Chapter 3: Battle on the Sestina Plains

Sestina’s eastern region was made up of vast plains.

The lands near the castle had once been barren, but after much irrigation and cultivation, the area was now Farzia’s leading farm belt. Llewyne must have known that if they trampled over those croplands, the effects on next year’s harvest would come back to bite them during their future reign; back when they had fought the royal army during the summer, they had picked a desolate area some distance from those fields as their battleground. This time, too, the Llewynians had positioned themselves in a barren wasteland to await our arrival.

“It looks like the enemy troops are largely made up of Llewynian soldiers this time,” Lady Évrard remarked. “Lucky for us.”

“Did you run into trouble in Kilrea?” Reggie asked.

She nodded, her face drawn into a frown. “Yes. Llewynians were the minority there. The Delphion men were prepared for such an eventuality, so they handled themselves alright. The rest of our troops had a much harder time of it, however. The enemy had gone to the effort of dyeing their capes, so it was a simple matter of striking down all those who turned their swords on you... but it certainly wasn’t a pleasant confrontation.” She then grumbled, “That was what put us behind schedule, I’m afraid.”

Somehow, Lady Évrard seemed more hawkish than ever. Perhaps that was the inevitable result of seeing Évrard invaded. I’d only lived there for two years, and it had still hurt to see my home laid to waste. Plus, Lady Évrard had her husband’s injuries weighing on her too. I was pretty sure I wasn’t just imagining the hatred in her eyes when it came to Llewyne.

She was decked out in her breastplate and gauntlets. Her silver locks, the same hue as Reggie’s, were pinned high upon her head. Looking gallant and gorgeous as her blue cape fluttered in the wind, she was the picture of a goddess.

Maya and the knights of Évrard were busy escorting a handful of people away from their lady. Among them was Virgil, the man who had been held prisoner at Fort Nazant. The former captain of the royal guard and the soldiers under his command had disregarded Reggie’s orders to stay in the fort and instead followed us out into battle. From the sound of it, Virgil had slipped into the crowd with the help of a knight who was an old acquaintance of his.

With a force of 20,000 men, we couldn’t keep an eye on everything. If he had kept his mouth shut, we never would have known he was there—but wouldn’t you know it, his men had to go and accost Lady Évrard, immediately alerting us to their presence.

“Allow me to fight by your side!” Virgil had begged her.

Reggie had cut in with, “Strange. I could have sworn your injuries hadn’t healed yet.”

Lady Évrard had then shot him down. “An injured man is no use on the battlefield. Hang back, if you would.”

By the end of the encounter, Maya had shouted to the surrounding knights, “Let’s hand them over to the rescue squad!”

Now they were in the process of dragging the men down from the hilltop upon which Reggie and Lady Évrard stood. I was pretty impressed by how deftly Maya was escorting them away.

Meanwhile, we called our march to a halt a good distance from the Llewynian troops. We still had a ways to go before the enemy would even be in range of our archers on the front lines.

This wasn’t normal procedure, mind you. Our goal was to waste as little time as possible. Lord Patriciél, on the other hand, would be perfectly happy to let this drag on until winter, when we’d be forced to suspend hostilities. So long as Farzia didn’t open fire, Lord Patriciél was no doubt prepared to hold his front lines until the first snowfall of the year.

However, Reggie had said, “If we have a way to force the enemy’s hand, and it would put us at a greater advantage, obviously we should be using it.” And with that, he had handed me my orders.

Once we were lined up and ready to go, I moved toward the front lines with Cain and Master Horace. The 500 soldiers at the vanguard divided themselves up into five groups around lines I’d drawn in the ground, huddled together, and waited for the next step.

I glanced back at Reggie, and when he raised his hand in a signal, I cast my magic.

“Let’s go!”

I raised the ground under our archers’ feet, which materialized into a thick stone slab with a set of wheels. Since I’d given them an explanation and a practice run beforehand, the men calmly sprang right into action. I built walls all around them, leaving them a small window in the front to see through. And with that, it was go time.

“Our mobile archer unit is a-go!”

The wheels began to turn. Loaded into their makeshift stone tank, the archers hurtled straight toward the enemy.

Of course, we weren’t about to have them rush all the way in. Once they’d drawn close enough for their arrows to reach enemy lines, one of the men toward the back gave a purposeful wave of his hand, and I brought them to a stop.

