----East Gate SIDE

　This was a bad idea. The zombies are moving too fast. The plan was to use ranged magic to deal a massive blow to the attacking zombies, and then have Tenma move in as an attacker.

"Merlin, the zombies are on the move again. "Merlin, the zombies are on the move again.

　There are more of them. It's a good way to save magic if they're still coming at you all at once.

I'll fire three rounds of Firestorm, then ignore the dying ones and fire a few arrows at the less-damaged zombies.

　As he said this, he fired his Firestorm at a crowd of zombies. But I've only managed to kill about a thousand of them.

(This isn't good, even though it's still more than six hours before sunrise.

　In front of me, the zombies attacked me as if they didn't care enough to reduce the number of zombies by a thousand.

　More and more zombies are reaching the fence, you still have some magic power, but you'll run out of energy before they do.

The smoke is obscuring your vision, so be careful where you shoot!

　This time, I give them instructions while firing a series of 10 air blitzes. The magic power of the remaining wizards here could be in danger.

''The wizards need to rest a bit and drink the magic potion!

　He released a few wind cutters where the other magic had stopped. The smoke was dispersed by the wind that rolled up, but the number of zombies that appeared didn't seem to change much.

'Leave the smaller zombies to the golems! Concentrate your arrows on the medium and large zombies and deal damage!

　Smaller zombies would quickly come to the fence due to their large numbers and relatively fast movement, but they would easily die in the aftermath of a magic attack or a blow from a golem. When it came to medium-sized and larger zombies, they wouldn't fall without a certain amount of damage directly to their heads.

''The number of medium-sized and larger zombies has increased considerably.

　Just as Merlin said, in the beginning there were only the occasional medium-sized one among the small ones, but now it's become like 6 small and 4 medium-sized or larger.
　The number has not increased, but has not decreased either, and there are always about 3,000 of them coming slowly towards us.

　At this time, a large fire pillar rises at the north gate and lights up the vicinity of the fort.

"Enemy attack?
What was that?
Is the North Gate safe?

　One after another, voices rose from the area. Some of them were screaming that it was the enemy's new move.

'Calm down! That pillar of fire must be Temma's magic attack!

　He explained to the people around him, but the commotion didn't quite subside.

''Merlin-sama, no matter how much Tenma can use advanced magic, I've never heard of magic like that!

　One of the wizards speaks to me in an exaggerated voice.

I am certain that this is Temma. "This is definitely Temma," he says, "and her magic is even greater than Ciria's. I'm sure she is no match for me in terms of talent alone. It's not only that, they've already perfected some original magic at that age. I believe that this is one of them.

　I explained to them. Everyone was skeptical at his words, but they were delighted to hear that Tenma had used his magic to nearly decimate the zombies that had gathered at the north gate, about four thousand of them, and headed for the west gate. They were screaming with joy at the news that the



---- South Gate SIDE----.

　The south gate has about seven thousand zombies swarming about four to five hundred meters away.

''What's going on with the zombies over here!

　At Ricardo's question, Ciria glared at the zombies crawling out of the forest.

No significant activity so far, which is creepy.

　I replied with a difficult look on my face.

'You're a zombie, you're supposed to be creepy.

　And Ricardo spoke in a deliberately light tone, but Shelia kept a serious face.

No, I'm not saying it's creepy, I'm saying it's acting weird. It's just that it stays still, like it's waiting for something.

　He replied back. Indeed, the zombies seem to be deliberately keeping their distance from us, even though quite a few of them are coming out of the forest.

What do you think that something is?

I don't know, but it must be bad for us.

　As I was talking to him, I saw a series of magical sounds and lights coming from the east gate.

A simultaneous invasion of the East Gate!

　And then Ricardo was ready, but the zombies didn't move, which was a bit of a letdown for Ricardo.

Surely this is spooky.

　And I agree with Shelia's hunch.

'Shelia, is your magic okay?'

Yeah, I had a potion earlier, so I'm almost full.

　As I was talking to them, the zombies began to slowly move forward.

'What at all is going on with the zombie's thought process?

Well, why doesn't he call at the same time as the east gate? Well, that's what makes it so creepy.

　The two men begin to act in some puzzling ways.

