ACT 6
“Huaaaah...” Mitsuki sat up in her bed, yawning and stretching.
She was getting up from a good long rest, but she still felt the weight of fatigue that hadn’t fully left her.
Compared to the modern world, beds in this era weren’t as good to sleep on... but that wasn’t the reason. She’d already long since gotten used to that.
No, the real problem that caused her to wake up tired was...
“Even while I’m sleeping, I’m training the whole time with Lady Rífa. I don’t feel like I slept at all...” Mitsuki rubbed her tired eyes and sighed deeply.
Only two weeks remained until the night of the next full moon. There wasn’t much time. She had to push herself, even if it was a little reckless to her health.
“Mitsuki ᛋᛃᛋᚦᛖᛉ, ᚷᛟᛞ ᛗᛟᛉᚷᛟᛜ.” Felicia’s voice came from outside the bedroom door, which soon opened.
A smile blossomed on Mitsuki’s face as soon as she saw her. It was evidence that the two of them had really opened up to each other over the course of the past week.
“Oh, just one second, please.” Mitsuki closed her eyes, and took a long, deep breath. She focused her mind on the power within her.
When she opened her eyes again, the pair of golden symbols glowed within them.
“♪~~!” She threaded the magical power into her voice and traced a certain melody. “There we go. Good morning, Felicia.”
“...Good morning. It seems you have fully mastered the ‘Connections’ galdr, and in the span of just one week. Honestly, I fear I may lose confidence in my own abilities.”
Felicia placed a hand on her cheek and sighed. She followed it quickly with another smile, though; it was easy to see that she was only joking.
“It’s because I have a good teacher!” Mitsuki smiled. “And you’re willing to work with me from morning to night, after all.”
Mitsuki had indeed spent almost every waking (and sleeping) moment the past week training to control her power.
She worked with Felicia in her waking hours, and with Rífa in her dreams, receiving thorough instruction from both of them.
Thanks to that, Mitsuki could now freely call forth the twin runes in her eyes, and she had reached the point where she was able to manage simple galdr spells, too.
“You are still progressing at an astounding pace,” Felicia said. “At this rate, we may very well succeed.”
“But complacency is the greatest enemy! We can’t fail next time, no matter what.” Mitsuki clenched her fists in front of her, psyching herself up.
When Mitsuki had first told the others that she’d met Rífa in her dreams and secured her cooperation in summoning Yuuto, they had all half-doubted her.
Of course, the fact that they had also half-believed her was something to be grateful for.
If this had been the modern world with its culture of pure science, such a fantastical story would have simply been laughed off.
This was one area where it really made a difference that Yggdrasil was a world with Einherjar and galdr and seiðr, and various other mysterious phenomena.
Eventually, as Mitsuki began to get control over her power, the people who had doubted her at first gradually began to switch to placing their trust and expectations with her. This was especially true because she so closely resembled Rífa.
And so now, Mitsuki was spending her days doing her best to deal with the heavy pressure of the entire Wolf Clan’s expectations.
“Hee hee, you are quite right,” Felicia said. “In that case, why don’t we get right to your training once breakfast is over?”
“Yes! Thank you very much!” Mitsuki said.
“Phewww! I’m so tired...!” Letting out a groan, Mitsuki flopped down onto the table she was sitting at.
She was on a terrace which overlooked the inner courtyard of the palace. It was well-lit by the sun and had become one of Mitsuki’s favorite places.
In the world of fantasy video games, the trope was that magic users were physically weak, but Yggdrasil’s seiðr magics actually required lots of physical stamina. It was pretty much all dancing and singing, after all.
Her physical training started with at least an hour of running, followed by muscle exercises like push-ups and crunches, and then flexibility exercises and voice training. All together, it was a lot like the training for professional stage actors.
Mitsuki had been in the gardening club in middle school, and the only real athletics she’d done were normal gym classes, so this was all pretty rough on her. She was finally getting used to it all now, but at the beginning, she’d suffered from terrible muscle pains.
“Thank you for your hard work again today, Lady Mitsuki,” a young girl said. “Here is your milk and date juice.”
