Realizing that the other heretics were also hunting for civilians, Oakley began peering through the windows of nearby houses, one after another.
Every single one was empty.
There were no signs of ransacking inside. Rooms were strangely pristine, furniture untouched.
It was as if the city had calmly prepared for the cult’s attack, then vanished in good order.
Oakley sucked in a sharp breath. He was about to learn why the citizens had disappeared.
As Oakley ran, hunting down heretics, something unfamiliar caught his eye—a corpse lying diagonally ahead in the snow.
At first, he assumed it was someone he had killed. But that wasn’t it. The fatal wounds were entirely different from those left by the Flame Blade.
The body had lost everything above the waist, ragged flesh hanging like torn rags, as though something with immense strength had ripped the upper half clean off.
As if answering his growing suspicion, the snow and wind began to rage with an abnormal fury.
The gears of the Jade Occupation Operation were slipping.
Oakley became sure of it at once: the Orthodox side was moving.
“Oakley, are you all right!?” a voice called.
He turned to see Celestia hurrying toward him through the storm.
“I’m fine!” he shouted back. “What’s happening? What about weather control?”
“There is an Orthodox executive in this city!” Celestia replied. “Giather Cormode’s summoned beasts have had a full view of our movements from the start!”
Oakley clicked his tongue. He’d just been thinking it was lucky he’d sheathed the Flame Blade to conserve its catalyst, only for this revelation to drop on his head.
Orthodoxy executive rank five, Giather Cormode.
Just like Fuankilo, he wasn’t suited to direct combat, but he commanded magic that allowed him to gather particles of light, shape them into summoned beasts, and control them freely.
So that’s what felt wrong. Giather’s summons are absurdly versatile. He must have brought out some snow-based creature and yanked control of the weather out from under Celestia.
Beasts with excellent night vision. Beasts that could fly. Beasts that could turn invisible.
Giather could generate and manipulate any number of different summons.
Most likely, one of Giather’s creatures had been patrolling high over the kingdom and had spotted the Raid Unit moving toward the northeast.
From there, it would be simple: throw up a defensive line around Jade, the city in their path, and lay down countermeasures in advance in case anything happened. That was how Oakley chose to interpret it.
“Any intel on Giather’s summoned beasts?” he asked.
“There are too many varieties,” Celestia said, shaking her head. “I don’t know which ones he’s using. I haven’t catalogued them all myself. What I can say is that we must first concentrate on securing the surface.”
“What about the Raid Unit and the others?”
“The Raid Unit is circling the city to gather information. I’ve also sent runners to warn Joanne and Stella about the situation. They should be returning around now, but…”
The small groups of soldiers moving alone, Celestia’s runners, had already died by Oakley’s hand.
Realizing that explained why he kept finding isolated cultists, he quietly adjusted his understanding of the situation upward from “complicated” to “worse than expected.”
His thoughts began to spin at high speed.
Celestia was desperately trying to seize control of the weather again, but it didn’t look like it was going well.
The storm only grew harsher. A sub-zero wind knifed through them, squeezing at their organs as if trying to wring the life out of their guts.
At this rate, they’ll all freeze to death before they die in battle. What a sick joke that would be.
Just as that bitter notion crossed his mind, a massive silhouette emerged from the white, fog-like world ahead.
Gerugoroi stepped out of the blizzard.
“I have assessed the current state of Jade,” he announced.
“And the others?” Celestia asked.
“My squad has been annihilated by summoned beasts. All but myself are dead.”
“What…?”
“I will report,” he continued. “Giather and the enemy soldiers appear to be gathering the civilians in the old castle. Furthermore, they have raised ice walls around it and seem fully intent on a siege. So, what will you do?”
Celestia bit her thumbnail, frowning.
Soldiers and civilians clustered in a single location was the worst-case scenario for occupying a city.
The longer they dragged this out, the more the cold would sap the cultists’ strength, and the more likely it became that Orthodoxy reinforcements would arrive.
