Hyakuren no Haou to Seiyaku no Valkyria - Volume 15 - Chapter 5

ACT 5 

Taking a good look at the Holy Capital from his position atop one of his siege castles, Nobunaga scratched at the side of his cheek and sighed. 

“Good grief, this city is going to be more of a pain than I thought. Capturing it will take quite some time.” 

A whole month had already passed since the Flame Clan had begun their attack on the Holy Capital. 

In that time, they’d launched only intermittent attacks. With the intent of boosting morale among the soldiers, they’d tried every single conventional siege tactic—but they had very little to show for their efforts. 

After all— 

“This city is just too damn big!” 

This, at least, everyone agreed on, and was the root of all their problems. 

Their first problem was that since the castle walls were so tall—and the Steel Clan’s projectiles were more powerful than the Flame Clan’s—if Nobunaga’s forces approached the city walls without taking excessive precautions, they’d stand to lose some of their own soldiers without being able to take out any of the enemy’s. They weren’t going to make any forward progress that way. 

Their second problem was that since they couldn’t get close to the walls, and the city buildings inside were so spread out, they weren’t going to be able to rely on clamoring yells of soldiers outside the walls causing mental distress to the residents inside the city. 

Their third problem was that they couldn’t allow their soldiers to surround the entirety of the city; if they had done so, their forces would have been spread too thinly to repel a concentrated attack from the defending forces. 

This last problem was especially obvious when the great Ífingr River, which flowed into the east side of the city, was freely being used by the residents of the city. Nobunaga’s forces didn’t have the strength to put in place a formal blockade on the waters of the river, so the residents had been able to receive boatloads of food and weapons from ships passing through the city walls, just as they might have done before the siege started. 

It was almost as if the city weren’t under siege at all. 

The patrol guards walking atop the city walls looked just as healthy and lively as ever, showing no signs of worry or sleeplessness, despite the enemy soldiers waiting just beyond their walls. 

“Well, the true battle is yet to come. We have merely completed preparations with our efforts so far.” 

The point of constructing siege castles in front of the south and west gates had been to cut off additional regiments of enemy soldiers from arriving from their outposts in the Múspelheim region. Essentially, the siege castles had been built not to attack the city but rather to defend Nobunaga’s forces and their positions around the gates. 

Second-in-Command Ran came over to give his report. 

“Lord Nobunaga, Steel Clan reinforcements are now arriving from Gimlé. They are approximately ten thousand in number.” 

It was almost exactly what Nobunaga had predicted. He calmly nodded his head, and then said, “Is that indeed the case? Very well. Let us ready the encampment at the north gate and lie in wait for them there, shall we?” 

It was perhaps an obvious point to make, but should one control an ideal position from which to attack enemy forces, it is possible for the defending force to hold out against a more numerous enemy. 

And with that surplus of soldiers resulting from the careful rationing of their force to the north gate, they would be able to easily proceed with their next attack. 

This was Nobunaga’s strategy. This was the strategy of a man from the Land of the Rising Sun.

“The main forces of the Flame Clan have begun moving towards the north walls of the Holy Capital. They are around thirty thousand in number.” 

“So they intend to prevent us from rendezvousing with our reinforcements? Geez, this feels like I’m just locked into an Eternal Card Pull by Nobunaga. ‘It’s my turn! My turn again! And again!’” 

Yuuto snorted out of exasperation and disgust at the contents of Kristina’s report. 

In turn-based games, one can only attack on one’s turn—but, if you can manage to have it always be your turn, then you have an Eternal Card Pull (or so it had been referred to online when discussing a particular manga). 

“Man, those are some pretty heavy-duty siege castles they’ve got out there. If there are ten thousand troops inside each of them, we’d never be able to take control of them with the forces we have now.” 

Even if they decided to attack a single one of the siege castles, they wouldn’t be able to knock it down before the Flame Clan host moving north would arrive to pull off a pincer attack on Yuuto’s forces. 

Yuuto could hardly command his soldiers to charge headfirst into such danger. 

“In that case, what if we just attacked the main band of soldiers? We’ll be able to coordinate with our own reinforcements and perform a pincer attack on them. We’ll be evenly matched, I think, and perhaps even be strong enough to secure a victory,” suggested Kristina. 

“That sounds scary to consider, too. It’s as if that’s what they’re planning for us to do,” Yuuto responded. 

Yuuto looked back north. If they sent their units to pull off such a pincer attack, Nobunaga would surely be prepared for that eventuality and fight them off. No matter which way they moved them, in fact, Nobunaga would have something planned for a counterattack, based on past experience. 

At the moment, it was too optimistic to hope that the Steel Clan would be able to overwhelm the Flame Clan, given the quality of their weapons, the sophisticated training of their soldiers, and the abilities of the general leading them. 

In the meantime, while they were all huddled down inside the city thinking about what was going on, they were just getting surrounded by the Flame Clan reinforcements coming up from the south and west. 

They had nothing else they could do but suck their thumbs and watch as the Flame Clan maneuvered around the city walls. Even then, though, the Flame Clan would merely come up to the north gate and build another siege castle while they tried to address the problems arising on other fronts. The whole situation was just getting worse and worse, caught in the negative cycle as they were. 

“Geez, whoever was it that said ‘if the bird doesn’t sing, kill it’? They were completely wrong about that whole idea.” Yuuto spat in disgust. 

Nobunaga’s strategy was tricky, careful, and extremely logical. He’d used sophisticated methods to get into his current position, and by doing so he’d forced Yuuto into his current quandary—but Nobunaga didn’t appear to be struggling out there at all. 

In the ten years since he’d showed up in Yggdrasil, he’d been careful, oh so careful, in preparing his troops to conquer the world. He hadn’t wasted a single bit of effort. 

Sun Tzu did say that “A victorious soldier seeks to first win and then seeks battle; a defeated soldier shall first fight and then seek victory.” 

And he was entirely correct. 

Yuuto was painfully aware of the truth of his words. 

It was absolutely necessary to create the circumstances for victory before the battle even started. 

Even when it came to siege battles, it was obvious that it was still important to make such preparations for victory. No one would argue against that. But still, usually one’s preparations would be limited by the amount of money and availability of other resources. 

The fact that Nobunaga had made all these arrangements possible despite the limitations put upon him showed the true terror of his abilities. 

What he had done, the revolution he had led, the country he had made great—all of that had required his ingenuity. And he had pulled it off in just ten years! 

Nobunaga had clearly surpassed all that Yuuto had once known him to be. 

He had taken his experience and experienced even more, increasing in ability and strength to reach his full power in time. 

“When it came down to it, he really was able to move his forces both quickly and decisively. Surprisingly so, in fact.” 

Finding himself placed in sudden and unexpected danger, Yuuto was reminded of the time he had surrounded the Flame Clan himself, and all his careful, precise preparations were made for naught as he found himself forced to push hard to gain the upper hand on his opponent. 

At the very least, when the Flame Clan was fighting the Spear Clan, the Steel Clan certainly had one ace up their sleeve, one that put them high above the rest: they had the þjóðann. 

At some point, however, that advantage had been flipped back against them and had discouraged others from allying themselves with the Steel Clan. 

It was a clever plan, to be sure. 

“‘Strike hard against any sign of weakness, but remain prepared for the harshest attacks.’ Surreal that he’s pulled it off so well that he’s left no opening for an attack.” 

Yuuto honestly had nothing to do but click his tongue at how marvelously he had been overwhelmed. 

Even so, it was something he had to overcome. 

He didn’t have the slightest intention of sitting by quietly while his enemies surrounded him.

“Oho! It’s been a while since I’ve been in an atmosphere so positively stinging.” 

Jörgen, in the middle of the camp enclosure, folded his arms as he sat in his seat, trembling with excitement for the battle to come. As the patriarch of the Wolf Clan, which was the central force of the greater Steel Clan, he had been tasked with leading ten thousand troops to Glaðsheimr by the Second-in-Command, Linnea. 

“Well now, aren’t we getting a little overexcited? Are you sure you’re going to be okay? You’ve been leaving all the fighting to the young folk recently and commanding from the rear, but that doesn’t really seem like you at all.” 

The man who stood next to him was teasing him. 

It was Botvid, patriarch of the Claw Clan, the birth father of both Albertina and Kristina. 

The hair on his head was thinning and had receded well past his forehead. He was forcing a smile on his face against this poor joke, contrasting with his generally dark and sullen demeanor. This middle-aged man was none other than the fourth-highest ranked in the hierarchy of the Steel Clan, a true mover and shaker. He was highly regarded as an ingenious leader of the armed forces. 

In the past, he had originally been the one to bring the Ash and Fang clans together in secret to secure their cooperation and defeat Hveðrungr, the man who previously went by the name of Loptr—once the Second of the Wolf Clan. Successes such as those were part of the reason why he had been named second-in-command of the reinforcement force. 

“Hmph! They should know well not to underestimate me. Sure, I have indeed led from afar these past three years, but my spear still moves far faster than those held by those old fools! I’m yet young!” 

“Oho! Truly, I feel not the slightest aura of decrepitness emanating from you. Why, the last time I saw you on the battlefield was a mere five years ago, was it not? You seem livelier now than you ever did then!” 

Botvid’s eyes were half-way closed, as if he was caught up in some fond memory. 

Back when the Wolf Clan and the Claw Clan were still enemies, the two of them had met on the battlefield several times—or had been forced to confront each other over the negotiating table. 

Now, however, they fought side by side. Life could be truly strange. 

“Haha! With Father around, I do feel a bit younger... Though I must say, I feel like my lifespan has gotten a good deal shorter too.” 

“Hah! Hear, hear! I can certainly imagine why you’d feel that way.” 

“Right? They say it is the doing that is truly everything—which is just common sense—but I do wish he’d do a bit more preparing before he got on with the doing.” 

Jörgen sounded amused as he said this. 

He had not worked so hard that he expected some great reward or sense of satisfaction from his efforts. 

“But we’ve come quite far, and at quite a rapid pace, thanks to him. Until he became patriarch, we had at most two thousand in our ranks, but now Father controls twenty thousand troops in the main force, and once we join him, his ranks shall swell to thirty thousand! In just four years, he increased his forces by an order of magnitude.” 

“The world has changed, certainly.” 

Botvid nodded his head deeply in agreement. 

Back when he had facilitated the aforementioned cooperation between the Ash and Fang Clan forces, he had heard that the cost of doing so had been quite high. 

During that period, the Flame Clan had so far only managed to muster a force of around five thousand troops—a mere tenth of what they now possessed. 

“Come on, it’s about time you came back to the present. There’ll be time for your war tales later.” 

The one who (gently) threw a wet blanket on their reminiscing was the Assistant Second of the reinforcement force, the Ash Clan patriarch, Douglas. 

And he was quite right. This was no time to be thinking about “the old days” and telling stories from back then. 

“Haha! Pardon me. Now then, back to the matter at hand...” 

With a quick laugh to hide his distracted state of mind, Jörgen looked back down at the map spread out on the table beneath him. It was a map of the area surrounding the castle. A clay figurine, representing the position of the Steel Clan’s main forces, stood atop where the map indicated the Holy Capital stood. 

To the Capital’s south and west were markers indicating the presence of siege castles, and on top of them were laid clay figurines bearing the symbol of the Flame Clan. 

The size of the figurines indicated how strong the forces were at any given place on the map. 

“Those two siege castles are each manned by ten thousand troops, and on the north side, the Flame Clan patriarch is leading a force of thirty thousand troops. His troops are really in quite awful positions for us, tactically speaking.” 

Jörgen frowned deeply and groaned. 

“Indeed they are,” Botvid said, nodding. 

The Flame Clan’s forces had taken up positions in wide, undeveloped fields, full of wild grasses and flowers—the perfect terrain from which one could see far and wide. 

There wasn’t any better place for a large army to make its encampment. 

They were able to commit all their troops to battle with ease, without wasting a single soldier to territorial inefficiencies. 

On the other hand, there were a great number of disadvantages to fighting on such terrain if you had fewer troops than your enemy did. 

The more enemies that fought, the more easily they would be able to surround your forces due to how easily the terrain facilitated troop movements. Because of how flat and visible the surrounding area was on such terrain, it would be also hard to create any sort of opening using an ambush or some other clever tactic. 

“Do they show any signs of moving yet?” 

“No, no movement at all. Our enemy must know the advantages they possess.” 

“Our enemy is a most troublesome one, indeed,” Jörgen said, letting out a long sigh. 

Based on the tendencies of troop movements that he had observed over the past month, if they made no further movements with their own troops, the Flame Clan forces would undoubtedly sense this as an opportunity to construct another siege castle. 