From there, the archers began firing their arrows. The enemy responded with arrows of their own, naturally, but all I had to do was pull the tank back a smidge to make sure they bounced off the stone walls. Our tank was, in practice, a mobile wall of archers. So long as the enemy didn’t move in for a close-range attack, it was open season until we ran out of arrows.

I had figured they could counter us with defective spellcasters, but given their indiscriminate style of attack, those were most effective when tossed into the middle of a crowd. For lack of any better options, Lord Patriciél’s troops were sure to advance. This was all part of our calculations.

It wasn’t long before his troops began their forward march, just as we had predicted. Yet for some reason, the archers in the stone tank had yet to give me the signal to retreat. Based on the way their heads were jerking back and forth, it looked like there was some kind of commotion going on in there.

“What should we do, Sir Cain, Master Horace? Something’s off.”

“Let’s pull them back. The delay could be due to a problem they’ve encountered. If we leave them like this, they’re going to end up in close combat with the enemy.”

At Cain’s prompting, I rolled the stone tank back. The enemy followed after them like fish taking the bait. Once they had drawn close enough, however, I realized there was something odd about the enemy’s formation.

Of the five neat rows of their frontline troops, only three were marching forward. The men at the head of the charge weren’t wearing black capes. Whenever one of them fell, the others continued their march, dragging the corpse along with them.

“What’s going on?” Cain muttered, his brow furrowing.

“Guess Llewyne decided to bring out slaves as their meat shields,” Master Horace all but groaned.

As I listened to their exchange, the term “human shields” rose to my mind.

Our reconnaissance unit had informed us that Llewyne had transported slaves along with their troops. At the time, however, we had naively assumed they would be putting them on the front lines to serve as close-range fighters. The sight of those slaves pressing onward no matter how many of their companions fell must have left our archers terribly disturbed.

While I steadily drew the archers back, Cain sent a nearby soldier off to Reggie with a message. He came back with the prince’s orders almost immediately.

To prevent the enemy from getting any closer to us than we wanted, we kept the frontline infantry planted right where we had discussed. Once I’d moved the archers behind those foot soldiers, Cain gave me a ride on his horse, and together we moved right up close to the tank. We’d be able to get a better look at what was happening from there.

When we pulled up, I hopped back down to the ground and started searching for where my copper ore had landed. I’d asked the archers to scatter it around when they were shooting their arrows. I scouted out the most opportune spots, then cast my spell.

To start, I targeted the pikemen lined up behind the slaves by forming humps under their feet, sending them rolling, and effectively splitting them up.

“Sorry, but it’s time for you guys to take a fall!”

Next, I made holes to drop the slaves into, resigned to the fact that they were going to get at least a little hurt in the process.

“They’re going to get hit with our arrows if you leave them like that, Miss Kiara.”

“On it!”

I rushed to cover up the pits with a slab of stone. I felt bad locking them away in total darkness, but this was an emergency evacuation, so I needed them to bear with it for now. I then tried the same trick on all three of the Llewynian units.

You see, Reggie had given me orders to rescue the slaves. Of course, we couldn’t afford to leave an opening for the Llewynian soldiers behind them, so our archers kept on firing their arrows all the while.

The more time passed, the more slaves lost their lives. I’d managed to trap the third unit in a hole and separate them from the rest of the Llewynians, but I had to wonder just how many of them had made it down there alive.

At this point, the front lines were turning into a free-for-all struggle. No matter how many slaves they lost, Llewyne’s vanguard pressed onward.

“Focus on taking out the rear units, Miss Kiara.”

“Got it.”

The Llewynian troops in the rear were now likewise on the move. The head of their forces was composed of the same slave-foot soldier mix we’d seen in the other units.

From atop a tall platform just behind our frontline soldiers—a modified version of the tank I’d made—I tried giving them the same treatment as the other units. Unfortunately, there were way too many of them.

The slaves were large enough in number to make Cain mutter, “Just how many men did they cart along?”

The amount of slaves Lord Patriciél had brought with him nearly rivaled the entirety of his infantry. Lord Patriciél’s troops numbered about 20,000, and from what we could estimate at a glance, there were about 10,000 slaves.

