The Girl Raised by the Death God Holds the Sword of Darkness in Her Arms - Volume 7 - Chapter 4.1

Chapter Four: A Heroes’ Ballad

I

At the summons of Lion von Elfriede, the Council of the Thirteen Stars convened once more. It was highly irregular for the council to meet for a second time in the same month, and so was the location—not the Seventh City, but the Third.

The Third City of Bay Grand, the United City-States of Sutherland

When the lords and ladies of Sutherland gathered in Bay Grand heard from Luciana of the destruction of the Sixth City of Rue Shalla, all were lost for words. Though she was almost haggard with exhaustion, Lion had asked her to break the news in his stead—not because he wished to torment her further, but to make others recognize the arguably absurd story as reality, and press them to address the threat that bore down upon them.

When Luciana was finished, Lion picked up where she had left off with the latest information his Wolfpack had brought him, then a dead hush settled over the room.

“As if a horde of ghouls wasn’t ridiculous enough, you say those same ghouls flew imperial banners?” It was Leisenheimer of the Second City who broke the silence.

“Yes. That is why I asked you to convene here, rather than Crimson Liber. We are close enough here for you to ride out and see them.”

“Those spies of yours couldn’t have mistaken what they saw?”

Lion’s lips curled in a mirthless smile. “Weren’t you listening? If you doubt me, go and see for yourself.”

Leisenheimer’s eyes widened. “How dare you—!”

“Do calm yourself, Lord Leisenheimer,” interjected Lord Shaola of the First City. “Lord Lion, there is not a soul here who would accuse Lady Luciana of lying after seeing her thus. In light of that, however, I will ask again if you can truthfully say that the banners the ghouls flew were those of the empire.”

“Well,” Lion said dryly, “if there is a nation other than the Asvelt Empire whose banners bear crossed swords on an azure field, I would reconsider, but I, at least, know of no such land.”

Shaola made a noise of acknowledgment that was almost a groan, then fell silent. Losing none of his air of disdain, Lion went on. “In your wisdom, I am sure you have all realized that we are meant to take the swift annihilation of Rue Shalla as an explicit ultimatum. In other words, this new emperor has, in his generosity, responded to our declaration of war by offering us the chance to reconsider.” He paused. “What will it be, then?” he asked, voice laden with sarcasm. “The path of submission, or of ruin?”

A heavy thud echoed through the room. Its source, as Lion had guessed, was Leisenheimer, who had pounded the table a second time.

“There’s no question! We fight!” he raged. But the only one to display any support for him was the lord of the Fifth City, and even his reaction could hardly have been called enthusiastic. Lion’s impression was that, given the Second City provided him with most of his mineral resources, he felt obligated to at least offer that much. The remaining lords and ladies all wore the same grim expression.

“Come on, now! Have you all lost your tongues?” Leisenheimer exclaimed. “Surely you haven’t all gotten cold feet, not now?” He cast his gaze around the long table, a threatening glint in his eyes.

“I voted for war because I thought our opponent would be the empire,” purred Lady Cassandra of the Twelfth City, hiding her mouth behind an extravagant purple fan. “I don’t recall consenting to do battle with ghouls.”

“Don’t trouble yourself,” Leisenheimer replied, not even looking at her. “No one was expecting anything from a pathetic excuse for a military who let the Royal Army crush them.”

Cassandra gritted her teeth, then turned to glare at Drake, who stood behind her. Drake, for his part, kept his eyes fixed somewhere in midair, as though the matter did not concern him.

From what I hear, Drake consistently opposed the war with Fernest, but his queen, cheerfully stupid as ever, refused to listen to a word he said. Truly, my heart weeps. Even against the Death God’s forces, with a veteran commander like Drake in charge, she could at least have avoided losing eight for every ten of her soldiers. Lion regarded Drake with a faint flicker of sympathy.

Leisenheimer, frustration burning in his eyes, turned to glare at Lion, then, lowering his voice, said, “Don’t tell me even you’ve lost your nerve, Lion.”

“It’s not as simple as that,” Lion replied. “The ghouls have stopped for now, but when they march again, their next destination will be...” He rapped his knuckles on the long table as though knocking on a door. “This seems like a good time to make things clear. If we fail to stop the ghouls here, in the not-so-distant future Sutherland will find itself an imperial territory. That is not a prediction—it is a certainty.” He cast his eyes around the long table as Leisenheimer had done earlier, gauging each of their reactions.

“How many of these so-called ghouls are there, anyway?” the lord of the Fourth City asked. In order to add to the air of chaos, Lion had purposely failed to disclose the total number of ghouls. The question from the lord of the Fourth City had come at the perfect time. He held up five fingers for them all to see.

