ACT 4
The view was filled with countless cherry blossoms, in the glory of their full bloom.
Yuuto found himself simply overwhelmed by their bright, vibrant beauty.
Of course, this wasn’t his first time seeing something like this. But there really was a certain something about cherry blossoms, something that pulled on the strings of a Japanese heart.
It had now been three days since his return from Yggdrasil.
He still hadn’t received any contact from Felicia, and Mitsuki had taken the chance to invite him, halfway forcing him really, to come along with her to a flower viewing event.
“Just as crazy crowded as always, I see,” he murmured.
The many cherry blossom trees were arranged surrounding a pond. At the base of the trees, the visitors had spread out picnic sheets and blankets, and had set out things like boxed lunches and alcohol. There wasn’t a single tree left with open space beneath it.
Because of the elegant way the cherry blossoms were reflected on the surface of the lake, Hachio Park was famous in this region as a great place for flower viewing.
The weather was clear, and it was a Sunday to boot, so the huge crowds were only to be expected.
“Hey, I don’t think we’re gonna find a spot, at this point,” Yuuto put in.
“Don’t worry about that part,” Mitsuki said, looking this way and that. “Let’s see... oh! There she is. Heeey, Ruri-chan!”
Mitsuki called out and waved her hand in the air vigorously.
That seemed to be enough to get the other girl’s attention.
“Oh, Mitsuki! Over here, over here!” She was standing in a spot under the third tree straight ahead of them, with her hair done up in a ponytail, and was already munching on some sweet dango dumplings. She waved them over towards her.
Smiling, Mitsuki ran over to her and they exchanged a high-five. “Thanks for getting the spot for us! It wasn’t too bad, I hope?”
“Naw, not in the least. How about it? Isn’t this pretty much the best spot?”
“Yeah, way to go, Ruri-chan!”
The two of them giggled and chatted happily with each other. In stark contrast, Yuuto scrunched up his face with displeasure.
It was only yesterday that he’d had to face that girl’s judgmental stares and teasing.
“Suoh-san, come on, don’t make that face,” Ruri said. “I already apologized for yesterday, right?”
“What about Saya-san? She’s not with you today?” For now, Yuuto ignored Ruri and looked around, trying to spot her older cousin.
Saya was valuable as one of the few people who could tighten the leash on the cheeky and outspoken girl in front of him, of course, but Yuuto was also concerned about the fact that yesterday, she had realized something important related to the world of Yggdrasil.
“If you’re looking for Saya, she’s been busy reading over some difficult-looking book ever since yesterday. Tima-something, I think she called it. And another one called Cri-something.”
“What do you mean, ‘something’...?”
“Ahh, well, I can’t ever remember Western style names and stuff, ahaha,” Ruri said with a laugh.
Yuuto could only give a sigh in response.
It was probably some important key clue towards unraveling the mystery of Yggdrasil, but this way he didn’t have any idea what it was.
“Look, Saya said that once she’d figured something out, she’ll get in touch, okay?”
Ruri’s words were a little too unconcerned to be reassuring, but Yuuto agreed with her. “Ah, yeah, I guess that’s true.”
He might have actually experienced living and working in a B.C. era, but he was still a complete layman when it came to archaeology, without even knowledge of the basics.
It would be best to leave the expert to handle the investigation. “Leave bread to the bakers,” as the saying went.
“Anyway, more importantly...” Turning her gaze to the neatly-wrapped bundle in Yuuto’s hands, Ruri licked her lips.
Seeing this, Mitsuki let out a small giggle. “Hee hee, can’t wait any longer? I’ll get it ready right away.”
“Yaaay!” Ruri threw up her arms in celebration as Mitsuki took the bundle from Yuuto and began to untie the cloth wrapping.
Inside was a heavy, dark black box, made of four stacked layers. Mitsuki separated the layers one by one, and laid them out atop the picnic blanket.
“Whoooaa! It looks so good!” Ruri was so impressed that she let out what was practically a deep bellow.
Do you have to throw being ladylike out the window that much? Yuuto thought with a bit of worry, but it wasn’t like he didn’t understand her reaction.
The layered trays of the box were filled with things like hamburg steak, fried chicken, and sweet grilled amberjack, all Yuuto’s favorites.
Everything even looked good visually, to the point where it could pretty much be considered something right out of a delicious-looking picture from a cookbook.
“Did your mom make this?” Yuuto asked.
“No, I made it,” Mitsuki replied matter-of-factly.
Yuuto’s eyes went wide. “Wait, is this edible?”
“Wha... that’s terrible! I’m pretty confident in my cooking skills, you know!”
“Yeah, you say that, but I remember the time when I almost had to eat one of your mud pies.”
“Why are you bringing up something from that long ago?!”
“Hey, Suoh-san, Suoh-san.” Ruri tugged at Yuuto’s sleeve. “Mitsuki’s cooking is seri ously good. So good that if I was a guy, I’d have proposed.”
She said that with a completely straight face.
“What, seriously?” Yuuto was astonished. “This is the same Mitsuki who brought in a handmade ‘chocolate’ on Valentine’s Day one time that was full of weird pockmarks and bubbles, like some kind of poisoned...”
“Again, why are you talking about something from that long ago?! Okay, fine then. I’m not giving you any, Yuu-kun. Ruri-chan, let’s eat, just the two of us.” With that, Mitsuki pulled away the portion that had been set in front of Yuuto, and moved it over to the space in front of Ruri.
