Chapter 117
Just as we were about to take up our positions.
Alois appeared before the knights and soldiers.
The knights were not particularly demoralized, but the soldiers' morale was clearly low.
It was only natural. From their perspective, the lord's mother being held hostage had nothing to do with them, and being told about the Southern Alliance was hardly enough to inspire any sense of belonging. They were citizens of the Empire, and that had not changed.
That was why they were reluctant to fight this battle.
And there was only one person who could send them into battle.
Alois.
"I'm sorry to have gathered you all here. There is something I have to tell you honestly... It was my uncle who assassinated the Imperial Army's general. I didn't know about it, but I don't think the army will believe me."
"What...? Then are we going to fight them head-on!?"
"You said we would wait and see until the situation changed!"
"They have ten thousand men! There's no way we can win!"
Voices of discontent and anxiety rose from the soldiers.
Alois took their complaints in stride and gave a firm nod.
"I have decided to fight. But I am not fighting for the Southern Alliance or the Empire. I am fighting for the responsibility passed down through the generations. House Simmel is the lord of this land. We have a duty to protect its people. Even if we surrender, the army will take many things from us as it invades the South. And because this place rose in rebellion against the Empire before surrendering, it will be condemned. That will surely lead to this land's decline. We must... avoid that future."
To be honest, he probably wanted to fight for his mother.
How important must a mother be to a twelve-year-old boy who had lost his father?
Even so, Alois maintained a brave front. He was the lord.
"His Majesty the Emperor has dispatched an imperial envoy to Duke Kruger. Once that envoy arrives, the war may not take place, depending on the negotiations. However, if we let the army pass through here, there will be no negotiations with the envoy. We only need to hold out for a few days! If we can endure for just a few days, the situation will change in many ways! If the envoy's negotiations fail, the Southern Alliance will have no choice but to help us. At the same time, His Majesty does not want a large-scale civil war. He will send agents to win over cities that put up fierce resistance. If we surrender then, the damage will be minimized. That is why... I will fight now."
With that, Alois drew the sword he had inherited from his father.
Then he addressed the knights and soldiers.
"I will not punish anyone who leaves. If you are not willing to risk your life alongside me, leave. I am sorry for being such an inadequate lord..."
A moment later, silence fell.
Amid that silence, a soldier carrying a spear raised his voice.
"Don't spout a bunch of fancy reasoning. Just say you want our help because you want to save your mother. That should be enough."
He was a rough man.
He looked to be in his forties.
Among the soldiers who looked like amateurs, he was the only one with a certain degree of composure and bearing.
Perhaps he had once been an adventurer.
The people around him clearly held him in high regard as well, and attention naturally focused on him.
"Yordan-san..."
"My lord. Speak honestly. What do you want to do?"
"...I want to protect my mother... and, at the same time, I want to protect this city..."
"We've been in the previous lord's care all these years... And now this kid is asking us to lend him our strength! How can we sit still after making a child say all that? We'll send the Imperial Army packing!"
The soldiers' eyes filled with determination at the words of the man called Yordan.
Their downcast spirits rallied.
They were soldiers now.
"That's right! We'll do it!"
"Leave it to us!"
The trust House Simmel had earned turned them into soldiers.
The soldiers' morale soared all at once, overwhelming even the knights.
Alois looked at me happily.
Good. Now we could fight.
"Then I will explain the strategy!"
Vogt seized the momentum and announced it in a loud voice.
Their morale rose even higher when they heard him.
■■■
"Woooooah!!!!"
Roars could be heard from the main gate.
The first wave of the Imperial Army was attacking it, trying to break through.
The vanguard had not brought any large-scale siege weapons. They presumably needed to make the battle look like an accidental clash.
Therefore, their method was a classic one: starting with harassment by arrows, then destroying the gate with a battering ram and infiltrating the walls with ladders.
Most of our forces were concentrated at the main gate. In a siege, the defenders were generally at an advantage. No matter how elite the Imperial Army was, it was not as though they had numerous warriors capable of defeating a hundred men each, and most of the latest weapons were given priority to the border army.
They had no revolutionary weapon capable of turning the situation around.
So they relied on their numbers.
"Strategist, are they really coming to the East Gate?"
Yordan, one of the hundred soldiers assigned to my command, said that as he looked beyond the East Gate.
The terrain around the East Gate was unusual.
The road leading to the gate was a single slope.
Normally, it would be the most difficult gate to attack.
That was precisely why I expected them to target it.
"If we're wrong, we just move immediately. Though we won't be wrong."
"Where does that confidence of yours come from?"
"It's standard Imperial Army doctrine. Attack the main gate, then launch a surprise attack from another location. From a psychological standpoint, launching a surprise attack from the place that seems most difficult to attack is effective. That is what they have been taught."
