Chapter 19

Chapter 19. Exploring the Ruins(?) (1)

When we made it down to where the carriage had been, a major battle was already underway there.

"Urk!"

"Damn it! Hold them back!"

"Die!"

Shouts and screams stabbed into my ears, and blood flew in every direction.

The carriage was already destroyed. The soldiers who had been guarding it were lying dead near the wreck.

That should have meant there was no one left to fight, but at present, dozens of soldiers were battling mercenaries clad in leather armor.

There were some faces among the soldiers I did not recognize, but a few were men I had seen while they were on watch duty.

There were knights among them as well.

They were facing the enemy with swordsmanship on an entirely different level from the soldiers.

But the knights were unable to bring their opponents down.

No, they were being pushed back instead.

Their enemies were dressed no differently from ordinary mercenaries. But the swords they wielded were on the level of knights, or perhaps even beyond them.

"What order of knighthood do you belong to? A knight mixing in with mercenaries and launching an attack like this-have you thrown away your honor?"

A knight shouted in fury, but the man in the leather helmet, pulled low over his face, only sneered at him.

"I have never had the chance to earn that kind of honor. Though once this is over, I might finally be standing in that place myself."

The knights were being pushed back. The soldiers were being pushed back.

No-they were dressed like mercenaries, but they did not look like mercenaries at all.

I had expected that something was going on, but I had never imagined matters would escalate to this degree. This had turned from a mystery story into a war story.

Those mercenaries had come to kill us, and the knights and soldiers were most likely the hidden force prepared to spring a trap and capture the enemy.

I could understand that the plan had changed and the hidden troops had now gathered to fight them head-on, but—

Why are they being pushed back?

If these were the forces prepared for an ambush, it made no sense for them to be losing this badly!

And yet, right here, the knights and territorial soldiers were being overwhelmed by the enemy.

Soldiers falling. Knights being driven back by one mercenary only to be stabbed from behind by another.

More soldiers were hurrying here at last, but the territorial forces were collapsing far faster than reinforcements were arriving.

What was worse, not all of the mercenaries were participating in the battle.

There were men and women on horseback, watching the fight.

Among them, a middle-aged mercenary who looked like their captain raised his sword and shouted,

"It is Adria! The target is over there!"

His voice cut through the noise of the battlefield and reached everyone’s ears.

Click.

The battle stopped.

Everyone turned to look at us.

"This is a problem."

I should have disguised her before we came down. The stares directed at us were painfully sharp.

The silence did not last long.

"Get them!"

The next moment, the battle began again.

This time, unlike before, it was a fight in which no one even had time to form proper ranks.

"Move!"

"Hold them off! Do not let them get close!"

While the soldiers blocked the enemy, the knights quickly converged around our group.

"Sir Ugo! We cannot hold the enemy back! I do not think retreat will be easy either."

"What if we retreat into the fortress and buy time? Reinforcements should arrive soon."

At the knights’ words, the knight leading us, Ugo, shook his head.

"It is too dangerous. We break through the encirclement and retreat."

"What? That may be even more dangerous. If we hold out until reinforcements arrive, we may be able to turn the tide."

Sir Ugo pointed at Simon.

"Young Master Simon is with the party. Our highest priority right now is Young Master Simon’s safety."

"Good heavens."

"Why is Young Master Simon here...?"

The knights started in shock when they saw Simon.

"Kuh! Will escape even be possible?"

Another knight shouted as he blocked a mercenary who had already come charging in.

More and more mercenaries were breaking through the soldiers’ defensive line and rushing toward us. The knights.

The knights hurried to stop them, but judging by the number of mercenaries charging in, it did not look as though they could hold them off for long.

Sir Ugo bowed his head to Adria.

"My apologies. I believe we will have to split our numbers."

Adria tilted her head. She clearly did not understand what Sir Ugo meant.

Simon’s safety came first, and if they intended to split their forces on top of that, then there was only one possible conclusion.

"Are you saying she should serve as bait?!"

Bianca exploded in anger.

"Bait?"

"Bait?"

Simon and Adria both voiced their confusion, and Sir Ugo answered quickly.

"They are after Lady Adria. My apologies. If we are to get Young Master Simon to safety, this is the only way."

It was supposedly to save the duke’s heir, but to use the marquess’s daughter as bait...

This would clearly cause enormous trouble later, yet there was not the slightest fear on the knight’s face.

Adria bit her lip, and Bianca looked ready to flare up again.

But someone else burst out in anger first.

"What are you talking about? Not only are you not protecting her, you are asking her to act as bait. Is that something a knight can say?"

"Yes. I am a knight of the ducal house of Gresia."

That was not why Sir Ugo felt no fear.

'So that is what loyalty to the ducal house looks like...'

Even amid the chaos, seeing that facet of a knight’s loyalty left a bitter taste in my mouth.

"You will escort Young Master Simon and break through. I will escort Lady Adria."

"Understood."

The other knights answered while holding back the soldiers.

Only after hearing their replies did Sir Ugo turn to me.

"What will you do, Young Master?"

Even if I showed my skill, even if I earned recognition, even if I was younger, an illegitimate son was still just an illegitimate son.

The difference in treatment between me and Simon was so stark that I nearly laughed.

I answered with a faintly mocking tone.

"From your perspective, it would be better if I stayed behind, would it not?"

"Yes. If one member of the ducal house remains behind, the marquess’s house will have less ground to protest later."

He answered as though it were only natural.

He was a terrible man.

Now that I was experiencing it myself, I almost felt sorry toward the two women who had been subjected to it first.

It was absurd for a knight to say such things, but he was not wrong.