Our cavalry slashed their way through the front lines again and again. However, we refrained from forcing the Llewynians back in one big push. Instead, I would create an opportunity to separate the slaves from the rest of the pack, then our men would back off, only to charge back in yet again. The front lines were steadily falling back toward the Farzian ranks, but there wasn’t much we could do about that.

There was a good reason why we had chosen that tactic: Llewyne had a wealth of contract stones. But as long as we put on a show of being forced back, the enemy wouldn’t resort to using the ace up their sleeve. In the meantime, we just had to take custody of their go-to defective spellcaster potentials, the slaves.

Unfortunately, there was a limit to what I could do.

“We’re going to run out of copper ore soon, Sir Cain!” The copper ore I had asked the archers to sprinkle over the battlefield for me was falling into short supply.

“Let’s clear out two more units, then fall back for now,” Cain suggested.

I nodded. It was right then, however, that a knight came barreling for the front lines.

“Miss Kiara!”

Someone suddenly tugged me back by the arm. I slammed hard against a stone surface, only to find myself safely sandwiched between Cain’s back and the wall behind me. The first sound I heard was the light clang of iron, followed by the metallic screech of blade crashing against blade. From where Cain was shielding me behind him, I could see how taut his arms and shoulders were.

I couldn’t do anything until I knew what had just happened. And so, I peeked out from around Cain’s side.

“What?”

The man Cain was clashing swords with was a Farzian knight—though he had jumped down from his horse and was now standing on the platform with us.

“Though I bear you no grudge, I’m afraid I must have you die, Lady Spellcaster!”

I recognized the man, to boot.

He drew back his sword, only to bring it down on me once more. Cain knocked the weapon out of his hands with tremendous force, tore through the man’s arm, and stabbed his blade through a gap in the assailant’s armor for good measure.

“I know you still have the strength to speak. Tell me: why are you doing this? Are you working with the former king’s knight-guard, Virgil?” Cain asked, his sword still thrust deep into the man’s flesh.

The man who had attacked me was, indeed, one of the soldiers who had been held prisoner alongside Virgil.

Unfortunately, we never managed to get an answer out of him. As an anguished expression rose to his face, the soldier drew a knife from around his waist. Taking advantage of the moment Cain jerked away, he thrust the knife into his neck and took his own life.

“Wha...?”

Why would he do that?! Did he assume his attempt on my life had sealed his fate either way?

While I stood there stunned, Cain gathered me up in his arms and carried me away. “Let’s retreat for now, Miss Kiara. This area is too lightly defended.”

Now that knights and soldiers had begun to gather, noticing that something had gone wrong, Cain started handing out orders and sending men off every which way with messages. Farzia’s greatest weapon, its spellcaster, was about to leave the front lines. That was certainly worth reporting.

A knight galloped off to inform Reggie of the assassination attempt.

Wait a second, though. If it was one of Virgil’s men who attacked me, what does that say about the man himself? Is he on our side? If he is an enemy, who would he go after first?

“Sir Cain, I’m worried about Reggie.”

“So am I. That said, I just sent him a message, and he ought to have Groul and the rest of his knights with him. He should be fine... but nevertheless, let us make haste.”

Cain helped me onto a horse he’d kept around nearby, and together we headed off to go find Reggie.

My heart was pounding like crazy the whole way over. Now that Reggie was in danger of being assassinated yet again, I almost had to wonder: could it be that the very world itself was conspiring to kill him? I certainly hoped not. We were in the middle of a war, and perhaps being king in such a conflict-ridden world simply made him an obvious target.

But I was still worried. After all, I remembered losing him once before—not just in my memories of the RPG, but in my memories as “the Kiara who never escaped,” too.

Cain must have known how nervous this was going to make me. Here he was taking me to go see Reggie, even though there was no urgent need to do so.

By the time we made it over to the main body, we found our ranks in chaos. When I spotted Reggie, I saw that Virgil was closing in on him. Dozens of people lay injured around them. The majority of Reggie’s knights were off engaged in fights of their own, leaving only Felix by his side.

Unfortunately, Felix’s attention had been grabbed by a soldier dashing toward him from behind. I spotted another soldier hoping to cash in on the opportunity, aiming an arrow at the now-unguarded prince from afar. It was yet another one of the soldiers who had been held captive alongside Virgil.

