Arc 4 Chapter 34 : Landslide

[Ezio POV]

The sight inside the forest earlier had been horrifying.

Out of the 2,000 troops who had previously pursued the enemy soldiers, only a few dozen had survived.

However, I had already grown accustomed to the horrors of war.

I had even lost a comrade when the Imperial forces attacked Regium Fortress City.

I crouched down and examined one of the corpses, a soldier whose body was covered in severe burns.

His fingers appeared to be clutching something.

I opened his hand and found a locket that had partially melted from the intense heat of the fire.

There seemed to be something inside the locket.

I opened it and found a shiny ring and a small piece of paper.

There was writing on the paper.

“For you, Juliana... I hope that after the war ends, we can be together and build a family.”

War was not a game.

Countless lives had to be sacrificed to achieve victory.

I had been foolish before, wishing for this war simply because I wanted to experience a new challenge and become stronger.

“Ezio, let's move.”

Marcela suddenly approached me.

She had the Sniper she always carried strapped across her back.

“Captain Siena ordered us to immediately pursue the enemy into the mountains.”

Into the mountains?

Was that really a good decision in an area like this while it was still raining?

However, if we waited for the rain to stop, the enemy would surely get much farther away, making them difficult to track down again.

“All right. Let's go, Marcela.”

I stood up and placed the fallen soldier's locket and ring into my uniform pocket.

I would make sure that the person most precious to him received the ring and the message written on that small piece of paper.

We began walking into the mountains.

Looking around, I noticed that our enemies had left fairly clear footprints behind.

It seemed they had been in a great hurry to leave the area.

Captain Siena then ordered several members of the Cavalier Squad to scout the surroundings so that we wouldn't be suddenly ambushed by the enemy.

The farther we ventured into the mountains, the steeper the path became, requiring more strength to move forward.

On top of that, the rain made the ground slippery, causing several soldiers to lose their footing.

After moving for ten minutes, we entered an area filled with fairly tall cliffs.

Captain Siena ordered us to stop for a moment while we waited for a report from the scouting team before proceeding any farther.

“Captain, we didn't find anything suspicious around here,” one of the scouts reported.

“All right. We'll enter this area,” Captain Siena said. “Keep watching our surroundings and remain vigilant.”

We continued moving.

Their footprints were still visible in the muddy ground, indicating that they had passed through here not long ago.

My body began to tremble from the cold mountain air combined with the rain pouring over us.

How far were we going to follow them?

The higher we climbed, the colder the temperature would become, and the more difficult the terrain would be to traverse.

—BOOOOMM!!!!

Suddenly, we were startled by an incredibly loud explosion directly above our formation.

I looked upward and saw chunks of rock and an avalanche of earth collapsing toward us as a result of the explosion.

We're all going to die...

There were simply too many rocks and too much earth falling toward us.

“Spatial Magic!”

Yet, for some reason, I suddenly found myself transported onto an intact cliff above us.

A deafening rumble could be heard from below.

The cliff where I stood also shook from the impact of the landslide and the countless rocks that had just fallen.

My heart was still pounding from how close I had come to death.

Looking around, I saw that all the members of the Cavalier Squad were also standing up here.

“This... This is the Captain's magic. She moved us here...”

I turned to the side and saw Captain Siena kneeling on the ground, breathing heavily.

Her expression was grim despite having saved all of us from the landslide and falling rocks.

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“I couldn't move everyone...” Captain Siena muttered regretfully. “It happened too quickly. I didn't have enough time to gather my mana.”

Hearing her words, my eyes widened as I looked down from the cliff.

Hundreds of people were still below us, crushed beneath the rocks and buried alive by the landslide that had swept over them.

My emotions surged again when I realized how many of my comrades had lost their lives.

How could this have happened?

Shouldn't the senior members have checked this area beforehand?

Could the enemy have used some kind of magic?

While I was still trying to understand what had just happened, my eyes suddenly caught sight of a black-haired man and a red-haired woman fleeing in the distance.

“Direction one o'clock! Two enemies spotted!”

I immediately moved to pursue them.

Several other members followed me, determined to avenge the deaths of our comrades at their hands.

“Follow those two! I'll catch up as soon as possible!” Captain Siena ordered.

She still seemed to be struggling to move after using her magic earlier.

We had to hurry.

I wouldn't let them escape after they had just buried our comrades alive!

After pursuing them for a while, we all stopped when we saw that the two enemies who had fled earlier had already joined dozens of their comrades at a crossroads.

Suddenly, dozens of enemy soldiers fled along the road to the right, while one other person took the road to the left.

I was about to pursue them when someone suddenly grabbed my shoulder.

“Vice Captain Valen, what are you doing? Why aren't we pursuing them? Those bastards killed our comrades back there!” I said angrily.

“Don't let your emotions make you act recklessly, Ezio!” the Vice Captain snapped at me. “We don't know what their plan is by splitting up like this! At the very least, we need to wait for Captain Siena before making a decision!”

I could only bite my lip and clench both fists after hearing Vice Captain Valen's advice.

I knew what he said was right, but the desire to immediately destroy the people who had killed my comrades was not something I could easily suppress.

After waiting for a while, Captain Siena finally arrived.

The Vice Captain then explained the situation to her.

After hearing Vice Captain Valen's explanation, Captain Siena remained silent for a moment, contemplating our next move.

“Valen, take 30 Senior members and pursue the black-haired man,” Captain Siena ordered. “I and 20 Junior members will follow the dozens of enemies who took the road on the right.”

“But Captain, I think all the Senior members are too many just to pursue one person,” Vice Captain Valen said.