If they did that, the Holy Capital would be completely cut off, and Jörgen’s forces would find it even more difficult to rendezvous with the main Steel Clan force inside the city. 

But at the same time, even if they attempted to breach the enemy forces massing outside the Holy Capital right now, they’d be crushed in a single battle. Anyone could see that. 

“...Hm. What of the movements of the other surrounding clans? Have they done nothing?” 

Jörgen’s eyes flicked to Botvid as he asked him this question. 

Botvid was Kristina’s birth father, and it was he who had thoroughly taught her how to analyze and make use of strategic information. 

It was because he had built up his own intelligence network that he had been selected to be promoted to Second-in-Command. 

“They show absolutely no signs of making a move. The Armor, Shield, and Helmet Clans have each rallied their forces, but they still haven’t actually made any attempt to march them beyond the borders of their territories yet.” 

All three of those clans had pledged their fealty to the þjóðann, Yuuto. 

They’d already been urged to join in the battle to protect the Holy Capital several times by now, but they had been biding their time, waiting for the “opportune moment,” or some other weakness to appear in the Flame Clan’s forces. Excuses to do nothing, essentially. 

Jörgen let out a snort of ridicule. 

“Waiting for a clear, sunny day, are they? How the mighty have fallen. Did they not once pride themselves on being highly honored warriors?” 

Yes, they had gone around claiming very proudly about the fact that they had gained hereditary positions as retainers for the empire, but who were they to be proud when they could not rise to assist the þjóðann when he was in danger? A despicable lot, all of them. 

They were merely waiting to see which side would appear to be victorious before entering the battle. 

At the moment, it looked as though the Flame Clan might be the ones to gain the upper hand. It was unlikely any of them would choose to join forces with the Steel Clan if it looked to be in a particularly disadvantageous position. 

After all, if any clan chose to fight alongside the Steel Clan, they could very possibly become the Flame Clan’s next target for attack. 

“Yes, we are indeed in quite the predicament. Should those other three clans join us, then the numbers would be on our side and we would very likely win, but until it looks like we are already likely to win, they will not join us! Truly, a dilemma indeed.” 

“You’re quite right. Let’s leave that problem for Father to resolve.” 

And without a moment’s hesitation, Jörgen stopped thinking about the issue entirely. 

Their opponent was someone powerful enough to defeat the monster that was Dólg?rasir, the Battle-Hungry Tiger, a man who could slay scores of his enemies without a second thought. With someone of that caliber up against them, it was important for the Steel Clan to match their opponent like-for-like. At least, that was what Jörgen believed as he considered the situation the Steel Clan currently found itself in. 

“In any case, let us do the job that we’ve been given.”

“They still haven’t moved against us.” 

Inside the encampment built for the patriarch (a temporary hut, really), Nobunaga was sitting cross-legged, looking bored as he rested his head on his hand. 

Approximately two weeks had passed since the Steel Clan’s reinforcements had arrived. In that time, both the reinforcements and the main forces of the Steel Clan inside the city had merely watched Nobunaga’s armies, showing not the slightest indication that they were about to attack. 

“Perhaps they simply will not move, no matter what?” 

“They certainly have aligned their forces to be facing right at us, but it would appear that they do, indeed, have no intent to move upon us.” 

To Ran’s question, Nobunaga gave his somewhat assured reply. 

He knew his opponent was definitely not going to sit by and wait patiently for death to come to him, however. 

Even as he was having this conversation, Nobunaga knew that his opponent was watching the movements of his own forces with an eagle eye, waiting for the opportune moment. 

He was also aware that Yuuto knew that he knew this—that if they were to make a move now, it would result in their sound defeat. 

“Is that how it is? Our opponent is quite capable of holding himself back, isn’t he?” 

“Indeed he is. What a terrible brat, waiting like that until the end times.” 

The more time that went by, the more his opponent was sure to know that it would place him at a greater tactical disadvantage. 

The great unease caused by drawing things out this long, the anxiety induced by such waiting—it was impossible to describe. 

Anxiety tended to narrow one’s field of view, it urged one to act rashly, impulsively. 

That said, it would have been an utter failure on the part of his opponent to wait for such carelessness to manifest itself in Nobunaga. 

Nobunaga would stand strong against the encroaching despair, push back against the impatience creeping up his spine, and believe his opportune moment would come. He would steady his quick breathing, preserve his power, and submit himself to waiting for the right time to act. 

Nobunaga knew himself well enough to know that what his opponent was waiting for was, essentially, a miracle. 

“He may wait,” Nobunaga said, “but that brat shall not find a single chink in my armor through which to slip.” 

Nobunaga bared his canines, allowing a most lurid smile to creep across his face. 

His was the face of a man who had come of age almost fifty years ago. It was the face of a man who had fought and fought and fought. It was the face of a god of war. 

“The loser in this battle shall be the one who panics first, indeed.” 

The Flame Clan was, at the moment, maintaining its dominant strategic position—but one could hardly say that Nobunaga’s current position would be an easy one to hold indefinitely. 

The overall balance of forces present in the greater battlefield of the city, its walls, and the surrounding fields was yet to be determined. It was for that very reason that just as his enemy could not easily maneuver his forces in the face of such uncertainty, neither could Nobunaga. 

From the current position of the Flame Clan’s forces, Nobunaga would be able to move them to the siege castle near the west gate in around six hours, or over to the south gate within half a day. 

In order to reach the southernmost siege castle held by the Sword Clan, which was allied with the Steel Clan, it would take approximately a full day to get there from their current position. 

A two-day round trip. 

There was also, of course, the unknown number of days it would require in order to take control of the siege castle itself. 

If, during that time, either of the southern or western Flame Clan siege castles were taken by their Steel clan opponents, the Flame Clan’s supply lines would be cut off and their main force would be isolated away from their support forces. The various allied forces of the Steel Clan who had been biding their time would surely move in to take advantage of this situation if it were to occur. 

In other words, the strategic balance of the battlefield would lean towards the Steel Clan, and the Flame Clan would be the ones who found themselves in danger. 

Siege castles do not traditionally fall to enemy forces within the span of just a few days, but it was said that the Steel Clan possessed powerful siege weapons. Nobunaga couldn’t let his guard down for any reason. 

However, if either the Steel Clan’s main forces or their reinforcements grew impatient and decided to be the first ones to launch an attack, the Flame Clan would almost certainly come out the victors. 

“We are so close to achieving the dream we were denied in the Land of the Rising Sun. We shall not repeat our earlier failure. Now then, young brat, let us see who shall win this test of endurance!” 

It was at this moment, however, that Nobunaga failed to realize something. 

Yuuto had, in fact, predicted that Nobunaga would act precisely as he had done so far, and had already made preparations for the current state of affairs. 

The longer a siege went on, the better the situation would become for the besieging forces—the Flame Clan, in this instance. He knew that very well from his own success with the technique. 

Ironically, it was that false promise of success that blinded Nobunaga to the true facts of the matter: Yuuto’s goal was not to outlast Nobunaga, but merely to buy time for his greater strategy.

“Just a little while longer and then the wind direction will change! It’ll come from that direction,” Albertina said confidently, informing the crew. 

“Right then! You heard ‘er, sailors! The wind’s changin’ to north-north-west. Reset the sails! Tell the other two ships to do the same!” barked the ship’s captain. 

“Aye-aye!” 

At the young woman’s order, the men all started dashing around to do as she said. Moments later, the ship had accelerated to the point where one could feel it in their body. 

It was all because they had adjusted the ship’s square sails to take full advantage of the tailwinds. 

“Aunt Albertina, you are really quite something.” 

“Oh, you think so? I’m not doing much. The captain’s the one who actually gives the real directions, as well as the sailors who are actually adjusting the sails,” Albertina said this, perhaps looking a bit bashful, but not entirely displeased by the compliment. She was scratching the back of her head as if she were shyly grateful. 

“Oho! You got some real nice things to say, don’t you, Miss Admiral!” 

“Ah, if it’s for Miss Admiral here, I’ll do anything!” 

“For sure! It’s because Miss Admiral’s here that we’re able to be here too.” 

The sailors cheered as loud as their lungs would allow them. 

As the commander of the Steel Clan’s navy, Albertina had been granted the rank of “Admiral,” but due to her personality, most of the crew had taken to calling her “Miss Admiral” instead. 

“Oi! I’ve told you louts this every time, but you’d best be addressing her properly! It’s ‘Admiral’ to you lot!” 

The Captain’s red-faced yelling did little to change their ways, however. 

“What’s with that super formal attitude, Captain?” 

“Y’gotta know that callin’ her ‘Miss Admiral’ means we love and respect ‘er, right?” 

“Damn right! I ain’t goin’ to be dyin’ for you, Cap’n, but for Miss Admiral, I’d give my life!” 

“Yeah! I’m with ya on that for sure!” 

The crew members showed no signs of guilt as they called out “Miss Admiral! Miss Admiral!” over and over, joking and laughing as they did so. 

They may have been making light of the situation, but they were not taking Albertina or the authority of her station lightly. 

The day may have just begun, but they were on a ship. They were all keenly aware of just how important it was to take advantage of a favorable wind. 

Someone like the Admiral who could read the changing of the winds was worthy of their worship—made yet easier by the fact that the object of their affection was a charming, cheerful, and cute girl. 

Long journeys at sea could become quite boring, but the crew felt different when she was around. 

In the past month that they’d been out at sea, she’d become something of a pop idol amongst their ranks. 

“Good grief... The honorable Admiral has the privilege of being an adopted child of His Majesty Suoh-Yuuto, and yet they treat her like this...” 

The captain was the only one aboard who couldn’t accept this “improper” manner of address. He complained away, heedless of the cheering around him. 

Unlike the other crew members who had been hired for this expedition, he was a sworn child of Skáviðr from the Panther Clan and had been brought up to pay strict attention to the hierarchy of rank. 

“No need to get yourself all worked up, Captain. I don’t mind being called ‘Miss Admiral’ at all.” 

“It is not a problem of whether you mind, ma’am. Now then, as for the punishment for such disrespect...” 

The captain was absolutely refusing to let go of the issue. 

“It’s not like I don’t understand how you feel about the nickname, Captain, but surely it is nothing so problematic as to merit any punishment.” 

“Wh-Why, if it isn’t Aunt Sigrún!” 

The captain stood sharp at attention upon the sudden appearance of the silver-haired young lady. 

She and her Múspell bodyguards had boarded the ship on Yuuto’s orders. 

Behind Sigrún was another young woman with her hair up in pigtails, leaning over the ship’s railing and puking her guts out, feeding the frenzied fish in the waters below—but everyone was pretending not to see her doing so at all. It was rude to draw attention to a lady who had been forced to succumb to an indignity such as seasickness. 

“Look, everyone is so lively as they work! If they can fulfill their duties like that, well, there’s no reason to get hung up on formalities like proper forms of address now is there?” 

“Yes ma’am! If that is your opinion on the issue, I understand completely.” 

Or so the captain said, his face red with embarrassment. 

Sigrún was one of the few sworn children of the þjóðann, Suoh-Yuuto. She was one of the greatest warriors of the Steel Clan who had achieved many impressive military gains in the name of her sworn father. 

She had also inherited the title of Mánagarmr—the Strongest Silver Wolf—from the man who was now the patriarch of the Panther Clan, Skáviðr. 

While he may have been a sworn child of Skáviðr, he was still relatively low down the hierarchical totem pole. Being confronted by a child of the þjóðann like Sigrún was much like a heavenly being sent down to him from on high. 

“Boo! Even if I tell the captain I don’t mind being called that, he still won’t call me ‘Miss Admiral’ himself...” 

“Ah, ma’am, that is not—that was not my—well...” 

Albertina puffed out her cheeks with dissatisfaction at the captain’s hesitance to call her by the more familiar form of address. The captain, realizing that his commanding officer was displeased with his conduct, was shocked back to reality by that fact and searched for some good excuse as to why he couldn’t do so—but ended up just silently cringing at the admiral’s reproach. 

“Yeah! You’re being mean to her, Captain!” 

“Maybe the captain actually looks down upon Miss Admiral?” 

“Apologize to Miss Admiral!” 

“Take back your awful words, Mister Big Nose!” 

The entire crew suddenly erupted in a storm of jeers as they sensed this opportunity to correct a perceived slight of their beloved Miss Admiral. 

Well, perhaps “jeering” wasn’t quite the right word for what they were doing—they all had smiles on their faces. 

