Hyakuren no Haou to Seiyaku no Valkyria - Volume 18 - Chapter 3

ACT 3

“Ah, so these are the schematics for the monster catapult.”

Unfurling the scroll he had received, Nobunaga smiled as he looked over its contents with interest. He was a man who always enjoyed being able to experience new things. It was no surprise that he would be excited to look over the schematics for a weapon he had never seen before.

“Kuuga sure is something to have been able to recreate something like this with only people’s memories to go by.”

“Indeed, My Lord. I was surprised to see it as well.” As he listened to Nobunaga’s praise of Kuuga, Ran nodded his agreement. He was probably voicing his sincere opinion, rather than simply humoring his liege. It had taken several years for native Japanese craftsmen to recreate the arquebuses they’d acquired from the Portuguese. By contrast, while the design of the trebuchet was somewhat simpler than a firearm, it was still an impressive feat of innovation to be able to reproduce an enemy siege weapon to the point that it could be used in battle after just three months.

“Even so, this isn’t enough to make up for his insubordination.” Once he had taken a single look at the design, Nobunaga tossed aside the scroll as though he had lost interest in it. Certainly, a trebuchet was an extremely powerful weapon on Yggdrasil, where the arsenal of siege equipment was made up almost entirely of battering rams and hooked rope used for scaling walls. Had it been a year ago, Nobunaga would have dropped everything to heap praise on Kuuga and would have used him as an example for the rest of his retainers to follow. But that was then. He no longer had any need for a trebuchet.

“Ran, are the new province destroyers ready?!”

“Yes, they’re all prepared and can be deployed on your orders, My Lord.”

“Heh, good. I can already picture the surprised looks on our enemies’ faces,” Nobunaga said with a confident smirk.

This “province destroyer” being described was a siege weapon Nobunaga had been developing in secret for years, and while its name might have suggested to some that it used large arrows of some sort, it was, in fact, a completely different beast. The object that appeared, pushed along by three large men, was so heavy that its wheels groaned under its weight. It was a black cylinder roughly in the shape of a gourd. The hole on one end of the cylinder was roughly the size of a person’s fist. The cylinder would be packed with a bag of gunpowder and a three-kilogram lead ball, after which a matchlock would be used to set off the gunpowder. The resulting explosion propelled the ball at the target. It was essentially a cannon. Three of them were gathered in front of Nobunaga.

“You seem to be taking a significant risk by deciding to implement features of the tanegashima into the old province destroyer designs, My Lord.”

“Hrmph. The old version was simply not good enough,” Nobunaga responded.

The “old version” of the weapon that they were referring to was the Frankish cannons. They were the breech-loading swivel guns that had been the first cannons to be used in Japan. It was said that Otomo Sorin was the first to introduce them into his armies, and Nobunaga had used them aboard his ships in his battle with the Mori Clan’s naval forces, who themselves were also armed with the same cannons at the time. The cannons had a relatively high rate of fire, so they were useful to a certain extent. However, because the cannonball and the gunpowder were loaded from the back, along with the fact that the technology of the time didn’t allow effective sealing of the breech, it wasted a great deal of the gunpowder’s explosive energy, leading to a substantial decrease in striking power and range.

In an effort to improve the devices, Nobunaga had decided to implement the muzzle-loading method employed by Tanegashima arquebuses on a larger scale, which had meant sealing the cylinder entirely by casting it as a single piece. Historically, in Japan, similar weapons were invented several years after the Honno-ji Temple incident, during the reigns of Hideyoshi and Ieyasu. It was a testament to Nobunaga’s own innovative thought process that he had come up with the concept on his own, several years ahead of actual history.

“Heh. Sure, the new-style province destroyers can’t fire as quickly, but they’re far more lethal and capable of hitting at much greater ranges. Mere brick walls won’t last long in the face of their firepower,” Nobunaga claimed proudly. Soon after, he gave the order to his forces to begin the attack. “Right then! Fire! Remind the Steel Clan that they ought to fear the might of the Flame Clan!”

“Yes, My Lord!” The gun captain used a matchlock to ignite the first cannon. The soldiers near the cannons all placed their hands over their ears. Then, a moment later, three loud booms reverberated through the air, sending a shock through the assembled soldiers even through their improvised earmuffs. The powerful shots were loud enough to echo as they whizzed toward their target. A heartbeat later, the sounds of heavy objects striking one another rang through the air, and shattered bricks flew off the wall.