“Five thousand...” the other lord said. “Not many, to have destroyed Rue Shalla.” His incredulity that, ghouls or not, the Sixth City could have fallen to such a number was written plain on his face. The reactions from the others showed more of the same.

With a crooked smile, Lion shook his head. “You’re missing a figure on the end.”

“Not fifty thousand?! A host that great?!”

Amid the uproar that followed, Leisenheimer sprang to his feet.

“A mere fifty thousand!” he roared. “That is nothing to fear! With our three hundred thousand soldiers waiting to be mobilized, we far outnumber them!” He looked and sounded as though he were spurring on soldiers in battle, and a number of the others responded, adding their agreement.

Oh, he’s a sly one, Lion thought. But then, I suppose I can’t expect better from people who let a brief spell of peace lull them into indolence.

An advantage in numbers meant an advantage in battle. While these were true words, there was something the others still failed to grasp—the foes they were facing were not soldiers, nor even human at all.

“It’s not people we’ll be fighting,” he told them flatly. “Put delicately, they used to be people. It’s safe to assume that neither the numbers game nor conventional strategy and tactics will help us here.”

“We can’t know that until we fight them!” Leisenheimer shot back furiously.

“Do you not understand I am saying that after we fight them, it will be too late?”

The air crackled as they stared each other down. But then a quiet hand went up, drawing all eyes in the room like a magnet. Following the account she had given at the start, Luciana had sat passively at Lion’s side like an ornament, but now she spoke.

“Those things don’t understand language. No matter how you cut them, they feel no pain. Some of my soldiers and civilians who were attacked even became like them. Soldiers who moments earlier had fought with all their might to protect me suddenly came at me, teeth bared and hungering after my flesh. Such...such creatures!” She was trembling as though she might have a fit. Lion softly laid a hand on her shoulder. He felt her stiffen for a moment, then the tension gradually drained out of her.

“Thank you, Lady Luciana, for your instructive words.” Lion took his hand from her shoulder, then rose slowly from his chair to address the room. “I think Lady Luciana has made it clear enough just how dire our situation is. The truly terrifying thing about the ghouls is that, while not all are afflicted, those they bite are in turn transformed into ghouls. In other words, the more of our soldiers they kill, the more their numbers will swell. I said they numbered fifty thousand before; now, there are likely far more. You don’t need me to tell you why, I hope?”

Leisenheimer folded his arms tightly, his mouth now set in a hard line. Satisfied that there would be no more unnecessary noise thanks to Luciana’s input, Lion tucked back the locks of hair that fell over his eyes and took a few steps forward.

“That being said,” he continued, “it is no easy task to make someone accept that which they have not seen with their own eyes. General Julius, see to Lady Luciana.”

With a nod, Julius helped Luciana to her feet, then led her off to an adjoining room. Lion waited, feeling the suspicious eyes of the other lords and ladies on him, until he was sure the two were gone, then turned to the soldiers who stood at attention at the entrance.

“Bring it here,” he said.

“Yes, my lord!” The two soldiers together opened the door wide to reveal eight other soldiers, all of their faces stiff with terror. On their shoulders, they supported an iron cage covered with a black cloth. As they carried it carefully into the room, those around the table watched with bated breath. But only for a moment. As a dreadful noise emerged from beneath the cloth, they all began to speak at once.

“Lord Lion, don’t tell me...”

“It is exactly what you think it is, Lord Shaola.” Lion went over to the cage, seized a corner of the cloth, and tugged hard.

“Eeeeeeeeeeeeeek!”

With a shriek that could have pierced stone, Cassandra tumbled ungracefully from her chair. While the others’ reactions to the ghoul were not as obvious as Cassandra’s, as the creature rattled at the bars with its mottled arms and let out a moan to chill the blood of the living, palpable fear swept over the room. Lion himself had unconsciously recoiled the first time he saw it.

“That’s a ghoul, all right...” Leisenheimer muttered, a faint sheen of sweat on his brow.

“Now, just how much of a threat does our friend here pose? Rather than me simply telling you, you can see for yourselves.”

Lion beckoned to one of the soldiers, and they handed him their sword. He slipped it between the bars, then slowly pushed it into the ghoul’s stomach. It pierced through without much resistance, but this did not seem to trouble the ghoul. Instead, it began to beat its head against the bars, trying to tear at Lion with its teeth.

“This... This is what we have to fight...?!” There was a shrill note in the voice of the lord of the Thirteenth City that none could fail to hear.

