“My Lord! We have a huge, h-huge problem!”
It was a sunny noon.
A soldier of the territory hurriedly came running to the mansion, huffing and puffing. He broke into the Baron’s office, disregarding all etiquette and formality.
After listening to him for a while, the Baron’s teacup fell to the floor.
Shatter!
“…. What?” The Baron’s face became pale. “Say that again. Ant beasts?”
“Yes, My Lord, ant beasts have appeared inside the tunnel where Young Master Lloyd has been digging.”
“Then, what about Lloyd?”
“According to the workers who were with him, he stayed behind. He ordered everyone to evacuate quickly….”
“Is he there alone?”
“No, Sir Asrahan stays behind with him.”
“….”
After reporting, the soldier’s face became somber.
Ant beasts inhabited the eastern wilderness beyond the mountain range. They were terrifying creatures. Each individual was much stronger than a wolf. Additionally, there were too many of them. They were also fearless and very organized.
In other words, there was no way to survive once caught by them. It’d become even more hopeless especially when encountering them underground.
“Sir Bayern first summoned his troops. Right now, they are gathered in front of the mine, starting the preparations to close the mine.”
That was the best they could do.
What if the ant beasts came out of the mine?
The hunting grounds would be destroyed. The residents of this estate would also be annihilated. Not only the people, but livestock would also get hunted and made into meat dumplings. If you got lucky, you would be paralyzed alive and then stored in a warehouse, or become a delicious prey for the ant colony’s larvae.
To prevent this situation, the right thing to do was to close the mine before it was too late. However, for some reason, the Baron fell silent.
“….”
“My Lord?”
“….”
“Sir Bayern told me to ask for My Lord’s command….” The soldier timidly glanced at the Baron.
The Baron continued to be silent. Then, at some point, the Baron suddenly sprang up from his seat and opened the closet in his office. He took out the armor that had been stored there and began to wear it.
“M-My Lord?”
However, Baron Frontera still didn’t answer. Instead of his answer, only the clinking sound from the Baron’s armor could be heard inside the office.
Clink, clink! Thud!
He wore a brigandine1Brigandine: is a form of body armor from the Middle Ages, typically made of heavy cloth, canvas, or leather, lined internally with small oblong steel plates riveted to the fabric, sometimes with a second layer of fabric on the inside. with iron plates attached to it and wrapped his knees with silver-colored poleyns2Poleyn: is a component of Medieval and Renaissance armor that protected the knee.. After that, he wore the demi-greaves3Demi-greaves are greaves that only protect the shin. Greaves itself is another part of armor from the Middle Ages which are used to protect the legs. and a bascinet helmet4Bascinet: a medieval helmet of light steel, fits closely to the wearer’s head and typically has a visor.. An iron-rimmed shield was carried on his back while a long sword hung on the waist of his armor.
In everyone’s eyes, the Baron appeared ready for a battle. However, the soldier was surprised as the Baron hadn’t held a sword even once in the past ten years.
“Excuse me, My Lord? Right now….”
“Let’s go.”
“Pardon?”
“If you can’t keep up, I’ll leave you behind.”
Wham!
The Baron stormed out after roughly opening the office door by kicking it. He ran through the corridors, down to the horse stable, and climbed on a horse’s back.
“Ha!” the Baron kicked the horse’s sides.
Only one thought occupied the Baron’s mind.
‘Lloyd, wait for a little bit. Please hang in there, by all means!’
His heart beat accelerated as he rushed towards the mine.
Dash dash dash! Swish!
After kicking the ground to do a rough jump, a sword fiercely slashed the space.
Crunch!
“Kieeeeeek!”
The long sword hit and split the ant’s head. Along with a scream, transparent bodily fluids splattered.
However, at that point in time, the longsword had been pulled out of its head a long time ago. The sword had already been searching for its next target, beaming calm and cold light.
Slash! Clang! Thud!
Javier turned his body sideways to cut its body. He kicked its bottom part to block it. He stabbed, pulled, and lifted the sword.
Lloyd thought Javier would slash upwards, but then he advanced with his sword moving like a gale.
‘One slash to the left, one slash to the right, a jab to the side on its upper left, then what was next, a downright slash?’
Lloyd left his tongue hanging out as he ran through the narrow tunnel. He had no choice but to do so.
Javier was running two steps ahead of him, charging forward. Meanwhile, Lloyd looked at Javier’s swordsmanship with eyes full of admiration.
‘Really amazing. This is the skill of a real knight.’
It was on a different level than his previous duel with Sir Neumann. There was no obstruction in all of Javier’s movements. It flowed naturally just like water, yet also fierce and unstoppable at the same time.
