Ch.98Chapter 98. Battle of Hispil Castle (8)

What’s happening right now?

The guards standing behind me and Reika were the first to grasp the situation.

“T-this can’t be…!”

And.

As the guard’s voice reached us—

Like being released from Medusa’s curse, Reika and I slowly regained our senses.

“This is…”

“S-Swen…?! W-what is this…???”

When my mind snapped back to clarity, my first thought wasn’t about why this happened or why the rapier had glowed.

We need to get out of here as quickly as possible.

That single sentence dominated my thoughts.

“Ms. Reika, let’s go back!”

“Y-yes…? Eh? B-but—”

“There’s no time. Come on, hurry!”

Reika could barely respond properly.

Her pupils were trembling, clearly showing her bewilderment—

But she immediately took my outstretched hand.

I was almost grateful she didn’t waste time hesitating.

I quickly shouted to the guards.

“Bring the carriage! Forget about the mission. We need to return to Balhart Castle immediately!”

The stunned guards nodded after hearing my words.

“U-understood!”

The guard quickly calmed the panicking horses, then helped Reika and me into the carriage.

Even the guard who had been assigned the mission of “infiltrating enemy territory” now joined our hasty retreat.

Because my mind was dominated by the thought of ‘we need to escape from here,’ I failed to notice—

That there was a person standing beyond the cleanly opened hole.

* * *

“What was that?!”

“What was that sound?!”

The eastern wall of Hisfil Castle was destroyed with a tremendous boom.

This news spread extremely quickly to all key figures within the castle.

Of course it would spread. Along with the tremendous sound of the collapsing wall, acrid smoke entered the interior of the castle.

And as it happened, Serpina, who had come out to personally direct the operation, quickly received this information and arrived at the scene accompanied by Lord Yuan and one of the castle’s generals.

“Lady Serpina, this way…!!”

Following the soldier’s guidance, they arrived at—

‘This can’t be…!’

A hole so enormous it seemed unreal.

At this point, it was less of a hole and more like a passageway.

“What on earth happened here?”

“I-I don’t know! There was suddenly a loud boom, and before we knew it, the castle wall had collapsed…!”

Breaking through castle walls requires siege weapons at minimum.

Of course, I have no idea what kind of weapon could make such a clean, circular hole, but that was a secondary concern.

There was nothing beyond the castle wall to begin with.

If someone had brought siege weapons, they couldn’t have gone unnoticed.

“Couldn’t anyone identify who did this? What were the watchtower guards doing?!”

At Yuan’s thundering question, the soldier stammered, unable to properly respond.

“W-well… this area isn’t visible from the watchtower where our soldiers are stationed… I-I’m sorry…!”

“You call that an—”

“Wait.”

Serpina raised her hand, stopping Yuan.

Yuan immediately closed his mouth without any retort.

“…”

She turned her head to check the watchtower’s position.

Indeed… it would be difficult to see what happened here from that position.

Moreover, beyond this hole, there was nothing but forest. There was no real need to monitor this area.

She herself wouldn’t have considered monitoring this area particularly important, and it wasn’t her style to blame the workers after an incident had already occurred.

“Never mind. What’s done is done. Anyway, was there no trace of anyone around?”

“Yes, that’s right…! We searched the area but found nothing. It’s truly baffling…!”

‘…’

An impossible situation had occurred.

But once it had happened, it was no longer impossible.

There must be a cause and effect relationship.

Was it an earthquake?

No, that would have caused damage over a wider area.

Did the wall collapse due to poor construction?

That’s not a realistic assumption either.

She tried to extract all possibilities from her mind, but that was all she could come up with.

In historical records and throughout her life, such an incident—

“Suddenly there was a loud noise and a hole appeared in the castle wall”—had never happened before.

How was she supposed to make sense of this?

“…Yuan.”

“Yes, ma’am!”

“Have the deployed soldiers retreat immediately.”

“Retreat, you say…?”

“Yes. We’ll postpone the attack on the Aeshus army.”