Everyone knew that without the coordination skills of the captain, the ship would never function properly. He, too, was a target of the crew’s affection—in a different way. 

“Oi! Who’s the fool who said that last thing about my nose! I can overlook everything else you sailors have said, but I shall not allow anyone to make such comments about things I’m self-conscious about!” 

“A-Ah! Shit!” 

“Sorry for interrupting you in the middle of all this.” 

“Eeep! Wh-Whatever might you need, ma’am?” 

The captain had rolled up his sleeves and was seizing crew members left and right, hoisting them up by their collars—but upon being addressed by Sigrún, he quickly released the crew members, whirled around, and stammered out a reply. 

Sigrún didn’t seem particularly perturbed by this unprofessional display and merely returned to the topic at hand— 

“How much longer until we arrive at Helheim?” 

Helheim was the southernmost region of Yggdrasil. 

It enjoyed a fairly temperate climate, and was known in the northern regions of the Vana-Kvísl river basin as a place “fertile from time immemorial.” Thanks to the reforms put in place by Oda Nobunaga, it had gained renown as the best grain-producing region of all of Yggdrasil by a rather impressive margin. 

It was, in other words, the stronghold of the Flame Clan.

“So this is Helheim, hm? Just as warm as the stories say.” 

Erna disembarked from the ship. As she walked on the solid ground of their destination, she looked around at the new landscape with interest. 

Her shoulder-length hair hung down freely to her collar, flowing and loose—a perfect symbol of the cheerful, beautiful young woman that she was. 

Around her waist, however, was belted a sheath, carrying her sword. 

“It would have taken us half a month to arrive here on foot, but here we are, just three days later... It’s hard to believe that they’re making these kinds of things...” 

Next to Erna stood Bára, who let out a long, deep sigh. 

Before arriving, they’d passed by public bathing houses, water wheels, houses made of clay, post stations loaded up with horses, and countless other revolutionary inventions that had changed civilization. The long sigh had come from Bára being overwhelmed by the countless innovations she was witnessing. 

Once she learned that all these things had been proposed by Yuuto, she immediately fell into a deep, self-hating slump. 

“In Yggdrasil, they call me one of the three wisest people in the world... and yet I’ve been made to look like some conceited braggart in the face of all this... I’m really just... nothing... not even small fry. More like a mosquito, or maybe a dragonfly...” 

“Don’t say such things about yourself! His Majesty comes from the heavens, does he not? You, a human, need not trouble yourself if you do not measure up to him.” 

“Big Sister Thír, thank you...” 

Bára had turned around to face a beautiful young woman, in the prime of her youth, who had long silver hair that fell to her waist. 

She was a delicate, graceful woman who exuded a calming aura. Behind her were another six maidens, all in their teens or twenties, each with weapons strapped to their person. They disembarked from the boat, one after the other. 

In the midst of such a large group of coarse, uncultured men, they carried with them a radiant sweetness that stood out from the others around them. 

Sweet and cute though they may have been, every one of them were also Einherjar. They may currently have been exuding a calm aura, but they also were very clearly not individuals to be taken lightly. 

Together, they were the pride and joy of the Sword Clan; they were the nine elite Einherjar, the Maidens of the Waves. 

“Focus on the matter at hand, Bára. We’re in enemy territory.” 

“Yes, ma’am...” 

Bára cringed at Thír’s cold, hard tone and nodded meekly in acceptance. 

At first glance, Thír looked to be in her mid-twenties, but she was actually already past forty years old. She was the “Ogre” leader who had taught her Maidens of the Waves the ins-and-outs of fighting. 

Bára knew, of course, just how terrifying Thír could be, and also knew that she was in no mood for jokes or idle chatter. 

Bára was, in this sense, much more perceptive when it came to social cues than Erna or the others were. 

“We must redeem ourselves for our failures in Vígríðr, no matter what the cost.” 

At the word “Vígríðr,” a flash of petrifying anxiety swept over the faces of all of the Maidens of the Waves. 

That word was, to them, the root of a grave and bitter trauma they all shared. 

Despite the fact that they had achieved renown far and wide as one of the strongest bands of Einherjar, they were, after all, just human—visibly so, in the manner which their fear gripped them. 

Even Bára, known widely to be a brilliant strategist, could not match Yuuto in a battle of intellect. 

In the battle the Maidens of the Waves had fought against him, the once-proud name of their band had been crushed into the ground. 

“This calling of the banners is the perfect opportunity for us to regain our honor as Einherjar!” 

Reluctant as they may have been to do so, all of the nine elites nodded their heads at these words from Thír, docile and unresisting. 

Each one of them knew well the particulars of the situation they were in, after all. 

The three galleon ships would be able to carry, at most, fifteen hundred. 

Subtracting the number of noncombatant sailors, that left only a little more than thirteen hundred fighters. 

Only their band, the corps of the elite, had been chosen to go to face this enemy arriving by sea. 

If they were not able to meet the expectations of those who had sent them here to fight, the “Maidens of the Waves” would never see a restoration to their former glory. 

“Alright then, everyone, we’re heading out! Let’s show these ‘Steel Clan’ folk the true strength of the Maidens of the Waves, once and for all!” 

“Yes, ma’am!” They all said, as one.

On the day when Maripas was representing his lord in Blíkjanda-Böl, he heard a great crash and rumble that shook him to his core. Something had collapsed, and the sound had woken him up. 

“What was that?! An earthquake?!” 

He leapt out of his bed and looked left and right for the source of the commotion. 

It was not unreasonable for him to think that the great din had erupted from some earthquake. After all, the memory of that other earthquake was still fresh in his mind. 

However, neither the equipment nor furniture in his room was shaken in the slightest. Right when he was about to go back to sleep, dismissing the noise as something he had dreamt up—it happened again. 

Once more, a terrifying roar pierced his eardrums, leaving them ringing. It was so loud that he was almost led to believe that meteors were falling upon the city, but Maripas had never heard of meteors falling in the same place twice. 

“Hail! Hail! Does anyone hear me?” 

“Yes, over here!” 

“What monstrous commotion was that?!” 

“I shall go inspect the source of the noise at once!” 

In a panic, Maripas summoned one of his attendants and sent him scurrying off to find out more. 

But before the attendant could return with more news, he heard a great battle cry reverberate through his chambers. 

Maripas, stunned by this completely unexpected turn of events, was left slack-jawed. He was utterly incapable of understanding the sudden and unbelievable situation he found himself in. 

“Ouch. Why did that hurt?” 

Maripas tried pinching his cheeks, but it hurt, just like normal. 

In other words—this was not a dream. 

Even so, the reality of everything happening before him was simply too unreal to believe. 

“Lord Maripas, we’re in danger! An enemy is attacking! The city is under attack!” 

While Maripas was struggling to take everything in, the attendant he’d sent off in search of more information had finally returned. 

With the report of an enemy attack presented to him, Maripas was finally able to accept everything that was going on as being very much real. Someone—something—had attacked the Flame Clan’s capital city of Blíkjanda-Böl. 

“Hmph. Are they mountain bandits or some other band of ruffians? They are foolish to think that now is the perfect opportunity for them to attack our city.” 

Due to the ongoing campaign against the Holy Capital, almost all of the soldiers in Blíkjanda-Böl were gone from the city. 

In order to preserve peace and order in the city, as well as to ensure all governmental functions continued without disruption, only one thousand soldiers were currently stationed within the city walls. 

They may have only been one thousand strong, but these men had been thoroughly trained in the tactics of mass combat and would be far more skilled than a bunch of untrained bandits. The distinction in their skills was stark as can be. 

While Maripas was thinking this through, pushing aside his earlier anxiety about the explosions, and feeling the exalt of a bloodlust run through his veins, he heard something else: 

“They’re Steel Clan fighters! It’s the Múspell Special Forces, led by Sigrún!” 

“Whaaaaaat?!” 

Maripas’ eyes bulged out of his sockets as he yelled in surprise. 

The names of Sigrún, Mánagarmr and the “Strongest Silver Wolf,” as well as the Múspell Special Forces, were known far and wide, even in Blíkjanda-Böl. 

According to the stories, they formed the core of the Steel Clan’s quickly moving advance forces. 

Other stories told that Sigrún had defeated Yngvi of the Hoof Clan and Sígismund of the Fang Clan, as well as several other renowned generals. She led the most powerful group of calvary knights in Yggdrasil, or so it went. 

“This can’t be! There’s no way they can be out there? Where could they have possibly come from?!” Maripas screamed in a high-pitched voice, sounding as though he, a grown man, was about to have a temper tantrum. 

He had reason to be upset. The Flame Clan’s capital was far away from enemy territory. Not in a million years should an enemy have come to attack them in their home! 

“I-I am unaware of their manner of approach—they simply appeared, suddenly, out of the darkness of the night...” 

“What foolishness! In any case, get the city guard to defend their posts! Send out riders to Lord Nobunaga and the surrounding villages, at once! Call for aid!” 

It was in times like these that one understood why Nobunaga had left Maripas in command of the clan’s capital while he was gone. Even in completely unimaginable situations like this, he was able to regain his composure in short order and issue the proper commands to his subordinates. He was a man worthy of admiration. 

Even with his back up against a wall, he was able to exercise good judgment. 

He did so as if it were simply second nature to him, when it was, in fact, a most difficult thing to do. 

“They may be the Múspell Special Forces, but the city walls of Blíkjanda-Böl shall not be breached so easily! It shan’t be so difficult to hold out until our reinforcements arrive...” 

“S-Sir, the castle walls... have already been breached.” 

“Wha—?!” 

Maripas was struck speechless. He stared at the attendant with utter astonishment on his face. This situation was not only unimaginable, it was impossible. He was just now receiving his first report of the attack. 

In other words, less than one hour ago, the enemy started attacking the city. 

Despite how brief the period of time that had passed since their attack had begun, the walls of Blíkjanda-Böl had already been breached. Maripas couldn’t believe what he was hearing. 

“Is there a traitor in our midst?!” 

That was the only answer he could think of. A traitor who had snuck through the dark shadows of the night, opened the castle gates, and guided the enemy inside. 

That idea was certainly the most logical explanation of what had occurred, but the possibility was completely negated by the fact that— 

“No, sir. The enemy broke through the city walls and attacked us that way!” 

“Whaaaaaaaaat?!” 

Maripas’ jaw dropped so quickly and so sharply, it might as well have fallen off his face entirely. 

“Preposterous! The enemy broke through the city walls?!” 

“Y-Yes. The earlier commotion seems to have been related to their assault on the walls...” 

But how in the world could someone, mere humans, break through those massive walls in an instant as they had? 

The very idea was unthinkable. 

This time, the noise was much closer. 

The very ground under Maripas’ feet shook with the force of the assault. 

“Wh-What are those brutes doing to our city?!” Maripas screamed with a panicked edge to his voice. 

People are, after all, afraid of the unknown. 

And right then, something unknowable was definitely happening. Something that was most certainly extremely bad for the whole city. 

Bad though it may have been, they were still completely unaware of what, exactly, was happening. 

With no thought as to how his behavior might look to his subordinates, he let the fear he felt rising deep within him shake him. He could not stop the tremors. 

“I-I have news to report!” 

A new soldier hastened inside his chambers. 

“What is it this time?!” 

“The palace walls have been breached!” 

Not only had the outer walls which guarded the city itself been destroyed, but the walls guarding the palace had, too, been broken through. 

It was all happening too quickly. 

“How did they do this?!” 

“Th-The enemies have hurled massive boulders at the walls! They pulverized them, leaving not even a trace of our defenses still standing.” 

“Massive boulders?! Do our enemies have the mountain giants of legend among their ranks?!” 

“W-We do not know. But... it’s true, thrown boulders did pulverize our city!” 

“Oh no...” 

Maripas held his head in his hands. 

The situation unfolding was particularly unfortunate for him. He had been selected by Nobunaga for his skills as an administrator, not as a military leader. 

It made sense, given the fact he had been given control over territory that was far removed from the threat of any feasible enemy attack. 

His master, Nobunaga, had only asked that he ensure the capital’s government functioned smoothly while he was away, that he assessed the proper taxes on all crops, and that he continued to send weapons and provisions to the main Flame Clan forces while they were out on their campaign. 

It was because he was a politician—a civilian leader, as opposed to a military one—that he hadn’t been made privy to information concerning the boulder-throwing siege weapons the Steel Clan had invented. 

And yet, while Maripas was panicking about this new development, a new tumult of noise grew louder and louder. 

The enemy, it would seem, had infiltrated the palace proper. 

In the blink of an eye, the enemy had gotten closer and closer to where he stood. 