“I can see now just how Rue Shalla could fall to a force such as this,” the lord of the Fifth City added. “How is the empire controlling these things, exactly?”

Lion still had no answer to this question. Even as they spoke, Heaven remained down in the bowels of the castle gleefully running tests on the ghouls, but no results seemed immediately forthcoming. He replied, with the qualification that he was only speculating, that he thought the creatures’ existence the work of a mage.

“A mage...” Lady Diana of the Eighth City regarded the ghoul with revulsion. “Yes, this sort of perversity is certainly their specialty.”

Naturally, all of them there understood the threat a mage posed. The air of foreboding that settled over the room was, therefore, inevitable.

“As I said, this is mere speculation, nothing more,” Lion said. “And right now, our attention is required elsewhere.”

“You mean the ghouls on our doorstep, I assume,” said the lord of the Ninth City. “But how do we even fight a creature that doesn’t blink when you stick a sword in its gut? I’d sooner go head-to-head with a dangerous beast than this thing.” The previous ruler of the Ninth City had had skill enough with a blade before succumbing to a sudden illness, but children did not necessarily inherit their parents’ talents. In Lion’s evaluation, the current lord was the very picture of mediocrity.

“A valid concern. For all they lack in intelligence, it’s true that the ghouls are nastier than any dangerous beast. However, they are not invincible—as I will now demonstrate for you.”

In one motion, Lion withdrew the sword from the ghoul’s stomach. A few of the others, seeing the turbid yellow fluid that oozed off the blade, covered their mouths with their handkerchiefs. The ghoul was still entirely unconcerned. It went on moaning and rattling savagely at the bars.

“The way to incapacitate them—” Lion began, then drove his sword through the right side of the ghoul’s chest. The loud moaning filling the room cut off as though it had never been. He drew the blade back, and just like that, the ghoul collapsed. “—is to stab them in the right side of their chest.”

For a while, no one spoke. Their eyes were glued to the fallen ghoul. Diana was the first to break the silence.

“Rather ironic that their weak point is on the opposite side to the heart, isn’t it?” she said, shaking her head in a show of morbid amusement.

“Is that their only vulnerability?” Leisenheimer asked.

“Lopping their heads off works fairly well too,” Lion replied. “The trouble is, even without the head, the body keeps moving. I tried a range of methods, but if you want them to go down immediately, the right side of the chest is your best target.” He tapped the right side of his own chest with his finger.

“Now we know where they are weak,” Shaola said. “My next question for you, Lord Lion, is if we have any chance of victory against these inhuman creatures?”

“As to that, I have no idea,” Lion replied bluntly.

The lord of the First City looked pained. “We need you to know.”

What was Lion supposed to say to that? After much experimentation he had ascertained the ghouls’ weak point, yes, but he would not still be so cautious if that alone were enough to win. He would have given Shaola all the guarantees of victory he wanted, if such guarantees were possible, but they were facing a foe that dealt with neither words nor reason.

This was why he was rushing to complete the vessel—his secret weapon.

“Maybe we should submit to the empire...” This came from the lord of the Tenth City. He had not, it seemed, intended to say it out loud—when he realized that all eyes in the room were now fixed on him, he hastily added, “I-I mean, to be precise, that we pretend to submit to the empire. Once we see the ghouls have withdrawn, we sweep in to invade them. Just another idea...”

Lion didn’t let his exasperation show as he replied. “Schemes and intrigue are all very well, but we can’t hope that Darmés will be easily deceived. Rest assured that if we offer vassalage, he’ll come back with some sort of demand—ordering that we disarm ourselves, for example. He’ll likely also ask for hostages. He’ll never call back his army of ghouls until he is sure beyond a doubt that all our will to fight is gone. We must set aside any starry-eyed fantasies.”

The lord of the Tenth City shrank back so far it was as though he wanted to dive under the table. In his place, Lord Nelson Freesia of the Eleventh City spoke up.

“Doesn’t that leave us with no choice but vassalage, then? Lady Luciana has my most heartfelt sympathies for the loss of Rue Shalla, but this empire is not the empire we know. I don’t love the idea of licking Darmés’s boots, but I’d take it over being torn apart by ghouls any day.”

“Rolling over to show your belly without so much as a fight!” Leisenheimer burst out. “Tell me, when did you become the empire’s dog?!”

Nelson huffed through his nose. “I commend your courage, that you still want to fight after what we saw, but I am simply looking at the reality of the situation. If we lose, we will have lost everything. Instead of letting your feelings govern you, I suggest you try and use your head.”

