Volume 1 Chapter 39 The Escape
Edited by: Kanaa-senpai
I had been caught in a “man-hunt” alongside Rudy and sold into the life of a slave soldier.
Regardless of the peace negotiations King Kiridal was conducting, Count Straba had propped up the Second Prince as a figurehead, raising an independent army of ten thousand.
Rudy and I were folded into this force as expendable meat. Our destination was Obernbach, a place I once called home.
The treatment of slave soldiers in this rogue army was atrocious. Food was non-existent, and despite the biting winter, we were issued only a single, thin blanket.
Sleeping in the open without cover, the already exhausted refugees began to drop. The weak died first, claimed by the cold before a single sword was even drawn.
”If you’re planning to run, take us with you,” the old translator said.
He had approached us the day before. Behind him, the other two men in our five-man cell nodded in silent plea.
Rudy and I had tried to keep our escape plans between ourselves, but the desperate aura of people about to bolt must have leaked.
”We’ll let you know if we move,” I replied.
The greatest risk was a leak; the second was hesitation. Once the break started, looking back was a death sentence.
You run at full tilt. If a stray arrow catches your leg, it’s all over. To survive, you have to clear the archers’ effective range in the first few seconds.
I had already made a cold, visceral calculation: we would shout as we ran to bait the other refugees into following.
Those people would become a living shield against the arrows. The survivors would then be forced to stall the guards while Rudy and I vanished.
(It’s a nasty bit of math, but it’s the only way…)
The march from Linto to Obernbach finally began. It looked like the army intended to use Linto as a forward supply base, given the number of cargo wagons left behind.
Today is the day, I thought.
I caught Rudy’s eye and gave a sharp nod. Our cell was positioned in the sixth row. The old translator was on the far left, with Rudy and me right beside him.
My heart hammered against my ribs from the first step. I kept a constant, sidelong watch on the mercenary guards.
Usually, guards flanked every odd-numbered row, but now there were only guards at the very front and the fifth row.
The surveillance had thinned.
(They must think they’re close enough to the Obernbach garrison that they can slack off, or they’re moving the vanguard to use us as human shields the moment we hit a skirmish.) Either way, the lapse in security was a godsend.
The road wound through rolling hills. To the left, the earth rose into steep embankments; to the right, it fell away.
If an ambush came, it would come from the heights on the left. Naturally, the mercenaries kept their eyes glued to the ridges above.
The escape route was to the right. Rudy clicked his tongue twice—the signal. The spot was coming up.
Two days ago, while we were pitching tents, Rudy had leaned in close.
”The day after we hit Linto, Kiridal attacked from Vod Fortress, right?” I remembered.
That was the day I first saw Isabella. The day I first took a life.
”Do you remember the hidden trail Kiridal carved out from Vod?” Rudy continued. “While you were in the infirmary, we were tasked with driving anti-cavalry stakes into that path to keep wagons and horses from using it.”
Rudy’s plan was to use that very trail to reach Vod Fortress, where the Royal Army was stationed.
”There’s a waist-high safety fence at the entrance to prevent falls,” Rudy had whispered. “But down the slope, it’s a graveyard of hedgehog defenses. Horses can’t get through, but a man on foot can weave through them.”
I hadn’t hesitated. I was in. Now, the fence was looming. It was just as Rudy described—waist-high and weathered. The mercenaries were still fixated on the hills to the left.
The other slave soldiers shuffled along with hollow eyes and slumped shoulders, ghosts already half-claimed by the road. I matched their sluggish pace, but as we drew level with the fence, my breath turned shallow.
Beside me, Rudy’s shoulders were tight with tension.
Now.
I staggered as if my legs had given out, veering right. I ducked behind the old translator and lunged toward the mercenary guarding our flank.
I reached out as if to steady myself, but instead, I channeled my Mana. I unleashed a sharp kinetic burst, the same force I’d once used to send Hans-niisan flying.
The mercenary was blasted backward with a muffled grunt. I didn’t wait to see him hit the ground. I vaulted over the fence.
Rudy swung his heavy, dirt-caked blanket—a makeshift flail—slamming it into the face of the mercenary ahead of him.