“A-Assemble all soldiers in the great hall, at once! We shall engage the enemy there!” 

The flustered Maripas gave his orders, and his attendants ran off to see them fulfilled. 

However, it was already far too late for any such action. 

It was only a few moments later when— 

“Sto—!” 

“Y-You shall not pa—” 

“Th-They’re too strong...!” 

“What are these... monsters?! Gah!” 

The final cries of the soldiers in the moments before they died began echoing through the doors of Maripas’ chamber. 

The enemy had made their way up to the palace’s most inner sanctum. 

With a loud bang, the chamber’s doors were kicked down, and through them came a band of fair and beautiful women. 

The entire sequence of events was too insane for Maripas to possibly comprehend. 

“Hah! This is clearly just a dream... Nothing more than a nightmareee!” 

Those were his last words.

“Blíkjanda-Böl has fallen, you say?!” 

It had been a little over two months since the siege of the Holy Capital of Glaðsheimr had begun. 

Nobunaga could hardly believe his ears upon hearing the report and let out a cry of surprise. 

He had certainly not expected this. Not at all. 

Despite just how experienced a warrior he was, he was still taken aback by this turn of events. 

It was a development that absolutely could not be allowed to happen. Nobunaga had done everything in his power to prevent it from occurring—or so he thought. 

“Impossible! What was Kuuga doing while this happened?!” 

In order to go from the Álfheimr region, where the Steel Clan was based, to the Múspelheim region, the home of the Flame Clan, it was necessary to pass through the Vanaheimr region. 

It was for this very reason that Nobunaga had deployed ten thousand troops to the northern reaches of Vanaheimr well before he had begun his siege on the Holy Capital. These troops were led by generals he trusted and were currently patrolling the former territory of the Lightning Clan, ready to prevent any attempt at a surprise assault on his home city by the enemy. 

Nobunaga, however, had not received any reports of these forces being defeated by the Wolf Clan, let alone any news of an attack by the Steel Clan. With the former Lightning Clan territory acting as a natural barrier between the Flame Clan lands and those of its enemies, there was certainly no way a force powerful enough to raze his capital could have made it through undetected. 

Yet in the midst of all this silence, he had received this report—that Blíkjanda-Böl had fallen. 

Truly, a bolt from the blue. 

“I don’t understand how this could happen. Just three days ago, Lord Kuuga sent word that nothing was out of the ordinary. What in the world could have happened since then...” 

Standing next to him, Ran was also frowning, his brow furrowed. 

Nobunaga was a man who firmly believed it was important to be quick to act. 

Naturally, he too employed a post station system much the same as Yuuto’s. The letter he’d received from Kuuga was dated as being written seven days ago. 

It took approximately two days to reach Nobunaga’s current location from Blíkjanda-Böl. 

In other words, if Bilskírnir had truly fallen, the Wolf Clan’s forces had marched across Vanaheimr and taken Blíkjanda-Böl in a mere five days. 

“There’s clearly something very strange about all this,” Nobunaga put a hand over his mouth, muttering to himself. 

The amount of information it could transmit was limited, but the Flame Clan also maintained a network of smoke signal fires that could be used to warn of such an attack. Word of an assault on Bilskírnir should have reached his ears by now. 

And yet, he’d heard nothing. 

Based on just the information he had at his disposal, he was able to deduce this: the Steel Clan’s forces had not passed through Vanaheimr, but had still somehow appeared quite suddenly at Blíkjanda-Böl. 

It was then that Nobunaga realized what had happened. 

“That’s it! They traveled by sea!” 

Nobunaga clapped a hand to his forehead. 

At this point, he was simply unable to imagine any other possibility. 

“That’s right—at that meeting, they said something about moving to a ‘new land,’ didn’t they? They were secretly preparing for this all along, then. Damn, we’ve been had.” 

This was an age in which it took centuries for technologies like steelmaking and vehicular transport to be transmitted from one country to the next. 

Nobunaga had sent spies to the major cities of Gimlé, Iárnvi?r, and Fólkvangr, but had no steady source of news from the other cities of his enemy’s realm. 

In all the battles the Steel Clan had fought up until now, they’d never used boats to transport their troops, or so the reports had claimed. There hadn’t even been any news of the Steel Clan constructing ships, for that matter. 

It was precisely because of this preconceived notion that such troop movements weren’t possible for them to pull off that he hadn’t prepared for this possibility, and that failure of imagination had been thoroughly exploited by his enemy. 

“Now I understand... Basically, those reinforcements were just a decoy designed to get us to direct our attention to Ásgarðr.” 

“So it would seem.” 

Ran spat in disgust, while Nobunaga merely nodded—his silent appreciation for the logic behind the strategy. 

When the Steel Clan’s reinforcements had simply failed to appear on the battlefield, Nobunaga had found the situation particularly suspicious. 

He knew that there was something off in the way the battle was—or rather, wasn’t—proceeding. 

Yuuto’s goal appeared not to be protecting the Holy Capital, but perhaps something else entirely. 

That had been the reason for the Steel Clan reinforcements’ presence out beyond the horizon—they had been there to reassure him that Yuuto was massing his troops around the Holy Capital, and also to prevent him from sending some of his own troops back to Blíkjanda-Böl in order to aid with its defense. 

The reason neither the forces inside the city nor the reinforcements stationed on the plains had moved, then, was not that they had been waiting for the opportune moment to strike. They had merely been placed there to buy time for the other operations going on simultaneously. 

In this siege, the more time that passed, the more advantageous the Flame Clan’s situation should become. That assumption had been so deeply buried into his mindset that Nobunaga hadn’t realized that he’d been lured into thinking precisely the way Yuuto wanted him to think. 

“That cheeky little brat!” 

Nobunaga was forced to admit that, once again, the tides of battle had been turned against him. 

The Flame Clan capital of Blíkjanda-Böl was, after all, the most important base of support for the fifty thousand Flame Clan soldiers currently attacking the Holy Capital. 

Surrounding Blíkjanda-Böl was the great grain-producing region that Nobunaga had spent ten years cultivating. The most recent winter wheat crop was almost ready to be harvested, in fact. If that land and its resources had been taken from him, it would be no exaggeration to say that the foundation of his army had been broken. 

Were the Flame Clan forces to continue their siege, the army that would starve first would not be the Steel Clan’s, but the Flame Clan’s. 

“Our next move is obvious. We must retreat for now.” 

His decision was immediate. 

Regardless of how favorable their current position may be, if they had lost the war, they needed to accept that reality without delay and act accordingly. 

It was, of course, easy to say as much, but it is human nature to be indecisive. Humans do tend to be worrywarts. 

In spite of that, Nobunaga was quick to cut through any hesitation he may have felt and made the quick, correct decision. This ability of Oda Nobunaga’s was truly his greatest and most fearsome quality.

“Father, the Flame Clan’s troops have begun their retreat.” 

“Finally.” 

Yuuto heaved a drawn-out sigh upon hearing Kristina’s report. 

Even for someone who’d already been through as much as Yuuto, these past two months had been particularly stressful for him. There was no telling when Yggdrasil would meet its end, after all. 

Despite how stressful the waiting had been, Yuuto hadn’t been able to think of any other way he could win. The constant unease and the weight of the practical decisions he had to make every day had threatened to drive him mad. 

“Looks like they’ve heard the news about the fall of Blíkjanda-Böl.” 

Yuuto had already heard about it himself via a carrier pigeon report sent from Sigrún. 

He’d been well prepared for dealing with the Flame Clan once they’d heard the news as well. 

All they had needed to do once the preparations were done, then, was to wait. 

“Kristina!” 

“Yes, Father?” 

“Inform the Vindálfs concealing themselves in the nearby clans that we’ve taken Blíkjanda-Böl and that the Flame Clan’s armies are retreating! Let Jörgen know that he is to make his move immediately.” 

“Very well, Father.” 

Quick and light as a breeze, Kristina vanished. Her disappearance was, of course, merely an illusion caused by her suppressing her presence, but it was a skillful shift all the same. 

“Felicia!” 

“Yes, Big Brother!” 

“Our troops are already in position, yes?” 

“Yes, Big Brother! All Steel Clan troops have gathered at the western gate, just as you ordered.” 

“Perfect!” 

Yuuto stood up so quickly that his seat almost tipped over, making his way out the door so rapidly his cloak flapped in the air. 

Exiting the palace, he boarded his favorite chariot and rode down the main street that led toward the western gate. Just as Felicia had said, standing there in tight formation were his twenty thousand troops, ready to carry out his commands at a moment’s notice. 

“Well done, men! You’ve endured the stresses of these past two months with grace!” 

Using the power of Gjallarhorn, the Call to War, which he had borrowed from Fagrahvél, the Sword Clan’s patriarch, to magnify his voice, Yuuto addressed his troops. 

While the power to magnify one’s voice was useful in its own way, this same rune’s power was used by Fagrahvél herself at the Battle of Vígríðr to turn the soldiers of the Anti-Steel Clan Alliance Army into fearless berserkers—an utterly terrifying prospect to be certain. There was little wonder that Gjallarhorn had come to be known as the Rune of Kings. 

“As I’m sure you’ve already heard, the Múspell Special Forces Unit, commanded by the Mánagarmr, Sigrún, has taken the capital of the Flame Clan, Blíkjanda-Böl!” 

“Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!” 

The cheers of the troops broke out in waves. 

They already knew what to expect for the battle to come. If they were going to have to fight anyway, they’d much rather win the battle and come home triumphant. 

Any news that would lighten their spirits before battle was welcomed by them with open arms. 

“The enemy has heard this news as well. Even now, they tremble with panic, and have begun their retreat! If we are to crush them, the time is now!” 

The cheers only grew louder as Yuuto continued to speak. 

“Lastly, I have a bit of personal news to share with you all... On this day, my second formal wife, Sigrdrífa, has given birth to our longed-for baby boy! This can be nothing but a good omen for the battle to come!” 

“Sieg þjóðann! Sieg þjóðann!” 

The troops were positively electric with excitement. 

It had been announced beforehand that should a boy be born, then that would be the day the troops moved out to face the enemy on the field. 

Using the sex of the newborn child as a method for deciding that sort of thing was rather like deciding one’s future by divining it from the cracks in a turtle’s shell when thrown into the fire, but no one could fault them for doing so—this was an era in which politics and religion were merely two sides of the same coin. 

Just before the battle began, the long-awaited successor of the empire’s ruler had been born. There could be no better sign of their good fortune. 

It pained Yuuto to involve his children in political machinations, but there was no margin for error in his battle with Nobunaga. Were he to fall, he now had a boy of his own blood to take the throne. 

“Men of the Steel Clan! We are marching out! Take all your anger and frustration at having been trapped within these walls these past two months and throw it all at the enemy!”

“Smoke signal confirmed. The Steel Clan Army has emerged from behind their city walls.” 

“That was fast, indeed. The lad is certainly of a different caliber than the peace-addled Asakura Yoshikage was,” Nobunaga said, letting slip words of admiration. 

He was, at that moment, recalling the battle at Kanegasaki. 

If I’m recalling this correctly, I was rather proud of how speedily and orderly we’d retreated from the battlefield, but our losses were surprisingly few not because of the discipline of our troops, but because the Asakura army had been so caught up in internal strife that they’d been slow to pursue us. 

Yoshikage hadn’t responded to Yoshiaki’s request for him to come to Kyoto, nor had he made any sort of decisive move in the siege. In any and every case, he was a man unable to act even when an opportunity presented itself. 

Nobunaga had, in one sense, been saved by this indecisiveness. 

If Takeda Shingen or Uesugi Kenshin had been on that battlefield on Echizen, at that point in the conflict, Nobunaga might very well have been brought to his knees before even establishing the siege. 

It wasn’t appropriate to compare Yuuto to a fool like Yoshikage, but relative to the latter’s indecisiveness, the young lad’s actions had been truly swift. 

Too swift, almost. 

“Smoke signals from the north, confirmed. The Sword Clan fort that ten thousand of the Steel Clan’s troops had been occupying appears to be showing signs of movement as well,” Ran said matter-of-factly, much like a receptionist might perhaps have spoken. 

Ran was a man that could remain calm and think clearly even under the most extreme stresses. That was why Nobunaga had been sure to keep him close by, and why he had taken such good care of him. There was no other person he could rely upon as thoroughly in a time of need like this. 

“I-Is that so? So their scheme is to trap us in a pincer attack, indeed...” 

“Judging from how obvious their movements are, he’s likely already requested assistance from the surrounding clans,” Ran stated, nary missing a beat in spite of his lord’s comments. 

