Rune Troopers: Self-Defense Forces Adventure - Chapter 5: The Eye of the Storm (Part 3)

Kuze looked down at her, stunned with his gun ready.

[Ku, ku, Third Lieutenant Kuze, I…]

Ichinose’s trembling voice sounded over his radio as if he had been watching the situation from the top of the tower. 

Kuze was startled. Ichinose had fulfilled his mission of ‘protecting friendly commanders,’ the reason behind the deployment of snipers within the Self-Defense Force. Like Kuze, he was a bit hesitant to shoot Richarda, who was at the end of his scope.

Then, Kuze recalled Kato, his Superior Officer who had given him the courage to shoot and the escape route. Kuze relayed his message to Ichinose on the radio using as cheerful a tone as possible.

“Ichinose! Thank you for saving my life!”

[Eh…]

“Sorry, I left the safety of my gun on. It was my habit. I would have died if you hadn’t taken the shot.”

By saying this, Kuze was trying to ease Ichinose’s guilt as a young man. Ichinose, on the other end of the radio, was silent, as if he had sensed this or was merely distressed.

“Are you all right? Kuze-dono!”

From behind him, he saw Carda running toward him. Kuze turned around, and she seemed relieved to see that he was unhurt. He was in the middle of a fight.

“Fu… Fu…”

The dying Richarda, who had fallen on her back and was looking up at the sky as she smiled thinly. Carda walked over to her, eyes narrowed.

“What’s funny? Invader!”

“Such an ugly way to die…”

Carda snickered and readied her spear.

“I’ll make it easy for you. This much is mercy for the invaders.”

Richarda turned her gaze to Kuze, as if Carda’s words had fallen on deaf ears.

“Say, Kuze…”

“Yes, Commander.”

“Let me ask you…”

Kuze nodded to her words.

“What did you take up arms … for?”

Kuze cringed at this question. A feeling of wanting to mend this feeling arose in his mind, but Kuze decided to answer honestly.

“It may be a self-serving reason, but I did it to protect someone I wanted to protect.”

Perhaps a Self-Defense Officer would have to answer that it was for the good of the Nation. But he could not do so.

After all, he could only muster the courage to protect someone close to him. Just as he could not pull the trigger even when he was about to be killed.

Richarda laughed dryly and then vomited a lot of blood.

“I, too, should have been…”

‘

After uttering these words, Richarda died. Carda looked at the enemy Commander with a complicated expression. Kuze crouched down beside the body of Richarda. He gently closed both of her wide-open eyes.

“Carda-san…”

“Eh!”

“Everyone is in a hurry to die on this battlefield…”

“Kuze-dono.”

After a few moments, Kuze looked up with a determined expression on his face. He returned to the barricade and grabbed the loudspeaker.

[Attention, Imperial Army Generals! I demand your withdrawal from this Nation, or else I demand your surrender upon disarmament! If you do not comply, we will not hesitate to fight a decisive battle! Do you want to be like those dragons?]

Kuze’s exclamation echoed through the castle. The soldiers of the Imperial Army had already had their pride as elite soldiers shattered. No matter how strong they were, without their Commanding Officer, and even more so, without the Commander in whom they had placed their absolute trust, the unit would be reduced to a skeleton.

Moral breakdown led to fear and despair so great that they could no longer function as a unit.

“Ah… Ahh, the Commander is….”

“It’s over…”

The knights of the Succession Empire, clad in black armor and supposed to be an unparalleled army in this world, uttered words of lament after another.

“Carda-san.”

Kuze looked at Carda with serious eyes.

“What is it?”

“If you kill even one of them who isn’t resisting, I will be on their side this time.”

The people of Marysea were startled. But Carda only nodded and did not object. They were not afraid of Kuze.

“I understand. I will keep that promise in my honor.”

The backlash from her countrymen was inevitable, but she vowed nonetheless. It was not out of gratitude for saving her Nation or fear of the power that had defeated the Imperial Army. It was just a trust in this young man.

She raised her voice to the enemy.

“Drop your weapons! Do this, and we will not take your life!”

The Imperial soldiers, perhaps relieved by her words, began to lay down their weapons in unison. 

Usually, after a battle, the only thing that remained was either victory or death. When hope for life was born in a place where one had prepared for such a situation, it was human nature to want to cling to that hope.

Especially on this battlefield, where victory was not possible. Many Marysean soldiers watched the scene with bewilderment. However, some of them showed a disturbing movement. It was a killing intent.

They were angry because their comrades and family members had been killed. But Carda noticed it and shouted.

“Anyone who disobeys my orders and commits an act of personal execution is considered to be in defiance of his superiors!”

With this power, even those who were about to head toward the unarmed Imperial troops had no choice but to give up.

“Is it over?”

