Chapter 3 – Story 69: The Humiliation of Sunomuta 9 – Black Wall (End)

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This event was also visible for Alexius who commanded the 5th Division far in the rear. Sitting on his chair that was installed on a wooden stage which was likewise built onto a chariot, Alexius leaned back as if to press his back against the backrest while laughing loudly.

“Isn’t that the height of unsightliness!?”

Even though they’ve boasted about building a country for all races, they devolve into such a disorganized mob as soon as they are in a pinch. By abandoning the other races on their side and running away against all promises, the zoan have exposed a behavior so disgraceful that even vile brutes are much better than them.

“They allowed me to enjoy myself with the cavalry that used archery and the zoan stone throwing, but in the end, I guess this is all they had up their sleeves.”

Alexius laughed once more, jeering in his head just how lowly his opponents were.

If the battlefield had been slightly bigger, the archer cavalry and the zoan stone throwers might have had a different impact on the battle’s outcome. But, setting a fortress in your rear that cannot move as your headquarters was doomed to fail for the very start. That 「Divine Son of Destruction」 or whatever having chosen an open field as a battlefield without even understanding as much makes me only laugh at his ridiculous incompetence. And it makes General Darius’s absurdity even more evident, seeing how he still harps about the danger of that guy――not to mention his embarrassing defeat five years ago. As I expected all along, that old coot didn’t have what it takes to be a marshal in the first place. If you consider it like that, it also means that I do have quite a lenient heart, I must say.

“Well, I have no choice but to evaluate him highly for having formed the 『Black Wall』 into what it is today.”

Alexius watched with a deep sense of satisfaction how the 「Black Wall」 was steadily drawing closer to the enemy headquarters.

After single-handedly warding off the stone-throwing which had tormented the royal army’s heavy spear infantry led by General Numitos so much, they zoan have had no choice but to pull back due to the 「Black Wall」 advancing while keeping their ranks closed and in order. The sight of the unit’s movements is truly a sight to behold. They’ll overwhelm the enemy with the power of their numbers.

And this was exactly the sort of battle as Alexius had envisioned it.

“Look, Divine Son of Destruction! This is our Holmea’s strongest army corps, the 『Black Wall』!”

Alexius guffawed loudly.

◆◇◆◇◆

While everyone in Holmea’s punitive force was certain of victory, Hiakis was the only one feeling a sense of discomfort while being in the rear of the 2nd Division.

This is supposed to be the level of the guy who defeated His Excellency General Darius?

Something incessantly kept gnawing at him from the deepest recesses of his mind. However, no matter how often he calmly reviewed the war situation, he didn’t see anything being out of order.

Even though I won’t go as far as calling it the best move, it’s not a bad move by any means either. Besides, the wish to deliberately seek a decisive battle on flatland where numerical advantages are crucial while actually having inferior numbers stems from the revolting slaves having no other choice if they want to use the zoan stone throwing and the highly mobile archer cavalry to its full extent. But, now that both were repelled, the 「Divine Son of Destruction」 won’t have any moves to play anymore. It’s almost as if the outcome has already been decided at this point.

――Yep, it should be set in stone by now.

But, in the end, something was tugging at him inside his head. An uncomfortable feeling that had been warning him of danger for a while now. He felt like he had experienced a similar feeling somewhere else in the past.

Where did I sense something like that before…?

Suddenly a nostalgic scene surfaced in Hiakis’s mind as he rummaged through his memories.

“If I remember correctly, during one of my exercises with His Excellency…”

Having been his adjutant, Hiakis had served as an opponent during Darius’s military exercises on many occasions. It often happened that Hiakis saw through the general’s plan or read his next move, causing him to believe that victory was at hand. But, whenever that happened, General Darius had prepared a counterattack or some trap. In the end, Hiakis didn’t manage to win even once.

After one of his losses, General Darius had addressed his adjutant, “If people believe that they saw through their opponent’s plan and thus exceeded the enemy as things were developing as they had predicted, they will be fixated on that one solution they thought of and become convinced of their conclusion being the sole, correct answer. And then they will unconsciously discard all other possibilities and fall for traps they would have usually noticed.

Putting it the other way around, you can make an enemy move as you wish by preparing developments and goals which are desired by the enemy.”

According to 『Darius’s Training Guide』, “You have to wake the enemy’s wish to make a move first, if you want the enemy to act in some way.”

Hiakis got startled by the words he had unconsciously spoken out loud. And at the same time he noticed the true nature of his discomfort. It was the same feeling which he had perceived when he was about to fall for one of General Darius’s traps during their exercises.

“Don’t tell me…!”

The pores all over Hiakis’s body opened and cold sweat began to gush out. But, Hiakis violently shook his head, telling himself, “What kind of stupid things am I thinking?”, denying his own suspicions.

