57 fossil months later.
“Is it already the new year?…”
“Time flies, Logan. Two years have already passed since I first saw you.”
“Yes. It has already happened.”
As winter reached its peak, a new year began again.
A time when food rationing is still ongoing.
Unlike in the past, it was said that the residents of the territory, who had more free time, were holding a New Year’s Eve party.
However, on the outskirts of Tethron Castle, there were still soldiers sweating regardless of the atmosphere.
“one!”
“under!”
“two!”
“under!”
After running 10km in iron armor, the soldiers underwent high-intensity swordsmanship training, swinging their swords while sweating even in the harsh winter.
“There are no more eliminated candidates. As you said, only those who have both stamina and grit remain.”
“I guess so.”
Training period: 90 days.
Training begins with 1,000 people.
12 people lost.
1 death.
987 people passed basic training.
In addition to the 502 regular soldiers, there are a total of about 1,300 troops other than knights, including mercenaries.
Since more people than originally planned passed the training, Logan couldn’t help but be satisfied.
“It looks like the basic training has been roughly completed. The crossbow production you mentioned has also progressed quite a bit. It’s not yet enough to equip all soldiers with crossbows, but 400 new units have arrived.”
“Yes. Hamar worked hard.”
As soon as I returned from vacation, I burst out laughing when I thought of Hamar, who was commanding construction work in the village and firing a crossbow at the same time.
It seemed like he was spouting curses with his eyes every time we ran into each other, but I was planning on keeping it tight, at least until the civil war broke out this winter.
Anyway, thanks to that, the basic power we had planned was roughly in place.
then.
“Now we can get to the real battle.”
“…actually?”
“We’ll see. I look forward to it.”
Kai’s expressionless face showed anxiety, but Logan only smiled faintly.
* * *
“Let’s bulldoze the monster forest to supply the town with lumber… Is this your idea too?”
“Anyway, it’s almost time for a monster wave to occur. It’s a forest where you never know when monsters will come out, so let’s push them away now.”
“You think the monster forest that the family’s ancestors have neglected for hundreds of years will be easily cut down?”
“That’s right. We have enough troops now. Of course, this is only when we mobilize the knights.”
Logan trusted the repeating crossbow, which he had already tested several times against monsters in the southern forest.
Conquering the monster forest was possible because there was confidence that the lowest level monsters could be dealt with in an instant, no matter how many there were.
And that was something Padrick agreed with.
“…Hmm. Yes, if it’s a forest at the bottom of a mountain range, it won’t be a problem. Knights will also need some practical training.”
“Oh? Then, how about learning the Iron Blood Sword…”
“Everyone has learned the basics. But for proficiency, it is still a matter of practice.”
“Of course. To improve your skills, you need to practice.”
The moment when the father and son, the most powerful people in the territory, hold hands with satisfied smiles.
The hardships of the troops under McLane were destined for them without their knowledge.
* * *
“Is everyone ready?!”
“yes!”
Their faces are so haggard that they don’t look like Force users at all.
However, the knights answered loudly with bright smiles that did not suit their faces.
‘I feel more comfortable in actual combat.’
The knights had half their faces covered in extreme thirst under the guise of their swordsmanship training over the past few months.
At this moment, they were all of one mind.
but.
“Even though it’s a monster forest, the majority are low-level monsters. If you get even a scratch, you’ll have three days of personal sparring with me. Do you understand?”
With one shout from Padric, a momentary silence came to the ranks of the noisy knights.
“…what?”
“What kind of nonsense…”
“This is crazy…”
One or two people began to spit out curses in very low voices while lowering their heads.
However, the moment those swear words were thrown out at the same time from all over the place, the atmosphere at the parade ground instantly turned into a market atmosphere.
At the same time that Padric’s expression became grimly distorted, silence fell once again.
“Oh, you’re not confident that you won’t get hurt even against low-level monsters? Are the knights of McLane only that good?”
Fortunately, there were no stupid knights caught up in these words.
The level of the monster wasn’t the problem.
