The White Cat That Swore Vengeance Was Just Lazing on the Dragon King’s Lap - Volume 2 - Chapter 10

Chapter 10: Invasion

Peaceful days continued for some time in the Nation of the Dragon King. One day, as Ruri was basking in the sun in the castle’s garden, Joshua came up to her. He approached with his usual warm and inviting smile, but the news he brought was just the opposite—it was blunt and tense.

“Ruri, Nadasha is finally starting their invasion. They’ll be entering the Nation of the Dragon King in a few days.” Ruri flusteredly jumped to her feet, so Joshua crossed his legs and sat down in front of her. “It seems the Priestess Princess has joined the army, too.”

“She’s still taking part in the war even though I gave her that much warning?! She can’t even fight!”

It would be fine if Asahi could freely use magic like Ruri, but the only magic she was capable of was Bewitchment. Or was it possible she’d learned how to use other forms of magic as well? Regardless, it was still reckless on her part. Considering Asahi was born in a world and era of peace, never having seen a war outside of a television screen, the thought of her participating in such bloodshed was absurd.

“She’s probably hopping aboard to get you back personally.”

“I can’t believe that idiot!”

“Alright, relax. We’ve been notified to capture the Priestess Princess alive. Now, whether or not she comes with us unscathed is another story...” said Joshua, looking off to the side.

“That is not a vote of confidence!”

“What do you want from me? It’s humans versus dragonkin. We’re way stronger than they are. And you saw them training. All those dragonkin soldiers go crazy for the thrill of battle. Once they charge in and forget to hold back, a human doesn’t stand a chance. Doesn’t help that the human body is made weak anyway.”

It was less that humans were weak and more that dragonkin were abnormal. Any other race of demi-humans would be in seriously bad shape if they got shot with arrows or pierced by weapons. They wouldn’t just laugh it off and get back to training like dragonkin would, either.

Ruri was extremely worried that the next time she saw Asahi it wouldn’t be in one piece. That sight was likely to haunt her dreams.

“M-Maybe I should go along, too.” Although Ruri lacked the courage to fight, she was powerful enough to protect herself, unlike Asahi.

“You know that’s a no-go. His Majesty would never allow it.”

“I’ll go and ask Jade-sama, then,” said Ruri, leaving Joshua behind and dashing off to Jade.

The royal office, receiving reports of Nadasha’s invasion, was filled with Jade’s vassals. They all had the same distressed expression. Ruri slipped in between them, through the unwelcoming atmosphere, and headed toward Jade. She jumped onto his desk and voiced her desire for them to take her into war, but...

“No.”

“Pretty please?” Ruri pleaded in an adorable tone, doe eyes wavering.

Jade flinched just slightly, but winning him over wasn’t so simple today. “I said no, and I mean no. It’s too dangerous. War isn’t some game.”

“I’m well aware of that, but it’s crucial I go along. I’m not going to participate in the war. I’d be fine with just watching from someplace safe. I don’t want to inconvenience anyone.”

Perhaps moved by Ruri’s desperate display, Jade contemplated the matter until someone else spoke up.

“I don’t see any issues.” That someone was Euclase. They most likely knew why Ruri wanted to go so badly since they already knew her identity.

“But if something were to happen to Ruri...” Jade started, still torn despite Euclase’s show of approval.

“You’ll be in quite the predicament if you continue to turn her down and she ends up running away like the last time. Which is why I believe keeping her within eyeshot and assigning guard detail would be the safer option.”

Looking somewhat convinced, Jade started to weigh his options.

Seeing this, Ruri also piled on the pressure to keep the opportunity from slipping past her. “Don’t worry. I’ll have the spirits with me. I’ll also have Rin. She is the highest level of spirit there is. I’ll be completely safe. Isn’t that right, Rin?”

The conversation now shifted to her, Rin backed Ruri, saying, “So long as I’m around, I will keep Ruri safe even if every dragonkin in the kingdom attacked her.”

“...Alright, then,” Jade said, finally raising the white flag. “Follow my instructions, don’t pull any dangerous stunts, and don’t leave the spirits’ side. Can you uphold all that?”

“Yes, sir! Thank you very much!” Ruri said, relieved. She had gained Jade’s permission, albeit reluctantly.

Although she wouldn’t be fighting, the idea of watching the war unfold instilled her with a sense of fear. But she remembered that the King of Nadasha and the Head Priest planned on getting rid of Asahi.

(Hopefully nothing happens to her.) Ruri thought, her heart uneasy.