If you look at the battlefield, the enemy’s main force, the zoan, have fled and our troops are closing in on the enemy headquarters. At this point, the situation cannot be salvaged for the enemy anymore. It should be possible to turn the tables here. The enemy isn’t General Darius. I’m overthinking this, Hiakis kept persuading himself like that.

But, his feeling of discomfort didn’t vanish nonetheless.

◆◇◆◇◆

While the dense formation of the 「Black Wall」 under Regimental Commander Gaius’s lead was approaching, the warrior leader of the dwarves who had been rescued from Holmea’s Copper Mine Marven, Norðri, greeted Souma after he went back inside the fortress.

“Is everything ready?”

These were the first words coming out of Souma’s mouth and Norðri confirmed by drumming on his chest and declaring, “Aye, we are ready to go at any time!”

After nodding once, Souma ordered, “Then, please do what you must!”

“Roger! ――All of you, combat stations!”

The latter part of Norðri’s remark was directed at the dwarves around them. In response, all dwarves began to move simultaneously. During the resulting hustle and bustle, Norðri used the opportunity to thank Souma.

“Allow me to deeply thank you for giving us the opportunity to clear away our years of resentment against Holmea.”

Souma shook his head at that, “Please thank me after everything has ended. Right now, fighting the enemy comes first.”

“Hohhohhohho! You got a point there,” Norðri laughed cheerful, his beard trembling.

At that moment, a harpyian called out to them after having watched the enemy’s movements while making use of her good eyes.

“The enemy, the heavy spear infantry, is going to reach the target area any moment now!”

At once Norðri suppressed his laughter and hurled at his brethren, “Everything ready, you lot!?”

The dwarves confirmed in chorus while donning nervous expressions. And behind the dwarves Souma looked outside through the fortress’s gate that had been left open. Over there he saw the formation of heavy spear infantrymen, which clearly reminded him of a pitch-black wall, climbing the gentle slope, heading straight towards them.

“Holmea’s strongest army corps, the 『Black Wall』, huh…?”

While watching the enemy approach, Souma slowly raised his right arm, and muttered to himself, “If they call themselves a 『Black Wall』, we should deal with them in an appropriate way.”

As his mutter was still in the midst of fading, Pipi screeched, “Enemy, entered!”

Souma swung down his arm sharply.

“――Please do it!”

◆◇◆◇◆

Regimental Commander Gaius had aligned his horse with the front row of the 「Black Wall」 as it drew closer to the fortress, raised his thick, right arm and shouted, “Hahahahahaha! Go, go, go! Get me the head of that evil 『Divine Son of Destruction』! I will personally lay it down at His Excellency’s feet!”

But, as he shouted so, even Gaius started to feel that something was off. The enemy still didn’t show any signs of trying to close the fortress’s gate, apparently being delayed by something. However, Gaius couldn’t fathom what the enemy was supposed to do in this situation.

We have 3,000 heavy spear infantrymen. It’ll be impossible to stop them with some half-baked measures. Ever since they took control of the bridgepoint, we’ve been monitoring this place all the time, even if only from a distance. There’s no way that they could have carried out large-scale combat engineering such as digging moats or pitfalls that could stop us while tricking the eyes of all our observers. Also, as far as I can see, obstacles such as fences are nowhere to be found. Moreover, with the enemy’s main force having escaped, the enemy shouldn’t have any cards to play anymore.

As soon as he argued it away as some sort of illusion, Gaius ordered his soldiers once more, “Go, go, go! Trample the enemy into the ground!”

Suddenly something crossed a corner of Gaius’s eyes for an instant. He wondered what it might have been, but in the next instant his consciousness was blown away alongside a violent impact.

◆◇◆◇◆

The first thing that could be heard was a succession of heavy impacts. Shortly thereafter, human screams and bellows joined the cacophony.

This noise also reached the ears of Hiakis.

“Just what happened!?”

Furthermore, the screams and bellows weren’t limited to a single spot of the formation, but came from the entire middle row.

This isn’t some sort of accident. It’s clearly based on something the enemy did, Hiakis judged right away, but he became confused right away. He couldn’t come up with a means that would be capable of simultaneously and effectively striking the entire dense formation of the 「Black Wall」 all at once.

Anyway, I must get a grasp on the middle row’s situation.

“Is there no contact from Regimental Commander Gaius!? ――Messenger! Messenger! Check the state of the middle row at once!”

The middle row was in a state of utter chaos right now. And as such, it was unlikely for reports to immediately come in. As such Hiakis sent the messengers at hand to the front. All the while he could still intermittently hear screams and impacts from the middle row.

“Fuck! Just what the hell is happening at the front line!?”

As if to answer that question of Hiakis, the middle row’s wall of heavy spear infantry broke apart while something was rushing through the gap in his direction. That thing caused a deep rumbling, rolling all the way to the feet of the horse with Hiakis on it.

“T-This is…!”

It was a huge, round boulder.

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