#225
The Kalkos Tribal Alliance (3)
Beorsen was a city formed around a large oasis in the middle of the desert, as well as a key transportation hub leading to other regions in the south.
No matter how strongly the south valued martial might, and no matter how much it was scorned by other regions as a land of barbarians, it was still a land where people lived, so commerce was naturally an important factor as well.
It was not quite large enough to be called a metropolis, but it was one of the trading cities connecting several regions, a city that bustled day and night without rest.
That was Beorsen.
“...It was also Balteon’s birthplace, and the city he used as his base... or so it used to be.”
A short distance away from the city, which was now covered in ominous, pitch-black energy, with no trace of its former appearance remaining, behind a sand dune.
“As expected, the situation seems far from ordinary. It was worth hurrying.”
Misty, who had guided the hero’s party here, let out a sigh and murmured quietly.
She was a beauty with the healthy coppery skin distinctive to southerners, dark brown hair braided into several strands, and black eyes that shone like obsidian.
Befitting the title of great shaman, she had ornate markings engraved from her forehead, past one eye, down to her collarbone, but her eyes looked so tired they were almost closing.
“...Are you all right? It seems you pushed yourself too hard.”
“I’m not all right, but there was nothing to be done. It was a situation where I had to push myself.”
At Heinrich’s question, she rubbed her eyes and groaned.
Of course she would.
Immediately after encountering the hero’s party, she had had to work extremely hard to move the warriors under her command while keeping pace with them.
No matter how elite each and every one of those warriors was, if they had tried to keep up with the hero’s party on their own, they would all have collapsed by the time they arrived.
“I wouldn’t be of much help in direct combat anyway. So I chose the option with the highest chance of success. Meeting all of you must have been fate as well.”
Indeed, looking at the current situation, it seemed to have been a good choice to come together with the warriors.
Although the hero’s party’s objective was the leadership—Balteon and Hans—there would surely be considerable interference on the way to reaching them.
Great Shaman Misty, who had maintained spells on hundreds of people for half a day, helping them arrive here quickly, stealthily, and in peak condition.
“And our meeting must be fate too.”
...At some point, she had approached Harley’s side and was leaning against his massive arm as she whispered softly.
“Huh?”
“Ah— I’ve never seen such beautiful muscles before. This magnificent biceps brachii, these forearm muscles... no, from the top of your head to the tips of your toes, you are a perfect work of art!”
“Wahahaha! Looks like the young lady knows a thing or two!”
At that sudden action, the expressions of not only the hero’s party but also the southern warriors nearby turned strange, but simple-minded Harley merely burst into a satisfied laugh.
“Ever since this maiden was carried on Lord Harley’s broad back, it was so hard to control my trembling heart. From your style to your physique, I never dreamed that the ideal man I’d only ever imagined would exist in reality.”
Her tone, which had remained calm from beginning to end, became dreamy.
No, not just her tone—her actions too.
Now she was practically hugging his arm and rubbing her cheek against it.
“This is embarrassing! Hwahahat—!”
“My, even your laughter sounds so dependable.”
Harley, who seemed even more like a southern warrior than the southern warriors themselves.
To people from other regions, he looked like nothing more than a savage barbarian, but here, he was quite literally the finest handsome man one might only encounter in a dream.
“Tch, good-looking bastards have women flock to them even when they just stand still! Damn annoying.”
“Ugh, Lady Misty, the noble flower of the desert...!”
“Hey, I get how you feel, but calm down. Being handsome isn’t all that man has going for him. If you mess with him for no reason, you might end up a bloody pulp.”
Naturally, the male warriors who had come all the way here with them cast jealous gazes at them.
“Hah! Men, honestly. At least be jealous of something worth being jealous over. With that much difference in level, what’s there to envy?”
“By the way, I had my eye on him too. I never thought Lady Misty would make a move first like that. Whew~ look at those arms. I’m jealous.”
“I thought she had no interest in men at all until now, but it turns out her standards were just high?”
Even several of the female warriors sent them regretful looks.
