Read Novel Full Chapter 256
Chapter 256
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Chapter 256 – The End of Escape
“Lucian, what is it?”
“Strange presence.”
One of the shrine maidens, questioned by the Prince, points to the south, where the royal castle used to be. I can’t see anything; it’s just a flat sea of sand.
“Do you feel any presence, Mir?”
“I can’t sense anything. We’d better leave early, just in case.”
Although we could not sense anything, each of the four people dressed in white seemed to have an unidentified feeling of discomfort. They all have similar faces, statures, and names, so it’s hard to tell them apart.
By the way, Milian was on the ramparts, Masian was at the cannon position, Lucian was left outside the castle, and Shariel was tied to the watchtower.
Or rather, Shariel is the only one who sounds different.
I looked at her suspiciously when I heard her name, and Prince Haidar added an additional explanation.
“Milian and the other two are shrine maidens of the Eastern Temple, like Tinian, and Shariel is a shrine maiden of the Western Temple, like Fel and Eyal.”
Huh? I thought Tinian might be, but Fel and Eyal were also shrine maidens…
I looked at the twins without thinking, and they looked back at me angrily. Oh, did they know what I was thinking?
“”What is it? Do we look like anything other than shrine maidens?””
“No, I don’t know. What do you mean? I’m sorry, but I don’t know anything about religious things.”
“Hmm. Me neither. I only worship the fire god of the dwarves out of courtesy.”
“”All the girls who serve the royal family are shrine maidens.””
“And the children of the fort?”
“They are young and have not yet received the oracle. Some of them are boys.”
I see. I was so worried about their health that I didn’t look closely at each one, but I thought they were boys.
Once everyone was aboard, I launched Casspir and set a course north. I asked Myrril to stay at the gun emplacement and keep an eye on things.
“If we continue on our current course, we will reach an oasis in about two hours. I don’t think it’s inhabited, but there might be Imperial ambushers positioned there.”
“Should we avoid them?”
“No, we’ll use the currency of grace there.”
“Huh? You want to take the corpses out?”
“No, we’ll use the water to track their movements.”
What is this cheating ability? In the northern continent, where there is plenty of water, you can do whatever you want.
“Can you use this power in the ocean?”
“No, unfortunately.”
“There is water everywhere.”
“What I feel from the northern water is anger. It’s so powerful, so full of life, that it drowns out any voice or sign of life.”
“Is that bad?”
It’s not all good news.
The Prince’s assumed speed of travel was by horse or camel, and after an hour’s ride, the oasis was soon found. From the looks of it, there was no ambush by the Imperial Army. There was a spring about 10 meters in diameter, with dying undergrowth and palm-like vegetation. The water was shallow, and although it was a spring, it was more like a swamp.
The Prince got out of the Casspir and dipped his hand into the water. He seemed to be chanting some kind of incantation, but we took our weapons and stood guard around him. We also give the four shrine maidens who have joined us out of necessity some target practice with PPSh submachine guns. It’s a tricky process, but the shooting itself is done from the shooter’s eye, which is less dangerous, so all they have to do is learn how to use the gun with a minimum of safety.
“We’re going to take out as many magazines as we have. Everybody load the mags.”
I’m going to load the drum magazines, which are tricky, time-consuming, and dangerous. I’ve never had any trouble before, but now that I’m halfway through my knowledge of the dangers, I’m honestly scared.
I have one hundred and twenty PPSh box magazines with thirty-five rounds and ten drum magazines with seventy rounds. If that doesn’t work, I will use other weapons.
“Your Majesty, the Demon King.”
Prince Haidar called me to approach the water. He was searching for information through the water, but his complexion was not good.
“What is the matter?”
“The troops from the south are too numerous to read. And there is still Kaienholt’s reaction.”
“You mean he’s still alive after being shot so thoroughly? I’m sorry, but I find that hard to believe.”
“Umu. He definitely looked dead back then.”
I thought this was bad news, but apparently not. The Prince pointed to the north side of the oasis in the direction we were heading.
“About two hours north, there seems to be a group of refugees from Solbesia hiding.”
“How many?”
“A little less than a hundred.”
They can’t be saved. Even if we could get them to the coast, we can’t guarantee their safety. Prince Haidar looks at me and shakes his head.
“I understand. They seem to be farming there, and they don’t want to leave the village. However…”
“You mean we can’t go north with such a large Imperial army?”
“I’m sorry.”
I exchanged glances with Myrril. We could go east or west, or we could face the army right here.
“There’s also the possibility of going south…”
“The same. Then it would be more constructive to make all possible preparations here.”
We can’t build a castle, but we can at least create a favorable environment.
Flying south by teleportation, I dug up the sand about a kilometer from the oasis and stored it, along with the rock beneath it, to create a huge depression several hundred meters in diameter. Spreading it out to the east and west, I created something like a dry river about a kilometer long.
The excavated sand and rock were piled high on the north side of the oasis, which was the hinterland for the Imperial Army. It was expected to flow and collapse to some degree. Even a small difference in elevation would give us visibility and a shooting advantage. I placed Casspir on top of the rock and pointed my gunsight to the north and south.
“Prince, do we have any other means of defense?”
“If we pour in the currency of grace, or…”
“All right, I’ll leave it up to you. I’ll get all the bodies out.”
I check the position of the drain so as not to contaminate the water of the water source. At the Prince’s suggestion, I decided to spread the water far and wide in the depression I had dug. But there were 10,000 corpses. It was almost as if I was filling the sand I had dug up with corpses.
