchen to your table.
“That about wraps things up here. Anyway, I have a few questions for you guys, if that’s okay.”
I slid the sword back into its sheath and looked at the guards and townsfolk. They all looked completely taken aback at what they’d just seen.
I took another step forward to try and speak with them, only to be met with fear, and several spears pointed my way.
“Arc, behind you!”
I glanced back to find Ariane running full tilt in my direction, sword drawn. It took me a second to realize what she was trying to tell me. I pulled my shield up with my left hand and swung my sword with my right to meet the incoming blow.
The newcomer did a flip through the air, bounding over my head, and landing in the middle of the human guards. He swung his blades with deadly precision, sending blood spraying every which way.
“Sasuke!” Chiyome called out his name.
I couldn’t tell if he was actually responding to her or not, but Sasuke’s expressionless face slowly turned toward me.
Before I could react, I heard a now-familiar cry from above and felt the ground tremble beneath my feet.
I used Dimensional Step to move out of the way.
The earth rumbled so tremendously that the surrounding buildings shook on their foundations. The spot where I’d been standing mere moments ago was now occupied by a six-meter-tall dark giant, its weapon raised high in the air.
That was close. One second too late, and I would’ve been as flat as a flower shoved between the pages of a book.
The giant let out a furious cry before lifting up its immense stone axe and swinging it down toward Sasuke. The ninja, however, anticipated the strike and bounded up the wall of a building, disappearing onto the rooftops.
“W-wait up, Sasuke!”
Chiyome took off after him, running down a narrow alley before bounding onto the roofs herself, heading in the direction Sasuke had gone.
Goemon ran straight up the side of a building and followed suit, leaving clear outlines where his feet slammed into the wall. That technique must’ve been a sheer feat of strength.
Ariane watched them go, the worry clear on her face, before glancing toward me. She wasn’t sure if she should stay with me or follow them.
“Ariane, you go after Chiyome and Goemon! Leave this big lug to me!”
She glanced up at the roof above her and, after a prompting nod from me, chased after the others.
It was now just me and the dark giant alone in the square.
The headless dark giant pulled its stone axe up from the earth and focused its large, inky black eyes on me. It was a rather disconcerting sight. The dark giant swung wide, and I pulled up my own weapon, light slowly building around the blade. I slammed it into the ground.
“Sword of Judgment!”
A rune appeared under the giant’s feet. Out of the center rose a sword of light, piercing the giant’s body from below. The sword tore up out of the giant’s mouth before a loud metal clang resounded through the square as it shattered into a thousand pieces a second later.
As the shards of light clattered to the ground, the giant began shaking wildly.
“Well, your hide may be tough, but sensitive spots are all the same.”
I yanked my sword from the ground and started walking away when I suddenly spotted a young boy huddled in the ruins of a building.
I put my sword back in its sheath and approached him. He looked afraid as he clutched a piece of timber in his hands, pointing it in my direction. Behind the young boy, I could see a woman lying on the ground, her foot trapped under the rubble, blood flowing from her head.
The woman, probably the boy’s mother, spoke weakly.
“Please…save yourself… Please…”
However, the young boy continued holding out the wood, tears rolling down his cheeks. “I’m not leaving you, Mama! I won’t go without you!”
I felt bad that he believed I intended to do him harm, but I had no ill intentions for him or his mother. To be fair, though, I must have looked just like the other skeletons to them.
“Kyii! Kyiiii!”
Ponta looked up from where it was wrapped around my neck like a scarf and tried telling them I wasn’t some sort of strange monster. Unfortunately, it had little effect.
I remembered something I had stashed away at my waist and reached down to pull out my waterskin. After a quick swig, I was overcome by a massive headache as everything blurred in front of me.
I let out a deep breath as I tried to get ahold of myself.
A shudder passed through my body as the rush of built-up emotions washed over me. Maybe it was the up-close-and-personal battle with the giant that had taken such an emotional toll on me.
I took another deep breath and let it out slowly before turning my attention back to the boy and pulling my helmet off.
“You’re…not a human, are you mister?” The young boy looked up at me with great curiosity.
“I’m an elf. Have you heard of them? We can use magic. Even magic that allows us to heal people.”
The boy’s face lit up as I pulled the helmet back on. “You… You can fix Mama?”
