And so, having planned everything out, strategy included, we departed for Stonegaze the next morning.
Day one went by without incident. They probably held off on an attack since we were still relatively close to Diamoncut at that point and could have feasibly called for reinforcements from this distance.
An attack the next day, therefore, was highly likely. By that time, we’d be farther from both Diamoncut and Stonehunt, so it would be harder for anyone to either notice or send help.
And it seemed my suspicions were right on the money.
“Everyone, stop!”
At my command, Tom started slowing the carriage down—unlike a single horse, a carriage wasn’t able to come to a sudden stop... The accompanying knights slowed their speed to match him.
“So they really are here, Lord Ark?” Nia asked.
“Yeah. Nia, stay inside the carriage with Laura and keep the window closed tight,” I answered, urging my horse ahead of the position that was my usual spot slightly behind the carriage.
Nia nodded, closing the window. She looked a little nervous, but that was all. Even if she had experienced being attacked before, she was quite calm for someone who was about to witness a battle larger than any she’d faced before.
“I can’t show her my bad side, can I?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Pretty unusual for you to try to act cool, isn’t it, Commander?”
“Shut up, that’s not what I’m doing.”
One of the knights in front of the carriage teased me, and I quipped back with a laugh. They were men from the company I’d led back in the Special Battalion, so we were pretty casual with each other. That made things a lot easier. But I should probably say something, shouldn’t I?
“I’m not your commander anymore, y’know,” I said. “Call me Viscount McGuine.”
“Yes, my apologies, Your Excellency Viscount McGuine!”
“Okay, you’ve got some guts!” I exclaimed. “I’ll make sure to put you through the wringer later!”
“Urk, go easy on me!”
I kept on moving forward as we joked at each other, while the knights formed a barrier around the carriage. This was all part of the plan.
Once I was a bit farther ahead, I got off my horse. While being on horseback was technically the better offensive position, our horses weren’t currently armored, so they’d get injured pretty easily in this fight. It’d be one thing to choose not to use the horses in a proper battle, but I didn’t want to risk it against some fake bandits like this.
Then, I unhooked my weapon from the saddle: a stick roughly three meters long. It was the exact same cane I’d used when training with Laura and Tom. There were two reasons I’d decided not to bring my wolf tooth cudgel with me. One was that I just didn’t want to spook the villagers with something so scary looking. The second reason was that I’d prefer to capture these guys alive.
There was actually a third reason too, but I’d leave it at two for now.
Holding my cane over my shoulder, I sauntered even farther forward.
“Hey, we already know you’re there, so why don’t you just come out already? Isn’t it gonna be harder for you to fight if you’re playing hide-and-seek?”
I could feel their confusion at my words. I couldn’t blame them. The part of highway we were on was lined with trees and boulders that hindered visibility, and it was one of the places Nia had said would be ideal for an ambush. The bandits hid themselves thinking we’d never notice them, but not only had we stopped way before getting there, I was also addressing them directly. They were probably wondering what exactly was going on.
But it seemed that their confusion was keeping them from making up their minds.
“Want me to guess how many men you’ve got?” I continued, taunting. “Let’s see. Five behind that boulder, four behind this one. Each of the three boulders behind us is hiding three guys each. There’s one on that tree, and one on this. Archers, maybe? Then, you’ve got two more men underneath each of the trees.”
I used my cane to point at every hiding spot I called out, and with each reveal they seemed to become more and more bewildered. None of them were actually peeking out to look at me, but they could probably tell where I was pointing from the direction of my voice.
I didn’t want to brag, but I was pretty sure there weren’t a lot of people who could accurately tell where and how many people were around by just their aura.
It’d be nice if Count Barracuda and I could compete over something like this. I’m sure he’d be pretty damn good at it too.
“What, are you guys new to ambushing people? You can’t possibly be this shitty at hiding otherwise. There’s footprints near the rocks you didn’t even bother to erase, and whoever’s up in the trees is moving the branches they’re shaking so much.”
I mean, their footprints weren’t that deep, and the branches were only shaking a tiny bit, but they couldn’t get past me. Most of the men in the Special Battalion would’ve noticed too. These guys were just that sloppy with their hiding places.
They probably would’ve been fine against the average caravan, but they were up against the wrong people. Or were Sylvarian knights bad enough that even this would fool them?
“If you’ve got that many men here, then you must know who I am, right? Or could it be that you’re making light of Ark McGuine, the infamous ‘Black Wolf’?”
I ended up calling myself infamous.
They didn’t flip out upon hearing my name, so they already knew who I was. But for them to still be like this... Oh, I get it.
“Hey hey, they didn’t feed you that crap about how the ‘Black Wolf’ was a dumbass who could only go wild on the battlefield, did they? I pity you. Unfortunately for you guys, this wolf has got a good nose,” I bragged, making a show of flicking my nose with a finger.
Was I playing it up too much? Was that why they’d teased me before? But it was true that I had a good nose, both literally and figuratively. But let’s leave aside the fact that it was how I’d found Nia.
“I mean, if you wanna fight while you’re still hiding, go ahead. All it’d mean is that we’d just have to attack each spot.”
I made a very showy step forward, and their auras quivered even more than before. It didn’t even warrant saying that hiding wouldn’t make fighting easy for them. If we attacked them where they were, then it’d be a waste of their numbers.
Their commander or leader or whatever understood that much. After the commander sent some sort of signal, the men came out from behind the rocks. And just as we’d heard, while they were all wearing different clothes, the swords in their hands were all the same. To be blunt, their weapons looked just like the ones the Sylvarian military had used during the war, and that was a solid confirmation that these men were employed by Sylvario.
“You there,” said a man who looked to be the bandit leader, looking flummoxed. “What in the world are you thinking?”
What kind of question is that? “That I’m gonna beat you guys down and capture you?”
“And that’s why you came forward...? Wait, do you think that you could win this? You’re not going to beg us to spare your wife and subordinates, and offer yourself in trade? Not at all?”
Oh, so that was why they were confused. They’d foreseen that I would notice them and hypothesized that I’d come forward alone. The goal for Balthazar, Sylvario’s second prince, in all this scheming was to take back this province. With that in mind, it wasn’t completely out of the question for them to have planned to take me hostage and use me as a bargaining chip in future negotiations or plans.
But if they’d done that, His Highness Prince Alphonse would’ve thought up a good excuse to restart the war. Odds were that they hadn’t even considered that happening at all.
So that was why when I came out and challenged them instead, they wondered what the hell I was doing. You Sylvarians are still so green.