“Oh, thank you, Ephy! ?” Mitsuki accepted the glass from Ephelia and downed it right away.
Juice from the date palm fruit was incredibly sweet on its own, so Mitsuki preferred to drink it mixed with milk to soften the flavor.
It was a drink that digested quickly and was high in nutrition, so it was perfect for a tired body.
“Lunch for today is vegetable soup and grilled salmon,” Ephelia added.
“Wow, it looks so tasty!” Mitsuki quickly placed her hands together and said the traditional itadakimasu, before digging in to the food at a rapid pace.
“When in Rome, do as the Romans do,” as the famous saying went, but for Mitsuki, two meals a day just wasn’t enough. She’d only just come here recently from a three-meals lifestyle, and was working hard all day, so her body might not be able to hold out with just a meal in the morning and evening.
“Hee hee, Big Sister Mitsuki, it seems like your stomach is holding up just fine, after all,” Felicia said, sitting casually in a chair beside her. “That was my biggest concern for you, and I am so happy to see it was unnecessary.”
“Ohhh, yeah, now that you mention it...”
Apparently when Yuuto had first come to Yggdrasil, for a good while, the food hadn’t agreed with his stomach, and he’d been very ill. But Mitsuki hadn’t had any stomach issues as of yet, so it seemed she had nothing to worry about in that regard.
Maybe she had a stronger stomach than Yuuto, or perhaps it had something to do with the mysterious power dwelling in the runes in her eyes.
Either way, it was good enough for her that it didn’t look like she’d need to use the stomach medicine packed into the backpack she’d brought.
Her days and nights were packed with multiple sessions of training and studying, so meals were one of her only chances to wind down and relax. If she’d had to worry about health problems brought on by meals here, the stress would likely have driven her off the deep end.
The soup was delicious, with a flavor she felt she could really get addicted to. The broth tasted like it could use a little bit more salt, but the vegetables were sweeter and their unique flavors stronger than the ones in the modern world.
Mitsuki had read on the internet that, thanks to all the chemicals used in modern farming, vegetables had come to have less flavor and nutrition than they used to long ago. These meals were the type of experience that made her believe it must be true.
The salmon did taste like it could use a little more salt, but it was a fish caught that very morning, far fresher than what she could have bought at the supermarket in her hometown.
The milk mixed in with the date juice she’d just had was also freshly milked.
Her lunch might look simple at first glance, but to someone from modern Japan, one could see it as quite the luxurious meal.
Mitsuki, certainly, had grown quite fond of the food and cooking of Yggdrasil.
“Mm, but you know, I really still do want white rice...” she murmured.
“Ahaha! Yuuto always said the same thing,” Ingrid chimed in from the seat across the table. “Is that rice stuff really that good?” she added, clearly interested.
If she’d heard Yuuto mention it that many times, it was no surprise that she was curious about how good it tasted.
“Mm... well, it’s not like rice itself is super delicious on its own or anything, it’s more like... having it with your meal makes the other food taste better.”
“Huh, really? Hearing it described like that makes me really want to try it.”
“Oh, well, I did bring a small amount with me when I came here. So once things settle down a bit, I’ll treat you all to some.”
After a short, silent pause, Ingrid flashed a bright smile. “...I’m looking forward to that.”
Talking with her like this, Mitsuki felt like Ingrid’s easy-to-talk-to personality reminded her a bit of Ruri. But she still had an air about her befitting the sixth-ranked officer of the Wolf Clan.
Considering the severity of the situation the Wolf Clan was in right now, it was probably hard for her to be cheerful and optimistic.
“These lovely girl-only get-togethers have gotten a lot more lonely.” Mitsuki looked over at the empty chairs at the table. “I want us all to be able to do things as cheerfully as before — no, not just us, I want to include Linnea too.”
Sigrún and the Claw Clan twins had left Iárnviðr five days earlier to act against the encroaching forces of the Lightning Clan.
It was possible that they might be engaged in battle with the Lightning Clan already. That thought filled Mitsuki with worry for them.
It was a feeling she’d faced so many times with Yuuto, but she’d never really got used to it.
