357 What Role is There?
"Uwoooooooh!"
"I'm not kicking the bucket hereeeeeeeee!"
"You scumbags ain't leaving this place alive!"
"I shan't let a single hair strand of yours enter our kingdom!"
Seems like the soldiers have made it in time. A fight has broken out between them and the bandits.
Apparently they acted flexibly during the time of emergency and let those wanting to enter the kingdom in without inspections, so nobody is injured.
They're still doing a small skirmish since the fight has just started, neither of the side is going hard yet.
(Now then, here's the problem. How should I intrude and at what timing?)
My head cooled down after seeing the skirmish.
I've brought my legs here high on the idea of 'enjoy' but I have no role to play here.
(If a war broke out, those children and 'Numbers' could end up as casualty. Those kids have just started their lives, I won't let this stand.)
The question is whether there is a need for my after-sales service to prevent war happening in this kingdom or not?
Yeah, might as well see this through to the end. I've made up my mind.
But the problem is how. How should I 'participate' in this war?
(Maybe I should throw rocks from here while staying hidden, or perhaps I should annihilate the belligerents in Accelerated state? How much should I back up these soldiers...)
The small skirmish is still going on while I'm lost in thought.
I'm just wasting my time thinking about pointless stuff while the situation gradually shifts.
The more it shifts, the more thinking needed, wasting more time in an endless loop.
A spiral of ever-shifting battlefield and non-stop deliberations.
Yeah, there's no point in me just being here. Just thinking about it won't change anything besides putting this closer to game over.
<TLN: Catch the latest updates and edits at Sousetsuka .com >
"CHAAAARGE! Rout them! Show them our strength!"
Reinforcement from the knights rushed in. Then just as I was thinking, 'everything is fine now'.
The bandits made a new movement. Bandits brandishing imposing greatshields took up the front line and stopped the knights' charge.
The same bandits who were equipped with worn-out armaments. Yet those shields looked obviously regal.
And they were moving systematically like they had been trained in it.
(Ooh, you can easily tell their movement from up here.)
I'm currently standing on top of a rampart tower, overlooking the battlefield below.
The knights were taken by surprise at this sudden show of leadership. Yet both sides managed to prevent huge loss as they clashed.
Like they're being controlled.
The bandits who had been fighting haphazardly against the soldiers you'd think they'd get pushed back soon, immediately became competent the moment the knights made their entrance.
"Ah, those guys are definitely trained soldiers. And it's obvious seen from above, this is a tactic to buy time..."
And that time came.
Enemy soldiers who showed up out of nowhere had finished setting up their formation in the great plain situated between the kingdom and the federation.
The number total to more than 20,000. It's a result of multi year planning stages.
But it's not over yet. The spies that have been lurking inside the kingdom are also making their moves to create chaos all over.
Thus began an unjustified war fueled by the federation's pure greed.