“U-understood!”

After Yuan withdrew.

Serpina was left alone with her thoughts.

Despite the situation, no sign of panic could be read on Serpina’s face.

Though she wasn’t a superhuman perfect in all things, she knew what attitude someone in her position should maintain.

As a leader, showing signs of anxiety was forbidden.

She was walking a tightrope made of rules she had set herself and the rules that intertwined with them.

In any case, since this had happened, it was clear that “someone” had done “something.”

And if that was the case, there was no guarantee this was the end.

This wasn’t a supernatural phenomenon. Something must have been done to create the situation before her eyes. If so, she needed to prepare her soldiers.

‘This is truly absurd. As if… someone used magic…’

Yes.

The most realistic explanation for this was nothing but magic.

And with the word “magic” coming to mind—the topic naturally led to “that man.”

“So… I suspect that man might really be a mage.”

“On what basis?”

“Well, it’s a much more plausible assumption than sudden natural disasters occurring because someone prayed to the heavens.”

‘Magic…’

Jenna had said it. That there was a high possibility a mage had appeared.

So was this really magic?

It was truly hard to believe… but considering the giant stone falling from the sky and the sudden hole in the castle wall, it seemed the most likely possibility.

And one more thing.

Just now, Serpina had naturally ordered a retreat from a favorable battle.

Given what had happened, withdrawing to defend the castle was a rational action.

So who would benefit most from this action?

‘The Aeshus army.’

And the current affiliation of that white-haired man?

Just as she reached that thought—

“M-my lord!”

A soldier rushed urgently to Serpina.

Beside the soldier stood a middle-aged man.

“What is it?”

“One of the territory’s residents was near when the hole was made, so I brought him right away!”

“What?”

Fortunately, there was a witness?

The man, who introduced himself as an ordinary farmer, told her everything he had seen without omission.

“Because of the smoke, I couldn’t see clearly… but I distinctly saw a hooded man and woman fleeing!”

“Do you remember any detailed characteristics?”

“T-that… as I said, the smoke was so thick… I couldn’t confirm. I’m sorry…!”

“…No. Then let me ask one more thing. About their physical characteristics.”

“Physical characteristics, you say?”

“For instance, if they had distinctive hair colors.”

At Serpina’s words, the man fell into thought, then nodded as if remembering something.

“Now that you mention it…”

“…!”

If the man’s hair was white, she could be certain this was magic.

Thinking this, she waited for his answer.

“The fleeing woman’s hair color was one I’ve never seen around here. It was pink.”

“…Is that so?”

“Yes. That’s all I can remember… I’m sorry.”

A woman with pink hair?

It was as rare a sight as a young man with white hair, so it wasn’t useless information… but it wasn’t decisive evidence either.

“…I understand. I appreciate your cooperation.”

After sending the man away, Serpina fell into thought again.

If what the man said was true, the hooded pair presumed responsible for this incident had fled… but why had they done this in the first place?

Having thought that far, Serpina roughly organized the pieces she had so far and let out a short sigh.

There was no point in thinking further about a problem that wouldn’t be solved.

Though they had fled, there was a possibility they might attempt something like “magic” again, so she needed to focus on defending the castle for now.

“Hasla.”

“Ah, y-yes, sir!”

The male general, who had been silently following the situation, was startled by Serpina’s words and responded.

“Gather troops to guard this area immediately. Handle it similar to guarding the castle gate.”

“U-understood!”

“Good. I’m counting on you.”

After saying this, Serpina quickly walked away.

The male general who had been accompanying Yuan watched her back and thought:

‘She… knew my name…!’

It was her nature to remember the names of her officers, no matter how insignificant they might seem.

In that moment, another person became captivated by her overwhelming leadership.

* * *

“…”

The inside of the carriage returning to Balhart Castle was utterly silent.

Neither I nor Reika initiated conversation.

We didn’t even have the presence of mind to talk. I couldn’t even comprehend what had just happened.

‘The rapier suddenly started glowing… and Reika’s fireball was drawn into my rapier. As if it were a magnet.’

