The 9th Class Swordmaster: Blade of Truth

Chapter 298: Proof (1)

“Shoot!! Shoot!!”

Boom! Crash!

BOOM—!!

Explosions erupted everywhere. Arrows rained down like a shower from the border fortress, filling the sky. The arrowheads were mixed with powder from elemental stones, making them dozens of times more powerful than ordinary arrows.

“Did they use elemental stones stolen from the mines to make such shoddy things?”

The amount of elemental stone powder used in each arrow was not much, but when the arrows flew in the tens of thousands, it became a different story.

Karyl swung his dagger irritably.

Fwoosh...!

The blade of Agnel, imbued with Ramine’s power, traced an arc in the air, leaving a trail of flames. The arrows caught in the arc erupted into clouds of black smoke.

“A... Attack!!” the fortress commander shouted, his voice trembling as he watched the scene unfold. But despite the command, he knew full well that the weapons of the magic troops stationed there would be powerless against Karyl.

“Is... Is there no word from Lord Beryl?!”

“Um... The communication orb has gone dark.”

“What?!”

The commander frowned at his subordinate’s report. By now, Beryl might already be preparing to defect to the empire. He had probably heard about the outcome of Simon Coden and Karyl’s confrontation—the card they had gambled on had failed.

Clang!

The commander didn’t even have time to properly assess the situation, as the thick fortress gate was cleaved in half.

“...!!”

Seeing the gate split open life tofu, the commander couldn’t believe his eyes. After all, this gate was the elaborate creation that Beryl had painstakingly designed, even fortified with protective magic.

“They embedded five trigonal stones into the gate? Wasting expensive elemental stones on such pointless things... They must be mad.”

Karyl shook his head in disbelief as he looked down at the fallen gate. Although he had cut through it effortlessly, in truth, the gate of the Istan Kingdom’s border fortress was sturdier than most of those in the empire.

In fact, the only gate in the empire crafted with elemental stones was the one at the imperial palace in the capital. Made with five elemental stones, this gate was so tough that dozens of knights would struggle to even scratch it.

But that was only from a knight’s perspective. To Karyl, who was beyond the norm, the protective properties of the trigonal stones were no more than adding a single sheet of paper on top of another.

Step, step, step...

“Shoot, shoot!!”

At the commander’s cry, arrows once again rained down on Karyl, although the archers knew it was hopeless.

Swoosh―!!

Karyl slightly tilted his head, catching one of the arrows as it grazed his face.

Voosh—!!

He then threw it back in the direction it had come from.

“Aagh!”

“Aaaargh...!!”

Even with advanced weaponry, the kingdom’s soldiers stood no chance against Karyl. Though they were part of a magic corps, they were ordinary men, not even reaching the level of knights. Unsurprisingly, they were unable to avoid the arrow Karyl had hurled back, and screams rang out as they fell one by one.

Thud!

Karyl then effortlessly leaped up dozens of meters onto the battlements, and the soldiers scattered in a panic.

“Sp-Spare me!!”

Karyl grabbed one of the fleeing soldiers by the scruff of his neck.

“Guh...!”

“Do you want to live?”

“Please, spare me!!”

The soldier caught by Karyl turned his head and wet himself in fear upon meeting his gaze. His legs shook so badly that he couldn’t even stand, pitifully collapsing to the ground.

“If you want to live, answer my question. Is Beryl here?”

“L-Lord B-Beryl, you mean?”

“Lord? That damn geezer must have sold my mine and even bought himself a title,” Karyl scoffed, motioning the soldier to continue.

“L-Lord Beryl... Lord Beryl isn’t here right now. He said he would send reinforcements, but since there’s been no word from him, he must have fled by himself!”

Sensing what might please Karyl, the quick-witted soldier spoke ill of Beryl, carefully watching Karyl’s reaction.

“If he’s not in the capital... then he must be at Horn Cape! It’s the only place in the kingdom with a port that can take him to the empire!”

“If what you say is true, then it’s clear that the Three Kingdoms of Istria have joined forces with the empire to fight Viola. And the Eastern Land has lent you their strength as well.”

“Y-Yes, that’s correct.”

“But how do you know that?”

“...What?”

“How does a mere soldier like you know where Beryl would flee?”

Tired of listening to the soldier, Karyl snapped his neck with a swift motion.