And Giather’s summoned beasts, which dominated the snowy world outside, were very likely beyond Celestia’s ability to handle in her current state.
“The messengers sent to Joanne and Stella still haven’t returned?” she pressed.
“If their return is this delayed,” Gerugoroi said, “they’re almost certainly already dead.”
“Also the work of summoned beasts, then?”
“In truth, I did see a corpse. But the wounds were mostly cuts and burns. Summoned beasts crush their prey with far greater force. I would say a very skilled fighter is moving through the blizzard.”
“What did you say?”
“If the couriers don’t make it back, we have no way to know what’s happening underground. The storm is so fierce now that we can’t even see ten meters ahead. In my opinion, we should withdraw for the moment.”
His suggestion was offered with complete composure.
He saw the greater picture clearly. As befit an executive candidate, his judgment left little to criticize.
Taking his proposal in, Celestia suggested they first regroup the scattered surface units, then link up with the forces underground.
Oakley stayed silent, pressing down the sleeve over his right arm and suppressing his presence as much as he could.
Gerugoroi’s gaze slid over to him, lingering with a hint of meaning.
“By the way, Oakley…” Gerugoroi began slowly. “What’s up with the burns on your right hand?”
With a faint, crooked smile at that roundabout question, Oakley turned away, walking over to the toppled streetlamp. He held his blade to the glass, and once more kindled fire along the steel, the sword gleaming wetly as the flames caught.
“What do you think?” he asked quietly.
“Heh… Making me say it out loud, are you, executive candidate Oakley Mercury-kun?” Gerugoroi chuckled.
The Flame Blade roared back to life, tongues of fire stretching long along the edge.
Celestia’s beautiful features twisted; her shoulders trembled as she shook her head.
“Oakley?” she whispered.
If there were a perfect example of someone struck dumb with shock, it would have been that expression.
Looking at that face steeped in raw grief, Oakley gave her a gentle smile.
“Did you betray us?” she asked.
Oakley fell silent.
“The rumors back at the base… Were you truly the one who killed Fuankilo?”
“More or less,” he said at last.
“Fwahaha! So, it was an internal squabble gone rotten!” Gerugoroi barked, slapping a hand against his thigh at the new piece of gossip.
Oakley ignored him completely, keeping his gaze fixed on Celestia as he spoke.
“I’ll come for you someday,” he said softly. “Wait for me until then.”
The moment the words left his mouth, a monster emerged from the far side of the blizzard.
Its head was lost in the raging whiteout, but its nature was obvious. It was a giant.
Perhaps ten meters tall, its limbs were like enormous rods and its torso a round sphere, all of it oddly artificial in shape. Clad in armor of ice and snow, the giant of frost simply stood there, watching the three of them.
The Frost Giant Frimslus, one of Giather’s summoned beasts.
In its right hand, it held a club carved as if straight out of a glacier.
With a body that size wielding a weapon like that, a human would be swatted aside like dust.
“Celestia, I’ll deal with this traitor,” Gerugoroi called out. “You focus all your attention on the summoned beast!”
“Understood!” Celestia answered.
She sprang toward Giather’s summoned giant, cloak whipping in the gale as she launched herself at Frimslus.
Left behind in the storm-churned street, Gerugoroi and Oakley faced each other, keeping a careful distance as they slowly circled.
Gerugoroi spun his long spear lazily around his body, coiling it along his torso like a serpent, his mouth stretching into a delightedly vulgar grin.
“Really now, Oakley…” he drawled. “The way you spoke to Celestia just now. Those were the eyes of a man talking to his first love. For a moment, I thought some tragic romance play had suddenly started.”
“Poetic of you,” Oakley shot back, tone dry. “You should quit being a heretic and aim to be a poet instead.”
“I refuse. I have but one wish: to cross blades to the death at the farthest edge of battle.”
Flaming sword and pointed spear. The two executive candidates glared at one another, the distance between them taut as a drawn bowstring. Then, in the same heartbeat, they leapt. Trailing long bands of sparks and flame through the blizzard, the two men collided with explosive force.