I Was Reincarnated as a Mob Noble, and I Swear I'll Protect the Villainess Who Got Married Off to Me No Matter What ~To Dodge Our Total Downfall, I Went All Out Training My Trash Skill [Super Recovery] Through Crazy Hard Work, and Before I Knew It, I Could Totally Wreck the Game Protagonist Who Condemned My Wife Easily - Chapter 21

Chapter 21: To Take the Enemy Castle, Valeria and I Pretend to Be Passionate Lovers

“I’m gonna pull off what Father couldn’t—capture Dalham Castle.”

“Wh-what…!?”

Everyone’s eyes popped wide open at once.

Dalham Castle used to be one of our frontier count territory’s strongholds, a key defense point against the Balzark Empire. But now the imperial army had taken it over and turned it into their frontline base.

If we could snatch it back, the imperial forces that had pushed into our lands would lose their supply lines and have no choice but to retreat.

It’d be the ultimate comeback move—reclaiming all the territory they stole in one big sweep.

Father had made capturing Dalham Castle his lifelong dream, but he’d failed over and over.

So if I managed to take it back, Father and the generals would have no choice but to recognize my skills as a commander.

During this war, the crazy idea of putting me in charge of the whole army—something that’d normally never fly—would suddenly have a real shot at happening.

“Felix, the lord of Dalham Castle is Prince Lucian, right? No mistake?”

“Yes sir. I’ve heard that the Empire’s fifth prince, His Highness Lucian, was put in charge of the castle after they took it from us…”

Prince Lucian was a character who appeared in the game too. I knew his personality inside out.

“Alright. Then we can probably take Dalham Castle back.”

“If we actually pulled that off, yeah, it’d be a massive achievement, but…”

“Are you seriously thinking about storming a castle? I heard you were hiring mercenaries, but no matter what, just the two of us aren’t gonna have enough troops.”

Valeria crossed her arms, looking pretty skeptical.

“The imperial army’s got golem soldiers standing guard—ones that don’t need sleep. Our big advantage, undead night raids, won’t work on them. Even if Zenon’s 【Super Recovery】can heal our soldiers, I think they’d just get wiped out by concentrated fire from the castle walls before they could even get close.”

“…Unfortunately, I have to agree with Lady Valeria. Dalham Castle is way more fortified now thanks to those golem soldiers. To take it, even on the lowest estimate, you’d need around 100,000 troops.”

Felix really knew his stuff from his days as a famous general. That assessment sounded spot-on.

But I’ve got deep game knowledge from grinding 『KimiKoi』.

“That reliance on the golem legion is actually the imperial army’s biggest weakness.”

I started explaining slowly.

“If we take out the commander—Prince Lucian—all the golem soldiers inside Dalham Castle will just freeze up and turn into lifeless dolls. To prevent rebellion, only members of the imperial family are allowed to give orders to the golem soldiers.”

Golem soldiers were basically magical robots. They only obeyed commands from whoever was programmed as their master.

They were super powerful weapons, so the emperor set up this restriction out of fear they’d get used in a coup.

Once Prince Lucian was dead, the only person left in the invading imperial army who could command the golems would be the supreme commander—First Imperial Princess Leticia.

That’d be a huge blow to their whole force.

“…If we could actually do that, yeah, we might win. But how exactly?”

“I pretend to defect to the imperial army and sneak into Dalham Castle. Then I assassinate Prince Lucian.”

““Wha…?””

Valeria’s and Felix’s eyes went completely blank.

“The dumb son of the Greivan frontier count house—who got stuck with a dud skill, couldn’t make it work with his fiancée, and finally snapped and went off the rails—decides to switch sides. That’s the perfect story for defecting to the Empire, right? They’re gonna want inside info on our frontier army. They’ll definitely take me in.”

“Are you insane!? Going into the enemy castle alone!? If it fails, they’ll kill you for sure!”

Valeria stepped right up to me and started scolding.

“Just hear me out. Specifically, I get close to Prince Lucian and assassinate him with the new 【Excessive Recovery】 I just learned. They probably know I got a dud magic-type skill and collapsed from magic depletion. There’s no way they’d ever dream that in just a few days I’d be able to use attack magic.”

I held up my hand to calm her down and kept going.

According to Valeria, my MP growth rate was freakish.