“All riiight!”
“Wait, no, Mitsuki, don’t do this to me now! That would be heartless,” Yuuto protested. “It was a joke, a joke, okay?”
With everything that had happened, Yuuto still hadn’t had a chance to eat well since coming back to the modern era.
Additionally, this was the home cooking of the girl he loved.
Frankly speaking, he wanted to eat it really, really badly. Just one glance at the food had set his mouth watering like a faucet.
Of course, there wouldn’t have been a problem if he had just refrained from teasing her, but this sort of behavior was like an old, unconscious habit at this point.
“I mean it,” he pleaded. “I was wrong. I apologize, so please just feed me something here.”
He practically prostrated himself in apology.
Mitsuki, however, puffed out her cheek and turned away from him. “Sorry, no.”
It looked like she was actually mad at him.
Yuuto started wracking his brain, trying to think of what to do, when Ruri spoke up.
“Wooow, that’s so bold. You begged Mitsuki to feed you, huh?”
“Whaaaaat?!” Mitsuki let out a panicked cry. Apparently Ruri’s well-timed explosive statement had successfully blasted the anger right out of her mind.
“Ah, wait, no.” Flustered, Yuuto started to attempt to explain himself. “I didn’t mean it like that!”
“Y-Yuu-kun, do you... want me to feed you?” Mitsuki was bright red and fidgeting, but she still looked right at Yuuto with intensity in her eyes.
“Uh. Umm...” Yuuto lost all capacity for words.
“Th-then... all right, Yuu-kun, here’s some of the fried chicken you like... s-say, ‘Ahh.’” Without even waiting for Yuuto’s answer, Mitsuki used her chopsticks to pluck a small piece of crispy, breaded chicken from the box and held it up towards Yuuto.
Yuuto honestly felt like he wanted to lunge forward and bite down, but he couldn’t get his mind off of the leering, entertained stare coming from the other girl next to him.
“Y-you won’t eat it?” she asked tremulously.
“Ah, n-no, that’s, it’s—” Stealing glances in Ruri’s direction, Yuuto tried to communicate with silent body language that the girl was in the way and making things awkward.
However, Ruri didn’t seem to understand that at all.
“Even though you let Felicia-san and Sigrún-san feed you!” Mitsuki cried.
“Wha?!”
“Even though you let Ingrid-san and Linnea-san take care of you, too!”
“You — how can you bring that up at a time like...?”
“(Heh heh heh...)” Ruri’s smirking face was really getting to Yuuto. If she had been a guy, he would absolutely have decked her at this point.
“And you’ve been looking at Ruri-chan this whole time, geez!” Mitsuki yelled. “What? You want Ruri-chan to feed you?!”
“No! And hey, Mitsuki, you’re getting way too worked up...”
“Y-you really don’t want me to feed you, that much...?” Now she was starting to cry.
It didn’t seem like words would get through to her at this point.
This was it; Yuuto had to give up.
The saying “a woman’s tears are the most powerful weapon” was a pretty apt one. That was all the more so when it was a woman one had feelings for.
Yuuto had no choice but to swallow his pride and accept defeat.
“All right, already.” Steeling his nerves, Yuuto leaned forward and took the piece of fried chicken in his mouth.
Click! There was a small sound, a camera shutter. As if she’d been aiming for this exact moment the whole time, Ruri had her smartphone at the ready, and snapped a picture.
“Thanks for the meal! It was really delicious!” Yuuto clapped his hands together and expressed his appreciation, then patted his stomach with great satisfaction.
All four layers of the stacked lunch box were now completely empty.
Just as Ruri had said, Mitsuki really was a magnificent cook. Added to that was the fact that it had been three whole years since Yuuto had eaten real Japanese home cooking. The nostalgic flavor of home had been the best spice of all.
Yuuto’s chopsticks in particular had moved with a ravenous speed — when it was all over, he realized he’d taken care of more than half of the food himself. It was no wonder he’d gotten this completely full.
“Thank you, it was nothing, really,” Mitsuki replied politely. “Here, have some tea.”
Mitsuki took out a tall canteen and cup, and poured out some for him. Apparently it was a well-insulated thermos; a little bit of steam drifted up from the still-hot tea.
“Oh, thanks.” Yuuto accepted the cup and took a sip, then let out a relaxed breath.
He gazed out at the scenery around them, not looking at anything in particular, just taking it all in.
“It’s the very image of peaceful,” he muttered to himself.
Above all, everything was so prosperous and convenient.
It was about an hour’s walk from his house to this park, but he’d gotten here in practically no time, thanks to the bus.
He didn’t have to go to a river to get water to drink; there were automated vending machines everywhere where he could get any one of a variety of drinks.
This was a world where “room temperature” wasn’t fixed to the weather; one could freely make it hotter or colder anytime.
There were kids out in the park wearing baseball gloves and playing catch, or kicking a soccer ball back and forth, or sitting around playing games on their phones.
Three years ago, all of this had just been normal to him. But now, he felt an odd sensation, as if things were out of place. He could no longer accept this ordinary world as it was and take it for granted.
It was because he’d come to know the life lived by the people of Yggdrasil.
This scene playing out around him now was so much more precious, had so much more value.
“Yeah, it’s peaceful here,” Mitsuki agreed. “Yuu-kun, you don’t have to fight anymore.”
