Chapter 190: Everyone, Stay Away from Me! (1)
Ghislaine quickly scanned the front and spoke.
“Gillian, take control of the right castle wall. Kaor, go for the left. I will breach the center and open the castle gate.”
Once the operation began, doubts and disobedience were not tolerated.
The two moved as soon as the orders were given.
Boom!
As Gillian and Kaor, charged with mana, kicked off the ground, a deafening sound erupted and the ground caved in.
Some of the Knights followed suit, sprinting towards the respective castle walls.
Ghislaine waved his hand and continued quickly.
“Belinda, deal with the mages holding the walls. Also, take care of the archers. You don’t have to kill them all; just create chaos so the enemy can’t concentrate. You can do that, right?”
“Of course. Thanks to you, Young Master, my mana has increased significantly, allowing me to use techniques I could not before.”
The figure of Belinda, with a black mask, began to shimmer as it blended into the darkness.
Where she stood, the surroundings distorted slightly in human shape, as if a person had become transparent.
Unlike the magic ‘Invisibility,’ one could tell something was there if observed closely, but in the middle of the chaos at night, it would be hard to notice.
“Then I will head out first. Young Master, please be careful!”
Whoosh.
Leaving behind a shimmering afterimage like darkness rippling, Belinda moved.
This technique wrapped mana around her body, reflecting light to deceive the opponent’s eyes.
Though it consumed a lot of mana, it was highly effective in the chaos where detecting presence was difficult; a favorite among assassins.
Unaware of this, the knights were aghast at watching Belinda disappear, but there was no time to solve their doubts.
Speed and timing were the life of this operation.
Boom!
As Ghislaine dashed out, the remaining knights gritted their teeth, hurriedly following him.
The cautiously approaching Cabaldy troops were startled by the charging figures.
“What is it? Are they enemies? Allies? Who are they?”
In the midst of their confusion, Ghislaine approached like a lightning bolt.
“Who? Who else? Your new lord is here!”
Thwack!
The head of the one in front fell off in an instant.
As if that were a signal, the Knights of Penris behind Ghislaine began their massacre.
“What… what is this! Who are these guys!”
“It’s the enemy! The enemy has appeared!”
“How did they get inside the castle!”
In the blink of an eye, the scouting party was annihilated.
Their screams echoed to the Cabaldy troops waiting by the castle walls.
When the wall commander turned his head, startled by the loud noise…
BOOM!
Without giving them a chance to grasp the situation, Ghislaine and the Knights of Penris charged in.
“Uaaaah!”
Caught off guard, Cabaldy’s soldiers fell one by one, helplessly.
The knights, wielding their swords while releasing streams of mana, were not something ordinary soldiers could withstand.
Suddenly, with the enemy breaking into the castle, Cabaldy’s soldiers panicked and began to lose formation.
The soldiers, flustered, began to stray from their positions in the display.
With enemies waiting outside the castle while more rushed in from within, they couldn’t figure out where to focus their attention.
It wasn’t just the soldiers who were confused; the knights were in the same boat.
“What the heck is happening?!”
“Where did the enemies come from?!”
“Assess the situation! Quickly!”
The Knights of Cabaldy were all in a flap, trying to regain control over the soldiers, but the atmosphere was anything but orderly. It was understandable; they were suddenly blindsided from an unexpected direction.
In the midst of all this, the soldiers fell, cluelessly, one after the other.
Ultimately, the knights pressed Jaimon, the commander of the castle walls and the military head.
“Commander! What should we do?!”
“Enemies appeared out of nowhere!”
“It’s an ambush! It’s an enemy ambush!”
Jaimon was just as baffled.
He mumbled, unable to grasp what was happening.
“Why? Why did the enemies appear here? The tunnels? What happened to the Lord?”
He was sure those guys were tunneling and had diverted their main forces that way.
Count Cabaldy, confident of victory, had said he would take charge himself and headed that direction.
But now the enemies had suddenly popped up? How on earth? Did they break through the allied forces stationed at the tunnel?
At that moment, an image of the peculiar object he had seen earlier popped into Jaimon’s mind.
“Could it be… that flying thing from the sky… did the enemies use it?”
It was hard to believe, but there was no other explanation.