“Likely indeed. In other words, he’s cornered us,” Nobunaga said, making obvious what the two both already knew at this point. 

“Yes, sir. Of course, Suoh Yuuto must be thinking the same,” Ran replied. 

“Just so. And there, Ran, is our opening for an attack.” 

The corners of Nobunaga’s mouth were upturned as a most fierce smile snaked its way across his lips. 

Nobunaga knew from experience that opportunity lurks in the midst of crisis. As the old saying went, “even in death, life can be found.” 

He had grasped the truth of this saying, and it was because of this that he’d been almost able to unite all of Japan under his rule. 

“Oho?” 

He looked down at what had fallen into the palm of his hand and laughed. 

It seemed that the heavens still counted Nobunaga as an ally. 

“This is a good omen indeed. We have already lost a good deal of ground, but now it is our turn to make a move of our own.” 

Normally, the Flame Clan would be forced to retreat, given the circumstances. There was simply nothing else they could do. 

Anyone who understood even the basics of military strategy would agree. 

And it is precisely because of the overpowering strength of those preconceptions concerning his next move that Nobunaga would be able to turn the tables. 

“Keh heh heh... Suoh Yuuto! You shall behold the power of the Demon King, Oda Nobunaga!”

Chill water broke in droplets against Yuuto’s cheeks as his forces advanced. He put one hand against his cheek, looked up, and saw the sky completely full of dark clouds. 

No sooner had he done this did another drop of water bead across his face. 

“Rain, huh...” 

Watching the droplets fall onto the palm of his hand, Yuuto frowned in disgust. 

His was the face of a man who had been to war dozens of times before. He had both marched and fought in downpours. He wasn’t about to mind getting wet at this point. 

The rain itself was of no particular concern to him—he was bothered about something else entirely. 

“Dammit, it’s really started to fall. It doesn’t look like it’s going to let up any time soon, either.” 

In mere moments, the rain was falling everywhere, as far as the eye could see. It had become quite the rainstorm. 

“The timing couldn’t possibly be any worse. This’ll cause some real havoc for our pursuit.” 

Heavy rain often made it much harder to see, garments and armor would become wet and chilly, and it also became much more likely for troops to come down with some form of illness. 

There’d been a theory that, rather than enemy soldiers, it had been disease that had killed most troops throughout ancient and medieval history. 

With weather like this, Yuuto would usually have his troops set up tarps to shelter them from the rain and have them gather close together to conserve their body heat—but if he had them do that now, they’d very likely miss their chance to crush the Flame Clan. 

“Big Brother, how shall we proceed?” 

“I feel bad for the troops, but we can’t let up our pursuit. We’re up against Nobunaga, after all. If we don’t hit him hard here and now, we may never get another opportunity to do so.” 

Yuuto’s plan had worked well, but he was in no mood to be smug. 

Nine times out of ten, Nobunaga would beat him on the battlefield. 

He just happened to have gotten lucky that this time was the rare case in which he’d won—or so he thought. 

That’s why he wanted to beat Nobunaga quite decisively here, so that no further battles with the man would soon be forced upon him. 

“Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure it rained at Okehazama as well, didn’t it?” 

Perhaps because his opponent was Oda Nobunaga, Yuuto happened to recall that bit of history. 

Oda Nobunaga had crushed the twenty-five thousand strong army of Imagawa Yoshimoto, who was said to be the greatest general in all of Tokaido, with a mere three thousand troops. The battle was one of the three most famous ambushes in Japanese history. 

It had been this victory that had raised the name of Oda Nobunaga to national prominence. Using the outcome as an opportunity for yet more conquest, Nobunaga had launched his invasions of Mino and Ise, rapidly expanding the range of his territory. 

“This time, however, we’ll be the ones launching a surprise attack on you, Nobunaga,” said Yuuto, chuckling. 

From that point of view, it was actually lucky that the rain was falling. After all, that meant the Flame Clan’s many tanegashima couldn’t be used. 

Yuuto honestly believed that the gods had granted him their blessings. 

Unfortunately for him, however, he didn’t yet know the truth. 

He had studied a good number of Nobunaga’s philosophies on various subjects such as tactics, politics, diplomacy, and logical thinking. He hadn’t, however, studied anything relating to Nobunaga’s interest in the occult. 

A certain novelist had once given Nobunaga a special name, considering that whenever there was a turning point in his battles, it had always been raining. Yuuto, of course, had been born in a time where few read this novelist anymore so he couldn’t possibly have known, but the name had been thus: 

“The General of the Rainy Season.” 

If he had known of this, he might have sensed the foreboding outcome that awaited him on the battlefield and given up his pursuit, instead returning to the Holy Capital. It was also possible that he might have been unable to completely rid himself of the suspicion that this sudden rainstorm hadn’t been coincidental at all. 

Even so, presented with an opportunity like this, the correct course of action was to pursue his enemy. It would be stupid not to. 

For that reason, Yuuto made the unfortunate decision to follow through with his original plan. He had been forced to do so by how inviting the opportunity was.

The rain fell harder... 

Some time had passed since he had decided to continue his pursuit. The transceiver in his hand buzzed. 

“Father, we’re in trouble. We must prepare for battle immediately! The main Flame Clan force is charging straight toward us!” 

“Wha—?!” 

The report he’d just received from Kristina, who was currently acting as one of his scouts, left him utterly stunned. 

Rain may have been falling all around him, but this was, truly, a bolt from the blue. 

“It’s not just their rear guard charging, is it?!” 

“Not at all! It’s the entire army!” 

“No way... That’s impossible...!” 

The Flame Clan’s army should be collapsing with the weight of their loss of their capital, Blíkjanda-Böl. 

Now that the scales had tipped in the Steel Clan’s favor, the surrounding clans would also join the Steel Clan’s offensive against the Flame Clan’s army. Anyone could see that. They clearly needed to retreat from the battlefield as soon as possible in order to return to their capital. 

And yet, despite all that had occurred, the Flame Clan’s army had reoriented to face the pursuing Steel Clan forces and had begun charging right at them. It was nothing short of madness. 

If Yuuto didn’t deal with this appropriately, the Steel Clan forces were in serious danger of being surrounded and thus annihilated. 

It was precisely because the Flame Clan’s actions were borderline insane that Yuuto had been rendered speechless by the unexpected development. 

“Please hurry. Not only was my discovery delayed by the rain, but the enemy is moving fast!” Kristina yelled in a panicked tone over the transceiver. 

“Damn! All soldiers, assume battle formations at once! The enemy is coming!” 

Yuuto clicked his tongue in frustration and hastily gave orders. 

However, commanding his men to do something did not necessarily mean that they were in a state to follow those orders. 

The long columns of marching troops had essentially formed a snaking queue to make their way onto the battlefield. Getting that line of troops to maneuver themselves into an adequate battle formation would take a fair amount of time. 

If this had been the Steel Clan Army that had fought at the Battle of Vígríðr, they might have just barely gotten into formation in time, but more than half the soldiers in the current Steel Clan Army had troops from newer clans mixed in. They hadn’t progressed very far in their training in the short time since they’d joined. 

“Yes, Reginarch!” 

Still unprepared for the onslaught of enemy soldiers, a battle cry was heard ringing out ahead of them. It was here and now that the curtain would finally fall on the battle between the Steel and Flame clans.

The Flame Clan forces that the Steel Clan Army found itself presented with wielded long spears of an unusual size and their forces were lined up such that not a single gap could be found even in their flanks. 

The Steel Clan soldiers were trying to hide themselves behind their shields, but there were simply too many enemy spearmen. 

Several of the soldiers’ shields were inevitably pierced through, leaving the men wounded or worse—they fell to the ground and sunk into the swampy mud below them. 

“Damn, I really didn’t expect them to give us this much trouble as enemies.” 

Skáviðr, who was commanding the troops at the front line, unconsciously cursed the events unfolding around him. 

The use of long spears to create a phalanx formation had been a unique specialty of the Steel Clan’s. 

Now, however, the hearts of the Steel Clan’s soldiers were full of unease, their ranks were in disarray, and their movements were uneven. 

All this made it impossible for them to stand together as one. As such, they were getting crushed left and right. 

“Don’t give into panic! Get into your formations! If we keep our heads, we Steel Clan soldiers cannot lose!” 

Skáviðr gave his orders and attempted to invigorate his troops, but his words had little effect. 

His words, after all, were those of the Steel Clan’s very own “reaper of death”, Ní?h?ggr, the Sneering Slaughter. 

His troops would normally quake with fear and obey his commands, but today it seemed that his scolds were falling on deaf ears. 

“Gahh!” 

“Aghh!” 

“Ahhh!” 

While Skáviðr stood by watching, screams of fatal agony arose from his troops. 

“Damn... This is bad.” 

Low enough so that no one else could hear, Skáviðr cursed once again. 

This unexpected charge by the Flame Clan was extremely unwelcome. 

Wars are won and lost by momentum. If the Steel Clan kept getting pushed back like this, the literal movements of the troops would turn the tides of the battle. 

Once that happened, troop morale would fall off a cliff, and it would be impossible to reverse their losses. Not even Yuuto, who seemed to come up with one god-like tactic after another, would be able to think of a way out of this. 

“If this rain continues as it is, then there’s no way we’ll be able to use our firearms, or even our bows, for that matter.” 

Skáviðr glared up at the sky as it continued to pelt him with rain. 

Before the battle, Yuuto had said that the Steel Clan’s advantage over the Flame Clan had been their bows. 

Because of the current storm, however, bows, strings, and arrow feathers had been soaked through, leading to a much different turn of events than Yuuto had planned for. 

Everything they carried and wore had become heavy, and the streaks of pouring rain threatened to drown soldiers with each new shower that fell. 

The rains reduced the range of their bows considerably, in addition to throwing off their aim. 

Setting Yuuto aside for the moment—if he were to take command over all Steel Clan forces, how would he get the troops to regroup? 

Right as he was considering that idea— 

“Huh?!” 

His spirits were suddenly uplifted, and he felt strength welling up from somewhere deep inside his body. 

At first he thought it was merely the crazed energy of a fool caught inside a fire, but it wasn’t quite like that. It was almost as if something outside of him had lifted his spirits. He couldn’t shake the feeling that his feelings weren’t entirely his own. 

A fierce, animal-like roar erupted from the army. 

The soldiers, who had just a moment ago appeared ready to be swallowed up by the enemy, now had bloodshot eyes, looking like cannibalistic fiends as they charged fearlessly into the Flame Clan forces. 

The crisis had been averted, but something strange was clearly happening. 

Still, that was no reason not to take advantage of the opportunity that had presented itself to him. 

“Right, we’re pushing them back! All units, attack!”

“Whew. Guess we’ll manage to hold out against them... for now.” 

At the encampment that had been set up for the main Steel Clan forces, Yuuto slumped down onto the ground and let out a long sigh. 

To be perfectly honest, they’d been in a rather tight situation just now. 

If it hadn’t been for her, he wouldn’t have been able to do anything at all, and his forces would have been swept away by a landslide of Flame Clan soldiers. 

“It’s times like these that I remember just how terrifying war can be. You really helped me out there, Fagrahvél.” 

Yuuto turned around to face the blonde beauty behind him and thanked her from the depths of his heart. 

The rune Fagrahvél bore—Gjallarhorn, the Call to War—boosted the morale of one’s troops and was also capable of bringing out their latent abilities. 

The fact that using it had resulted in being able to instantly turn the tide of battle showed that its effectiveness on the battlefield was truly awesome. 

Honestly, still having her as an opponent would be utterly terrifying. I’m so glad that she’s one of my most reliable allies now. It’s no wonder everyone called her rune the Rune of Kings... Yuuto thought to himself. 

“I am... just glad to hear... that my power... was useful...” 

Or so Fagrahvél tried to say, her lungs heaving as she spoke with a strained voice. 

Her forehead was covered with beads of sweat, and she looked to be struggling immensely to do even as much as speak. 

“Ah—don’t force yourself to talk. Focus on the spell.” 

Yuuto panicked a bit once he’d realized how distracting he’d been, flailing his arms around as if to wave away the conversation. 

Fagrahvél’s rune was overwhelmingly powerful, but it wasn’t without its weakness. 

The more soldiers in one army, the more intensely using the rune drained its bearer of all stamina; it was a double-edged sword. 

Placing its effects upon all twenty thousand troops in the Steel Clan’s main force seemed like it would be quite impossible, just as he’d expected. 

“Ah... About that... To be honest... I’ve already... hit my limit... Just one moment... is all I can manage without preparing...” 

