by Fuse
These consuls were the politicians of Lubelius. If not even they could order this division around, they had to be powerful, indeed.
“By the way, my friend Alberto was invited to join this division once. He turned it down so he could serve as my aide in the Holy Church. The Holy Emperor rewarded him with the title of acolyte.”
His jawbone clacked up and down in a show of what I assumed was pride. Alberto was the death knight that gave Hakuro all that trouble, if I recall. He was now just a skeletal fighter, but between his sword skills and possessing a monster’s strength, he’d give anyone a run for their money.
“However, I understand that things are quite different around the group now.”
Oops. Adalmann still wasn’t done talking.
According to him, the biggest difference was the power the Church had acquired; their Crusader paladin corps gave them a much greater say in matters. Papal consuls were now largely picked from the Holy Church’s cardinals, putting them in a much safer position than before. The Seven Days Clergy had a lot to do with that.
When Adalmann was there, this Clergy also worked as consuls, enjoying powers second only to the Holy Emperor. They were ordered to rebuild and shore up the Church’s position, and the changes they enacted created the Church structure we know today.
This Seven Days Clergy sounded kind of fishy to me, though. It sounded like they were the ones who tried to run Adalmann and his friends out of the Church, and he was clearly still no fan of theirs.
Although the Crusaders performed few noteworthy feats under the Clergy’s direction, Hinata’s training had helped them grow into the strongest of knight corps. This was how Lubelius had acquired both the Master Rooks and the Crusaders for itself.
“You seem to know a lot about this, Adalmann. Weren’t you in Clayman’s domain by this point in time?”
Adalmann gave this question a clacking laugh. “The demon lord Clayman saw the Western Holy Church as his enemy. He feared its power to make war and gathered as much intelligence as he could about them. I was a leader in their bureaucracy, so even if he didn’t accept my feedback, he still provided me with the information he had.”
That made sense. Clayman’s near-obsessive wariness had unexpectedly helped us out.
“Please, my lord and savior Rimuru, be careful. Lubelius is home to a group of Enlightened known as the Ten Great Saints, a cabal that even Clayman was afraid of. I must advise you not to let your guard down.”
He also mentioned the Three Battlesages, a group within the Master Rooks that was also Enlightened class. This trio, along with six commander-level knights and Hinata, formed the Ten Great Saints. An Enlightened was a human with powers on the same level as a would-be demon lord, and if they had ten of those, no wonder they kept Clayman awake at night. It seemed pretty likely that Hinata’s four companions on her current journey came from this group. Bringing regular soldiers along would just guarantee their deaths; better to presume that the top brass would be knocking on our door. Plus, if the Temple Knights were being mobilized, it was safe to assume the Master Rooks were, too, along with the Three Battlesages.
“My lord, please allow me as a former Church cardinal to attempt to reason with this Hinata woman! I will gladly convince her to abandon her faith in the Church and turn it toward you instead—”
“Ah, wait, wait. I don’t need any of that, so you can go.”
I put a stop to Adalmann before things got any weirder. In a way, he was even worse than Hinata—once his mind’s made up, there’s no derailing it. Talking with someone like him rarely results in anything useful.
“I see… A wonderful idea.”
“Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh… Ah yes, there is always that approach!”
And of course Shion and Diablo loved it.
“What are you two idiots talking about?! If we try to pull that crap on her, things are gonna get even more complicated!”
Talk about being cut from the same cloth. I was starting to wonder if they actually liked more than hated each other.
With Adalmann gone, it was time to return to the topic at hand. We had all the info we needed—now to devise some actual policies.
First, I wanted to have some kind of throwaway piece I could use to gauge my opponent’s power. Who would work for that…? I could sense Veldora eagerly staring at me. No, Veldora, not you. That’s too much.
“Veldora, you—”
“Ah! Finally, my turn in the spotlight? At your service!”
“No, Veldora. I want you to man our last line of defense.”