“...Somehow, I knew it. She kept burying her face in his back the whole time we were being carried.”
And Isea, who was watching them from a step away, muttered with a sour expression.
When they had agreed to travel together according to their mutual interests, Misty had specifically asked Harley to carry her.
Of course, his broad back was more than enough to carry two women with room to spare, and since he was also a southerner, she would be more comfortable with him, so they had simply let it pass...
She had thought Misty rubbing her forehead against his back throughout the journey was something she did while concentrating on maintaining her spells, but it seemed she had been satisfying her own selfish desires since then.
‘Still, she seemed to have been hiding it until now, so why in this situation of all times?’
She did not seem like someone so incapable of distinguishing time and place.
As Isea quietly stared at Misty like that, she suddenly realized that Misty’s eyes were not simply dreamy—they had gone completely unfocused.
As if she were utterly drunk on sleep.
‘...Don’t tell me she’s sleep-talking right now?’
She had seemed strangely precarious for a while now.
Just in case, Isea approached the two who were laughing and chatting and carefully shook Misty’s shoulder.
As expected, there was no reaction at all.
“Um, Miss Misty? Miss Misty! Come to your senses! This isn’t the time for this!”
Only after Isea shouted and shook her body roughly did Misty finally—
“Ha! Yes, yes? What suddenly...”
As though waking from sleep, Misty opened her eyes wide and slowly looked around.
The gazes around them were all focused on her.
“......”
Then she slowly raised her head along Harley’s arm, which she had been hugging.
When her eyes met his as he stared blankly down at her, her dark skin began rapidly flushing bright red.
“...I apologize. I think I lost my mind for a moment.”
Then, as if nothing had happened, she smoothly let go of his arm, stepped far to the side, and pulled the hood of her robe low over her head.
For a brief moment, an awkward silence drifted through the area.
“Theeen!”
As if to help Misty, who was quietly writhing and twisting her whole body, Saint Riesta, who had been silent, raised her voice and gathered everyone’s attention.
“...What do we do now? It will be dark soon. If the Immortal King is involved, fighting in the darkness wouldn’t be a very good choice. But I don’t think delaying any longer here would be good either.”
However, the topic she brought up was certainly one worth considering.
Beorsen, wrapped in dense darkness, looked suspicious at a glance and did not seem like a place they should enter at night.
Heinrich slowly looked over his companions.
They had run for quite a long time, but his party members were not at a level where a forced march of this degree would diminish their skills.
They had also adjusted the pace a little more after the southern warriors joined them.
And those warriors too were in fairly good condition thanks to Misty’s spells.
They had recovered from what little fatigue they had by resting for about an hour from immediately after arriving until now, so the only person incapable of fighting was Misty, who was almost exhausted.
Amid his deliberation, another lively conference began inside his mind.
-Harley: I can fight right now!
-Heinz II: Is there any need to take a risk? It would be safer to wait until daybreak before going in.
-Hubert: It’s frustrating now that the connection that was always there has been cut. Certainly, it would be safer to go after daybreak. No matter how insane Hans has become, surely he won’t try to kill Heinrich and Harley, but as for the other party members, who knows.
-Howard: I think we should go right away if we’re ready! Is that bastard Hans the type to get stronger just because it’s night, or weaker because it’s day?
-Hugo: That’s true enough. But we don’t know what kind of trickery is waiting in there. Won’t the warriors suffer heavy losses?
-Hesperon: ...No, if you think about it, there’s no answer except to go in right now.
But the conference soon began to lean in one direction once clever Hesperon started making his argument.
-Hesperon: Right now, Hans is probably in the middle of swallowing the entire city. To contaminate all the soldiers who will be mobilized for war.
-Hubert: The civilians will probably be included as forces in the process as well.
-Hesperon: ...Right. And once that work is finished, Hans will immediately put Balteon forward and move to the next location. To devour the remaining troops that have been prepared.
-Hugo: Come to think of it, whatever method he used, those soldiers obeyed Balteon’s orders completely. Even if the Immortal King appeared right in front of them, they wouldn’t be able to resist.
