The Girl Raised by the Death God Holds the Sword of Darkness in Her Arms - Volume 3 - Chapter 3.4

IV

General Patrick’s Army on the Freyberg Plateau, the Central Front

After Gladden appointed him to lead the attack on the Second Legion, Patrick smashed his way through their defensive lines one after another. Finally, he reached what had to be their final line of defense on the Freyberg Plateau. After he broke them here, marching on the royal capital would no longer be a mere dream.

“So, this is where they’ve chosen as their grave.”

“Yes, ser. We’ve finally got them pinned down.”

Patrick’s aide, Major Ares, gazed out at the sea of Second Legion banners. The Gold Lions, each with two stars, fluttered in the distance.

“I thought they’d never run out of those sneaky tricks. It made me sick, if I’m honest.”

Patrick found great meaning in an honest, head-on battle, but he could hardly force his enemies to comply. Yet using steel wire to impede the enemy army’s advance, reversing the flow of a river to create a perfect bog, then turning around and setting absurdly simple pit traps—these were so far from honest warfare as to deeply wound the honor of the perpetrators themselves.

To Patrick’s surprise, though, Ares replied with admiration. “Ser, I must disagree. There is no beauty in war. Ensnaring your enemy—and being ensnared yourself—are all of a piece in battle. The enemy general is intimately familiar with the demands of war—I’d be happy to have him in our army.”

Patrick snorted. “Aren’t you just full of praise for our enemy.”

“I have no reservations about praising brilliance, even from an enemy,” Ares replied. He was also a tactician, and a teacherly expression graced his features as he went on. “It’s perfectly natural, ser.”

“Would you stop harping on about every little thing?” Patrick exclaimed. “You always talked too damn much!”

Ares shrugged with a sardonic smile, which only made Patrick sigh. He looked back at the Second Legion, its soldiers assembled to form a triangle. “A flying wedge, at this stage...” he said. “They mean to fight to the bitter end, then.”

“Unlike us, the enemy should be close to the limits of exhaustion...” Ares said, unspoken meaning dripping from his every word. Patrick didn’t miss the implication.

“Hah. Unless I’m much mistaken, they’ve guessed that the First Legion has come to their rescue.” In order to prevent the Second Legion catching wind of the First Legion’s approach, Gladden had sent out reconnaissance agents over a wide area to cut off their sources of information. If the Second Legion still retained the will to fight, they must have guessed it anyway.

“It would seem so, ser. Oh, well. It’s not as though we were relying too much on that.”

Patrick looked at Ares and snorted. “Obviously. All respect to Marshal Gladden, but we never needed any spies in the first place. We’ll hit them head-on and crush them—there’s no need to exploit their vulnerabilities.”

“Setting that aside for the moment, what is our plan, ser? Standard practice would be to send out a number of units ahead to see what the enemy does.”

“What a stupid question. You know what I’m thinking, don’t you?”

“As a rule, you are rather easy to read, my lord,” Ares said, a smile tugging at his mouth. The man never knew when to shut up, but he was an excellent soldier, and Patrick valued that highly.

“Shut it. In my army, we always go at them! I’ve got no patience for observing the enemy. If they’re coming at us in a flying wedge, we’ll use a crane formation to surround and exterminate them.”

“I shall begin preparations at once,” Ares said. He turned smartly on his heel and headed for the runner’s station.

Second Legion Command, the Freyberg Plateau on the Central Front

“The calm before the storm...” Blood muttered. Here on the Freyberg Plateau, the Second Legion’s final line of defense, the two armies faced off in silence. Blood and Lise, though both bone-tired, closely studied the scene. Three long weeks had passed since their battle with the Helios Knights began. The arrival of the First Legion had drawn away the bulk of the enemy force, lightening the Second Legion’s burden significantly. Even then, their third and fourth lines of defense had been penetrated, and they had lost a prodigious number of soldiers. Although their spirit was not yet broken, Blood could clearly see that they were quickly reaching their limit.

“My lord, the enemy is moving,” Lise said. Blood nodded. Before him, the enemy army fanned out on both sides into a crescent moon shape. Their maneuvering was polished and efficient, and the formation was quickly completed.

“A crane formation...”

“Presumably it’s in response to our wedge formation?”

“You’re probably right. They worked out we still have some fight left in us and mean to put an end to us in one blow.”

“How are we going to counter them?” Lise asked, her expression bleak. She too knew they had no hope of winning this fight. Even if they couldn’t win, however, they could still refuse to lose.

Blood was quiet for a moment, then said, “If a crane is to soar, it needs both its wings.”

“In other words, if we take out one of their flanks, we can temporarily incapacitate them,” Lise replied at once.

Sharp as always, Blood thought, privately amused. Out loud he said, “Exactly. Wretched as it is, all we’re capable of right now is buying time and praying that the First Legion emerges victorious in the meantime.”

Without needing to be told, Lise relayed orders to each of the runners while Blood lit a cigarette and looked on. A thread of smoke coiled up into the sky.

“Major Olivia’s unit still hasn’t arrived.” Lise made the remark suddenly after she’d finished with the runners. “We could really do with even one more ally right now...” They’d received word that Major Olivia was on her way to them, but she had yet to appear.

“Maybe if she had a real army, but at the end of the day, they’re just a slipshod militia.”