“Ah...!” Yuuto tensed up. “...Yeah, that’s true. I’m home now, so I don’t have to... do anything violent or bloody anymore, do I...”
He whispered this to himself as if he’d only just now realized it.
“Yuu-kun, you’ve already worked so hard and done so much for everyone in the Wolf Clan up until now.” Mitsuki grasped Yuuto’s hand in hers. “So, you don’t need to anymore.”
It was as if she were trying to grasp ahold of Yuuto and physically connect him to this world.
“Y-yeah. You’re... right, yeah.” Even as Yuuto felt comfort from Mitsuki’s body heat flowing into his hand, his words were unsure.
He absolutely hated having to fight someone with death on the line; he’d had enough of that. If he could get by without having to fight, that was best. He’d always thought that way.
However, the thought of just him being here in this peaceful world gave him a strange feeling of guilt.
Right now his comrades were fighting, risking their very lives in battle, while only he got to be here eating delicious food, sitting around looking at cherry blossoms, rejoicing in this peace. Was that really okay?
“Yuu-kun, come with me!” Mitsuki exclaimed.
“Huh? Whoa—”
Mitsuki’s hand had released his, only to grab him by the wrist and pull him to his feet.
“Have a good tiiime!” Ruri called. “I’ll be here keeping an eye on everyone’s stuff, okay?”
Ruri waved goodbye and sent them off cheerily. Yuuto found himself being taken, somewhat forcefully, over towards the nearby street.
The street was lined with various stalls and stands, all topped by tents of bright yellow fabric. Exuberant voices called out, everyone trying their best to attract customers.
Mitsuki spotted one booth in particular, a shooting gallery, and headed towards it. “Hi, mister! One game, please.”
“You got it,” he said. “You can take up to three shots, all right?”
“Here you go, Yuu-kun.” With that, Mitsuki took the cork gun from the booth operator and handed it over to Yuuto. “Yuu-kun, you know, I really want that dog plushie up there.”
She pointed to a stuffed animal sitting on the second platform from the top, a rather odd-looking one with funny eyebrows that looked kind of like the swirly depictions of departed souls in manga and anime.
To Yuuto, at first glance it looked more like a cat, but Mitsuki said it was a dog, so that had to be what it was.
“Uh... um...”
Mitsuki’s rather forceful behavior had left Yuuto at a loss, and he stood there dumbfounded, looking back and forth between Mitsuki and the cork gun.
“Come on, let’s have fun, Yuu-kun. You’ve got to make up for what you’ve been missing out on. You’re not even seventeen yet, you know that?”
“...Oh. Yeah, you’re right. I’m still only sixteen.”
Yuuto nodded, and then he held up the cork gun and took aim.
He was here at a big, festive flower viewing event at the park, after all. He couldn’t be blamed if, just for today, he put difficult things out of his head and had a little fun.
Actually, Mitsuki had gone through the trouble of inviting him out here, even cooking him all that food herself. Fully enjoying himself here was the only proper way to respond to her efforts.
“Make sure you aim carefully!” Mitsuki called. “I’ve been wanting that thing for a long time now.”
“Okay, okay.” Yuuto centered the gun’s sights on Mitsuki’s chosen dog plushie, and tightened the gun against his armpit and shoulder to keep it steady, then pulled the trigger.
With a pop, the cork flew out of the barrel. It lost speed just before completing the distance to the target, and fell into the space between the second and third platforms.
“Ohh, you missed!” she moaned.
“Ah ha ha, you’ve still got two shots left though,” laughed the booth operator. “Come on, son, gotta look good in front of your girlfriend there.”
“Huuuh?! G-girlfriend, that’s, well...” Mitsuki’s face flushed red, and she bashfully put both hands on her cheeks, making a fuss.
However, Yuuto was already so focused on the task of shooting that he didn’t hear the other two talking.
Judging by the first shot, the gas pressure in the gun was set to be pretty weak. The game operator had a friendly face, but this was definitely a business. It wasn’t going to be easy to knock that target down.
“Well, guess I’ll just do what I can.”
Yuuto fixed his sights on the space a bit directly above the stuffed animal, and fired. However, the cork still ended up flying through the space under the toy.
“Ahh, Yuu-kun, you’re so bad at thiiis,” Mitsuki complained. “You need to aim more properly.”
Yuuto ignored that and aimed even higher, firing his third shot.
The cork traced a smooth parabola up and through the air, then came down to smack against the target stuffed animal’s head.
“Ohhhh, you did it!” Mitsuki cried out and raised both fists victoriously into the air as the stuffed animal wobbled, then fell off of its platform.
“Ohh. You’ve got a good shooting arm, there, kid,” the booth operator said, holding out the stuffed animal prize. “Looks like I lose.”
“Ha ha, just a lucky shot,” Yuuto responded with a shrug.
He had been lucky, in that the first shot had been at exactly the right horizontal trajectory. All he’d needed to do after that was adjust his vertical angle over the next two shots. If he’d had to start with both the horizontal and vertical being off target on the first shot, three shots surely wouldn’t have been enough.
“Here.” Yuuto took the plushie the man had given him and casually tossed it over at Mitsuki.
“W-w-whoa! Hey, don’t throw it at me!” Mitsuki struggled to catch the thing without dropping it, then puffed out her cheeks. But as soon as she held up the plushie and looked at it, her face broke into a wide smile once more.