No one else had noticed him there yet. Worse, whether I tried building a wall with my magic or running over to shield Reggie myself, I wasn’t going to make it in time to stop him.

“Master Horace!”

I chucked Master Horace into the air with all my mana and might.

“Whaaaaa?!”

The doll soared through the air, kicking up gales in his wake—and hurtling straight toward the soldier drawing his bow. Just as the arrow flew free, it was swallowed up into the windstorm, smacked right into my mentor’s clay body, and plummeted to the ground. Master Horace, meanwhile, continued careening through the air after the soldier ducked out of his path.

That alerted everyone else to the archer’s presence. Everyone jumped to apprehend him, but the soldier responded by swallowing something and transforming into a defective spellcaster in the blink of an eye.

When I saw the flames begin to gush from his body, I screamed, “Everyone, get away from him!”

I hopped down from my horse, then swiftly manipulated the earth to trap the soldier-turned-defective spellcaster under the soil.

Meanwhile, the fight against Virgil and his men was drawing to a close. Reggie intercepted Virgil’s attack and slashed through his leg, while Groul skewered the man through the arm and robbed him of the means to fight back. Soldiers were apprehended one after the other, and Felix cut down the man who had charged at him from behind.

Before bothering with anything else, I went to go check out the arrow that had dropped to the earth. A soldier picked it up and handed it over to me. Once I’d taken a closer look at it, I saw that there was indeed contract stone powder pasted over the tip.

While I was busy examining the arrow, Reggie tracked me down. “If you came back all this way, I take it you ran into trouble on your end as well.”

Cain answered for me. “Yes. Someone made an attempt on Miss Kiara’s life, too—though I made swift work of him. He was one of Virgil’s men.”

Following a nod of acknowledgment, Reggie’s expression darkened. “Wait here for the time being, Kiara. We’ll have the frostfoxes hold the front lines in your stead. I don’t doubt that the enemy purposely left Virgil in that fort to assassinate us after we’d taken him into custody. I’m sure this was all a part of Patriciél’s plan.”

Reggie walked up to the apprehended Virgil. He was moaning in agony, his arm still pinned to the ground by Groul’s blade.

“Was Lord Patriciél the one who put you up to the task? My, he really put you through the wringer, locking you up just to make you look like his captive. What did you ask for in exchange? Start talking, and I might be amenable to having you healed.”

The former captain continued to groan in pain, but otherwise insisted on keeping his mouth shut.

“Oh, I see. You were in debt. He must have given you enough money to wipe the slate clean.”

Virgil looked like he could hardly believe what he was hearing. “How did you—?”

“I’ve gathered quite a bit of information on you and your ilk in preparation for one day ousting you alongside the king. Not that any of that turned out to be necessary, of course. If that was the deal you made, why did you bother coming all the way to Sestina?”

“For my wife... and daughter. Llewyne said I had a good shot at infiltrating the Farzian army.”

It sounded like his loved ones had been taken hostage, and he’d subsequently been ordered to deliver Farzia a heavy blow.

Since he had technically answered our questions, Reggie ordered that his wounds be treated. By this point, however, it was a coin toss as to whether that would save him. He had already lost so much blood that he was white as a sheet, lying listlessly on the ground.

Now that I knew how everything had ended up, I turned to take my leave. Reggie immediately stopped me in my tracks.

“Where are you going, Kiara?”

“Err, I sent Master Horace flying not long ago, so I need to go look for him.”

No sooner had I answered his question than a frostfox wearing a blue ribbon—Reynard—came bounding up to us.

“Aghhh! I’m covered in dog slobber!” came Master Horace’s cry.

Upon taking a closer look, I saw that Reynard was carrying Master Horace in his mouth. When I took him back, there was clearly only a little drool on him.

“Thanks, Reynard. And c’mon, Master Horace, this is practically nothing. You’ll be fine if I wipe you dry, and you should be grateful he brought you back in the first place.”

“He ate me alive...”

Though his clay expression was unchanging as ever, he somehow managed to look like he was crying in terror. What a card.

While I was occupied with consoling my wailing mentor, Llewyne began its gradual retreat, just as Reggie had predicted. For today, at least, it seemed things had ended in a draw.

◇◇◇

After that, it was my time to shine.

