It was early in the morning the day after our fun little get-together. We had been drinking well into the night, and I had actually woken up late for a change. Looking out the window, I saw that the sun had already risen; normally I would’ve long since been awake by that time.
I wasn’t particularly concerned about having overslept, though; I was off duty that day. Commander Bolton had arranged for that, telling us that we probably could use a bit of rest after completing our mission to infiltrate Sorcera.
Even so, I didn’t really have much of anything to do. Once I had finished my morning training, I stopped by the dorm cafeteria, where I happened to run into Seira.
“Good morning, Sarge!”
“Hi, Seira. You’re here early for being off today.”
“The same goes for you! How are you feeling, though? I thought you took a whole lot of damage during the fight in Sorcera.”
“No problems here. I’m a durable guy.”
“That’s our Sieg! Just don’t overdo it, okay? If things get tough, you can always rely on us!”
“Right. I’ll do that.” I took a look around the cafeteria. “Did we just hire someone new?”
“What? Why do you ask?”
“There’s someone over there who looks exactly like Spinoza—but it’s before noon, on a day she’s not even on duty.”
On the receiving end of my gaze was Spinoza, lying face down at one of the cafeteria tables. The day after a drinking party, she was usually dead to the world until the sun was high in the sky.
“Oh! You certainly don’t see that every day!” Seira exclaimed.
“She may be here, technically, but I wouldn’t consider her awake,” Fam said, appearing out of nowhere.
“Meaning...?” I asked.
“It’s quite simple: She never made it back to her room last night.”
“So you’re saying she’s been that way ever since last night?” Seira blinked.
“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Fam confirmed.
“Ah. Sounds like we didn’t get a new hire after all, then,” I quipped.
“This isn’t a laughing matter! We have to do something for her! She’s going to hurt herself trying to sleep in a place like that.” Seira then went over to try and help her out. “Spinoza! It’s morning! Time to wake up!” she said, rubbing her back gently.
Eventually, Spinoza’s tightly shut eyelids creaked open.
“Augh...! Every inch of my body hurts like hell...!” she groaned, lifting her head languidly. She took a huge stretch, then looked around her, and a puzzled look appeared on her face. “Huh? What the hell am I doin’ here?”
“You really hit the bottles hard last night. You don’t remember?” I asked.
“I can’t remember a damn thing after we left the castle...”
“That’s a bit excessive. So you lost memories from before you even started drinking? I would’ve understood if it had been from the point you entered the pub,” I stated incredulously.
“Hey, you know what they say—time flies when you’re havin’ fun, right?”
“That’s not flying, that’s vanishing into thin air.”
“Anyway, where’s Alma? I don’t see her around,” Spinoza asked in sudden realization.
“Good question. I haven’t seen her yet today,” I said.
“Heh heh. So she’s still sleepin’, huh? What a slob. All the rest of us are awake, even though we don’t work today.”
“You were completely passed out until just a moment ago,” Fam said, rolling her eyes.
I sighed and forced a smile. “Look, we have the day off. She’s probably tired from our battle; we might as well let her sleep.”
“I think Alma is already awake, though? I didn’t see her in bed when I got up, at least,” Seira reported.
Ah, that’s right—Seira and Alma are roommates.
“Where the hell’d she run off to so early in the mornin’? The pub, maybe?”
“She’s not you, Spinoza,” I said, deadpan. “Well, she’ll be back soon enough, I’m sure.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Spinoza responded, then immediately moved on. “Well, now that I’ve finally got some time off, guess I’ll go hit up those slots!”
“You shouldn’t gamble, Spinoza,” Seira chastised.
“You risked your life for that money, yet you seem to have no problem tossing it all right down the drain,” Fam berated. “It’s pretty much the same as gradually killing yourself.”
Just as we were getting ready to relax and enjoy our day off—
DINGDINGDINGDING!
—the alarm bell began ringing loudly from outside.
“That sound—I guess we’re under attack,” I said.
“You gotta be kiddin’ me... Why couldn’t they save it for a workday?!” Spinoza sputtered.
Of course, we couldn’t just ignore it.
“Let’s head over to the guard station, everyone!” Seira yelled.
We equipped ourselves in a hurry and made our way over to the guard station.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Apparently there’s a group of monsters heading over to attack us.”
We had made our way over to the commander’s office, where Commander Bolton was giving us a rundown of the situation.
“They’re packing some pretty big numbers, from what I hear. We’re thinking there might be a demon commanding them—if they’re targeting us while we’re shorthanded for troops like this, the Royal Capital’s in serious trouble.”
“We’ll back you up,” I assured him.
“Appreciated. I know you’re supposed to be off today,” the Commander said. “Truth is, though, we’d be up shit creek without you guys. Go out there and get ’em.”
“Leave it to us, Commander!” Seira saluted.
“You better pay us overtime for workin’ on our day off,” Spinoza muttered.
“Hah! I know I can always rely on you to keep track of that paycheck, even when things get crazy.” Commander Bolton then raised an eyebrow. “Hm...? Where’s Alma, anyway?”
“No clue—she ran off somewhere this mornin’,” Spinoza responded.
“Well, that stinks. She’s one of our top units too.”
“If she’s here in the city, she will have heard the alarm bell and will catch up with us soon enough. For now, let’s head to the gate without her.”
“Yes, sir!”
“Right!”
“Roger.”
It boggled my mind that such a massive force of monsters had come to attack us—it was almost as if they were trying to take advantage of the fact that our wounds from the battle in Sorcera hadn’t yet healed. The timing was just too perfect.
Maybe I’m overthinking things...?
✦ ✦ ✦
We soon arrived at Astaroth’s front gate, where we were greeted by a combined force of the Knight Corps and the Guard Corps. As soon as they saw us show up, they began cheering enthusiastically.
“It’s the Fifth Squadron! They’re here to back us up!”
“With you here, it doesn’t matter what might be coming after us—we’re not afraid!”
Everyone really seemed to have faith in us; I could feel the morale of our allies rising.
“And to think, not too long ago they were a bunch of creeps...” Fam pointed out.
“Yeah,” I agreed.
“Though it ain’t a bad feelin’ to hear ’em compliment us either,” Spinoza admitted.
“Let’s do our best to live up to the faith they’re putting into us!” Seira insisted.
We positioned ourselves at the front lines on the bridge to the main gate and waited for the enemy forces to arrive. Eventually, we saw a horde of monsters approaching from across the plains.
The reports were right. There are quite a few of them—I’d say probably close to a thousand that I can see so far. It’s not just a single type of monster either; if they’re able to control this many different species at once, it’s only natural to assume there’s a demon with some very powerful magic in command.
It looks like this’ll be a pretty backbreaking battle—but we can’t allow them to get past this point. If we let the monsters break through our lines, the Royal Capital will fall. If we lose the Orb of Light to them, it’ll end up being the Demon King’s second coming.
As I was psyching myself up for combat, I heard a sudden commotion in our ranks. Apparently, they had seen something among the horde of monsters.
“Hey, take a look at that...”
The first voice I heard was Spinoza’s. Looking over among the army of hideous monsters, I saw a lone human on horseback commanding them. It had to be the leader of the enemy forces.
It was surprising enough to see a human commanding the monsters, but what shocked us even more was that it was the very person whom we’d noticed had been missing since earlier that morning.
“Oh, this has gotta be some kind o’ sick joke,” Spinoza muttered.
“I certainly didn’t expect to see her leading the monsters,” Fam murmured.
“Alma?!” Seira gasped.
It was Alma—Commander of the Royal Guard of Sorcera, and our Fifth Squadron comrade who supposedly had amnesia—commanding the massive monster army.