“What, did you really want that thing that badly?” Yuuto asked.
“I did want it, of course, just, um, it’s not just that.”
“Hm? What, then?” Yuuto grew suspicious at Mitsuki’s vague, hesitant language.
Mitsuki’s eyes darted this way and that, and she looked as if she was hesitating about whether to say what came next. “Y-Yuu-kun, it’s also because you got it for me.”
She looked up at him, clutching the stuffed animal to her chest as if she were clutching the courage she needed to say those words.
“O-oh, so that’s why.”
“Y-yeah, that’s why.”
The two of them said only that much before both going silent, looking at each other as their cheeks grew bright red.
This was so embarrassing.
It was so incredibly awkward.
But, at the same time, it didn’t feel bad, either.
“Hey there, you two,” said the booth man. “It’s fine that you’re in full bloom and all, but you’re getting in the way of business by standing right there, so if you’re not going to do any more shooting, could you maybe run off somewhere else together?”
“W-we’re so very sorry—!!”
The two of them suddenly remembered that they were out in public, and ran off, embarrassed, at top speed.
As Mitsuki and Yuuto walked along the road home in the darkening light, Mitsuki spoke with a lingering sigh. “The cherry blossoms were really pretty, weren’t they? I know I see them every year, but I don’t ever get tired of them.”
Time flies while having fun, as is often said. After the shooting gallery, they had gone around to check out the other stalls and booths, strolled aimlessly around the inside of the park, joined back up with Ruri and lounged around, and even played badminton together. Before they’d realized it, it had grown quite late.
“Yeah, you’re right,” Yuuto said.
From Yuuto’s perspective, Mitsuki’s happy, smiling face was even more pretty, and cuter too, but though that thought came to mind, he held back from saying it aloud, and simply nodded.
That kind of statement seemed too affected, too cheesy, too embarrassing. But it was also how he really felt.
“Still, I wish we could’ve stayed to enjoy the nighttime flowers too.” Mitsuki closed her eyes and smiled, as if she were looking at a picture from within her memories.
At Hachio Park, the cherry blossoms were lit up by spotlights at night, creating a beautiful scene that was quite different from during the day.
Or so Yuuto had heard. He himself had never seen it. It was one of those cases where, growing up as a local resident, he hadn’t gone to the tourist spots in his own area that often.
Seeing how dejected Mitsuki was at missing the chance made Yuuto really want to see the nighttime cherry blossoms himself.
“Hey, there’s nothing we can do about that,” he said gently. “You’ve got a curfew.”
“Uuuugh, yeah, I know, buuut...”
“And besides, it might not have been on purpose, but the other night, I showed up in your bedroom in the middle of the night. After something like that, if I made you late for your curfew, your family would seriously think the worst of me.”
There was no way the parents of a teenage girl would have any kind of a good impression of a boy who’d suddenly barged into their daughter’s room late at night. Yuuto was just lucky he hadn’t been reported to the police right then and there.
“I don’t think they’d think much worse of you, though,” Mitsuki said.
“So they already pretty much think the worst of me, then?!”
“No, no. Mom’s always wanted to have a son, and she always says stuff like, ‘If only someone like Yuu-kun could be part of my family,’ and things like that.”
“Yeah, but that was three years ago.”
“It’s no different now. Actually, I think her opinion of you’s gotten better. She even complimented you, saying you ‘grew into a real fine man.’”
“Uh... I’m pretty sure I’m not all that attractive, though... does your mom like guys with my type of face or something?”
“Hee hee, maybe that’s it. She is my mom, after all. Ah...” Once the words were out, Mitsuki stopped and put her hands over her mouth.
Apparently she had just realized that she had also said, indirectly, that Yuuto was her type, too.
Yuuto was sure that Mitsuki would quickly follow up with something to divert attention or change the subject, but instead she bit her lower lip, and as if she’d decided on something important, turned to look up at Yuuto.
“Hey, that question Ruri-chan asked you back during lunch at the restaurant? Could you tell me your answer, now?”
“Huh?” For a brief second, Yuuto didn’t understand what she meant, but right away his mind went straight to the only question that fit.
How do you feel about Mitsuki?
“Hey... give me your answer,” Mitsuki pled in a weak voice, then softly closed her eyes.
Yuuto understood what that meant; he wasn’t fool enough to miss it.
How did he feel about Mitsuki?
He didn’t even need to think about the answer. He’d always loved her, since even before he’d gone to Yggdrasil.
It was just that he’d sworn to himself, in his heart, that he could never say that out loud to her until he made it properly back to the modern world.
He placed a hand gently on Mitsuki’s shoulder. She shuddered slightly; that told him just how tense she was right now.
And it was a something he could only know because he was here with her now, touching her.
There were no more barriers of space and time between them.
There was no more need for him to restrain himself any longer.
Then, why? Why was it that he hesitated now? Yuuto shook his head, trying to banish the weak-willed part of himself.
“Mitsuki...”
He made up his mind, and he spoke the beloved name of the girl in his heart aloud, as if to spur that heart onward. Yuuto moved his lips closer to hers...
Beep! Delelee! Deedeleleeee! ?
Just when their lips were about to touch, suddenly, Mitsuki’s smartphone began ringing, and the two of them flinched and jumped apart from each other.