“According to Alesio's report, the man you're talking about is the one they call the Ghost of Cataluna—the man who slaughtered 20 Knights of the Kingdom of Draconia by himself,” the Captain revealed.

Everyone, including me, was shocked upon hearing this.

Although each of the Seniors could individually match a Knight, they wouldn't be able to survive against two or more Knights at once.

I couldn't even imagine how strong a man capable of slaughtering 20 Knights must be.

“Don't let your guard down. After the Junior members and I defeat the dozens of enemies who took the road on the right, we'll immediately join you,” Captain Siena ordered Vice Captain Valen. “If you find that man, don't recklessly attack him. Just follow his movements and keep your distance.”

“All right, Captain,” Vice Captain Valen replied.

We then split up.

However, Captain Siena also ordered Marcela—our Sniper—to join the Senior group.

She said Marcela would be extremely useful against that man.

I stopped for a moment to watch the Seniors and Marcela disappear down the road to the left.

“Good luck, Seniors.”

---

[Valentino POV]

We separated from the Junior group led by Captain Siena.

I didn't know whether this was a good or bad idea, because the Juniors would be facing more enemies on their side.

Even though Captain Siena herself was leading them, I was honestly afraid that the Juniors would become a burden to her if we Seniors weren't there with them.

“Valen, do you think this man is really as terrifying as Captain Siena said?”

The person who asked that was Aldo.

He and I were among the first members of the Cavalier Squad formed by Captain Siena three years ago.

Back then, our initial number had been only ten people, but gradually, more members joined until our ranks reached 70 people this year.

However, since the war began, we had already lost 20 of our comrades, both Seniors and Juniors.

“Captain Siena herself could fight 30 Knights at once if she were serious, Aldo,” I told him. “Have you forgotten when she trained us Seniors back then? The Empire must have powerful Knights of its own as well.”

In the past, Captain Siena often trained us Seniors.

She would always ask all of us to attack her simultaneously.

Yet no matter how hard we tried, we couldn't even land a single attack on her back then.

If we compared their strength, Captain Siena could have become the strongest Grand Espada if she had been born in the Aragon Empire.

That was why Captain Siena was a source of pride for our people.

We searched for about fifteen minutes along the road to the left, but we still couldn't find the black-haired man.

Where had he gone?

Did he know of another route and circle around to join his group that had taken the road to the right?

—Clang! Clang! Clang!

While I was wondering where the man could be, three cylindrical canisters suddenly fell in front of us.

Not long afterward, the three cylinders exploded, releasing thick white smoke that engulfed the surrounding area.

“Don't panic! Get out of the smoke immediately!” I shouted, giving orders to the others.

I tried to escape the cloud of smoke that completely obscured my surroundings.

I began hearing the screams of my comrades from within the thick smoke.

“Arrrghhh!”

“I can feel him! He's ri—”

“Quick! Get out of this smoke!”

Damn it.

I couldn't see anything.

I just hoped that not too many of us would become victims of this ambush.

—Crash!

I suddenly collided with someone, causing me to immediately swing my sword wildly.

“It's me, Aldo!” the man I had struck shouted.

“Aldo?” I called out.

“Valen, is that you?” my comrade asked, sounding confused. “I can't see you at all in this smoke!”

“Don't stop moving, Aldo!” I shouted back.

I kept running until the two of us finally emerged from the smoke and leaped onto higher ground so we could see the surroundings more clearly.

Several other members had also managed to escape the thick smoke.

However, I still couldn't see the enemy who had attacked us from above.

After a minute, the smoke began to thin.

We could finally see something through the remaining haze.

A black-haired man was standing there, not far from ten corpses belonging to my comrades whom he had killed during the ambush.

“Finally, that bastard has shown himself.”

Aldo cursed angrily beside me.

“Valen, let's kill him and avenge our comrades.”

I looked at the expressions of the other members.

They were furious and clearly impatient to vent their anger on that man.

He then looked up at me from below with an expression that seemed to belittle us.

“Pathetic,” he said coldly as he stepped on the head of one of our fallen comrades whom he had killed.

My anger reached its limit.

I didn't care that the Captain had ordered me to hold back.

I would never forgive someone who humiliated my comrades who had died defending our homeland.

“Kill that bastard!” I ordered everyone.

We all leaped down from above, intent on slaughtering that bastard.

---

[Siena POV]

It had been nearly twenty minutes since we had followed the road to the right taken by the dozens of enemy soldiers.

Yet we still hadn't seen any sign of them.

Earlier, I had divided the Cavalier Squad into two groups to pursue the enemy forces that had taken the two different routes.

I was afraid they were planning something, but I couldn't figure out what they intended to do.

That was why I decided to send 30 Senior members after the black-haired man they had mentioned, while I led the Juniors in searching for the remaining dozens of enemies who had taken the road to the right.

This was because I was the only one capable of performing recovery if the dozens of enemy soldiers turned out to be bait and the black-haired man they had mentioned was actually the executor.

However, after following the enemy's trail for a while, we suddenly reached a dead end.

Only mountain rocks stood in our way.

Their footprints stopped directly in front of the rocky mountainside.

Were they using some kind of magic to hide?

I then tried touching the mountain rocks in front of me and performed a Scan using my Spatial Magic.

However, I couldn't sense any empty space that they could be using as a hiding place.

“...”

No.

I had to go back!

Valen and the others were in danger now.

Activating Ashpalt magic, I hurried back along the route taken by Valen and the other Senior members.

“Captain Siena, where are you going in such a hurry!?”

I ignored the shouts of my Juniors behind me.

My priority now was to join the Senior members as quickly as possible.

“I hope I'm not too late...”