Chapter 16

『They ain’t here, sir.』

Ray furrowed his brow at the unexpected report from the Eighth Company’s Captain.

『What do you mean by ‘not here’?』

『As in ‘up and left’, sir. Clearing’s here; so’s the mess. Tribe isn’t.』

The tribe in question wasn’t large – roughly a hundred individuals by the estimates of their aerial reconnaissance. In theory, small tribes were more likely to flee than large ones. Did that mean he was finally creating the right tribal movements, or was it something else? Ray scanned the horizon, wishing that he had a Hippogriff of his own to see what was going on.

『I’ll have the Dragoons look into it. Keep going, but stay sharp for signs as to what happened to those Demihumans.』

『Yes, sir.』

Unable to spot their attendant air service flight, Ray turned to one of the mages in his bodyguard.

“Totre, get me Captain Yovel.”

“On it, sir.”

Ray sighed, mulling over the possibilities. It could have been a coincidental migration, for all he knew. With the coming of spring, any number of tribes could be moving from their winter settlements.

“I have Captain Yovel, sir.”

“Tell him that Group F6 is missing. We need to figure out where they went.”

“…he’s looking into it now.”

After one last glance around, Ray instructed his mobile headquarters to head over to the abandoned Demihuman camp. While he understood that information could never be perfect, he never liked not knowing exactly what was going on around him.

They arrived at the camp, where he instructed his men to spread out and investigate the surroundings. The reek of Goblin was still fresh on the piles of refuse strewn between the crude shelters left behind to be claimed by the elements. Their advance had brought them high enough up the valley that late snows still lay in the shadows; filling hollows and dips in the ground.

“All of the groups in today’s sweep were confirmed as of yesterday, yes?”

“Yes, my lady,” Ray replied. “They can’t have gotten far, but small deviations in our plans affect everything down the line. There were no indications that they were getting ready to move. Then again, these tribes don’t have many belongings to carry with them in the first place.”

“It isn’t officially spring yet,” Lady Zahradnik noted, “but spring has certainly come to this valley. I didn’t see anything on your maps indicating animal movement or potential dens from where hibernating creatures might emerge.”

As if on cue, a screech pierced the air, settling into a rumbling growl. Several screams rose from an outcropping on the east side of their camp.

“There are more girls in your battalion than I thought,” the Baroness said lightly.

The sound of boots hitting the dirt sounded around them as Lady Zahradnik’s bodyguard dismounted. Another monstrous shriek-growl filled the air as she dismounted as well. Ray edged his warhorse away from the sound.

“Why are you dismounting, my lady?” He asked.

“They aren’t something you want to be fighting from horseback,” she answered.

With that, she walked off to an open part of the Demihuman camp with her men. They started to spread out as she pointed to various positions in front of her.

“Orders, sir?”

Ray eyed the men of his bodyguard, who kept glancing back and forth between him and Lady Zahradnik. Was she purposely trying to upstage him? The Baroness had swiftly seized upon an unexpected situation, stealing the initiative from him with a calm performance that was sure to win the confidence of all who witnessed her.

That was if the outcome did not prove her a fool. At the same time, that outcome would reflect badly on him and any injury to her person would surely come with a requisite cost. It was a move that cost her little unless it killed her outright. Politically, any lesser costs would be shouldered by Ray as the Commander of the battalion.

As much as he was irked by the fact that she had deftly outmanoeuvred him, that same manoeuvre demanded respect. It was also far more aggressive than a noblewoman’s typical behaviour and he would have to recalculate his tactics when it came to her.

“Have you fought these before, Sergeant?”

“Owlbears? Yeah – real nasty beasties.”

Ray nodded at the Sergeant’s reply. As someone who focused on his vocation as a Commander, Ray’s exposure to direct combat was minimal. He had gone from the Imperial Magic Academy to the Imperial Military Academy and entered the Imperial Army on the back of his promising performance as a student of strategy. Needless to say, this focus on Command meant that he was either behind a desk or behind an army and his experience with the patrols that encountered wilderness threats was minimal.

That he had little in the way of martial valour was not a point of shame for Ray: he positioned himself in the place where he would be the most effective, and that was that.

Now that he knew what they were up against, he could refer to what he had learned from his studies and reviewed in reports. An Owlbear was a Magical Beast and adults were at minimum a Difficulty Rating 36 target by the measures of the region’s Adventurer Guilds. This meant that a commission involving an Owlbear was considered one that required a Gold-rank Adventurer team to tackle with reasonable expectations for success.

The piercing roar of the Owlbear filled the air again as three of his men scurried out from behind the outcropping. Gold-rank Adventurers couldn’t survive in the Empire because the Imperial Army did their work. Ray’s bodyguard was a squad of men who could each match veteran Imperial Knights in strength, so dispatching an Owlbear would be a simple matter of execution.

“Get your men ready, Sergeant.”

“Yes, sir. Should we dismount?”

“Do it. Bonded mounts might be able to survive, but the regular ones won’t.”

