Chapter 241
Chapter 241
Dwayne couldn't make sense of what was happening.
'R-right. Stay calm and think this through.'
First.
Duke Crownhardt was invading the Kingdom of Triban.
Second.
With Akarind Academy students in tow.
Third.
And himself among them.
'This doesn't add up......'
Dwayne slumped in despair.
In fairness, it wasn't his fault.
Not a single Akarind Academy student could cleanly make sense of the current situation either.
"Tch tch. He's genuinely lost his mind."
Even the Spear God was clicking his tongue.
And if even they were like this—
"Are you insane?! Who's invading where?!"
—the Triban royal house had no chance of keeping its composure.
"Why are they attacking us?! Did they find out about our plan?!"
Zelta's prediction had been spot-on.
The Triban court had no backup plan.
They'd positioned troops near the border with the intention of taking civilians hostage and forcing negotiations.
All they wanted was one person: the rebel prince, Dwayne.
If they could retrieve him, they were prepared to accept a degree of losses.
Even the annihilation of some of their knight orders.
That was as far as they'd thought.
"They're heading straight for the capital! Moving fast! Cavalry!"
"W-we have cavalry too! Recall the border knights!"
"That would abandon the original operation......"
"To hell with the operation—the royal palace is about to be attacked!"
The knights and soldiers of House Crownhardt were formidable indeed.
Ignoring everything else, they'd charged straight at the capital, and their speed was staggering.
Triban's own mounted knights, riding identical horses, couldn't hope to keep pace.
"They had civilians with them, didn't they?! And they're still this fast?!"
The knight order fumed.
They were wrong.
"All right! You've had a good rest. Time to head south!"
Kantaros said cheerfully, setting off with a small group of mercenaries, students, and civilians.
"Ahh, what a view!"
Taking civilians into a war had been absurd from the start.
They weren't even Akarind Academy affiliates.
Dragging Aislard refugees along while the Belmein Kingdom attacked the Kingdom of Triban?
The already chaotic global situation would have been turned on its head.
"There are no civilians?"
Triban's knights realized the truth quickly enough.
"What does it matter?! Crownhardt's knights are coming!"
The deep-seated fear of the Empire overrode everything.
Part of it was also complacency born from knowing Cassian's character.
He was a man who traveled the world to save it, who slew demons.
Even now, he'd gone to Aislard to deal with monsters that had pushed south all the way into northern Belmein.
The Kingdom of Triban sat between Belmein and Aislard.
So how had Aislard's monsters reached Belmein?
Because Triban had simply "let them through."
It wasn't that Triban was especially callous.
That was simply how kingdoms worked.
Some citizens suffered for the sake of national policy.
No one getting hurt and everyone being happy was mere idealism.
But Cassian pursued exactly that kind of ideal.
He was a teacher, not a noble or politician.
So they'd assumed he would hand over Prince Dwayne to save the civilians.
"Your Majesty! The enemy is......"
But what arrived at their gates was Duke Crownhardt and his army.
The outer wall of the royal capital.
Hundreds of knights stood in formation along its ramparts, staring down at them.
"Ngh...... are there no forces left in the capital?! The Royal Knights?!"
"More than half have already deployed. Sh-shall we send out the remaining knights?"
"When will our knight order arrive?!"
"According to the mages' reports, approximately...... five hours."
Five hours.
More than enough time to hold a defensive siege.
That was—
By the standards that existed before Aura.
"Let's go."
Duke Crownhardt nudged his horse forward at a leisurely walk.
Behind him, his adjutants, then his captains, then senior knights, then regular knights, then soldiers—all followed in measured step.
The mana in the air began to roil.
"Match your pace!"
"Maintain lateral formation! Remember your function!"
These were no ordinary soldiers.
They were a military organism—five-hundred-man formations built to bring down the World Eater.
A mythic monster that had dwarfed their individual strength.
And they had felled it.
A mere fortress wall was no obstacle.
"Double time!"
Mana infused their bodies as they accelerated.
Not the mana of a single person—mana flowing through the entire Crownhardt army as if it were one body.
And at its terminus stood the Duke.
'Hrgh!'
He tightened his grip on the sword.
Mana surging through his entire body made him feel as if he might burst.
He'd deliberately formed a hundred-man unit—a fifth of the full five hundred.
And even that was this difficult to endure......
'Gkh. Hold it!'
He could grit his teeth and hold on.
But the weapon was the problem.
At this rate, the blade would shatter under the mana's strain.
So Duke Crownhardt hurled his Aura outward.
SHWAAAK!
A massive pillar of Aura slammed into the outer wall.