”RUN!” I screamed.
We plummeted down the slope. The thick treeline along the path obscured us from the main column’s view almost instantly.
Any arrows fired now would be blind shots. At the bottom of the incline, we hit the hedgehog defenses—man-sized wooden stakes lashed together in tripod shapes.
Rudy tore through them first. I followed, glancing back. A handful of refugees had taken the bait and were scrambling over the fence.
Behind them, chaos erupted as the mercenaries turned their blades on the crowd. Arrows began to whistle in from the left, thudding into the dirt and flesh above.
”Hurry!” I roared.
The mercenaries were already clearing the fence. The “shields” wouldn’t hold them for long. I dove into the maze of stakes, leaping, ducking, and sliding through the gauntlet.
Beyond the obstacles lay a narrow track, barely wide enough for a single cart. I cleared the stakes just as three mercenaries broke through behind us.
”You little shits!” one guard screamed, brandishing a spear.
Desperation turned to sudden, violent defiance. A few refugees who had made it through turned to fight with their bare hands. They threw slush and wet leaves—useless gestures of a dying hope.
I couldn’t just watch. One refugee took a sword through the shoulder but managed to tackle the swordsman, pinning him to the muddy ground.
As the mercenary smirked and prepared to gut the man, I stepped in. I didn’t use a blade.
I channeled a Fireball—the kind meant to warp iron bars—and took the guard’s head off point-blank. The mercenary’s face vanished in a flash of heat.
He went into a brief, violent convulsion before going still.
I snatched the dead man’s sword. I turned on the second guard, who was dancing back and forth with a spear, trying to keep a group of refugees at bay.
As the guard lunged, one of the men grabbed the shaft of the spear, entering a desperate tug-of-war.
I circled behind.
The guard wore only a simple metal brow-guard. I brought the sword down on the man’s exposed neck. The blade caught on the bone, but it was enough to end him.
The third mercenary saw his friends die and bolted back toward the stakes, but a refugee-turned-killer sent a captured spear through his back.
Only a few had made it. Behind the stakes, the screams of those left behind were being cut short. The “meat wall” had served its purpose.
”Move,” I said.
”Gah… vuh…” the refugee replied.
The words were unintelligible, but the refugee followed as we started running again. The path turned into a grueling uphill climb. We ran until our lungs burned, occasionally looking back, but the pursuit never came.
The mercenaries had likely judged the Kiridal-held territory too dangerous to enter for a few escaped slaves. As the sun began to dip, a stone fortress loomed ahead, its heavy gates barred shut.
”What’s the holdup?” I asked, catching up to Rudy.
”I told them who we were,” Rudy replied. “But the grunts can’t open the gate. They went to get someone with actual rank.”
”And you?” Rudy looked at Larry. “You’re covered in blood, man.”
”Ran into some trouble,” I said.
”You’re too soft for your own good,” Rudy muttered.
I just shrugged.
”Is there someone there who can speak?” a voice boomed from the battlements.
”Yes!” I said.
”State your name and unit!” the voice demanded.
”Larry Fee, 303rd Militia!”
”Militia? If you’re 303rd, tell me who your commanding officer is.”
”Captain Bours Debritz,” I replied. “Formerly of the Royal Army.”
There was a long silence, then the grinding of gears.
The gate groaned open, and five men in military uniforms stepped out.
”I am Major Helvet Ogen Sigmund of the Royal Army General Staff,” the lead man announced. “I hold full authority over Vod Fortress. Now, boy… what is so funny?”
Rudy was vibrating with suppressed laughter.
”Sorry, sir,” Rudy said. “It’s just… every soldier we see is all lean and shredded, but you’ve got a real spare tire going on.”
The Major didn’t explode. He just patted his stomach with a smirk.
”Listen well, brat. I am a Major. Once you hit field officer rank, you don’t have to waste time with physical drills. In this army, being fat is proof of status. Isn’t that right, men?”
”Sir!” the soldiers barked, though their expressions crumbled into grins the moment the Major turned his back.
Since he was a man from the General Staff¹, he was someone who held the reins of this country’s heart.