“You dare!” Leisenheimer seemed as though he might fly at Nelson then and there, but Lion quelled him with a look.

“Casting ballots will take time we do not have. If any other agrees with Lord Nelson that we ought to surrender to the empire, I ask you here and now to raise your hand.”

Nelson thrust his arm up with undisguised insolence. A few moments later, Cassandra, leaning on Drake’s arm to climb back into her chair, also raised a trembling hand. There was another pause, then the lord of the Tenth City joined them, his face turned down. The last hand belonged to the lord of the Ninth City.

“Four of you...” Leisenheimer fumed. “Have you, the rulers of Sutherland, no pride?!”

“Can’t say I do,” Nelson replied without a hint of embarrassment. The others, afraid of further trouble, all looked elsewhere.

“Very well, the four of you who raised your hands shall henceforth be deemed enemies of Sutherland. Not a problem, I trust?” Lion said matter-of-factly. Nelson’s smirk disappeared.

“Wha—?!” he exclaimed, gaping. “How did it come to that all of a sudden? Besides, you have no right to decide any such thing!”

“A majority support fighting the empire. I’m not about to invoke the Charter of the Thirteen now, but you did choose vassalage under the empire. One naturally assumes that you were ready to face the consequences.”

“Don’t give me that! My choice to accept vassalage to the empire is a highly political one, and nothing else. Even if we are reduced entirely to a vassal state, so long as Sutherland endures, sooner or later an opportunity will arise. Like I said, this is a highly political decision.”

“How incredibly naive you are. So, what? You won’t join the fight against the empire, but you don’t want to leave Sutherland either—is that it?”

“That’s right.”

A bang echoed through the room as a powerful blow struck the long table.

“You’d best start taking me seriously,” Lion said softly. There was an intake of breath from the others. Only Julius’s face remained impassive as he observed his lord’s transformation from his place behind his chair.

Lion ran a careless hand through his golden hair, then went on. “The fate of Sutherland is riding on this battle. My patience for your prattle, you self-enamored fools immediately rushing to save your own skins, will only stretch so far.”

“C-Come now, Lord Lion—”

“I’ve heard enough.” Lion clicked his fingers, and Julius’s melodious voice rang out.

“Guards!”

The door to the adjoining room flew open, and soldiers in full armor began to pour forth. Now, while the other lords and ladies sat stunned by the sudden development, it was Lion who called out. His voice then, as Julius would later describe it, cut like a naked blade.

“Arrest the lords of the Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh, and Twelfth Cities immediately!”

The guards moved swiftly. Lion was satisfied to see that before the four could so much as rise from their chairs, the guards had them in custody. The only one who had given him pause was Drake, but though his fingers reached the hilt of his sword, he immediately raised his hands to show he did not mean to resist.

“You will not lay your common soldier’s hands on my noble skin! Aurion Gravis Drake! Do something about this!”

“Nothing I can do.”

“Drake!”

“Lord Shaola!” Nelson called. “Please, put a stop to this madness of Lord Lion’s!”

In contrast to the lack of resistance from the lords of the Ninth and Tenth Cities, Cassandra and Nelson went on desperately calling for aid even as their faces were pressed into the table.

At Nelson’s words, Shaola turned to Lion with a tortured look. “Isn’t this going a little far?”

“This is an urgent situation—an infant child could see that. I will not show mercy to fools who turn a blind eye to reality.”

“Hrmm...” Shaola considered. “I suppose it must be done...”

“Lord Shaola?! You condone this outrage?!”

As though to avoid Nelson’s frantic pleading, Shaola looked down at the table and began to fiddle with his beard.

Lion looked around the table again. “If any of you take issue with how I’ve dealt with this, speak up now. I don’t want the bother of people whining at me later.”

Leisenheimer, his arms tightly folded, spoke up at once. “It was a high-handed way of doing it, but I’m not complaining. I’ve no use for a pack of cowards who want to bend the knee to the empire.”

“That being said,” a voice broke in lightly, “after observing that brilliant performance, one wonders if you had already anticipated this turn of events, Lord Lion.”

Lion turned, his eyes meeting those of Diana, who rested her elbows on the table with her chin in her hands. The fact was, he had anticipated all of it, and so he answered plainly.

“Yes, that’s right.”

“In my opinion, you made just the right decision.” As Diana spoke, she looked down the table to where Cassandra was held bent double against the table, the chill in her eyes so bitter she looked like a different person.

“Lord Lion. We will be losing eighty thousand soldiers by arresting those four. How, may I ask, do you plan on making up for that?”