One day elapsed into another, and eventually Nadasha crossed the border, starting their invasion. The Nation of the Dragon King dispatched their troops immediately, and Ruri headed toward the battlefield with Rin in tow.

◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

Far ahead from where Finn was stood the army of Nadasha, a few hundred thousand in number all lined in formation. There were people as far as the eye could see, all of them brandishing Nadasha’s flag.

Their opposition was the army of the Nation of the Dragon King, composed of only a few thousand soldiers. The reason why they were so few in number wasn’t because they lacked soldiers. Far from it. The Nation of the Dragon King’s military strength was leagues ahead of Nadasha. The reason why they were so limited despite their superior military force was simply because any more soldiers would be excessive. The gap in power between dragonkin and humans was so massive they were confident they could win comfortably even with the numbers skewed so heavily.

Knowing that, the troops of the Nation of the Dragon King were filled with enthusiasm. In fact, it was more apt to say that the dragonkin troops were a tad too enthusiastic. It was the complete opposite of the Nadashian troops; many of their soldiers were both physically exhausted from the long trek on foot and mentally exhausted from the fear of having to do battle with their dragonkin foes.

Sensing that at this rate the situation could take a turn for the worse, Finn made a declaration to the soldiers in front of him. “Listen, men! Be sure to exercise restraint! The majority of those soldiers are regular citizens, untrained and forced to serve under their nation’s orders. I’m sure there are many who would join us if persuaded. And make sure not to get near the girl known as the ‘Priestess Princess’ and their prince. Just report their location and contain them. You all are very likely to kill them instead, so I’ll dispatch a different troop,” Finn said, adding an extra warning. “Are we clear? Don’t do more than what is necessary!”

“Aye, sir!” the soldiers shouted back, pumping their fists in the air. However, from the looks on their faces, it was extremely doubtful they actually heard a word Finn said.

“Well, that’s worrying...” Finn said under his breath.

The front line consisted of dragonkin soldiers. Originally, the plan was to decrease their force by facing them with their non-dragonkin demi-human troops, but the dragonkin soldiers loudly objected, demanding to be allowed to fight as well. There was opposition to this too, though, as letting battle-hungry soldiers out into the wild was far too dangerous. But the upper brass of the army was filled with dragonkin, the same as the political branch, meaning the opposition fell on deaf ears.

Therefore, Jade sent Finn out to the front lines. Considering he was strong enough to take over as Dragon King himself, he was capable of stopping any dragonkin soldier that went berserk from the thrill of battle. The fact that he was there, not to help battle against Nadasha but to help contain his own allies, was quite pathetic, but if so many dragonkin soldiers were to run amok, then it would take a powerful dragon like Finn or Jade to deal with them.

With that concern weighing on Finn’s mind, the war started.

At first, the Nadashian army rode the momentum of their large numbers, but the dragonkin soldiers tore through the masses at full force, charging their way into the center of the Nadashian troops in no time. Any boulder catapulted their way, they punched it to smithereens. Any offensive spell unleashed on them, they charged straight through without defending. Any arrow fired at them, they repelled it with magic before it could hit them. One swing of a dragonkin’s arm could send ten men flying, and they even had a mastery of magic. The difference in numbers didn’t matter at this point. It was turning out to be a one-sided massacre.

Many of the Nadashian soldiers lost the will to fight in the face of the overwhelming strength of the dragonkin. However, the dragonkin soldiers were relatively calm and composed. Perhaps they found it difficult to lose themselves in the heat of war with such severely weak human opposition. They didn’t even bother with the soldiers whose legs quivered like a newborn fawn; they nonchalantly faced only those who came at them.

The dragons in charge of supporting the rear guard circled the skies, calling for the Nadashian soldiers to surrender. Hearing that their lives would be guaranteed if they complied, the people who begrudgingly took part in the war admitted their nation’s defeat and cast aside their weapons, one after another. The outcome of this battle was already clear.

Finn, overseeing the events unfolding before him, breathed a heavy sigh. “This was far too anticlimactic... Did King Nadasha truly wage this war with the intent to win?” Finn asked himself. The curtain fell so quickly it made him contemplate if this war was started with some ulterior motive in mind.

As a result of the quick outcome, the dragonkin still had plenty of fuel to spend. Pent up with frustration and resentment, they started to take it out on their own allies. Spats and fights began to break out all over. Finn breathed yet another heavy sigh. Since spats like these were commonplace during training, he let them do as they pleased.