The battles this time were expected to be particularly fierce, and all she could do was pray fervently that they made it home in one piece.
After lunch, Mitsuki resumed her special training with Felicia.
Her training in the morning was all focused on the fundamentals and improving her physical stamina, while the afternoon session was all about practicing actual techniques.
They conducted lessons in the hörgr at the top of the Hliðskjálf tower itself, having concluded that it would be best to train in the same location where they would be performing the actual rite.
The religious atmosphere inside the sanctuary hall added to Mitsuki’s energy and focus.
“Fa, Fagra, himn, fibulr...” Mitsuki stammered over the words. Energy and focus weren’t enough to bend reality to her will.
“Incorrect. Not ‘fibulr,’ but ᚠᛁᛞᛒᚢᛚ.”
“Right!”
The incantations for a seiðr ritual all needed to be recited in the language of Yggdrasil.
And they had to be done while performing a dance, so using a cheat sheet to help was out of the question. Rote memorization was the only option.
But, for a Japanese girl like Mitsuki, the words sounded like nothing more than lines of meaningless syllables. That made it difficult for her to remember them.
She had trouble with the pronunciations, too.
And these incantations added up to three whole minutes. Even just remembering all of that was a really exhausting task.
She continuously repeated the incantations, over and over, until the sun set.
“I think we should leave off here for today,” Felicia said at last. “You did wonderfully.”
“Th-thank you very much.” Mitsuki only barely managed to finish a proper thank-you before collapsing to the ground. Her whole body felt heavy and sluggish.
So this is why people in the Drama Club call themselves an athletic club, she thought tiredly.
“All right... I’m gonna go ahead and call Yuu-kun.” Mitsuki pulled out her smartphone and, with unsteady steps, made her way over to a corner of the room.
This was technically a call with her boyfriend, so she would feel embarrassed to have another person listening in.
She turned back one last time to confirm that she was far enough away from Felicia before calling Yuuto’s number.
“Hello?” Yuuto asked.
“It’s Mitsuki. Good evening, Yuu-kun!”
“Hey, good evening. How are you doing?”
“Ugh, I’m so worn ouuut! But I guess you could say things are going well? Felicia and Lady Rífa said that, at this rate, it might work.”
“I see... that’s great. This is all happening so fast, though, like... it still doesn’t feel real. Who’d have thought you were a twin-rune Einherjar, right?”
“Ahaha! I think I’m still the one who has the most trouble believing it. Before I came to Yggdrasil, I was nothing more than your average, ordinary high school girl...”
“Hold on,” Yuuto objected. “Calling you ‘average and ordinary’? That’s an insult to all the normal high school girls out there.”
“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean?!”
“Kidding, just kidding. Well, half-kidding.”
“So then you’re half serious.” Mitsuki’s voice turned cold and rough.
Of course, her tone of voice was also meant as a joke. Partly.
“No, but seriously, you waited three whole years for me to come back, and then decided to go to Yggdrasil with me. I know just how big-hearted you are,” Yuuto said. “Felicia even said something to me about it! ‘As expected of the woman Big Brother selected. She is truly the one worthy of being the wife of a ruler.’ You should have seen my face. And then, when I heard about what you said after that, giving your official approval to affairs... I had trouble closing my jaw after that one.”
“Th-that was... I did research on wives from the Warring States period, and thought a lot about everything, and so...”
“You’re overthinking it, though. I’m loyal to you, and you only.”
“Yeah. I know that I’m the person you love the most. But the person you love the second most is Felicia, right?”
“......”
“I’ll interpret silence as admitting to it.”
“N-no, wait, hold on. Now, um...”
Yuuto began to stammer and panic, causing Mitsuki to chuckle.
“Look, I’m not trying to attack you or blame you or anything. She’s a beautiful woman, and she looked after your needs, both work and personal, for so long. I think it would be impossible to ask you not to have felt anything for her.”
“But I still chose you. And you gave up so much, just to be together with me. I have a responsibility to...”
“Yuu-kun, you have a responsibility to think of your clan first, not me,” Mitsuki stated flatly. “Because you’re their patriarch.”