“Um, um, er...” Mitsuki was panicking.
“...Just go ahead and answer for now,” Yuuto murmured, gesturing for her to do so.
“O-okay.”
She clumsily took the smartphone out of her bag. As Yuuto watched from right next to her, he took a huge breath.
He felt his heart still racing.
His emotions were running high, and he couldn’t calm down, but even that wasn’t a bad feeling.
However, his time enjoying those complicated feelings came to a crashing halt at Mitsuki’s next words.
“Yuu-kun. I don’t know what they’re saying, but it sounds like they’re calling for you. They keep saying, ‘Yuuto! Yuuto!’”
Yuuto gasped. “Felicia! Is it Felicia?!”
He grabbed the smartphone roughly out of Mitsuki’s hands when she held it out to him, and cried out the name of the person to whom he had given his own smartphone.
“That voice! Yuuto! Is that you, Yuuto?!”
“Ingrid?!” The voice over the phone was not his golden-haired adjutant, but instead was the red-haired girl who had been his trusted partner in the forge. “Why are you the one who’s...”
“Ohh, that’s ’cause the twins brought the thing to me.”
“...Ah. I see now.” That bit of information was enough for Yuuto to get a rough grasp of the situation.
Since time was of the utmost essence, they had sent the phone with the twins, the fastest two people in the Wolf Clan, back to Iárnviðr to deliver to Ingrid.
For Yuuto, who had felt like every moment was an eternity while waiting to hear from them, that was an excellent decision. He could expect no less from his adjutant Felicia, in whom he’d placed his absolute trust.
“Okay, then! Tell me, what’s the situation right now?! What happened at Gashina?!”
Yuuto was also curious how things were in Iárnviðr now that they surely knew he was gone, but of course the most important thing on his mind was how events had developed with the armies near Fort Gashina.
It would have become known to everyone that he, the commander-in-chief, was absent, while the army was smack in the middle of the battlefield. There was no more precarious situation for them than that.
As Yuuto anxiously swallowed, Ingrid gave a small sigh, then spoke. “They lost. There was a sudden attack at night, and the wagon wall defense was broken...”
“Agh! Th-then, what about everyone in the army?! What happened to Rún, and Felicia?!”
“For now, it sounds like they were able to flee into the fortress, and survived.”
“I... I see.” Yuuto started to sigh in relief.
“But that was two days ago. As for right now, I don’t know...”
“Ah...!”
That’s right, Yuuto realized. Unlike the modern era, in Yggdrasil there was no way to transmit information instantly in real time.
And the Panther Clan had use of the trebuchet, and the Lightning Clan had Steinþórr and his destructive rune Mjǫlnir, the Shatterer.
A small fortress like Gashina would hardly be an obstacle to such powerful foes.
The more he thought about it, the more Yuuto’s anxiety grew. He wanted more than anything to rush to their aid right now.
However...
Yuuto turned his gaze to what was right in front of him now.
Standing there was the girl he had wanted to meet for so long, had wished to touch again for so long, and she was looking at him with worry in her eyes.
WHAM! Rumble, clatter clatter...
The huge rock fell down from the sky and slammed into the wall of Fort Gashina, which crumbled easily at the impact.
This was followed by the fevered screams of the Panther Clan and Lightning Clan soldiers, who all at once began to charge into the interior of the fortress.
“Uoooooghhh! Attaaaaack!”
“Kill them all!!”
“So they’re here!” Olof called.
From atop the overlooking terrace balcony, Olof gave a quick sweeping glance of his surroundings and smacked his weapon loudly against his well-worn armor.
Right now, the allied Panther and Lightning clan soldiers surrounding the Fort Gashina numbered fifteen thousand strong. Against them, there were five hundred Wolf Clan soldiers left to defend the fortress.
It was often said that the defensive side in a siege could afford to face an attacking force five or ten times its size, but against an army thirty times their size, they could not hope to put up an even fight.
That was all the more true because their enemy had the trebuchet, a siege weapon from a far more advanced era.
This was in every respects a losing battle, without the slightest chance of victory for the Wolf Clan.
Yet the soldiers were still trying.
“Attack, attack, attack!”
“Don’t let them take a single step further!”
“Oh, goddess Angrboða! Give me strength!”
“We’ll show you just how strong the soldiers of the Wolf Clan really are!”
Despite the situation at hand, the Wolf Clan soldiers protecting the fortress were at the peak of their morale.
That was only natural, for they were the soldiers that had stayed behind in this place of certain death of their own accord.
They were the heroes who had volunteered for this suicide corps, who were willing to pay with their own lives in order to protect the main body of the Wolf Clan army in its retreat.
They weren’t about to turn coward now just because defeat was the only outcome, because that was something they had understood from the very beginning.
In fact, they were emboldened by the will to fight in order to buy even just a little bit more time for their comrades to escape. A numbers disadvantage was meaningless, and with abandon, they attacked the enemies who entered the fortress, one after another.
“Heh heh, this reminds me of the Siege of Iárnviðr two years ago.” Olof smirked as he gazed down nostalgically at his men below, fighting at their best and most desperate.
Back in that battle, things had been just as hopeless as they were now. Naturally, Olof himself had taken part in that battle.
When it seemed like everyone else was ready to give up, Yuuto alone had refused to abandon hope, and used the “miracle” created by the solar eclipse, as well as the use of the trebuchet, to deliver an incredible victory.