If I had known it would come to this, I should not have acted so clever.

No, if I had not, I might well have died back then.

There was no helping it. If I abandoned my post and ran, there was no chance the duke’s personality would lead to a favorable outcome for me.

Simon would surely be beaten black and blue when we returned, but if I went with him, there was a strong chance I would simply be handed over to the marquess’s house as prey.

'If I could not come back to life, I would have run without ever looking back.'

I had to live through five years all over again if I died, but it was precisely because I believed I could live again that I was able to make this decision.

"Hah... I will stay too."

"You have chosen well."

It was only a brief exchange, but the enemy was already pouring in.

"Move at once! We are retreating into the ruined fortress!"

Adria bit her lip and turned around. Under Bianca’s protection, she began climbing back up the path we had taken down.

Sir Ugo and I followed behind the two of them, holding the enemy back.

"The target is escaping! After them!"

Just as Sir Ugo had predicted, the moment the enemy saw Adria flee, they abandoned Simon and the other knights and began chasing us instead.

Thanks to that, Simon and the knights were able to break out of the encirclement almost at once.

After apparently hearing something from the knights, Simon ran north with them.

"I will bring reinforcements right away! Please hold on just a little longer!"

Simon shouted that to us at the end, but the hardened expression on Adria’s face did not ease in the slightest.

Five of us had come down this path.

Now four of us were climbing back up it.

The ruined fortress drew steadily closer.

Perhaps because we were retracing a route we had already taken once, our group was able to shake off pursuit fairly quickly.

The moment we entered the ruined fortress, Sir Ugo took the lead.

As though he knew the place inside and out, he found the way in an instant and headed deeper into the ruins.

The expressions on Adria and Bianca, following behind him, were grim beyond words.

They had been abandoned by the very people they had trusted, and now they looked prepared even for death.

It was deeply admirable that Adria, still only a teenager, could remain so steadfast even in a situation like this, but apparently she found me even more remarkable.

"Aren’t you afraid? We might die, but you do not look afraid at all."

Adria, who had somehow moved up beside me, spoke to me.

At her words, Bianca also glanced sidelong at my face.

To be honest, I was not afraid.

I had died too many times to fear death.

That said, I had not the slightest intention of dying like this.

I believed I would come back to life again, but I still hated the painful experience of death, and I had no wish to repeat those same five years all over again.

This time, I intended to survive to the very end and return alive.

Still, there was no need to tell them the truth.

"I am afraid too."

"I thought so. I am afraid too."

It seemed my answer eased her heart a little. Her expression looked better than before.

Even as we exchanged those brief words, we kept moving deeper into the fortress.

At last, Bianca called out to Sir Ugo, who was running ahead of us.

"But where are we going? Even if we go deeper inside, does that not only make it harder to escape?"

Since they had not chased us straight in, it seemed the enemy intended to lay out a proper encirclement.

No one knew when reinforcements would arrive, but at this rate, we would be nothing more than rats trapped in a jar.

Sir Ugo kept running as he answered.

"Do you know why I was sent here as the one in charge? This place was my playground from the time I was a child. I know this fortress inside and out."

He pointed deeper into the fortress.

"I did not stay behind because I intended to kill myself. I stayed behind to protect Lady Adria and Young Master Alex."

What he pointed to was a statue standing there, strangely at odds with the ruined fortress.

---

Some time after the group disappeared deep into the fortress,

mercenaries appeared among the outer walls.

The mercenaries at the front tracked the targets by the traces left on the ground, while the mercenaries who had fought the knights and the mounted mercenaries followed behind them.

At their center stood the middle-aged mercenary who had been commanding them earlier.

Unlike the group that had been fleeing, they did not rush in haste. They were moving forward steadily, eliminating every variable as they went.

From the rear, a sharp-looking mercenary approached them and reported,

"The encirclement is complete."

The middle-aged mercenary nodded.

"That said, the enemy’s attacks are fierce. I do not think we can hold them for long."

"Tell them to buy time and then fall back."

"Understood."

At the captain’s command, the mercenary turned away again.

Once the messenger was gone, the only female mercenary in the group spoke to the captain.

"This turned out easier than expected. It is thanks to that boy who fled with the knights. Could he have been the duke’s son?"

"He was indeed the duke’s son."

At the captain’s answer, the woman looked startled.

"What? And you just let him go?"

"He is not our target. It would be troublesome if he died for no reason."

"True. It would not do to stir up the ducal house of Gresia unnecessarily. Still, are we really going to be all right? We have run wild right in the duke’s own backyard."

"So long as we deal with the target and withdraw, there will be no problem. There is no evidence, so they cannot start a war immediately. And even if they begin looking for evidence later, everything will already be over by then."

"Yes, yes. The higher-ups know what they are doing, I suppose. Still, it is a pity after all the effort you put into setting this trap."

"The whole thing was misjudged from the start. There was no way the preparations would have been proper."

"Exactly. To kill the bride just to prevent a marriage alliance... It is absurd, really, killing a lovely young lady over something so petty."

"Wait."

The middle-aged mercenary raised his hand, cutting off the rest of her words.

The mercenaries tracking ahead had come to a stop.

They had gathered in one place and were staring downward with grave expressions.

The middle-aged mercenary walked over to where they stood.

The moment he arrived, his face turned just as grave as theirs.

"Well now, we have a variable. What do we do now?"

No one answered the woman’s question.

In the ground ahead of where they stood was a passage leading underground.

And beside it lay the toppled statue that had been covering the passage only moments before.

The mercenaries peered down into the passage.

The brick stairs descending below were swallowed by darkness, and their end could not be seen.