I nodded, and approached the woman behind him.
After casting a healing spell on the woman’s head and making sure the bleeding had stopped, I began removing the bricks so I could examine her leg. It looked broken, and would probably need a more powerful spell.
“Are you sure you’re an elf, mister? I heard that elves are cunning people who stole their powers from God.”
I was taken aback by the boy’s statement. Apparently, this is what the Hilk church was teaching its followers. “Are you saying you’ve never met a cunning human?”
The boy thought for a minute before shaking his head.
I’d be willing to bet someone specific had come to mind.
“Say, for example, there was a thief. If that thief were a human, would that make all humans thieves? Are you or your mother thieves? It’s the same thing.”
“Mama and I ain’t no thieves!” the boy shot back angrily.
After finishing with my healing magic, I looked over the woman’s leg and nodded. It should be all right now.
“Thank you so much,” the woman said.
“Beyond the wall is relatively safe. Keep out of sight and make your way out of town.”
The woman slowly stood on unsteady legs and bowed her head. I glanced down at the worried young boy and cast a healing spell on him as well.
“Keep her safe, boy.”
The boy watched the magical glow fade with great interest and responded with a firm nod. He took his mother’s hand and led her out of the square and down the road. A few moments later, they were gone.
That had taken longer than I anticipated. I needed to get up onto the roofs and get my bearings.
***
Two dark shadows dashed across the rooftops of the buildings of Tagent.
Leading the way was a cat-eared man dressed all in black and wrapped in a dark cloak. His bright red eyes and pale complexion made him look like a ghost. A young cat girl dressed in similar black ninja garb followed a short distance behind him.
Her azure eyes were fixed on the man’s back as she darted across the crumbling roof tiles, desperate to not lose sight of him.
The man she chased was someone she’d once considered a brother. They’d both lost their families. They’d lived and trained together. He’d doted on her like a sister, and she’d admired him as if he were her real brother.
One of the six great fighters of the Jinshin clan, Sasuke was also one of the youngest members to ever assume that role. However, the Sasuke she was pursuing was no longer the man she’d once known.
It was nothing short of a tragedy that she’d finally
find the man she’d been looking for in a state like this, devoid of any life. He was undead, a man no longer of this world. Jealous of the living, he could do nothing but dispense death.
A corpse without a soul…or so they said.
But Chiyome had to believe that the man she’d once known was still inside. From getting yelled at by Master Hanzo to eating flour dumpling soup, they’d done everything together. She refused to believe that that man was gone.
“Wait up, Sasuke!”
Chiyome used her ninja skills to throw some water shuriken at Sasuke’s feet, but he immediately responded with shuriken of his own, knocking them away.
Sasuke’s split-second pause, however, was all the time another figure, a mammoth of a man, needed to close in from the opposite side. He came in fast with a right hook, his arm looking like it was made entirely of metal.
“Goemon?!”
“Muscle to stone, concussive fist!”
Sasuke launched into the air and did a somersault right as Goemon’s fist came crashing down, taking him out of the massive man’s reach.
The roof exploded beneath Goemon’s fist as if it’d been hit by a bomb, throwing bricks and dust everywhere.
Chiyome yelled at him. “What’re you doing, Goemon?! What if you’d hit Sasuke?”
Goemon glared at Chiyome. “You know it as well as I do. Sasuke was one of us, but now he’s a member of the undead. Do you want to see him bring further disgrace to his name?”
The normally silent man’s voice boomed, his eyes wide.
Chiyome looked back and forth between Sasuke and Goemon.
Sasuke picked up on her hesitation. A moment later, he had both blades out from the sheaths at his back and was rushing in to strike.
Chiyome evaded the first slash and blocked the second with her own blade, but Sasuke caught her square in the stomach with a powerful kick, sending her flying backward and crashing onto another roof.
“Hyauuk!”
The young ninja spit blood from her mouth and lurched to her feet, but Sasuke was already closing in fast. All she could do was watch blankly.
Goemon appeared behind Sasuke, his body now fully engulfed in bronze as he tried running the other man through. However, Sasuke mostly managed to dodge the attack, catching only a glancing blow that threw him off balance. While still in mid-air, Sasuke pulled several metal shuriken out of his pocket and threw them.