The situation continued to worsen.
They seemed to have killed dozens of Gnolls, yet the monsters still filled the entire area around them.
Despite the efforts of the soldiers, Catherine, and Bilford, so many Gnolls were now climbing over the wagons at once that it was impossible to count them all.
Milton had already treated wounded soldiers several times, and he had little Mana left.
“Hup!”
CRASH!
It was already Karl’s eleventh charge.
By now, he had learned how to steady himself and lessen the impact at the instant his horse slammed into a Gnoll.
Huff! Huff!
But Karl’s Warhorse, which had been forced to take the full impact of all eleven charges with its chest, was gradually reaching its limit.
It had carried Karl on its back throughout the journey here, charged at a full gallop before they established the formation, endlessly circled within the formation afterward, and then rammed into enemies with its chest eleven separate times.
It would have been stranger if the horse were not exhausted.
Karl knew perfectly well that his horse was utterly spent.
However, his riding skills were far too poor for him to quickly switch to one of the other horses huddled together at the center of the formation.
Karl had never learned anything like transferring from one horse to another while mounted.
Yet if he dismounted to change horses, there was no time to spare. If Karl stopped moving even for a moment, the Gnolls that had broken into the formation would attack the soldiers from behind.
By now, the number of conscripts had visibly dwindled.
One, then another.
Their numbers had decreased slowly but surely until half of them were already dead.
The circular formation had become markedly smaller than it had been at first, and even the imperial soldiers guarding the gaps between the wagons had been forced to withdraw because their backs were becoming too exposed.
At least there was one fortunate thing.
Thanks to their sturdy armor, the imperial soldiers had suffered minor wounds, but not a single one had died.
“Aagh!”
“Save me!”
As the conscripts continued to die, the formation shrank even further.
Karl clenched his teeth.
Leaving aside how exhausted his horse had become, there was barely enough space left to make another charge.
Not only the packhorses but even the Warhorses were visibly restless and trembling with anxiety.
Karl looked toward Catherine and Bilford.
Catherine, who could wield Mana, was slaughtering Gnolls like a tiger among a flock of sheep, while Bilford was also fighting magnificently, even if he could not quite match her.
But even Karl could see that the movements of both had clearly slowed compared to the beginning of the battle.
Catherine was not exhausted. She was merely conserving her Mana so that, if the worst came to pass, she could save Karl and escape.
Bilford, however, could not wield Mana and had only just reached adulthood. The young Squire had been feeling his limits for quite some time.
“Huff! Haaah!”
He was fighting precariously, almost as though he were leaning on his armor for support.
CLANG!
His stamina had fallen so far that he no longer trusted himself to keep his arm extended and take an attack head-on, so Bilford tucked his arm tightly against his body.
The axe swung by a Gnoll struck his Vambrace, slid along the curve of his armor, and swept harmlessly past.
Had he been in proper condition, Bilford could have deflected it merely by twisting his waist slightly and immediately cut the monster’s throat.
But his heavy legs barely obeyed him. After staggering slightly, he laboriously braced the Pommel of his sword and thrust upward.
THUNK!
The Gnoll, which had just thrust its head forward to bite through Bilford’s throat, had its jaw pierced and its brain skewered.
“Hup!”
Bilford twisted aside from the collapsing Gnoll, pulled his sword free, and staggered as he tried to resume fighting.
“Bilford! Fall back and receive treatment!”
Karl shouted loudly.
A sudden fear seized him that Bilford, a valuable talent, might be lost in a battle against mere Gnolls.
Besides, Bilford would be far more useful if he received Milton’s Healing Magic before returning to the fight rather than continuing in his shattered condition.
It was tactically the correct decision as well.
“Huff! Huff! Huff! Huff!”
At Karl’s shout, Bilford jerked up his head, which kept drooping despite him, and hurriedly looked around.
After hesitating for a moment, he swept his sword one final time to drive back a Gnoll, then practically threw himself into the shield wall formed by the imperial soldiers.
“Hmph!”
An imperial soldier gently caught Bilford against his shield, then pivoted and allowed him through into the formation.
The moment the soldier turned back toward the enemy, the shield wall became solid once more.
“Milton! Hurry!”
Karl was so desperate that he struck Milton across the back with the Longsword in his right hand as he shouted.
He did not even realize that he had just hit Milton with his sword, or that he had spoken to him so curtly.
Naturally, Milton had no attention to spare for something so trivial either.
He rushed toward Bilford, who had collapsed to the ground, and immediately used Healing Magic.
Bilford no longer had enough strength to rise on his own. He lay sprawled on the ground, drool running from his mouth.
He was so exhausted that even the weight of his own body made it difficult to breathe.