While they fought amongst themselves, Finn received a report that the Prince and Priestess Princess had been located. Entrusting the supervision to someone else, he quickly rushed off, turning into his dragon form and gliding at a low altitude. He spotted a single location from above that was completely cleared out. Several individuals stood in the center, the troops of the Nation of the Dragon King surrounding them.

Finn descended to where they were and returned to human form. There he saw a well-dressed man shivering in fear. Finn guessed that this was the Prince of Nadasha. Standing next to him was a girl in her late teens to early twenties, glaring with unyielding spirit at the soldiers surrounding her. She was clad in clothes ill-fit for the battlefield—a fancy, fluttery outfit that seemed difficult to adequately move in. And behind them both were several other men and women who didn’t seem like combatants, their faces twisted in fear like the Prince.

“Which of you would be the Priestess Princess?” Finn asked.

The young girl beside the Prince stepped forward. “I am! And you’re the group of kidnappers who took away Ruri-chan! I can’t believe you’d stoop so low as brainwashing her! Now, give Ruri-chan back!”

The soldiers surrounding her heard the word “kidnap” and looked at one another, slightly confused and unsettled. There were quite a number of them who heard the name “Ruri” and thought of the Beloved. However, they immediately realized that a Beloved couldn’t possibly be kidnapped under their noses.

“Kidnapping? We have done nothing of the sort.”

“You’re lying.”

“I assure you I am not. Who is this ‘Ruri’? I know of no person by that name.” The only “Ruri” Finn knew of was not a person but a cat. Be that as it may, the Nation of the Dragon King had neither kidnapped nor brainwashed Ruri in any way. In the first place, the spirits would not take that lying down.

“I won’t be fooled by your words!”

Neither of them were on the same page. The girl claimed that the Nation of the Dragon King had kidnapped Ruri, but Finn honestly had no idea what she was talking about. Asahi was erratic, and she didn’t seem as though she’d listen to whatever he had to say. He wasn’t sure how to handle this situation, but he eventually came to the conclusion that he should calmly speak to her after she settled down. And since Ruri was nearby, Finn had no desire to draw this back-and-forth out longer than necessary. He wanted to hurry Ruri back to safety as quickly as possible.

“Seize them,” Finn said to the circle of soldiers. They slowly closed in, following their commanding officer’s orders.

The Nadasha group was unarmed and their mana was paltry. Plus, the soldiers that were protecting them were already apprehended, leaving them with nothing to defend themselves. That was why Finn let his guard down. He thought that these people wouldn’t stand a chance even if they resisted.

Asahi took out something from a pouch tied on her waist and chucked it at Finn. It was a transparent stone no bigger than a human fist.

A last hurrah? Finn hadn’t a clue as to what the stone was, but he decided to put up a magic barrier to block it. It harmlessly bounced off of Finn’s barrier—or so everyone thought. But once it hit the barrier’s surface, the entire thing was practically sucked into the stone and vanished without a trace.

“What?!” Finn exclaimed, eyes wide in shock.

Immediately afterward, there was a massive explosion so intense that the winds from the blast reached the rear guard soldiers off in the distance.

The area was enshrouded in a cloud of dust as everyone’s vision went white.

◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

Ruri was with Rin and the other spirits in the skies. They had a clear view of the battlefield. No attack would reach Ruri up here, but she could still clearly see the war unfold. Below, the troops of the Nation of the Dragon King and Nadasha faced off against one another.

“Hey, doesn’t it look like the Nation of the Dragon King is short on people? Will they be okay?” Ruri asked.

The Nadashian troops outnumbered the Nation of the Dragon King severalfold. Under normal circumstances, it looked like a losing battle.

“They’ll be alright. It seems like their front line is composed of dragonkin, so I’d say they’re overpowered,” replied Rin.

“Well, that’s assuring, I suppose.”

After a standoff, both armies set out and collided with one another. Ruri prayed on bated breath for the safety of the Nation of the Dragon King’s troops, but her prayers were unnecessary. The dragonkin were crushing the Nadashian army with their overwhelming strength.

While most of their forces were non-dragonkin soldiers in the rear guard, the scant collection of dragonkin on the front lines were doing most of the fighting. However, despite lacking the numbers their opposition possessed, they were clearly coming out on top.

“Holy crap...” Ruri trailed off in awe. She had always heard that dragonkin were strong, but seeing that strength in action was a different story.

Ruri was baffled. How did Nadasha have the gall to wage a war against a land composed of dragonkin in the first place?

“Ruri, it looks like it is coming to an end.”

