"We're going to send in a detachment."
It was an urgent decision.
With the moon's fragments now in the wrong place due to demonic intervention, Leon had ordered a special squadron to retrieve them.
Mother Anak chimed in.
"It's going to be dangerous. I don't think the demons knew what we were doing, but they knew something was up."
"I know. But that moon fragment is an opportunity that High Priestess Isabelle risked her life to create. We must secure it."
Yes, there was no giving up. Even for the sake of the future, Leon cannot choose to give it up.
"The good news is that the Star Iron is a mass of pure holy power, and most demons will be destroyed at the mere touch."
A stellar summons that strikes only the evil without doing any damage to the good.
It traveled through the atmosphere and annihilated over two hundred thousand demons. The greatest violence a divine power could unleash.
"I don't think this king will be able to do it himself."
"Of course not…! Your Majesty, leave it to me, I will retrieve the shards!"
Loxley flared up at the prospect of Leon taking matters into his own hands.
This is an allied army, and this army will not return without Leon.
With less than 200,000 troops, why wouldn't ten million demons attack at once?
The Holy Knights are said to be super-powerful, but they have the Grail Guardian, the Lionheart King, above them.
If Leon is killed, the Alliance will fall at once. This was not a gloomy prediction or assumption, but a clear truth.
"Lord Antoine."
"Speak, Your Majesty."
"The fragments of the moon that Priestess Isabelle shot will not be able to be disassembled except by the priests of the Iron and Blacksmiths. You will take charge and lead a detachment to secure the fragments."
"Your Majesty, how much discretion am I allowed in the composition of the detachment?"
"Two saints. We are a small force, so I want the best of the best."
Antoine looked a little troubled at that.
He understood Leon's concern for the safety of the detachment. But if two Holy Knights were missing, how would this place be defended?
The presence of the Holy Knights somehow balances out the outnumbering by a factor of dozens.
With the recent disappearance of the greatest Holy Knight of all, Sir Vulcanus, how can they──
"Your Majesty, is it not possible for you to order the Archduke of Dragonia to return?"
"I cannot. The Archduke and the Northern Army have made their choice. I cannot enforce it."
The members of this coalition are nominally equal, but that doesn't mean they're actually equal.
The Lionheart is the absolute symbol of this alliance, drawing in the survivors and being its greatest practical force.
The Northern Dragonia Army, however, is a different story.
Long ago, the Archduke of Dragonia, who founded the Lionheart with the first Lionheart King, was a Dragon Slayer who slayed many of the kingdom's greatest enemies.
For this reason, the First Lionheart King made Dragonia a semi-independent Grand Duchy, making them an eternal ally.
They were the voice of the North and a barrier against the barbarians. The Lionheart Kings can never treat the Archduke of Dragonia as lesser.
"Archduchess Karina will not return."
"In that case, Your Majesty."
Antoine said, continuing the previous topic.
"Please allow me to include those who have joined the coalition this time."
"You mean those brought in by Lord...Gillingham?"
"Yes. From what I hear, they have unusual skills, especially the woman named Beatrice and the half-breed named Yakt Spinner. They will be of great assistance."
"...."
Leon pondered for a moment; only he knew that they were saints and saintesses ordained by his future self.
They have real lives, unlike his own, which are merely recreations of the past.
He wanted to get them out of here intact with as little risk as possible, but....
'It's not fair to waste two Holy Knights.'
Han Ha-ri and Chun So-yeon are also strong at the level of master, but they are not comparable to the Holy Knights.
They should be able to deal with any threats on their own.
"It's a race against time. Hurry, secure the moon shard and return home."
* * * *
Two companies of five hundred knights and a company of freemen light cavalry rode toward the moon shard at lightning speed.
Lionheart's steeds had the stamina to last three days on the road, and even the horsemen, who considered them the pride of their country, could not help but be stunned by the monstrosity leading the way.
"Lord ....Is that really a creature?"
One knight's question was legitimate. So was Antoine's.
-Diverse!
Eight steel legs pacing the ground as a spider of steel, dozens of times larger than Lionheart's steed was racing at a speed of eighty kilometers per hour.
The strange creature of steel, never seen before in any continent or kingdom, had to slow down to keep pace with the steed behind it.
The answer to that question was simple.
