I Became The Tyrant Of A Defense Game [EN]: Chapter 384

As Evangeline said, the people of Crossroads were resilient, and the city’s restoration was swift.

About a month had passed since the end of the defense battle.

The goblins’ corpses were cleared away without a trace, and their bloodstains were thoroughly washed away.

The returning residents began to live their lives as before. The city walls were under reconstruction, and the city was regaining its usual vitality.

……However.

Some wounds never heal.

It was the last day of February in the year 650 of the Imperial Calendar.

Exactly one year after I fell into this world, a funeral was held on this day.

And coincidentally, this day was also the day to commemorate the soldiers who died in the black spider legion during the tutorial stage.

“……”

Crossroads West. The cemetery.

Looking around at the people gathered like clouds, I swallowed my words.

The bodies had all been laid to rest in the tombs. The priests sprinkled holy water on the graves and blessed the afterlife of the deceased.

As the choir’s funeral dirge echoed, people shed tears in front of the graves of their lost loved ones.

“……”

Lily was only watching this scene from afar.

Godhand had not yet been given a grave. Because Lily, his lover, wanted it that way.

His colleagues, Burnout and Bodybag, and Berdandi, who was said to be his superior in the past, also agreed.

That’s why Godhand was still missing.

March starts tomorrow.

It was officially spring, but Lily was still waiting for Godhand’s return.

Behind her, Burnout and Bodybag stood side by side, staring down at the cemetery.

I glanced at the three of them, then turned my gaze away.

Many people had died, and many mourners had come, but there was one grave that was particularly crowded.

It was Margherita’s.

Was there anyone in this city who had not been helped by her?

From a light cold to severe injuries that exposed bones, Margherita was the one who treated everyone.

Suddenly, my left arm throbbed. I gripped my left arm tightly with my right hand.

Her touch, when she put a cast on this arm, was still vivid.

Now, I can never be treated by her again.

“I’m going to apply to the Central Order for the dispatch of a new chief priest.”

Damian, who had been by Margherita’s grave, said as he rushed to me.

Damian had been working tirelessly as the acting chief priest for the past month.

“It’s also to replenish manpower. The Central Order is also in chaos due to the civil war between the princes, so I don’t know if they’ll be able to select someone properly……”

“……”

“I wonder if there are any foolish priests left who would willingly walk into a fortress city. Haha……”

Damian was right. This place was not a place that anyone but a foolish priest could handle.

It was a place where you had to treat the severely injured who were dying every day in a city that could be captured by monsters at any time.

Margherita was an incredibly foolish person.

Even while complaining, she never ran away and fought against death in the temple.

I will miss that foolishness.

I quietly ruffled Damian’s curly hair. Come to think of it, you’re just as foolish.

“Just hang in there a little longer until the next chief priest arrives.”

“Hang in there? I don’t think so at all. It’s just that……”

Damian looked at Margherita’s grave and smiled sadly.

“I think Margherita was a really great person. I make mistakes even with the help of other priests, but I wonder how Margherita managed to handle so much work alone……”

“……”

We only realize the value of something after we lose it. Foolishly, as always.

I visited the graves of other heroes and soldiers as well. They were all crowded with mourners, but there was one place that was particularly desolate.

It was in front of the graves of the Leprosy Extermination Squad.

Torkel stood alone in front of the empty graves.

I and Damian quietly approached and offered a silent prayer in front of the graves.

Torkel glanced at us once, bowed his head to me, then lowered his head again and closed his eyes.

“Mr. Torkel…… has been volunteering to do chores at the temple ever since.”

Damian said as we left the graves of the Leprosy Extermination Squad.

“Even if I try to ask him to do something easier, he insists on taking on the dirty work that others don’t want to do…… Of course, I’m grateful since the temple is busy, but I wish he would……”

There was a sense of pity in Damian’s voice.

“I wish he wouldn’t push himself so hard……”

“……”

That must be his way of suppressing his grief.

So I decided not to stop him. We headed to the next grave.

After visiting all the newly made graves and expressing our condolences, the sun was already high in the sky.

