novelraw Chapter 14 : Chapter 14
Chapter 14 : Chapter 14
༺ 𓆩 Chapter 14 𓆪 ༻
「Translator — Creator」
᠃ ⚘᠂ ⚘ ˚ ⚘ ᠂ ⚘ ᠃
“What the—”
Captain Menharn had been about to snap back, to call it nonsense, but he, too, was a veteran who had managed to survive years in the Vanargand Fortress.
And it didn’t take him long to understand.
Rier Yung’s choice to fight rather than flee had little to do with faith or discipline.
‘The moment they cross the walls, even if we run, we won't make it alive to the Siegfried Line.’
Fear dulled reason, warped a man’s grasp of reality.
Menharn forced himself to look clearly, and in that clarity, he knew Rier Yung’s words were absolutely right.
Run without fighting?
That would truly be dying like dogs.
Even the few warhorses they had were half-starved.
The trucks for troop transport were pitifully few, and the ones they had were out of fuel; try running for the Siegfried Line? He could already picture the wolves snapping at their heels, dragging them down as nothing more than a snack.
‘Get it together.’
Two Dual Numbers. The worst possible scenario, and that hadn’t changed.
But once the option of retreat vanished from his mind, his focus steadied and his eyes fixed on the battlefield.
‘We've sent a support request from High Command.’
A miracle, courtesy of the half-broken radio, a set so outdated it should have been replaced long ago, but had been pushed to the bottom of the priority list until it was barely more than dead weight.
But paradoxically, he couldn't expect much.
‘Setting aside whether support will arrive on time, will they even send it in the first place?’
At first glance, this might seem like assuming the worst, but he was seeing reality more clearly than ever before.
‘It's not because they don't believe our report, or because we're Cerberus Brigade.’
...Though those reasons might play a small part.
The biggest reason was that the enemy consisted of Dual Numbers.
A full brigade might be different.
But at best, they only maintained battalion-level strength, with just six Specialist Officers. Even then, their main forces, Lieutenant Colonel Ain Krieg and Major Arditi Günther, were absent.
Even if support came, what were the odds of surviving long enough for it to matter?
‘It looks hopeless even to us. The 10th Corps staff must think it's even worse.’
They were probably calculating that holding at the Siegfried Line, even unfinished, was a hundred times better than sending support only to meet the enemy on the road.
The funny thing was that even Captain Menharn himself thought that would be the 'realistic' way to stop those damned revolting monsters.
Nothing changes.
Whether this situation was unreasonable, whether he feared this wretched death—
This was no time to rail against the unfairness of it, no time to dwell on a wretched death.
The only thing that mattered was clawing, biting, and holding against the enemy now before them.
“C-Captain—”
“Everyone to positions.”
“B-But—!”
“To Positions!”
At his barked order, even those who had seemed on the verge of bolting fell silent and took their stations, as if the cruelty of the truth had finally sunk into their bones.
The gunports yawned open; and the rifles were gripped tight. Throats swallowed dry as they stared down at the seething tide beneath the fortress walls.
“…Hold it together. Major Günther will be here soon.”
As commander of 1st Battalion and acting Battalion Leader, Menharn was the only one who could keep the line steady. There was no one else.
So he was left with no choice but to tell the men, those staring at him with naked fear, a hope he himself did not believe.
They all knew the truth.
Even with all the respect she commanded, Arditi Günther could not stop two Dual Numbers.
But they had to fight.
Even a wretched scrap of hope was something to lash themselves to, a means to keep breathing for just a moment longer.
“They’re, they’re coming!”
The voice, shrill, almost a scream, came from somewhere along the wall.
―Awooooooooo!
Wolves, their ashen flesh rotting and sloughing away, moved with nothing but pure hatred for humankind; their howls were the opening volley of the battle.
An eerie fog descended upon the battlefield, and without anyone going first, countless murderous intents burst forth against each other.
“Fire! Cut them down!”
KWHOOOOOM—!!!
Every shell left was hurled into the fray.
Ashen Wolves, Doppelgängers, No Deer, all met the storm head-on.
Limbs spun into the air, bodies tore apart, and instead of blood, blackened ash-water sprayed across the white ground.
“Urrraaahhh!”
“Die! Die!”
Bullets rained in a ceaseless hail from the walls.
On the thick fortifications stretching across the frozen land, claws dug into stone, bodies piled on one another, monsters clawing over the dead to climb again and again.
“Mors Tua, Vita Mea (Your Death, My Life)!”
Rier Yung’s black uniform writhed as he moved.
With a rosary wound tight around his fists, he smashed the skulls of the wolves clawing over the parapets. Ash-water streaked his cheek, soaking into his knuckles, staining the black fabric of his shirt, and he paid it no mind; that massive frame moved only to heap more offerings of atonement upon the Forgotten God’s throne.
“W—Wait—!”
A soldier aiming down at the horde below had his head caught in the grasp of a No Deer’s hand and was yanked over the battlements.
CRUNCH—!!! SQUELCH—!!!
His body vanished beneath a heap of monstrous flesh, leaving behind only the wet tearing of meat.
One private, seeing it happen, shook and muttered under his breath.
“Ah… ahhh—”
There was no way to win.
This was a dog’s death. A senseless dog’s death.
The Dual Numbers hadn’t even entered the battle yet, those cursed scarecrows were still hanging back, their eyes glinting, their slack corpses swaying like broken marionettes.
“I… I have to run…”
He stumbled backward, not realizing how far he had moved until he found himself at the far side of the wall, fumbling for the stairway.
Even if alone, he had to get away.
But then—
KRAKK—!!!