“That so? Two hours... huh.” 

This application of her rune’s powers had lasted a much shorter amount of time than when she had used it against Yuuto atVígríðr, and the difference had shocked him—but all the same, he understood why that was. 

The ritual that had allowed Yuuto to be summoned to Yggdrasil using the seiðr Gleipnir required special offerings, as well as magical tools to channel one’s ásmegin into a more concentrated form. 

Additionally, the casters of the seiðr—Felicia and Mitsuki—had spent much time carrying out ritual purification and also partook in meditation sessions in an attempt to hone their powers of concentration to the extreme. 

All that preparation was done in order to cast that one spell. 

In a situation like this, where he’d asked for her to use her rune’s power quite suddenly, there would of course be limits as to how effective the spell could be. 

“In those two hours, we’ll have to regroup and gain whatever advantage we can.” 

He looked out at the Flame Clan army in the distance and balled up his fists tightly. 

Without Fagrahvél’s cheat ability, they wouldn’t have made it out alive. 

In other words, even though he’d been blessed with the good fortune of a brutal rainstorm—as a general, Yuuto had lost to Nobunaga. 

Completely and utterly. 

“He’s one hell of an old man, that’s for sure.” 

A man who had almost succeeded in uniting all of Japan under his rule was of course going to be an altogether different type of person. 

“To be a soldier is to be deceptive.” 

Yuuto felt as though he’d been shown the truth of that saying. 

It was precisely because he had done something so unexpected that the enemy had been able to outsmart him. 

Knowing how something was done, however, was very different from doing it yourself. 

He had learned that lesson quite thoroughly in the do-or-die situation he’d scraped through just moments ago. 

He couldn’t help but be amazed at the boldness of his enemy. 

The Steel Clan had managed to survive the onslaught of the first attack, but that hadn’t changed the fact that they were at a disadvantage on the battlefield. 

He had to pull his troops together and get them to face the enemy once more, as soldiers.

Watching the Steel Clan Army making a comeback, Nobunaga’s eyes widened. He let out a sigh of admiration as he watched the battle progress. 

“Oho, not as much as a pushover as I’d thought. The boy can fight.” 

Nobunaga had almost perfectly been able to hit the Steel Clan at their weakest point. 

Just a few moments ago, the Steel Clan soldiers had been quaking in their boots in the face of the oncoming Flame Clan soldiers—they had been in absolutely no condition to fight. 

Even for Nobunaga, getting his soldiers to recover from that state of mind would have been extremely difficult. 

“There’s something that feels a bit strange about the sudden shift in their attitudes. Based on the reports, it seems like the Steel Clan soldiers are behaving rather unusually. The whole situation reeks of that divine power unique to this world—ásmegin. How abhorrent.” 

Nobunaga’s Second-in-Command, Ran, frowned and spat as he said this. 

As a practical and rational man, he despised galdr, alchemy, and all other sorts of suspect mysticism. 

Nobunaga let out a harsh laugh at Ran’s obvious disgust. 

“Obstinate as always, aren’t you?” 

“You’re the one who too easily lends your ear to stories of such magics, my lord. Without those odd spells, victory would be ours already.” 

“Haha! Such trouble is unavoidable. It is pointless to deny that which exists.” 

“But sir...” 

“In order to win, one must use everything at one’s disposal, no? That impudent brat has played the ace up his sleeve, nothing more. The wisdom he and I share is unusual in this world, is it not? We come to the battlefield with the same advantages,” Nobunaga said in a very matter-of-fact manner. 

It was this conversation that truly showed the difference in life experience between Ran, who had only come to serve the Nobunaga family after almost all its enemies had been vanquished, and Nobunaga himself, who had made it through many dangerous situations in which he’d been at serious risk of losing everything. 

Victory wins all, and defeat loses everything. 

It was for this very reason that a general must win by any means necessary, no matter the consequences. Even if that meant him being called a dog, a swine, or worse for the methods he employed. 

Nobunaga knew this well. 

“My lord! I carry a message from Lord Shiba! The enemy’s advance is pushing further into our ranks, and he requests immediate assistance!” 

“Oh my! Even the brave Shiba cannot stop their advance! Keh... This is what I’ve longed for. A war hasn’t truly begun until you can feel the tension of battle sting your spine!” 

With a ferocious grin on his face, bloodlust began to steam out of Nobunaga’s every pore. 

“Only by surviving each day by the skin of one’s teeth can the light of meaning shine through.” 

At least, that was Nobunaga’s philosophy. 

And now, he’d finally found the opponent that would actually force him to “survive by the skin of his teeth.” 

Of course he was going to get excited about this prospect. 

“Ran! I’m heading out! Soldiers, follow me!” 

Nobunaga jumped onto his horse’s saddle and whipped the horse to urge it forward. 

His movements were completely fluid, agile even—he showed no signs of being over sixty years old. 

Nobunaga headed towards the place where Shiba’s unit was under attack. 

While he installed some of his fiercest generals at the front lines of the army, he was driving his horse in and out of the ranks of his main host, rousing his fighting troops, moving the army as if they were his own arms and legs. 

It was terribly dangerous for him to do so (and Nobunaga had actually suffered a not-insignificant number of injuries when carrying out this practice), but the risks involved in a clan’s patriarch getting that close to the front lines were worth the reward: his presence had a tremendous effect on the morale of his troops. He was also able to receive detailed information and give specific orders concerning further troop movements. 

Oddly enough, it was said that Alexander the Great had also preferred to fight on the frontlines to encourage his troops. A great ruler should fight alongside his men, after all.

An hour had quickly passed by since the opening of hostilities. 

During that time, the Steel and Flame Clan armies had each alternated between attacking and defending—the tides of battle moved one side to advance, the other to retreat, and back again, on and on. 

Currently, the ones pressing the attack were the Steel Clan soldiers. Even so, Yuuto’s heart was full of unease at the way the battle was progressing. 

“Damn, that old man is a real monster...!” 

A patriarch must not show weakness in front of his men. He knew that, but he was still unable to refrain from spitting in disgust at the latest enemy maneuvers. 

“Our troops are a whole lot stronger, that’s for sure.” 

The reason for that? They had used the power of Fagrahvél’s rune—Gjallarhorn, the Call to War—to turn them into fearless war heroes. He’d basically had his own soldiers drugged to enhance their abilities. 

“Our units should be much quicker to coordinate and react to developments on the battlefield now.” 

Not to mention the fact that he was quite frankly cheating by coordinating with his subordinates via his transceiver. His enemies certainly didn’t have those at their disposal. 

In spite of all those advantages though, the Steel Clan still wasn’t able to completely overwhelm the Flame Clan forces. 

Even against the Steel Clan soldiers, who were filled with a crazed bloodlust, the Flame Clan’s men still held firm and fought just as hard as before. 

They followed Nobunaga’s orders to the letter, and did so without hesitation. 

The difference between their two armies illustrated the difference between an army made of conscripted farmers versus one composed of professional soldiers. 

Then there was Nobunaga himself—he truly embodied the old words used to describe a capable commander: “Better quick and rough than slow and careful.” 

If pushed, pull back; if your formations were near collapse, reinforce them with additional soldiers and go back on the offensive. 

He saw every weakness in the Steel Clan’s front lines and immediately sent his soldiers to penetrate those weaknesses. 

Not only was he “quick and rough,” but he moved his forces so quickly it was almost as if he had the gift of true foresight—every move he made was precisely the right one. 

Most likely, his skills as a commander came from the fact that he brought decades of experience with him on the battlefield. All those fights had surely sharpened his intuition to the point where it was practically god-like. 

To put it bluntly, Yuuto wasn’t able to say he had claimed the high ground in this battle. He had just pushed his troops forward, and they were being pushed back just as hard. At best, he could describe the current situation as one where they were evenly matched. 

“It’s gonna end pretty badly at this rate...” 

There was the two-hour time limit on the effects of Gjallarhorn, and once its magic wore off, who knew what would happen then... 

Just thinking about it gave Yuuto the shivers. 

“What do I do... What do I do...?!” 

Yuuto’s mind raced as he tried to think of a good idea, but he came up with absolutely nothing. 

In times like these, he often used his elite band of raiders to turn the tide of battle. With their ability to quickly move around the battlefield, they were able to disrupt the enemy before they had time to react. 

But the Múspell Special Forces Unit was currently in Helheim, far away from Ásgarðr. The Independent Cavalry Regiment led by Hveðrungr had been nearly destroyed in the previous battle, and Hveðrungr himself still bore serious, unhealed wounds on his arms and legs. Yuuto had had no choice but to leave him back in the Holy Capital. 

“Oh! That’s right! Jörgen! I’ve got Jörgen’s units too!” 

Yuuto was suddenly reminded of the existence of his reinforcement units, and he clenched his fists with anticipation. 

Upon marching out of the Holy Capital, he had already given the order to Jörgen that he was to attack the Flame Clan forces. 

The original plan had been for Yuuto to take the brunt of the enemy attack using the main host, while the reinforcements led by Jörgen assaulted the Flame Clan forces from the rear. 

He had felt so cornered by everything that had been going on that he had forgotten his own plans. 

The sheer pressure induced by having to face off against a man as great as Nobunaga was completely overwhelming him. 

“Even if we can’t beat him ourselves, as long as we maintain our front lines, Jörgen will eventually be able to hit them from behind. We’ve just got to hold out until then...” 

Unexpectedly, Yuuto heard a burst of static erupt from the transceiver fixed to his waist. 

For some reason, he had a bad feeling about what was going to happen next, and his gut was usually right about these sorts of things. 

“þjóðann, we’re in trouble!” 

A panicked voice pierced his ears with its urgency. 

Though the voice was shrill, it sounded familiar. 

It belonged to Rikka, one of Kristina’s spies who had been assigned to handle communications between units on the left flank. 

“The enemy reinforcements are coming right for us! In huge numbers!” 

“Wh-What?! It can’t be...!” 

Upon hearing those words, Yuuto finally realized that he had been gravely mistaken. 

Nobunaga had initially been forced to retreat because Yuuto had assaulted Blíkjanda-Böl. Yuuto had thought that this sudden shifting in positions and subsequent attack by Nobunaga had been motivated by a desire to make the retreat as successful as possible. 

He couldn’t have been more wrong. 

Nobunaga hadn’t retreated at all. 

He had pretended to act just as Yuuto had planned for him to, and lured him out onto the battlefield. 

That was the only explanation for the situation. There was no other way that enemy reinforcements could have arrived at the western gate this early in the battle otherwise. 

Nobunaga had ordered the soldiers who had been stationed within the siege castle near the western gate not to retreat, but rather to assault the Steel Clan soldiers emerging from behind the city walls. 

“Just as Sun Tzu said, ‘The most important way to get the enemy to move in the way you want is by making their leader think they have the advantage. The most important way to get the enemy to stop in their tracks is by making them think they are at a disadvantage.’” 

The words of Sun Tzu echoed faintly in the back of Yuuto’s mind. 

“The man who makes an enemy go in a certain direction has done so because he has shown the enemy can profit from such a move,” is what those words meant. 

Yuuto had taken the bait offered by Nobunaga. 

He knew the trick. 

He had known all too well, but still... 

“This is way too crazy of a move, even for him!” 

Full of indignation, Yuuto slammed his fists against the edge of the chariot. 

The enemy had few provisions remaining after their long siege of the Holy Capital, not to mention the stemmed flow as a result of the capture of their own capital. If Yuuto hadn’t led the charge into battle, they would have been surrounded by the other clans’ forces and cut off from their supply chains. 

If they had made even one wrong move, they would have risked utter annihilation. 

On the other hand, Yuuto had known that in the situation he had been presented with, he would have always chosen to press the attack. 

Nobunaga must’ve known that too. That was why he had chosen to undertake such a risky maneuver. 

“Ugh! This is awful! A total defeat! Damn it all!” 

Yuuto scratched the back of his head in irritation and kicked the edge of the chariot. 

Ever since he had left the Holy Capital, all the way up until now, he had acted exactly as Nobunaga had wanted him to. 

“B-Big Brother?!” 

“There’s only one option left to us now,” Yuuto stated calmly, in stark contrast to the nearby Felicia who was in a complete panic. 

The fact that he had been so thoroughly played by Nobunaga had actually invigorated him and allowed him to cut away from his anxiety and doubt entirely. 

The overall momentum of the battle had been decided. The possibility of a Steel Clan victory was nearly zero. 

With that in mind, there was only one order any good leader could give his men: 

“Discretion is the better part of valor—we’re running away!”