However, Nobunaga was left staring wide-eyed in shock. Behind the brick wall emerged an ash-colored stone wall. Judging by what he could see, the bricks had absorbed some of the impact from the cannonballs, and the newly emerged walls were only faintly dented by the barrage. “Tch. I see. He had already planned for the possibility that we’d copy his catapults.” Nobunaga couldn’t help but click his tongue in frustration. The reports from Fort Gashina had indicated that the walls had collapsed easily after being bombarded with Steel Clan-style catapults, and in his last campaign, Nobunaga hadn’t utilized any sort of siege weaponry. As such, Nobunaga had thought Yuuto would have designed this fortification with the assumption that the Flame Clan possessed no siege weaponry. It seemed he had underestimated the young lad. “Hrmph. Then let us test what is superior: my new and improved province destroyers, or your walls. Focus your fire! Unload more rounds into the damaged section!”

“Yes, My Lord!” the gun captain responded.

Over the next two hours, the Flame Clan continued its cannonade against the Steel Clan’s fortress wall. While Nobunaga would have liked to precisely target all of his shots into the parts of the wall where the bricks had been destroyed and the underlying wall was exposed, this was an age where there was no method to calculate projectile trajectories, never mind anything as complicated as a computer with target correction software. It was extremely difficult to hit a desired location with a cannonball with any amount of consistency. That said, Nobunaga’s cannons made up for what they lacked in accuracy with sheer volume. They fired endlessly over the course of two hours and had easily blasted over fifty shots into the wall in that time. With that amount of cannon fire, several of the shots had managed to hit the exposed sections of the stone wall. The wall showed no signs of giving way to the fusillade, however.

“Well, that’s certainly an irritatingly strong wall,” Nobunaga said more with exasperation than admiration. The walls weren’t undamaged; in fact, there were countless impact craters scattered along them. By all accounts, the surface appeared to be completely ruined, but in the end, it was barely anything more than cosmetic damage. There wasn’t a single opening that indicated they’d made an actual breach in the wall, nor did it appear that it would collapse under the weight of the force directed at it. Considering how little damage they had done with their bombardment, it would take an enormous amount of cannon fire to create an opening large enough for an army to pass through. It was clear that the Flame Clan would run out of gunpowder and cannonballs long before they could manage such a thing. Nobunaga let out a long sigh and ruffled his hair. “Great. What do we do...? This is going to take much more effort than I had expected. Then again, it wouldn’t be anywhere near as enjoyable if that wasn’t the case.”

“Phew. They’ve finally stopped.”

Stationed a short distance away at Gjallarbrú Fortress, Yuuto let out a sigh of relief. Given that trebuchets operated on fairly simple principles, he had anticipated the possibility that the enemy would create their own versions, which was why he had taken measures against them in the fortress design. However, cannons hadn’t been part of the Flame Clan’s various invasion campaigns, nor were they used during the Siege of Glaðsheimr. The existence of those cannons had caught him completely by surprise.

“Kris! Hurry and gather damage reports on the wall. Also, check on the mental state of the soldiers.”

“Huh? O-Oh, yes, of course!” Kristina said as though roused from a daze, hurriedly replying to Yuuto’s instructions. It was hard to believe that she, who was always calm and even showed an air of studied impudence at all times, would be caught in a daze in the middle of battle. But Yuuto couldn’t bring himself to blame her. She wasn’t the only one. Everyone around him had gone pale with fear.

“This is frightening in a different way from the tetsuhau,” Felicia said with a faint tremor present in her voice. Yuuto nodded to signify his agreement.

“Yeah, honestly, I was scared out of my wits.”

Tetsuhau were the small bombs frequently employed by the Steel Clan Army in battle. While they exploded with an extremely loud concussion sound, they weren’t particularly lethal, and their basic use in battle was to confuse and disorient the enemy. By contrast, the enemy’s cannons, though relatively quiet when they were fired, produced an enormous impact when the cannonballs slammed against the fortress walls. It was the first time Yuuto had experienced it himself, and each impact felt like a thunderclap had struck through his body. The giant fortress walls visibly shook after each impact. And it wasn’t just one impact. The shots came one after the other. Yuuto himself had nearly fallen into a panic as he considered the possibility that the fortress walls would collapse under the barrage.

