The Shadowed Legacy of the Soulless Messenger [EN]: Chapter 424

The beast cavalry charged, their terrifying momentum tearing through the ground, sending the still-unmelted snow of the Arangi Kingdom swirling around them. These monsters of flesh, teeth, and bone, crushing the frozen earth, advanced, wielding death itself.

But the Arangian Guard met that death with fire in their eyes.

“Show them!”

The leading Arangian Guards surged forward, halberds raised high.

They rushed towards the beasts that sought to trample them, striking the creatures’ forelegs with their halberds and then slamming the shafts into the ground. The blades and shafts became massive wedges, throwing the charging beast cavalry off balance.

The massive beast cavalry tumbled with the momentum of their charge, and the Arangian Guard moved aside to avoid the falling beasts. Surprisingly, they knew how to deal with these monsters.

Like a scene from mythology, beings who, though large, were still within the human realm, hunted massive beasts that clearly surpassed human limitations.

“Die!”

The Arangian Guard spewed flames from their primal bloodline, coating their swords with it. The heated blades pierced the eyes of the beast cavalry, and with the smell of burning flesh, the massive beasts writhed in agony. As the Arangian Guard effectively halted the beast cavalry’s charge, the enemy’s advance faltered.

At that moment, with Azadin’s signal, the Heraldic Clan’s arrows flew. The small number of the Heraldic Clan split into two wings, firing arrows from their positions. Though few in number, their arrows were surprisingly accurate and powerful, striking the sides of the ogre warband and disrupting their charge.

The ogre warriors, who should have been slaughtering the disorganized ranks, were instead disoriented by the arrows raining down from the sides. The ogre mages cast defensive spells and used blood magic to calm their excited troops. They calmly divided their forces, rushing towards the Heraldic Clan archers who were firing the few arrows.

After all, the Arangian Guard at the front had already become an unbreakable anvil, blocking their path. Although the Arangian Guard were few in number, they might eventually be broken through, but how great would the cost be to their own forces?

It was a reasonable tactic to charge at the annoying humans who were shooting arrows, avoiding the seemingly impenetrable anvil.

However….

“Fire!”

The dwarves, who had been lying prone in shallow ditches, rose up. The dwarf blunderbuss soldiers, elite troops of Banreung, who had been lying in roadside ditches and field furrows, rose up and fired their blunderbusses in unison.

Originally, blunderbuss soldiers liked to fix bayonets to their blunderbusses and charge after a volley, engaging in melee combat. However, Azadin strictly forbade such tactics to prevent unnecessary casualties. The blunderbuss soldiers fired a volley and retreated. The severely damaged ogres charged in fury, but this time, the musketeers positioned behind the blunderbuss soldiers fired another volley.

And at the same time, Azadin moved to the next position.

Azadin’s hippogriff [a mythical creature, half-eagle, half-horse] flew towards the cavalry on the flanks, led by Marquis Gazein.

“Now! Charge!”

Being able to survey the battlefield from the sky and approach the desired units to issue timely orders made the hippogriff worth more than its expensive upkeep.

Upon Azadin’s command, the cavalry of the Arangi Kingdom charged. The cavalry units at the edges of the flanks spurred their horses.

“Run! Run!”

Ignoring the ogres targeting the archers and musketeers, they ran and ran. The cavalry’s target was the goblin units behind the ogres. When the goblin shamans, surprised, began to cast spells, sharp thorn bushes grew, blocking their path.

“Ugh….”

“Damn it!”

The knights were in danger of falling due to the goblin shamans’ magic.

But then, the paladins and priests of the King’s Church stepped forward. As they chanted and threw their maces, a storm of divine power swept through, tearing apart the thorn bushes laid by the goblin shamans and clearing the way.

“What?!”

“Excellent! Where did these priests come from?”

Marquis Gazein was deeply moved by the sight of the paladins using divine magic. How many years had it been since he, a great noble, had seen paladins who could properly use divine magic?

For a long time, many paladins in the King’s Church had been losing their white magic. Yet, here were proper paladins in Azadin’s army, which the King’s Church had deemed heretical?

“It is thanks to converting to the New Testament.”

“What?”

“That, that’s absurd. Are you serious?”

“It is true. The priests and paladins who have accepted the New Testament have regained their white magic.”

“Hasn’t it already been proven by the Light of Kingship? The Yaegas gods said that if a righteous king sits on the throne and seeks to protect his people, the power of white magic will protect this land.”

Since Azadin began his activities in the southern region and proclaimed the New Testament, many paladins and priests had converted to Azadin’s New Testament and regained their white magic. And now, they were demonstrating that power before Marquis Gazein and many other nobles of Arangi….

“Oh….”

“This is….”

They had no choice but to acknowledge it. The nobles, witnessing the miracle unfolding before their eyes, the return of divine magic, charged their horses and crashed into the goblin troops.

The Arangi knights, with their incredible impact, swept through the goblin troops, and the enemy’s rear began to be torn apart. Meanwhile, Azadin flew off again on his hippogriff, this time reaching the infantry.

