Chapter 98 : Chapter 98

Chapter 98. The Baron of Runestone City! A Last Stand with No Retreat!

The instant the Golden Lion Knights slammed into the routed rebels, they displayed a terrifying, utterly overwhelming might.

Ron rode at the very front, and the massive lance in his hand flashed like golden lightning.

Any fleeing soldier who stood in his path was effortlessly skewered straight through, man and shield alike.

The Golden Lion Knights behind him followed close on his heels, their heavy warhorses pounding the earth.

The sharp lances in their hands were lowered in perfect unison, forming a forest of death.

Before that destructive charge, the fleeing rebels were as fragile as stalks of wheat.

In a single charge alone, the Golden Lion Knights plowed several ghastly lanes of flesh and blood through the chaotic crowd.

Severed limbs flew through the air, and the fleeing rebels who were struck were sent tumbling like broken sacks.

The scene was as brutal as a field of hell.

Yet this unstoppable force did not pursue at their heels and slaughter them to the last man like an ordinary army would.

Under Ron’s precise control, the Golden Lion Knights instead drove and compressed the already chaotic flood of routed soldiers forward with merciless force.

Buck, leading the Black Crow Knights and the Black Territory veterans, pressed close behind them.

Blades and spears hung over the routed soldiers’ backs the entire time, forcing them to flee desperately onward without even daring to look behind them.

...

At that very moment, Sabda was holding his breath and focusing intently behind the earthen slope of the preset ambush position, waiting for Eli’s reinforcements to appear.

When the thunder of hooves and the chaotic shouting rolled closer and closer from the direction of Lucerne City, a trace of relief first crossed his taut face, only to turn at once into confusion.

“Caphis?” he murmured, his brows knitting slightly.

“Why is the commotion so great? And why are they running this way with their men?”

He thought Caphis had completed the bait mission and was coming to join him.

He rose to his feet and peered into the distance.

But the sight that entered his eyes made him freeze where he stood.

There was no smug face of Caphis, flushed with triumph, anywhere to be seen.

There was only a boundless tide of terrified routed soldiers.

They had thrown away their armor and weapons, and their faces were filled with ultimate fear and despair.

Crying, shoving, stumbling, they came hurtling toward his position for their lives.

And behind those fleeing men, amid the rolling dust, glimmers of gold could be seen.

All the blood drained from Sabda’s face in an instant, leaving him as pale as though every trace of life had been pulled from him.

He stared fixedly at that patch of gold, the symbol of the La Roche Family’s highest martial might, and his body swayed almost imperceptibly.

All his calculations, all his ambition, all his desperate gambling were crushed into pieces by reality at that moment.

“So that’s how it is... Eli Pendragon, what a move...”

Sabda muttered to himself, a bitter smile tugging at his lips.

There was no hysteria of a gambler who had lost everything.

There was only a calm that came from the death of all hope.

And beneath that calm lay a despair without bottom.

“So this time... I’ve lost.”

“Baron Sabda! Wh-what is the meaning of this?!” Steward Winter’s frantic voice rang out beside him.

He pointed at the routed soldiers surging toward them like a flood, and at the pursuers close behind.

“Caphis’s men... they... why do they look as though they’re being driven this way?! This is nothing like what we agreed on!”

Sabda slowly turned his head, his voice so calm that it held not the slightest ripple.

“As you can see, Steward Winter. My plan... has failed.”

“Failed?! What sort of joke are you making, Sabda?!” Winter completely lost his composure and shouted at him.

At the same time, his mind raced wildly.

No! It is not over yet! There is still a chance!

As long as... as long as I hand him over!

Yes! Hand over this mastermind who colluded with the rebels to that Eli!

And offer up Runestone City as well... perhaps... perhaps the count can still spare me...

The expression on his face changed rapidly as a vicious thought took shape in an instant.

As he spoke, he quietly slid a hand into the inner pocket of his sleeve, while at the same time edging closer to Sabda without drawing attention.

“My lord baron, I think...” Winter forced a false smile onto his face, trying to distract Sabda.

At the very instant the hand gripping the dagger was about to slip from his sleeve and stab into the middle of Sabda’s back—

A cold flash of steel streaked past.

Slash!

The smile on Steward Winter’s face froze instantly, while his eyes filled with shock and confusion.

He felt only a chill at his neck, and then his vision spun violently.

It seemed as though he saw his own headless body still leaning forward with the dagger in its hand, while blood sprayed wildly from the severed neck...

It was Ragnar.

The silent guard had moved the very instant Winter’s killing intent revealed itself.

Fast. Precise. Ruthless.

One stroke. One beheading.

Winter’s head rolled into the dust, still wearing an expression of utter disbelief, while his headless corpse collapsed heavily to the ground.

