How To Live As A Third Son Of A Failure [EN]: Chapter 124

Less than a few hours after the meeting concluded, all preparations for battle were complete.

It was thanks to the prior notice that they were able to act so quickly, but there was still not much time given.

Rodkius had abandoned them. Would Baron Trill, having realized this, really allow himself to be captured so easily?

Even if I didn’t know for sure, now that he’d been abandoned by everyone, he would likely use the prisoners to stage a hostage situation.

I couldn’t exactly hope for Rodkius’s help.

He said he would release the prisoners and take care of the three nobles, but that was more to signify that Rodkius would no longer be involved in this matter.

I understand. From Rodkius’s perspective, he’d want to wash his hands of it as quickly as possible and get out as if it never happened.

“Baron.”

Harkins approached me, sensing that battle was imminent.

I acknowledged him and nodded, asking,

“Is everything ready?”

“Everyone is awaiting your command.”

“And the Knights?”

“They will come here as soon as the attack begins.”

“Good. Then we just need to wait for the signal to attack.”

Speak of the devil, and no sooner had I said that than horns began to blare resonantly from all directions of the Duke’s encampment.

Woo-oong…

The army, which had been orderly arranged in formation beforehand, began to move. At the same time, the Knights, who had taken their place on one side, rushed towards me.

They were the Wisdom Knights.

Looking at them gathered, I took a light breath and opened my mouth calmly.

“The gates will open. Leave the battle to the others, and we will break through via the shortest route to secure the safety of the prisoners first.”

“The gates will open? Was there something discussed?”

At Harkins’s question, I recalled what I had promised Alione at the end of the meeting.

“Yes. The gates will open. You can assume that the castle is in chaos due to internal strife. I am familiar with the internal structure, so follow me. We will pass through the outer castle and head straight for the inner castle.”

“Understood. Lead the way.”

Harkins, who had been nodding, suddenly tilted his head as if he had remembered something.

“By the way, has your escort knight returned to the North? I thought his skills would be helpful, but I don’t see him.”

“Ah, Ruth? I’ve sent him on a little errand.”

“An errand, you say?”

“Yes.”

“…Is that so?”

Ruth was out for the secretly promised task with Alione, so Harkins, unaware of his whereabouts, could only be puzzled.

It was then. A familiar voice was heard from behind the lined-up Knights.

“Are you going to rescue the prisoners?”

It was the Duke. Dressed in a battle mage robe and mounted on a white warhorse, the Duke looked resolute.

“Are you going to participate in the battle directly?”

“Don’t treat me like an old man.”

The Duke had roamed countless battlefields in his younger days. Naturally, he would be skilled at commanding troops.

I nodded and looked at the Duke.

“Will you come with us?”

To my question of whether he would go with me to rescue the prisoners in the inner castle, the Duke shook his head.

“You started this. So you should finish it.”

“Understood.”

Thump.

The Duke threw me a crude silver fox insignia, symbolizing the commander.

“I hereby temporarily grant you command of the Wisdom Knights. Be sure to rescue the prisoners with the Knights and return.”

I lightly accepted it, mounted my horse, looked at Baron Trill’s castle, and nodded.

“Understood.”

There was no grand speech. Everyone was well aware of their mission, and their fighting spirit was already burning hot enough.

“Hyah!”

“Hah!”

Starting with my signal to depart, dozens of Knights kicked the flanks of their horses and began to head towards Baron Trill’s castle.

* * *

“We’re going to die.”

Fleta said in a tone as calm as it was cold. There was no regret or self-deprecation in her tone.

Just as one should open their eyes in the morning and fall asleep at night, she affirmed that she would die.

That’s right. No one can avoid death. Therefore, Fleta’s words had the flavor of an old philosopher’s contemplation.

If the place where they were having that conversation wasn’t inside a damp, moss-covered underground prison.

“I’m sorry, Illia. You’ve been caught up in this because of me.”

“It’s alright.”

At first, they had treated them like noble prisoners.

But as time went on, the amount of food gradually decreased. In weather where icicles formed on the prison walls at dawn, they weren’t even given a blanket to cover themselves.

At first, Fleta was furious at this harsh treatment, but the clever her was soon able to guess the current situation.

