novelraw Chapter 238 : The North (17)
Chapter 238 : The North (17)
“I believe it's possible.”
Kanna Cartier truly thought so.
She didn't know the exact military strength of the Orc Mountains, but even so, at its core, it was a Baron-class Demon King's Territory.
Calculating from her experience on various battlefields, the Orc Mountains' strength, even by the most conservative estimates, was roughly at the level of a mid-to-high-ranking Count-level Anti-Demon Front.
In other words.
It was at a slightly higher level than the
Of course, the uniquely rugged terrain of the Orc Mountains and the potential for a knight-class intervention from the Demon King's allied forces could introduce some variables, but this was the conclusion she had reached after weighing all those factors in her head.
Based on Kanna Cartier's combat experience from commanding and leading countless battlefields, she thought that while a full-scale conquest might be a different story, breaking through one flank of the Orc Mountains to create a new supply route wouldn't be all that difficult.
Even if the Black Sea Veil had drastically reduced their forces by blocking The Order's divine magic, the damage incurred during the conquest of the Downhill Wilderness had been minimal.
Above all, the operation had been so clean that it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say there were virtually no casualties among the Hero-class individuals.
If they were willing to accept a certain amount of damage, even for the infamous 'Orc Mountains', punching a path through shouldn't be too hard.
‘...’
Of course, her point was valid.
Conquering the Orc Mountains and breaking through a path in the Orc Mountains were, in terms of difficulty, two completely different matters.
However.
“Hmm...”
Ludwig Allegro made a sound, as if he didn't find Kanna Cartier's judgment agreeable.
The reason was simple.
As the head of the UMC, responsible for intelligence in this Northern Subjugation War, he could spot a critical flaw in Kanna Cartier's current logic.
“...No matter how I think about it, I'm against it.”
“...Is there a problem?”
“Seeing as you think it's possible just because our condition is good, it seems you're thinking of the Orc Mountains as just some ordinary Count-class Demon King's Territory.”
A strange light entered Kanna Cartier's eyes.
The reason was simple.
Though he seemed to be saying it casually as if it were nothing, Ludwig Allegro was reading Kanna Cartier's thoughts almost perfectly.
“I'm quite sure I didn't leave a report on the Orc Mountains that was so half-assed.”
“...”
“Isn't that right, Kanna Cartier?”
At Ludwig Allegro's pointed question, Kanna Cartier reluctantly opened her mouth.
“...‘Unknown variable.’ That is what I was told.”
“Right, ‘Unknown variable.’”
Nod—
“On the surface, it means ‘I don't know’.”
“But...”
Before she could even voice her rebuttal, Ludwig Allegro shook his head.
“It's not like I confirm intelligence and then report it like some country bumpkin, and this battle isn't some hike up a hill in a rural backwater.”
“...”
“The UMC isn't some gathering of village idiots, either, and you should know full well that I don't do my job in such a slapdash manner...”
Shrug—
“So where on earth did you get the conclusion that just punching through a supply route would be manageable?”
Ludwig Allegro shrugged and asked in a tone that suggested he truly couldn't understand.
“...”
Ludwig Allegro's question wasn't simply about whether it was possible or not.
He was pointing out the sloppiness in Kanna Cartier's reasoning process, that her argument was insufficient, even if it turned out to be possible.
“If this goes wrong, this entire corps-level force here is going to get wiped out, you know?”
“...”
Of course, it wasn't that Ludwig Allegro wanted to give Kanna Cartier a hard time.
Kanna Cartier was, in her own right, one of the top-ranking High Priests, and frankly speaking, when it came to battlefield experience, she, who had spent her entire life as a Paladin and earned the title of Valkyrie, had more.
Though they bickered whenever they met, she was a comrade from their monastery days with whom he had been through thick and thin, and one of the few people within The Order he could speak openly with.
Nevertheless, the reason Ludwig Allegro was speaking this way came down to one thing.
It was because he could confidently say that in 'this one particular area' related to the current problem, he had more experience than Kanna Cartier.
“Look at who our opponent is, Kanna.”
“...”
“He's not some back-alley thug.”
Specifically, the part about dealing with 'Isaac Einstein'.
In that one area, Ludwig Allegro's experience level was overwhelmingly higher than Kanna Cartier's.
After all, since his appointment as the head of the UMC, more than half of the cases he had handled were in some way connected to Isaac Einstein.
“It's not like I just took a quick look and said 'I don't know'. I dug into it dozens of times and conducted hundreds of probes. I wrote it that way because even then, I couldn't get an answer from the data.”
“...”
“On top of that, its growth potential is incomparable to anything else, so there's no data to even compare it with, and the mountains themselves are a god-awful terrain that puts 'natural fortresses' to shame, so I couldn't even get a direct look inside.”
“...”
