The voices from behind had somehow grown smaller.
Raienbach had probably properly fulfilled his role.
Todd dashed to the hut, but no more arrows flew now.
Only hearing Shiranui slicing through the wind, he arrived at his destination.
Todd briefly considered attacking as-is, but decided to go flashy and channeled mana in one go.
Then he sheathed the swords on his back, combining them back into Kusanagi, and leapt up.
Floating in midair, he overlapped his hands into a fist.
Landing atop the hut’s roof, he swung down a blow he greatly wound up.
Bang!
Shiranui’s strike caved in the roof in an instant.
The impact propagated inside, and the hut started crumbling with cracking sounds.
Jumping down from the roof and grasping his swords again, some women screamed as they ran out from inside.
Having completely forgotten there might be people besides the chieftain, Todd scratched his head inside Shiranui, annoyed at himself.
(It was thatched, so it should be fine…but to be so caught up I forgot something like that. Still got a ways to go.)
As a man thought to be the chieftain came out with the women, the hut finally completely collapsed.
The man, probably the chieftain, was glaring at Todd as if enraged.
“Chieftain, if you swear obedience I won’t take your life.”
“─Take just my head. Don’t kill the others.”
“Unfortunately, I must refuse.”
“Even with strength like that…!”
Perhaps thinking his whole tribe would be massacred, the chieftain charged at Todd fully aware the odds were against him alone.
Of course, Todd had no intention of annihilating their tribe.
If it were him in that position, could he have said those words – take only my head, and let the others live without worry.
Laughing, Todd closed in on the chieftain Ho and placed his sword at his neck─
“What are your intentions?”
He hit it right on the head.
The blade of murakumo turns a light shade of red as it cuts through a thin layer of skin.
The force was exquisitely judged, to the point he was internally praising himself.
“We’re outsiders…well, our ways are different than you people here. So we’ll have you follow our ways.”
“Oh? And what will you…do with us?”
Seeing Ho’s chieftain stoic face, Todd idly thought he had probably misunderstood and expected something terrible.
It would be faster to just kill him, but Todd had taken quite a liking to Ho.
So contrary to the ways of the mountain people, he had decided on a whim to spare Ho’s life.
“Where I’m from, we make captured pieces our comrades. So Ho, I’ll make you a comrade too. I’ll be the chieftain, but otherwise nothing will change… No, I promise you’ll have a much richer life than before.”
“─Any objections to those words?”
“Yes, I swear it on our ancestors’ spirits and my own siblings.”
” …… I see. “
Todd moved the sword from his neck, vigorously swung it to scatter the blood, then overlapped the two swords, channeled mana in, and returned them to Kusanagi on his waist.
Seeing him suddenly stow his weapon, Ho made a puzzled expression.
Smiling at him, Todd said,
“Hurry and placate everyone. You’re my comrade now, you can do it, right?”
“Tch, rude way to use people! Oi, put down your swords! Stow your bows!”
Suddenly burdened with this, Ho looked disgruntled but still headed toward the former Ho tribesmen.
Todd might have done something cruel to Ho. But everything depends on his life.
Mentally apologizing that he would increase Ho’s discretion and such once he somehow dealt with Tottila, Todd watched Ho’s broad back as he carefully made sure none were killed.
The fighting seemed to have died down, as Raienbach briskly made his way over to me.
Turning his back on the mountain folk so they couldn’t see his mouth, he whispered:
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“Is this okay? Crushing them from above and taking everything is the way of the mountain folk, isn’t it?”
“Well the kingdom’s way is to take them all together from the top,” I replied.
“It could spark future conflict.”
“It’ll be fine. With Totila gone, the mountain folk will be stable for years. In that time we can develop the armored knights, and crush them immediately if it needed.”
Conversations with Raienbach occasionally took on a question and answer format like this.
Todd considered this own way of educating me.
“I see. Then I leave it to your discretion,”
neither arguing his point further nor saying anything more after I had responded.
In these war-torn times, it could become a bad habit, but it’s in my nature to want to make use of capable people rather than just kill them outright.
