Chapter 68: The Empire’s Trump Card
The massive night raid orchestrated by Zenon marked the beginning of a true nightmare for the Imperial Army.
At the hour of the rat—midnight—the Silva Plains, which should have been shrouded in pitch-black darkness, were suddenly flooded with blinding, midday-bright light. The Arkwright mage corps had deployed a gigantic illumination spell high above.
Caught in their sleep, the Imperial troops were thrown into utter panic, unable to comprehend what was happening.
And into the heart of that confusion…
The allied forces of the Kingdom and Arkwright surged forth like a raging torrent.
Their target had been identified by the reconnaissance balloon: the Empire’s most vulnerable point—its southern flank.
Guarding it was a ragtag mercenary corps.
“Fire!”
At Hector’s command, the Arkwright musketeers unleashed a coordinated volley.
Thunderous gunshots tore through the night, mowing down mercenaries who had not even formed a proper defensive line.
Behind them charged General Gustav and the Royal Knights.
Their morale was at its peak. As if avenging their earlier humiliation, their spears and swords cut through the panicking enemies without mercy.
The Imperial southern flank collapsed almost instantly.
From there, the coalition forces swept forward like a tidal wave, pushing toward the central Imperial encampment.
“Impossible…! Why!? How are they moving so coherently at night!?”
In the main camp, Imperial Supreme Commander Marshal Gaius shouted in disbelief.
By his calculations, a night attack should have resulted only in confusion and friendly fire—a sheer folly.
But reality proved otherwise.
The enemy was cutting through his camp with perfect daytime-level coordination.
“Marshal! The southern flank is completely overrun!”
“The central regiment is in chaos! The command chain is collapsing!”
One hopeless report after another.
Gaius ground his teeth.
Once again, he had fallen right into that young demon Zenon’s trap.
But he was no fool like Vargas.
Even in this catastrophe, his mind calmly searched for a way out.
“…Do not panic.”
He silenced his frantic subordinates with a single bark.
“The enemy seeks a short decisive battle. They intend to use this confusion to strike directly at our headquarters.…But we will not allow it.”
His aged eyes gleamed like those of a predatory hawk.
“…Call them.”
“—!!”
His aides turned pale.
“Is… is that truly wise, Marshal? Using them in a chaotic melee—!”
“It does not matter!”
Gaius made his decree.
“To fight a demon, one must send demons!…Deploy the Empire’s greatest trump card!”
Meanwhile, the coalition advance continued smoothly.
Yet Zenon, listening to the incoming battlefield reports through the transmission device, furrowed his brows ever so slightly.
(…Too smooth.)
His crisis-sense as a consultant rang loudly.
There was no way the cunning Gaius would crumble this easily.
There had to be something more.
His uneasy premonition became reality moments later.
Just before reaching the Imperial headquarters…
The coalition vanguard suddenly halted.
『Z-Zenon-sama! There’s… some strange group ahead!』
Hector’s voice trembled through the transmission.
『They’re few—only a dozen or so. But something’s wrong. Every time they take a single step, our soldiers collapse!』
“What?”
Zenon ordered the reconnaissance balloon to display its footage on the magic screen.
When he saw what appeared there, Zenon’s expression shifted for the first time.
A group of a little more than a dozen, clad in black robes.
They held no weapons.
They simply walked.
But around them, the Kingdom’s strongest knights were flung aside by invisible forces, or impaled by stone spears erupting from the ground.
“…Those are—”
Aldous, watching beside him, gasped.
“…The Empire’s most elite mage unit. The Black Thirteen Saints…!”
The room fell pale.
“Each one of them possesses combat magic power equivalent to our nation’s chief court mage.
It’s said that when they act seriously, they can annihilate an entire army overnight.”
Aldous explained with a trembling voice.
“That they would deploy them here of all places…!”
The Empire’s trump card.
Unlike Zenon’s magitech inventions, this trump card represented pure, overwhelming magical power—
the pinnacle of destructive capability embodied in individuals.
On the screen, the Black Thirteen Saints enacted a one-sided massacre.
Musket bullets bounced off their magic barriers.
Knight charges were misled by illusions, causing them to attack each other.
The tide of battle shifted completely.
The coalition’s advance halted and began to retreat.
“…Damn it!”
General Gustav’s transmission burst with anger and desperation.
『Zenon! At this rate we’ll be wiped out! We must retreat!』
But Zenon remained calm.
He watched the black-robed figures tearing through his forces— not with fear, but with the cold eyes of an analyst evaluating a subject.
(…I see. So this is the pinnacle of individual combat ability in this world.)
Instead of dread, he felt burning intellectual curiosity—and a strategist’s fighting spirit.
(Fascinating. Truly fascinating.)
He picked up the communication device.
And then, to the entire collapsing army, issued a new command—merciless, unexpected, but perfectly rational.
“—All units, fall back. But do not retreat in a straight line.…You will lure them—exactly as calculated—to the designated location.”
No one yet understood what those words meant.
Nor could they imagine the terrifying trap that awaited ahead.