"He is the chosen knight of the god Heto. He has been sworn in as a Holy Knight by Arianna, and that is enough."
The Knights of the Lionheart are notoriously rigid and inflexible, but they are infinitely flexible at the command of the Lionheart King and the choice of the Temple of Ten Thousand Gods.
His Majesty has commanded it, and you're going to protest?
Chosen by the gods, how can a mere creature know the depths of their will?
As long as it's not something as bizarre as converting demons or swearing in orcs as knights, the knights are ready to accept anything.
The only people who stand by Yappy, the odd man out, are Sir Antoine, who is fascinated by his abilities, and Beatrice, his original companion.
-Bam!
Yappy stowed the drones with depleted batteries in the fuselage and flew a secondary drone reconnaissance team, bringing up a holographic map that integrated and mapped the surrounding information.
"Oooh… What kind of trick is this?"
Lord Antoine approached, admiring the 3D map, which detailed the terrain and forest views and Yappy made a smug sound.
-An integrated reconnaissance system that could not be realized by barbaric organics. The excellence of this device is unrivaled.
"Haha, no wonder. You're an all-rounder, my disciple."
Yappy looks a little unhappy with Antoine's remarks.
-Suggested name correction. You are only a technology provider. You do not possess the intellectual capacity to impose disciplehood on me.
"Hahahahahaha!"
Antoine laughed merrily, patting the mechanical leg of Yappy twice his height.
"Looks like we're getting acquainted, huh?"
"Does it seem so?"
"There aren't many people on my side of the world who can talk to Lord Yappy like this."
Yappy tends to treat most of his opponents mechanically. He's friendly to a point, but it's hard to tell if it's friendly or just a one-sided joke.
In that sense, it was refreshing for Beatrice to see Yappy unable to resist Antoine.
"Since you are the embodiment of rationality, Lord Yappy, it's no wonder you covet Antoine's skills.
Is there something that connects the Holy Knights of the God of Iron and Blacksmith's?
Beatrice wished she had met Sir Jerea when she first opened the gate the other day.
"My lady, I'm sure you've noticed."
"Yes, he is strangely unobtrusive."
In addition to Yappy's search, the cavalry had been scouting the area.
Still, there's no sign of movement as they make their way to where the moon fragment fell.
"There's no way they're letting this go."
"They'll probably start attacking when we start mining the shards."
The question is, how many demons, and what level of demons? But I don't think they're expecting three Holy Knights in this squadron.
After a long day of traveling, they reached the spot where the moon shard had fallen.
"There it is."
The shard of moon that had fallen had created a huge crater, but it was still intact and glowing.
A shard the Moon Goddess had allowed to diminish her divinity and that had been shot down by her priest, even as she threw her life away.
"Let the extraction begin."
Antoine approached the moon shard and began to pound it with his hammer and chisel.
"Lord Spinner, come and help."
-Bam!
Antoine and Spinner along with a dozen blacksmith priests worked together to dismantle the stardust from the moon shard while Beatrice manipulated the defensive measures and set up camp.
'If I were them, I would attack at this time.'
They would take advantage of the defenselessness of extracting stardust from the moon shard. Now, the success of the shipment depends on how effectively they fend off the attack.
"Set up camp and prepare for battle. This is our most vulnerable moment."
The good news is that they have an overwhelming advantage in information warfare.
A hundred or so Free People light troopers are constantly scouting the area and Yappy's drones are on long-range surveillance missions.
No matter how stealthy they try to be, we're sure to catch them.
The problem is their size since the demons' numbers are beyond imagination.
Even the kingdoms of the gods were helpless before the waves of demons that are now multiplying infinitely through the Demon Gate.
But in the face of this overwhelming disadvantage, they could still hold on.
"Only three Holy Knights can be dealt with by overwhelming force. The difficulty is how many high-level demons are coming."
The demonic forces are so numerous as to be overwhelming. That means there are plenty of high ranking demons to command the barbarians, demon followers, and lesser demons.
-Boom! Enemy movement detected. Bringing up holographic map.
Yappy, who was still mining the moon shard, picked up the enemy's movements with a drone.
The hologram shows black blobs targeting the flanks of the entrenched troops.