“It's not an 'Ah, screw it, I don't know.' It's an 'No matter how I look at it, I have no idea what the hell he's hidden in there'.”
As Ludwig Allegro's words poured out like a rapid-fire volley, Leonardo Louis Button nodded for the first time.
“...I don't know what that Isaac fellow has hidden in there, but if we attack recklessly, we'll all be annihilated.”
If it had been a normal situation, he would have started by refuting him.
But Louis, too, knew well the meticulousness and cruelty of Isaac Einstein from his work as an Inquisitor dealing with Demonic Species.
“...This man is not wrong, Kanna Cartier.”
“...”
“He might have put it a bit strongly, but the opposing strategist is certainly not someone to be underestimated. In fact, it's been a stroke of luck that things have proceeded so smoothly until now.”
Of course, that alone didn't explain everything.
They were the two people in The Order with the most contact with 'Isaac Einstein', and they also held the title of 'Advisory Committee'.
But even considering those things, the two men's statements were remarkably conclusive.
It wasn't just on the level of 'It seems dangerous, so shouldn't we avoid it?' Instead, their tones carried something akin to a 'certainty' that if they proceeded as planned, they would die.
And the thing that influenced their attitude at this moment was not any of the aforementioned reasons, but solely one person.
‘...Heh.’
U-jin.
It was his influence.
‘...They're being more proactive than I thought.’
Of course, Kanna Cartier had no way of knowing, as U-jin had never mentioned it.
Ludwig Allegro and Leonardo Louis Button, selected as the two advisors for the Northern Subjugation Army, had already had a private talk with U-jin at the coronation ceremony in the Beastkin Nation.
『It's a trap, you know.』
『...!』
『One that Isaac Einstein dug himself.』
One of the key points of that conversation was that this entire subjugation war was a trap orchestrated by Isaac Einstein himself.
...And a complete one at that, planned from start to finish.
Even though they hadn't been told exactly how the trap was constructed, they were the two people U-jin had painstakingly bribed(?) by bringing up unbelievable stories like the 'Saintess's Prophecy' and the 'Oracle'.
Although they were deviating from U-jin's expectations by being far more proactive than he'd anticipated, the one who had contributed to the two men dissuading Kanna Cartier to this extent was U-jin himself, who hadn't even opened his mouth.
...Well.
‘It's not a bad thing, anyway.’
Even after that, the two men continued to find various faults(?) to block Kanna Cartier from proceeding with the operation.
- Look, look. I know a thing or two about fortune-telling, and this, this shape is called a 'Hyungsu,' and it's the worst of all inauspicious signs.
- ...I also had a bad dream last night. A giant cucumber appeared and ate me...
- And looking at your fortune, this year is exactly when your Great Luck is supposed to change, so...
...Well, of course.
As they went on, more and more incomprehensibly useless stories were added, so from that point on, even U-jin tuned them out.
* * *
- Even looking at the constellations, heading southeast aligns with your fortune...
- There's a method of warding off evil often used by Exorcists where you take a detour even for a short path right in front of you. In this case, it's the same...
- Likewise...
- Blah blah blah...
After a long persuasion show by Ludwig Allegro and Leonardo Louis Button.
The long-awaited answer came from the lips of Kanna Cartier, who had been maintaining her silence.
“...I understand.”
Perhaps the two's heartfelt(?) advice sounded like proper counsel for once?
Kanna Cartier dropped her previous playful attitude and accepted their advice.
Compared to her attitude of completely ignoring them since their arrival at the camp, it was an encouraging result.
For all one knew, when she first announced her decision to press on as if it were a final notice, her face had shown no sign of wavering.
It seemed that it was difficult to completely ignore the words of people close to her, especially two who were her direct seniors and held the highest trust within The Order.
‘...Well, or maybe.’
It was also possible that the absurdly baseless add-ons they'd spouted afterward had worked.
Well, in any case, it seemed the immediate continuation of the battle was canceled.
Kanna Cartier, who had answered curtly, once again assembled the officers, canceled the order she had given, and reversed it with a command to reorganize their formation.
The faces of the officers coming back out held expressions of incomprehension.
Well, that was only natural.
Canceling the immediate assault didn't mean another alternative had suddenly appeared, and the fact that they were at a crossroads, having only postponed the decision, was an unchangeable reality.
The reason she had concluded with 'continue the battle' in the first place was that there were no other viable options.
Going back through the Black Sea Veil was tantamount to a suicide mission, and just sitting still and waiting for the Black Sea to lift, with no idea when that would be, was also not an option.
“However, remaining complacent in our current state is also dangerous. We don't know when the Demon King's Army might launch a preemptive strike, and the advantage the defending side has in a battle is only under the assumption that supplies for both sides are flowing smoothly.”
“...”
“If they were to launch an all-out offensive right now, we probably wouldn't last four days.”