However, his current behavior felt a bit staged; I suspected he was a frank man, the kind who was genuinely loved by his subordinates.
”So then, Larry-kun, was it? Could you give me a quick rundown of the situation?” said the Major.
In response to his question, I started from the retreat from Garao Village and the attack just before reaching Owens Village.
I explained how I fled into the mountains with Rudy and spent several days as a captive in Barsheni Village.
I told him about escaping to the city of Opcheri, getting caught in a man-hunt², and being press-ganged into the army of Count Straba-who was propping up the Second Prince of Kiridal on his way to Obernbach.
I also mentioned how I’d fled alongside the refugees from Harmonia who had been caught in the same raid.
”Major, cavalry approaching!” a voice called from atop the fort.
Looking back the way we had come, I saw several mercenaries on horseback about a hundred meters away. Among them was a woman whose massive frame was unmistakable even at a distance: Isabella.
”Larry Fee, I have words for you,” she called out in that uniquely low voice of hers. “Don’t worry. We’re heading back to our own country now. I’m not going to kill you.”
I figured that if she really wanted me dead, she would have finished me off in that ruined village, so I started walking toward her.
Major Helbert and Rudy tried to stop me, and even the refugees looked on with concern, but I told them it was alright.
I stopped about twenty meters away from her.
”What is it?” I asked.
”There was something I couldn’t say back there,” she said, referring to our time in the ruins. “First, there’s the medical bill for this face: five gold coins. Consider it a debt to be paid once you’re worth something, but make sure you pay it back.”
(She came all this way for that?)
”And one more thing,” she added. “Marie is my niece.”
(Wait, what? What did she just say?)
”Shall I say it again? Marie is my niece. If you ever do anything to make that girl cry, I will track you down no matter where you are and kill you.”
(Hold on a second-this is the first I’ve heard of this. If I’d known that, I never would have laid a hand on her…)
”Do we have an understanding?” Isabella asked.
She immediately yanked the reins, spinning her horse around.
”You came all this way just to tell me that?” I called out.
”Consider this area my backyard,” she tossed back, raising a hand as if to tell me not to worry about it.
She kicked her horse’s flanks and galloped off with her crew, heading back the way we’d come.
”Larry-kun, what was that about?” Major Helbert asked.
I was too stunned by the news about Marie to find the words. The niece of that mercenary leader? By “making her cry,” did she mean dumping her? Even if she told me not to, I didn’t think I’d ever be going back to that village.
(Wait… was that why she told me to go see the Village Chief back then? No, but… I really feel like she would actually find me and kill me.)
”Ah… I’ll tell you later. More importantly, please look after the refugees,” I said.
There was no way I could admit to sleeping with a girl in the middle of a desperate escape.
”Ah, right. Unfortunately, the people who speak the Harmonian tongue are currently out,” Helbert replied.
”It’s okay. Quite a few of the refugees understand the local language,” I assured him.
Relieved, the Major ordered his subordinates to provide tents and proper hospitality.
I wanted to be impressed by his humanitarianism, but I’ve learned not to trust these kinds of middle-aged guys too quickly.
That aside, the main body of Vod Fortress was located a short distance away from the small fort where we had arrived.
It was a stone structure that felt more like a castle than a mere fort.
As we entered the wide dome at the entrance, people would bow as they passed the old man. He pulled one person aside, spoke for a moment, and then turned back to us.
”Well then, Larry-kun and Rudy-kun, a clerk will be here shortly. I’ll need you to report on everything that happened after you left the unit. It’ll be done separately, if you don’t mind.”
I figured they wanted to check if our stories matched, but there was no helping it.
”Once the report is finished, go grab a meal. I’ll have rooms prepared for you so you can rest. We can handle the rest later,” the Major said.
He offered a hand, and when I shook it, his grip was surprisingly firm and calloused.
”Husband?”
A familiar phrase and voice rang out.
”I knew it was you, Husband!”
Bursting out from a group of women in military uniforms, the exceptionally tall Lieutenant Louise came charging toward me.
(Please tell me the Witch of the Black Forest³ isn’t here too…) The group of women gave me suspicious looks, but the Witch-Major Sonya-wasn’t among them.