“You think she’ll have problems with discipline?”

“I think it’s very possible.”

“But they might also already be close at hand,” Lise insisted. Blood nodded.

“You may be right. But in any case, I wouldn’t count on it.” Six thousand reinforcements did sound very appealing at the moment, and usually Blood would have welcomed them with open arms. But in many ways, undisciplined soldiers could do more damage than an enemy. A misstep could lead to a breakdown in the chain of command, and even the ultimate collapse of the army. Blood, therefore, had complicated feelings on the matter.

“All right, time for us to get moving. Just because we’re only buying time doesn’t mean we have to wait for our enemy to get themselves into position. Let’s go for their right flank; they were a bit slower.”

“Yes, ser!” Lise replied. At Blood’s command, the Second Legion began to advance on the enemy’s left flank.

A fierce battle raged on. The moment Patrick saw the Second Legion advancing on his right flank, he sent heavy infantry with great shields to stand at the front. The unit commander gave the command and the soldiers moved into position as though choreographed to form a solid wall of shields. This was the Helios Knights’ favored defensive tactic: the high tower formation.

“This is a tough nut to crack...” Blood muttered. After initiating the attack, he soon realized that the enemy defense was too solid and changed his tactics. Now, they focused their attack on the enemy’s right flank. Any common commander would have pushed on with the original plan, but it was this ability to instantly change tack that had won Blood the command of the Second Legion.

“They’re fast. Don’t let them draw you in!” Patrick shouted, immediately sending soldiers from the center out to bolster the left flank.

The battle between the two brilliant commanders wore on, neither taking the upper hand.

Two days after the battle began, the Second Legion first showed signs of fraying. The Helios Knights took this momentary lapse and used it to tear through one corner of their defenses. Patrick, at his best when on the offensive, didn’t waste any time, commanding his army to charge through the hole they’d opened. Meanwhile, Blood sent word to Lieutenant Reiner to close the gap and immediately dispatched soldiers held in reserve. The enemy read his intentions, however, and the reserves were ambushed before they reached their destination. With this, the direction of the battle was decided.

“My lord!” Lise shouted.

“Looks like they don’t plan to wait for us to close the gap. I’ll be damned, their commander certainly isn’t a slouch.” Blood ran his fingers roughly through his hair and grimaced.

“This isn’t the time to be impressed!” Lise snapped.

“As you say. With this, it’s only a matter of time until they break us. And after that, all that’s waiting for us...” Blood paused, his expression dark. “I think you know the rest.”

“Then...” Lise said, her thin lips faintly trembling.

“I’m afraid it’s time. The Second Legion is to withdraw, then head for the Dale of Kasthall to the east. You should be able to mount a solid defense there. I’ll stay here with three thousand soldiers to keep the Helios Knights pinned down.”

It was Colonel Carlheinz who replied. “Yes, ser! We won’t let you down!” he cried spiritedly. He was a resourceful soldier and a good fighter. The plan was for him to join Blood in the rear guard in the event that the Second Legion had to retreat.

“Ser,” Lise said fiercely, pushing her way forward. “Please, allow me to stay by your side until the end.” Her strikingly blue eyes burned with intensity behind her glasses, and Blood knew she wouldn’t back down. He laid a hand gently on her narrow shoulder.

“You can’t,” he said. “The fight doesn’t end here. Captain Lise, you are my aide, and it is your duty to see that as many of our soldiers as possible get out alive. That’s an order, understood?”

“There are others who could do it—Major General Adam, for one,” she protested. “Besides, as your aide, I have the right to refuse an order if it is totally absurd.”

Blood looked at her. “First I’m hearing of it. Is that really in the code of conduct?” He thought back to his hazy memories of the military academy, but couldn’t remember anything of the sort. More to the point, if such a rule did exist, he would have made good use of it during his stint as aide.

“It isn’t. I just made it up,” Lise said brazenly. Her face was dead serious. Amidst the imminent danger of their situation, Blood couldn’t help but burst out laughing.

“That’s some nerve!” he said. “If you can joke like that at a time like this, you’ll be all right.”

“I’m not joking, my lord. I will fight at your side to the last,” Lise said, then softly closed her eyes. “And I will die at your side.” When she opened her eyes once more, a smile blossomed wide on her face like a flower—but not a flower that sought to draw him in; on the contrary, it looked so fragile that a touch could scatter its petals.

Blood’s face twisted into a hard expression that rarely ever graced his handsome features. “That’s enough, Captain. Our deaths aren’t set in stone yet, and I for one don’t plan to die here. I told you before. I’m not the sort to die for my country.”

“In that case, I have no objections,” Lise replied. Her smile was pure now, as she drew close to Blood. A scent, sweet yet somehow faint, wrapped around him.

“Lise,” he said at last. “Please listen to me. There’s not much time.” Lise didn’t reply. “Lise? Lise, are you hearing me?” Still, she said nothing, only stared out at some point behind Blood as though in a daze. As though pulled her by her gaze, Blood turned around, then laughed. “Now they show up?” he said. “And damn, what an entrance.”

A ray of light shone through a gap in the clouds to where, on the crest of a hill, there stood a girl in glittering, ebony-black armor, like a hero of legends. Beside her rose a banner upon which was drawn a skull upon two great scythes, fluttering majestically in the breeze.