Furthermore, in between his connected movements, Javier also added numerous small movements that were too hard to see with eyes. It went in a flash, just like lightning. A myriad of feints and lethal attacks were brilliantly mixed in. In short, Javier’s swordplay itself was an art.
The ant beasts got literally slaughtered in front of his elegant but destructive swordsmanship.
“….. Even in this situation, don’t you get tired?” Lloyd, who had been following Javier, cried out. While swinging his sword, Javier glanced at him.
“I’m tired,” Javier answered in a single breath. His breath didn’t seem to be disordered just yet. Everybody wouldn’t know that he was tired just by listening to his voice.
However, Lloyd knew.
‘We don’t have much time.’
No matter how strong Javier was, he was still a human. Humans had limitations to their stamina. He couldn’t fight forever.
If he had reached the level of a Sword Master, the endless cycle of mana could loosen his stamina constraints, but he hadn’t reached it just yet.
Right now, he was just slowing down the accumulation of fatigue with Asrahan Core Technique.
“About the brilliant way Lloyd-nim said, are we not there yet?”
Slash slash!
Javier asked while cutting down the ant who blocked his way into three pieces: head, chest, and stomach. Lloyd grimaced.
“Not yet!”
“Then, when will it be?”
“I also don’t know. I’m searching for it as hard as I can!”
“What do you mean by you’re still searching….”
“Stop talking to me, just focus on clearing the path. We have to move as far as we can to increase the probability!” Lloyd exclaimed.
What he shouted was the truth. Even now, he was still activating his Intermediate Survey Skill to its limit. As an optional skill of the survey skill, the ground composition of the ant nest inside the five meters range he’d targeted would continuously be identified.
The thing he’d been desperately searching for was a methane gas layer that must’ve been buried somewhere inside the ant nest.
‘It should certainly be around here. Here, there were bituminous coal beds embedded all over the place. So, the methane gas layer must be here somewhere.’
Lloyd continued to run. With Javier in front of him, they ran from corner to corner inside the ant nest.
The survey skill was used as optimal as possible to detect all possible directions.
How hard did he search for it?
Finally, Lloyd’s eyes saw something.
‘Found it!’
Five meters under the ground, Lloyd could see some methane gas lurking there. However, it wasn’t the main part of the layer.
Was it a stream of methane gas layer? It was indeed only a small stream.
‘Nevertheless, there was no way we could immediately come in contact with it from here.’
The one thing he was confident about was that this stream of gas was indeed methane and where it was connected to.
Between him and the gas, there was five meters thick of soil and rock. Digging it with a shovel would take a very long time. Even worse, the tunnel wasn’t large enough for Bangul to transform into her giant state.
“Javier! Over there!” Lloyd pointed at one of the passageways. That direction was where the stream of methane gas was connected to. “From now on, just run towards the direction I pointed at!”
“I understand, but-”
“But?”
“We, can we just go outside?”
“….”
Javier’s eyes were calm while he was slicing the ants. He looked like he had already made up his mind to face his end here.
In front of his subdued eyes, Lloyd stopped smiling. “Why? Are you scared?”
“I’m not afraid, just-”
“Just what?”
“I felt a little resentful.”
“Is it because you’re afraid of dying in a place like this?”
“No, it’s not.”
“Then, did you hide any dirty paintings under the bed in your quarters and you were afraid of getting caught?”
“Obviously not. To be honest with you-” Javier sighed deeply and continued, “I’m afraid of dying with someone like Lloyd-nim.”
“Oh my!”
“It was my greed as a knight, I guess. I think the most honorable death a knight can get is when he sacrificed his life for someone worthy and respectable.”
“Hoho, so you feel that dying hand-in-hand together with a scumbag like me is unfair?”
“That’s an accurate summary.”
“Really? Are we going to leave now, just like that?”
“We’re going to die together here anyhow, aren’t we?”
“You’re laying bare your true colors for the last time before we, as companions, are going to the afterlife, aren’t you?” asked Lloyd.
Javier then retorted, “I’m just saying this because I think I’ll be less resentful if I spoke to you frankly regarding this, honestly.”
Clang! Clack! Swish!
The ants were still running towards both of them. In front of them, large soldier ants blocked the way. Whenever that happened, Javier proceeded to keep on running, cutting, and slaughtering the ants in front of him without rest.
Naturally, Lloyd followed closely behind. With a torch and a steel shovel in both of his hands, he worked hard on stopping the ants that were chasing them from behind.
As such, the two of them fought against the swarm of ants with their bodies. In the meantime, they still quarreled with each other.
“Ha! Okay! Since we’re going to die, let’s do yaja time!” said Lloyd.
Not knowing what that was, Javier asked, “What is yaja time?”
No Comments Yet
Post a new comment
Register or Login