‘They’ve chosen war.’

It was the right decision.

Trading her for the territories of the three nobles was an extremely unequal deal. Some called her the future of Bashrun, but in reality, that future depended on the territories of the three nobles.

‘I would have made the same choice.’

The situation was flowing towards war, and therefore, she could predict that her fate, whose value was decreasing, was also approaching.

She could accept it. She was prepared to die if it meant dying for this cause.

But there were definitely some regrets.

Clatter-!

A tin pot resembling a dog bowl was thrown through a small opening.

She didn’t even need to see the contents to know.

It was probably greenish-blue moldy porridge with maggots rolling around on top like a playground.

Of course, she didn’t regret that meal.

“My offer is still valid, but you still haven’t changed your mind?”

The guard’s greasy gaze, baring his yellow teeth and shaking a well-baked sausage, scanned Fleta up and down.

That was the regret.

She could endure a meal swarming with maggots.

Likewise, she could willingly endure an environment without a single blanket.

But she couldn’t stand that guard who leered as he poured water on them every day to keep their body temperature down, forcing them to cling to Illia.

To have to die without gouging out those eye sockets and tearing out the roots of his tongue.

That was the only regret.

“Well, let’s see how long you can last.”

The guard, shaking the sausage back and forth in a way that clearly indicated what he meant, disappeared.

Thus, they were left alone again in the cold prison. Afterwards, Illia moved as if she had planned it out and picked up the tin pot.

“You don’t have to eat it.”

“You must eat. You need to preserve at least some strength so you can seize an opportunity when it comes.”

Fleta bit her lip as she watched Illia, who had tied her bobbed hair back, picking out the maggots one by one with her hands.

“Opportunity? What opportunity?”

Even with her hair covered in dust and lacking luster, and her gaunt appearance, Illia’s eyes were still vividly alive.

That appearance puzzled Fleta.

The situation was heading towards disaster, but Illia was acting as if she was waiting for something.

“I don’t know. I can’t really tell you what kind of opportunity it is, but…”

“…”

“A feeling, perhaps? Yes, just a hunch.”

“A hunch?”

Hunch. Hearing that word, Fleta suddenly thought of a face.

A man who had made many decisions based solely on hunches, and they had turned out to be strangely accurate.

“…”

For some reason, she felt a surge of defiance, as if that man would click his tongue and say she was giving up too easily if he saw her current state.

“Damn it.”

Fleta frowned bitterly and shook off her seat. Then, she approached Illia and pulled her up.

“Let’s do it together.”

Illia, who had widened her eyes for a moment, nodded and was about to hand the tin pot to Fleta when…

Thwack!

A dull sound echoed through the dark underground prison corridor.

Thud!

A sound followed as an unknown liquid stuck to the wall. After a while, the faintly rising smell suggested it was blood.

Thump, thump…

The sausage rolled from the source of the sound to the front of the bars.

Illia quickly reached out to grab the sausage from outside the bars. But someone’s hand grabbed the sausage faster.

“Oh, what a waste… Ah, right.”

The owner of the hand was Ruth.

Ruth unknowingly picked up the sausage and belatedly realized that his hand was covered in blood, and clicked his tongue.

“Hmm?”

Then, Ruth looked around inside the bars and took on an flustered expression upon discovering two women staring at the bloody sausage he was holding with fierce eyes.

“Did I do something wrong?”

* * *

Thud thud thud-!

The vibrations created by the horses’ hooves kicking the ground shook the body violently up and down.

“We’re almost at the gate!”

Harkins, who was running beside me, expressed his doubts. The gate was still tightly closed, not allowing anyone to enter or exit.

“It will open.”

But at my confident words, Harkins shut his mouth.

Swish-!

At the same time, archers who had risen above the ramparts began to fire arrows. Their target was the Knights, including me.

Thud thud!

But the opponents were the Knights of Bashrun, a family of magical renown. The artifacts they each possessed exerted their power, deploying shields in all directions to block the arrows.

The charge continued, and at any moment it seemed as if they would collide with the gate, which had become closer and closer.

Drrr…

The gate began to open.

The width was narrow enough for only one or two warhorses to barely pass through. But for the Knights, who possessed excellent horsemanship, it was no different from a wide triumphal arch.