The battle had continued for an unbearably long time without pause.
Throughout all of it, Bilford had not rested for even a moment, fighting relentlessly and ferociously.
It was thanks to him that the formation had held until now, and that the soldiers had been able to preserve even a little of their strength rather than dropping their spears and shields.
For a young Squire who could not even wield Mana, his performance was almost unbelievable.
‘Damn it!’
Yet even through the haze clouding his mind from lack of oxygen after fighting far beyond his limits, Bilford could not help bitterly blaming himself.
If only he had a little more stamina.
If only he were at least one year older.
If only he could wield even the slightest amount of Mana!
Then things would never have deteriorated this far.
He could have guarded Catherine’s back and rampaged through the Gnolls alongside her.
There would have been almost no casualties, and the battle would never have dragged on like this in the first place.
The two of them could simply have annihilated the Gnolls together!
Bilford blamed himself, but had Catherine heard his thoughts, she would have sternly rebuked him.
There were limits even to arrogance.
To be capable of guarding Catherine’s back, one needed skill impressive enough that anyone would eagerly seek to take him in as a knight.
Bilford was judging himself by the standards of the Imperial Knights, which recruited only the finest warriors in the Empire.
The thought revealed just how greatly the young Squire, who still could not even wield Mana, overestimated his own talent with the rash confidence of youth.
And yet, had he truly been given just one more year, Bilford possessed enough talent that he could indeed have guarded Catherine’s back and shattered that tide of Gnolls.
But there was no point dwelling on what might have been.
“Damn it.”
Karl cursed in a voice that had gone completely hoarse and looked around.
By now, he hardly even needed to.
The circular formation had become too small.
There was no longer any point in remaining mounted, so Karl finally jumped down from his utterly exhausted horse.
“Lord Karl.”
Milton, crouched on the ground while treating Bilford, reached out to stop him.
Karl firmly shook off his hand.
“Focus on treating Bilford!”
Bilford needed to recover quickly if they were to maintain the line.
Right now, Bilford was more valuable than Karl, so he had to be given priority.
Ironically, for Karl to survive this situation, he had to risk his own life to buy enough time for Bilford to recover.
CLANK!
With trembling hands, Karl lowered his Visor.
The restricted vision was stifling, but it was better than leaving his face completely exposed.
In fact, as though it were a lie that even a breastplate had once felt suffocating, Karl now desperately wished for armor that would cover his entire body.
Even if it made moving somewhat inconvenient, if he were wearing Full Plate Armor like Catherine, there would be nothing to fear!
Huff! Huff! Huff!
Inside the Helmet with its lowered Visor, Karl grew dizzy from the heat of his own breath swirling around him.
His ears felt completely blocked.
Unable to hear properly, Karl had to whip his head around constantly to read the battle through the slit in his Visor.
The small stature and slight build that had been concealed while he was on horseback were now fully exposed, making him look like a lost child who had somehow wandered into the middle of a battlefield.
“Aaaaaagh!”
Then a scream so sharp that Karl could hear it clearly even through his Helmet rang out.
Karl immediately turned his head.
In the scene flashing past his vision, he saw Catherine’s spear strike down a Gnoll forcing its way through the collapsing line.
Then beyond that sight, Karl spotted a conscript pinned to the ground beneath a Gnoll, with no one available to help him as the monster prepared to tear out his throat.
Catherine was defending another section.
Bilford could not move.
The imperial soldiers were already at their limit merely holding the enemies in front of them. Expecting the conscripts to help that man while maintaining the formation would be impossible.
“Hup!”
“Lord Karl! No!”
Before Milton could grab him, Karl charged forward with his red cloak and the red plume of his Helmet streaming behind him.
In truth, Karl himself did not even understand what he was doing.
Like a cornered beast, he was acting purely on the instinct to survive.
Karl instinctively understood what he had to do in this situation.
If he wanted to live, he had to fight.
With his small, slight body, yet with the ferocity of a beast that had tasted blood, he charged like a young lion!
Haa…!
The sound of Karl’s own breathing echoed in his ears.
His nerves, sharpened to their utmost by tension and terror, assessed everything with startling clarity.
His body, which had shrunk in fear, loosened while retaining just enough tension for the optimal attack, and the legs that had stiffly pressed against the ground now sprang forward with elasticity.
Karl’s wrist moved fluidly as he drew back his sword.
The swordpoint, initially held in a middle guard, seemed to remain suspended alone in place.
But Karl himself was advancing, and so the swordpoint naturally rose upward.
It was almost picturesque.
Far too clean for something performed in a first real battle.
As though slipping through a narrow opening, the blade entered along a delicate, razor-sharp trajectory.