Thinking back to that victory gave Olof chills, even now. Starting with that victory, the Wolf Clan had begun to thrive and prosper.
“If Father were here, he would likely have turned even this grim situation around somehow,” Olof murmured to himself.
Right now, his soldiers were overpowering the enemy with their sheer ferocity, but their strength, born of conviction and readiness for death, still had a limit. It would not last long.
He could already see that sooner rather than later, they would no longer be able to hold back the enemy’s momentum.
A mere man like himself was nothing like the Gleipsieg Yuuto, the “Child of Victory” who had been sent to them by the gods; he could not produce miracles like Yuuto could.
“But even I have my pride and honor,” he said aloud. “I cannot die just yet, not when I still have the shame of my earlier defeat. Take heed, Panther Clan. Do not think you will take us down easily just because we are a small force. We’ll fight, and struggle, and tear at you until the very end.”
“Fools, why are you taking so long?! The enemy is only a few hundred men!” Within the Panther Clan main formation, Hveðrungr raised his voice in irritation, for the fortress had still not fallen into his hands.
At this rate, he would lose his chance to catch up to the main body of the Wolf Clan forces.
In order to make this a true and perfect victory, and in order to make his future conquest of the Wolf Clan go smoothly, he needed to be able to hit them as hard as he could now, while he had the opportunity.
“Perhaps I should have left capturing the fortress to the Lightning Clan alone, and headed immediately after the Wolf Clan,” he muttered.
Hveðrungr had assumed he would take a small fortress like this quickly and easily, but he had miscalculated.
At this point, the battlefield victory for the allied Panther and Lightning Clans was already set, and so he had switched to acting with standard, reliable tactics, but that had backfired on him here.
Even so, complaining about that at this point would change nothing, and was meaningless.
“Tch, if my red-haired ‘brother’ had charged in, this would have ended in a flash.” Hveðrungr hatefully spat out the words.
The Lightning Clan patriarch Steinþórr had apparently decided to simply watch how things played out, and had left commanding his army to his right-hand man, his assistant-second-in-command Þjálfi.
The man was truly a fickle one, through and through.
If he were the man’s sworn younger sibling or child subordinate, he could have ordered the man out onto the front lines as he wished, but the Oath of the Chalice sworn between them had been an even one, fifty-fifty. He could not give outright commands to another patriarch with ostensibly equal authority to himself.
That was all the more true because the Lightning Clan troops were indeed participating in the attack on the fortress.
As a result, he had no trump card to play here, and had fallen into this situation of failing to fully capture the objective.
However, he wasn’t about to give up on attacking just because of that.
“Engineers, I want you to throw even more rocks at them, and widen the spaces we can break in through,” Hveðrungr ordered. “We’re going to pile attacks on top of each other. Know that no reward awaits you if you take much longer!”
At this urging from Hveðrungr, the Panther Clan fighters forced their way into Fort Gashina with an even greater, desperate momentum.
Even still, the Wolf Clan fighters within the fortress held on.
They continued to hold on.
The siege had been launched on the fortress along with the rising of the sun that morning, and even as that sun began to stain the western sky with red, they still kept up their resistance.
If one were to consider an enemy force thirty times greater in strength, along with advanced siege weapons, it is clear what an astounding display of tenacity this was.
And yet, even with that, the Panther Clan eventually seized control of all sections of the fortress, until all that was left was to take the commander’s chambers and the head of the commander barricaded inside.
Hveðrungr and some of his men dispatched the Wolf Clan soldiers who guarded the entrance, and he burst into the room.
“Kyeaaaagh!!”
In that instant, with an ear-splitting cry, a man with long hair leapt at them and swung his sword in a powerful downward strike from a high stance, cutting down one of the Panther Clan men.
The man whirled his sword around in a storm of bold, powerful attacks, striking at the squad of Panther Clan fighters.
The man’s body was already riddled with wounds.
There was blood seeping out from under bandages wrapped around his head and abdomen. There were countless cuts and chinks all over his armor, telling the story of just how fiercely he had fought until now.
His face was pale, and he looked to be about at his last breath, but his eyes were not dead yet. Even in this situation he was aflame with the spirit of battle.
Overcome by the man’s intensity of spirit, another, then another Panther Clan fighter fell at his hands.
It was enough to make one question just how such a man so wounded could still be so full of such strength.
However, in the end, he was still one man against a great number.
As he cut down one more Panther Clan soldier, a second one leapt onto him and grappled him. Another leapt onto him after that, and they forced him to the ground.
“You certainly made me waste a lot of time, didn’t you?” Hveðrungr looked down at the man — at Olof — and spat those words at him mockingly.
Thanks to this man, the main segment of the Wolf Clan army had completely escaped. Even if he chased them now, he would never catch up. It was incredibly irritating.
“Still, it was quite the impressive feat for you to hold out this long against such numbers, with only a few hundred at your command,” Hveðrungr said. “Enemy though you are, I shall praise your magnificent work. How about it, then? Would you join me, and fight under my banner?”
“That voice... you’re Loptr, aren’t you?” Olof said slowly. “That would explain why the Panther Clan had something like the trebuchet.”
Glaring up as if the man were his worst enemy — which, as it so happened, was true in this case — Olof shot daggers of animosity at Hveðrungr with his eyes.
