In a village in the central region near the western region.

"The tax during the time of harvest is 40%, the same for our county, but you guys have taken up battle expenses during the war, so as compensation I’ll have you offer a special tax for 3 years!"

Everyone screams in response to that announcement. 

"If we cannot rebuild our fields then we cannot offer the tax. Please grant us with some deferment!"

The old man who looks like the village chief desperately pleads to the acting official but his reaction is cold.

The knight, Gertrude Albright is looking at me in anger.

"Shut up! We are the officers of Margrave Sigismund Jagiellon."

The escort of the acting official kicks away the village chief.

"Listen! If you default on a payment then we can sell you guys off to retrieve the war expenses. So don’t crawl around here and get to work immediately!"

Gertrude seems to be losing at her edge. I have no choice but to unleash them. 

I draw my sword and run towards the group of soldiers. Gertrude and Mirai run past me.

While I am engaging an enemy, Gertrude smashes a man's head smashed open. In addition, she cut off the hand that is holding the sword, after giving her spear a spin, and several people fly back. The fortunate ones are able to stand back up after rolling around, but the unlucky ones crashed into the trees and die.

The intense thrust enters one of them through the chest, piercing through the leather armor, and the blade protrudes out from the other side. Gertrude overcomes the man, who is stabbed and is desperately grabbing the spear, and pulling it out of him. The man let out an agonizing cry of death before dancing in the air, causing blood to rain down on himself and on the companions around him.

There are five corpses around her feet and Mirai has killed two men. Their fighting spirit is vanishing.

The man sneakily circling behind me gets a huge spear thrust right through the front of his face, and his face disappears. It is Gertrude's. She is going to toss him back and return him to his friends below while he is still stabbed, but when she lifts him up, his head tore off and it becomes a mess. Well, are they still going to come?

In raw strength alone, Gertrude comes close to Irijina.

The soldiers are about to withdraw, but they spot Mirai who is close to me.

"Get that small one, use it as a shield!"

The men are approaching  Mirai.

Long swords are swung and war hammers are slammed down, but Mirai swiftly evades, and shadows stretch to all of the attackers and bind them.

"What is ..."

"I can't move.."

"My legs are.."

That's Shadow binding spell.

With Mirai’s arm strength, it is difficult to pierce through armor and to send heads flying. 

They can only fall and wait for someone to finish them off – a pathetic existence.

Just when Mirai is about to stab the necks of the four men static on the ground, a sword swung at her from behind. She instantly blocks it, but perhaps it is due to the difference in body size, she got pushed back. The four men are released from the magical binding. Seeing his chance, the man swings his sword, but she disappears.

"What?"

She instantly appears beneath his crotch.

"Tch-!　You bitch…………aaah……Aaaah………Aaaaaaaaah!!!"

Up until now, it is the loudest scream. Mirai’s short sword stabs the man’s crotch.

It looks like Mirai will be fine. When I shift my attention to Gertrude, as expected, she is rampaging against the four men released from the binding.

"Fuun-!　Sei-!"

As soon as they step forward, her sword digs into their chests and necks, and they fall down one by one.

One person grabs her blade and holds his companion who got stabbed by Gertrude. If the tip of the spear gets grabbed then you won’t be able to do anything. But he’s looking down on Gertrude.

"Uuuwaa!!"

Irijina lifts the sword along with the man who is grabbing it. Surprised, he let go of his hands in midair and a ferocious strike befell the sacrifice. Penetrating the chest along with the armor, the man was thrown away, getting impaled by the branches of a dead tree.

As I thought, she’s strong. She also has technique, but compared to an inept man, she has more arm strength.

My blade stabs the back of the head of the last man, and the soldiers are exterminated.

It's so tiring. If there is no one around, I might even stretch my shoulders.

I resist the urge to sigh and stride towards the villagers, followed by the two girls. Gertrude's every step is accompanied by the clanking of metal.

As I draw closer to them, I could clearly see the confusion and unease on the villagers' faces. 

It is not that they are not happy being saved from the aggressive knights, but frightened by the unknown fighters before them.

"You have been saved. Be at ease."

"You...you are.."

"We saw someone attacking this village, so we came to help."

"Oooooh!"

As the noises spill out, looks of relief dawn on the faces of the villagers. Even so, they could not be completely at ease.

My mind works like crazy to think of an excuse or reason.

"Sir.."

The old man's voice wakes me up from my pondering.

I got an idea. I take a pouch from my bag and show to them what's inside.

"Ooo...gold coins..."

"A lot of gold coins."

I can't hide my grin.

"I want to pay these gold to your village. But you need to so dome job for me."

Yes. Job. As our proxy and informer.

***