That thing, which he had dully watched without knowing what it was, had surely transported the enemies into the castle.
“This is unbelievable. There’s no way there could be such a thing… How could something fly in the sky…”
Trying to comprehend something that defied common sense was causing his head to spin. Meanwhile, the screams of the allies continued to ring out from various directions.
“Commander! You need to pull yourself together!”
“Please give us your orders!”
“The enemy’s momentum is too strong! Our forces are on the brink of annihilation!”
Jaimon snapped back to reality at the cries of the knights. Now was not the time to be curious about how the enemies got in.
He was the commander. He needed to assess the situation and give the best orders possible.
And for that, he needed to understand the enemy’s intentions.
Slowly, he turned his head to look at the Penris Army outside the castle.
In contrast to the chaos within, there was a heavy silence outside the castle.
It was terrifying.
The troops silently loomed in the darkness, watching the castle with no words, no actions; it felt like a beast just waiting for the chance to strike.
“They were aiming for the castle gate…”
Finally, he understood the enemies’ operation.
Fooled by the tunnels, most of the allied forces had concentrated there.
The enemies didn’t need siege equipment at all. A handful of them could easily slip in and open the castle gates.
If such a large army entered, it would be too late for the allies to rush back.
They were already in a pretty desperate state, starving and with morale low. They were hinging their last hope on the trap they dug for the tunnels, and if the enemy forces entered unscathed and formed up?
They wouldn’t stand a chance. It would be a certain defeat.
‘Is this how it ends…’
Chills ran down his spine.
The notion of flying into enemy territory was something he had never even imagined, let alone thought it could succeed.
The very thought of someone devising such a strategy—the creativity to think up a tactic that wasn’t in any military book, combined with the audacity to jump right into the enemy’s territory and the capability to pull it off…
Could he possibly withstand such a foe?
‘I’ve been such a fool.’
What if he had detected the enemy’s feint just a bit sooner?
If only I had realized it faster.
If I had intercepted that flying thing.
If only…
Zing!
“Get a grip!”
Jaimon smacked his own cheek hard and clenched his teeth.
The enemy numbers about 100, while we have around 600.
Although caught off guard by the sudden situation, the enemy is small in number. They are divided into three directions, making each group even fewer.
No matter how much of an ambush it was, if we could just get our heads straight, it was a fight we could handle.
“Repel them immediately…”
Jaimon hastily started to speak but stopped dead after assessing the battlefield. Instead of repelling the enemies, we were on the verge of annihilation.
The momentum of those ambushers was way too strong. Our allies were falling like leaves, yet not a single enemy had died.
“How can such a small number…”
A mere hundred or so of them were overwhelming a much larger force in a single blow.
He had never seen a military this fast and strong before.
“Could it be that all of them are mana-using knights? That’s… that’s just ridiculous.”
But mocking his thoughts, swords coated in mana lit up the dark night, swinging everywhere.
“Penris was hiding this kind of power?”
From the unknown flying object to the knights numbering over a hundred. The surreal scene was dizzying.
“We can’t win under these circumstances.”
To begin with, to face someone who manipulates mana with just soldiers, everyone had to form a proper line. But here, due to the ambush, instead of forming ranks, everyone was in chaos.
That’s how ambushes work. If successful, even several times larger numbers can be cornered.
Once in a state like this, it was not easy to turn the tide.
“I need to buy time.”
Jaimon gritted his teeth. The enemies were indeed strong, but it wasn’t impossible to win.
If our main force arrived before the enemy opened the castle gate, we could surround and obliterate them.
He needed to manage the situation and hold on until his allies arrived.
Thoughts raced in his mind, desperately searching for a solution.
“Get a grip, everyone! The enemy lacks siege equipment and archers, so they can’t attack the castle walls collectively! Leave only the minimum number of mages and archers to hold the walls! Everyone else, get down and create a defensive line! The remaining half of the troops focus on defending the gate!”
“Understood!”
Count Cabaldy’s Territory wasn’t just known as the strongest in the north because of its soldiers’ armament.
The soldiers underwent training that matched their armament level and became elite, with knights and commanders leading them at a high level.
Especially Jaimon, who was exceptionally capable and entrusted with this place by Count Cabaldy.