“The gate is open!”

What was visible through the narrowly opened gate was a scene of brutal slaughter.

Unable to believe that they had been betrayed, corpses met their deaths with bewildered faces, forming a sea of people.

And next to that pile of corpses, several knights wearing cloaks with black bears drawn on them stood and stared at us indifferently.

‘Are they Rodkius’s knights?’

They seemed to be the ones who opened the gate.

They simply stared blankly at me and the Knights passing by, and soon gradually hid themselves somewhere.

“Where are we going?”

“To the inner castle!”

The main street was noisy. It was crowded with soldiers who were in chaos because they had not predicted that the gate would open, and citizens who were hurriedly fleeing.

Some soldiers bravely held out their spears to try to stop the charge. But even that courage was easily extinguished by the aura created by the Knights.

“It seems like the outer castle is almost over!”

Harkins shouted from atop the running warhorse.

He was right. Once the gate was opened and the interior was in chaos, normal defense was impossible.

In addition, Baron Trill, who had realized that he had been betrayed, would probably withdraw his main forces to the inner castle, where the lord’s castle was located, and try to hold out.

He would definitely do so because of the last card, the prisoners.

“They’re probably retreating all the main forces to the inner castle!”

“Then to there?”

“Follow me! We must strike before they can reorganize!”

The warhorse, which had been running without hesitation, exhaled white breath.

At the same time as that breath scattered in the air, the inner castle, located far away on the hill, came into view.

The effect of running quickly was there. Thanks to the procession of troops hastily retreating, the inner castle gate was still open.

“Block them!”

The other side must have known that everything would be over if even the inner castle was breached.

That’s why knights with the Trill family crest rushed out. The numbers were about the same, but the opponent had many more soldiers besides the knights.

The defending soldiers, with their spears forward, knelt down and took a firm stance. It was a spear wall that was effective in stopping cavalry charges.

Above those spearmen, archers on the inner castle walls aimed their huge longbows. It was a close enough distance that even the shield could be pierced if they were not careful, so that was also a considerable burden.

“It seems like a battle is unavoidable!”

“It’s okay. Just break through and keep the gate from closing.”

“What? Keep the gate from closing? Shouldn’t we be rescuing the prisoners first?”

“There’s no need to go and rescue them directly. All we have to do is meet them.”

“What? Meet them?”

“There’s not much time! So let’s replace the explanation with an order. Break through the gate. And defend that gate with your life.”

Harkins, looking at the silver fox insignia on my chest at the coercive words of command, nodded.

“I’ll trust you for now.”

Was it the power of the insignia? Harkins, who nodded without a moment’s hesitation, raised his sword.

“Wisdom Knights! Formation 3!”

At the same time as Harkins’s command, the Knights began to form a formation in an orderly manner.

It was a wedge formation effective for penetrating the center.

The formation was completed with Harkins and I at the forefront, and soon the blue spear in the shape of a wedge, burning with aura, was aimed at the gate.

Thwack!

As if they wouldn’t just watch us, countless longbows spat out arrows.

At the same time, Harkins tore off the amulet he was wearing around his neck and held it in the air.

Swoosh-!

A thick shield, unlike anything they had shown so far, was formed and enveloped the Knights.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The arrows began to strike the shield with sounds as if they were hitting it with a blunt weapon.

But even the arrow barrage was not enough to stop the Knights’ charge. The Knights, who had endured one wave, soon became one with the giant wedge and collided with the enemy.

The screams of crushed humans and the cries of warhorses pierced by spears were intertwined in an instant.

Thanks to the price paid in flesh and bone, the Knights’ charge stopped. After that, all that remained was a desperate close combat.

Thump!

Harkins, stepping on a warhorse with its neck pierced, jumped up and landed in the middle of the enemy camp, emitting aura.

“Who wants to die first!”

The soldiers flinched at the roaring shout and momentarily retreated.

Knights are dealt with by knights.

The soldiers, thinking of that, were momentarily distracted as they tried to find allied knights.

‘They were holding out well.’

Through the scattered formation, Ruth, Illia, and Fleta were seen far away, backed against the wall and surrounded by a group of soldiers.