So I could use the fact that I collapsed from magic depletion to trick the imperial army.

“Haa… you really think it’ll go that smoothly? The imperial prince, being a commander, has a famous elite guard—the royal guard—sticking close to him. They’re bound to get suspicious if you show up pretending to surrender. Getting near Prince Lucian is gonna be tough.”

“That’s fine. Prince Lucian’s famous for being a sadistic torture freak. If I defect, there’s almost no chance he won’t personally torture me to squeeze out info. Like ‘Spill it—what’s your real goal here!’”

“Eh…?”

Valeria looked stunned.

This plan only worked because they didn’t know about the power of 【Super Recovery】.

“I can auto-heal even while being tortured. And if Prince Lucian gets close enough, I can hit him with 【Excessive Recovery】 .”

Of course, I’d need to test the range, power, and activation time of 【Excessive Recovery】 really carefully.

“Even if they restrain my arms and legs, with my current strength I can break free on my own. And worst case, if they somehow block my magic, I can still kill with bare hands.”

I pulled a copper coin out of my pocket and bent it in half with one hand to show them.

“Wh-what…!”

The guards’ eyes went huge in shock.

“As long as I can keep them off guard, I think the assassination will succeed.”

“I get it. Okay. It’s a brilliant plan based on analyzing Prince Lucian’s personality. But…”

Valeria gave me this scary look.

“Even if it works, what happens after? With your low MP, you won’t be able to use 【Miracle of Healing】 anymore. You’ll be all alone and get killed! The royal guard’s magic attacks can turn a person to ash in an instant!”

“She’s right, young master Zenon. Even with 【Super Recovery】, you can’t instantly replace lost blood! If you don’t secure an escape route, they’ll torture you to death! I can’t let you walk into a deathtrap like that!”

Felix’s face had gone pale too.

“No, it’s okay. I can secure an escape. If they’re gonna torture me, they’ll probably chain me up in the underground dungeon so I can’t run. There’s a secret escape tunnel from the dungeon that leads outside the castle. I’ll use that to get out. Then we just send in the hired mercenaries and Valeria’s Schwarz Ritter to storm the confused Dalham Castle after their commander’s down…!”

I pleaded desperately. I really believed we had a solid chance.

More than anything, if we didn’t take a huge gamble here, we couldn’t change our doomed future.

“…It’s not a sure thing. Prince Lucian’s royal guard is on the same level as Schwarz Ritter—or maybe even stronger. How many do you think there are?”

Valeria let out a big sigh.

“I’ve got one condition if I’m gonna help with this plan.”

“What?”

“I’m coming to Dalham Castle with you. A ducal daughter branded a traitor and exiled to the frontier… I’ve got the perfect setup to make defecting to the Empire look natural, don’t I?”

I was floored and immediately tried to stop her.

“You idiot, you could die!”

“Isn’t that the same for you?”

Valeria stared straight into my eyes, her gaze full of unshakable determination.

“I’m the crown prince’s ex-fiancée. The kingdom’s classified info I carry is exactly what they’d want.”

“Maybe, but… it’s way too dangerous, right?”

With 【Super Recovery】, I could heal any injury right away.

But if Valeria wasn’t near me, she could actually die.

“‘The noblest blood flows first’—that’s the Asphodel ducal house motto. My fiancé’s heading into battle—there’s no way I can just sit safe somewhere else. And besides…”

Valeria took my hand.

“If we work together, we’ll never lose to any enemy. Right?”

Her beautiful amethyst eyes looked up at me, and my heart skipped hard.

She was right. With Valeria around, I could borrow her massive magic power. That’s how we beat Soul Eater.

From the magic link we shared, I could tell her max MP was probably over 3000. Easily more than 150 times mine.

“Yeah, that’s true…”

“Exactly. My 【Necromancer】 drawback can get canceled out by your 【Miracle of Healing】. That way I can summon way more undead—not just Schwarz Ritter—right inside the enemy castle. Then we can take Dalham Castle for sure, right?”

Valeria nodded like she’d read my mind.

Yeah. After taking out the enemy commander, if we let the undead rampage and open the gates from inside, our victory would be rock-solid.

…And most importantly, the only way for both of us to survive was to win.

If this plan failed, Valeria—being targeted by the saintess—would die just like in the game scenario.

I didn’t want Valeria to die.