The refugee soldiers, whom the Arangian Guard and the noble coalition had ridiculed, the refugee soldiers without proper equipment, were also excellent troops when the enemy was torn apart and in chaos. Moreover, Azadin had placed well-armed veterans among them.

“Now! Charge!”

The refugee soldiers approached, throwing stones at the goblins who were in disarray after being torn apart by the knights. It was generally accepted that sling stones did little damage to those wearing armor and shields, but there were civilian priests in Azadin’s army.

“Believe! The Light of Kingship is with us!”

“The divine covenant will prove itself with power!”

“This is the will of our King!”

The priests, who had gained the ability to wield white magic through Azadin’s New Testament, cast blessings on the troops. The sling stones, imbued with the magic of blessing, became not just simple stones but mediums containing white magic.

The sling stones that flew in this way inflicted piercing damage on those who blocked them with armor or shields. The goblin shield soldiers fell, and the sling stones that followed shattered their ranks. Then, the veterans and spearmen who charged in after them utterly trampled the goblins.

The ogres tried to turn back and attack the infantry, but the Arangian Guard struck the ogres from behind, and then the knights turned back and attacked their flanks. The battle in northern Arang ended in a complete victory for Azadin’s army.

*********

“Damn it. This is different from what I heard?!”

Prince Balthazar, astonished by the sheer number of the ogre army, was convinced that Azadin’s choice had been correct. The forces led by ogres and beast cavalry easily overwhelmed an equal number of humans. Moreover, wasn’t Azadin’s army mostly made up of peasant soldiers using the anachronistic weapon of slings, except for a few veterans?

However, contrary to expectations, Azadin minimized casualties, stopped the ogre army, and achieved a great victory. However, Azadin’s army did not achieve a completely bloodless victory. The beast cavalry that the Arangian Guard failed to stop charged into the peasant soldiers, causing massive damage, and the soldiers who pursued the enemy to eliminate them were torn apart by the ogres’ counterattacks.

Nevertheless, the priests and paladins who had converted to King Azadin, and the newly selected priests from the populace, used divine magic to aid in the battle, allowing them to achieve overwhelming results despite their equipment. This made Prince Balthazar’s position, who had opened the way, difficult.

The Arangian Guard and the noble coalition had fulfilled their duty by standing with King Azadin and stopping the ogre army, but Prince Balthazar alone had neglected his duty as a Marcher Lord, allowing the Arangi Kingdom to be plundered.

Belatedly, Prince Balthazar led his men to cut off the rear of the enemy, blocking the ogres’ retreat, but this only caused the fleeing ogres to scatter and settle in various parts of the Arangi Kingdom. Even if Prince Balthazar cut off the heads of the ogres and displayed them to boast of his achievements, the people would only despise and ridicule the prince for not fulfilling his duty as a Marcher Lord.

“I shouldn’t have neglected my duty as a Marcher Lord, it only made my position more difficult. And those heretics who serve that Heraldic Clan guy really do use divine magic. Then he really is a divine king?”

“Yes, he has manifested the Light of Kingship. He is indeed a true divine king.”

Erasmaya, a merchant of the Telbarin Guild, acknowledged that Azadin was a divine king.

For Prince Balthazar, this was a frustrating statement.

“That soulless heretic is a righteous divine king? You knew that and yet you made me fight against him?”

“Oh dear, that’s troublesome, Your Highness. You clearly knew from the beginning that he was a divine king. Isn’t that right?”

“Don’t be ridiculous! I didn’t know! If I had known….”

“If you had known, would you have handed over the throne to him and sworn allegiance as his vassal? Don’t tell lies that you can’t even deceive yourself with. You were surprised to see him stop the ogre army, and now you’re making excuses, but originally, Your Highness, you had ambitions. Isn’t that right?”

Erasmaya asked Prince Balthazar with a sticky smile.

“……….”

Her words were true. Prince Balthazar knew that Azadin was a divine king, but until now, he had pretended not to know because of his ambition. And now, he was just getting angry at Erasmaya for not knowing, which the elf merchant was accurately pointing out.

“Do not worry.”

“Don’t worry? I’ve been marked by the divine king, and I’ve neglected my duty as a Marcher Lord, practically opening the way for the enemy, and you tell me not to worry?”

“As King Azadin confronts the darkness alone as a divine king, the power of darkness will become even more powerful and fierce. The apostles of Mezeri [a dark god] will lead their followers in assassinations and riots in various cities. If Your Highness permits, we will move the witches of the Witch Coven inland to spread plagues throughout the cities and contaminate the food in the granaries.”

“You bastards!”

Only then did Balthazar realize that those he had joined hands with were not just forces of the Northern Empire, but a group of evil cultists. Or rather, he had thought of them as a group of evil that he could somehow control, but now he realized that they were an uncontrollable, monstrous evil. They were villains beyond imagination, no, they were closer to monsters.