The Third Son of a Medieval Knight Family Chapter 89 - Knight of Ascension (24)

What had once been a fairly large village with its own name had now been reduced to a barbarian supply base and fortress.

Uncharacteristically for them, they had dug a moat and cut large logs to erect a palisade, which clearly meant they had forced principality people to work.

“But it’s crude.”

Viktor muttered while lightly spinning his axe.

With the sound of trumpets, dozens of warriors aimed their bows from atop the palisade, glaring down at the advancing principality army, but he paid them no mind.

Viktor, who had been slowly taking steps at the front, suddenly accelerated explosively.

“Ah…!”

Arrows poured down like rain, but it was a judgment made too late.

The barbarian archers skillfully reloaded their arrows and aimed at Viktor, who had charged out alone.

Whiz! Ping!

It was excellent rapid fire combined with quick judgment, but Viktor simply covered his face with his arm as if annoyed and continued charging forward.

One by one, arrows fell to the ground, unable to penetrate his armor.

He deflected arrows that accurately targeted exposed gaps with his arm and axe, while boldly taking the rest head-on as he charged—a daring feat.

The mercenaries following behind unconsciously let out gasps at such courage that even if known, would be difficult to imitate.

“But what is Sir Viktor trying to do by charging alone like that?”

“If it were a surrender proposal, shouldn’t he have done it before the arrows started flying…?”

Their questions were quickly answered.

“Huh, what…?”

“What is he doing?!”

Viktor stepped forward powerfully based on explosive acceleration that couldn’t be stopped by mere arrows.

As his body soared and he lightly leaped over the moat, people’s mouths gaped open.

Compared to a proper castle’s moat, it was narrow and shallow, but it wasn’t so crude that a person could simply jump over it.

Moreover, it was filled with sharp spikes and stakes.

Normally, one wouldn’t even think of jumping over such a thing.

Viktor paid no mind to whether people on both sides were falling over in surprise and calmly moved to his next action.

Thud!

A javelin Viktor drew from his thigh embedded itself into the middle of the palisade.

“Sh-shit, what the hell…!”

A warrior on the palisade unconsciously muttered in a fearful voice and fell backward.

Now that he looked, this wasn’t a knight but definitely a monster, demon, or evil spirit.

Otherwise, it was impossible to understand.

Viktor put strength into the hand gripping the javelin and lifted his body, then embedded another javelin that had somehow appeared in his other hand higher up.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

Watching him begin to climb the palisade by alternating javelins, one warrior muttered helplessly.

That knight was drilling through thick logs as if they were soft cheese.

“Monster…”

This made the palisade meaningless.

Viktor, who had climbed the wall far too easily, looked around.

Those glaring at him with fearful expressions while aiming bows were the better ones.

Looking at the warrior who had fallen backward right in front of him and was staring with a pallid expression, Viktor muttered calmly.

“Move aside.”

“Uh, uaaaah!”

“Kill the monster! Kill him!”

Crash!

Viktor charged straight at the rushing warriors, shoving them aside with his shoulder, then drew his battle axe.

From here, he needed to move a bit faster.

‘While the enemy is panicking… I’ll gain perfect advantage.’

Perhaps they had never imagined the top of the palisade would be captured in such a way, as they were still fumbling about.

“I told you to move aside if you don’t want to die!”

A thunderous voice echoed, and Viktor swung his axe to cut down the warriors.

In that state, he quickly gained speed and rapidly climbed down a ladder to stand before the palisade.

Then he took a deep breath.

“What, what is he trying to do now!”

“Just shoot! Stop him!”

The warriors still crowded on the palisade shouted from some inexplicable anxiety and shot arrows, but Viktor ignored it all and simply raised his axe high.

Crash! Crash!

As the axe swung madly, sounds like siege engines colliding echoed.

“Wh-what?!”

Warriors lost their balance and rolled off the palisade that was visibly cracking and beginning to shake instantly.

Crack, crack-crack—

The axe swings, accurate and fast without tiring, never stopped.

Finally, the palisade made of several layers of large logs couldn’t hold and collapsed.

Bang!

The barbarians on both sides gaped helplessly.

“Th-this… is principality siege technique…?”

