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「Frigostella Celestiluo Glace Horizon Mortje Lata──O Queen of Ice filled with chilling majesty, grant your white embrace unto that one! Absolute Zero Glacial Execution Formation (Frigostellarion)」
The bloodline magic passed down through the Edelweiss Ducal House, one of the Twelve Ducal Houses, is a tactical-class large-scale freezing spell. It draws mana from the earth veins and creates a vast frozen domain. For a thousand years, this magic had served as a shield against the demonic realms within their territory. And if turned upon a battlefield──the answer was simple. Everything within a radius of two ri* became a single polar wasteland.
TN: A traditional Japanese unit of distance. In modern contexts (post-Meiji era), 1 Ri is approximately 3.9 kilometers (about 2.4 miles).
The air froze solid.
A thin layer of frost spread across the ground in an instant. The frost rapidly thickened, eventually becoming armor-like ice that covered the earth. The wind froze, clouds descended, and wove pillars of rime ice. Within mere seconds, the temperature plunged into the realm of minus eighty degrees Celsius.
Within it, the beasts roared.
The soldiers of the Bazenfeld Ducal House were renowned for their strength. Through the bloodline magic King of the Pack (Legiora) wielded by its head, Harold Sera Bazenfeld, all who followed him became beings whose beastly nature had been drawn forth. Their pupils split vertically. Their sense of smell could detect the scent of iron from ten ri away, and the muscle fibers in their limbs gained explosive bursts of speed. Fighting across the battlefield as a single pack, they had been hailed for the past fifty years as the Empire’s strongest corps.──However, beasts also possess the weaknesses of beasts.
It was a fundamental truth of living creatures. What could an ordinary beast of flesh and blood do when cast into temperatures of minus eighty degrees? The capillaries in their nasal cavities froze solid. Their tongues stuck to the insides of their mouths, and each breath of frigid air tore apart their alveoli from within. The muscle fibers meant to produce explosive speed contracted, while the synovial fluid in their joints became icy grit that groaned with every movement.
The beast soldiers dropped to their knees one after another. Some collapsed before they could kneel. Others froze solid while still standing. Yet there was one man alone at the center of the pack who did not kneel.
It was the Beast King, Harold Sera Bazenfeld.
His towering frame of over six shaku* stood unmoving within the icy mist. His copper-colored hair, reminiscent of a lion’s mane, glittered white with frost along its edges, while the countless battle scars carved into his face had turned dark bluish-black with frozen blood. White breath rose from the gaps in his leather armor, and even that breath became ice crystals the instant it was born, settling upon his shoulders.
TN: 1 Shaku = approximately 30.3 cm (or 11.9 inches).
Harold was smiling.
His voice forced its way out by violently shattering the ice freezing his throat. Each word split the lining of his mouth apart. Blood welled forth, only to freeze before it could run down his chin. The man paid it no mind.
「──Heh, fuhahaha. Edelweiss. So, it is Edelweiss!」
「Indeed. It is Edelweiss, Harold-dono」
A voice answered from beyond the frozen mist.
It was Helmine Ira Edelweiss.
A tall woman of forty-six approached across the frozen wasteland alone atop a white horse. Her silver-gray hair was loosely tied back, and her military uniform bore not a single metal ornament, designed solely for practicality. At her waist hung a single slender sword. That was all. The army under her command remained stationed far behind upon the distant hills, and here there existed only her and the freezing pack of the Beast King.
「So this──is the way of the Northern Wall? Rather than hunting beasts one by one, you freeze the entire pack to death」
「I see no reason to burden myself with the trouble of hunting your beasts individually」
「You speak boldly」
「Your beasts are formidable. Had my soldiers fought them as beasts, it would eventually have become a battle of attrition, and neither side would have escaped unharmed. I have no intention of offering even a single one of my soldiers to your fangs」
「And so──you freeze the entire pack?」
「Indeed. The entire pack」
Harold roared with laughter. With every burst of laughter, he could feel the capillaries within his lungs rupturing. Yet the man did not stop. There was no meaning in stopping.