THUNK!
The sword descended like a ray of light and struck the head of the Gnoll that had just been about to tear out the conscript’s throat.
It did not split the skull completely, but the back of its head cracked open, exposing the severed brain within.
It was dead.
“Hup!”
Only Karl’s own breathing echoed in his ears.
Instinctively, he snapped one step backward, recovered his sword, raised it high, shifted his center of gravity, and leaned forward.
SWISH!
This time, a long downward slash descended from the high guard.
It struck the head of a Gnoll attempting to squeeze through the soldiers’ ranks with flawless precision.
CRACK!
In his first real battle, Karl perfectly executed a technique he had properly practiced for only two days.
The clean downward slash split into the Gnoll’s skull and continued through, cleaving its elongated muzzle apart.
It was an excellent strike.
But Karl froze in alarm.
“Gasp!”
The sword buried in the skull would not come free!
Neither Catherine nor Bilford had expected Karl to experience killing an enemy so soon, so neither of them had taught him how to efficiently retrieve a sword lodged in a corpse!
Karl, who had been swinging his sword with his reason almost entirely gone, as though walking through a dream, suddenly snapped back to his senses.
The collapsing Gnoll dragged the embedded sword downward, jerking Karl’s body forward.
His sword was trapped below him, and another Gnoll was forcing its way toward him from the front.
Someone seemed to scream at the sight of Karl left completely exposed.
“Aaaaaah!”
Karl remembered seeing the soldiers twist their spears free from Gnolls and let out a wild cry as he violently twisted his wrist.
The blade buried in the Gnoll’s skull turned, forcing the wound wider, and Karl toppled backward.
GRAAAGH!
A Gnoll that had finally broken through the line saw Karl fallen on the ground and lunged at him.
Karl had never learned how to swing a sword while flat on his back.
“Gasp!”
At the sight visible through the slit of his Visor, Karl reflexively thrust out his sword.
CLANG!
Karl’s Longsword collided with the Gnoll’s axe.
Karl gripped the sword with every ounce of strength he had, but he could not withstand the power of a Gnoll, a monster stronger than an adult man.
The sword was knocked helplessly from his grasp and sent flying.
However, the Gnoll’s axe, made with crude metallurgy, could not withstand the impact either.
Its head shattered.
Fragments broke apart and fell from the haft.
In that fleeting instant, the Gnoll abandoned the broken axe and reached out with its claws, aiming for Karl’s head and neck.
Karl saw his own death approaching.
He wanted to live.
“Aaaaaagh!”
Karl screamed as the Gnoll seized his head and neck.
Under the monster’s tremendous strength, Karl’s body was shaken helplessly like a toy.
GRIND! GRIND!
The Gnoll opened its jaws wide and tried to bite through Karl’s neck.
Fortunately, the sturdy Helmet supplied by the Imperial Family extended down below his neck.
Its teeth slipped against the armor, tearing through the collar of his clothing and scraping violently across the small portion of exposed collarbone.
Brutal strength.
A horrific stench.
And the pain of his skin being torn apart!
At some point, Karl’s scream abruptly stopped.
He looked almost as though the Gnoll had already ripped out his throat and killed him.
STAB! STAB! STAB! STAB!
YELP!
But the moment several short, wet impacts sounded in succession, the Gnoll that had been savaging Karl shrieked, twisted its body, and tried to flee.
The instant the Gnoll pulled away, Karl sprang upright.
Then, unbelievably, he hurled himself onto the crouching monster, clung to it, and viciously drove the dagger in his right hand into its neck and shoulder again and again until it died.
“Haaah! Haaah! Haaah!”
Before his breathing had even calmed, Karl threw the dagger aside and frantically felt around until his hand closed around his sword.
In that brief instant when the Gnoll charged him, Karl’s cold, machine-like survival instinct had immediately found a path to survival.
Trying to block it with his arms would only cripple him.
So he would trust his armor and give it his head and neck.
Then he would draw the dagger at his right side and kill it.
Even Karl himself could not understand how he had thought of it, or how he had managed to do it.
Karl staggered, drenched in blood that had poured from the Gnoll that had been straddling him.
Yet he stood firmly once more and calmly turned his head, searching for where he was needed next.
“Treat someone else! I am fine!”
Karl shouted, stopping Milton as he hurried toward him.
And truly, Karl was fine.
His entire body felt as though it were burning hot and freezing cold at the same time.
Perhaps because of the adrenaline, he could not even feel the pain.
His eyes met Bilford’s, who was trying to crawl toward him on all fours despite his body already being at its limit.
But Karl had no time to say anything.
He immediately raised his sword and charged toward another section.
The battle was not over yet.