It was late at night when the report reached Cru.

　'That little bastard!

　Hearing the news of Kailas' defeat, Kryu's face turned red and he shouted at him.
　The fist that Kryu swung down caused a crack to appear on the desk.

　Seeing his subordinate frightened, Kryu calmed down.

　(According to the report, Rosais' army consisted of nine thousand infantry and four thousand five hundred cavalry. ) To this, four thousand of the Carlo faction would be assembled, making 13,000 infantry and four thousand five hundred cavalry. In total, 17,500. Meanwhile, we have twenty-eight thousand infantry and two thousand cavalry. Total, 30,000. (Are we superior in numbers...)

　Then Kryu turns his attention to the enemy's holed-up walls.
　They will fall in three days.

　But in three days, the enemy will come.
　And if that happens, Roselle's army will be pinned down.

　There were two options.
　The first is to retreat once and get into position.
　The disadvantage of this strategy is that it would allow the enemy to join us. The enemy force would be equal to Roselle's.

　The other is to leave some troops behind and let them continue to attack the castle, while Kryu fights King Rosais in a decisive battle. A two-fronted strategy.
　The disadvantage of this strategy is that it disperses the troops.

　Considering that the number of troops holed up is 10,000, we still have to leave at least 10,000 of them behind.
　This would still mean fighting an enemy with an army equal to Roselle's.

　Either way, it's still troublesome.



　''Considering the presence of the enemy in the background, is the former better.......''
　It's not the best, but it's the next best thing.

　Once they decide that, we'll be ready to talk.

　Tell them to get ready to leave.







　"Oh, I'm sleepy...

　Alice walked on the roof, rubbing her sleepy eyes.
　Every night she invaded the royal capital of King Domorgal's country and carried out a series of assassinations.

　Originally, she had targeted the centurion class, but lately she had been killing common soldiers.
　It's because the security has been tightened.

　So far, the enemy hasn't realized that the assassin, Alice, is coming from outside the city walls every night.
　It's probably because common sense tells us that it's impossible to imagine anyone being able to climb the high walls of the city without a ladder.

　The enemy believes that there is a traitor inside, and they keep their eyes on the inside.
　Therefore, the degree of difficulty in getting past the city walls is the same as the first day.

　The number of soldiers Alice can kill is about three per day.
　Since she has to take advantage of the moment when the soldiers are relaxed, it will take her a long time to kill even one of them.

　If it's a one-off assassination, there's no problem with moving flamboyantly, but.......
　This assassination is done in order to mentally corner the enemy.

　That's why it needs to be repeated over and over again, and the assassin named Alice can't be recognized as coming from the outside.

　''Does this make sense?''

　Alice muttered as she looked at the moon shining in the night sky.
　The original plan was for Alice to kill the soldiers on guard, and then take down the walls in a night raid while she was there.

　The suggestion was Aldo Domorgal.

　But this was rejected by Cru.
　According to him, it was unlikely to succeed.

　Rather than taking such a gamble, it would be much more effective to continue the humble assassination.
　Kryu said.

　Needless to say, Alice was beaten up by Aldo, who was offended afterwards.

　'Well, all right. I'll do my job well.''

　Alice takes aim at the soldier far ahead.
　The soldier puts his palm to his mouth and makes a big missing move.

　Alice closed the distance in an instant.

　''Huh?''
　Good night.

　One poor soldier is dead.







　Alice!　You're back at last!　You're late!

　Aldo Domorgal yelled at him in a bad mood.
　As of late, Aldo has always been in a bad mood.

　This is because Aldo's proposals have been exhaustively rejected by Kryu.

　He is the King of Domorgal, and he is the greatest of all of them.
　So why should I be despised?

　Aldo thinks that he is the best of all, so why should he be despised?

　Today, however, he looked even more pissed off.

　'What is wrong with you?
　'The guy from Cru said he was going to pull out!　If we don't, we'll allow the enemy to join us!
　'Huh...'

　Since Alice doesn't understand the art of warfare, she couldn't quite understand why Aldo was angry.
　But considering the structure of Aldo's rejection of Kryu's idea, Kryu's decision to retreat was probably the right one.