The funeral was coming to an end, and it was my turn to give a speech, so I stepped onto the podium.

Thousands of gazes flew like arrows and pierced me.

I took a breath and opened my mouth.

“When I first came to this place and held the first funeral, I said. You will continue to die on this front line.”

When I first came to Crossroads and held the funeral for the soldiers who died in the tutorial, I said this.

“But your deaths are expensive. So I will save you as much as possible. I will save you and use you, so don’t die easily.”

After listing the words I had said at that time, I quietly looked around the cemetery.

“I made such a bold statement, but now, a year later…… the graves continue to increase.”

“……”

“The monster’s invasions are becoming more and more intense, and our side’s losses are also increasing uncontrollably like wildfire.”

People swallowed hard. I clenched my fist.

“At the last funeral, I said that I would use every means available to crush their invasion.”

“……”

“I made such a bold statement, but I wonder if I really used every means available……”

I took a breath.

“I promise. Now I will truly mobilize ‘all means’.”

I declared my decision.

“If it means exterminating the monsters and saving even one more person…… I will do anything.”

Perhaps they read some kind of will in my words.

Some people’s faces turned pale, some people’s shoulders trembled, and some people looked at me with trembling eyes.

It doesn’t matter.

After all, everyone will soon know what this means.

And I will force them all to follow me.

“I hope for your active cooperation in the path that I and this monster front will take in the future.”

I turned my head and looked at the communal tombstone.

It was a tombstone commemorating those who died during the tutorial stage.

I turned my head again and looked at the newly created tombstones.

I repeated the names of the dead in my mind.

For a moment, my throat choked up.

“……Only after countless sacrifices, I was able to reach this conclusion.”

I lowered my head.

“I will offer a moment of silence for all those who have died in the past year, and for all those who will die in the future, who have become the milestones of the monster front through their deaths.”

Thousands of people bowed their heads in unison.

After a short moment of silence, I nodded and stepped down from the platform.

As Lucas, who was waiting next to the artillery unit, waved his arm, the artillerymen lit the cannons.

Bang! Bang! Boom!

The cannon fire commemorating the dead echoed hollowly through the cemetery.

Another funeral ended like this.

***

“I was expecting the funeral speech in Crossroads to be moving.”

I was standing on a hill, watching the people disperse, when I heard a voice next to me.

“This speech was more like…… chilling than moving.”

“……Your Majesty.”

It was the elf queen, Skuld, who approached, wearing a white twig crown and a teardrop mark in a diamond shape.

I sneered slightly.

“I thought you would go straight back to the autonomous region. You’re staying quite long.”

Just a month ago, she acted like she would leave immediately, but Skuld and her elves were using Crossroads as a base to tour the surrounding area.

There was no reason to stop them, so I left them alone, but it was a bit absurd.

Skuld shrugged nonchalantly.

“I came out of the autonomous region for the first time in a hundred years. It’s okay to get some fresh air, right? But that outing is over now…… I’m going back soon.”

“You’ve been busy going around the surrounding city-states. Did you get the results you wanted?”

“I got some small results, but I didn’t achieve my biggest goal. So this outing wasn’t very successful.”

Her biggest goal was probably…… me.

She seemed to have been trying to do something by relying on the banner and cause I had put forward. But that was canceled when I broke that banner.

“Oh, by the way. Before I leave, can I ask you a small favor?”

Skuld took out a small pouch from her bosom and handed it to me.

“Please give this to Sister Berdandi.”

“This is……”

“These are sunflower seeds grown in the Elven Autonomous Region. It’s a variety brought from my hometown. Hehe, they’re the best in the world, you know?”

As expected of a hamster race, even the queen carries seeds around. I took it silently.

“……It doesn’t matter whether the Holy Grail is real or a hoax. Whether it exists or not, the Fairy Kingdom is already destroyed, and the World Tree is dead.”

Skuld sighed softly.

“I just hope that my sister will accept that reality now and come back to my side.”

