CHAPTER 7 - II -
The War Council this time was different compared to the last one that was held here. The most glaring difference was that Maddie was now with us, and she now led the discussion.
“Welcome, leaders of the Holy Coalition.” she greeted, “Please, have a seat.”
We all took our chairs. I had Griffyth come along with me, for he was acting as my second-in-command. Lily was also there, but she deferred to Maddie in leading the council. The other nobles were also with us, including the Duchess of Henristone.
“As you know, a grave threat has emerged after the outbreak of the war in Amaranth. From an Imperial invasion force, we now face an army of the undead, brought forth by the magic of the Saint of the Flame, Seirna. I put up a barrier to stop them, but alas, my powers are limited, for I am no god.”
“Your Holiness, so it is indeed true!” the Count of Brooke spoke, “Why would a saint do such a thing?”
“I don’t know myself, Your Excellency.” Maddie answered him, “For all I know, Lady Seirna had been against my policies from the start.”
Well, I guess I’ll have to talk to Maddie later about the reasons Seirna is doing that. It’s not bad to understand where your enemy is coming from, after all.
“So, for now, I’m asking you once again, you who have defied the odds and fought under my banner!” Maddie pleaded, “Will you please fight for me once again?”
The nobles never wavered at their determination in fighting for their beloved Saint. However, what they wanted now were directions.
“Your Holiness, if I may ask…” the Duchess of Henristone stood up, “How do we fight this undead? My men told me they tried to behead these monsters, but they keep on coming at them!”
At that moment, I knew Maddie had no answer to her question. She tried to exorcise them, but Seirna’s magic prevented her from succeeding. I decided to enter the conversation.
“You simply can’t.” I said, “It’s impossible to defeat an enemy who’s not afraid to die and with a saint spawning those.”
“What made you say that Sir Kuro?” the Count of Brooke, who was getting emotional, asked me, “Please don’t lie to us! My family’s safety is at stake here!”
“I…” I was about to admit that I came from another world. But I hesitated and turned to Maddie. She just gave me a nod. With her permission now granted, I revealed to them, “You may not believe this…but I am a person from another world.”
“Huh?”
“This is getting complicated.”
The Prince of Stadtsberg only whistled.
“It’s true.” Maddie backed me up, “I summoned Sir Kuro here.”
“So, Sir Kuro is a hero?” the Count of Tillie suddenly became excited, “Like the legendary Cassandra David?”
“No, I’m not.” I corrected him, “For one, Her Holiness summoned me by accident. And second, I have no supernatural powers to save you. I’m just an ordinary human.”
An air of defeatist sentiments floated in the War Room. I could tell that their hopes were dashed when I told them about my limitations.
Well, sorry I got your expectations up.
But then again, I won’t allow to leave something unfinished, “Your Excellencies, please listen to me! Even though I’m an ordinary person from another world, isn’t that I could lead our armies to victories against the formidable legionnaires of the Empire?”
“Of course, we won’t forget that fact.” the Duke of Greene spoke, “So, what do you want to say here, Sir Kuro?”
“I’ll give you another victory once again.”
“Hmm…such brave words, Sire.” the Duchess of Henristone commented.
“No, it’s not just brave words, Your Excellency.” I countered, “I told you I’m from another world, and coincidentally, that world knows how to defeat these beings.”
“Oooh…” I could tell everyone’s ears were on me once they heard my statement.
“First, that undead is called a ‘zombie’ in my world. It may seem weak in few numbers, but in hordes, it can be deadly. I don’t know how Seirna did it, but based on my observations back in Gebrei, it transfers her undead magic by its bite. And most of you have seen how those creatures don’t care for their lives.”
“They’re undead, Kuro.” Griffyth reminded me.
“Right…” there was an awkward silence, but then I continued, “Second, it mostly moves following the direction of the sounds.”
“And? What about it?”
“So, we can turn those to our advantage.”
“How?” it was Maddie who asked.
“Well, we have options on how to defeat those monsters.” I explained, “One way is to incinerate them.”
“Hmm…I haven’t thought of that until now.” Maddie quipped.
“Of course. No one wanted to turn into ashes those people whom we considered friends once. But please remember that those aren’t your family and loved ones anymore. The quicker we ‘kill’ them, the better for their souls.”
“Yes!”
“Second, we could use traps to immobilize those creatures. Aside from their bites, they could also run, so we should remove its mobility.”
“We could use the wind magic to slice at their feet!” the Earl of Yares suggested.
“Or deploy earth spikes.” the Duchess of Henristone added.
“Another way, of course, is to use warriors.” I turned to Lily, “Your Highness, this is where your skill ‘Bloodbath’ will be put into full use. All you need to do is to crush its head so that it can’t do anything to you. Then you may beat it to a bloody pulp.”
“But you said before that they can transfer their curse through bites.” Lily raised that point.
“Yep, and that could simply be countered by armor, especially to your limbs and shoulders. Those parts were the most susceptible to bites.” I couldn’t help but get amused at those movies that always portrayed a zombie apocalypse as something unsolvable. A simple set of armor and flamethrowers in capable hands could end that kind of tragedy.
“So, what should we do then, Sir Kuro?”
“We’re going to combine the magicians, traps, and warriors in the attack.” I asked Lily for a pen and paper and began drawing, “We’ll attract those zombies using the marching sounds of the men. We’ll advance slowly, as the magicians incinerate the zombies from afar, building a literal flame wall. As this undead is running, it might go past the flame barriers and attack the defenseless magicians. For this, we deploy the traps, shield-bearers, and warriors, in that order. They will take care of the zombies that would go past the flames.”
“How about magic barriers?”
“Well, if we could afford extra magicians to cast that, it will be a nice addition to our army’s defense. Otherwise, we need to concentrate on our attacks, since the undead would be relentless in their assault. Remember, those creatures don’t care about its ‘lives’ anymore, so it’d literally throw itself against our defenses.”
“Sounds plausible.” the Count of Tillie commented, “However, I think we’ll need an army of magicians for this strategy to work.”
“Uhh…we lost a lot of magicians in the Battle of Gebrei and the undead attack after that.” Griffyth revealed, “Notwithstanding, we lost another substantial number in Dawson Valley, during our feigned retreat.”
“We’ll need the support of the other surviving kingdoms if we’re to defeat this threat, and fast.” the Duke of Greene calculated.
“As for the financial problem, I got this taken care of, courtesy of the generous support from the Duchess of Braunhauer,” Maddie said.
“The Duchess of Braunhauer?” the Duke of Greene exclaimed, “W-Well, that would take care of a lot.”
“However, the other kingdoms are refusing to lend their men to us.” the Duchess of Henristone revealed, “They claim they needed them to defend their land.”
“Ugh…they always do that.” Lily could only scratch her head in disgust, “And when everything’s back to normal, these kings would be the ones to claim the credit.”
“Whether for their glory, our concern should be the welfare of the people.” Maddie reiterated, “We should send emissaries to the kings to ask for their support; tell them we’ll buy those if we must. Let’s see how would they respond if it’s their Saint who asked them.”
“Okay, then Your Holiness.” Lily took down her orders, “We shall send envoys right away.”
