A deafening roar swept across the battlefield. It was the first time Leo had experienced artillery fire from so close. For an instant, he felt as though he had lost his hearing. There were far more sounds tearing through the air than he had imagined, as though countless objects were screaming past behind him.
Grapeshot! Before explosive shells—shells that burst open on detonation—were invented, grapeshot was the most terrifying field-artillery ammunition. A single discharge could launch more than a dozen iron balls three to five centimeters in diameter, giving it tremendous power against groups of targets. The four cannons had fired nearly fifty iron balls in total, sending them densely into the cavalry formation.
Then came the shriek of metal plate armor being crushed and deformed. Mage cavalry possessed physiques far beyond those of ordinary people and could bear heavy plate armor. That armor offered some protection against the lead balls of matchlocks, but against solid iron shot, a cavalryman's plate was as fragile as a thin aluminum can.
The iron balls crumpled the plate inward, crushing the riders' chests and lungs, then punched through the armor and into the far more fragile flesh beneath. Warhorses went down. Cavalrymen fell from their saddles.
Leo looked back. Of the forty-five riders who had remained, fewer than thirty were still mounted. The space behind him had suddenly become terrifyingly empty. He even spotted Major Willy, who had just been knocked to the ground.
Even a C-Grade Mage could not withstand artillery head-on. Leo had clearly seen an iron ball strike Major Willy squarely in the chest, yet it had not struck something that behaved like iron plate. It had struck something more like rubber.
The iron armor over Major Willy's chest deformed. It suddenly seemed to acquire tremendous elasticity and actually hurled the iron ball back. Then the surface of the armor rippled like water, like a sheet of rubber after a violent blow.
C-Grade Form Magic—Armor-Shield Rebound spell! The grapeshot had failed to kill Major Willy, but the tremendous impact had still knocked him from his horse.
Once the thunder of the cannons passed, the cavalrymen who remained mounted looked lost. Only thirty meters remained. The riders were moving forward on little more than the momentum of their horses, seemingly preparing to meet their deaths. Even the proud Catherine Cavendish's mind had gone completely blank.
What kind of weapon was this? What were they supposed to do now?
In the distance, the Count of Blackport unconsciously tightened his grip on the reins. The leather creaked inside his armored gauntlets. Leo, however, stared fixedly at the two West Empire cannons ahead and to the right.
Battle lines drift to the right...
In the age of cold weapons, very few formations could maintain a perfectly straight course while charging or fighting. Most soldiers held shields in their left hands and wielded weapons with their right.
To avoid being accidentally struck by the swords of comrades on their left, and to gain whatever protection might be offered by the shields of comrades on their right, soldiers on a battlefield tended to drift unconsciously to the right. Leo therefore knew that this cavalry charge would naturally veer toward the right front.
His eyes remained locked on the two cannons to the right. He had a bold idea...
Everyone in the Unicorn Legion noticed that one of the two riders at the very front—the cavalryman carrying the long shield—was the first to react after the cannons roared. Leo swung his war hammer and hurled it toward the two cannons ahead and to his right.
First, the hammer became lighter in his hand. Under the effect of the D-Grade Cipher spell, Featherlight spell, its weight fell to thirty percent of normal. Haste Magic intervened as well, increasing the speed at which the hammer left his hand.
Once the war hammer left him, the soul waves attached to it began to dissipate gradually. When a spell ended, a mage could choose to disperse the mana on the affected object instantly, or do nothing and allow the mana—that is, the soul waves—to dissipate slowly on its own.
As the mana dispersed, the war hammer gradually returned to its original weight. Carrying enormous kinetic energy, it spun toward the cannon.
Projectile Intuition, one of the basic abilities of a Haste Mage, now showed its value. A Haste Mage could rely on intuition to control the landing point of a projectile weapon with considerable accuracy. As a result, every Haste Mage was a master archer and an excellent marksman.
The five-kilogram war hammer smashed into a West Empire soldier who was rolling one of the cannon's wheels and killed him instantly. A faint wave of dizziness suddenly passed through Leo, and a bell sounded within his Soul Sea.
Death tolls the Calamity Bell. When the bell sounds, it mourns the passing of a soul!
This one had been an ordinary man, not a mage. Fortunately, Leo had gradually adapted to the side effects of the Calamity Bell. Otherwise, becoming dizzy on a battlefield could be fatal.
By now, Leo had also gradually worked out the pattern behind the growth of soul power. Hard training caused soul power to increase slowly. For ordinary people, this was the primary means of increasing it.
Leo, however, possessed the Calamity Bell. Killing an ordinary person increased his soul power by one point; killing a mage increased it by ten. Completing a Final Entrustment ritual or an Intimidation ritual also increased his soul power by ten points. Advancing to a higher mage grade or acquiring the abilities of a new school likewise required one of those two rituals.
The bell gradually fell silent, and Leo's soul power increased by another point. After the brief dizziness passed, he invested that point of soul power into his Cipher Soul String. Leo's Cipher soul power reached thirty-two points. He was still a D-Grade Tier 3 Cipher Mage.
The war hammer had not exhausted its momentum. It continued onward and struck the wheel behind the West Empire soldier. Wood chips exploded into the air as the spokes shattered.