We had to dig out all the men who had been buried beneath the soil. I’d been sure to leave them vents, of course, but we had left them trapped in the pitch dark for almost an hour. They were probably scared out of their wits.

Although we were a good distance from where Llewyne had set up camp, I took a bodyguard along to the scene just to be on the safe side. Once I’d peeled back the earthen ceiling and formed a simple ramp, other soldiers helped guide the slaves back up to the ground.

We cut the ropes on the dead slaves and left them down in the hole. I planned to bury them there once everyone else had made it to the surface.

The enslaved men neither put up a struggle nor tried to run. They simply followed our orders and trudged along, their expressions glum.

Only a select few of them walked with their heads held high. Those ones were all pretty young. There were about ten of them, ranging in age from boys to men in their thirties. Amid the sea of people who seemed to have forgotten how to so much as hang their heads and cry, it was hard not to notice them.

When Alan and Reggie appeared on the scene, careful to keep a safe distance, those men moved to the head of the pack and started asking questions.

“Are you this army’s commander-in-chief?”

When he saw the amused look on Reggie’s face, Alan took a step forward and answered them, his expression blank. “That’s right. I’m in charge around here.”

While this was a conversation they needed to have, they were likely wary of a potential surprise attack; thus, Alan had stepped forward in Reggie’s place.

The young slave replied, “I’d like to know what you plan on doing with us. Seeing as you opted not to slaughter us in battle, I assume you have some sort of use for us.”

“Frankly speaking? Yes, we do. And of course, we expect you to do as we say. It doesn’t look like you have much of a choice either way.”

Cold as Alan’s response was, it was the truth. Seeing as their role was to serve as human shields, they had simply been thrown into whatever clothes were readily on hand, and their shoes were nearly worn through. Soldiers generally kept emergency rations on them, but these men likely didn’t even have that. Running meant they would simply starve to death. If they resorted to robbing a nearby village, they would eventually get caught and killed.

Perhaps they weren’t trying to get away because they knew that. Still, it was weird how compliant they were being. With how well disciplined they were, it was almost like they were following someone’s orders, no matter how listlessly they were going about it.

Don’t tell me they’ve made some sort of secret pact with Lord Patriciél. Still, would they be willing to let their fellow countrymen die just for that? Who would agree to that knowing it might cost them their own life?

While I was puzzling everything over, Alan pushed the conversation onward. “We’re going to send you back to your home country.”

“What?”

The slaves’ eyes went wide as saucers. Even the ones who had been lifelessly staring at the ground lifted their heads in surprise. The only thing a slave was ever ordered to do in the middle of a war was to fight, after all.

“You’re not... going to have us fight?” the young man asked, dumbfounded. Who could have blamed him?

“We will send you out into the next battle. Not as shields, however. We want you to reach out to the rest of Llewyne’s slaves. Help us bring your comrades over to our side. That’s our best move to whittle down the enemy’s numbers. After that, we’ll send you back home.”

“Are you serious?” asked the young slave standing at the head of the group.

Alan nodded. “There’s too many of you for us to manage, anyway. We don’t have the resources to keep you fed. There is one condition, however. We’re going to send you home with weapons in hand. In exchange, take a stand and fight off the Llewynians who have occupied your home.”

Even I was surprised to hear that part of it. The slaves were left absolutely stunned.

“How... How did you know Llewyne invaded our home?”

“We looked into it when conducting our reconnaissance. You’re from the Kingdom of Toldi, yes? Surely you hold a grudge against Llewyne. Whether your family was killed or likewise turned into slaves, you ought to have plenty of reason to take a sword in hand and take back your country. I’m confident you will agree to our terms.”

Alan looked out at the gathering of slaves. “If you don’t wish to go home, however, I’m afraid we can’t take you on ourselves. We’ll find something else to do with you. Furthermore, we need you to come to a decision here and now. If I had to guess, you lot were in charge of organizing the freshly transferred slaves?” He turned his gaze toward a teenage boy standing behind the leader. “And he must be either a member of the Toldi royal family, or else a noble with royal blood.”

The man’s eyes went wide. He didn’t show anything more on his face than that, but the two men standing alongside the boy behind him seemed to panic, stepping in to protect him.