“……”

“Please tell her this along with the seeds. Tell her to come to the autonomous region anytime. I’ll be waiting for her.”

“I will.”

Skuld’s elf subordinates brought a deer. Skuld stroked the deer’s neck, looked at me intently, and opened her mouth.

“Prince Ash. I don’t know why you broke your own banner.”

“……”

“But I know that breaking the banner you were pursuing is as painful as breaking your own heart.”

I glared at her.

“How do you know that?”

“Because I’ve done it.”

Skuld gave a hollow smile.

“Because I’ve thrown away so much to survive.”

“……”

“Breaking the flag is very difficult at first, but after the first time, it becomes too easy. Because it’s already broken.”

Skuld’s long finger went up to the center of her chest.

“Once you start compromising, you’ll end up bending endlessly. Eventually, you’ll live on your knees. Like me.”

“……”

“I’ll give you one last piece of advice. Even if you give up everything and compromise with everything, keep one core in your heart firmly. Without it, a person is not really living, even if they are alive.”

Her advice was sincere and appropriate, but it was already too late.

I had already broken it.

My flagpole was already shattered. I had already decided to abandon it.

I bowed formally without answering. Skuld also bowed in the Imperial style, then jumped onto the deer.

I watched the elves disappear into the distance, then turned around.

It was time to do what I had to do.

***

I took Lucas and the soldiers and headed to Crossroads city.

Lucas had a dark expression throughout the funeral, but as soon as he joined me, he began to speak in a worried tone.

“My lord. The next defense battle is coming soon…… But we haven’t even completed the restoration of the city walls of Crossroads, let alone the forward base.”

“……”

“Most of the teleport gates that were installed on the monsters’ path have also been destroyed. So it’s difficult to use guerrilla tactics. In this situation, how do you plan to fight the defense battle? You haven’t even shared it with us……”

It had already been about a month since the last defense battle ended.

The next stage was coming soon. But the repairs to the defensive facilities were not completed, and the treatment of the wounded was not finished. The recruitment of new soldiers was also slow.

It was natural for Lucas to worry since I was so calm in this situation.

“Don’t worry, Lucas.”

I grinned.

“I have something prepared. Right here.”

“Here is……?”

The place where I stopped was a place with a thick iron gate blocking the entrance.

It was the Crossroads Central Prison. The guards who were guarding the entrance parted to the left and right, making way.

Lucas looked at the prison with a suspicious face.

“You have something prepared? Inside this prison……?”

“Yes.”

I took the lead and went inside. Lucas cautiously followed behind me.

And at the very back of the prison. Lucas’s eyes widened as he stood in front of a large cell.

“Le, let me out! Let me out!”

“What are you doing! Why are you putting this on our bodies!”

“Please save me! Please save me, Your Highness! Please!”

Four prisoners were screaming and tied up.

They were the four Aegis special forces agents who were captured during the last special forces infiltration incident.

Their bodies, which were tightly bound, were connected to a large amount of explosives, along with a magic core-containing explosive device.

“Do you know where the goblins rushed to the most during this goblin invasion, after the temple?”

“Don’t tell me……”

“Yes. It was this prison. The goblins rushed in to kill these prisoners who were hiding behind the sturdy iron bars, but absurdly, the iron bars were so strong that all the prisoners survived.”

I sat down casually on a chair placed in front of the cell.

“After seeing that scene and thinking a little, I realized that it would be very easy to defeat the monsters.”

“……”

“The basic principle of the monsters’ behavior is simple. They attack the closest human.”

I stretched out my leg and kicked the iron bars of the cell with a bang. The prisoners screamed and huddled on the floor.

“Then, what if we put human bombs with explosive devices all over them in a sturdy iron cage and throw them in front of a group of monsters?”

“……”

“Like monkeys trying to lick the flesh inside a shell, the monsters will gather around the iron cage. And then, boom!”

I made a gesture of a bomb exploding with my hand.

“It will inflict massive damage on the swarming monsters. It’s completely efficient.”

“……”

“This is not all. This is just a very primitive trap, and if this test is successful, I will apply this method to……”