Sword, Magic and Academic Society

The actual defense border post of the Yuglia Kingdom’s northwest army was 5 kilometers away to the west of the ruins.

The members of the army had gathered here as Godorfun called for a strategic council, his face showed utmost seriousness despite the situation being nothing more than a practice drill.

“Never had I expected for someone to proactively push for impossible heights right when the conclusion was around the corner, and with their minds and bodies reaching their limits. I now see why he’s called the ‘walking anomaly’. Plus, he also has the support of his entire class despite this being nothing more than a reckless extra step…… I must say, their mentality is just out of the norm.”

What transpired a while ago had surpassed Tim’s logic and common sense.

“Fuhahaha! What you saw was the growth of youngsters and their determination. It’s not something we adults can imitate. But let’s look at our situation.

Now, you may be confused, but there’s a reason why we’re upping our game for the offense. I have been told by Allen Rovenne that they can easily repel the attack of the 4th troop of the Torveil army by themselves…… In that case, there’s no need to hold back and attack as if you’re facing an enemy. Understood?”

A vein popped up on the forehead of a knight donning a well-worn silvery armor. He was going to be the leader of the force that was going to raid the supposed defense post.

“Haaa? They’ll blow us out of the water?! Since when did trash have the gall to be so arrogant?! I’ll personally show that trash that the color of blood is red!”

“Now putting that aside, the enemy bases are placed in a rhombus pattern. On the top-most corner is the ruin, the defense post we were supposed to raid first. But now, there are three more teams placed on the remaining corners in an inverted triangle shape. Tim, what’s your opinion?”

Prompted by the question, Tim groaned.

"Hmm... I must say, it's remarkable. Each base is positioned in such a way that they can easily support each other, and even if one is captured, there's a risk of it being retaken. This forces the attackers to spread their forces thin. Unlike the ruin that’s in an open area, these bases are well-protected by natural terrain, making them easy to defend and difficult to attack.

However, if we try to advance while ignoring them in actual combat, we'd likely be pincered near the Mer Swamp by the troops at the ruin base and the border defense forces. As the attackers, we'd need to capture all of these strongholds before advancing.

...I would have never expected the task of repairing and fortifying the defense post in 72 hours would result in such an elaborate mountain fortress design... I must admit, I'm surprised by Bester's boldness. This outdoor class session has continued to amaze me with the hidden potential of the students you've nurtured, Sir."

“Fuhahaha. Well, it would be more correct to say that their growth has been prompted by their eagerness rather than due to my training…… I’m just as surprised as you are at the unexpected potential of Bester Von Stocklaud. ‘His charisma lies in his talent of finding out other people’s virtues’… is how Satowa had evaluated him, and this made me recall that.”

Godorfun reminisced, and then turned to the battalion leaders, throwing a question their way.

“Well then, young’uns. How will you tackle the enemy's defenses?”

One of the battalion leaders, the red-haired woman Elan, raised her hand.

“Yes! Frankly, with the disparity in our war potential, I would have pushed for a swift victory with a simultaneous attack…… but it smells like a trap, and we have no reason to push ourselves.

In that case, we should stick to the mountain warfare style and suppress our enemies in order starting from above. It's the sole stone-built base the enemies have, and there is a much more open space there for large forces to gather. By taking it down, there’ll be only makeshift bases left, and we should also get access to all of them without any risk. So we should capture that base and control it first, then use it as leverage for our raid.”

Godorfun squinted his eyes and nodded.

“...... Well, that is indeed the safest choice. But, while it becomes easier to access the other bases, you’ll also be hard-pressed to defend it…… However, given the difference in numbers, it might as well be for the best if the opponent is pressured to recapture it as it would be easier that way.”

“Leave the first assault to me! I’ll curb their arrogance so that it never appears again!”

The silver-armored Maxim proposed, striking the floor with his sheathed long sword.

“Very well, Maxim. I heard Stella Achilies is your niece, so I hope you don’t cut corners. Got it?”

“Naturally! Never have I held back in her training since her childhood!”

Following Maxim, Jipro, the blue-haired man and the last of the battalion leaders, then stated his opinion.

“The best trick our opponent can pull is raiding our logistic supply lines. But even a child can guess that much, so it may be a needless concern, but I’ll have two of my squads spread out in the locations as a precaution. It may be stacking too much against a mere 20 opponents even if they’re Class A, the elites of the Royal Academy, but we have surplus forces on our hands. This may be squandering our forces too much, but with enough preparation, it would simply earn us more time to react if something happens either way.”