-Heinz II: I see. Then that energy surrounding the city right now is proof that Hans is still there.
-Hesperon: This is the only chance. Once Hans starts moving, we’ll never be able to keep up with his mobility. If we intend to stop him, we can’t give him any more time.
The conference in his mind ended there.
In truth, from the moment he realized victims were continuing to appear inside, the conclusion might already have been decided.
-Heinrich: We enter immediately. And...
Heinrich, the final decision-maker of the party who had made up his mind, expressed his thoughts, and the others nodded in agreement.
Of course, the southern warriors who would act as their helpers also began moving at once according to that decision.
-Heinrich: ...I will, without fail, drive the holy sword into that bastard Hans’s heart.
Heinrich’s steps, filled with irritation and rage, headed toward the city where Hans was—Beorsen.
***
“Just trust us, Harley! Even if we die, we won’t let the small fry get a single step closer!”
“Though, truth is, that’s about all we can do.”
“...But former Great Chieftain Balteon isn’t even the real problem. I never imagined the Immortal King would be behind him.”
The trio of southern warriors who had once been with Harley.
As they approached the city, they stuck close to him and whispered quietly, as if easing their tension.
During the journey here, they had already caught up with one another and he had learned well enough why they were here.
Though they were from the south, even while living as mercenaries, they had kept in regular contact with their homeland, and in the midst of that, they had learned that something suspicious was happening in the south.
Each of them had carried that unease and talked about it, only to realize that all three had been thinking the same thing.
So they had stopped by the Hubert Trading Company, entrusted them with a letter to send to Harley, and immediately come down south.
“Ah, now that I think about it, I wrote all kinds of embarrassing things in that letter back then. Harley, I think it’d be better if you didn’t read it and just disposed of it.”
“...Ahem, I reckon so too.”
After coming down south, they had by chance encountered Misty, who had just escaped confinement and was being chased by pursuers.
Afterward, they helped her, and after many twists and turns, gathered warriors who had not yet fallen under Balteon, ultimately making it all the way here.
‘Looks like these guys have had quite a tumultuous adventure too.’
Though of course, it could hardly compare to Harley himself.
He nodded in satisfaction, then raised his head and looked at Beorsen’s gate.
Although it was a desert city, there were not few monsters roaming around here, so a wall built from bricks of compressed, hardened sand surrounded the entire city.
And in the middle of it, a tightly shut gate blocked their way.
“...The gate is closed, but there isn’t a single soldier guarding it.”
Heinrich tilted his head slightly.
The quietest method would be for everyone to stealthily scale the wall, but if it was Hans, he would already know that they were approaching.
Then the better option was for a few people to climb over the wall and force the gate open...
Before he could finish that thought and open his mouth to say anything.
By then, Harley, who had strode up to the gate without a thought, had already—
“Wait, Har—!”
“Hra-cha-cha—!”
Swung his enormous fist at the gate.
Kwaaaang—!
He had not used bodily mutation, nor had he used the Mad Dragon’s scales.
Yet the fist, which had surpassed the speed of sound by far from the moment it was swung, smashed straight into the gate.
Kwadeudeuk—! Kururung! Kwaaaang—!
And sent the huge, metal-reinforced doors flying into the city wall like cannonballs.
Then, along the path the hideously crumpled gate had taken, the sounds of something breaking and collapsing inside rang out in succession.
It was an incomparably splendid signal to begin the battle.
“Kuaaaak!”
“Khrghhh—!”
As if provoked by it, grotesque screams full of rage began echoing from all over the city.
“Huh? Why? Did you call me?”
“...It’s nothing. Well done, Lord Harley.”
It had been sudden, but thanks to that, they were able to learn that a considerable number of enemy forces had been lying in ambush inside.
And that they had already lost their reason.
“Let’s go. We’ll take the lead.”
“Oh! Sounds good!”
And so, with the hero’s party at the forefront—
A band of forces poured into the city to strike down Great Chieftain Balteon and the Immortal King, Hannibal Strauss.