As his men scurried in to rejoin their squad, Ray’s eyes widened as not one, but four Owlbears came into view. They immediately charged, red-rimmed eyes issuing frenzied glares over wickedly-sharp beaks. Scraps of refuse and broken tents went into the air as the Magical Beasts barreled straight towards them.

Were they all adults? They had to be. Each was larger than his warhorse and had a body like that of a large bear with its front half-covered in striped and spotted feathers. One was half again as large as the others…was it a male, or was it some strong variant?

All four were charging straight after the men that had come to the squad – at least until several arrows and bolts came from the side to strike the largest and the one closest to it. They slowed their charge and reared onto their hind legs, turning to regard Lady Zahradnik’s bodyguard with crazed looks on their owl-like faces. The taller of the two was four metres in height, but Ray couldn’t spare any further attention as the remaining pair closed within a metre of the line of men ahead of him.

“Brace!” The Sergeant called out.

“「Fortress」!”

“「Fortress」!”

A few more calls of the Defensive Art went up as the Magical Beasts slammed into the rank of men. The air seemed to shudder from the impact and the line held, yet the massive forms pressing the soldiers made losses seem inevitable.

“Bennet,” Ray called out, “do you have a way to disable one of them?”

The Cleric of the Earth God raised his holy symbol high.

“「Sunlight」!”

Ray shielded his eyes as a flash of intense light flared over the shoulders of his men. The ear-piercing cries of the Owlbears sounded in response. He winced at how loud they were from several metres away.

The blinding spell didn’t give them a moment’s pause; in fact, the Owlbears seemed to grow all the more enraged. Paws as wide as a man’s chest ripped across the rank with knife-like claws that looked as long as his forearm. Spears from men who weren’t desperately trying to defend themselves jabbed in.

“Bennet! Did that work?”

“One of them is blind, but I sure can’t tell the difference!”

The Cleric drew his mace, pointing it over the heads of the struggling men.

“My Lord, Oh God of Earth, bestow your divine providence upon the battlefield! 「Prayer」!”

A surge of divine favour filled him as Bennet’s spell burst forth over the surroundings. The men’s attacks became sharper; their opponents’, less so.

“My Lord, Oh God of Earth, may courage guide the strong arm of your devoted warriors! 「Bless」!”

Even with divine magic fortifying his men, the Owlbears still appeared a dire threat. They were a mass of feathers, claws and unbridled rage, seemingly lashing out at random. The men struggled to defend themselves against sudden attacks that tore gashes in steel breastplates forged by the Empire’s finest armoursmiths. Ray examined each, trying to determine which one had been blinded.

『Focus on the right! It isn’t blind! Sergeant – help handle the other one.』

The men shifted according to Ray’s instructions, pressing in with their spears to topple one of their towering foes. A loud clank, followed by the screech of claws on metal sounded from the side.

“M’lady, this thing’s damn angry!”

“That’s fine – they’re always angry.”

Tempted as he was to see what was going on, Ray continued to focus on his end. The Owlbear on the right was soaked in blood from dozens of deep wounds, yet still flailed about with no less energy than before. Its thrashing caused a Scorching Ray spell to miss; Totre cursed and switched to the more reliable Magic Arrow.

Three of the men were on the ground and Bennet was tending to one of them. In seconds that seemed like minutes, their first enemy succumbed to its wounds and collapsed.

The men were visibly exhausted, but they were only half done.

『Good job! Don’t let up yet, there’s one mo–』

“Fuck! Let go of me you–!”

Ray turned his head just in time to see the Sergeant lifted in a brutal bear hug. Oblivious to the spears jabbing into it, the second Owlbear brought its head down and crushed the man’s full helm in its beak. As if squeezing an overripe fruit, streams of blood spilt out from under the helmet and over the man’s plate armour.

The soldiers faltered at the grisly death of their officer and, as if it wasn’t enough, the Owlbear twisted its neck and ripped the Sergeant’s head off before dropping back down to all fours. It immediately turned to send a savage swipe at another man nearby. He went flying into one of the crude tents left behind by the Demihuman tribe. Cries of panic rose from the men as the hulking Magical Beast hurtled forward in another devastating charge.

“Over here, ya crazy sow!”

A soldier with a shield nearby received the Owlbear’s charge with Fortress. An arrow sprouted from the Magical Beast’s flank and more soldiers came from behind the brave infantryman to surround their foe.

Ray relaxed as the remaining Owlbear was put down with no further fatalities, letting out a breath as his gaze crossed over the camp. It was then that he realised that the fighting was over and all four Owlbears had been slain: the soldier that had received the final charge of the second Owlbear had been one of the men from the Baroness’ bodyguard.

Roughly fifty metres to the right, the largest Owlbear lay in a bloody heap. The second one was lying against the base of a tree, its head and shoulders feathered with arrows. A Ranger was perched on a branch overhead, looking down tentatively as if unsure whether the thing was dead or not.

“Your Excellency.”