She continued:
“For example... If you took Linnea, or Al and Kris, as wives, that would deepen relations between the clans, right?”
“...Well, yeah, it would.”
“And keep in mind I’m not planning to give up the seat of ‘first wife and queen’ to anyone, of course. But if you did that, if you took in girls from other clans as secondary wives and the like, that would be a huge benefit to the Wolf Clan. Does that scenario make sense?”
“......” Once more, Yuuto was silent in a way that served as tacit admittance. Then, he gave a long sigh. “Are you really sure you’d be okay with something like that?”
“If you really will always love me most of all, then yes.”
“...You really, really are too good for me. I don’t deserve a wife like you.”
“Well then, you’d better treat me right.” Mitsuki said this last statement in an almost playful manner. But the tone of voice in the reply that came back to her was almost grimly serious.
“Yeah, I will, no matter what. ...I love you.”
“And he actually said that—! Aaaah!” Mitsuki exclaimed. “When I heard that, I got so emotional, I thought I was going to pass out!”
“O-oh, I see. That’s wonderful.” Rífa physically pulled back, overwhelmed by Mitsuki, who was jumping around excitedly as she talked.
The two of them were once again in the familiar garden of white flowers.
Mitsuki, for her part, seemed to pay no notice to how Rífa was reacting.
“Isn’t it, though?! Yuu-kun is a pretty old-fashioned kind of guy, you know, so I was so sure he wasn’t ever going to say ‘I love you’ to me at all. I figured if I ever heard it, it would be on his deathbed or something. But to think I’d get to hear it this same year! I was all, ‘That’s it, I have no more regrets...’”
“Oh, will you just be quiet already!” Rífa snapped. “You were so intent on asking me to hear you out that I thought it was something important, and what do I get but your foolish bragging about your love life! It’s enough to make me sick!”
Rífa finished shouting and puffed up one of her cheeks, still obviously angry.
She was at the very end of her patience, it would appear.
However, considering that she had spent her whole life doted on as the center of attention, perhaps there was something to be said for the fact that she had held out for this long.
“Didn’t you come here to train so that we could summon Yuuto?!” she snapped. “We don’t have the time to waste on idle chatter!”
“Y-yes, that’s true...”
“Good, then let’s get back to practicing the incantation for Mistilteinn.”
“Right!”
The training session that day was a good deal tougher than usual.
It was uncertain whether that was due, in part, to jealousy.
“Fire, fire, fire! Unleash everything you can!” Sigrún screamed, spurring on her men, as she herself aimed her bow and arrow at an enemy and let loose.
The bow she was using was a new model, which Ingrid had made over the winter for Sigrún and the members of her special forces.
The common sort of bow used in Yggdrasil was crescent-shaped, but these new bows had a shape like a pair of mountains joined at the middle.
According to Yuuto, this shape provided a stronger pull on the bowstring, increasing the power of the arrows.
Thanks to that, even though these bows were kept small so they could be used on horseback, they shot farther than normal bows, and they were easier to wield, too.
As the Lightning Clan soldiers began to transition into a counterattack and press forward, Sigrún swiftly gave the order to retreat. “Ghh. All right, pull back!”
However, in a rare showing from the elite members of her unit, the men were slow to react.
That delay gave time for the Lightning Clan troops to close the distance.
“Rrraaagh! I’ll kill you all!”
“Did you really think you could face us and win with such small numbers?!”
The Lightning Clan soldiers pressed forward with even more ferocity.
In a field battle like this, the most kills and captures always came from attacking your enemy as they retreated.
The vast majority of the soldiers had been drafted into the army by decree, but they were still eager to earn rewards for military achievements that would make a fair price for risking death in battle.
Enemy kills could earn rewards from one’s patriarch, not to mention that the enemy’s weapons and personal belongings could be seized for oneself and sold later.
Right now, the attacking soldiers were convinced without a doubt that this was the perfect chance to make their fortunes.
“Looks like they took the bait,” Sigrún murmured to herself, and kicked her horse into a faster run. She then slid her upper body into a position facing backward, and began to fire.
The Múspell forces under her command all followed her lead, and launched arrow after arrow.