「A matter of compatibility, then. The nature of my magic is that of beasts. It is terribly incompatible with yours」
「Indeed. Such is the nature of magic」
「Hmph… Even the beastly aura boiling within me withers and dies here, does it? Then I have no choice but to fight as a man. Even so, to think you would betray the Empire」
「I do possess loyalty toward the Empire. However, it is not loyalty toward that poisonous flower. Had you sided with us as well, you would not have needed to leave your corpse exposed in a place such as this」
「So it is because you care for the Empire, hmm? It seems your way differs from mine」
The Beast King drew his sword.
The blade had already begun to freeze, and the moment it left the scabbard, the frost clinging to the inside shattered and scattered into the air. It was a massive greatsword. A weight that would crush an ordinary man’s knees merely from lifting it was held by Harold in a one-handed middle stance.
「This is the final exchange, Edelweiss. Witness the Beast King’s final roar」
「I shall receive it」
Helmine drew her slender sword. The instant it left the sheath, pale blue frost flowers crystallized across the blade’s surface, transforming the sword itself into a blade of cold air.
The distance between them was twenty ken.
TN: 1 Ken = approximately 1.82 meters (about 6 feet).
Harold kicked off the ground.
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「Magnificent, Harold-dono. It was a strike worthy of the name Beast King. However, if you are not a beast, but merely a man, then you are not particularly frightening」
Helmine whispered.
At the same time, with a soft thud.
Harold’s head fell upon the snow.
Harold Sera Bazenfeld, aged fifty-two.
One pillar of the Empire’s Twelve Ducal Houses fell here.
The wind began to return across the frozen wasteland.
The returning wind brushed across the corpses of the beasts, gently swaying their white frozen manes.
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The Imperial Capital, Guynesfried. Chancellor’s Office.
It was deep into the night. Half the corridor lamps had long since been extinguished, and a single oil lamp upon the desk weakly illuminated the mountain of documents. Sitting at the desk was Chancellor Zigitaris. Her pale golden hair was loosely tied back, and she wore a troubled expression as she glared at the reports before her.
──Unsettling movements in the south, hmm.
Among the Twelve Ducal Houses of the south, the Lindblum Ducal House and the Graus Ducal House had established themselves as the two dominant powers. Zigitaris had intended for Duke Lindblum, famed as the 『Water Dragon Duke』, to keep the Graus Ducal House in check.
A knock sounded at the door.
It was not an ordinary knock. It was just short of frantic pounding.
「Your Excellency, an urgent messenger has arrived」
「Enter」
A man entered while clinging to the back of a clerk. No, rather than entering, he collapsed into the room. Black patches of frostbite covered his leather leggings, and his lips had gone beyond purple into a leaden gray. Each cough sent bloody foam trailing down his chin. He was unmistakably a man who had ridden from the north, changing horses along the way.
「Report… from the northern army…」
「Yes, let us hear it. Calm yourself now」
Her voice was gentle. Or rather, loose. The sort of gentleness meant to give prey room to flee.
「Zanderholm Plains. Before dawn on the twelfth day, engaged the Edelweiss forces. Within a single koku…」
TN: 1 Koku = approximately 2 hours.
The messenger spread open the letter with trembling hands──
「…Duke Bazenfeld has fallen in battle」
he announced.
「…Continue」
「…Duke Bazenfeld has fallen in battle. The main force has collapsed and is currently retreating toward the domain capital of Sachsen」
「I see. I expected the Edelweiss Ducal House to move somewhat later than this──」
It was none other than Zigitaris who had incited the northern barbarians, supplied them with goods, and intensified the conflict with the Edelweiss territory. It had been one of her strategies against the Three Dukes. While buying time, she had planned to bring in Duke Kariste, the 『Puppeteer』 who ruled the region surrounding the Orkenstein Mountains──that had been her calculation.
「So she annihilated them all at once with her bloodline magic. But her magic draws an enormous amount of magic power from the earth veins. If overused, the land withers and the people starve. Considering her personality, I assumed she would never do something that would needlessly starve her people. It seems I slightly underestimated her resolve」
Zigitaris murmured with a sigh.
「Still, with Duke Bazenfeld dead, we now have proper justification to mobilize the army on a larger scale」
It was by no means something that could be called favorable news, and yet──it was still a wedge capable of shifting the course of the conflict.
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