Don’t even get hurt while carrying out an unprecedented large-scale subjugation.
Doesn’t that mean you have to be careful about even the branches of trees that brush against you?
Rather than charging in bravely, we need to be cautious.
But their crazy monarch added one more ridiculous demand.
“Stand in a row and cut down trees with your sword while shouting commands. Then, take care of the monsters that pop out in between. Make full use of the Iron Blood Sword and never back down, and hold your ground!”
“Huh…”
“You really want to kill us…”
“What if the monsters escape?”
Even low-level monsters usually had fighting instincts.
Unless there is an overwhelming number of groups, they will never try to attack the knights, and if many monsters attack at once, some will definitely be missed.
However, if you chase after them, the line-by-line formation I mentioned earlier will become meaningless.
It was an appropriate question considering the overall situation, but the answer was simple.
“Leave it alone.”
“yes?”
“We will place soldiers who have completed basic training behind us. Shouldn’t we also test their training performance?”
What he meant was that the Knights’ current mission was actually lumberjacking.
Although the knights had their pride subtly hurt, there was no objection.
While enduring the past two months of training, they experienced first-hand how ignorant a top-class knight who had given up his lord’s duties could become.
The knights had no choice but to bury their past resentment of swinging their swords at each other and unite to resist their master’s madness.
The act of coming forward and arguing against it would only lead to the nightmare of one-on-one sparring training with the lord.
“Everyone, take your seats! I’ll have your back!”
To the drivers, it sounded like I was going to hit them in the back if they didn’t do it right.
In an instant, the knights’ eyes flashed fiercely within the visors of their equipped helmets.
* * *
“Monsters will run away behind the knights. Don’t miss a single one.”
“yes!”
“Crossbows are the first option. Those who get too close will be dealt with by the standby team. Do you understand?”
“Yes, I understand!”
A look of tension was evident on the soldiers’ faces.
It wasn’t just because of the tension of the first real game after training.
This was because Logan had announced prior to this actual training that he would select those who showed talent in this training as knight trainees.
The soldiers’ eyes were burning with motivation. In fact, Logan was looking at them with a calm expression.
‘As expected… I don’t think what I felt since training was an illusion. The test may be meaningless….’
The guys I had been keeping an eye on were gradually improving in the meantime.
While observing the soldiers’ training, Logan was able to discover something unusual.
I felt slight changes in a small number of soldiers, including Victor.
It feels like my strength is building up little by little compared to others.
It was just a fragment of a subtle supernatural ability that could hardly be called a force, or rather a scent, but it had a distinct feeling.
Many of them were selected through tests that focused on senses, some were existing soldiers, and a few were selected based solely on physical strength.
It was an unfamiliar experience even for Logan.
This may be because as the force core gradually increases in power, the senses also become amplified.
Although this was a small difference, it was a huge discovery.
‘I think we can select people who have a high chance of becoming Force users without having to take a test like this?’
The more I paid attention to the difference I felt, the more I thought about it.
In the future, if his senses grow further and he can observe the achievements of these soldiers and find common reasons to create a model.
Perhaps it would be possible to completely identify the ‘talent of the Force’ that even the future empire could not clearly discover.
If we were to find something that could not be clearly identified with any magic, it would be a major event that would truly change history.
‘So, I need to prove exactly whether my feelings are an illusion or not.’
This monster forest subjugation was not only practical training, but also information gathering.
And regardless of talent, there was no need for guys who couldn’t demonstrate their skills in real life.
With that in mind, Logan selected only the soldiers who caught his eye and made them hold swords rather than crossbows.
It was to see the enemy fight from a closer perspective.
‘In that sense, it may be a good thing that only about 400 crossbows have been distributed yet.’
In addition to the 150 soldiers he had his eye on, there were another 150 soldiers who excelled in martial arts training.
Logan expected that the differences they would show now would also serve as additional information to prepare for the future.
That was when Logan’s eyes lit up and he looked at each of their expressions.
“Let’s begin!”
