Chapter 49
The quality of superhumans is what matters in war.
But in a war fought to protect something, quantity matters too.
Since one person cannot protect the east, west, north, and south all at once, at least four are needed.
Reinwald, a senior knight of the Sneria Domain, had believed that until at least today.
But at this very moment, his common sense was changing.
“We have defeated the enemy commander.”
That was Duke’s declaration five minutes after jumping down from the wall.
It was also a declaration made after he had dragged the lord from the middle of the enemy camp right to his feet as casually as pulling candy from a snack bag, then cut him in half.
Apparently, he had cut down the enemy commander before a single arrow had even been fired.
It was a scene that left both the enemy and their allies utterly dumbfounded.
“Huh? Huh?”
While everyone was still unable to grasp the situation, Duke cut down the enemy’s flags fluttering high in the sky with sword aura and asked,
“Will you continue?”
Clang.
The army lowered its weapons and knelt before a single man.
*
Over the next fifteen days, there were five invasions.
Each time, Duke used telekinesis to drag a lord before him and personally cut him in half.
After five lords had been cut in half, peace came to the eastern front.
During the first week of peace since the war began, the guards were so bored that they indulged in luxurious yawns.
Considering that they had still been at war only a week earlier, it was an astonishingly complacent attitude.
Thus, after bringing the war halfway to an end in just fifteen days, Duke drank tea and chatted with the commander of the front.
“War is always called for by those safest from it.”
If so, making those who advocated war unsafe could stop the war.
Having received this perfectly obvious logic from Rex, Duke had immediately put it into practice.
Of course, the method Rex had wanted was slightly different.
[When war begins, assassinate the lord.]
As an eminently sensible strategist, Rex had formed a special-operations squad centered on Duke and had him infiltrate the enemy lines like an assassin and kill the commanders.
That was how hero units in games had always been used, after all.
But if Rex had overlooked one thing, it was that games had skills prohibited for balance reasons, no matter how strong a unit was, whereas reality did not.
Besides, most ordinary people, including Rex, had no idea what superhumans of Tier 7 or higher were capable of, or how far their abilities extended.
Because of that gap in common sense, Duke had interpreted Rex’s orders differently.
‘Aha! So I’m supposed to cut off the commander’s head as soon as we start!’
That was Duke’s least favorite thing to do.
A boss was supposed to be reasonable. If it spammed unavoidable instant-death attacks from the moment the fight began, it was bound to get cursed out.
But this time, he had come to stop a war, not cosplay as a boss.
As someone who lived off tax revenue, Duke decided to put his hobby aside for a moment and faithfully carry out his orders.
‘I have to earn my keep.’
So he had dragged a lord over with telekinesis.
From the middle of the enemy camp all the way to his feet, as though he were playing a claw machine.
Then he had cut him in half with a single blow for all to see.
The fifth lord, apparently unwilling to die, had holed up in his domain and sent only his army, so Duke broke into his mansion at dawn and beheaded him.
After that, the lords stopped invading.
In any case, thanks to Duke’s exploits, the eastern region had managed to regain peace.
The commander in charge of the east found this reality utterly absurd.
‘I must have studied tactics wrong.’
A single superhuman couldn’t stop a war?
That was merely an excuse made by those who lacked strength.
This was strategy, and this was tactics.
The commander took one conviction to heart.
‘Clever tricks are for people like me who lack strength.’
If Rex, who was working his brain overtime on those very clever tricks, had heard that, he would have clutched the back of his neck and collapsed.
In any case, the eastern front had entered a lull.
But the war was not over.
“I hear most of the lords have headed south.”
The north had grown quiet because of the blind swordsman guarding the canyon,
and the east because of Duke, who killed only the lords.
So the alliance had turned toward the south, which seemed relatively much safer and easier to conquer.
Toward the direction Hana was defending.
The commander quietly watched Duke, who sipped his tea, moving only his jaw.
