Located in the southern part of Ximengsi Continent, Oran City, the capital city of Owles Kingdom, faced an unprecedented crisis as the Augusta Empire’s vanguard army attacked the city walls. Although there were only a bit over a thousand enemy soldiers, the number of defenders was even less than the original hundred soldiers who had stayed behind as the royals had fled. Upon seeing the wave of Augusta Empire’s Black Knights charging toward them, many who had never experienced war simply tossed aside their flimsy chest plates and weapons and fled. Now, the defenders atop the wall numbered two.
“Really! These cowards are all just useless goods!”
“Big Brother Clyde, aren’t you alone enough? If those useless teammates had stayed behind, they would have just been a burden.”
“Lucifer, I think you too could take care of this alone.”
“That’s impossible. Fighting, killing—I don’t like such things.”
Clyde looked at the smiling Lucifer leaning on the city wall beside him. He absolutely didn’t agree with her; that this bloodkin Lolita didn’t like to fight and kill was absolutely a lie. It was impossible for an existence of her level to be peace-loving and live freely beneath the sunlight. After all, that time when they had met for the first time, a squad of Light Church had been chasing her. Although Clyde still didn’t know the reason for that, he knew enough to suspect that something about her was incredibly valuable, enough so that she’d have to kill to protect herself.
Augusta Empire’s vanguard of Black Knights quickly rushed over, and the worn-out city gate of Oran City simply crumpled beneath their onslaught. The first war-horse directly rammed it and broke through, rearing in the square just behind the splintered gate. Clyde casually grabbed a dropped sword, jumped down from above the city gate and met the enemy head-on. He didn’t know any martial skills, so he simply hacked at the enemy.
When the Black Knights’ war-horses approached Clyde, although they had undergone rigorous training, they were still so scared by his mysterious power that they collapsed and died, their mouths frothing in terror. The Black Knights who were caught unprepared directly fell down from the war-horses. Seeing their sprawled forms, Clyde took advantage of their vulnerability and quickly walked over before slamming his sword down. However, since their black armor belonged to the heavy armor category, the sword he brandished shattered upon striking their formidable armor. Amid the sound of breaking steel, not a scratch was left on that polished black armor.
“This level of weapon can’t cut through our armor, fool! You… cough cough!”
“What did you say? I couldn’t hear.”
Clyde threw the sword’s hilt away and directly punched the knight, interrupting his mockery. A bloody hole appeared on the speaking Black Knight’s chest, and he died on the spot, unable to complete his sentence. Upon seeing this, the other Black Knights were stunned. The armor they wore could easily block arrows shot from even general-level crossbows, yet this fellow could actually pierce through their black armor with his bare hands. His fighting power was too abnormal!
While the Black Knights were absent-mindedly digesting the frightening event, Clyde swung his fists around and attacked all the knights within his range, killing quite a few Black Knights before they could move. Because the city gate was not too big, only one or two people could pass through at a time, and none could enter since Clyde had blocked the only path into the city. In this situation, the Black Knights were unable to display the advantage of their superior numbers and were forced to fight Clyde one-on-one. Soon, a dozen or so Black Knights had died in Clyde’s hands. The path through the destroyed city gate was quickly littered with the corpses of Black Knights and became even more crowded, making fighting Clyde even more difficult.
“Damn, this fellow is at least a S-ranked mercenary. Quickly retreat! We’ll enter the city from different directions. He can’t block everywhere.”
Upon seeing that they couldn’t break in via the city gate, they turned around to retreat, planning to smash through the wall in multiple places so Clyde wouldn’t be able to react. Unfortunately, their decision to retreat was a little too late. From the city wall, Lucifer launched a magic attack. With a roar, a ball made up of strange bright-red flames fell from the sky. That fireball seemed to have consciousness and automatically flew toward the fleeing Black Knights. Upon contact, those Black Knights would burn on the spot, leaving only their wails of pain behind as their ashes floated down.
“Retreat! They have a magician! Retreat!”