“Whaaaat?”
“Did you hear me? The last…line…of defense. Doesn’t that sound cool? You’re the only person I could imagine for the job.”
“Mm, of course, of course. I thought so as well!”
He nodded proudly. Great. Good thing I could corral him before he went berserk on me. Veldora would never lose in battle, but sending him out just wouldn’t be the right thing to do, I thought. I hadn’t given up all hope of talking things over with Hinata, so I couldn’t just whip Veldora out at first sight, or even as primary backup.
With Veldora placated, it was Benimaru who spoke next.
“First, I will announce my assignments for Sir Yohm’s reinforcements.”
Mm. Good. Benimaru was turning into quite the commander. He had gained a lot of experience in that previous battle, and unlike Shion, he wasn’t letting it get to his head any longer. Now he could correctly analyze the data at hand and determine the differences between the two sides. I was still the commander in chief, but by this point, he was better suited for the job than I was. I mean, hell, I didn’t really want that work anyway. Let’s hope that Benimaru can grow into the role.
With his loud, deep voice, Benimaru announced the assignments. The reinforcements would consist of one hundred goblin riders, led by Gobta; four thousand troops from Benimaru’s Green Numbers, along with a hundred members of Team Kurenai to lead them (the remaining two hundred Kurenai members would stay back to protect the town), and a hundred fighters from Gabil’s Team Hiryu. That was a force of 4,300 in total.
“…That is all. This will mean fewer troops guarding the town, but we have lycanthropes among our fighters now, as well as Sir Veldora, so I don’t anticipate that being a problem. Any feedback?”
“Whoa! Uh, me?!”
“Is there a problem with that, Gobta?”
“Nnnn…no.”
Benimaru’s eyes were enough to clamp Gobta’s mouth shut. Doofus.
“Hakuro will be the supreme commander of this force, but don’t worry. If anything happens, I will use Spatial Motion to back you up at once. Just keep in mind that there’s a good chance I will be fighting Hinata Sakaguchi myself. This might make it impossible to contact me, so try to follow Hakuro’s orders as closely as possible!”
“Understood, sir,” said Hakuro.
“It shall be this battle, this very battle, where my name will shine!” cried Gabil.
“Yeah, yeah, all right…,” murmured Gobta.
Hakuro and Gabil were raring to go. Gobta frankly worried me a little, but he had a knack for working through crises, so he ought to be fine, I think. Maybe.
“Hmm. I still worry, though. Ranga, are you awake?”
I addressed Ranga, currently sleeping in my shadow. He spent almost all his time in there lately, in part to guard me, but his magicule energy had been expanding in the weirdest way. He probably needed more exercise.
“Will I be deployed, Master?”
“Yep. I need to get you running around now and then, you know? Follow Gobta and keep him safe!”
“I shall! A little wake-up exercise would be very kind to me.”
Weird. I was getting the strangest feeling that unleashing this guy was gonna be seriously bad news. For our foes anyway.
“Oooh, yeah, if Ranga’s joining me, I’ll be totally fine!”
Now Gobta was showing some more enthusiasm. Looking out for number one, aren’t you?
“Ranga,
don’t take any reckless risks. And try not to kill your opponents, all right?”
“It shall be done! Lady Shion has taught me how to restrain myself!”
“Um, great…”
Now I was really worried. I thought he was just spending all day sleeping in my shadow, but he was doing that, too? Having Shion as his teacher filled me with anxiety, but hopefully it’d work out fine. We’ve got potions, I guess.
Benimaru offered no objection, although his eyes indicated he thought I was spoiling Gobta. Thus, with a delighted howl, Ranga curled up next to Gobta. Let’s just hope anyone who crosses him lives to tell the tale. I almost wanted to wish my opponents luck.
We had our force assignments. Now we had to discuss the reinforcements Farmus’s new king was receiving.
“So, Diablo, tell me how you intend to proceed.”
