Chapter 64: A Worthy Opponent

From the very beginning, this was a one-sided battle. Roll’s men launched a surprise attack on the soldiers at the city gate and took control of the gate in a very short time. This special force of only about a hundred people was not skilled at proper open-field combat, but in this narrow and chaotic situation, they fully brought out their own strengths. These warriors, who barely knew the fear of death, fully revealed the twisted and brutal side of their natures, like a poisoned dagger slicing open the skin of Davo City. The shadow of despair they spread seeped inward from the city gate like a powerful poison, trampling the lives of their enemies while writing their own legend.

After the initial shock and fear, the Winstons launched their counterattack. Their fighting could not be called anything but brave, and their courage was truly admirable. If this had been open ground, they could have smashed and crushed that formation of a hundred men in an instant. Even in a narrow and winding place like the city gate, if they had just a few more breaths of time, completely wiping out the surrounded attackers would only have been a matter of time.

But what Roll and his death-bound force wanted to buy for us was only those few breaths of time.

Red Flame led his Light Cavalry unit at the fastest possible speed through the rain of arrows falling from the city walls. White light from the enhanced Haste Spell shimmered on their bodies, like a meteor streaking across the night sky. Even arrows could not match their speed. The intercepting arrows fired by the archers on the walls, following conventional logic, almost all landed behind the horses of these lightning-fast riders. Only a few unlucky ones were hit and fell to the ground.

This was the method Fred and Poirot had developed together for applying magic to battlefield formations: if a caster’s offensive ability could not be displayed on the battlefield at all, then it was better to use them as a support combat unit, using low-level support spells to strengthen the abilities of combat units. Having personally experienced it twice, we deeply understood that the Haste Spell’s improvement to a soldier’s combat power could absolutely not be measured by any quantified standard. As long as magic was used properly, it could definitely turn a weak and scattered force into an elite army of tigers and wolves. In the near future, this attempt to use magic in large-scale battlefield formations triggered a massive military reform across the entire continent. The status of Mages rapidly rose, becoming one of the most noble professions under the sun—although there were still not many who could tolerate their eccentricities—and this was precisely Poirot’s most important contribution to the magic cause he worshipped.

When Roll and his men were nearly powerless to hold back the surging flood of enemies, Red Flame led his unit across the drawbridge and plunged hard into the city gate. If Roll’s dagger had sliced open the thick skin of Davo City, then Red Flame’s twin sabers tore that tiny wound into an irreparable gash, letting a great flood of blood drain from the body of this giant castle. The performance of the magic-enhanced Light Cavalry could be described with the word “divine bravery,” a term that should be reserved for great warriors. No, they had even surpassed that limit. This veteran army that prided itself on cavalry and had once made the entire continent tremble looked utterly helpless before them. The whirling sabers were like cloth in a dye house, just pulled out of one red dye vat and then dipped into another.

And when Dakla’s Heavy Infantry slowly and steadily moved into the city gate, there was no more suspense.

Before the wide-open city gate, the arrows coming down from the walls on both sides did not cause much trouble. Or rather, they did not get the chance to cause much trouble, because our warriors were truly exposed in front of them for only a very short time. By the time they drew their bows for a second shot, our men had already surged into the city. A moment later, the fight for the gate dissolved. The soldiers who had entered first had already begun fighting for control of the city walls.

“Fall back into the inner city!” a Winston commander shouted loudly. After losing the support of the walls, it was unwise to face an enemy several times their own number with an obviously inferior force. Our enemies had already admitted that the fall of the outer city was beyond redemption.

I entered the city gate together with the main force. By this time, the battle situation had already stabilized. Almost the entire stretch of the wall was filled with our warriors. The real fighting was only confined to a small open area outside the inner city gate.

In the melee, our soldiers and the Winston warriors were all tangled together. In this narrow space, they fought at close quarters where they could smell each other’s breath. There was no such thing as tactics or formations. This was one group of people trading their lives for another group’s lives. Even with the support of arrows, our losses were far higher than the enemy’s. But the huge advantage in numbers still allowed us to continuously force the enemy back into the city. At this rate, before long the mixed mass of enemy and friendly soldiers would all flood through the gate together, and the inner city defense line might collapse as quickly as the outer city had.

It was at this moment that we witnessed the greatest feat since the battle began:

“Close the gates!” A Winston general still outside the inner city gate shouted loudly. Closely guarding him were fewer than a hundred officers of various ranks. They blocked the inner city gate with their bodies and bravely faced us. The half-open gate was right behind them, but no one looked back at it even once.

“Gutierrez, have you all gone mad? Get in here now!” On the inner city wall, a tall general in bright armor bravely leaned out his head and shouted.

“Carlisle, close the gates!” the commander below shouted loudly. “Do you want everyone to die together?!”

