Following my wishes, the Craving Blade transformed into a more nimble longsword. I closed in on the soldiers as they were still shaking off their daze and struck the first arm I reached. It felt good watching the Craving Blade cut through steel and flesh alike with equal ease and send the severed limb wheeling skyward.
It might not need saying, but I hadn’t doctored up my strike with my magic in any way. The realm of human logic and this particular weapon weren’t really on speaking terms. In the hands of a suitable wielder, no mere metal of the prosaic world would bear up against it.
Sorry, folks, I thought. I can’t handle this sword quite as deftly, so I’m afraid I can’t leave you any fingers to work with when we’re done here. Not that I was planning to.
I was pretty pissed, after all; we’d been thrust into a life-or-death fight without cause or warning by forces beyond our understanding. I’d try not to kill anyone, but, well, I wasn’t about to keep track. They were here to kill us, so they had no right to complain if they died in the process. I couldn’t afford any grown person the childish logic that they were allowed some exclusive right to lethal force. They had tried to trample us underfoot, so they had no excuse if I returned the favor by equally absurd means.
I had their full attention now. They wouldn’t follow the “logical” path and ignore me to hunt the people of Mottenheim. It seemed like that they had sensed the threat of my blade, especially now that it’d tasted blood. They wouldn’t dare turn their backs on me—just as I’d hoped.
Still, I needed to make doubly sure.
They had heavy armor. That meant whoever was funding them had deep pockets—someone important. If they screwed up, then who knew what punishment this lot would face.
“I’m coming for your leader’s head! Stay where you are!”
I made the announcement with a loud enough voice that it hurt my throat. Now I was sure I would keep their full attention.
All right, come on then, guys. You wanna get rid of this annoying little foot soldier, don’tcha?
I was pretty sure their boss wouldn’t hesitate to harm their families should they fail the mission, so naturally they would want to sort me out as soon as possible. But if they were here to kill, then I’d give them the exact same treatment.
The Craving Blade made another sound, as if it had cottoned on to my bloodlust, and a beat later the flag bearers kicked their horses into action, ready to put their lives on the line.
[Tips] When you work for a noble and you lose your life as you fail to protect them, your family might bear the brunt of the responsibility. This isn’t particularly approved of in public circles, but it is an unavoidable outcome in a world where the law doesn’t reach every corner.
Cavalrymen were terrifying until they really, really weren’t.
I wondered where I read or heard that? But it was true. Seeing this one cavalryman, who must have shaken off by my blinding flash from earlier, charge at me with his lance was truly impressive. He had his lance under his armpit, kept in place by the hook on his breastplate—if someone sketched him right now, it would make for a wonderful image.
It was the sort of sight that could freeze you where you stood. However, herein lay the weakness of a single cavalryman trying to take on a single foot soldier. If I read the trajectory of his lance, I could duck my head just in time. His lance would pass by as he dashed on, leaving nothing but a gust of wind. Blinding speed was a weapon, but it was also a weakness. My own speed made it difficult for him to course-correct.
As we passed one another, I struck up and across, severing his arm. He wailed as a stream of blood followed him and I heard a thud—most likely him falling off his horse.
Not even the toughest races could survive a mounted charge with a well-aimed lance, and if you did survive the initial blow, you were all set to be crushed beneath a storm of hooves. Against a whole unit in formation, any attempt at escape would reduce you to a smear on the ground. But one-on-one? Even if I stood there stock-still, waiting for the collision, I had nothing to fear. As long as you could get your hit in as they passed by, they were easy to deal with. Sure, the approach was rough on the nerves and primed you to panic—you were, after all, basically playing an extremely high stakes game of chicken—but as long as you kept a cool head, you could exploit their stupidly easy trajectory.
Ideally, it was best to sever the horse’s legs and leave them out of commission—you’d get the rider caught up in the crash too for an unpleasant death—but I wasn’t thrilled about killing an animal that’d never asked to be thrust onto the battlefield. In any case, it made sense to leave as many alive as I could, so we’d have more people to grill for information later.
I gave the Craving Blade another test swing to flick the blood off the business end, and it let out another cry of elation. The scream scraped at the deepest parts of my brain, but I wasn’t going to complain, so long as the job got done. I wasn’t so small at heart that I’d piss and moan at my navigator for getting their groove on in the passenger seat now that their jam was playing.
The other cavalrymen split their formation to close in on me from three sides. Their positions and speeds were calculated so that they wouldn’t crash into their allies, even if I managed to dodge. This was the sort of precise and quick coordination I expected from well-trained mercs. It was a waste making them put innocent peasants to the sword out here in the sticks for reasons unclear. I was pretty sure they must have gotten started as a knight and his attendants.
The world was really an unfair place.
If I were still functioning under my restrictions from mere moments ago, I would have had to dodge the first charge, use the Eastern crossbow under my arm to loose a bolt at the second soldier, then work out the best position to dodge the attack from the third cavalryman... A bit much, huh?
“To me, my swordsmen...”
I activated my next spell. Thanks to the power of fixed values, my Mana Capacity had only been cranked up to Scale VII and my Mana Output had halted at Scale V. These were pitifully low compared to anyone who’d picked a better set of racial traits for it or otherwise fine-tuned that facet of their build. I was but a mere mage. It didn’t matter if it was embarrassing or if people more talented than me laughed—I wouldn’t hesitate to use an incantation when activating my spells.
At almost the same time, the row of soldiers were unhorsed—by their own beloved blades.
The trick wasn’t so different from my usual strat: I’d simply chained several Unseen Hands spells thanks to Independent Processing. I had increased their range and strength, and now, with Third Hand, I could pull off some quite dexterous feats. With my swarm of Hands, I’d drawn my foes’ swords from their own scabbards, slamming the pommels into their chins.
One simply fell backward; his horse, now free, galloped off wherever it wanted. One fell to the side, but unfortunately for him, his foot got caught in his stirrup, and now his horse dragged his limp body behind it. The last one fell with more finesse than the others, and although he groaned, he was still conscious.