Crack―

“Guh—!”

With a final, strangled cry, the soldier collapsed to the ground, lifeless.

“Hey, identify this man's rank.”

“...He’s the fortress commander.”

“I see.”

As if he had expected this, Karyl decapitated the fallen commander with another stroke of his blade and held up his head.

“If you’re the commander of a fortress, you should take responsibility for the soldiers who died under you. A man dressed like his soldiers, planning to escape... what a disgrace,” Karyl spat as he looked down at the corpse.

He then tossed the head to another soldier.

“Gah?!?!”

“Announce his death from the top of the walls.”

At Karyl’s command, the soldier on the battlements hurriedly lifted the commander's head.

“Listen up, everyone.”

Karyl placed one foot on the battlements, resting his hand on his knee as he looked down at the soldiers below.

“It is not a crime to follow a fool. The fault lies with the one who led you down a foolish path.”

Murmur... Murmur...

“Those who surrender will not be punished.”

As soon as Karyl finished speaking, soldiers began kneeling, one by one, as if they had been waiting for his words. Having witnessed Karyl’s duel with Simon Coden, known as the greatest warrior of the Eastern Land, they had long since lost their will to fight.

“Hey, you over there.”

It had taken just a few minutes to bring down the border fortress, likely making for the fastest conquest in history.

“Y-Yes?! Yes, sir!!”

Karyl looked at the soldiers surrendering to him and nodded in satisfaction.

“Light the torches.”

“...What?”

The soldier looked at him, puzzled. With the sun still high in the sky, Karyl’s order to light torches seemed strange.

“Place the torches in a large circle outside the fortress and make sure they never go out. The flames should be as large as possible, and the fire must last until dawn.”

The soldier bowed his head, finally understanding that Karyl wanted the torches placed where Aidan and Simon Coden were fighting.

“Yes, sir!”

“Do you think Aidan can defeat the master of the Eastern Land?”

Beikan looked around the border fortress of Istan, which had been taken without bloodshed, making the Free Army he had brought seem unnecessary.

“The assassins that Simon Coden has brought are all stronger than upper Sword Experts. Even for a Sword Master, defeating them all while also fighting Simon Coden is no easy task.”

“Hmm...”

“But I didn’t tell him to defeat them all,” Karyl went on. “Assassins are not knights. An assassin’s task is to infiltrate a heavily guarded palace and take the king’s head. Winning a fight is not their goal; surviving is.”

Karyl raised a finger.

“In the end, there is only one target,” he said, pointing toward Simon Coden. “Aidan’s task is to take his head, nothing more.”

“But that’s an open plain over there, with no place to hide. Such terrain put assassins at a deadly disadvantage.

“That’s why I told them to light the torches.”

“...What?”

Beikan looked at Karyl, puzzled. Given that torches are typically used to see through darkness, they would naturally put assassins at a disadvantage.

“Even if we extinguished all the lights in this fortress, the starlight alone would be enough for the assassins of the Burning Darkness to see by. The stronger the light, the deeper the accompanying shadows.”

“Ah...!” Bekain exclaimed, finally understanding Karyl’s idea.

The shadows cast by the torches would create opportunities for Aidan to execute his assassination.

“But he won’t be the only one able to use that darkness. I’m just creating the opportunity.”

The rest was up to Aidan. After all, this wasn’t a battle to annihilate the Three Kingdoms of Istria but a stage for Aidan to prove his worth.

“Beikan, what’s Viola doing now? She hasn’t gone into hiding to avoid getting scolded for her incompetence, has she? If so, she should’ve stayed a sheltered flower instead, not declare her own principality.”

Beikan gave a bitter smile at Karyl’s words. He had also been part of this months-long battle, and seeing Karyl achieve in just a few days what they had struggled with for so long filled him with both awe and a sense of futility.

“Princess Viola moved the army as soon as she heard of your arrival. She didn’t tell me, but... I think she had the same thought as you.”

“Why?”

“Before leaving, she said she would come to you within two days, so I believe she’ll come to the fortress.”

“Anyone can think. Compared to those fools from the Three Kingdoms, Viola has a pretty sharp mind. But if she can’t turn her ideals into reality, they’re just delusions,” Karyl said coldly.

“In war, what matters most is victory, not strategy,” he went on. “Only the results are recorded in history.”