I scanned the area, but she was nowhere to be seen. No major threats, then-except for the massive Lieutenant Louise marching my way.
”I am so glad you’re safe! I was so worried when I heard you were missing!”
She pulled me into an embrace so tight that her suffocatingly soft chest and powerful build nearly crushed the breath out of me.
”Lieutenant Louise, is Larry-kun really your husband?” Major Helbert asked.
With a beaming smile, she replied, “Major Sonya has already given us her blessing!”
”I see. If the Witch has recognized it, then I suppose there’s no need to prepare a separate room for him.”
”Of course not!”
(How did it even come to this?) Major Helbert and the Witch of the Black Forest might both be Majors, but if you asked a hundred people who held the real power, all hundred would say the Witch.
Crying to this little old man wasn’t going to help me at all.
”Well, I’m going to have him questioned now. Once we’re done, I’ll take him to the cafeteria. I’ll leave the rest to you,” said Helbert.
”Understood!”
The Lieutenant gave a crisp, perfect salute to the useless Major, her face still glowing with that smile.
”It looks like you’ve got a bad case of ‘woman trouble’ written all over your face,” the Major said, wrinkling his brow with a look of mock sympathy before laughing out loud.
Then, the rude old man disappeared into the crowd with his subordinates.
”Seriously, Isabella is going to kill you,” Rudy added, before heading off with the clerk assigned to him.
”I wonder what those gentlemen were talking about?” Louise mused.
”Well then, I’ll finish up my work and wait for you. Oh, I need to submit my leave request for tomorrow!” The elated Lieutenant headed back to her group.
(Maybe if I tell the clerk about the series of “atrocities” I suffered at the hands of Louise, the Witch, and that medical Mage, they’ll get punished?)
As I waited, the Major’s subordinate returned with a woman in a clerical uniform.
”I am Second Lieutenant Marie Daknell. I’ll be conducting your hearing.”
The clerk who spoke was slender and looked down at me with a sharp, haughty tilt of her chin. Her face and height were a mirror image of Marie.
—
Summary:
Larry and Rudy successfully execute a desperate breakout from Count Straba’s slave army during a march toward Obernbach.
Utilizing a hidden trail Rudy previously fortified, they navigate a graveyard of military obstacles while leaving other refugees to act as unwitting decoys.
The duo eventually reaches the safety of Vod Fortress, coming face-to-face with the eccentric and portly Major Sigmund.
Larry arrives at Vod Fortress and faces a sudden confrontation with the mercenary Isabella, who reveals a shocking familial connection to Marie.
After she departs, Larry is reunited with the overwhelming Lieutenant Louise, whose claims of their marriage are backed by the influential Witch.
As Larry prepares for an official hearing, he is confronted by a clerk who bears an uncanny resemblance to the very girl he was warned about.
—
Trivia:
- Larry used Mana to shove a mercenary, a technique he first used on his brother Hans.
- The ‘hedgehog defenses’ were originally put there by Larry’s own unit to stop the Kiridal army.
- Larry killed a man with a point-blank fireball, showing increasing comfort with lethal magic.
- The Royal Army differentiates status by physique, according to Major Sigmund.
- Isabella demands five gold coins as a ‘treatment fee’ for her face.
- The ‘Witch’ (Sonya) holds a Major rank but carries more social/political weight than Major Helbert.
- Larry’s past involves ‘atrocities’ by a trio: Louise, the Witch, and a medical Mage.
- The refugees from Harmonia are being integrated into the fort’s hospitality due to their linguistic abilities
—
Character Insight:
Larry demonstrates a chilling pragmatism, consciously using other refugees as human shields to ensure his and Rudy’s survival, though he later contradicts this by saving a few during the final skirmish.
Larry’s ‘woman trouble’ is escalating from physical danger to social and administrative entrapment. Isabella’s threat adds a layer of lethal pressure, while Louise’s public claim of marriage further complicates his military standing.
—
Lore And Worldbuilding Context:
The contrast between the ‘lean’ soldiers and the ‘plump’ Major highlights a satirical view of military bureaucracy in this world.