“Father, according to my scouts, the walls facing the enemy are shattered or cracked and badly damaged. However, there’s no sign that the enemy has breached them.”

“Good, then that’s within expectations. What about the interior? Are there any cracks or the like?”

“While I’ve received reports of some bricks being knocked off, no one has reported anything of that sort for the moment.”

“I see.” Once again, Yuuto let out a sigh of relief. Considering the vicious thunderclaps of each impact, he was anxious about the state of the fortress itself. “Man, I’m glad I had the workers pour in Roman concrete. Had this been a standard brick wall, we would’ve been screwed.” He felt a cold shiver run up his spine as he imagined the alternative.

Roman concrete was a special kind of concrete utilized by the Roman Empire during its heyday from the 8th century BCE to the 5th century CE. The concrete consisted primarily of volcanic ash, and it was a different animal from modern concrete. However, despite its antiquity, it was nearly twice as tough as modern concrete. That wasn’t its only advantage, though. Roman concrete hardened faster than modern concrete, and it was an extremely useful material that was being implemented on a trial basis in the modern world.

Fortunately, the Steel Clan had the Three Great Mountain Ranges within its borders. It made the acquisition of volcanic ash easy, so there was no reason not to make the best of that resource.

“This is all thanks to you and your rune Gjallarhorn, Fagrahvél.”

While the production method of concrete itself wasn’t particularly complicated—only requiring that the ingredients be mixed in the right order—the lack of machinery in Yggdrasil meant that the entire process of mixing, carrying, and pouring concrete had to be done by hand. Although they had effective transportation tools like the improved wheelbarrows, it was only thanks to her ability to bring out the fullest abilities of those under her command that they had been able to produce these walls in time.

“In hindsight, it’s pretty clear I was asking a lot. Thanks for making it happen,” Yuuto said with sincere appreciation, but Fagrahvél bowed her head and responded without so much as a flicker of expression crossing her features. “You honor me, Your Majesty.”

While Fagrahvél tended to wear her emotions on her sleeve when it involved her milk-sibling Sigrdrífa, in all other circumstances, she was rather more cool and collected. That was probably just how much Sigrdrífa had meant to her.

“For the moment, it looks like we’ll be able to buy some time with this.” He’d heard the Panther Clan’s subjects had already started their migration. If he could hold off the enemy here for about a month, all of their people would finish their migrations. He could probably manage to fend Nobunaga off for a month. He believed it was probably possible, but...

“It won’t be easy to hold that monstrous old demon back. If anything, the hard part is gonna come after we’ve finished stalling them, I think.”

“Oh, come on, this is ridiculous! Just how tough are these walls?” A week later, on the western side of Yggdrasil, Shiba, like his master Nobunaga, was at a loss as to how to deal with the concrete fortress wall that stood before him. He had launched boulder after boulder with their giant catapult, but there was no sign of it collapsing under the assault.

“Just what in the blazes is that thing?” The more he looked at it, the more he was convinced it was stone of some sort. However, unlike a standard stone wall, there were no seams. As far as he could tell, it was essentially one giant rock, but that was impossible; there was no such thing as a rock that big. Even if one did exist, it wouldn’t be possible to carry it with mere human strength. “Well, no use denying what’s actually in front of me. How do I deal with it, though...?”

Whether it be brick or stone, a wall constructed by piling up those materials would collapse with enough of an impact. This wall, however, showed no sign of falling even after being bombarded by boulders that required several large men to load into the catapult. Even if they continued like this, they weren’t going to make any progress.

“First the Great Lord’s weird inventions, and now this. This is ridiculous.” Shiba ruffled his hair in frustration. If there was no way he could breach the fortress walls, he would have to wait for the next opportunity to fight in a melee. Shiba couldn’t hide the fact that he was incredibly disappointed that he was finding no opportunities to fight and show his skill during this campaign.

“What do you wish to do? Shall we bring out the siege chariot?”

The siege chariot, which consisted of a wheeled battering ram that was protected by iron-plated walls, had been one of the siege weapons that had enabled the Flame Clan’s rapid subjugation of its enemies. However...