Down below, soldier after soldier lost their will to fight and surrendered. The Nadashian Army was largely composed of common folk with no combat experience who were forced to enlist anyway. It only made sense that they had neither the willpower nor the patriotism to maintain morale in the face of their fighting-crazed opponents. There were still smaller skirmishes happening in patches all over, but it wouldn’t be long before they were suppressed.

Ruri searched for any sign of Asahi. “Now, where is she? Hmm... Oh, there she is!” She was wearing an inappropriate dress, so she stuck out like a sore thumb.

After a while, Ruri saw Finn turn into a dragon and fly over her way. Asahi was safe for now. Ruri felt relieved that she had worried over nothing, but the spirits around her noticed something odd happening. She looked around to see they all looked extremely uncomfortable.

“What’s wrong, guys?”

“Something’s weird.”

“Yeah, I don’t like it.”

“Don’t like ‘what’?”

“The mana around here is flowing into somewhere.”

Ruri cocked her head in confusion. As she pondered what they meant, the soldiers down below started to close in on Asahi and the Prince in order to restrain them. That was when Asahi pulled out what appeared to be a stone.

Once Rin saw it, she raised her voice in alarm. “That presence... I can’t believe it. It’s a Spirit Slayer!”

“What’s a ‘Spirit Slayer’?”

As soon as the other spirits heard that ominous name, they all ran, screaming their tiny heads off.

“Huh? Guys?!” Ruri exclaimed, looking at Rin for an answer.

“Magic is something you employ the help of a spirit to use. There are other forms of magic you can use via your own mana alone, like physical boosting or Bewitchment magic, but magic with bigger effects will never manifest without the assistance of a spirit. But there are few people who can see spirits and many who don’t believe in them. We can’t help those who don’t believe. Because of that, humans came up with a way to forcibly take power from the world. That way being Spirit Slayer magic. Spirits answer an individual’s wishes and let them borrow power in proportion to their mana. But humans don’t have much mana. Spirit Slayer magic squeezes the mana it needs from the world around it. If any weaker spirits are in the area when it’s used, it drains their powers and they disappear. That’s why it’s referred to as ‘Spirit Slayer.’ It’s a wicked magic developed by humans with small mana reserves. I’d thought that this magic, which ignores the will of spirits, had been lost to the sands of time, but someone must have uncovered it from texts of the past.”

Rin’s tone was stern, and Ruri’s face tensed up. “If that’s the case, you need to hurry up and get away like the others, Rin! You’ll end up disappearing, too!!”

“I’ll be fine. There are limits to magic controllable by a mere human. It may rob weaker spirits of their powers, but no magic exists strong enough to take the power from a supreme-level spirit such as myself.”

Those words helped relieve Ruri.

“But, this is still bad. Any mana in the area is going to be sucked into that stone, little by little. And in other places as well...”

“Wh-What do we do? What’s going to happen?”

“I’m not certain.”

“This is most likely the handiwork of the King and Head Priest, right? They did say they’d eliminate Asahi, after all,” Ruri said, panicked. She knew she had to do something, but she didn’t know what.

As Ruri stood flustered, a film of water surrounded her. “Huh? What is this?”

“It’s not safe, so stay here. Make sure you don’t move,” said Rin, heading down and leaving Ruri where she was.

“Wait a second! Rin?!”

Immediately afterward, there was a huge explosion below.

◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

Finn took the blast from the stone at close range. He closed his eyes and crossed his arms in front of him, bracing for impact. Several seconds went by, but he didn’t feel an ounce of pain. He nervously opened his eyes. His vision was obstructed by a dust cloud, and he couldn’t see what had become of the other soldiers. He could, however, hear the intermittent sounds of explosions from several places, close and afar.

Just as Finn started to assume the worst for his men, he curiously wondered why he remained safe. And while there was a cloud of dust all around, it wasn’t touching Finn’s body. He focused his vision and noticed a semi-circular wall formed around him, protecting him from the outside world. He reached out and touched it, feeling it out on his fingertips.

“Is this... water?”

It wasn’t long before the explosions stopped, the dust settled, and visibility cleared again. Finn, who had been worried about the well-being of his allies this entire time, breathed a sigh of relief. He could see that they were all protected by the same kind of water wall that was around him. Everyone was standing around dumbfounded, but they all seemed to be unharmed.

The walls of water began to disappear all at once, as if they’d fulfilled their purpose.

“That was a close call,” said an unknown voice. Soon after, the Spirit of Water flapped her wings down toward Finn.

“Lady Rin...? Why are you here? Is Ruri alright?”

