IV
“Reporting, ser. The ghouls will arrive in the marshlands in approximately seven hours.”
The news arrived as Heaven and Lion were performing their final checks. The sky above was coated with a thick layer of clouds.
The ghouls began to march exactly at the hour Darmés had declared, down to the minute. With a discordant cacophony that none who heard it could dislodge from their ears, the horde made its way south, walking ever on at the same pace without distinction between day and night.
Finally, a messenger arrived, face rigid with nerves, to announce that the fated moment had arrived.
“The monsters have reached the marshland!”
The tension inside the tent strained to a breaking point. Lion, who sat perfectly still with his arms folded, opened his eyes.
“Here we are at last...” he said. Before any of the others, he got up and left the tent. Julius handed him a spyglass, which he pointed straight ahead to see ghouls spilling into the expanse of the marshlands like a wave of sludge. It was impossible to call them an army, not when they moved independently and mindlessly—but this only made it clearer that this enemy was not human.
Though the others had seen a ghoul back at the Council of the Thirteen Stars, as they filed out of the tent, their eyes were locked on the marshlands. It wasn’t hard to imagine the alarm and fear of the soldiers seeing the creatures for the first time. All the soldiers knew the enemy they would be facing, of course. But hearing about something shocking was entirely different from seeing it with one’s own eyes, and the gap only widened the further that something was from what could be explained by common sense.
“Those are the ghouls...”
“That’s what we’ve got to fight...?”
“Forget it. We can’t beat those things.”
Anxiety and frustration abounded. Their fear germinated, then it took root in their bodies. From somewhere, they heard the sound of rattling metal, and it wasn’t long before the sound spread through the entire army.
“Lord Lion...” Shaola, clad in his warlord period armor, looked at Lion with an uncommonly grave expression. Lion didn’t have to ask. He knew what Shaola was trying to tell him as well as if the other man had spoken.
“I’ll go.” Leisenheimer squared his shoulders and made to stride off, but Lion called him back. “What?” he demanded. “At this rate, the ranks will collapse before the fighting even begins.”
“It isn’t a bad thing for them to be afraid.”
It was rash to dismiss fear as a vice. In battle, fear was a vital element for protecting oneself. Without it, it was impossible to perceive danger. Some hero had once said that fear was there to be conquered, but Lion’s view was somewhat at odds with this. He believed that fear ought not to be conquered, but rather cautiously tamed. Maintaining a healthy relationship with it was the best way to survive.
Leisenheimer didn’t bother to hide his irritation. “You don’t need to tell me that. What I’m worried about is the terror overwhelming them completely.”
“Ah. And is that something a pep talk from you will help with?”
“Then what, we just sit here and watch?!”
“No one is saying that. If fear has taken hold of them, all we need to do is show them hope powerful enough to blot it out. What do you think this is for?” With the air of someone knocking on a door, Lion rapped on the Armored Mage Cannon. He then called up to the woman who stood imperiously atop an unnaturally stacked pile of wooden boxes. “We’re ready, right, Heaven?”
Heaven snickered. “I was born ready!” she said, rubbing her nose with her palm for some reason, before jumping into her seat in the firing platform mounted on the cannon. “Here I go!”
In front of her was an orderly array of protruding shapes. Heaven rubbed her hands together, licked her lips, then began to move her fingers like an organist. In response, the cannon began to vibrate with a faint hum. She then gripped the two operation rods similarly mounted in front of her, then slowly stepped onto a plate at her feet. Gradually, with a massive, almost grandiose noise, the cannon began to spin. The fear-filled eyes of the soldiers were drawn to it as it whirred to life.
“The ghouls’ course is drifting a little to the left!”
“Roger that. Correcting bearing by three degrees. Mana connection circuit, all normal. Commencing mana injection.” Heaven pushed the operation rod back. The patterns drawn on the weapon’s enormous barrel began to glow with faint light. In the meantime, Heaven’s hands kept on moving, her expression so serene she looked like a different person.
“Internal levels for the power unit holding at nominal. Mana flow pressure thirty...fifty...seventy...ninety... Mana flow pressure has reached its critical point. Now releasing final safeties. We are ready to fire.”
The patterns on the barrel now blazed with golden light, and a dull drone filled the air. Heaven’s eyes, just like those of all the others, were fixed on Lion and Lion alone. From somewhere, a leaf fluttered down to brush against the barrel—only to evaporate without a trace.
“Fire!”
There was a roar that seemed to tear into Lion’s gut, and a torrent of light that surged forward in a perfectly straight line.
His mouth twisted in a smile devoid of emotion.
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