“Thank you, sir. I was expecting reinforcements, but thirty thousand is well beyond my projections. My original plan assumed a force of approximately ten thousand fighting for Edward.”
His new plans began with having Edmaris send a letter to the new king once he began moving these troops around, asking him to explain his actions. Edward was no doubt planning to shift responsibility for the reparations to Edmaris, and I wanted to keep that from happening. The new king would no doubt say that any agreement Edmaris signed was null and void. That wouldn’t pass muster with the Council if Farmus was part of it—it barely did with us, in fact.
No, his plan likely involved executing Edmaris and reneging on his promises to us. We’d then be angered enough to stage a military operation, and then the Western Nations would join together to resist us—that kind of thing. To prevent that, Edmaris had been rescued by Yohm’s squad. He was lying low in Migam at the moment, which was just what we planned. Yohm had a force of about five thousand over there, and the original plan called for us to teleport 4,300 more to Migam for him. That’s not a huge difference, but the psychological effect—the terror of having a brand-new army appear out of nowhere behind the first one—would turn the tables during battle.
But now that Edward had started assembling reinforcements, we couldn’t use that. If we waited for him to get his whole force together, we’d be faced with a four-against-one disadvantage in numbers. The sooner we acted, the better.
“It seems to me,” concluded Diablo, “that Edward is waiting for reinforcements he can use to strike Edmaris’s domain.”
The plan at this point had been to defeat Edward in one decisive battle or another, then have Edmaris endorse the champion Yohm as king instead of reclaiming the throne.
“Currently, Edward has access to a force of twenty thousand,” Soei commented. “Give him three more weeks, and the full force of forty thousand will be assembled. That’s more than enough to take Migam, as weak as its rear guard currently is.”
So the longer we wait, the worse things will get. But if we go all out right now, it’s going to be full-on, blood-soaked war. Farmus had already lost twenty thousand troops; a dragged-out war would cause untold damage.
So what then…?
“…This is just the worst. We could always just give up on this, you know. If I forgive the remaining debt they owe us, we can avoid war that way, right? That’ll eliminate the whole pretense for fighting us in the first place.”
“We can’t! If we do that, Sir Rimuru, you will look like a big pushover!”
“I wouldn’t want that, no, but we’ve already profited from this big-time. Wouldn’t it be easier if we just stepped on the brakes and waited until after we’ve handled Hinata to deal with it?”
As far as I was concerned, we were paid more money than I ever expected to see from them. Cutting our losses now would still put us way ahead, and I felt that waging a war on two fronts would be too risky by comparison. Shion did have a point, though. Demon lords have a vested interest in being feared.
“Heh-heh-heh-heh… Abandoning this plan would be unthinkable. Sir Rimuru, you are willing to let me handle this, yes?”
“Yeah, but I don’t want people to keep dying on my watch, whether they’re involved with it or not…”
“That will not be a problem. If that is your will, sir, then it is my duty to abide by it. It will be a simple task for me.”
I was seriously considering calling the whole thing off, but Diablo hadn’t given up at all.
“What are you intending to do?”
“I will find the culprit,” he quietly replied. “The evildoer who tried to pin the crime on me.”
Wow. He’s pretty angry.
“‘Destroy the demon,’ they say?” He gave me a little grin. “Well, if they want me eradicated, I will gladly serve as their opponent. Somewhere, among this thirty thousand, there could be someone involved with the culprit. I will give them a gentle interrogation.”
Uh-oh. There wasn’t a shred of gentleness about that. And Diablo sounded like he was ready to take on thirty thousand Temple Knights by himself. Better rein him in a little bit—
“I see,” Benimaru said as I stewed over this. “If you came out to engage them, we’d have nothing to worry about. But don’t kill any innocents, all right?”
“There is no need to remind me. I will never defy Sir Rimuru’s will.”
“Fair enough. In that case, Hakuro, can you suppress the new king’s soldiers without killing any of them?”