It was the technique of their hated enemy, the mounted archers of the Panther Clan — the Parthian shot.
In the fall of the previous year, the Wolf Clan had suffered at the hands of the Parthian shot tactic, so over the course of the past winter, they had trained themselves furiously in its use for themselves.
Their execution of it was of course still quite imperfect compared to the clan they’d copied it from, but their enemies here had let their guard down.
The Lightning Clan soldiers fell prey to the arrows so easily, it was almost comical.
And yet, still they did not halt their pursuit.
Though the Wolf Clan special forces were using this technique to deliberately draw the enemy toward themselves, from their enemy’s perspective, it still looked like they were fleeing.
So, rather than falter, the Lightning Clan soldiers hounded the Wolf Clan riders with even more energy.
They were serving themselves up on a silver platter.
Lure the enemy close, then fire and flee. Lure, and fire. Sigrún’s unit repeated this process over and over.
They eventually expended all of their arrows; and, having managed to deal a satisfactory number of casualties, it was time to pull out.
That was when it happened.
A single rider on horseback came charging out from within the Lightning Clan troops, leaving a huge cloud of dust in his wake.
Even from far away, Sigrún could make out the fiery red of the rider’s hair, and she shuddered.
“We’re leaving!” she shouted. “Retreat at full speed!”
At her command, the special forces all spurred their trusty horses into a full run, leaning their bodies forward and focusing only on making the escape.
They moved at an incredible speed, incomparable to their pretend “fleeing” earlier, and in the blink of an eye, the Lightning Clan troops fell out of sight behind them.
However, Steinþórr himself still remained hot on their heels. Far from being left behind, he was gaining on them by the second.
“Khh... he’s so fast!” Sigrún grimaced bitterly as she glanced behind her.
The enemy’s top commander had charged forward to chase them alone, without any allies or protection. Normally, this would be a golden opportunity. However, common sense was useless against this foe — Steinþórr, the superhuman warrior without peer.
If she were to attack him now along with all three hundred of her elite special forces soldiers, she did think there was a good chance she could win. But it would unmistakably come at the cost of enormous casualties on her side.
Of course, there was enough value in killing him to make even that price worth it. The problem was that, in all likelihood, before they managed to wear him down enough to finish him off, his troops would catch up with them again. That was the most predictable outcome, and it would render all of their losses completely pointless.
Of course, at this rate, it was only a matter of time before he caught up to them anyway.
“Come on... come on... where is it...?!” Sigrún muttered to herself, almost like a chant, unable to suppress her impatience.
It should be just a little farther ahead.
Every passing second felt hopelessly long.
“Guaah!” A cry came from behind her, a man’s dying scream.
One of the members of her unit had fallen behind, and Steinþórr had reached him.
“Rrgh...! How much farther?!” A gleam of light hit Sigrún’s eyes — the reflection of sunlight off of water. “Ah! There it is!”
A river came into full view, its water a dirty gray-brown. It was the Élivágar, the river that had formerly been the border between the Wolf and Lightning Clan territories.
“Forward! We’re going in!” Immediately, she barked the order.
One after the other, her riders leapt their horses into the river with a heavy splash! and pressed forward through the water.
Their speed dropped visibly, as the current took its toll on their footing.
This spelled the perfect opportunity for Steinþórr. However, he pulled back firmly on the reins of his horse and came to a sudden stop, refusing to approach the water’s edge.
His behavior was only natural.
It was during the Battle of Élivágar River, indeed at this very river, where raging floodwaters had given Steinþórr the very first defeat of his life.
He was a man who always charged relentlessly forward, but in this moment, he could do naught but hesitate.
And so, the Múspell Special Forces Unit escaped Steinþórr’s pursuit.
That evening, after Steinþórr had regrouped with his main army, he found himself enduring a storm of a different kind.
“How many times... how many times must I tell you before you will listen?! Do not! Charge! Ahead! Alone!”
jálfi’s shouts came down on him like thunderbolts, broken up by small pauses for breath.