The poisoned dagger hidden in his sleeve fell to the earth with a clatter, its blade glinting with a faint blue sheen.

“Ragnar! Th-this...”

Luke, one of Sabda’s trusted men, was so terrified by the sudden bloody scene that his soul nearly left his body.

He hurriedly tore off his cloak and, fumbling in panic, threw it over Winter’s headless corpse.

Fortunately, the two hundred household soldiers Winter had brought from Alders had deliberately been arranged by Sabda at the very front of the ambush position.

At this moment, all their attention was fixed on the routed soldiers and pursuers flooding toward them from the rear, and they had not yet noticed the sudden change here.

“Ragnar! You—” Casso too was stunned by Ragnar’s thunderous strike.

He looked uncertainly at Ragnar, then at the dagger lying on the ground.

In an instant, he understood what had happened, and his expression became incomparably complicated.

Ragnar ignored Casso’s question entirely.

He merely bent down expressionlessly, used the tip of his sword to lift the poisoned dagger from the ground, and presented it before Sabda.

Through his actions, he proved his loyalty.

Sabda looked at Ragnar’s silent, resolute face, and at last the dead-ash stillness in his eyes stirred with the faintest ripple.

His voice, calm as a dried-up well, sounded once more.

“Heh... Ragnar... I... thought you would be the one to seize the chance and kill me.”

For once, Ragnar tugged faintly at the corner of his mouth, revealing a weary, bitter smile.

“I would indeed kill you,” he said, his voice low and hoarse.

“But not now. We can do that when we go to hell together.

“If we are to die, then we die in the final struggle against the enemy—not from some vile betrayal from behind.”

Sabda went still.

He looked into Ragnar’s eyes and saw that familiar loyalty.

Even in this hopeless dead end, it had not wavered in the least.

And yet he had once doubted him...

Heh... I truly am a contemptible wretch...

A surge of indescribable bitterness instantly shattered the deathly calm he had been forcing himself to maintain.

He shut his eyes hard.

When he opened them again, there seemed to be the faintest trace of light within them.

“Hahahaha...” Sabda suddenly let out a hoarse laugh, one filled with self-mockery and release.

He turned to look at his uncle beside him, Calvin Medici, whose face was as dark as still water.

“Uncle Calvin... this battle began because of me. It was my arrogance that dragged you and the warriors of House Medici into this...

“While the field is still in chaos, take the family’s remaining elites and go.

“Abandon Runestone City and return to the Southern Frontier at once...”

“Bullshit!”

With a furious roar, Calvin cut Sabda off.

The Gold-Tier Knight’s hair and beard bristled as rage and unyielding battle intent blazed in his eyes. He stared hard at Sabda.

“Sabda Medici! Look at the state you’re in right now!

“I, Calvin Medici, will never stand by and watch one of my own nephews flee like a coward!

“Nor will I abandon you and save myself alone! If anyone is to remain behind and cover the retreat, it will be me, while you go!

“The blood of House Medici must not end here!”

He ripped the knight’s longsword from his waist in one motion, and the powerful pressure he released instantly drove away part of the fear in the hearts of the surrounding soldiers.

“My lord! We’re not leaving!”

“We’ll fight them to the death!”

“There are no cowards in House Medici!”

Luke, Casso, and the rest of Sabda’s core subordinates were also ignited by Calvin’s roar, their final trace of blood-hot courage flaring back to life.

They all drew their weapons and gathered around Sabda, roaring so loudly that the air trembled.

The Alders household soldiers, ignorant of the truth, also shouted along with them.

Their fear was temporarily crushed down, and a grim aura of total commitment, of a last stand with no road left to retreat, spread through the ranks.

Sabda listened to the roar of his subordinates, willing to live and die with him...

And the heart that had been wrapped in despair seemed to be forced to take in one last breath of life.

The dead ash in his eyes began to churn violently.

What reignited there was no longer the pride of the second son of the Duke of the Southern Frontier, nor that of the Baron of Runestone City.

It was the pride and ruthlessness that belonged to Sabda Medici himself.

It flared back to life again like sparks catching on dry tinder.

He drew in a deep breath.

He no longer looked at Calvin.

He no longer looked at Ragnar.

Instead, he fixed his gaze on the torrent of pursuers drawing ever nearer, carrying the breath of destruction with them.

Slowly, he drew the longsword at his waist, the one adorned with the crest of Runestone City.

“Good!” Sabda’s voice was no longer dead and empty. Instead, it carried a hoarse battle fervor that bordered on madness.

He roared with every bit of strength he had left.

“Then so be it—as you all wish! Not for Medici, but for our honor!

“Honor... shall be defended with our blood!

“Prepare—to meet the enemy!!!”