“No, don’t bother. Brother Kuuga already tried using one at Gashina, but I heard they crushed it without the faintest problem. It’d be a waste to even try.”

It was clear at a glance that the fortress walls of Iárnviðr were packed full with the giant bows that had dotted Fort Gashina’s walls, and there were also soldiers armed with tanegashimas stationed along it. They numbered approximately five thousand, meaning they were on equal footing with the Flame Clan forces. Trying to forcefully take the city would just mean taking massive losses.

“What do you propose, sir?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out right now. This is the sort of situation where it would be useful to have Brother Kuuga here.”

When faced with an obstacle, Shiba had a tendency to brute force his way through the problem, while Kuuga, by contrast, would often find unexpected and surprisingly effective solutions out of nowhere.

“He’s probably back in Bilskírnir by now.”

“Yeah, that’s the problem.” Shiba sighed with a sour expression on his face. Frankly, he couldn’t think of anything. Just as he was starting to believe that he might not find a solution to his problem...

“I bring word of a new weapon from the clan capital!”

“Oh?”

As he listened to the messenger’s report, Shiba showed great interest in the news he had divulged. New weapons for the Flame Clan meant additional powerful weapons like the tanegashima—weapons that completely changed the face of warfare, and were often very different from anything that existed previously in Yggdrasil. It was the single ray of hope for Shiba as he was faced with an untenable situation. However, the news he had received was not quite the saving grace he had hoped for...

“The province destroyer has a good name, but unfortunately, its bite’s not anywhere near as strong as its bark.” Shiba let his disappointment show as he sighed. They had tried firing five shots into the fortress walls, and while they had done some damage, it was nothing close to what they would need to actually raze the fortification. It was extremely difficult to hit the same place twice, and it looked like it would be impossible to completely destroy the wall and create an opening large enough for his soldiers to pass through.

“Big Brother, I think you’re being a bit harsh. The power, range, and accuracy are all superior to the Steel Clan’s catapults. Had those been conventional brick walls, we would have easily breached them.”

“So you’re saying we’ve found ourselves against the wrong opponent?” Shiba shrugged with a dry laugh. Even though they had just acquired a new weapon, they were back to square one. “I guess we’ll just have to prepare ourselves for a long siege...”

Just as Shiba was about to switch his approach to sieging the fortress, something caught Shiba’s eye. It was something that the Gjallarbrú Fortress lacked, but it existed at Iárnviðr. Shiba’s lips curled upward into a grin.

“Masa! Tell the gunners to aim for the gate!”

“Oh! Of course!” Upon hearing Shiba’s proposal, Masa widened his eyes in realization and nodded. Iárnviðr’s gate was about the height of two grown men and was just wide enough for a carriage to pass through. It would be extremely difficult to target it with an arcing weapon like a trebuchet. Even if its boulder did hit the gate, the boulder would only end up acting as an obstacle. It was also worth mentioning that Yggdrasil’s gates were usually double-layered—consisting of an inner and outer gate. Hitting the inner wall with a catapult was extremely difficult, and so Shiba had completely put aside the possibility of attacking the gate with the trebuchets. However, with the province destroyers, they might actually be able to land several shots on the gate. And if they could hit the gates, then their wooden foundations would be easily shattered by the projectile. The projectiles themselves were only the size of a person’s fist, and so wouldn’t become obstacles like the trebuchet’s boulders would. At the very least, it was worth a try.

“The gunners report that they’re ready. Shall I issue the order?”

“No, wait! Not yet.” Shiba closed his eyes and held up his hand to calm the excited Masa.

“Big Brother?”

“We don’t exactly have an endless supply of ammunition. I’ll read the wind.” With that, Shiba focused his consciousness, sharpening his senses. As he tightened his focus and heightened his awareness, the world around him went quiet. There wasn’t a sound in the world. Masa’s voice, the soldiers’ voices, the rustling of the leaves—none of it reached him. Shiba understood that he had reached the Realm of the Gods. That said, unlike in his battle with Sigrún, he hadn’t accelerated his mind as well. That was something he could only do during the extreme conditions of a life or death encounter, and even if he could do it on demand, it was simply too taxing to use so liberally. Even so, as a master of the God Realm, he could use the same foundational technique to sharpen his senses far beyond the norm. Shiba continued to sharpen his senses, and then, all of a sudden, the wind appeared in the darkness of his mind’s eye.