“Who can really say?” Hveðrungr gave a twisted smile. “I’ve long since forgotten whatever names I held before.”
He was aware that right now, his subordinates were seeing and hearing this. He couldn’t very well admit to being a kinslayer, perpetrator of the greatest crime in Yggdrasil.
However, he’d known Olof for a long time, and the man seemed to be sure of the true identity behind Hveðrungr’s mask.
“I knew you weren’t the kind of man who would die in a ditch somewhere, but to think you’d become patriarch of the Panther Clan,” Olof spat.
“Heh heh heh, I’ve no intention to talk about the distant past. I’ll ask again. Olof... are you unwilling to swear to me the Oath of the Chalice?”
Olof gaped at him. “What?”
“I’ve had a high opinion of you since long ago. I think that I could even entrust the position of assistant-second-in-command to someone of your caliber. Well?” Hveðrungr squatted down and peered into his face.
The Panther Clan were nomads who made their living while migrating across the land. Perhaps because of this, they were not well versed when it came to the art of governing cities.
For the Panther Clan, who had rapidly expanded their controlled territory into agricultural lands, a talented administrator like Olof was someone they were dying to recruit.
However, in response to Hveðrungr’s offer...
...Olof spat on him.
Hveðrungr clenched his teeth so hard they made a sound, but still did not immediately give up on his invitation.
“You should really think about this. If you refuse, all that awaits you is death.”
“Fine by me,” Olof snapped. “If you’re going to kill me, then do it. I have only one sworn father, the greatest hero in the land, Suoh-Yuuto! I have received the Oath of the Chalice directly from him, and there is no greater honor, so why would I have cause to swear on the Chalice of a petty low life such as you? Save your idiotic ramblings for when you mumble in your sleep.”
“Hmph! I’m impressed that you can bark so loudly at the end!” Hveðrungr drew the sword at his waist and in a single stroke, lopped off Olof’s head.
He hadn’t killed the man because he wanted to. He’d been spat on in full view of his subordinates, and then taunted in such a fashion afterward. If he had not executed Olof, he would have lost face as a patriarch, and so he’d been left with no other choice.
Hveðrungr looked down at the severed head as it rolled across the ground, and shot it a parting remark.
“Watch, then, from Valhalla. Watch as I burn Iárnviðr to the ground!”
“Ah!” Regaining consciousness, Sigrún bolted upright and checked her surroundings.
She seemed to have been sleeping atop a horse-drawn wagon.
There were soldiers marching in rank on all sides, stretching in front of and behind her. Their faces were all clouded over with incredible fatigue, and they walked with their heads hung down.
Looking further into the distance, she saw a wide expanse of plains, and further beyond that was the hazy outline of a mountain range.
“Where is this...?” she muttered.
A familiar voice reached her ears. “Oh, my. So you’re finally awake.”
Sigrún turned to find Felicia sitting in the wagon covered in a blanket, leaning against the side of the cart. She was clutching a bundle of papers in her hands, and seemed to have been writing.
Felicia set the papers aside, and continued. “You were asleep for a full day, unmoving as if dead. You must have really built up a great deal of fatigue from all of your fighting. You really shouldn’t push yourself to the limit so much, you know?”
“An entire day?! Then what about the Panther Clan?! What did Big Brother Olof do?!”
“Lord Olof took on responsibility for our defeat, and elected to stay behind with a small number of fighters at Fort Gashina as the rearguard so that we could escape.” Felicia paused, and directed her gaze off in a particular direction.
When Sigrún followed suit, she saw, in one place amongst the colors of the evening sky, an incredible number of birds swarming about.
It was difficult to tell at this distance, but they were likely crows. They were birds that were drawn to the stench of blood on the battlefield, and fed on the bodies of the dead.
“Until just a few moments ago, I could hear the sounds of the rocks from the trebuchet crashing into the fortress walls, and the battle cries of soldiers, but all that has grown quiet. It seems the battle is over. I would assume that by now...”
“...!” Sigrún said nothing, but there was a loud thud! as she pounded her left fist against the wagon cart.
It was a straightforward expression of the depths of her anger; the impact was enough to make the cart rock for a moment.
She had not been particularly close to Olof. Even so, he was her sworn brother, with their loyalty pledged to the same parent. That meant he was family.
Sigrún was sometimes called the “frozen flower,” but she was not so cold as to feel nothing about that man’s death.
“Lord Olof entrusted me with a message to give to you,” Felicia said.
“...What is it?”
“He said only, ‘I leave the rest to you now.’”
“...I see.” Sigrún said no more, and unsheathed her sword.
She brought its hilt up even with her eyes, the blade pointed up towards the heavens.
A warrior needed no words.
She had only to offer her silent respect to the great man who had gone to rest before her, and pray silently for his peace in the afterlife.
And thus, the curtain drew to a close on this series of battles between the Wolf Clan and the allied Panther and Lightning Clans, known afterward as the Battle of Gashina, having ended with the Wolf Clan’s terrible defeat.
News of the Wolf Clan’s massive military defeat sent shockwaves through the subsidiary clans that were under its protection.
In the Horn Clan capital, Fólkvangr:
“Is that really the truth?!” Linnea shot back at the messenger who brought her the report, unable to believe it.
Her outward appearance was that of a charming young girl, but she was the proud patriarch of the Horn Clan, which held the large swath of fertile territories in the river basin between the Körmt and Örmt Rivers.