So we had to pick the option with the highest chance of success.

If something went wrong in enemy territory, I’d just protect her with everything I had. I should be able to do that now.

“Got it. I’m counting on you, Valeria.”

“Yeah, leave it to me.”

We looked at each other and smiled.

“…But the problem is after we defect—they might separate us. Since Valeria’s got royal blood, she’ll probably get special treatment and be questioned in a different room.”

Even someone like Prince Lucian wouldn’t torture Valeria, so I figured I’d be the one sent to the underground dungeon.

Valeria’s mother was the king’s sister. Criminal or not, Valeria wasn’t someone you could handle carelessly.

Her treatment probably couldn’t be decided by Prince Lucian alone—he’d have to consult the emperor back home.

“Then… let’s say we’re a loving couple—no, a married couple—who defected together because we couldn’t stand the kingdom anymore. We insist on staying together the whole time. That way they won’t torture you, and Prince Lucian will question both of us at once.”

Valeria’s face turned bright red and she looked away.

I thought about it for a second.

In that case, we’d have to deal with the royal guard head-on… but the two of us together could probably force our way through.

“Hmm, yeah… How about the tragic lovers who gave up on the kingdom and defected to the Empire to protect our love?”

“Heh… l-love to… protect…!?”

Valeria let out this weird squeaky voice.

“…Oh crap, sorry. Maybe pretending to be a couple with me is kinda gross for you?”

She accepted me as her fiancé, but… sadly, I didn’t think that meant she actually liked me as a guy.

Valeria seemed to want me as the savior to replace the saintess, and she wanted to support me for that reason.

No way a cute girl like her would fall for someone like me.

I’d been single my whole life—from my previous world to now—so I didn’t have any weird delusions about girls.

I once totally misunderstood a classmate smiling at me as “she must like me,” and it ended in painful embarrassment.

“If I force you to act it out and you slip up, that’d be bad too.”

“Haa…!? N-no! It’s fine! Yeah, we’re a deeply in-love married couple who swore eternal love to each other… Starting right now, let’s act like it!”

Valeria said that and suddenly snuggled right up against me.

“W-wait, are we starting the act right now!?”

“Y-yeah! To fool the enemy, you gotta fool your allies first, right!?”

Earlier it was an emergency so we were hugging and pressed close, but when she did it on her own like this, I got super flustered.

Valeria’s just… really cute, y’know…

Wait, what am I even thinking?

This was just an act to take the enemy castle. Valeria wasn’t seriously into me.

“…Understood. If you two are that determined, this Felix won’t say another word. Please leave command of the mercenary corps to me!”

Felix bowed deeply.

“And since you’ll be playing husband and wife, let’s keep sharing the bedroom tonight as well. I’ll instruct the maids that Zenon-sama and Lady Valeria are deeply in love, so they’re not to interrupt your intimate moments.”

“W-wait…”

“Y-yeah, Felix. Please do that.”

Before I could even answer, Valeria already said yes.

“Y-you’re really okay with that!?”

“Of course! This way we’re definitely beating the imperial army!”

“N-no, wait—intimate moments? You mean we’re actually gonna do intimate stuff!?”

“Eh!? Th-that’s, um, still a bit early, but… a kiss or something, I could maybe…”

Valeria buried her face, looking all shy.

I was seriously shocked.

“Hold up—even for acting, a kiss is too much, right!?”

My heart couldn’t take it.

“Haa!? I’m saying I’d even let you kiss me, and you’re gonna refuse!? We’re supposed to be married, aren’t we!?”

“M-maybe, but… some things are just no!”

I yelled and backed away.

Stuff like that was for people who actually liked each other.

Sure, I was starting to really like Valeria.

But I shouldn’t ignore how she felt.

Sharing a bedroom was just an act to beat the enemy. I had to be careful not to cross any lines.

“Wait a sec, Zenon! After I said all that, you’re not gonna kiss me!? That’s unforgivable! We’re beating the imperial army, aren’t we!?”

Valeria latched onto me like she wasn’t letting go.

Whoa!? Wait—this feels kinda nice, but this is bad!

And just like that, I ended up wrestling with her while she begged for a kiss.

“Amazing! To think Lady Valeria loves young master Zenon this much! Our Greivan frontier count family is safe for good now!”

Felix was cheering like crazy, totally misunderstanding everything.