“Get in here, you bastard, I can hold them off!” The general named Carlisle on the wall shouted anxiously in anger. Even though arrows and rolling stones poured down like hail and torrential rain, the advance of our warriors could not be stopped. The soldiers beside Gutierrez were steadily decreasing.

“Close the gates!” Gutierrez shouted. “Remember your duty, friend. Do not let our friendship become your shame!”

“Damn it! Damn it!” the big man on the tower cursed loudly. “You get in here, or I’ll kill you…”

“No need for you to do it, friend. Someone more suitable than you will come along.” Gutierrez cut down a soldier with his sword and looked up. “It was my negligence that let the outer city fall. Now I must be the one to bear this responsibility. As for you, my friend, do not repeat my mistake. This wall does not belong to you or me. This is the glorious bulwark protecting His Highness the Crown Prince!”

“Close the gates, soldiers!” He gave up persuading his friend and shouted loudly at the soldiers inside the gate. “I order you in the name of the Empire’s Major General.”

The soldiers inside hesitated for a moment, then finally began to slowly close the gates.

“Bastard! Whoever dares to close the gates, I’ll cut him down! Open them! Open the gates, I order you…”

“My rank is higher than yours, boy. They have to listen to me, haha…” The blood-soaked officer laughed loudly, as if what he faced was not death but a cheering farce.

“Open the gates, open them…” Carlisle howled from the city wall, but the officers beside him held him back. No one dared to take that risk, to leave the open gates facing the enemy under these circumstances.

The heavy gates slowly closed, forever sealing off dozens of battlefield warriors who had freely given up their hope of survival outside that solid wall. The gates made a heavy sound as they closed, like the weighty sigh of a dear friend saying farewell.

“It was my incompetence that dragged everyone down. I’m sorry!” Gutierrez confessed to his steadily diminishing comrades around him.

“General, being able to follow you by your side is our honor!” A fairly high-ranking commander beside him shouted loudly. He had already lost his right arm in the fighting, and was now weakly swinging his weapon with his left hand, guarding Gutierrez.

“We will follow the General even in death!” The Winstons at the city gate, whether ordinary soldiers, low-ranking officers, or high-ranking commanders at or above battalion level, all shouted in unison. None of our soldiers were unmoved. These dozens of seriously wounded enemy warriors stood right there, only a few dozen steps away from us. But the distance seemed so far, so far that it had to be measured in life and death. Facing the overwhelming flood of enemies, these men who should long ago have fallen from their wounds actually burst out with strength no one could match, cutting down every soldier who came near.

“Good! Then let them see the fighting stance of our Winston warriors. Carlisle, my friend, I entrust the protection of His Highness the Crown Prince to you. Tell His Highness that I, Gutierrez, have failed his expectations, and only death can atone for it!”

“All troops, charge formation…”

Under the cover of the arrow rain from the city walls, these dozens of remaining soldiers formed up a standard charge formation.

“Target, directly ahead…”

Everyone raised their weapons. The swords and sabers, already nicked with chips, carried blood that might have been their enemy’s or their own, reflecting a dark red gleam.

“Charge!”

This was the most magnificent charge I had ever seen in my life: dozens of soldiers, so battered they could barely stand, launched a death-seeking charge against nearly ten thousand enemies. At this moment, time seemed to freeze. The fighting stances of these warriors were imprinted on the minds of everyone present like a still oil painting.

They limped through a row of spear formations. Two soldiers blocked the thrusting spears with their bodies, opening a path for their commander. Two or three spears pierced through their bodies, but as if they felt no pain, they stretched out their arms and tightly caught the spears thrust at them from both sides.

The spear formation of several hundred men collapsed. Their opponents were only a few dozen nearly crippled men, but no one could blame them. If I had been there, I would have stepped back too. And I believed that even my comrades, far stronger and braver than me, would surely make way for these enemies who could see death in their eyes.

“Arrows! Arrow cover!” On the city wall, Carlisle’s voice cracked from sobbing. He grabbed a longbow from the hand of a soldier beside him, nocked a sharp arrow, and shouted loudly, “Gutierrez, you cannot leave me behind. I am always by your side…”

The sharp arrow pierced the throat of a soldier in front of Gutierrez. Just a moment before, that soldier had been about to swing his blade at a fierce enemy general. After this arrow, the rain of arrows from the city wall came down even more urgently, sweeping open a path for their brave comrade.

Gutierrez pulled out the rescue arrow that had delayed his death and gripped it firmly with his left hand, the hand that held no weapon, as if holding on to his last support in this life. Blood poured steadily from the wound in his abdomen. Wherever he walked, a red path dyed by his own blood was laid down. This path stretched out fifty steps, a hundred steps… and continued to stretch onward. The warriors around him fell one after another, but those remaining still followed their commander, slowly traveling through the death forest of iron and blood.