“Whew, we somehow managed to win.” 

Nobunaga let out a long sigh as he watched the Steel Clan forces make their retreat. The burning bloodlust in his heart slowly fizzled away. 

If you were to simply look at how things had turned out, Nobunaga had clearly won this battle—but he’d been pushed to his absolute limit to pull off that victory, and it had certainly not been easy. 

In all actuality, he’d won by only the thinnest of margins. 

“He’s a fighter that lives up to his reputation. Who knows how this battle might have turned out if we had commanded the same number of soldiers.” 

The Steel Clan’s standing army was made up of twenty thousand troops, while the main Flame Clan force that Nobunaga commanded was thirty-thousand strong, but if the reinforcements stationed at the siege castle outside the Holy Capital’s western gate—a force numbering ten thousand itself—were included too, then his force was easily twice the size of his enemy’s. 

The most striking moment of the whole battle had been the sudden surge from the Steel Clan forces as they took the offensive. 

Not only had they suddenly gained huge momentum, but their movements had been perfectly accurate. 

It was only because the Flame Clan’s troop numbers had been overwhelmingly larger that they’d been able to endure the attack. 

Even so, war was no game. 

A commander had to use everything at their disposal in order to seize victory—in order to win the deathmatch that was war. 

There was nothing cowardly in doing so. 

The whole point was to send more soldiers out into the battlefield than your enemy did. It was the most basic tenet of strategy. 

“He was quick to retreat as well, wasn’t he? Almost too quick, don’t you think?” 

His Second-in-Command, Ran, sounded disappointed as he glared after the retreating Steel Clan forces. 

If they had delayed their retreat just a few moments more, the Flame Clan reinforcements at the western gate would have assaulted the Steel Clan’s flank, ensuring a total collapse of their forces. 

“One of the characteristics necessary to become a great general is the ability to make quick and accurate judgments. The boy continues to amuse me, indeed.” 

They had hit the Steel Clan’s army quite hard... but even so, they had themselves avoided a fatal blow by only the slimmest of margins. 

That was how Nobunaga would have described the current battle. 

That “slim margin,” however, made all the difference. The contrast between those who could win a battle and those who could not was as stark as the distinction between day and night. This was true and present wherever one fought. 

In other words, Nobunaga had confirmed in this battle that Suoh Yuuto had that special quality—he was one of the winners. 

“But I’m not kind enough to just let you run away like that, lad! Ran! Command all units to press the attack! I shall grant a kingdom to the soldier who brings me the lad’s head!” 

“That’s extremely generous of you, sir.” 

Ran’s eyes opened wide at Nobunaga’s order. 

Sure, capturing the enemy commander would be quite a glorious achievement, but a whole kingdom? Surely that was too much. 

“If we let him slip away from us here, we shall find ourselves in danger again before long.” 

Ran went pale and shivered when he heard the ice in Nobunaga’s tone. 

It was truly just as he had said. 

The Flame Clan forces were still surrounded by the warriors of the surrounding clans. Nothing had changed about that. 

As long as they remained unable to control the þjóðann, they wouldn’t be able to solve their other problems. The future of the Flame Clan very much rested on whether they were going to be able to capture Suoh Yuuto or not. His fate would decide their own. 

Even with the stakes being what they were, and in the midst of all the fighting, Nobunaga never forgot his sense of humor or lost his nerve. 

His face lifted into a smile as he said, “Now then! It’s time for a game of tag!”

From behind him rung out the agonizing cries and shouts from his soldiers. 

The pain they felt was palpable. Yuuto, too, could feel it. He bit his lower lip in frustration and his heart tightened with every scream. 

“I’m sorry, everyone...” 

The guilt washed over him in waves. 

He felt as though each anguished cry he heard was the result of a personal mistake he had made on the battlefield. 

“Big Brother, don’t let it trouble you so deeply. Both victory and defeat are constant companions of all those who venture into war.” 

“I know that, but I just can’t help but feel solely responsible for this...” 

“Not a single one of the great generals died undefeated—did you not tell me that yourself, all those years ago?” 

“Well, sure, that’s true, but still...” 

“There was simply nothing else you could do this time around.” 

“......” 

Yuuto was glad to have Felicia there to comfort him, but her words did not reach his heart. 

He could understand the truth of what she was saying, but that didn’t change how he felt. 

He’d been able to remain calm when deciding to issue the order for the Steel Clan’s retreat, but the screams of his wounded soldiers were tearing him up inside. 

Shoulda, woulda, coulda. 

If only I had done this, if only I had done that— 

I might have saved all those people. 

They might have left this battlefield alive. 

Yuuto couldn’t stop those regrets from circling about his mind, from haunting his heart. 

“Right... Um... Big Brother, forgive me.” 

“Hm?” 

Right around the time when Yuuto was wondering why Felicia’s voice sounded unusually low and stern, it happened... 

Bam! 

For a moment, he had no idea what had just happened. 

Very soon, he felt the stinging pain surge through his left cheek. Belatedly, he realized that he’d just been slapped across the face. 

“Fe...licia...?” 

His mind a complete blank, Yuuto called out her name. 

Felicia glared at him with a stern expression on her face. 

“Get a grip, Big Brother! This is war! We have no time for regrets or sorrows! Don’t you have other things you should be thinking about right now?!” she yelled. 

“—!” 

Yuuto was completely caught off guard by her sharp words. 

He started to feel embarrassed about how stupid he was being. He clenched his fists and, without further ado, punched his own forehead. 

“Big Brother?!” 

Felicia let out a cry of concern. 

Her earlier sternness had completely disappeared, and now she looked flustered and worried. Yuuto couldn’t help but sputter in surprise. 

With a tone that sounded more relieved than anything else, he said, “Thanks, Felicia. You really brought me back to my senses. I needed that.” 

She was totally right. There would be time for regrets and sorrows later on. There was something else he had to do right now. 

His forehead and cheek were still throbbing with pain, but his mind had cleared. That slap had batted away many of the feelings he’d allowed to distract him. 

“The first problem we need to deal with is this rain. Let’s get off this chariot and switch to our horses.” 

Yuuto stroked his chin with his hand as he went into overdrive trying to think of the best way to proceed. 

Since the ground was so completely soaked by the rain, the chariot wasn’t able to move very quickly at all. If anything, it ran a very real risk of getting stuck in the mud. 

He’d been using it ever since he became patriarch. He was rather attached to it, but it wasn’t as if he valued it more than his life. 

“Fortunately enough for us, I suppose, is the fact that the Holy Capital isn’t that far away. If we manage to retreat back to the castle, we’ll be able to regroup into our battle formations. The problem there, however, is the fact that the Flame Clan’s equipment is lighter than the Steel Clan’s. Because of that, they’re a bit faster on foot than we are. Hm, what to do...” 

“Back to the Yuuto I know and love, I see,” Felicia said warmly. 

“All thanks to you. Still, I’ve gotta admit... I sure never thought you, of all people, would hit me like that.” 

“Oh dear, have you lost your affection for me?” 

“Nah, I’ve fallen in love with you all over again. You’re the perfect adjutant, and the best woman.” 

“Ah... I see...” 

Felicia had a reputation to uphold, and she was lost as to how to respond to these overly affectionate comments that Yuuto was laying upon her. She found herself unable to do much more than mumble and blush at the compliments. 

She was so cute that he wanted to hold her in his arms right then and there, but that would have to wait until they both made it home—alive.

A certain man was, at this moment, at the very rear of the line of fleeing Steel Clan soldiers. 

He’d been fighting at the front lines, so it only made sense that he ended up being at the back when they began their retreat. 

The man was, thankfully, accompanied by his faithful equine partner. If he were to mount his horse, he would have been able to flee far faster than the others. 

He elected, however, not to do so. 

It was perhaps worth noting that the enemy was unusually quick in their pursuit. 

The man had participated in a feigned retreat back when he’d been fighting against the Lightning Clan Army, but the Flame Clan’s pursuit was much faster than theirs had been. 

He’d felt it while fighting these Flame Clan soldiers—they’d gone through fairly rigorous training. 

However, when he’d done battle with the Lightning Clan, they’d left a vast amount of highly valuable iron weapons lying on the ground to distract the enemy soldiers as they made their retreat. 

They didn’t have expensive weapons they could just drop at the enemy’s feet this time, though. At this rate, the Steel Clan’s losses would end up being quite significant. 

If nothing changed, their plans for uniting all the clans under the rule of the þjóðann might very well become impossible. 

If things went really bad, his liege might end up in the hands of those pursuing them right now. 

Someone, somehow, absolutely needed to stop the enemy’s advance, and he’d made up his mind quite some time ago that the one to do so would be him. 

That choice had been made from the day that the boy had miraculously saved Iárnvi?r. He’d determined that his life was meant to be lived in service of his liege. 

The man being described was none other than Skáviðr. He looked down at his subordinates below and asked them a life-changing question. 

“Suicide Squad! Are you ready to die?” 

The Suicide Squad was a unit that he had formed in secret, without Yuuto’s knowledge. 

They were approximately five hundred in number. Not many, to be sure, but he had hand-picked them. They were the cream of the crop. 

“Yes, sir!” 

The soldiers responded in perfect unison. 

Just as their voices were united, so were their hearts—not a single individual showed even the slightest trace of fear. 

This much was to be expected. After all, the criteria for joining the Suicide Squad had been not the strength of their arms, but the fierceness of their hearts. 

Would they be willing to, with a smile on their faces, die for their comrades? 

Yes. These soldiers would. 

Should their army be thrust into a perilous situation, they would throw their own lives away in service of their lord. 

And now, that time had come. 

At no point did Skáviðr doubt Yuuto’s abilities as a commander. 

Even if the Steel Clan were to suffer a complete defeat, Skáviðr’s faith in and admiration of Yuuto would remain absolutely unshakeable and undiminished. 

Skáviðr had experienced it for himself, after all. When people take the seeds of failure and plant them, they are most capable of growth. 

Skáviðr also knew that the boy’s spirit was immensely strong, that he possessed a great amount of ambition and strived to improve himself, and most importantly, that a defeat like this one would only serve to fuel his desire to become even stronger. 

Yuuto was not the sort of young man whose brilliance would vanish with a single defeat. His strength was not so fragile. 

From the seeds of this defeat, the boy would become stronger in body, mind, and spirit. He would grow greatly from this experience, of that there was no doubt. 

With all that in mind, he knew there was but one thing for him to do... He had to become the shield for that boy so that this defeat would not result in his life being taken as well. 

He needed to sacrifice himself for the people of the Steel Clan—no, for all the peoples of Yggdrasil. He also needed to save the lives of as many of Yuuto’s soldiers as he could. 

It was with this determination that Skáviðr had formed the Suicide Squad, in the unlikely event it would be necessary. 

Skáviðr slid his sword from his sheath and yelled, “Suicide Squad, hear me! Now is the time for you to give your lives for the Steel Clan! You must throw away your humanity! You must become slaughtering gods of death! Attack!”

“Gahh!” 

“Ahh!” 

“Gwahh!” 

“Th-Three soldiers, all at the same time...?! This bastard’s way too strong—ngh!” 

“Wh-What’s this guy’s deal—gah!” 

Standing before the panicked Flame Clan soldiers was a man who could only be described as some kind of God of Death. 

His skin was a pale whitish-blue, giving him the appearance of a ghost. 

He was too thin, his cheeks were hollow, and all those who looked upon him shivered with fear. 

Only his eyes looked alive. They were as sharp as a hawk’s, and the aura he possessed was that of someone looking to cause some trouble. 

In every sense, it felt as though his very presence was rather ominous indeed. 

He wasn’t just going to stand there being foreboding, though... 

“Ha—!” 

“Uwa—!” 

Another, then another, felled by the sword of the God of Death. The lives of Flame Clan soldiers were being taken at an incredible pace. 

It was also very clear to any observer that this guy was strong. He was an Einherjar, after all. 

If anything, it would have been too strange if he wasn’t one. Even so, he was much stronger than your average Einherjar. 

The man let out an animalistic roar as he led his bloodthirsty soldiers into battle, not a single one of them fearing death. 

To put it bluntly, there was no stopping them. 

“Take care not to let them get too close! Spears at the ready! Impale them! Let none live!” 

The apparent commander of the unit shouted out his orders. 

The Flame Clan soldiers quickly returned to their senses upon hearing their commander call out. 

Even the lowest infantry units of the Flame Clan Army had been trained rigorously to keep their heads in the face of such danger. 

“Yes, sir!” 

They shouted in unison as they stabbed their spearheads into the enemy flanks, like a hedgehog who had finally decided to needle its attacker. 