The moment I said that, the enemy appeared beyond the East Gate.
There were perhaps a thousand of them. Only a few were mounted, while the rest were infantry. They were coming straight toward us.
"They've come. Fire the arrows."
"They really came... That's surprising..."
At my command, several men fired their bows.
The reason there were only several men was that only a few of them could shoot accurately. Of course, that alone was not enough to stop the enemy.
Naturally, the enemy did not think the gate would be completely undefended.
Seeing several men fire arrows only strengthened that conviction.
The arrows vanished into the charging ambush force, striking one man and knocking him down while also taking down several of those behind him.
But they did not stop.
"Charge!!!!"
A man who appeared to be the commander, riding at the front, shouted at the top of his lungs.
The archers atop the walls faltered at that, but I calmly told them,
"Don't worry about it. Keep firing."
"Y-yes!"
"Prepare below."
"Got it."
After I gave Yordan his orders, the soldiers waiting below began bracing the gate.
The soldiers at the front soon reached the gate and began trying to break it down with a battering ram.
They also tried to raise ladders, but the archers managed to stop some, while other soldiers knocked them down. The gate being attacked by the battering ram, however, was another matter.
"Go! Destroy it quickly!"
"Aah! We can't hold it any longer!"
The crossbar securing the gate began to groan louder and louder.
The soldiers somehow held the gate in place, but it was obvious that the attack was stronger.
But we had known that from the beginning.
When the time was right, I signaled Yordan.
Yordan withdrew the soldiers from the gate as though he had been waiting for that signal.
"We can't hold it any longer! Fall back! Run!!"
"Aaaah!!"
"Run!!!"
Their retreat was not an act.
Only a select few knew the details. The screams were genuine.
That was precisely why the enemy was even more convinced
that their surprise attack had succeeded.
"Good! Break through all at once!"
The battering ram finally forced the gate open.
At that moment, Yordan and the others who had been preparing behind it hurled their spears.
The soldiers trying to break through the gate all at once were skewered, but they did not falter.
"Damn it! How dare you! Don't falter! Charge!!"
Spurred on by the commander's cry, the ambush force broke through the East Gate and flooded inside.
But they had been too careless.
A large amount of oil had been spread in front of the gate, and the soldiers rushing in at full speed lost their footing in it.
"W-what is this!?"
"Aah!!"
"It's oil! It's oil!!"
A scene of utter chaos immediately unfolded in front of the gate.
Unfortunately, because they had charged in at such speed, more and more soldiers entered and fell into the oil trap.
Amid the chaos, Yordan approached me carrying a burning stick.
"Hey, strategist! Is it all right to do it!?"
"Yes. Go ahead."
"Go ahead? The wind's blowing west right now! If things go badly, the fire could spread to the city!"
"There is no problem. Today, at this exact moment... the wind will blow east."
"Really!? Fine, but don't blame me if something happens!!"
With that, Yordan threw the burning stick into the oil-soaked ambush force.
At that moment.
The wind suddenly shifted east. Then the burning stick touched the oil, and an explosion erupted.
A massive explosion sent flames surging up, but a powerful gust blew eastward, keeping the damage from reaching the city.
Instead, the flames struck the rest of the ambush force, which was lined up one behind another along the slope.
It looked as though a dragon's breath had been unleashed from the gate.
The fire burned through the ambush force, and only those toward the rear escaped relatively unharmed.
Even they had suffered burns or were busy rescuing the injured.
They no longer had the leeway to attack us.
"Surviving soldiers! Listen well! This city of Gels now has a wandering military strategist named Grau on its side! You will not be entering this city! Tell your commander that!"
With that, I watched the retreating ambush force disappear while laughing.
Amid all this, Yordan approached me with a look of astonishment.
"You... are you a mage?"
"No. That was calculation."
"Seriously...?"
As I said that, I stuck my tongue out inside my hood.
Of course, it had been magic.
There was no way the wind could have changed so conveniently.
However, a military strategist with brilliant stratagems was more frightening than one who used magic.
There was no need to let them realize I had used magic, and most things could be explained away as calculation. To deceive the enemy, first deceive your allies. In time, rumors would reach the enemy as well, and they would come to fear me of their own accord.
Now the Imperial Army would have to consider countermeasures. That would buy us time and make the Imperial Army grow impatient.
They had no time.
"Then we'll proceed according to plan."
"Yeah, got it. Leave it to me."
With that, Yordan gathered his men.
Their next move had already been decided.
We needed to stay one step ahead and make our own move.
"Now, what kind of move will they make?"
I said that as I stared toward the Imperial Army.