Despite having shouted himself breathless, he still looked like he had a lot more he wanted to say. Anger seemed to radiate off of his whole body like steam, and it was enough to make even the rough and rowdy Lightning Clan soldiers tremble as they watched from a distance.
But Steinþórr himself didn’t seem to be bothered one bit. He idly picked at some dirt in his ear with a finger.
“Father!” Þjálfi screamed.
“Hey, you don’t have to shout so loud. I can hear you just fine. But come on, I didn’t have a choice.”
“How, exactly, did you not have a choice?!”
“Look, if I hadn’t done that, we would have ended up with a lot more dead and injured than what we got, right?”
“Nngh.” Þjálfi frowned, and didn’t answer.
The Wolf Clan cavalry’s attack had killed close to a hundred members of the Lightning Clan, leaving several times that number of injured.
“I helped us out by chasing those guys over to the other side of the river. Now they know they can’t try that crap with us anymore, right?”
“Rrrrgh...!” Þjálfi felt his teeth grinding.
He wanted to lash out angrily, but couldn’t. He had nowhere to direct his anger, and it contorted his face.
What Steinþórr had done was beyond foolish; it had been downright idiotic. But it had produced results. Lightning Clan casualties had been kept to a minimum.
That was how things usually went with this young man.
jálfi was still only twenty-nine, but recently he’d noticed his hairline was starting to recede, and he was absolutely certain it was because of the stress caused by this thoughtless, self-centered sworn father of his.
“Ohh yeah, one more thing,” Steinþórr added, as if he’d just remembered something.
“What is it?”
“Those guys went right across the river, just like normal. Pretty weird when there was all that heavy rain yesterday and the day before.”
“I see... that certainly is strange. We should have the area upriver searched beginning first thing tomorrow morning.”
“You catch on fast. This is why I like having you around, man. It makes things so much easier for me.”
jálfi snorted and shrugged his shoulders. “Meanwhile, being around you only causes me all sorts of headaches.”
After such heavy rains, the river should have been running significantly higher and faster. The fact that the enemy had crossed so easily was suspicious, even if one accounted for them being on horseback.
“I would think it’s most likely they’ve set something up... Still, they must take us for idiots. Even if this is you we are talking about, do they seriously think they can make the same trick work twice?”
“Wait,” Steinþórr began. “I’m pretty sure that means you called me an idiot just now.”
“Just your imagination, Father,” Þjálfi replied smoothly.
It was a lie, of course, but considering what Þjálfi had to go through, perhaps that much should be forgiven.
Steinþórr didn’t seem to pay it any further mind, and continued. “Well, yeah, I don’t think they seriously expect that we’ll fall for that trap again. They probably just did it in hope of the off chance that we will.”
“Ah, that makes sense. And putting it that way, quite impressive of them. In order to dam the river, the sandbags and laborers necessary would require quite a substantial amount of funds and preparation. Perhaps all the more so this time, since they likely did this on short notice.”
Even if the Wolf Clan had seen enormous profits from trade in their glasswares, that sort of expense couldn’t have been trivial to them.
For a strategy that would completely drive off or wipe out their enemies, then of course it would be a cheap price to pay, but if it didn’t provide any results, all of that money and labor would come to nothing.
Steinþórr chuckled. “Heh, that just shows that our enemy isn’t afraid to show how desperate they are. They’ve lost Suoh-Yuuto, and they’re backed into a corner. Maybe this is all they’ve got left?”
Meanwhile, the rare consecutive days of heavy rain had also caused the Körmt River’s waters to rise, effectively holding back the Panther Clan’s advance.
For a time, at least, the Horn Clan had the heavens themselves on their side. However, the Panther Clan remained camped near the southern bank of the river.
Five days passed, and that period of good fortune came to its end.
“The water level’s come down...” said Haugspori, the Horn Clan’s assistant second-in-command, glowering as he peered out at the Körmt River. “They could come at us at any point now.”
His gaze traveled up the far riverbank to the ranks of Panther Clan troops waiting there, and he nervously scratched the back of his head with one hand.
He’d gotten orders from his patriarch Linnea to hold back the Panther Clan at the river’s edge, but that was going to be pretty tough to do.
After all, the enemy had three times the number of soldiers.