“Now that things are fine here, might you be able to help my liege···”
“If that were possible, Lord Peter would already have headed south.”
Duke disliked having to address that old man respectfully, but he maintained proper etiquette in an official setting.
The commander gave a bitter smile, as though he had known Duke would say that.
“I suppose you’re right.”
The northern front was also entering a lull, just like Duke’s eastern front.
In the north, where there was only one such mad blind old man, he kept appearing at every road leading toward the domains and taking the heads of their lords, so any lord who valued his own neck had no choice but to lie low.
He was slower than Duke, but the situation was similar to that on the eastern front.
But neither Peter nor Duke could leave this place.
The moment they headed south and vacated their positions, the lords would somehow notice and begin advancing again.
That was the problem.
Of course, the commander understood this perfectly well, rationally speaking.
He had merely asked, cautiously, whether Duke might somehow manage it.
Unfortunately, reality trampled the commander’s hopes with merciless thoroughness.
“Sigh···”
Moreover, once winter ended, Duke would have to return to his own domain.
No matter that they were allies, there was no helping the fact that his own domain came first.
The grim reality made the commander’s vision seem to go dark.
Then he remembered that he was drinking tea with an honored guest, hurriedly composed his expression, and forced himself to smile brightly.
“I apologize. After all the help you’ve given us, how could I say something like···”
“I clearly cannot go south.”
“Pardon?”
“I mean that I have never left this fortress.”
“What does that mean···”
Duke set down his tea and jerked his chin toward the commander.
“Come with me.”
Although Reinwald was technically the commander on the ground, he had already come to recognize Duke as his superior in the depths of his heart, so he followed without a word of complaint.
When they left the tent, it had grown dark outside.
With everyone asleep, Duke naturally headed toward the barracks where the soldiers slept, bringing the commander along behind him like his personal attendant.
At the entrance to the barracks, the soldiers who should have been standing guard were sleeping soundly while leaning against spears and walls.
The commander’s expression curdled when he discovered the sleeping soldiers.
‘These crazy bastards.’
They were in the middle of a war, yet they were sleeping with such peaceful expressions.
And in front of an honored guest from a neighboring domain, no less.
‘You’re bringing shame on the entire domain.’
At that moment, Duke spoke in a voice only the commander could hear.
“Doesn’t that mean the soldiers trust me? It means I was able to fulfill my duty, so don’t scold them too harshly.”
The commander was once again impressed by Duke’s character.
But quite apart from that, the guards’ time in the brig was guaranteed once the war ended.
Duke ignored the guards and headed into the barracks where the soldiers were sleeping.
The commander hung slightly behind Duke and kicked one of the guards in the knee.
Whack.
“Urgh! Who···”
“Wake the others. And you lot, come to the commander’s office tomorrow morning.”
“Uh···”
It took less than a second for the soldier’s sweet dream to plummet into a nightmare.
After waking the guards, the commander hurriedly closed the distance with Duke again.
Duke’s steps did not waver as he entered the barracks.
He entered a camp belonging to an engineering unit and then···
“That one will do.”
pointed to a huge, bear-like man sleeping with his belly exposed on the bed.
***
Several days after the eastern front entered a lull,
a rumor spread across the southern front.
“I hear a knight named Duke came down south from the east?”
As proof, the lord of Sneria and the close retainers had been slowly losing ground, yet they suddenly launched a charge as though they had no rear to worry about.
As though someone were standing behind them.
The lords in the south grew terrified at the news and pulled their armies back to assess the situation.
Conversely, the lords on the eastern front began advancing again, taking advantage of Duke’s absence.
“Now is our chance, while he’s gone!”
A count who had been hiding in his domain and waiting for an opportunity finally charged forward with his banner flying boldly.
A retainer hurried over to the count.
“Your Excellency! We have intelligence that Duke was spotted atop the eastern wall! You should turn back at once···”
“You fool!”