“Yes, ma’am!” the messenger informed her. “The Wolf Clan troops engaged the allied Panther and Lightning Clan forces near Fort Gashina, and were defeated!”
“To think that the Panther Clan had made their way down there, as well...” Linnea frowned bitterly.
The Horn Clan had been victims of attacks by that Panther Clan’s cavalry, and she knew the threat they posed all too well. Their mobility and force in a charging assault was overwhelming.
And as for the Lightning Clan, even a combined attack by seven Einherjar had been easily brushed aside by Steinþórr’s wild strength, a memory that was still fresh in her mind even now.
If those two clans had combined forces, then even for Yuuto, who was lauded as a war god incarnate, it might not be helped that he couldn’t take care of both foes at the same time.
“Th-then... is Big Brother safe?!” she asked desperately.
Linnea’s concern was not born simply out of the fact that he was her sworn brother by the Chalice. To her, Yuuto was someone who had saved the Horn Clan from danger several times, and to whom she owed a great debt. He was someone she felt she could respect from the bottom of her heart for his wisdom. And he was also the man that she had fallen in love with.
His safety and whereabouts were the most important thing to Linnea.
“A-about that... the report is that Lord Yuuto was killed in the battle.”
“What?!” All of the color drained from Linnea’s face. Her teeth began chattering, and she stumbled a step backwards, then another. “Th-that’s a lie! B-Big Brother came to us from the land beyond the heavens. There is no way he could possibly have died!”
“H-however, that is the only reasonable conclusion here.”
“It’s a lie, a lie, a lie, a lie!” Linnea could do nothing but shout those words, repeating them over and over. Her mind refused to accept the idea.
“Princess, please get ahold of yourself! You are the patriarch, you must not act this way!” The one who cut in angrily to snap her out of it was a white-haired, older man who had been standing at her side.
His name was Rasmus, and he was a high official in the Horn Clan, who had formerly served as its second-in-command. He had retired from the position after being severely wounded in the Horn Clan’s last war with the Lightning Clan, and now he served as an advisor to Linnea. To Linnea, he was rather like a father figure.
“B-but...” she stuttered. “This claim that Big Brother died is just...”
“I do understand how you feel, but please remain calm! You will not be able to protect the Horn Clan otherwise!”
“Ugh...” A little bit of composure returned to Linnea’s eyes after hearing Rasmus’s words.
For her, protecting the clan which she had inherited from her father and bringing prosperity to its people was a duty that had to be her first priority. She now managed to remember that again.
“Y-you’re right,” she swallowed. “If... if we’re just supposing that Big Brother has really passed away, then...”
“Yes. There will be unavoidable chaos that follows, I think. We must decide how to overcome this crisis, and we must do it in all haste.”
“...Right.” Linnea nodded, furrowing her brow.
Beginning with the Horn Clan, the clans which had pledged their allegiance to the Wolf Clan as its subsidiaries were only staying loyal in large part due to the influence of the hero who had turned a small and weak clan into a great and prosperous nation in less than a generation, the man known as Suoh-Yuuto.
The man currently viewed as the likely successor to Yuuto, the Wolf Clan’s second-in-command Jörgen, was a talented man and by no means unworthy of authority, but it was a different story on the matter of rallying various other clan patriarchs under his leadership as well. One could not help but doubt he could be capable of that.
“Princess, this might actually be an opportunity for the Horn Clan,” Rasmus said.
“What?”
“I know that our Horn Clan is currently in the position of younger sister clan to the Wolf Clan, but as a nation, we are no less powerful than them. And our Oath of the Chalice with Jörgen was on equal, fifty-fifty terms. We have no more obligation to stand beneath them. We could use this opportunity to take back the leadership role in our alliance, and we could even take over the Wolf Clan itself...”
“You would repay our debt to them with betrayal?! Do you think I could ever do something so disloyal?!” Linnea shouted at Rasmus with a furious, burning anger, but Rasmus maintained a serious expression and continued.
“Princess, one cannot govern a nation on platitudes. I am not suggesting that we destroy the Wolf Clan, or anything of that sort. The strong rule, and the weak serve the strong. That is the natural order of things. What happens next will determine the future of the Horn Clan. Please, think long and carefully about this.”
“......” Linnea couldn’t say anything in response.
At about the same time that Linnea was receiving her report, the Claw Clan patriarch Botvid was getting a report from a messenger sent by his own daughter, Kristina.
Having inferred the major details of the situation, he was deep in thought. “Hm, so Big Bro Yuuto has returned to his realm beyond the heavens...”
Even for a man such as him, with a reputation as a great plotter and schemer, this event was completely outside of his predictions.
Frankly, he didn’t think the Wolf Clan stood a chance at resisting the combined might of the Panther and Lightning Clans without Yuuto. He needed to abide by his Oath of the Chalice if possible, but he was also in no mood to go down with a sinking ship.
He would thus need to take into consideration the possibility of switching allegiances to the Panther Clan or Lightning Clan in the future.
After all, the only way for a nation as small and weak as the Claw Clan to survive in this chaotic and war-torn world was to be shrewd.
“Now, then... how should I play this one, I wonder?” Rolling up the message, Botvid tapped his desk with a finger, and he thought to himself.
Under the surface, Yuuto’s absence had already begun to shake the foundation holding up the Wolf Clan.
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