He then pointed toward Aidan in the distance and said, “Beikan, the same applies to you. You must show me results. That’s how you prove yourself as a warrior of the Great Plains.”

“I will keep that in mind.” Beikan bowed deeply.

Indeed, Kinu Mukari, who had joined the civil war in the Lurein Principality, had distinguished herself in battle alongside Miliana.

But Beikan had failed to conquer the Three Kingdoms.

“...”

He clenched his fists.

Kinu and Beikan, both barbarians from the Great Plains, had been placed in separate battlegrounds, and only one had achieved victory.

Karyl had done that to ignite their competitive spirit.

“I don’t know what Viola intends to bring to me and why she’s been avoiding me all this time, but Istan will fall by tomorrow.”

If anyone else had said that, it might have sounded like nonsense, but Beikan knew it wasn’t just talk, not when Karyl MacGovern himself spoke those words.

“Grrrrrrrr...”

As if in response to his words, dozens of wyverns circled above, letting out low growls.

“If she doesn’t show me something worthwhile, then when the Three Kingdoms are dealt with, she’ll meet the same fate as them.”

With those words, Karyl lightly flicked his cloak and turned away.

***

Clang...!! Clang...!

The metallic clash of weapons echoed through the night, just as Karyl had predicted. With his eyes closed, Karyl leaned his temple against his fist, seemingly savoring the sharp sound.

Step, step...

He slowly opened his eyes.

Standing before him was none other than Viola, covered in blood. She had a few cuts and scratches here and there, but none of the wounds seemed severe. Fortunately, the blood on her clothes belonged to her enemies, not her.

“I’m late.”

She knelt down and presented a small box to Karyl.

“Hmm...”

Inside the box, Karyl found the severed head of Baron Beryl, his eyes wide open in shock, indicating that his death had been sudden.

“The warfare genius from the Three Kingdoms... Beryl’s end, reduced to this small box...” Karyl chuckled. He was pleased with the gift.

After hearing that Karyl was personally dealing with the Three Kingdoms of Istria, Viola knew she couldn’t come and face him empty-handed.

However, Karyl’s tone remained cold.

“Viola, did you borrow the Free Army just to bring me the head of some noble, instead of unifying the Three Kingdoms?”

“...”

Karyl was well aware of why the war had dragged on. He had given Viola only a few thousand troops from the Free Army, and the private soldiers she controlled from the Fanpinel family barely added a few hundred more.

Fighting against tens of thousands of soldiers from the Three Kingdoms with just a few thousand troops was no easy task. Besides, the sudden intervention of the Eastern Land and the betrayal of Baron Beryl’s magic troops, who had been a crucial part of her forces, had naturally delayed the campaign.

“...I’m sorry.”

But even knowing all this, Karyl showed no mercy. Not everyone with talent can reach their full potential. Karyl always provided opportunities, but it was up to the individual to hone themselves.

“However, since you didn’t come empty-handed, you narrowly earned a chance to explain yourself. Had you come without even this, the Fanpinel Principality would have vanished from the map as well.”

“...I understand,” Viola said with a tense expression.

“Beryl was a capable man. Though old and greedy, he was skilled in the art of war. Let me ask you one thing. How did you capture Beryl?”

“As Your Majesty said, Beryl is a shrew man, and I thought he would be the first you’d want to catch, since he has caused all this.”

“And then?”

“He was quick-witted. I anticipated that if he learned about Simon Coden’s arrival at the border and his failure to stop Your Majesty, he would try to flee. The only path to the empire from Istan was through the back roads of the capital. I suspected as much and pursued him there.”

“The back roads of Istan? If you were able to penetrate that deeply, I reckon you should have been able to deal with the Three Kingdoms without wasting so much time.”

“We were delayed by the Eastern Land’s intervention and the betrayal of Beryl’s magic troops.”

“That doesn’t make sense. I gave you the Free Army precisely to account for such situations.”

Karyl raised his hand and commanded the subordinate behind him, “Give her a seat.”

Clang...!

Karyl then pointed out the window and said, “I’ll give you until that sword dance ends, so speak.”

He then shot her a cold glare before warning, “And forget whatever lies you’ve prepared. I want to know the real reason you’ve been deliberately dragging this war on.”

At that moment, Viola felt a shiver run down her spine. She forced a faint smile, realizing Karyl had seen right through her.