Even considering the possibility of rebellion, if the benefits outweigh the risks, I still want to draw potential allies to our side.
But for now I think this is fine.
With the forces Totila has, the more reliable companions we can get, the better.
And so, with just Raienbach and myself, I succeeded in bringing down the Ho clan.
And while the Ho tribe survived, they would continue on as my personal elite troops ──.
“Yup yup, as expected of the Shiranui I developed! Not a scratch on it and still looking beautiful. Mmm, nice and smooth!”
When I went to send up the smoke signal we had agreed on after taking the Ho village, I noticed Haruto and the others had come to the rocky outcropping where we first hid.
I knew Haruto cared more about the weapons he developed than his own life, but it seems I still underestimated just how much.
I had many things I wanted to say, but I knew lecturing him would be useless.
I shot a disapproving look at the person next to me for not stopping him.
But it wasn’t the usual assistant, Renge, standing there.
“Lord Todd, you were amazing! One day I’m gonna become a strong man like you, Lord Todd!”
Garul just stared at me with sparkling eyes full of admiration while ignoring everything.
As I had instructed beforehand, he wore the fortified armor.
The chest switch used to activate it with magic was already glowing.
Neither of them would listen to a word I said.
It seems Garul had selective hearing as bad as Haruto’s.
Realizing any reprimand would be pointless, I led away Haruto, still clinging to his beloved Shiranui, and the newly-allied Ho, along with Garul back to our safe house.
And of course, Raienbach trailing behind.
Strangely, despite the Ho being left alive, the mountain folk had a very positive reaction.
Perhaps it showed just how much they trusted me.
“Do you Ho folk know the chieftain named Totila?” I asked.
“Of course. There’s not a mountain folk who doesn’t know the bastard,”
Ho replied, his manner of speech casual unlike the other chieftains who spoke with deference.
Raienbach moved to rest his hand on his sword, but I stopped him immediately.
What’s in a man’s heart matters far more than the words from his mouth.
Once I acknowledged him, Ho wouldn’t go back on it.
If I understand that, everything else is trivial.
“How far do you think Totila’s power reaches ?”
“The eastern edge… to be precise, from Mount Attica in the seventh range to around Mount Narup in the fifth is under his control. Seems he’s being held up by the rocky Narup cliffs and the clans living there.”
Ho’s explanation was more detailed and logical than what I’d heard from Hamar or Garul.
He seemed to grasp that we were trying to fight Totila, and was selectively providing the knowledge needed for that goal.
The Erenesia mountain range consisted of seven peaks.
From west to east it went Ning, Marb, Sout, Shira, Narup, Gar, and Attica, with temperatures dropping as you went east.
Continue east from there to reach the South Urban Glacier, then further east to arrive at the Six Kingdom Alliance, a small country the mountain folk had been driven out of.
Though not as powerful as the Rynsgaya -Rynfelt Alliance, they had strong nomadic bloodlines, with a political system of six ruling houses formed from the six clans who established the nation, governed by a council of those houses.
Apparently Totila had no intention of confronting the Alliance, merely intent on controlling the entirety of the Erenesia range.
“Without horses to cross the glacier, the mountain folk are just lightly-armed archers. Robbed of their greatest weapon – mobility – they stand no chance against the Six Kingdom Alliance. Attacking the neighboring kingdom connected by land still has more potential. The mountain folk love fighting – it’s in their blood. If there was a nearby country with a large military they could attack and start a war with, that’s clearly what they’d do next.”
“Your Highness’ concern is warranted. If Totila manages to bring the entire mountain range under his control, a crushing tidal wave of cavalry will come crashing down on the kingdom.”
As expected, Raienbach was breaking into a cold sweat at the prospect.
Even if we spoke of the mountain folk uniting, not a single person in the royal capital would believe it.
I would have been one of those laughing people had I not know what was going on myself.
Of course, it wasn’t that I was completely unaware of the Alliance or the mountain folk before.
But in the kingdom, the mountain folk were seen as barbarians – a loose coalition of small tribes.
The occasional raids they conducted were on the scale of destroying a few villages at most.
It stung, but not significantly, so they had no choice but to overlook it.
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