“Looks like I was right on the money. I can tell you were doing your best to hide it, but before we took you into our custody, there were several men positioning themselves to keep him defended.”

The leader hung his head, left with no choice but to acknowledge what Alan was saying.

I’d had no idea about any of this, so I was genuinely surprised. At the same time, I finally understood why the slaves had seemed so organized. Leaving aside whether the boy’s identity was public knowledge or not, the men around him had taken charge of the rest of the slaves—all so that they could find the right opportunity to let the boy escape, whether that be alongside everyone else or all on his own.

Eventually, the boyish ward took a step forward. Brown-haired and even younger than Alan, he looked the latter straight in the eye and said, “I am fifth in line to the throne of Toldi. My name is Lux. I will handle the negotiations here.”

“Milord,” the leader murmured. Based on his reaction, this Lux boy seemed to be the son of a duke. Considering how desperate the others had been to let him get away, it was likely that everyone else in line to the throne had been killed.

“If you’re willing to grant us weapons and safe return home, we will gladly accept your offer. We have no reason not to raise an army of our own. Particularly now that Llewyne has diverted a great deal of their forces to Farzia, their defenses in Toldi are bound to be weakened. What I don’t understand is what’s in it for you.”

Why would you show us such kindness? was the boy’s implicit question.

Reggie was the one to answer him. “It’s an investment toward the future. Once we’ve brought stability to our country, we will have to lead an assault on Llewyne somewhere down the line. We’d like to weaken them in preparation for that eventuality.”

“I see now. You want to undermine Llewyne’s power as a nation.”

The boy seemed to understand what Reggie was getting at.

I drew my lips into a thin line when Reggie said we would have to attack Llewyne. By the time we brought this war of aggression to an end, all we would have really done was kick the invaders out of our country. We wouldn’t have had a chance to properly retaliate, and there was a good chance Llewyne wasn’t going to quietly hand over their reparations.

This wasn’t going to be the last time we went to war. Once Llewyne got back on its feet, there was no telling what tricks they might resort to next. Thus, we had no choice but to crush them once and for all... or perhaps convert their king into one of our adherents.

Despite my mixed feelings on the matter, I knew I would always find my way to the battlefield regardless.

◇◇◇

That marked the end of the first battle. The slaves agreed to the conditions we’d set. We all gathered where Farzia had set up camp, ate dinner, and went to sleep.

It was the middle of the night when Lord Patriciél launched his assault.

“Wake up! We’re under attack!” Not long after I’d finally fallen asleep, I sprang to my feet, awakened by Cain’s voice.

It was dark out; dawn hadn’t broken yet. I could just barely make out Cain’s figure in the faint moonlight as he came barging into my tent.

I hurried to get up, hanging Master Horace in his usual spot at my waist. I always slept fully clothed when we were in the midst of a battle, so once I’d put on my shoes and grabbed my mentor, I was ready to go.

Even so, I was apparently dawdling too much for Cain’s liking. “Let’s get you somewhere safe,” he said, grabbing me by the wrist and taking off in a hurry.

Once we had stepped outside, the uproar rang louder in my ears. Gina and the knights of Évrard, who had been maintaining a protective ring around our camp, were nowhere to be seen, and I could hear shouts and the sounds of swords clashing from afar.

“Did the enemy sneak up on us?!”

“We noticed them coming, so we managed to return their fire. Unfortunately for us, the enemy resorted to some rather nasty tricks.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

As he walked his horse through the darkness, Cain replied with an unusual amount of distaste, “In a night raid, the enemy has two options: either get as close as possible without our noticing and force us back in one fell swoop, or attack with only a handful of men under the cover of night. This time around, they combined both methods.”

They had taken down the soldiers on patrol, and worse yet, the dim light of the moon meant nobody had noticed them right away. As soon as they were spotted closing in from the forest, however, Reggie and his knights had launched their counterattack.

Unfortunately, that was when the enemy had brought out their slaves once again.

“When it’s this dark out, it’s easy to slip up and accidentally kill one of your allies on the front lines; hence, surprise attacks are generally carried out in smaller numbers. In this case, however, Llewyne was relying on their slaves. If you position your thralls in front of you during the charge, the enemy will target them first. All that’s left to do then is take advantage of that moment to strike down your opponent. Even if you were to mistake your kill, it’s going to be either a slave or an enemy standing before you. That’s what allowed them to rush us in the middle of the night, heedless of the consequences.”

