The castle's shadow loomed against the sky, sometimes revealed by explosions. They were already so close.

As they got closer to the plaza in front of the castle, they could hear shouts and exchanges of magic. There was an explosion—from a spell, no doubt.

“Wait here,” Gellar said. It only took a second for her to disappear.

“Knight Sargent,” Jyn called out. “Our ally is scouting ahead.”

The knights’ leader turned around, only then noticing Gellar’s suspicious disappearance. “I didn’t want to say anything…” she muttered. “My apologies, I won’t pry.”

Demons were just rumors and fairytales for most people. She had no doubt that Jyn and Minimine knew something, but this was the sort of situation where the less she knew, the better—so she didn’t want to know!

A minute later, Gellar returned. Jyn and Sargent gathered together with her.

“The castle’s southern gate is besieged,” she explained. “33 enemies. One of them is a mage flinging explosive magic at the gate.”

“Most castle gates are reinforced with magic of their own,” Sargent said. “They won’t get through it.”

“But why aren’t the defenders fighting back?” Jyn asked. “Is the castle compromised, after all?”

“They might just be waiting for the enemy to exhaust their MP,” Gellar said. “The Maids of the castle are competent enough. I’m sure that’s their line of thinking.”

“Maids? I’m sorry, but Maids?” Sargent said. Gellar and Jyn looked at her like she was new here—which she was.

“Every single worker in that castle is a competent fighter,” Jyn explained. “Please ask no further. I won’t be able to answer.”

Sargent got the gist of it—well, she didn’t, but she pretended to. That’s right, it’s better to think of the castle as one filled with very ordinary defenders.

“We’ll have to break through,” Sargent suggested. “Once we attack, they’ll be sure to support us.”

“But that will take time,” Jyn added. “If we’re breaking through, we need to launch an effective surprise attack. It’s good we’re coming from the rear, but we still need something that will throw them all into disarray upon the first strike.”

“If only all my troops can launch fireballs,” Sargent chuckled wrly.

“Well…” Jyn hesitated to say this, as it would mean involving him, but… “We do have a mage.”

“Knight Jyn,” Gellar said with a strict tone.

“I know,” Jyn said. They weren’t supposed to be exposing Kalender to danger. “How else are we going to break through, however?”

“The person from the Company?” Sargent asked, blissfully unaware of the person’s significance. Rather, the shock of appraising Minimine earlier had blasted away her consciousness for a split second. No one would fault her for dismissing the random Companyman as a tag-along hired gun and not even bother appraising him after that. “Even if he’s as good as a war mage, they’ll be all on top of him the moment they figure out his position,” she continued to explain.

Sargent’s assessment was spot-on. The enemy had numerical superiority and their own mage. Assuming the first attack took out half the enemy, it still wouldn’t be ideal.

Rather, the most ideal kind of surprise attack was one which put the enemy in a state of absolute confusion. Making each and every one of them useless was a lot better than rendering half of them useless, regardless of whether the method would leave them alive. Against human opponents, demoralization was almost always going to be more efficient and effective.

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“What if you launch Flare spells from all directions to cover Kalender’s attack?” Jyn suggested.

“There will be none of that,” Gellar said. “I’ll take them out, myself.”

“All thirty?” Jyn muttered. No, she could believe it, but… “No, it will preoccupy you for too long. In the worst case, our more-powerful enemies will come up from behind, whereas only few of us here can confront them. The knights need to be the ones to confront these ones.”

Sargent pretended to hear nothing. More-powerful enemies? No such thing.

“Understood,” Gellar said. “Make your plans, but Kalender is only allowed one attack, and then he pulls back. I’ll be watching from above.”

Gellar disappeared in a way that left Sargent thinking this was all just a dream after all, and that she had well and truly died in that alley. The Valhalla Theory prevailed here; she’d died a soldier, and she fought as one even after death.

“Knight Sargent, about those Flares.”

Sargent shook her head. “Right. We can do with the Flare tactic, but only some of us have spell cards.”