Baroness Zahradnik approached from the direction of her men, though Ray hadn’t noticed her with them as he scanned the aftermath. Her exquisitely crafted equestrian uniform remained spotless and she seemed entirely unfazed from witnessing the bloody battle.

“My lady,” Ray nodded. “Are you alright?”

“Yes, thank you,” she replied. “How will you be proceeding?”

Ray took inventory of the situation. His men nearby were lying down or otherwise trying to catch their breath while Bennet went around tending to the long backlog of wounds that had accumulated during the fight. Lady Zahradnik’s bodyguard had returned to gather around the large Owlbear, chatting excitedly between themselves. One of the men was showing off a tower shield furrowed with claw marks. The Ranger in the tree dropped down to join them.

What’s with this difference…

“Did you know the Sergeant well?”

The question drew him from his frustrated thoughts.

“Not personally,” he replied, “but he was a man with a good record. Since he was close to making Captain, I had him lead my bodyguard under the notion that being exposed to greater responsibility would be good for him.”

It went without saying that the promotion to Captain while serving Ray directly would encourage the man to be personally loyal to him. Every soldier in his bodyguard was hand-picked for similar reasons. They were all capable, yet still unrecognised and would see Ray as their benefactor when they were finally knighted or received other honours.

While not precisely a debacle – in fact, the battle only having a single fatality was exceptional considering their opponents – Ray saw it as a stain on his reputation. Direct service to General Ray needed to be seen as a sure route to honour and glory, not an early grave. While his entire battalion could be said to be built on that principle, losses were to be expected and the idea that one could die would always be ‘someone else’ in his forces.

“That’s a shame,” Lady Zahradnik said. “Captains are the lynchpin of the Imperial Army – the death of one is a major loss.”

“Why Captains in particular, my lady?”

“It’s just the way it is, isn’t it?” The Baroness replied, “Human society needs a certain degree of security and stability to develop into true civilisation. Trying to build anything without strength simply results in it being taken away. In our history, it was those of strength who assumed positions of leadership that others gathered around to lay the foundation of Re-Estize. They were the original Nobles of Humanity: today, we call them ‘martial Nobles’.

“Shortly after the Empire’s successful rebellion against Re-Estize, they established the Imperial Army. The martial nobility saw this as the natural ‘evolution’ of their role: a place where even their spares could create a future for themselves. Frontier Nobles and their Sergeants over armed retinues became Imperial Captains and their Companies. This conversion – or perhaps adoption – of tradition was the catalyst that led to the officer corps of today’s Imperial Army.

“I do not know whether it was by accident or the product of visionaries in the past, but the Empire took something natural and essential to Human society and formalised it; turned it into an institution that serves as the pillar of a nation. As a nation and its army grows, it of course produces Commanders and eventually Generals, but they serve no purpose without the Captains and their Companies. As an institution, the Imperial Army has even progressed to the point where they can reliably raise officers without requiring them to be martial Nobles first.

“Ultimately, Human militaries revolve around their Captains. Humans cannot physically compare to many other races in the world but Captains both reinforce their men on the front lines and stand out as soldiers strong enough to face those threats on behalf of their subordinates, just like their predecessors of old. If a Captain is lost in such a situation, you can expect everything to fall apart from there.”

The Baroness sent a pointed look towards where the fallen Sergeant lay under a cloth shroud. As a Noble and a student of the Imperial Magic Academy, he was well aware of the Empire’s history but Lady Zahradnik’s interpretation of why things were the way they were made assertions that were entirely against the Empire’s system of values.

It all pointed to her background as a Noble of Re-Estize. The Nobles of Re-Estize – indeed, many Nobles of Baharuth still thought the same way – unironically believed in the virtue of their ‘Noble blood’ as if it imparted some mystical properties to their offspring and was the root of anything of any value in society. The Empire’s institutions, however, disproved those antiquated beliefs.

People could become anything they wanted to with sufficient resources, training and will. If something didn’t work out for them, they could always try something else. Deterministic beliefs spoke only of the lazy and useless dregs of society seeking excuses for why things were the way they were. He supposed that the Baroness also attributed her lineage to her enviable position.

“That’s a thought-provoking perspective, my lady,” Ray decided there was no merit in arguing her views. “Considering what happened here, I’ll be sure to make changes to–”

“M’lady!”

They turned at the sound of a breathless man from the Baroness’ bodyguard. He and several others each bore a cloth bundle in their arms.

“You must have charged off to check faster than you would have on horseback,” Lady Zahradnik smirked.

“Place stunk like a warehouse fulla rotten meat,” the man replied, “but they were there like you said they’d be.”

“What did you find?”

Ray eyed the bundles curiously. Varyn shifted his burden and raised the cloth laid over it, revealing an ovoid object speckled with black and brown spots.

“Owlbear eggs,” the Cavalier grinned.

“This was just the sort of incentive you were looking for,” Lady Zahradnik said, “wasn’t it, Your Excellency?”