From the other formations, Aura that couldn't be contained any longer erupted in a chain of detonations.
CRAAAASH!
The entire area shook as though struck by an earthquake.
Citizens huddled inside the walls trembled and screamed.
Soldiers on the ramparts scrambled. Archers and mages froze, jaws dropping.
The walls were broken.
"Wh-what......"
Not in just one place.
Every section struck directly by Aura had crumbled as though swatted by a giant's palm.
The stretch where the Duke had released his Aura was especially devastating.
Through the gaping breach, the settling dust revealed the inner wall beyond.
The Aura had punched through the wall and plowed down the main road behind it.
"Haah......"
As the Duke staggered, Latrine rushed to his side and steadied him.
"Are you all right?"
"The energy drain is enormous."
"But the results are extraordinary."
Extraordinary.
That was the right word.
A single kingdom's walls, devastated at the cost of five men collapsing from exhaustion.
An achievement that would challenge even several 5th-circle mages.
"Shall we proceed as planned?"
"Do so. I need to rest."
Crownhardt limped toward the rear of the formation.
All orders had already been given to Latrine.
"Everyone, west! Begin camp decoy positioning!"
The Triban knight order would be marching south from the north.
The goal was to draw them as far in as possible so their route wouldn't overlap with the civilians' descent.
The knights wouldn't dare act aggressively anyway.
With the walls breached, they'd rush to fortify the palace interior.
'They're cowards.'
Once Goldline scrolls confirmed all civilians had escaped—
Then his own forces could simply ride out and flee.
"Set up a reasonable camp and rest. We have about three hours—eat and conserve energy!"
***
Hati used tracking techniques to identify the trail of the large group that had passed through.
Soon, Cassian caught up with Kantaros's unit heading south.
"Ha! What a brilliant strategy! What's that? You're attacking Triban straight on? A true demon's brain!"
And then Cassian froze.
"What?"
Rozalin and Yuria froze too.
"Excuse me?"
And Kantaros, who'd been laughing heartily while explaining the operation, froze as well.
"Huh? This wasn't your plan?"
"Why would I attack the Kingdom of Triban? In this political climate......"
"Wait, so the Duke did that on his own......"
"......"
Cassian clutched his head.
What in the world.
What sort of aftermath did the Duke think he was going to manage?
It was absurd, but he couldn't just stand there in shock.
"......Kantaros, please evacuate the civilians as fast as you can."
"And you?"
"I need to go assess the situation."
"You're not worried about Duke Crownhardt, I take it."
Of course not.
The Duke was merely underappreciated at Akarind Academy due to its surplus of masters.
In the Empire, he was the most formidable general and strategist alive.
Being exceptional in the Empire meant he'd racked up countless victories against minor kingdoms and foreign peoples.
Leading five hundred Aura-wielding soldiers, taking a kingdom without a scratch wouldn't be a problem.
"If Triban falls apart...... we'll have double the refugees to deal with."
A kingdom was still a kingdom, whether you liked it or not.
In unstable times like these, the kingdom needed to exist if only to keep its people from spiraling into chaos.
"I'm going ahead. Hati, take the others and escort Kantaros down. Yuria—stay with Kantaros this time and use Holy Power on the refugees. We need to get them out of here fast."
Cassian mounted the Griffon.
Reading his intent, the Griffon beat its wings and surged toward the Triban capital.
He arrived shortly after the Triban knight order had returned.
The Crownhardt forces had shifted their formation southwest and were preparing to withdraw.
The Triban knights were paralyzed—unable to advance or retreat behind the walls.
Near the breached sections, tense soldiers stood in rows, armed with bows and arrows.
The people of the Triban capital must have been huddled behind the inner walls, trembling with fear.
"Whew."
Cassian sighed, then landed.
He felt every eye in the vicinity fix on him.
"Who goes there?!"
A shout came from the wall.
From the knight formations outside, knights scrambled to regroup.
"Teacher!"
From the withdrawing Crownhardt army, a reaction came too.
Cassian swept his gaze over all of them, then faced the royal castle.
"I am Cassian, Chief Supervisor of Akarind Academy. I seek an audience with the King of Triban."
"D-don't move!"
He'd merely opened his mouth.
But several over-tensed Triban soldiers lost their grip on their bowstrings.
A handful of poorly aimed arrows sliced through the air.
Most went wildly off course, but two or three arced toward him and the Griffon.
Just before they reached him, they lost all force and dropped from the sky—as if someone had simply let go of them.
Giant-Block.
That Fantasy had activated.
At the sight of that miracle, the soldiers' eyes shook violently.
"Then—I'll be going in."
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