“Ruri is just fine. I’ve used the same water barrier to protect her.”

“Was it you who just protected us?”

“Yes, it was.”

Finn placed his hand on his chest and took a deep, gracious bow. “You have my utmost gratitude. Thank you very much for saving me and my men. But what in blazes was that explosion just now?”

“I suppose you could call it Nadasha’s secret weapon. I never would have imagined that they would actually use Spirit Slayer magic.”

“Did you say Spirit Slayer?!” Finn exclaimed. He had never seen it before, but he’d certainly heard about it. It was a magic that forcibly pulled power from the world, slaying spirits. Each spirit that disappeared upset the delicate balance of nature. For that reason, it was forbidden magic in the Nation of the Dragon King and many other nations.

“I thought it just a figment of my imagination, but when I defended myself, it almost seemed as though my barrier was absorbed into that stone...”

“No, that wasn’t your imagination. Spirit Slayer is a type of magic that steals power in order to manifest. It absorbs magic and makes magic unusable. Granted, it’s pretty much ineffective against a spirit of my magnitude,” Rin proclaimed with a proud, haughty chuckle.

“Its presence hasn’t dissipated just yet. There must be other stones out there.”

Remembering the size of the last explosion, Finn’s expression went grim. Once Rin had settled herself down on Finn’s shoulder, he looked to where the Prince and the others were. Rin had shielded them from the blast, so there wasn’t a scratch on any of them, but they all seemed to have buckled under the fear and passed out. Asahi was the only one who had remained conscious through the ordeal, but she was deathly pale, terrified from the explosion.

Finn barked at the soldiers around him, “Search to see if there are any more Nadashian soldiers carrying transparent stones!”

“Sir!” the soldiers replied, carrying out their orders and dispersing over the battlefield. However, searching each individual soldier was shaping up to be a difficult job since there was such a huge disparity in numbers between the two armies.

Once they started searching, the walls of water that had protected Finn and his men earlier sprung up in several locations over the battlefield. They seemed to be enclosed around certain people.

Finn looked at Rin, riding on his shoulder, for answers.

“We don’t want to expose Ruri to another one of those explosions, after all.”

“So you know who is in possession of the stones?”

“Yes, because the mana around them is being absorbed into the stone. It exudes a nasty presence.”

“Your help is appreciated.”

Since explosions could happen at any moment, once Finn had Asahi, the Prince, and his entourage apprehended, he ordered his men to move them somewhere safe, away from the battlefield.

◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

From her safe space above, Ruri overheard Finn down below ordering his soldiers to “perform a body inspection on those enclosed in the walls of water.” She decided to descend and provide her help.

Finn, with Rin on his shoulder, looked at Ruri and knit his brows, saying, “Ruri, it’s still too dangerous here.”

“But the battle seems to be over, and I should be fine since Rin has her barriers in place. Besides, I’d like to help you retrieve the stones.”

“No, we don’t know when they might explode. You’re better off keeping yourself out of this.”

“And what do you plan to do with the stones after you’ve apprehended them? Collecting them is one thing, but as long as you don’t know when they might explode, it’s still just as dangerous, isn’t it?”

“Well...” Finn stammered. He hadn’t thought that far ahead. He awkwardly furrowed his brows.

However, Rin had a solution to that quandary. “You should place them into pocket space. Time remains frozen in there, so they wouldn’t explode even if they did absorb enough mana. Plus, if you give them to Lydia, she can erase them with any other pieces of space she doesn’t need.”

“Oh, that sounds like a good idea.”

Disposal of such volatile items left the others scratching their heads, but it wouldn’t be much of a hassle if the stones were erased from existence. Deleting them along with room space was a relatively simple task.

“In that case, I really should help you, Finn-san. If we collect them into my pocket space, then it’ll be easier to dispose of them later.”

Finn seemed slightly at odds with the suggestion, but he ultimately decided it was the best course of action and nodded in consent.

“Then I’ll be back!”

“Wait, I’m coming with you, Ruri.”

Since they were able to pinpoint the location of the stone holders thanks to Rin, the search went much faster than expected. There were some that exploded before they picked them up, but Rin’s water barriers made sure that the explosions didn’t outpour.

Ruri ran around the battlefield with Rin, recovering stones and placing them in her pocket space. By the time they finished, she was dead tired from all the running. But she was also satisfied knowing that she was able to make a difference.

Once they had finished, the Nation of the Dragon King’s army escorted the apprehended Prince and Priestess Princess to the royal capital, signaling the end of the war with Nadasha.