“bout!”
At the same time, cheers erupted from the mouths of the knights lined up at the edge of the forest.
So so so so so.
Then, with the sound of something cracking, exactly 73 trees began to sway at once.
Rumbling.
There was a slight difference depending on the level of the engineer, but on average, the iron trees from the southern mountain range that Hamar had assured could be used for civil engineering fell after two or three cuts.
Because they had not been touched by humans for a long time, they were all trees as thick as a human body.
This was clearly an impossible task for the McLane knights of the past.
“Wow!”
“This is it…”
The soldiers who were watching were amazed, but even louder cheers came from the knights who had actually accomplished this amazing feat.
I felt once again the power of the iron blood sword, an intermediate level swordsmanship focusing on strong attacks that I had mastered through intense hardships for two months.
And while hearing the cheers of the knights, Padric shouted without delay with a faint smile.
“Move right! Deploy in parallel again!”
Half a day’s drive south of McLane Castle.
A forest that seemed to be 1km across began to be slowly cut away from the edge.
Rumbling.
It’s already been more than three hours since the work started.
The sound of trees falling over. When they got used to the loud noise and the soldiers started yawning one by one,
nine golems that were about 2m tall and one golem that was about 3m tall were moving diligently, lifting and moving the trees that the knights had fallen down.
Golems are different from ordinary people. He did not flinch from the loud cries of beasts and monsters in the forest, and although his movements were slow, he easily carried the trees backwards with his powerful force. The
moment when Logan, looking at the scene, raised his thumb towards Clayton and his disciples.
Chuaaaaa!
With an unpleasant, rough breathing sound, humanoid monsters with black horns and half the size of regular people poured out of the forest.
“It’s a goblin!”
The boring atmosphere changed completely with the knights’ shouts.
Living as a group in the forest. These were low-level monsters.
They were smaller than humans, but they were just as fast, and they used small weapons such as daggers and poisonous needles efficiently.
But…
“At best, that was the first one that came out.”
Whoa!
“Are they goblins?”
Shuttered.
“It’s not fun. !”
Skag.
“Keeeeek!”
The goblins that came out first were quickly eliminated by the leading knights.
“Keeeeek!”
However, at the same time as the cries were heard again from inside the forest, they did not approach the knights. Goblins began to emerge left and right, scattering east and west.
“Unit! Crossbow!”
“Ha!”
“We will sweep away those who run away! Wing formation left and right!”
If the goblins who are currently scattering away from crowded places are left alone, they will unite among themselves again.
And if a group of goblins who have lost their home were to unite, they could cause fatal damage to the general public.
Fortunately, this was already expected . Because it was something they did, the soldiers’ reaction was quick.
Doo doo doo.
The soldiers, divided into 100 groups of 12 each, spread out left and right and chased the goblins.
Then, under the individual command of the leader
, “Shoot!”,
they started shooting without hesitation
. Baba Park.
The bolts fired from the crossbow became beams of light and rained down.
Then, the weak low-level monsters, who were not faster than horses and did not have leather hard enough to withstand the arrows, were unable to resist and began to be slaughtered.
Meanwhile, even among the goblins, there was an unusually large monster. A large, red-skinned goblin fell under the soldiers’ concentrated fire.
“We caught the hobgoblin! Leave the escaped monster alone! Back to the base!”
Goblins could not unite into a group without the leader of the group, a hobgoblin.
The soldiers who knew this fact returned to their original formation, leaving the goblins scattered as they had been trained in advance.
“Wahahahah! Did you see it?”
“I killed two!”
“I killed three!”
“It’s not that big of a deal! Why was I afraid of these things?”
With flushed faces, the soldiers compare each other’s battles and share their thoughts.
Most of them are fighting for the first time. They were new soldiers.
The appearance of the goblin seemed to have energized the soldiers who were bored with repeated training.
But that was only for a moment.
“Kyaoooooo!”
When an eerie cry that was completely different from that of a goblin rang out, their faces turned to stone. It hardened.