There wasn’t a single warrior who wouldn’t feel defeated seeing just one person render their carefully constructed defensive facility useless and even open a path.

The shadow of the massive figure dimly visible through the rising dust cloud flickered like a demon.

---

“Wouldn’t this mean we didn’t need to prepare so carefully…?”

Krupin set down the flag he’d been holding with a deflated expression.

“…I wondered why the Sir said such things… now I understand.”

Mikhail felt the same.

He was experiencing firsthand what it felt like to become calm when too shocked.

Mikhail was the most war-experienced person in the vanguard.

Naturally, having experienced several siege battles, Viktor’s words hadn’t been easily acceptable at first.

‘Sir, general battle or monster hunting is different from siege warfare. Without thorough preparation, even an ordinary village rather than a fortress can cause great damage!’

‘Sir Mikhail, please don’t worry about anything and just follow my instructions for now. If it succeeds, we should be able to enter without major damage.’

Mikhail sighed while watching the mercenaries grumbling and breaking the jars they had painstakingly prepared.

‘He was so confident, but his method turned out to be… something this absurd.’

This wasn’t siege technique or anything!

He felt foolish for staying up every night wracking his brain in preparation for siege operations, which were famous for being the most difficult and hardest to succeed among all battles.

‘…This is just a small village though? Even Sir Viktor couldn’t use such crude methods in front of properly built castle walls… no, what am I thinking right now.’

Mikhail, who had unconsciously fallen into other thoughts due to feeling his common sense being denied, shook his head vigorously and quickly came to his senses.

Thinking coldly, this was truly tremendous.

No matter how inferior to castle walls, the moat and barriers were well-made defensive facilities.

The vanguard, which hadn’t brought proper siege equipment, would have had to accept considerable damage to break through, but now that was no longer necessary.

The logs rolled down to fill the moat, and with the wall breached, they could approach the enemies directly.

Now was the time to perfectly capitalize on this opportunity.

Mikhail shouted to the mercenaries who were still blankly staring at the collapsed wall.

“What are you all doing! We don’t need oil jars now, so quickly take up your weapons! Sir Viktor has breached the wall! This must be God working with us! Charge! Charge! Charge!”

“…Waaaaaah!”

“The wall collapsed by itself! The wall collapsed by itself!”

“No, Sir Viktor brought it down!”

“The knight who brought down the wall!”

The mercenaries drew their weapons with extremely excited expressions and began rushing in.

‘Actually it’s not a wall but just a palisade… sigh, I must be getting old. I didn’t act like this even in front of that snake, but unnecessarily…’

Feeling his common sense being completely destroyed, Mikhail lightly tapped his head, which kept having negative thoughts, and drew his weapon.

Now was the time to abandon idle thoughts and charge.

---

“Gah!”

Viktor was running forward.

He was quite exhausted from guarding the front of the collapsed palisade until the mercenaries safely entered the village, but he still had to run.

‘This time I absolutely won’t let you escape, Bohdan.’

He wouldn’t make a mistake twice.

With strong determination, he swung his axe.

Another warrior who had appeared from between alleys with a dagger raised fell.

‘They’ve prepared quite a lot.’

Obstacles placed here and there and confusing paths.

A cityscape unlike anything easily seen in the surroundings had formed, and the desperate defensive system centered around it made even Viktor unable to easily relax.

It was indeed quite a large village.

Smoke and screams echoed from various parts of the village.

The angry mercenaries had definitely set fires.

‘I have to hope Sir Mikhail controls them appropriately.’

If they ended up burning to death from fire, that would truly be ridiculous.

Viktor reached out to grab the collar of a warrior hiding in the darkness and slammed him to the ground.

“Urgh…”

“Where is Bohdan?”

“…Ancestor wolf will curse you!”

“If you don’t know, that’s fine.”

Thud!

Viktor cut down the warrior and ran forward again.

He could clearly see them desperately trying to cling and persist.

The barbarian warriors were literally sacrificing their bodies to buy time for Bohdan to escape.

He had to find him before that.

It was when Viktor turned another alley and reached the front of a fairly large mansion.

“Sir Viktor! Sir Viktor!”

“Tumen?”

He spotted Tumen, his face covered in soot, frantically gesturing.

“What are you doing here instead of what I told you to do?”