Kato, who had been in the corridor leading to the throne room with the refugees, suddenly appeared.

“Those who drop their weapons and raise their hands will be permitted to come here! Those who do not will stay behind!”

At Carda’s words, the disarmed Imperial soldiers arrived a few at a time, and then gradually, in drops, with anxious expressions on their faces. Kato was relieved to hear that the war seemed to be over.

Even if there were still some who were willing to fight, it was not enough to overwhelm Marysea’s forces. It was impossible to rebuild a collapsed organization in the middle of hostile territory like this.

“Good grief! The aftermath would be tough to handle.”

Kato felt a sense of discomfort from one of the people coming this way.

‘Are you laughing?’

The man walked toward the body of Richarda.

****

“Your end was miserable, General Richarda.”

The man in the robe said to the lying corpse in a tone of heartfelt joy. Then he looked at the sword.

The Magic Sword Balmung. The sword with the blue jewel embedded in it had been in Richarda’s possession.

He, Genfur, laughed. Even with such a weapon and her overwhelming charisma, Richarda was no match for that being. 

“You monsters of the other world, you’ve done it!”

He looked at the oddly shaped ship floating in the bay.

“Kuku… But your death will not be in vain.” Genfur pulled something out of his pocket.

It was an old crystal bead. A beautifully polished, perfect sphere.

“This is the Order I am within, General,” he said and picked up his soot-covered sword as if he were making small talk.

He felt the sword’s Magical Energy. It seemed as if it was rejecting him. If he were a normal human being, he might have found it too hard to hold. But he was a Magician, a High Class Magician. He had this level of tolerance.

“When Prominia fell, we discovered that the idiots in that Nation had left us a terrible souvenir. Thanks to the Knights, who were so determined to take the throne that they let the Court Magicians escape in their entirety. They thought they were the center of the world, and they were willing to let the world fall rather than fall themselves. Relying on ancient texts, they used the magic of the ‘Winged Race’ to summon that monster into our world.”

Genfur held up a crystal ball.

“Yes, they are not of this world, General. I have been Ordered to take care of them in the event of the destruction of the Southern Expedition Mixed forces.”

He continued speaking as if the magic sword were Richarda itself. He was tinged with the euphoria of madness.

“We must maintain the balance of this world. They should not exist in this world. They have distorted the world and brought chaos.”

Genfur looked at the pile of corpses.

“You couldn’t stop them after all. So I will put an end to all of them.”

As he gazed lovingly at the crystal bead, he noticed that the Magic Sword was trembling. Strong and terrifying Magical Energy was contained in the crystal bead. The Magic Sword must have sensed it.

“Have you ever heard of the ‘Meteor Shower,’ mentioned only in fairy tales? It is said that the people of the Winged Race, who were said to be perished in ancient times, used a controller called the ‘Eye of the Storm’ to make the stars descend and strike down rebels and barbarians. Everyone believed it was a fairytale, but… Our Order does not believe so. Because… Here it is, the Eye of the Storm.”

When he held it up to the sky, he saw something within the crystal. It was not simply a reflection of the sky.

Inside the crystal was the universe. This crystal was the control unit of the ‘Meteor Shower,’ the Magic Tool of destruction; the ‘Eye of the Storm.’

He looked down on the burning city. 

“If the peace of the world can be obtained by the disappearance of a single country, it is a small price to pay.”

He then thrust Richarda’s sword into the ground.

“I am happy. I am now trying to save the world.”

He revealed his heart.

“You would despise me, but I am also protecting it, the Empire, the world!”

Holding the crystal with both hands, he began to focus his mind. The sweat on his forehead was not only because of the warmth of this land.

This Magical weapon was far too powerful for him to handle alone. And he understood that. Control came at a price. It was his life. But he didn’t care. Because he believed his name would be spoken of forever in the Order. As a martyr who gave his life to bury an enemy of the other world that even the elites of the Empire could not defeat!

He had no intention of coming back alive. This was a death to be desired. This was a death of honor. His body began to tremble. His heart beat fast and veins appeared on his skin.

As he concentrated to the limit, the ‘Eye of the Storm’ entered Genfur’s body. It began to absorb Genfur’s life force directly. Still, it was not enough. What it lacks, he must make up for.

Genfur was enveloped in darkness. The darkness began to take in the corpses scattered around it as if devouring them. By feeding on fresh blood and regret, the darkness grew.

“What the hell? What’s going on?” An otherworldly young man shouted. Genfur recognized him and shivered with a sense of superiority.

Now he had transcended everything. And then, Genfull was engulfed by the darkness and became darkness itself.

However, he managed to control it. A sense of incomparable accomplishment came over him.

“Ha, ha, ha! Now, you monsters of the other world, vanish with this country!”