And then, at the tip of the rapier blade, the fireball grew to an absurd size—

As soon as I swung the rapier a few times, it flew in the direction the blade was pointing.

Objectively analyzing the situation, it would be correct to say my rapier amplified her magic.

The problem was that I had no idea it could do that.

‘Did this decorative item have such an ability?’

I’ve invested 10,000 hours in this game.

10,000 hours!

That’s an absurd amount of time when converted to minutes.

Because of that, I was confident I knew everything about this game. My confidence in navigating with my Intelligence 100 brain came from believing there was nothing I didn’t know about this game.

But…

I only just now discovered that this decorative item amplifies magical power.

As I was thinking the situation might be more serious than I thought.

‘Come to think of it…’

I suddenly recalled when I obtained this item.

Ginor’s advice, “explore around this area,” came up as the optimal action.

My prediction was the same. Exploration was the optimal action our army could take.

It’s just exploration, when you think about it.

And what I got was just a decorative weapon.

Would an Intelligence 100 brain declare obtaining a merely decorative weapon as the optimal action?

At the time, I simply dismissed it as “well, at least I got an item”… but this world, while based on a game, wasn’t the game itself—it was reality itself.

The same goes for when I obtained gold while in the Luna army.

I got gold, used it for relief efforts, made myself known, and subjugated two mercenary groups.

It started with gold but didn’t simply end with obtaining gold.

Thinking about it that way, it wasn’t so strange that this item amplifies magic power, and that it was discovered in a country where Ginor, who has Reika as an adopted daughter, belongs.

‘Just how many moves ahead am I expected to see?’

Is Intelligence 100 supposed to let you see several moves ahead?

It was truly absurd… but anyway, I was able to complete the given mission.

Regardless of the details, after something like this happened, any sensible lord would withdraw their troops. With that level of destructive power, they could lose the castle.

It might take time for them to reach the conclusion of magic, wasting mental energy on unnecessary deductions, but that wasn’t bad for us either.

‘Right. No matter what happens, I’ll act as if I knew it all along.’

Thinking this way cleared my complicated mind.

With this newfound composure, I naturally noticed Reika trembling.

“…Ms. Reika.”

“Ah, yes…!”

“Don’t worry too much. You did well.”

“…That…”

“Although the result was a bit different from what we expected, we succeeded thanks to you.”

“…”

Reika didn’t respond, but I didn’t add anything further.

She must be having all sorts of thoughts.

After all, she just witnessed the destructive power of her magic firsthand, capable of becoming a lethal weapon.

At times like this, one needs time alone.

“Um… we’ve arrived.”

Just then, the carriage stopped.

I slowly helped Reika out of the carriage.

Suddenly, I recalled the time I visited Lynn Brans as an envoy of the Lunarian army.

Yes. Like then, let’s do it once more.

I headed toward the royal castle of Balhart, acting as if everything was going according to my plan.

*

“Swen, you’ve returned safely! How did it go?”

To Yurie who welcomed me, I replied with the most calm expression I could muster:

“…I wasn’t too late.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

I smiled.

Act like someone who knows everything.

With that in mind, I slowly parted my lips.

“Don’t worry. Serpina’s army will retreat.”

“Really? The plan succeeded?”

“That’s right.”

“Phew…”

Yurie sighed in relief and said:

“Actually, while you were away… a messenger came. I heard that Anima is in a difficult situation. Everything you said was right.”

That part proceeded according to my prediction as well.

I had prepared an excuse in case a natural disaster occurred, but it seems that was unnecessary.

Of course. What are the chances of another meteorite falling from the sky?

“She urgently requested reinforcements. Thanks to your advance warning, we had already sent aid, but I was still really anxious…”

She said this, then with a slightly choked voice, she sincerely thanked me:

“Thank you so much… Swen.”

A close save… I suppose?

I simply bowed my head and answered:

“If I’ve been of service to my lord, that is enough.”

I thought to myself, I hope this wraps up well.

*