Flare—a spell with decently low MP consumption, but with a long incantation and an equally complex magic circle. No knight in their right mind would try to memorize it, hence they carried cards with pre-enscribed magic circles.

“It would take too long to enscribe new ones…” Jyn muttered.

A certain girl cleared her throat. Jyn looked behind her, and there, with stars in her eyes, was a Combat Librarian who had found her time to shine.

***

The enemy had built a barricade that extended past the last building before the plaza. It was from there that thirty-two knights fired a random volleys of flame bullets, after which their mage popped out and threw an explosive ball at the castle’s gate.

With some creative parkour, four of Sargent’s knights snuck up to the edge of the roof right on top of the barricade, while Sargent herself and another four snuck up to the road, right at the edge of the enemy’s vision in the darkness.

Kalender was right behind the edge of the roof across the street from the other knights. Of everyone, he had the best view of the enemy. All he had to do now was wait for the signal and launch the biggest explosive ball he could.

“Steady yourself,” Jyn said beside him. He was pretty much going to kill people for the first time in this world.

“It’ll be easier to claim their souls this way,” Minimine added. She was hovering behind him with her amoral support—as if it helped calm him down!

“I hope Page is okay,” he muttered. She had stayed on ground level, right behind Sargent. She wasn’t going to participate in their charge. Jyn made sure of that.

“She’s listened to me,” Jyn said. “She’ll be fine. Now, follow what I say.”

Jyn’s instructions didn’t do much to calm Kalender, but it did ensure that he kept on moving and doing the right things regardless. He probably wouldn’t be able to fight at all if it weren’t for her.

Not that he was going to fight at all. “Shoot-and-scoot” wasn’t much of a heated way of fighting.

“Ready the spell,” Jyn said.

Kalender took a deep breath, exhaling and emptying his mind. {Let the spell origin be where I point. Explode it with 100 MP on my command.}

Moments passed. Everyone was in position.

Flares shot down from the roof above the enemy and from along the road, and they were loud, whistling as they flew and crackling as they bounced against walls and skipped along the road. They weren’t normal Flares, but an improvised spell called {Loud Flare}.

The enemy knights below shouted and scattered. From their perspective, night turned into day in a blink, and it was as if trumpets and air horns were being blown into their ears.

“Explode,” Jyn said.

{Explode}, Kalender repeated.

The blast was more powerful than he imagined, and it knocked both him and Jyn backwards. It got them coughing and scampering away, with Jyn pulling him by the arm.

“That was too powerful!” Jyn coughed. She tried to stand, but something might have gotten slushed internally. Kalender helped her sit down so he could cast a healing spell. He coughed, though.

“Prioritize yourself,” Jyn said.

“That’s not how I live,” he answered, “and you’re more beat up than I am.” Jyn didn’t say anything to that.

Still… “That really was just 100 MP, though. I’m not sure what happened” —

There was another explosion.

Jyn yanked Kalender down on the ground again. Just in time, too, as a blur passed overhead where they used to be.

The blur hit Minimine and her mana shield, exploding the projectile into a shower of gravel and sand.

“Demons!” Minimine warned through telepathy.

Gellar appeared on the roof with them just in the nick of time. “Heal yourselves while we’re moving! The Princess Knight and someone else are fighting” —she pointed— “that way!”

It was a distance far enough that people would have looked like ants, yet it was just a stone’s throw away for anyone even half as strong as Arpeggio.

Minimine looked that way. Cyrraia? she called out through her thoughts. The reply came quickly.

Minimine! We’re getting beat up over here! Cyrraia packed in the rest of what she knew faster than what could be processed through words.

I’m on my way. “Kalender, everyone,” she said with her mouth. “Arpeggio Selisie and a friend of mine are outnumbered. Please reach the castle without me.”

“What? Minimine!” Kalender shouted. Though he stretched out his hand, it caught nothing but air.

At the end of his sight were plumes of dust and combat like he’d never seen before, and all he could do was pray that Arpeggio would be okay.

“She’s doing fine,” Minimine replied.