“Here, this is definitely the place!”

Tumen carefully listened, then opened his mouth again with a confident expression.

“Bohdan, that bastard is definitely in this house. I saw one of his guards that I remember enter here!”

“…”

Viktor slowly examined the mansion.

He hadn’t been able to find Bohdan’s figure in the military tent set up inside the village either.

In the worst case, there was a possibility he had already escaped…

‘Looking at it, he’s strangely skilled.’

Tumen grinned as if hoping for praise.

It was as if he had a tail wagging behind him.

“Excellent, Tumen. If that bastard is really inside, you’ve achieved great merit.”

“Haha, to become Sir Viktor’s most loyal retainer, I naturally have to prove my usefulness!”

Letting Tumen’s words about kings or whatever flow in one ear and out the other, Viktor slowly stepped into the mansion.

If Bohdan was inside, there was nowhere left to run.

---

“…Isn’t that bastard really insane?”

At the crude words from Bohdan’s mouth, Kulak could only bow his head without saying anything.

In terms of feelings, he was no different.

In the depths of the mansion.

Bohdan continued muttering while holding his head as if dumbfounded.

“He jumps over the moat, smashes the barrier with an axe… Could it be the principality has been taming monsters we don’t know about?”

“…Chief, that’s…”

“I know, I know too. It’s not like that bastard has done this once or twice… but even so, it’s strange…”

Faint sounds of weapons clashing and screams continued flowing in from outside, but Bohdan no longer cared much about such things.

He was simply curious.

“House Kobarov… a stray dog tamed by the principality… Was there something special about their blood?”

“Chief, rather than that, first we should evacuate…”

“Kulak, my wise warrior Kulak. Where exactly is there to flee to? Stop such useless talk and let’s have a more constructive conversation.”

“…Chief! The tribe members are all buying time with desperate hearts! You can’t stay here like this!”

Finally Kulak shouted, but Bohdan’s expression didn’t change at all.

“Kulak.”

“…Yes.”

“If I abandon them and flee again, what would change?”

“…”

“And do you think barely prolonging my life by running away like that is truly what they want?”

“…Then rather than that, why don’t you go outside and at least command! That would be better than being holed up here like this!”

“Hah, meet your end with dignity, something like that.”

Kulak sighed deeply and rubbed his face.

Bohdan was acting like someone who had given up everything.

“Do I look like someone who’s given up everything?”

At Bohdan’s words that seemed to read his thoughts, Kulak flinched and raised his head.

“I’ve never given up, Kulak. I told you from the beginning. I’d catch that bastard here.”

Kulak examined his chief’s face closely once more.

It was a miserable and shabby appearance, but his eyes hadn’t dimmed.

“…Are you perhaps thinking of using that bastard’s brother for threats?”

Kulak sent a suspicious look.

That was only the role of a check when there was leisure between parties, and it was hard to think it could influence the overall situation.

Hadn’t his master acted the same way immediately?

No matter how much knights valued blood relations and family, in the end there were limits when facing great matters.

At Kulak’s words, Bohdan burst into hearty laughter.

“I’m not that stupid either, Kulak. In a situation like now, bringing out that brother would be nothing more or less than begging for life. To him, I’m just captured prey.”

“…Chief, then…?”

“Ancestor wolf said the thing to be most careful of when going hunting is carelessness in the darkness.”

Bohdan clenched his fist.

Not caring that blood was dripping, he continued.

“Until the very end, if there’s a possibility of winning, I can kneel as much as needed. I’ve lived like that until now. I’ll show him the most servile appearance possible. Using that brother, I’ll act pitiful and pathetic.”

“Chief…!”

“When that bastard, with captured prey before him, indulges in leisure and mocks me! I’ll use that carelessness to aim for reversal. Daughter, can you do it?”

“…Yes, father.”

“…!”

Kulak looked at the girl missing one eye.

She drew out a sharply honed dagger.

“I swore to kill all the Kobarov trash with these hands.”

It was when Kulak was about to say something with a pitying face.

Clang!

“Chief! It’s him! That bastard has finally made it here…!”

The screams of the guards echoed from outside the open door.

“Mmm…!”

The girl instantly disappeared into the darkness, and Bohdan nodded.