The count shouted at the terrified retainer.
“Obviously it’s a fake! Didn’t you say no one even knows what he looks like? They must have put something like that on a scarecrow and are bluffing!”
Of course, the count did not know whether the Duke his retainer had mentioned was a scarecrow or the real thing.
But humans were creatures that had to justify their actions in order to live with themselves.
He had already brought his army out, and if he turned tail and went back now, he would lose face.
He also did not want to admit that he had been hiding in his domain out of fear of Duke all this time.
Thus, the scales in the count’s heart tipped toward Duke being a fake.
It was not that he thought Duke was a fake; he thought Duke had to be one.
So the count did not stop his march and headed toward the eastern fortress.
When he concentrated his magic on his eyes, he saw a knight wearing a helmet and a fluttering cloak, just as his retainer had said.
However, the knight merely stood with his arms crossed, staring beyond the fortress walls without moving at all.
‘Just as I thought.’
The count shouted toward his retainers.
“Look! That lifeless doll! That knight is definitely a fa-“
But the count could not finish speaking.
The count was suddenly dragged off his horse and pulled toward the fortress as if something had seized him.
The retainers’ faces turned pale.
“Su··· Surely not···”
The count was dragged across the ground, leaving a trail, and before long he was flying toward Duke atop the fortress.
“Save-!”
Before the count could do anything, Duke uncrossed his arms and swung his greatsword.
Slash!
Just as the rumors had said, the lord was cut in half.
His corpse fell limply, painting the wall red.
Duke used voice-amplification magic and spoke to the army in a calm tone.
“Will you continue?”
A declaration of surrender came back immediately.
After dispatching the count so easily, Duke turned toward the commander.
“From now on, it’s your turn.”
Duke looked at the man trembling behind the commander, wearing clothes exactly like his own.
“I’ll lend you my name. From this moment on, you are to become the knight guarding the eastern fortress.”
The soldier could not answer, trembling inside his helmet.
He was too frightened to nod and too frightened to shake his head.
The soldier thought back to that night several days earlier.
- “Me?”
- “How rude. How dare you fail to watch your words in front of Sir Duke?”
- “I’m sorry! It’s far too much for me···”
- “You dare refuse my request? Do you truly wish to die?”
One night, the hero Duke had suddenly appeared.
He had asked the soldier to play Duke.
Simply because they were similar in size and build.
For an ordinary soldier, it was an exceedingly nerve-racking request.
If the enemy did not believe him and fired magic, he would die.
If he did something strange while dressed as Duke, he would die.
And if he refused, he would die by the commander’s sword.
Faced with such unreasonable choices, the soldier had no choice, and in the end, he had been dragged into this situation.
“Then I shall truly head south from now on. You haven’t forgotten my instructions, have you?”
“Yes, sir. You have never once left the east.”
“Very well. I leave it to you, Commander. Soldier, your responsibility is immense.”
Duke left the fortress after saying that.
The soldier wearing Duke’s helmet whimpered inside.
‘Ah··· I need to use the bathroom···’
And several days later.
Despite the news that Duke had appeared in the south, the east remained peaceful.
Many lords occasionally sent scouts east just in case, but the only reports that came back were of Duke standing atop the wall with his arms crossed like a lone tree.
Whenever they spotted him, any desire to head east vanished, and the lords began lying low again.
Hearing the news, Duke, who had been gauging the situation from between the southern and eastern fronts, nodded in satisfaction.
‘The dead Zhuge drove away the living··· who was it again?’
Otter? Sangdal? I remember there was a “dal” in it···
Was Zhuge even what they called him?
In any case, the important thing was that Rex’s plan had worked.
Duke relaxed and began properly heading south.
‘I’m an idiot, so I can’t prevent tragedies, but that Rex fellow is good at one thing: using his head.’
If I can get past this tragedy, I’ll at least start treating Rex like my superior.
Thinking that, Duke quickened his pace.