“It shouldn’t be a problem. It would be easier to stage a surprise attack to end things quickly, but that would provide no training for us.”
“True. Gabil, we’re going to need a great deal of potion.”
“Certainly! I will be sure it is ready.”
Huh? Um, hello? I was being left in the dust.
Shion smiled at me. “Looks like the Farmus invasion is in good hands, Sir Rimuru.”
“Uh, yeah… Yeah. Good luck, guys…”
““Yes, my lord!”” they all replied.
With that, the conversation was over. Couldn’t argue with that.
I didn’t like how that was handled very much, but either way, our discussions shifted over to the next issue—who would handle Hinata and her party.
“So about the party of five,” Benimaru said, looking at me. All right. Time to take the initiative on this one! …But just as I was about to speak, Soei suddenly stood up.
“Sir Rimuru,” he said in a strained voice, “we have an emergency. The Crusaders have begun to move…”
The room fell into a panic…or at least, I did.
“Is something up with Hinata’s team?”
“No. Hokuso, monitoring Englesia, reported to me that he sighted a hundred mounted knights departing at this very moment…”
“What?!”
“They are half a day behind Hinata, but at this rate, they will catch up with them before long. They are headed in the same direction, at least, so it seems fair to assume they are coming our way.”
Hinata was moving along at a regular, unhurried pace, although her four paladins had used magic to catch up at full speed before slowing back down. There had reportedly been some dispute among the group when they rendezvoused, but they remained together, a team of five bound for our city. They were still in Englesian lands, headed toward Blumund, but only at a relatively slow speed. If those hundred knights wanted to catch up with them, they could—however, instead of using the highway or another commonly used route, they were reportedly more likely to abandon their horses and take the old path into the forest instead.
“So they aren’t trying to meet up with Hinata?”
“Their motives are unclear. It will take no less than two weeks for Hinata to arrive, and the knights behind her are likely going to take about the same time.”
Soei, who was as confused about this as I was, ordered his force to tail them. We would just have to wait for further reports. Out of the frying pan and into the fire, huh? Except I had the impression we hadn’t left the frying pan at all. I really didn’t like this, but no point whining about it. Things were rapidly changi
ng.
My staff began to debate among themselves. I listened in, thinking over my options.
There were five Enlightened to deal with, Hinata included, plus a hundred paladins doing who knows what. This hundred was far more of a threat to us than the twenty thousand members of Farmus’s military—hell, Hinata alone was way worse. That’s just the way things worked in this world. Strength in numbers meant nothing against strength brought to loony extremes. No matter how many nameless Mohawk-wearing punks you lined up in a row, they weren’t going to beat the Fist of the North Star.
I wasn’t planning to go out there alone. That seemed kind of suicidal to me. So…what?
“Why not just kill them all instead of fretting about it?”
I probably don’t need to say who suggested that. Life’s so easy if you never use your brain at all, isn’t it? Just focus on the results; don’t think about whether you can or can’t do something. Of course, that’s probably how she earned that freaky unique skill of hers, but still…
“This would be exactly the kind of thing we could call upon Geld for,” Hakuro noted.
“Ah, he has his own tasks to deal with,” reasoned Benimaru. “We must handle this ourselves, unless there is truly no other recourse.”
I hated to hear that, but they had a point. Should I really be so stubborn about keeping Geld out of this? I mean, we’re only talking a hundred or so people. There was no point deploying a massive force against it; it was already clearly something only our strongest people could deal with.
If I was going to handle Hinata, someone else needed to keep the other four down for me. It’d be great if Hinata agreed to my one-on-one offer, but taking on five people at once by myself was way too risky.
Understood. It will not be a problem. The sole concern is the subject Hinata Sakaguchi.
Um, that’s kind of the problem here, man! Are you feeling all right? You’re starting to seem a lot less reliable than the Great Sage was.