“There, I see it.”

No one would understand him if he had said it aloud. Even Nobunaga, his Great Lord, would never have understood. Of course, with his eyes closed, Shiba wasn’t literally seeing the wind. In that sense, it was probably more accurate to say that he felt it. Exactly how it worked was irrelevant, in the end. He had grasped where the wind was, and that was what mattered at that moment.

“It’s still a bit strong...”

That meant it would be difficult for the gunners to land their shots on target. The timing wasn’t right to give the order to fire just yet. And so, time continued to pass...

Just how long had he waited? When in the God Realm, there was a tendency for time to feel like it had slowed down, even if it wasn’t to the same extent that it seemed like during battle. He couldn’t tell precisely how long it had been, though it had probably been less than an hour. Shiba finally grasped the right opportunity to strike.

“Gunners! The wind will die down briefly. Fire! Fire everything you’ve got at that gate!”

Bang!

Craaash!

“Whooa! What in the blazes?! They just destroyed the inner gate!”

“They broke through it with this tiny ball?!”

“Bring the wagons over here! We’ll seal the entrance!”

“Hurry! Form up before the enemy charges in!”

Loud shouts from Steel Clan soldiers echoed through the city. Linnea was too far away to hear what exactly the soldiers were saying, but she was aware that there was a stir near the city gates. Even after a few moments had passed, the chatter showed no signs of dying down. There was also the enormous noise and impacts that had ceased just moments earlier. All of that combined was more than enough information to allow her to make a safe guess as to what was going on. Then came the loud clatter of gongs that soon rang throughout the city.

“Tch. Seems like they’ve broken through both gates,” Linnea spat sourly, furrowing her brow.

If the enemy only had catapults, they would have been able to hold out, thanks to the resilience of Iárnviðr’s roman concrete walls. However, in the short time before Iárnviðr’s defensive duties were going to be taken over by Sigrún and the Múspell Unit, the enemy had pulled an enormous rabbit out of their hat.

“Before anything, we need to head to the front line!”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Accompanied by Cler, her bodyguard, Linnea jumped atop her chariot and rapidly made her way to the city gate. She was currently the commander in chief of all forces in Iárnviðr. She needed to see the situation for herself. As they approached the gates, she began to hear the clamor of the soldiers and the sound of dozens of men running around. She also heard the distant cheer of the enemy forces.

“Fire!”

A tense voice shouted out atop the walls, and the sharp crack of ballistae firing their bolts followed a moment later. It seemed the battle had already started.

“This isn’t good.” The moment she arrived at the front, Linnea frowned bitterly. The situation there was unfolding as one would expect, but unfortunately, things were turning out to be worse than she had predicted.

“Not good? So far as I can see, it seems like they’re moving according to their drills,” Cler observed with a raised brow.

By all accounts, he wasn’t wrong. The defending soldiers had already surrounded the area around the city gate with wagons, and they were already gathered behind them, their spears and crossbows ready to welcome the enemy. The sound of bolts cutting through the air rang from atop the walls, and they could hear the pained cries of the Flame Clan attackers as the men were struck by them.

“You’re right, they are moving as they’ve been instructed. Look closely at their faces though.”

“Huh? They look like they’re all focused and fully committed to me.”

“Yeah, they’re committed. But they also look like they’re on the back foot.”

Cler’s eyes widened and he took another look at the soldiers. While Cler’s skill as a warrior and Einherjar was fairly impressive, the fact that he wasn’t able to read the atmosphere was the main reason he was considered a tier or two below Rasmus or Haugspori among the Brísingamen. To put it more harshly, while he was a great warrior, he didn’t have what it took to be a general.

“It’s probably because of the enemy’s new weapon and the fact that they easily punched through the city gates using them. There’s a great deal of fear on all of their faces. They’re currently committed because they don’t want to die, but it won’t take much to break them. It’s a dangerous situation,” Linnea explained.

“I see! That’s certainly not good!”

“Indeed. I made the right choice in coming here.”

She needed to be on the front lines to actually see the faces of her soldiers. Linnea understood well that she still had much to learn as a general. She had no intention of keeping things that way, though, which was why she was willing to do whatever she needed in order to make herself a better general. She sucked in a deep breath.