Captain Kroh, the commander of Black Knights, found that the battle’s situation was going south and immediately issued the order to retreat. Realizing that the army was starting to unify beneath his words, Clyde pinpointed the position of this commander and secretly stared at him: the unfortunate Captain Kroh immediately exploded on the spot. The other Black Knights didn’t even know how that had happened to their captain, they only saw the effect—a mutilated bloody corpse and shards of their captain’s shiny armor shooting through the air.
Augusta Empire’s vanguard army was defeated. Captain Kroh was inexplicably killed in a flash. A hundred knights had died, but they had been unable to capture even the perimeter wall of Oran City or kill a single enemy. When the report reached Princess Ophelia’s hand, she was unable to make heads or tails of this. The opposite side had had only two people defending the city, but they had repelled the army of over a thousand soldiers; moreover, even the captain had been killed. She glanced at the messenger who had handed the report to her. Eyeing him up and down, she wondered whether this was a joke as she tried to ignore the shock that was sinking into her.
“Your Highness the Princess, Oran City has a magician defending it. In addition, there is also a S-ranked mercenary. If we add some troops to our attacking force and attack again…”
“That girl Seras shouldn’t have the money to hire a magician and a S-ranked mercenary. Make the vanguard army return and launch a surprise attack on Michelson Fortress instead. We should defeat Adrian Empire as quickly as possible before circling back to clean up Owles Kingdom.”
Princess Ophelia pondered for a while and decided to temporarily give up on attacking Oran City. Owles Kingdom was just a small country, and there was something strange about it. Recently, she’d been losing soldiers left and right, including her elite assassin guard. Furthermore, the expeditionary army of “Pure White Kingdom” Winifred Empire was almost here. If they didn’t defeat Adrian Empire as quickly as possible, her entire battle plan would fail. At that time, faced with the unfavorable situation of fighting a battle on two fronts, Augusta Empire would have to withdraw its troops, allowing themselves to be heckled along their retreat by the vengeful Adrian and Winifred soldiers.
In Oran City, Clyde and Lucifer finally obtained a free place in which to stay: Owles Kingdom’s imperial palace. Unfortunately, the imperial palace was truly plain and simple without a bit of decent decoration. After all, when the king had fled, he’d taken all the more valuable pieces with him. What made them even more speechless was that even the housekeepers, maids and servants weren’t present. Princess Seras alone was responsible for this big place. This place was no match even for the mansions of the lower nobles.
“Honestly, I am very embarrassed. Since there’s no money in the treasury, I cannot even afford to pay the soldiers’ salaries right now, but I will absolutely think of a way to pay you.”
“Big Sister Saras, you don’t have to be so tense. As long as we have a place to stay, it’s enough.”
Princess Saras gave the room that had originally belonged to the king to Clyde and Lucifer because they were the saviors of the kingdom. As for herself, she slept outside. Clyde was not dissatisfied with this this kind-hearted and simple blonde princess. In any case, he hadn’t intended to charge her any money from the very beginning since she had offered to give them a place to stay even before she had known of their great prowess. Money didn’t have any big importance to him. After all, his current body didn’t need food to function smoothly.
“Lucifer, what is your purpose in making me help this kingdom? Don’t tell me it’s out of kindness. I don’t believe it.”
“Big Brother Clyde, can’t you be a little stupid? Fine, since this is the case, I guess that I’ll just explain it to you. Although I don’t know what kind of existence you are, don’t you wish to have the appearance of a regular human?”
“This… Of course, I wish for that!”
Lucifer detailed her plan to make Clyde have a normal appearance. As far as she knew, as long as he signed a dark contract with a human, he would transform and gain a human’s appearance. Clyde’s appearance as a Great Old One was honestly too terrifying. If he couldn’t gain a human appearance, he basically couldn’t let anyone else see his appearance in this different world. Otherwise, he’d either disgust them, or much more likely, kill them. For Lucifer’s objective, the innocent and pure Princess Saras was undoubtedly the best candidate. There was a great chance to coax her to sign the contract.
“Lucifer, you want to…”
“I want to help Big Brother Clyde! You don’t even need to thank me! Just act the part.”