Beatrice deftly flicked her fingers to zoom in, confirming the monstrous spiders she'd seen before, as well as the werewolves with their freakishly large molars.
"Looks like they came as fast as they could with a mobile force."
Aboard the monstrous spiders and werewolves are vaguely familiar goblins and miniature demons.
Being three or four times the size of a warhorse, these creatures are intimidating by their sheer size alone.
"They're coming! About thirty thousand!"
This side is small, sending only their best cavalry, while the demonic side is overwhelmingly superior in numbers.
"Gunners, ready to shoot!"
The freemen light cavalrymen raise their arrows and the arrows shoot out and hit the spiders at a distance of over five hundred meters.
"That's amazing, is this some kind of magic?"
Beatrice asks in admiration, and a knight at the next table replies cheerfully.
"They are longbows blessed and crafted by the priests of Heto. They can pierce even the tough skin of orcs."
"I thought you disliked ranged weapons, but you're surprisingly good at running an army."
The knights scratched their cheeks in amusement at the comment but they had to continue giving commands.
"Javelins!"
Each of the knights pulled out one of the spears on their horse's side. Unlike their assault javelins, these were sharpened for throwing.
"Shoot!!!"
The knights channeled their energies into their spears and fired them at the horde of monstrous spiders. The javelins exploded with a terrible sound.
-Kiie-e-e-e-e!
The monstrous spiders let out a screeching roar, whether they had read the unusual aura or sensed their own doom. The next moment──
-Puck! Puff-puff-puff-puck!
The spears thrown by the knights pierced through the monstrous spiders.
"Those whose offensive power is weaker than a bow cannot become knights. That's why ranged weapons are inferior."
"I know that very well from His Majesty."
Beatrice grinned while Yappy, who had been mining, joined the offensive.
-Drone firepower. A saintly firestorm begins.
The Yakt Spinner doesn't just make armor in the Temple of Ten Thousand Gods.
Yappy, who can create tools wherever and whenever he needs them, made a bunch of holy bullets for himself.
-Toadadadadadadadad!
The bullets rained down with a terrible roar.
Coming from the flesh of a living saint, each bullet is imbued with holy power, inflicting fatal damage to the demons.
Yappy's hypervelocity machine guns are more effective than the arrows of the freemen.
Antoine marvels at the source of this monstrous machine, but he has yet to see his true power.
"And this?!"
There were familiar spell formulas but the caster was an otherworldly magician queen.
──Interpretation. Remake Magic
"Lamantha's thunderbolt… was it?"
-Bang!
A giant thunderbolt fell from the center of the magic circle and caused a huge explosion in the middle of the monstrous spiders but that's not all.
──Interpretation.
Her delicate fingers danced like a conductor in front of an orchestra.
Even on horseback, her grace is not impaired in the slightest, and the lightning that falls scatters in all directions as if representing her will.
-Quack! Quack! Quack! Kwah!
The thunderbolts explode out from where they fell. It stretched out in all directions, connecting like the legs of a monstrous spider.
-Poof!
-Kwazik!
The monster spiders whose flesh was unable to withstand the instantaneous heat created by the lightning passing through, exploded like bombs.
"This is amazing…Even the Imperial Prefects would not be able to perform such a huge magic."
"The level of mages in this world is not bad at all. They just evolved in a destructive way to counter the Holy Law."
Yes, obviously, the magic of wizards, including those of the imperial prefects, is not inferior.
So what is it about this magician-queen who can interpret and apply the principles of their magic just by looking at them?
Antoine has no way of knowing, but he cautiously speculates that she may be an Archmage descended from the blood of an Imperial Prefect.
-Kiiiiii....
-Kieieieie!
Ten thousand units of monstrous spiders flinch from the terrible firepower of the enemy.
There were a thousand casualties before they could even get close, it was no wonder that they were terrified.
"Now that we've broken the enemy's spirit…I'd like them to hesitate a bit longer."
Beatrice hoped to buy them as much time as possible, but they would try to close in, and hand-to-hand combat would be essential.
"If that's all they have, we can stop them…but of course it's not all.
As Beatrice had predicted, in the distant sky was beyond Yappy's range eyes moved, watching the battalion mining the moon shard.
[Send in the troops, we will wait for them to finish mining the shard]
In the clouds of the expanse, demons flapped their wings.