As the knights joined and Jaimon personally took command, the bewildered Cabaldy forces began to form their lines and stand against the intruders.
Clink! Clink! Clink!
Just like the best iron ore mine in the north, the soldiers were clad in steel shields and armor.
Thanks to the sacrifices of the dying soldiers in front, they barely managed to form their ranks.
“Send a rescue request to the lord immediately! Everyone must hold on! Holding on is the priority! Just hold on a little longer, and salvation will come!”
The trumpet sounded, announcing that the walls were in danger, and fireworks shot up into the sky multiple times.
Now it’s a race against time. Would the castle gate and walls be captured by the enemy, or would our main force arrive first?
“I have to, somehow, hold on. Hurry, please, come quickly!”
The castles of this era had developed to include cities within, making them quite vast.
Even the smallest and poorest territories had to grow their castles because they needed to prepare for attacks not only from people but also from monsters.
Not only that, but they also had to prepare for the monster’s attack.
Because of this, Jaimon felt a great pride in the vast Cabaldy Castle, but right now, the large scale was nothing but a source of resentment.
‘Is it too late?’
They had barely managed to establish a defense line, but the allies were still being pushed back helplessly.
Even though the soldiers on the castle wall and watchtower were shooting arrows to hold them off, it was ineffective.
The intruders were so skilled that they blocked all arrows with small shields and steadily began to assassinate the allies.
In a panic, Jaimon shouted at the top of his lungs.
“Mages! What are the mages doing? Don’t worry about the allies’ damage, just attack now!”
The mages, who could unleash powerful firepower, needed to attack to break the enemy’s momentum.
The enemy was small in number. If the mages attacked head-on, the enemy wouldn’t be safe.
Jaimon called for the mages, ready to sacrifice a bit, but there were still no signs of action from the castle wall.
This was the last opportunity now that the enemies hadn’t reached the castle wall yet, so why were they not attacking?
Feeling frustrated, Jaimon turned his gaze towards the castle wall and saw an astonishing sight.
The remaining mages and archers on the wall were falling one by one.
“You filthy bastards, I will kill you all!”
A mage, with a desperate expression, raised his hand high, summoning a massive ball of scorching flames in the air.
No matter how strong the knights were, they wouldn’t survive a spell unleashed with all the magic power of a mage.
Just as the mage attempted to attack, the space behind him rumbled, and someone appeared.
Skrug.
“Gck, urgh…”
The mage, whose throat was slit by a dagger, collapsed, gushing blood, and the spell he was casting quickly fizzled out.
“Enemies! Enemies have appeared on the castle wall!”
“Assassin!”
“The mage is down!”
As the chaos erupted, everyone on the wall turned their gazes toward the commotion, but the assailant had already vanished.
Skrug!
A moment later, another soldier holding a bow fell, his throat cut as well.
“Uaaagh!”
“I can’t see the enemy!”
“Monsters!”
The soldiers were gripped by fear. From the writhing darkness, the unseen enemies were killing their allies.
A different mage, coming to his senses late, quickly turned around.
He tried to cast magic at the distorted space, but the assassin was a step quicker.
Slash!
The assassin, tearing through the darkness, sliced the throat of the mage targeting him and moved on.
“Hmph.”
The black-masked assassin let out a dismissive grunt and seamlessly melded back into the shadows.
Finally, the knights, who had been directing from the back, moved to catch the assassin. But during this time, soldiers and mages on the wall were dropping like flies.
It wasn’t a mass murder all at once, but the steady increase in casualties sent the Cabaldy army into great confusion.
“This, this madman…”
Gritting his teeth, Jaimon assessed the state of the wall and watchtower.
With an assassin rampaging, proper counterattacks couldn’t be executed. Everyone was in a panic, too frightened to know when the assassin would strike next.
Thanks to that, the speed of the Penris army charging toward both sides of the wall didn’t slow down at all.
“How on earth did they nurture such knights?”
The assassin’s skills were astounding, but the leaders commanding the knights at the front lines were no less impressive.
With every blink of an eye, their allies were being swept away.
Blinking again.
“Huh…”
He was at a loss for words in disbelief.
The assailants had already reached both sides of the castle wall and started the massacre.
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