“Calm down, all of you!” she shouted at the top of her lungs, her throat aching from the effort. The soldiers’ gazes all naturally gathered to her.

“Huzzah!”

“It’s Lady Linnea!”

“Lady Linnea is here!”

A cheer rippled through the soldiers. Their general had appeared on the front lines. That alone was enough to boost their faltering morale. That was something she had learned from Yuuto and Rasmus. Of course, knowing that the battle would end if the general were slain, she understood that she needed to avoid putting herself at needless risk. However, wars couldn’t be won by simply sitting safely behind friendly lines and relying on messengers to receive intel and send out orders to the soldiers in the field. War wasn’t some kind of game played with inanimate pieces like the shogi or chess that Yuuto had created to pass the time, but rather something conducted between real people with emotions of their own.

Linnea confirmed that the soldiers had regained their composure before she slowly continued. “They’ve only broken our gates. They haven’t breached the walls. The only way they can get in is through the narrow opening the gates provide. If we surround them and hammer them, there’s no way we’ll lose!” Her voice, though still sounding a touch childish, rang confidently through the air, cutting through the sounds of battle echoing around them. That was something she had been born with. It was one of the traits that marked her as a leader. “Sigrún and the Múspells are heading in our direction. They’ll be here in a few days. If we can hold out until then, we’ll win! Buckle down, everyone! Sieg Iárn!”

Those words had a dramatic effect. The soldiers present were all from the Wolf, Horn, and Claw Clans. They all knew very well just how powerful Sigrún and the Múspell Unit were, and just how many heroes they had defeated. They had all heard about the countless victories the Múspells had brought the Steel Clan over the years.

“Sieg Iárn! Sieg Iárn!” the soldiers cried out in unison. There wasn’t a trace of fear left in their voices. Instead, their cries were full of confidence and determination. They were going to drive back their enemies and win this day.

“Remarkable. Impressive as always, Princess! No doubt Lord Rasmus would have been overjoyed to see you now!” After she finished her speech, Cler praised her, his voice trembling with emotion. There were also tears in his eyes. It seemed he had been moved by her speech, but Linnea felt shyness more than joy upon hearing his praise.

“No, I’ve still got a long way to go. My voice trembled a bit. I feel like I was hurrying through my words. Father or Rasmus would have been able to speak more slowly and with more confidence. And I forgot to mention the star fort.” Linnea let out a soft sigh and critiqued her own performance. While she was extremely kind to others, she was almost equally as hard on herself in turn. But the fact that she was her harshest critic and learned from even the smallest of mistakes was why she had grown into such a capable leader.

“You go to all that trouble and then almost ruin it all by showing the soldiers your crestfallen expression. You still let down your guard too early.” A cold, gravelly voice struck at her ears and heart. That was because the criticism it directed at her was absolutely valid. That didn’t make it any easier to deal with the malice behind the comment, however. She knew who it was without needing to turn to face the newcomer.

“Thank you for your critique. I’ll be sure to watch myself next time, Lord Bruno.” Linnea wiped the emotion from her face and put on a polite smile, faintly bowing her head. Despite her youth, she was still a skilled politician, and she could handle this level of criticism with tact.

“Yes, please do. Anxiety on the part of the army’s leader will quickly find its way into the hearts of the rank and file.”

“I’ll bear that in mind.”

“Of course. You did well otherwise. I would say you handled the situation acceptably, to be honest.”

“Huh?” Linnea couldn’t contain the faint squeak of surprise. Even in her wildest dreams, she wouldn’t have imagined he’d praise her.

“We’ve managed to reinforce their morale. Thank you.”

“A-Ah, of course,” Linnea said with a blank look of surprise.

This prompted a skeptical look from Bruno. “Is something wrong...?”

She struggled to process her thoughts for a moment, but she quickly came to a decision. They were fighting side by side, so it was best to clear the air between them. “Well, I was just surprised to be praised and thanked by you. Honestly, I’ve always felt you didn’t like me.”

“That is true. I’m not particularly fond of you,” Bruno responded with a snort, his expression one of lingering distaste. “Still, without you, the soldiers might not have regained their composure, and our city might have fallen as a result. Setting aside my personal feelings, I’m obliged to thank you,” he said in a rapid flow of words before turning away. When she looked closely at his face, she saw his cheeks were faintly flushed. It seemed as though he was feeling a little shy.