If they relied on that overwhelming size difference and attacked with their full force all at once, the Horn Clan side frankly wouldn’t have any real way of stopping them.
Of course, the chance of the Panther Clan trying such a brute force method was probably pretty low. They would be loath to throw away a huge number of their own men’s lives just to cross this point, after all.
“If either one of us shows an opening, it’ll all come loose in a second...” Haugspori muttered to himself.
Two armies, both ready in formation, staring each other down silently. This was a common situation with large field battles.
The key to this silent “battle before the battle” was in whether one could maintain one’s own troop morale and injure the enemy’s.
A prolonged stalemate depressed morale, as did bouts of bad weather like they’d just seen.
Furthermore, when the enemy’s forces had a clear advantage, maintaining morale with that knowledge was a difficult task all its own.
Almost all of the soldiers here were recruits drafted into service from the population; typically the second or third sons of farmers and the like. One couldn’t simply demand that such men fight and die for their nation with fearless loyalty.
If their fortunes took a bad turn, those men would likely flee.
Seamless coordination and discipline, like that shown by the Wolf Clan troops, was totally abnormal by common standards.
Standing on the other bank, a masked man was glaring back in his direction, watching.
“Damn! Even from far away, the sight of that guy creeps me out,” Haugspori muttered. Suddenly, he got the sensation that something was wrong. “Hm?”
One of the most important things to an archer is good vision. As the Horn Clan’s greatest archer, Haugspori also had the best eyes in the clan.
That was why he was able to realize what was happening.
However, he was just a little too late.
“Enemy attack! Enemy attack! Armed riders, approaching us from the west!”
“Heh heh, they fell right for it.” Hveðrungr smirked as he raced his horse alongside the bank of the Körmt River — the northern bank.
The man who had been standing so brazenly in full view on the southern riverbank was a total imposter, a man with similar build and hair whom Hveðrungr had made to wear a mask just like his own.
So infamous was Hveðrungr’s appearance that in the western lands of Yggdrasil, he was already known by the moniker Grímnir, the Masked Lord. Because of that, anyone who saw a person wearing his black iron mask would assume it was him. He’d simply used that fact to his advantage.
With “Hveðrungr” and the majority of the army he commanded standing visible on the shore, watching for an opening, the Horn Clan would of course have no choice but to devote their full attention to them.
And by drawing their attention toward his main force and his fake, the real Hveðrungr had been able to take three thousand riders with him in a separate unit, make their way to a different crossing point, and take their time fording the river.
Crossing had still been somewhat difficult, but without the added threat of Horn Clan troops, that was hardly an issue.
And once they were across, there would be no more to fear.
The Horn Clan was formed up facing off against the Panther Clan forces on the far shore, and so their unprotected flank was exposed.
“Heh heh, we’ll wipe them out in one fell swoop!” Hveðrungr thrust his hand forward, signaling his men to charge.
“Rrraaaaaaghh!!”
The Panther Clan riders let out a loud war cry and raced at full charge toward the Horn Clan with ferocious speed.
At that point, they assumed that all that remained was for them to overwhelm and wipe out their enemies in a one-sided massacre.
However...
From deep within the Horn Clan ranks came a loud rumbling sound. It was the ominous rumbling of scores of heavy wagon wheels.
“Ngh! The wagon wall?!” Hveðrungr clicked his tongue in irritation. “Tch... How could they have acquired that many of them on their own?!”
He hadn’t anticipated in the slightest that they’d have this prepared.
Thus far, Hveðrungr’s appraisal of Linnea had been anything but favorable. He had, in short, completely discounted her capabilities.
That assessment had been, in a way, inevitable. Linnea’s skill in military matters was absolutely mediocre, if one were to look only at the results of her battles.
She’d attacked the Wolf Clan with twice their troop strength and lost spectacularly, and afterward she’d been unable to do anything to stop the incursions of the Panther Clan, even losing fortified cities like Myrkviðr and Sylgr to them.
Despite being the ruler of the nation right next to Steinþórr’s, she couldn’t even merit his remembering her name.