A brutal hand clamped down on his collar.
His blurred vision cleared, and with dazed eyes, he found himself staring into the face of a red-haired man, spattered head to toe in ash-water.
“I’ll give you two choices, Private.”
Narrow eyes, barely slits, shifted slightly as that frigid gaze bored down on him.
“Either live as a beast who deserts and cannot atone."
Then he whispered softly.
“…or die here and atone to the Forgotten God.”
The duty of a military chaplain was to manage and monitor Specialist Officers for signs of Petrification. But why was it that most chaplains were revered, and feared, by ordinary soldiers?
The reason was simple.
They did not permit retreat on the battlefield.
For that itself was atonement.
“Choose. Are you a sinner?"
Captain Menharn’s assumption had been only half right.
"Or will you atone!"
Realistically, retreat was impossible.
But even if it were possible, Rier Yung had no intention of allowing it.
“H-Hiii!”
The private who had tried to flee turned pale and clutched his rifle.
Rier Yung shoved him, gladly, toward what could only be called the true front line, until his boots were at the parapet; then, with one stomp, he crushed the skull of a wolf as it lunged up over the wall.
Squelch—!!! CRACK—!!!
Ash-water sprayed, speckling the private’s cheek, and as the man all but pissed himself, Rier Yung passed by him with a quiet murmur.
“Memento mori (remember you must die).”
Many would die here. As they always had.
And the Forgotten God would remember them.
“Receive their atonement, O Forgotten God.”
With a smile of perfect devotion, Rier Yung ended another enemy’s life.
༒︎
“Shit, shit, shit…!”
He loaded another round and fired.
When the rifle jammed from poor maintenance, he snatched up one of the many weapons lying abandoned along the wall and fired again.
There was no shortage of rifles without owners; too many men had already died.
But the enemy didn’t thin out.
“Urrraaaahhh!”
The barrage of artillery from every direction could only hold them back for moments at a time; the fewer shells remained, the higher the monsters climbed over one another, until the guns finally fell silent, and then all that was left were the screams.
―Grrrkrrrk!
A No Deer’s antlers punched through a man’s torso, splitting him clean in half and spilling red blood.
The wolves tore into the corpse, gnawing greedily, while the human-shaped abominations, the grotesque Doppelgängers, raked their claws across soldiers’ faces, as if to cover their ruined features.
“A… ahhh.”
Pinned into a corner, one soldier cried and squeezed the trigger again and again.
But there were no more bullets.
Before him, a wolf flicked its tongue, drooling strings of grey saliva as if mocking him.
‘I’m going to die. I’m going to die. I’m going to die.’
Had the beast somehow read his mind? Or was it simply that its thirst for slaughter could no longer be contained?
―Kuhhhhuuuung!
Its eyes gleamed, and the wolf lunged, fangs bared for his throat.
“Uaaaaaaahhhh!”
As his scream tore free —
Schkkk—!!! Thunk—!!!
SHHHHHH—!!!
Something warm and foul splashed across his face.
But it wasn’t his.
When he opened his eyes, there were no yellowed wolf fangs filling his vision, but a plume of soft, white fur, a tail.
“…Annoying.”
Lieutenant Langier wiped the ash-water from her cheek, furrowing her brow and muttering as she stepped past him without another glance.
Thud—!!!
His legs gave out beneath him.
And only then did he understand.
‘We're not the ones holding the line.’
It wasn't the rabble of soldiers who had lost most of their will, whose artillery had fallen silent from lack of shells, who were defending the fortress.
“Get the wounded down the stairs!”
“Damn it, wake up! You piss yourself here, you’re dead anyway!”
“Jansen! Get this bastard out of the way first!”
Captain Menharn’s 1st Battalion was the only one still fighting like soldiers.
But that was all.
They too were steadily being pushed back by the monsters breaching the walls.
So who was it, then, that truly kept these walls standing?
Humans, and yet beyond human.
Superhumans, heirs to a lineage sustained despite the countdown on their lives, born from the advances of science and the corruption of mana.
“The Forgotten God demands more atonement! Mors tua, vita mea!”
Crunch—!!! CRRRRRK—!!!
Master Sergeant Rier Yung, the military chaplain, moved his massive frame through the melee, quite literally crushing monsters beneath it.
“..............”
Lieutenant Langier cut through her foes with an expression that could have meant boredom, or perhaps that she was weighing when best to slip away.
―TAAANG!
From somewhere unseen, Second Lieutenant Eugene Hailt’s rifle cracked, each shot punching a hole through a monster scaling the wall.
“T-Those are…”
Specialist Officers. It was them.
“C-Can we… hold?”
Someone's words became a plague called hope, lifting up those who had fallen.
They might be able to win.
Yes, this was the Vanargand Ironblood Fortress, it was a natural bulwark that had never been breached in two hundred years.
If they could just hold, they might yet prevail.
“We can—!”
CRRRRCK—!!!
“Ah?”
One soldier, mustering what courage he could, raised an arm to rally the others.
It might even have been a decent cry, if not for the tentacle that lashed out and tore his arm off at the shoulder.
“Heh… heh-heh-heh…”
Blood poured freely, and a hollow smile stretched between his clenched teeth.
In that moment, he knew.
“We’ve—”
…Lost.
His last word was drowned, and ended, by the Dual Number.
CRRRCK—!!!
Dual Number, Number 98, Reaper of Ash, crushed him in its tentacles, silencing him completely.
Thud—!!! Splat—!!!
Blood dripped in steady patters as the Reaper planted its thick legs into the fortress wall and roared.
―Kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiek!
And at last, despair settled over the battlefield.
END σϝ CHAPTER