He had spoken not a word up until then, but now Cassael, lord of the Seventh City, fixed his gaze on Lion. Rather than showing fear over the major reduction in their military strength, his eyes were ever-watchful, as though probing for something. Lion would have liked to spit in his face.

He had been sure beyond a doubt that Cassael would never submit to the empire, but even now, Lion couldn’t help but think how much easier this would be if he had voted for submission.

“Yes, we will lose eighty thousand soldiers, but here, I have readied a weapon to match if not surpass that loss. Let that be answer enough for now.” Even without turning around, Lion knew the look of shock that would be on Julius’s face. Feeling the penetrating stares of the other lords and ladies on him, he observed the mysterious glint that lit up Cassael’s eyes.

“My, my...” the lord of the Seventh City murmured. “A weapon worth more than eighty thousand soldiers, you say. I know you, Lord Lion, are not a man to throw around empty words. Truly, this is most intriguing.”

“I imagine it is, especially to you, Lord Cassael,” Lion replied acidly with a mirthless smile. Cassael kept silent, but a cunning smirk slid momentarily across his face. That was the moment Lion knew with renewed conviction that he hated the man.

“Whatever could this weapon be, I wonder?” Diana mused, looking at him with eyes alight with interest.

Lion registered Julius giving orders for the four they had restrained to be placed under house arrest as he spread his hands in mock apology. “The truth is, it still isn’t finished,” he admitted.

A mix of disbelief and unease filled the eyes of the others. Diana, meanwhile, pressed her index finger to the corner of her mouth and said lightly, “Will it be ready before the ghouls resume their march, pray tell?”

“I am hastening its completion to see that it is.”

Of course, if the ghouls started moving again that very moment, it would not be ready in time. But Lion did not think he needed to worry about that. The fact that even after they had openly refused vassalage, Darmés had tacitly presented them with the choice a second time, suggested that he wanted Sutherland’s unconditional surrender. If not, he would not have pointedly left his army of ghouls in Rue Shalla to encourage them to reconsider. The other side of this was that he would not think it mattered if he gave them more time.

I’m sure I can only push it so far, of course. But when he gave me time, he made a fatal mistake. Lion felt his eagerness for battle growing.

Diana smiled at him. “Well, then, I look forward to the finished product. And,” she added significantly, “what is to come.”

Lion only raised his eyebrows a fraction, then went on to describe to them his military policies as their supreme commander going forward. “That is all,” he concluded. “Our basic objective is unchanged. Return to your lands and mobilize your armies.”

Not long after, the council concluded. The lords and ladies emptied from the room, each of their faces reflecting their different thoughts. Leisenheimer stopped abruptly in front of Lion, fixing him with a sharp glare.

Such an easy man to read, Lion thought wryly. At the same time, he arranged his face into a polite expression and said, “Yes?”

“The blow of losing eighty thousand soldiers is beyond words. Will this so-called weapon of yours really be up to the task of filling that gap?”

“Can it be that even you fear what will happen without my weapon, Lord Leisenheimer?”

“Nonsense. With this weapon or without, I will not back down.” For a few moments, they held one another’s gaze. It was Leisenheimer who looked away first, then he left the room without another word.

Julius waited until all the other lords and ladies were gone before he spoke up. “That was not when I expected you to reveal it.”

“The way things were going, if I hadn’t revealed something, more might have voted to surrender. Are you displeased?”

“I think it was a wise move.” Julius smiled.

“If we can show our strength against the ghouls as anticipated, it will enable us to drive a powerful wedge between the other cities.”

Julius nodded in strong agreement, then added, “Incidentally, though, it appeared to me that Lady Diana is aware of our true intentions.”

“You thought so too?”

“I did, my lord.”

“Lady Diana isn’t like Her Majesty, after all. She has more intelligence than any one person needs. That she went out of her way to drop a hint then during the council, well, that can’t mean anything else. We can make good use of a woman like that. If she joins me of her own volition, I’ll make sure she is very well taken care of.”

He pictured Diana’s smile, so full of meaning, but a moment later, the image disappeared off into oblivion as Cassael’s repellent face pushed its way into his thoughts.

“Did the Bat look like he realized?”

“I expect we will have an easier time fighting the ghouls than deciphering the inner thoughts of that gentleman. However...” Julius paused. “I think it better to proceed on the assumption he knows.”

“Agreed. Can’t be too careful with that one, after all.”

Julius regarded him. “Lord Lion, you seem to be getting excited.”

Lion responded by flashing him a steely grin. The battle between the empire’s ghouls and Sutherland was nigh...