They didn’t doubt that these kids, this band of geniuses, would become the kingdom's support in the future, but despite being amateurs with military warfare, they had the arrogance to look down on the army so much.

The three commanders had been quite infuriated inside their minds, but having clawed their way to reach the position of battalion commander through military exploits, none of them were foolish enough to let anger cloud their judgment.

Tim, who had seen through it all, once again felt the impossibility of this scenario.

◆

“Alright then, I have something to do that I couldn't do earlier due to my solo mission, so I’m heading west. Take care of everything here, Bester~.”

I was about to leave when Fey hurled a question toward me, a smile creeping on her face.

“Hold on, Allen. Why did you suddenly push for more forces? Looking at your sinister face, I bet you have some sort of plan, don’t you?”

What the hell did she mean by sinister face? I never once had that sort of expression, yeah.

But regardless of my opinion, my other classmates, with whom I had quite an alright friendship, also showed wry looks, seemingly agreeing with Fey’s statement.

“You probably need to have your eyes checked, how can you call a face as average as mine sinister?…… Anyway, I said that to Godorfun since three troops alone would barely be able to stand up to Bester’s plan. Well, imagine the rest of the situation after that. The old fart would see that it’s not nearly enough to break through, and will nonchalantly send even more forces. From what little I can tell, it would be many times more. In our case, we would be then fighting an unfair battle and we’ll be constantly in the dark without a clue as to when it’ll stop.”

Now that I had said that much, I believe they were smart enough to connect the dots.

Leo crossed his arms and nodded.

“I see… so you played your cards and made him bring the maximum battle force of three battalions. It’s definitely valuable information for the defending side. It gives us the chance to prepare ourselves accordingly, otherwise, we would be plagued with the thought of ‘how many more’ the whole time.”

Dan agreed as well, linking his arms behind his hand as he added,

“And there are some tricks that would work only once as well. So we’re basically going to catch them all in one fell swoop right when they’re already pushing with their maximum forces. I must say, it’s not just your face, even your way of doing things is just as sinister, Allen.”

Like I said, my face is not sinister! But otherwise, Dan was right.

“With that said, I’ll be out for around three hours. Give it your best shot, Bester~.”

“Three hours? Aren’t you going to sleep after undertaking that solo mission?! Will you be fine without resting?”

I chuckled at his words.

“‘Tis nothing to worry about. I did a lot of thinking while battling the sleep, and I actually came up with some brilliant plans to make that old fart speechless…. Kukuku, sleep is something I can catch after this as well, so anyway I’ll explain everything later. It’s payback time after all. Kukuku! Hiyahahaha!”

Witnessing my dark mob villain impression improvised from my sleepless night, my classmates showed awkward expressions, their faces twitching.

◆

“They’re here! The three battalions seem to want to capture the northern base with their full force. Bester, should we show some resistance?”

A slight tension could be felt in the voice of the happy-go-lucky Al. I guess that was to be expected.

Bester shook his head in response to Al’s question.

“No, putting a half-assed effort here would be a waste of time and energy. We’re falling back just like we planned.”

“Roger! In that case, we’re leaving for the eastern base! Catch you guys later!”

“Alright, we’ll be heading for the western base then. You’re in charge of the southern base huh, Bester? Let’s do our best!”

The members of class A thus split up into team Bester, team Kate, and team Al as they left for their respective positions.

◆

“The heck, so they fled without trying to fight back? Ah, the typical all bark and no bite then. Hmph, must have pissed their pants seeing the aura of our battalion!”

Maxim blurted out in a disappointed tone, but the red-haired knight Elan had a wry smile on her face.

“There’s no idiot in the Royal Academy who would try confronting an army as large as this in an open place. Oh wait, even an idiot would prefer mountain warfare to this”

“Fufufu! Indeed. There’s no doubt they planned for this base to be taken. Then again, there shouldn’t be any other option for those kids.”

“It seems like a lot has been done since the last time we looked here, but I fear they have done more than this even with the short time frame of one and a half days they had. What shall we do, Sir?”

Godorfun hummed and stroked his goatee.

“There's no way to figure out the traps they’ve set up without poking around. We'll assign one company to each of the three strongholds simultaneously to determine what their main goal is. Given the terrain, sending a large force wouldn't be effective. Now then, let's go and knock those cocky rookies down a peg. Advance!"

“ “Roger!” ”