“”…Did you kill all of them?””
The twin guards looked at the pile of naked corpses and were shocked.
“This is less than half of them. If you add them all up, I’ve killed four or five times as many. I returned some of the bodies to their owners, so this is all I have left.”
After a brief pause, the twin former shrine maidens burst out laughing. When they turned and looked at me, they weren’t laughing at all.
“Are you sure, Your Majesty the Demon King?”
“Yes, you can use it as much as you want.”
“Yes, use as much as you want. If you need more, I will make more.”
Myrril-san, you opened the door again, didn’t you? The newly joined shrine maidens are far away, trembling like newborn fawns.
“The sandstorm.”
The twin escorts, suddenly looking south, blinked quizzically. Myrril, looking at them, let out a breath.
“No, that’s… the enemy.”
Something was approaching on the horizon. It was so big, so many, so wide, so thick, it looked like the harbinger of a natural disaster.
“Hahahahaha!”
“What are you laughing at, Mir-san?”
“Can you not laugh at this? Rejoice! Yoshua. I bet the target is more than 30,000 this time, right? The currency of grace will be in abundance!”
“No, I don’t think I should rejoice.”
But I can’t just wait and see. I put my hope in the saint, the one person I could count on.
“Market.”
Simon, who was smiling at me with a stack of papers in front of him, looked at my nervous face and lost his smile.
“What’s the matter, brother?”
“Ah, it’s a big problem. I’m sorry, but I need you to do something fast; all I need is an extra PKM belt, an RPG-7, and an IED. And maybe some heavy machine guns.”
“Oh, just in time, I have a KPV. It’s a little battered and bruised, but there’s no problem with its functionality.”
“Alright, good job, Simon! Give me that and as much ammo as you got!”
I lay out a barrel full of gold coins. I don’t know how much it costs, but right now, I’m willing to pay whatever the price is.
KPV heavy machine gun. It shoots 14.5 x 114 mm incendiary armor-piercing rounds and incendiary rounds, the same as the Simonov PTRS anti-tank rifle Kemich had used in Casemaian. This powerful ammunition is 15 times more powerful than the AKM, 7.5 times more powerful than the thirty ought six, and 1.5 times more powerful than the M2, the best-selling heavy machine gun in the west, which I could not get my hands on.
“Come see me when you are settled in; I have something to report.”
“Yes, pray that such a time comes.”
Even though time almost stood still while I was connecting the market, I was in a hurry and didn’t want to spend it in vain. I will close the market as soon as I receive the heavy weapons that have been offered to me.
The Prince and the shrine maidens roll their eyes when they see all the heavy weapons that suddenly appear in front of them.
“Yoshua, isn’t that …. machine gun?”
“Yes, it’s a very powerful machine gun. We had one in Casemaian, didn’t we?”
“There was one. I didn’t touch it, but it’s the one that burned the Wood Golem.”
“Yes, that’s it.”
The KPV, however, is quite impressive when you see it in person. The weapon itself is over two meters long. Although it is mounted on a solid tripod, you can feel its weight when you put both shoulders on the paired gunstocks. The bullets lined up on the belt link are the size of a thin plastic bottle or Tabasco, and the trigger is a four-finger lever. The size and weight are off the charts. I had seen the same thing at Casemaian, but I didn’t remember it being this big. I was so nervous during the golem fight that I barely remembered it. Maybe my sense of perspective was off because the giant Kemich and the tall elves were using it.
“How far are we from the enemy now, Mir?”
“A little less than two miles from the front, I think. Still mostly over the horizon.”
I checked the belt link and pulled the giant pin to load the first round. According to Simon’s description, it should be an incendiary, armor-piercing round.
“Is there a shrine maiden?”
“””””On the left.””””
“Can we shoot them without them landing on that side?”
“What’s the range of this thing?”
“Five kilometers… about three miles, I think.”
“That’s a hell of a thing…”
It’s completely out of my line of sight. I probably should have gotten a scope, but it was too late now. The front sight of the KPV I procured was a classic design, with the multiple circles of the magnifying glass type seen on pre-World War II aircraft machine guns and the apex of the triangle on the rear sight.
“All hands, cover your ears!”
“”””Y-yes.””””
I aim at what appears to be a shimmering, hostile shadow flickering on the horizon. My eyes can’t make out the slightest shape of the enemy. The distance may still be in kilometers, but I don’t care.
I pull the lever trigger with my right hand, and with a roar, a 14.5 mm heavy machine gun round is fired.
“Woah!”
The rate of fire was faster than expected, and even though the gun was mounted on a tripod, I felt a tremendous shock in my body. The trajectory of the bullet is seen flying far into the distance, and a cloud of dust and smoke rises from the ground as if it had landed in front of them. When I put on my elevation and sent the bullet beyond the horizon, I felt a slight reaction even though I couldn’t see it. This strange sensation could only be understood by those who had experienced long-range shooting.
“Oh, the bullet seems to have landed. It’s a very powerful shot.”
“What did you see?”
“I don’t know what hit it. It could have been a piece of meat, supplies, the wreckage of a wagon, or all of the above. It seems to have burst into flames.”
That’s good. That’s the power of an incendiary, armor-piercing round. My eyes couldn’t see the results, but I could see the power.
“Hahahahahaha…!”
The Prince and the others looked at me suspiciously as I suddenly burst out laughing, while Myrril-san nodded at me with a look of pityーsomething like a mother looking at a foolish boy.
“This is exactly what you wanted, Yoshua. We will kill the False Demon King. This time, for good.”