By turning their slaves into an expendable resource, the Llewynians had thrown the Farzian army for a loop.

Evidently, Cain had come to take me somewhere it would be easier to fight. “With how dark it is, your golem would serve as little but a roadblock.”

A person-sized golem might as well have been a drop in the ocean. On the flip side, if I sat atop a colossal titan, it would be hard to make out the people down below in the dark, which could end in me accidentally trampling my own allies underfoot.

“As such, His Highness believes it would be best if you saved your attack for Llewyne’s main body. We’re quite a ways from the front lines here. Why don’t you make a golem for us to ride out on? The farther we are off the ground, the easier it will be to keep you safe.”

“Alright.”

I formed a giant golem. After climbing onto its shoulder alongside Cain, I began marching toward the enemy camp, steering clear of Farzia’s tents so as not to tread on our troops. A nearby wood was ablaze; it looked like Reggie and his men had set fire to the surrounding area to give them a better look at the enemy. No doubt they were expecting me to put it out for them later.

The entire vicinity of Farzia’s campsite had become embroiled in a free-for-all battle.

I spotted a pale frostfox down below. After it had frozen the feet of every enemy soldier—slaves and servicemen alike—our troops moved in to take the immobilized Llewynians out. The slaves on our side were then given their chance to win over their comrades. Anyone who agreed to lay down their weapons was subsequently escorted off the battlefield.

Once that had happened enough times, the Llewynian slaves realized that their companions had aligned themselves with Farzia. That encouraged them to make their own escape, even if it meant risking a stab from behind.

It wasn’t long before Llewyne’s human shield strategy was ruined. By the time we entered back into standard warfare, the surroundings were so brightly illuminated by flames that we might as well have been fighting in broad daylight.

Unfortunately, that was when Llewyne broke out their last resort. Firing off arrow after arrow coated in contract sand, they turned anyone they could into a defective spellcaster, be they enemy or ally. I could see from above that Farzia had pulled their soldiers back, driving the battle into a deadlock.

If I could just land a blow against their main body, Llewyne would be left with no option but to retreat. Yet my number one target, Lord Patriciél, was nowhere to be found.

All of a sudden, a pillar of fire erupted from a corner of the woods.

“A defective spellcaster?!”

That was my first thought, but it wasn’t in the right spot for that. There was no point in dropping one in the middle of a forest, so far removed from the front lines. What’s more, the pillar just kept growing taller and taller—almost as though it were someone hoisting a flag.

“Miss Ada?”

I knew of only one person who could wield fire magic by design.

“If that is her, there’s a good chance Lord Patriciél is somewhere nearby,” Cain posited, and I started moving my golem in that direction.

Perhaps, I thought, there was a motive behind the blaze. For example, what if she was trying to tell us where to attack? From where she was standing, she ought to have been able to spot my golem’s silhouette against the starry sky, even in the faint moonlight.

By the time she let the fifth pillar of flame loose, we had arrived on the scene.

“Miss Ada!”

There, I could see Ada clear as day, shielding herself in a cocoon of her own flames. Llewynian soldiers were throwing their spears in an attempt to strike her down.

If they’re regarding her as an enemy, that means...

“You were trying to tell us where the enemy was!”

That certainly explained why she was under attack. She had exposed the very heart of the Llewynian troops.

Before I could move in to help her, however, vines of thorns suddenly sprang up from the earth, winding themselves around the incoming spears and soldiers and rendering them immobile.

The Thorn Princess is helping Ada?!

I hadn’t the foggiest idea what was happening, but what mattered right now was crushing the very backbone of Llewyne.

“Hurry up, Kiara!” I could faintly hear Ada shout.

With a nod, I willed my golem to deliver a swift kick to the nearby cavalry unit, sending them flying. From the looks of it, that had indeed been the linchpin of the troops. With those men out of the picture, the remaining knights fell to pieces and scattered every which way.

Later on, we managed to find the corpse of a Llewynian general among the bodies. Unfortunately, it seemed I’d let Lord Patriciél get away. We eventually learned that, under the guise of a divide-and-conquer tactic, he had taken a handful of knights with him and fled to Sestina Castle.