During the Panther Clan’s invasion, and even earlier during the Hoof Clan’s invasion, she had only defended her nation’s survival thanks to the protection of the Wolf Clan.
That was why Hveðrungr had assumed he would be able to defeat her with all the ease of a tiger swatting away a cub.
But...
“Damn it,” he spat in frustration, “Hold, men, hold, hold! Withdraw for now!” He turned his horse around.
This detached force he was currently leading didn’t have enough manpower to break through the wagon fortress defense.
“I guess even a second-rate patriarch is still a patriarch,” he grumbled. “So she was at least worthy of reaching her position, then.”
The wagon carriages used in the wagon wall were specially reinforced with iron plates, and so even one such carriage must have been quite expensive to create.
Even if the knowledge from Yuuto had made its production possible, iron was still very, very expensive. And the Horn Clan would have been importing the materials from the Wolf Clan, so that would make the production price even higher.
In just half a year, the Horn Clan had mass produced them. Linnea had fully grasped the military value of the wagon wall defense, and even as her nation was struggling in its weakened political state, she had found a way to raise the money to cover the enormous budget necessary. That was not the work of a mediocre ruler.
Hveðrungr would have to completely rethink his invasion strategy.
After the detached force of Panther Clan riders successfully escaped some distance from the battlefield area, they found a nearby farming village and attacked it, capturing both food supplies and a place to set up base.
The corpses of murdered residents lay strewn haphazardly here and there, and from various places outside the village, one could hear the wails and screams of women.
Let us take, for example, Uesugi Kenshin, who is regarded in Japanese history as an example of a righteous and heroic general: It is said that upon entering enemy territory, even he would aggressively plunder the villages of their autumn harvests and capture the locals for sale as slaves.
Inhumane though it may be, pillaging reduces the resources and strength of an enemy country while simultaneously sustaining one’s own army; two birds with one stone. Thus, it has always been a legitimate part of military strategy, even being recommended by Sun Tzu.
“Still, it seems they have gotten one over on us.” The Panther Clan general Narfi sighed and shook his head. “I would never have thought they would have those ‘wagon fortresses’ prepared against us...”
He was a slender man with clean-cut and delicately handsome features, which made him stand out among the men of the Panther Clan, who typically looked more wild, virile, and tough.
However, in contrast to his somewhat weak appearance, he was an Einherjar with the rune of Hrímfaxi, the Frostmane, and the third strongest fighter in the Panther Clan.
“What shall we do, then? We cannot exactly use brute strength to break our way through, as Uncle Steinþórr of the Lightning Clan might do. And I believe having our men infiltrate their formation in disguise, like we did at Gashina, will be a bit difficult this time.”
“Hmph, true, breaking through that defensive wall is no meager feat,” said Hveðrungr, sitting across from Narfi with a frustrated look on his face. He shrugged. “Even if we were to coordinate with our main forces on the southern riverbank and launch a pincer attack, we might still get repelled by their defenses anyway.”
Narfi silently nodded.
During their previous battle in Náströnd, they had attacked the Wolf Clan’s wagon wall with twice the number of troops and had been totally defeated without even being able to inflict significant losses on their enemy.
They had three times the number of troops as their enemy right now, but even with that, it seemed clear that rushing in headfirst without a plan would just lead to history repeating itself.
“However, that doesn’t mean there’s no solution,” Hveðrungr announced.
“Ohh, as expected of you, Father. So what sort of method do you have in mind?” Narfi was inwardly struck by how impressive it was that this man was managing to think of one clever trick after another to break through that seemingly impenetrable wagon wall defense.
“A long time ago, I heard this from a certain person: Apparently, fighting a hundred battles and winning each one is not the ideal result as a commander.”
“Well now, winning every single battle you fight sounds like a wonderful thing to me,” Narfi objected.
“Would you believe it? Apparently, the greatest victory is to defeat your enemy without ever having to fight them.” Hveðrungr sneered and chuckled to himself quietly.
Narfi knew that whenever Hveðrungr smiled in this way, it was always when he’d come up with a particularly evil idea.
In that moment, Narfi truly felt pity for his enemies in the Horn Clan.
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