I could not describe such a battlefield. Their way of fighting was somewhat similar to Roll’s “Dagger of the Dead”—equally unorthodox, equally fearless, even equally transcending the limits of death, making the enemy afraid, weak, and unable to face them. But it was also completely different: what they displayed was not the madness of someone pushed to the brink of death and bursting out in hysteria, but true courage. This courage allowed them to face the enemy’s weapons without hesitation and leave this world generously and peacefully.

What allowed them to do this?

I did not know.

I only knew that the people before me were true soldiers—people who had something they must defend and protect with their own lives and flesh and blood. Their noble character could not be ignored even from the standpoint of an enemy. On that tall officer, I vaguely saw a familiar shadow—a shadow that left its final back view to the young soldiers on the battlefield, a shadow that fought with love and stubborn devotion. That was our father, our commander, Carlson. These two men were different. They fought for different reasons, and they fell for different purposes.

But they looked so alike.

They were both people worthy of respect.

After his last attendant fell, Gutierrez finally stopped. He looked at the face of the soldier who had fallen and could not rise, then turned back to look at the subordinates who had fallen all along the way and had still stayed by his side in his final battle. On his face, covered in grease and filth, I vaguely saw two crystal-clear drops slide gently down.

Were those the tears of a warrior saying farewell?

Around him, the soldiers of Delanmaya stood in solemn silence for reasons no one knew. No one took the chance to attack him while he was too weak to move. All fighting stopped. The air of the battlefield was wrapped in a tragic and heroic atmosphere. This atmosphere surrounded the general who was about to die generously. It was both praise for him and the prelude to his death.

At this moment, Fred dismounted from his horse. I did not know what my friend intended to do. I struggled to support myself with my injured arm, dismounted, and followed closely behind him. With me was also Poirot.

Fred drew his battle saber and walked straight toward that solemn warrior. I worried for his safety and wanted to reach out and stop him, but he turned back, shook his hand, and stopped me with a serious expression: “It would be cruel not to let a soldier who bravely seeks death die in battle, Jeff. If this is his wish, then let me fulfill it.”

Fred walked up to him and gave a standard saber salute. “Lieutenant General of the Kingdom of Delanmaya, Legion Commander Frederick Ka Guderian, Viscount and Count, pays his respects to you, sir. Crossing blades with you is the honor of my lifetime.”

Gutierrez looked at Fred. His eyes seemed to light up. “Good. As my final opponent, you are suitable.”

“Before that, sir, is there anything you need me to do for you?”

Gutierrez looked back at the city wall behind him, then turned his face and replied: “After everything is over… cough, cough… take me to my friend.”

“I promise.” Fred replied. He nodded in greeting once more, then assumed an attacking stance.

Gutierrez gasped for breath and barely lifted his longsword. This weapon of ordinary weight seemed to weigh a thousand pounds in his hand. His strength was not even enough to wave it lightly. His left hand still tightly gripped his friend’s feathered arrow. The blood of the one who held it smeared the soft fletching and the slender shaft, dripping down the arrowhead that had once pierced an enemy’s throat and falling to the ground. Beneath his feet, the soil had already been dyed a reddish-brown by blood, like the color of purple tulips offered before a martyr’s grave.

Fred shouted loudly and charged at this great warrior. The black blade of light pierced through Gutierrez’s left chest and stuck out a long length from behind him. The last of his blood spurted from the wound like a bright flower blooming from the departed soul.

Gutierrez made no move to resist. Perhaps the last of his strength could only allow him to barely stand there.

This was not so much a battle as it was a ritual.

A soldier’s ritual that used death to affirm courage and honor, ensuring that the name of the brave would never fall.

“Gutierrez…” On the city wall, the dead man’s friend let out a cry of pain. Perhaps he had called his friend’s name hundreds and thousands of times, but never with such grief as this time. This cry drifted across the battlefield strewn with the dead, as if it could awaken the soul that had already departed and make it answer once more.

He fell. His right hand held his sword, and with it a warrior’s pride and courage. His left hand held that arrow—the final farewell keepsake from his friend.

Fred pulled out his battle saber. His body and face were already stained all over with the brave man’s blood. He had no intention of wiping away the traces of this great warrior’s last heroic battle in this world. Instead, he raised the saber high and saluted this unyielding man in tribute.

Without needing a command, I drew my sword and paid my respects to the dead in the most solemn way I knew. Around me, on this battlefield, all the warriors saluted these brave fighters one after another. Perhaps while they were alive, they were our enemies. We killed each other and fought against each other. The only thing we had to do was destroy them. But when they died gloriously, they became heroes for us to admire. The noble sense of duty and unyielding character they displayed made this worth doing.

Differences of country and nation could not separate the respect we held for heroes.