'The wizards, line up side by side and release the fireball on my signal, the warrior group will stand by.

　I'll give them instructions. When the zombie gets close to about 200 meters.

Let go!

　Ricardo's signal was given. The wizards released their magic to go with it.

I'll continue, this time aim further ahead than before. I'm not going to be able to get to the top.

　With that said, he gives the signal five times. With that, I succeed in killing nearly 2000 zombies.

'I hope it ends up being a simple task.

　Ricardo muttered. Shelia heard that.

That would be nice. It's a long shot.

　I cut them off. All the while, the zombies stepped over the corpses of their friends and came towards them.

''We'll use the same tactics as before, let go!

　The zombies are still in dense formation, heading for the gate.

　They release magic, slaughter zombies, take a breath, and drink a potion every now and then. After killing more than 10,000 zombies, it's halfway through the process when a message arrives for Ricardo.

"What, a swarm of zombies to the north and west!

　The same thing happened over and over again, and when my senses were paralyzed, I was suddenly taken by surprise.
　The amount of confusion around them was great as they had been led to believe that normal zombies couldn't possibly take such a battle strategy.

'Tell them to send out the wizards and warriors waiting to the north and west immediately!

　He was about to give the order immediately, but he quickly changed his instructions when he was told by Merlin that the messenger had asked him to send a message to send the waiting wizard to the west, since Tenma was on his way to the north.

'Head north only to the warriors! All wizards in waiting are going west!

　At Ricardo's instruction, the waiting group immediately began to move.

''Ciria, do you think you can send our wizard over here to that?

　I asked him, but Shelia told me

'Impossible, the zombies were going for this. It's picking up speed.

　It came back to me. The zombies had been in a dense formation a while ago, but now they are heading towards us with a gap in between.

'So the attack just now was an act?

'I hate to believe it, but it looks like it was. I can't believe that it was done on purpose and the siege operation was going on behind the scenes. Isn't this the first time in history that this has happened?

　And I'm jokingly saying that there's no room in my face for

I'm curious to see how far Temma can go, but...

　Ricardo let out a sigh of relief. But Shelia didn't sound so worried.

'I think that's okay. The boy has more magic than I do, and it looks like he's developed some original attack magic.

　I said, but Ricardo looked at him curiously.

How do you know that?

　He asked.

'She seemed to be hiding it, but sometimes she used magic of inexplicable power. Like Brit, she seemed to be very good at inventing and improving things we wouldn't have thought of.

　In fact, the Brit-type magic was something that Tenma had created and taught to Ciria and the others by imagining a pistol from the memories of his previous life. Besides that, he had also applied knowledge from his previous life to the magic, and when Ciria saw that, she thought it was the original.
　However, the only people who knew about it were Tenma himself and the gods, so it wasn't an exaggeration to say that it was original.

''It's just that I don't have much experience with it, so that's the only thing I'm worried about.

　While Ricardo thought that there was no longer the overprotectiveness towards Tenma that he had seen from Shelia lately, he was also a little jealous of Shelia for knowing something he didn't know about Tenma.

''Then let's just quickly annihilate the zombies here and go support Tenma!

Well, let's make that our goal.

　As Shelia replied while releasing the Firestorm, a large pillar of fire went up at the north gate.

''Hey, Shelia. Could that be Temma's magic?

　Suddenly, for a moment, the defenders of the south gate and the zombies stopped moving.

''Maybe it's not...''

　Shelia replies with a slightly drawn-out face.

''Hmm, Shelia! The zombies have stopped moving. Let's attack the magic while we're at it!

　With those words, Ciria unleashes five Firestorm shots in a row. The other wizards also follow suit, releasing a series of ball-type magic.

　It's not clear why, but the zombies that had stopped moving were slow to respond and fell one by one due to the magic. The number of them is more than 3,000.

''Okay, we've been dealt quite a blow!

　Most of the zombies that had come close to the gate were dead, and it seemed that a void had been created by a pockmarked blank space. At the same time, a pillar of fire went up at the west gate as well. A magic of that scale would have dealt quite a blow.
　Ricardo and the others were beginning to think that they would be able to survive if they went on like this.

　Until the next moment, from deep in the forest, a dim beam of light was released....