“Pfft.” Linnea couldn’t hold back her laughter.

This man was the head of those who had wanted to remain. She had blithely written him off as someone who continued to stubbornly defy Yuuto, but all those theatrics were his way of displaying his love for the city of Iárnviðr and the Wolf Clan. Protecting the Wolf Clan and Iárnviðr was everything to him, and that one directive was the basis of all of his decisions. She finally felt like she was beginning to understand him. While he was dismissive of other clans, she didn’t dislike his patriotism to his own clan.

Linnea nodded. “It’s as you say. I have many fond memories of this city as well. Let’s protect it together.” She made a fist with her hand and held it out in front of him. It was Bruno’s turn to stare in shock. However, he immediately understood what she wanted to do, and he curled his lips into a grin. “Of course. I have no intention of giving our city over to those ruffians.”

The two bumped fists.

Simultaneous with the events occurring inside the walls, Shiba was rapidly giving orders and urging on his troops as the Flame Clan Army continued its assault.

“Push! Puuush! Don’t give them time to regroup! Shout as loudly as your lungs will let you! Make as much noise as you can!”

While it was pointless to raise one’s voice in a one-on-one battle, the effect it had in large-scale combat was something else entirely. Huge battles like these weren’t always about defeating or killing the enemy. The key to winning these kinds of engagements was breaking the enemy’s morale. Raising a loud cheer showed an army’s morale and momentum, and if it was leveraged properly, it could lead the enemy to believe they couldn’t win, which could cause their ranks to collapse.

Shiba could tell with a single glance at the soldiers atop the walls that the repeated barrages from the province destroyers were having a powerful effect on the morale of those stationed there. Their fear of this new and mysterious weapon had clearly taken them aback, not to mention the destruction of their city’s gates. The murmurs among the defenders seemed to grow louder. Seeing an opportunity to bring the battle to a close, Shiba prepared to order his forces to charge. As he began to speak, a cheer rose from the men within the city.

“Sieg Iárn! Sieg Iárn!”

There was no trace of fear in their voices, and they were clearly prepared to fight.

“Tch. They’ve already rallied themselves. We’re done for now. Signal our retreat. We’ll try again later.” Shiba clicked his tongue in frustration, but quickly issued orders to withdraw. While he was known as an aggressive general for the strength of his charges, he wasn’t reckless or bullheaded. He would not hesitate to charge forward to make the best of an opportunity, but when he knew he had lost his chance for victory, he was able to put aside any notion of making up for losses and would quickly withdraw. Most generals would hesitate from fully committing even when the odds of success were overwhelmingly in their favor, while in turn trapping themselves into some form of sunk cost fallacy once their chances of victory had faded. Even as it remained obvious to a discerning eye that all hope was lost, the desperate generals would continue trying to piece together a positive result of some kind to make their efforts seem worthwhile. Being able to coolly and accurately make the decision to attack or withdraw, while not flashy, was Shiba’s greatest trait as a general and what made him such a difficult opponent to face.

“Our enemy is rather skilled. It’s quite an impressive feat to be able to restore an army’s morale so quickly.”

While it was easy enough to describe, it was quite difficult to actually pull off. Simply trying to copy what accomplished generals said or did would never produce the expected results. There were many factors that contributed toward success. These ranged from things such as the commander’s character, their accumulated history, and even the timbre of their voice and their body language. It was far too impractical in a battle to systematically determine which of these factors would best fit the situation and how best to leverage them. Hence, it was unavoidable for there to be an element of inborn talent in that style of leadership. All this meant that, just based on the opening stages of this battle, it was clear to Shiba the enemy’s commander had the requisite character to be a great general or even a king.

“Having someone like that hole up in such a tough fortress? That’s a damned hard nut to crack.”

The one thing Shiba had learned during his initial attack was that this was an extremely difficult city to attack. The walls that surrounded Iárnviðr were odd in that they were made of a seamless stone, but there was another reason they were different from a normal fortress city. Ordinarily, fortress walls, while perhaps off by a degree or two, were perpendicular to the gates. However, that wasn’t the case with Iárnviðr. The walls jutted out at an angle. He had inspected the city before the battle and had discovered that there were five sharp protrusions jutting out from the city. Since he hadn’t seen them from above, he couldn’t be certain, but if he was imagining it correctly, Iárnviðr’s walls had five sharp points that formed an angular flower shape. While he hadn’t understood the reason for that shape at first, he was given a painful lesson in why they had been built that way when he tried attacking.