That was Leo's real objective!
A three-pounder cannon weighing nearly five hundred pounds (220 kilograms) required wheels to remain mobile. With its wheel smashed apart by the war hammer, the cannon could no longer be moved. That single hammer had stopped the West Empire soldiers from pulling the cannon back behind their formation.
The hammer also became a signal on the battlefield, drawing the charging cavalry's attention toward the right front. At the same time, Leo made a dangerous move: he pulled his horse toward the right front instead of continuing straight ahead.
With the cavalry force already reduced by half, he finally had enough room to maneuver. Catherine was closest to Leo. She had no idea what he intended to do, but anything was better than doing nothing, so she turned right as well.
As the 1st Squad, they had originally been positioned on the far left of the charging force. The two of them were also farther forward than the other riders, so every cavalryman could see what they did.
Led by Leo and Catherine, the other riders unconsciously began turning right as well, causing the entire cavalry formation to tighten in that direction. The loose cavalry line gathered together again, becoming a clenched fist.
The entire cadet cavalry force charged toward the right front—toward the West Empire's left wing. At this distance, only close-quarters fighting remained, and the effectiveness of firearms and artillery had been greatly reduced.
Faced with the forest of pikes, Catherine instead regained her composure. At last, this was the kind of situation she had imagined. The mage cavalry of the Unicorn Legion feared no enemy.
Catherine roared, “For the glory of the Unicorn!
“Lancers! Thrust!”
Every Form Mage cavalryman couched his lance beneath his arm, gathered all his strength, and charged toward the West Empire's right wing.
Every rider shouted, “Lancers! Thrust!”
This was the first time Leo had ever seen how lancers attacked. Form Mages, the most common mages in the Manchel Empire, made up the greatest branch of the Unicorn Legion—the lancers. A cavalry lance was already half a meter to a meter longer than a pike.
A warhorse weighing nearly half a ton, combined with a heavily armored knight, gave a five-meter lance tremendous kinetic energy. The lance points were already aimed at the chests of the West Empire pikemen.
The West pikemen planted the butts of their pikes against the ground and angled the shafts upward. It was useless. These were the lances of Form Mages!
At a distance of eight meters, the Unicorn Legion's lances suddenly lengthened. Form Mages possessed the ability to deform objects. Under the power of a spell, the wooden lances, originally five meters long, abruptly stretched to six.
An E-Grade Thrust spell could deform an object it touched by twenty percent along its length. The slender, tapered lances became even narrower and sharper as they stretched, making them better suited for thrusting.
The power of magic combined with the power of the warhorses, making the metal lance points all but unstoppable. Before the pikes could reach the Unicorn Legion cavalry, the pikemen had already been impaled by six-meter lances.
One. Two...
Most of the lances had at least two West Empire soldiers skewered on them like grasshoppers. Some pierced as many as three enemies. Others snapped under the strain.
The Unicorn Legion cavalry immediately discarded their tapered cavalry lances. For cavalrymen, such lances were generally single-use weapons. The unicorn, a sacred beast combining lance and warhorse, was the object of every lancer's faith. Lancers would never allow the Unicorn Legion's standard to be disgraced.
This single charge killed at least sixty West Empire soldiers and shattered the entire left wing of the West force in an instant. Not only the first two ranks of pikemen, but also the matchlock infantry behind them, no longer had any chance to reload.
They had been suppressed throughout the charge. They knew nothing about the enemy's new weapons. Half their riders had fallen before reaching the enemy. Even so, the Unicorn Legion's lancers had still achieved an exchange ratio of one to two.
After discarding their lances, the cavalry rapidly disengaged from the right side of the battlefield. The Cavalry Tactics Regulations were clear: cavalry's strengths were mobility and shock power. Cavalry must not become trapped inside an enemy formation; after a charge, they had to disengage quickly.
Because the Unicorn cavalry had already charged diagonally to the right, breaking away was even easier. Deafening cheers erupted from the rear of the battlefield. This was the power that the Unicorn Legion's strongest lancers were supposed to possess.
The lancers had won the clash, but the 1st Squad of the temporary cavalry battalion had now run into some trouble. Catherine's 1st Squad had occupied the far left of the cavalry line and was now trailing behind the rest, making it the most dangerous Squad on the battlefield.
Catherine had practiced with the lance since childhood and had mastered it completely. Four enemies were still skewered on the lance she had thrown away.
Leo had clearly noticed that Catherine's lance had grown from five meters to more than seven. She had to be a D-Grade Form Mage. A D-Grade Thrust spell could deform an object it touched by fifty percent along its length.
Leo had heard rumors about this long ago. Some people believed nobles possessed special channels that allowed their descendants to complete Final Entrustment rituals again and again. The exact method was a secret no noble family would pass outside its own ranks, and it was also the foundation that allowed the nobility to remain powerful.
After the exhilaration of the charge faded, Catherine was just beginning to worry about her own safety when she saw Leo East, riding beside her, throw his long shield toward her. Caught off guard, Catherine grabbed it. A round shield in her left hand, a long shield in her right—she was certainly much safer now.
But without a shield, what was Leo East going to do?
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