The author uses the ‘niece’ reveal and the clerk’s appearance to create immediate tension and irony regarding Larry’s desire for a quiet military report.
—
Glossary:
Notes:
• Rudy – 14‑year‑old black‑haired militia recruit from Heberich Village, formerly of Garao, now wood‑hauls with Larry as his brother‑in‑arms. Grandson of a hunter, he knows forest creatures, excels at math, battles war anxiety yet mocks Larry’s condition, visits him daily. He code‑switches dialect to negotiate, struggles with armor and horse, holds elitist views of Strock Village, and fiercely protects Larry amid captivity. Filthy, traumatized, he devised a hidden‑trail escape and knows northern trade and Al‑miraJ biology.
• Isabella – A towering, muscular mercenary leader of the Weasels of Bohemia, hailing from Opcheri. She bears a burn scar from Larry’s fireball, has a massive frame and a low, sour‑voiced growl, and an aggressive, sour expression. Her sheer presence dominates the village, and she wields sharp insight into the value of mages.
• Hans – Larry, the rugged, wild‑eyed ‘Mad Dog’ of Strock Village, is the second son of the Fee family, a chronic alcoholic with assault and extortion convictions. As the older brother and heir to the Kessler estate he abandons his duties, returning to crash a ceremony. His brother is aggressive, decisive, pragmatic, known for strength and violence, and refuses the headship.
• Larry – 14‑year‑old third son of the Strock headman, reddish‑white skin, bronze eyes, curly bronze hair, now a slave‑soldier in Militia Unit 303. He hosts a Parasite with a 40‑yr‑old Sage’s memories, uses fire magic (Fireball), reads hearts/mana by touch, syncs golems, battles PTSD and mana inflammation, admires his sister‑in‑law, trains to be Village Head, and feels guilty for a killing.
• Bours – Tall, scarred, in a faded Royal Army uniform, he is a former Captain turned 303rd Militia leader, veteran of the Western Front and Elders’ Council member. Commander of cavalry and infantry during the Kiridal attack, expert marksman, married to Sheeta‑san, father of a son conscripted on the Imperial border, and originally from Larry’s village. He mercilessly saves Larry and Rudy from ambush.
• Sigmund – A Major in the Royal Army General Staff with full authority over Vod Fortress. He is short, plump, balding, and has a baby face.
• Helbert – A Major in the General Staff. A short, middle-aged man who is described as frank and well-loved by his subordinates. He has firm, calloused hands and a mocking sense of humor.
• Marie – 15‑year‑old granddaughter of the village head. From a prior village, briefly involved with Larry (also called Iva), she feigns harassment to hide her secret affair while prioritizing village rules over personal affection.
• Louise – Tall, voluptuous Second Lieutenant of the Schuberitz army, once a Corporal in forced memories, serves as vice‑commander of the Golem Battalion under Major Sonya. She has a powerful build, wears a military uniform, and is obsessed with Larry for procreation; after an arrow wound she was replaced by him.
• Witch of the Black Forest – Hexa Death Schwarzwalds, the runt‑like commander of the Golem Battalion, is first labeled ‘runt’ by Larry. Known as Hexa Death Schwarzwalds, he appears at the chapter’s end, leading golems and gaining wary respect from his troops while Larry watches with cautious curiosity.
• Sonya – A petite, flat‑chested elf orphan who serves as Major and Commander of the Golem Battalion, known as the Witch of the Black Forest, and wields telepathic powers.
• Marie Daknell – Second lieutenant and clerk; slender, sharp haughty gaze. Looks like Marie (the Niece of Isabella) from the village.
• Hexa des Schwarzwalds – Hexa des Schwarzwalds, also known as Hexa, is the Witch of the Black Forest—a powerful mage and healer with high authority, wielding strong magic and leading the Golem Battalion. She is sadistic in her golem use and has a past connection to Larry.
• Hexa – Hexa des Schwarzwalds, also known as Hexa, is the Witch of the Black Forest—a powerful mage and healer with high authority, wielding strong magic and leading the Golem Battalion. She is sadistic in her golem use and has a past connection to Larry.
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Edited by Kanaa-senpai.
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