The five “petals” of the flower were essentially giant bastions that formed kill zones. The edges of the petals had fixed ballistae mounted upon them, while the areas near the gate were filled with ordinary archers and crossbowmen, and the moment the enemy approached the gate, they would simultaneously unleash a barrage of arrows. It was a simple enough mechanism. While perpendicular walls had a limit of how much arrow fire they could direct at an enemy as they approached the gates, this shape allowed the defenders to rain down a greater volume of fire with a larger number of soldiers. Had the enemy not been caught off guard by the province destroyers, he would have taken significant losses from those defenses. On top of that, the city walls were tough enough to withstand bombardment by the province destroyers. He could only describe Iárnviðr as a frightening city to attack.

“We can’t waste too much more time here,” Shiba said as he started scratching at his scalp. According to his scouts, the Múspell Unit was heading in their direction. If nothing changed, his forces would be caught between the Múspells and the city. That was the last thing he needed.

“One of the important military lessons the Great Lord taught us was to defeat the enemy in detail in situations like these.”

If the enemy split their forces, Nobunaga had taught his generals to follow Sun Tzu’s Art of War and simply destroy the enemy in detail—a process that involved taking out the divided parts of the enemy army before they could coordinate their efforts and flank his forces. If he was to follow that tactic, then he’d need to decide whether to take down the Múspell Unit or Iárnviðr first. In the end, he’d concluded that it would be extremely difficult to break through this city’s immensely tough fortifications in such a short amount of time.

“Then shall we take down the Múspell Unit first? I believe their numbers are around two thousand, so we have an overwhelming advantage in that regard. If we wait at Fort Horn, we can have the river on either flank and face their cavalry head-on,” Masa said as though he were casually listing off administrative matters.

Shiba was impressed at the fact that, as always, Masa not only considered the size of the enemy force, but also the local terrain. Shiba had a habit of quickly disregarding matters that he wasn’t particularly interested in, so while Masa may have lacked the talent to be a general, he was extremely valuable to Shiba for his ability to process and retain information.

“Sigrún, the Múspell commander, is an extremely experienced general. I doubt she’d be so easily drawn into that sort of battle.”

From Sigrún’s perspective, there wasn’t much reason for her to take out Shiba’s forces on her own. Given that she was known as by far the greatest general in the Steel Clan, he was certain she wouldn’t do something as foolish as lead a forward charge against a force with much larger numbers, nor would she rush to get results as Kuuga had done at Fort Gashina. Realistically speaking, it was likely that she’d coordinate with the Iárnviðr garrison and guarantee they could field a much larger force capable of completely surrounding the Flame Clan Army before committing to battle.

“We could purposefully draw her out,” Masa suggested.

The greatest opportunities were also the times of greatest vulnerability. If the Steel Clan’s forces were going to attack the Flame Clan Army from two sides, that would mean the city’s defenders would need to leave the safety of their nigh-impenetrable fortifications. He would wait for that moment to come, and when it did, he would commit all of his strength to taking down those units. Once that was done, he would use the momentum of that victory to capture Iárnviðr and face off against the Múspells using the newly captured city. Its walls should be able to hold off even the Múspells.

“That would be too risky,” Shiba responded. It was far too dependent on chance. It was unrealistic to expect to be able to quickly defeat an enemy force of equal size. On top of that, the success of the strategy hinged on whether or not the Steel Clan would commit their entire defensive force to the attack. “Still, the idea of drawing them out into the open in order to defeat them isn’t a bad one. If we could make it just a little more reliable, I feel like it’d be a wise strategy to employ...”

“Pardon me, My Lord. Lord Kuuga has sent a messenger!”

“What?! Let him through!” Shiba barked.

This was the very definition of good timing. The messenger who appeared before him was a plump old man with a rather unique bushy white mustache. Shiba had never seen him before, but he had an odd aura of authority to him. The old man bowed his head and introduced himself. “A pleasure to meet you, Lord Shiba. I am Lord Kuuga’s messenger. My name is Alexis.”