　''Ah!　Disgusting!　If we don't, our throne will be far away from us!

　Aldo's fist goes to Alice's face.
　Alice stares at it with cold eyes.

　With Alice's kinetic vision, Aldo's fist appears to stop.
　But Alice never tries to avoid it. This is because there is no option to avoid it.

　''Aldo-sama. Are you ready?''

　Aldo's fists stopped.
　Aldo opened the door in a hurry.

　'This is Lord Merlin!　Yes, sir. I'm ready to go.

　Aldo runs up to Mari with a smile.
　His expression was torn and his cheeks were flushed.

　The observant ones would think that Aldo was in love with Mari.

　But Alice doesn't see it that way.

　Alice, who is usually with Aldo, can see it.
　The fact that Aldo's eyes are empty.

　From a witch who has lived for hundreds of years, it doesn't seem to matter that she sets up a young man who doesn't even have a single sorcerer's guard in the arts.

　(Well, what does it matter to me?)

　If Aldo ordered her to kill Mari, Alice would kill her in an instant.
　But she didn't accept such an order.

　For better or worse, Alice is passive and has no will of her own.





　''Carlo-sama!　It's hard!
　What's up?　Do you have that kind of blood on your hands?

　Carlo turned his gaze towards the soldiers who had entered without knocking.
　Carlo was planning his future strategy together with Bartolo, Tonino and Rene.

　'Roselle's army is gone!　And a note from King Almus by hawk mail!

　The messenger handed Carlo a friendly letter from Almus.
　Carlo broke the seal, took out the letter and looked it over.

　'What does it say?'
　Bartolo leaned forward.

　Carlo grinned and replied.

　'I hear they'll be arriving this way soon.

　'Really!　That means the siege is over....
　Rene reclined back in his chair.
　As a civil servant, the siege must have been a great burden on René.


　''The problem is my neck. Whether or not it will be properly connected tomorrow...''







　You're finally here.

　Towering in front of me is the royal capital of King Domorgal's country.
　Cracks and crumbling in places indicate the intensity of the battle.

　"We thank you for your help, King Armes.

　Carlo Domorgal steps forward in front of me and bows his head lightly.
　It was a sign of the power relationship between the two sides.

　In this world, countries are never equal to each other.
　The king of a small country inevitably needs to play down to the king of a large country.

　'Never mind that. I hope you don't mind, Mister Carlo. Let's help each other out, friend to friend.
　I'll take the territory as a friend fee, though.

　After me and Carlo finished greeting each other, Bartolo stepped forward and came out.

　Bartolo knelt in front of me and bowed deeply.

　'My King. I am responsible for this defeat, for misjudging the enemy's strength. I am prepared to face any punishment.
　Well....

　I take a deep breath and lower my voice.

　'Bartolo Pompeius. "Bartolo Pompeius, you are largely responsible for the recent defeat. And for that, I ask you to bear the responsibility.
　Yes, sir. I understand, sir.
　"You'll be my right hand man. You will be responsible for winning the next battle.
　?

　Bartolo has a surprising look on his face.
　He must have thought there was something more to it.

　''Victory and defeat are the norm for soldiers. If we judged every time we lost, there would be no more generals in our country. If you have violated military discipline, broken orders, or committed treason, we will judge you without mercy. But I will not question your defeat. I'm responsible for it, but I'm not guilty of it.

　I mean, I'm the one who left it up to Bartolo.
　If Bartolo is guilty, then I'm guilty too, right?

　I smiled.

　'Did you think he was going to kill you?'
　'No, not that much but I was prepared to reduce the territory.

　No, what's in it for me by cutting down your territory, which is my side, what's in it for me?
　Well, if you feel that much responsibility, it's not a problem.

　Bartolo. The next battle will avenge your humiliation. I want our men back together again at once!
　Yes!


　Well, next up is General Kryu.
　This time, this one is less numerous, but it has enough explosive spears.

　I don't know what this hairy monster is, but...
　I'm going to have to deal with my first kill on my first kill.