No matter how monstrous, no one should have been able to avoid their attack. 

No one should have been able to defend against it. 

No one should have. 

But the bloodthirsty enemy soldiers threw themselves upon their spears and became human skewers lurching forward on the battlefield. 

The “God of Death,” however—the core of their assault force—he was different. He used his arms, his elbows, his knees, and every other part of his body in a most clever and adroit way as he ever-so-slightly diverted the spears, before he finally slipped through the cracks of the phalanx and pressed the attack. 

At this point, it didn’t matter how long the spears were—they were just useless sticks when up against someone as powerful as this so-called “God.” 

“Gahh!” 

“Gwahh!” 

“Ughh!” 

Having lost the ability to defend themselves, the Flame Clan soldiers became yet more lives for the God of Death to harvest. Three more of them were cut down in quick succession. 

“Th-This guy... he isn’t human!” 

“He’s a m-monster...!” 

“No, he’s a god... a God of Death...!” 

Even the highly-trained Flame Clan soldiers found themselves unable to stay calm in the face of such a terror. 

The bloodthirsty soldiers were easier—fatally wound them and they’d be dead soon enough, although they might snap their jaws for a few moments before finally letting out a death rattle. They could be defeated. 

However, the “God of Death” wouldn’t be quite so simple to vanquish. He managed to slip through the forest of sharp spears that were the pride of the Flame Clan like they were mere weeds to be pushed aside along his path. 

Just how in the world were they supposed to defeat an opponent as mighty as him?! 

“F-F-Fear not, men! Look at him! Look at his clothing! Look at his arms and legs!” the unit commander shouted in a shrill voice as he pointed at the God of Death. 

It was then that the soldiers let out gasps of surprise. 

The God of Death’s clothes were covered in gashes and tears, dozens—possibly hundreds. Not only that, but blood was seeping out from many of the wounds that could be seen all over his body. 

His hands, his feet, even his knees. None of the injuries were anything close to life-threatening, but it certainly couldn’t be said that he was “unharmed.” 

Furthermore, it was plain to see that the blood that flowed through his veins was red—crimson, even. 

He was human, just like them. He could be defeated. 

That realization allowed the Flame Clan soldiers to regain their fighting spirit. 

“Attack!” 

Once more, they stabbed their spears at the God of Death. 

The God avoided them once more, and another three Flame Clan soldiers fell dead into the mud. And yet, the God’s wounds were more numerous than before. 

“Look! That bastard’s human too. If we injure him some more and get him to bleed, he won’t be able to move as quickly! Continue pressing the attack!” 

“...You know, you’re really starting to get on my nerves.” 

The God of Death glared sharply at the commander shouting these orders. 

A chill raced down the commander’s spine. 

“Kill him! Kill him now!” 

“Yes, sir!” 

Three, four, five times—over and over again—the soldiers stabbed their spears at their enemy at the commander’s shrill urging. 

Each time, however, the God of Death slipped this way and that as he wove skilfully through the thicket of spears and took life after life from the Flame Clan Army. 

Then, finally... 

“E-Eeep! Don’t get any closer! Go away! S-Someone, kill this—” 

At last, the God of Death’s blade sliced through the commander’s throat. 

Slowly, the God reassumed his fighting stance, held his sword at the ready, and glared at Flame Clan soldiers. 

Without even realizing what they were doing, every single one of them gulped in fear. 

In all likelihood, the man covered in blood who stood before them with his blade in his hands must have looked like a demon sent directly from the depths of hell. 

The number of fighters this fierce in all of Yggdrasil could be counted on one hand. 

And yet even so, in the face of so many tightly gathered spears, the enemy fighter had wounds all over his body. 

If you attack a single man with an entire unit, he will eventually fall—no matter how powerful he may be. 

The soldiers understood that, but they still couldn’t shake the dark thoughts intruding their minds. 

Things such as: We won the war. I don’t want to die now! and If I fight this man, I shall surely die... 

The soldiers were frozen with fear.

“Lord Takiasu has fallen in battle!” 

“...Killed by that so-called ‘God of Death,’ I assume?” 

“Yes!” 

“Is that so? Very well. Thank you for the report. At ease, soldier.” 

After hearing the news, Nobunaga rested his face against his hand and let out a long sigh. 

Even without knowing anything more about this “God of Death,” it was clear that he served the commander of the Steel Clan Army. 

Having this horde of soldiers possessed with a maddening bloodlust appear right in front of his pursuit unit was a slap to the face, literally. Not only had his pursuit unit faced resistance, but they’d been so terrified of the enemy soldiers that they’d frozen in place or begun retreating themselves. 

In the time since he’d given the order to retreat, several of his bravest warriors and one of his generals had been killed. It was for that reason that his pursuit unit was failing to make any forward progress in a timely manner. 

Though they may have been Nobunaga’s enemies, he couldn’t, by any measure, disparage their movements. They had been frighteningly effective. 

“Hmph. That brat has gathered together some rather fine fighters to be his subordinates, indeed.” 

For one, he was the commander of the highly-skilled warrior who, with just a small force, had taken the Flame Clan capital of Blíkjanda-Böl—the Mánagarmr, Sigrún. 

Then there had been that masked man who’d led the cavalry, as well as that magic user who’d whipped the entire Steel Clan Army into a frenzied bloodlust. 

Then, finally, there was this “God of Death.” 

All of them seemed likely to be Einherjar, but it was clear that they weren’t your run-of-the-mill Einherjar. Nobunaga would have very much liked to have one, just one of them working for him instead. 

If that had been the case, he would have undoubtedly been able to pull off a decisive victory here. 

“Ah,” he sighed, “no use thinking of such things.” 

Nobunaga let out a snort and shook his head at just how foolish he’d been. 

Being able to attract qualified generals was a necessary quality of those who wished to become rulers. 

That brat had been blessed with that very quality, obviously. 

“Tsk! I’ve let him slip away already, haven’t I? This time, the loss is mine.” 

Technically speaking, Nobunaga had won the battle. 

But that had only been a tactical victory, a tactical victory. Nothing more. 

In the end, not only had he failed to take the Holy Capital, but he had also failed to claim the head of the þjóðann. Furthermore, his most important base of military operations, his clan’s capital, had been stolen from him. 

The Flame Clan Army, in other words, had no choice this time but to make a full retreat from the territory surrounding the Holy Capital. 

In this sense, strategically speaking, it was clear that the true winner was the Steel Clan. 

“They got us this time, but you won’t have it easy next we fight, brat. Or should I say, Suoh Yuuto.” 

Nobunaga had rated Yuuto’s talents quite highly, but there had been a part of him that didn’t consider the young ruler to be much of a threat. 

It was perhaps inevitable he’d think that way. 

Even if Yuuto was much like a lion cub, Nobunaga’s attention focused on the cub, not the lion. 

Given that he was a fully-grown lion, he couldn’t help but underestimate a mere cub’s attempts to establish some form of superiority over him. 

Still, it reflected poorly upon him to insult an opponent who had beaten him on the battlefield by calling him a “brat.” He’d felt the strength of his opponent’s hand in this little bout of theirs—the boy was strong, indeed. Nobunaga could not deny that fact. He was forced to view his opponent in a new light—Yuuto was no child. He could not simply amuse himself with battling him any longer. 

The lad was in no way inferior to any of the opponents Nobunaga had faced in the past—in fact, he might be an even more formidable opponent. Yuuto was undoubtedly a powerful adversary.

“We’re the... only ones... left alive...?” 

Skáviðr looked around him. He had a wry, ironic grin on his face as he asked this. 

At a glance, there looked to be only thirteen of his soldiers left. 

It was likely that a portion of the remaining enemy soldiers had managed to escape. At the very least, he couldn’t see any more Flame Clan troops chasing after them. 

They’d done a truly excellent job. 

“Yes, Lord Skáviðr. It is all thanks to how hard you fought.” 

“Haha! The opposite, really. I drove you members of the Suicide Squad right to death’s door! The only reason we survived was—cough cough—wasn’t because of me... but because we were lucky. That’s all.” 

Leaning on the shoulders of one of his sworn children, Skáviðr coughed as he said this, smiling all the while. 

He truly believed they’d all been extremely lucky to have survived this far, given how they’d been through battle after battle. It wouldn’t have been strange at all for them to have been killed by now. 

They certainly had no obligation to thank him for still being alive. 

“Well, you know, the rest...” 

Bzzap! 

Right as he’d begun to speak, the transceiver at his waist chirped loudly. 

Yuuto had given him this precious device himself. No matter how injured he may have been, he had done all in his power to guard the device with his life. 

“—! I finally got through! Ská, are you there? Ská?!” 

The voice he most wanted to hear right now sputtered out from the transceiver. 

“Yes I am, my lord. Have you fared well in the battle? I was concerned for you.” 

“You dumb bastard! I was the one worrying about you! But really, I’m glad to hear that you’re alive. Just what I’d expect from the immortal Skáviðr.” 

“Hah...” 

Skáviðr couldn’t help but let a laugh slip out when he heard Yuuto’s words. 

“I’m back at the Holy Capital already. You hurry up and get yourself back here too.” 

“My apologies, my lord—ngh!—I’m afraid that might not be possible...” 

“Whoa, hold on there, what was that sound you just made?! Are you injured or something?!” 

There was a strong note of panic in Yuuto’s voice. 

Skáviðr tended to pretend he was always fine, especially when he really wasn’t. Yuuto knew he was that sort of man. It was for that reason that he’d realized that something was wrong. 

If Skáviðr was letting his pain creep into his voice—something was really wrong with him. 

“Er, well... It’s embarrassing to say, but my side’s basically been cut open.” 

Pressing down on the cut arcing up the left side of his torso, Skáviðr’s face twisted with pain, but also managed to contort into a self-mocking smile. 

Surely there was no more shameful way for a warrior to behave. 

Regardless of the fact that he’d been in battle after battle today, despite the bleeding and injuries that had left him feeling shaky—he’d never believed that he’d be done in by some cowardly soldier. 

“Your side?! Cut open?! Hey! Are you gonna be okay?!” 

“It’s a fatal wound, I’m afraid. At the moment, I’m pressing cotton against my flank in an attempt to stanch the bleeding, but—gah!—I don’t think I have much longer...” 

“N-No! Don’t give up! Come on back here! You’re supposed to be immortal! If we get you patched up, then...” 

“Too late for that, I’m afraid. I think I’ve spilled just a little too much blood... Just remaining conscious has become... quite difficult...” 

“We’ll send out a rescue unit right away—” 

“No you shall not!” 

His sudden shout pained his side, but even so, he gritted his teeth and forced himself to continue speaking. 

“You cannot send the uninjured into danger in order to save those who are already dying. It’ll mean all our sacrifices were for nothing .” 

“But, still—!” 

“Hah! To be able to hear your voice in my last moments, my lord, and know that you are safe... That is enough for me to be satisfied. I have no regrets.” 

“That’s ridiculous! Don’t say things like that! It’s like you’re telling me goodbye!” 

The voice emitting from the transceiver became a bit harder to understand. It sounded as though Yuuto was crying as he spoke. 

He, the sworn father he loved from the bottom of his heart, was crying for Skáviðr’s sake. Skáviðr was at peace with that knowledge. 

Which was why he could say, with a smile on his face that truly reflected his heart— 

“Yes, this is indeed goodbye. I have been sincerely glad to have been able to serve you, my lord. Being your sworn brother... was my life’s greatest honor.” 

There was not the slightest shred of a lie in these words. 

Skáviðr honestly believed that he had been blessed to have served under Yuuto. He felt that he had been extraordinarily lucky to have lived in the same age as him, to have fought alongside him. 

Most importantly, he had died protecting his lord—that was the greatest privilege any warrior could ask for. 

He could wish for no more. 

Filled with emotion, Skáviðr spoke his last words... 

“Farewell, my lord. May you be fortunate in the battles to come!” 

With that, Skáviðr switched off the transceiver. He did not wish for someone as kind as Yuuto to accompany him all the way unto his death, even if it was only via the device. His pride would never allow for that. 

“Return this to Lord Yuuto.” 

He handed the transceiver to one of his children. 

He had done all that he was meant to. He felt that he could die with no regrets. 

“Haha, you came after all... Elín, Iarl. I never thought I’d see you two again. There’s so much I have to tell you.” 

Whispering the names of his beloved wife and child, Skáviðr closed his eyes softly. 

Wearing the garments that had earned him the nickname “Death in a Cloak,” on the dead man’s face was a bright, satisfied smile—the smile of a man who had died happy.