His Soul is Marching On to Another World; or, the John Brown Isekai

[CabbagePreacher]

63rd​ of Summer, 5859
Yellowclover, Casamonu (League of Gileadites)​

Today the sun shone on a new Yellowclover. Of course, one could argue that all matter was ever-moving and therefore ever-changing, which meant that a new sun was always rising over a completely new world, but that kind of shallow philosophical rambling was far from anyone's mind. That sort of rambling would have to be left for whenever Gemeinplatz was liberated and there was time for standing around idly and debating metaphysics.

For now, it was the time to rise and shine, and rise and shine Shinasi did in his house. He had certainly missed his humble abode. Compared to the mud huts of Libertycave the house wasn't much of an improvement in terms of construction, but it had the advantage of having his memories in its walls. The lords could have their palaces, the merchants their apartments, but Shinasi would rather keep his shack to retire to whenever his adventuring days would be over. Perhaps he'd need to expand the building a bit to house more people… he was daydreaming about such a possibility while looking at Ayomide who was still knocked unconscious on the other corner. Maybe he wouldn't need to expand the building considering how compact she was. Maybe I should get out of bed instead of sitting on my behind.

Shinasi slipped out of the bedsheets and didn't get his clothes on as he had fallen asleep with all his fighting gear already on him. His sides hurt from his belt biting into him all night. His body just fell sore all around from having marched all day yesterday, and there was another day of marching tomorrow. The young man turned his head to Ayomide again. It was fine. He was just going to have to march one more day. One day out of who-knows how many in the future, but it was going to be fine. Probably. Hopefully. Maybe. He finally stood up after having had enough internal struggle for the day, and he noticed that the house was empty except for Ayomide.

Thinking that the others must have gone out, Shinasi stepped outside to see a feast happening outside his door. All the soldiers had gathered around in a scattered donut-shape to receive food from a couple of cauldrons set outdoors. Those serving them were familiar to Shinasi: they were his fellow villagers who had gotten to work on feeding those who had saved them. It wasn't too cheerful of a scene, mostly from the fact that these villagers had also just lost their friends and family. Still, they themselves having stayed alive seemed to have staved away potential gloom for the immediate moment. The scene was made unusual by the villagers and soldiers, lightskin and darkskin, sitting together in the field as equals. Curious children had surrounded the soldiers, so had even more curious adults, and the soldiers with curly hair had to chase away those trying to play with their hair without permission.

Looking through the crowd, Shinasi found Brown dining along with Shinasi Sr. Both the old men had laid themselves on the grass. They were talking about the "those old days" as those with advanced age tend to do.

"…and you know, one of my sons, he tried to slip out to play during Sabbath."

"What is 'Sabbath', Mister Brown?"

"On Sunday you see… I'll tell you all about it later. Young man, good morning." Brown waved to Shinasi looking at them from a short distance. "Your father's quite the curious fellow. He hasn't left me alone ever since he woke up."

"I'm sure he hasn't, captain." replied Shinasi Jr.

"I hadn't expected you to be… well, to be honest, I wasn't expecting you to be with anything… anything like this." Shinasi Sr. found himself lacking the vocabulary to explain John Brown's antics. The average peasant's political literacy hadn't seen much improvement ever since they saw the tax collector for the first time in their lives. "Ah… Anyways, I'm glad that you've found something to work towards in your life. Better for you to fight to save villages than for you to drift off into weird adventures and spend your time in the bawdy-"

Shinasi Jr. interrupted Shinasi Sr. by conspicuously clearing his throat. "Father, I think Mister Brown has heard enough details for today."

"I care not much for his background as long as he's standing before me as a noble man today." added Brown. "His… multiplicitous deeds with the fairer sex are to be judged later by the Lord." The way he squinted his eyes at Shinasi made him sure what Brown thought that judgement was going to be like.

"Yes, let's not talk about that today. I… Well, there was something I wanted to discuss with my father before all this happened." Now that Brown had explained the whole League thing to his father, Shinasi Jr. could skip the explanations and get right to the point.

"Oh? What'd that be, son?"

"Well…" Shinasi Jr.'s eyes shifted to Brown. I guess there's no harm in telling him. "I wanted to ask your permission- your… erm…" Shinasi felt his momentum dropping. Was this even the right time? But then I may never have the chance to ask this again… I at least want to get this done before the siege. "…I wanted to ask your permission to get engaged to a woman I've been courting."

"…" Shinasi Sr. was dumbstruck for a moment which proved to be way more than brief. He opened his mouth, closed it back, raised his hand, put it down, stammered a few syllables, and then he finally managed to say something intelligible "What?"

"Her name's Ayomide, the woman you probably saw sleeping this morning, in our house."

"…what?"

"I initially joined Captain Brown because I wanted to know who she was after she had saved me."

"…what?"

"And, and, we have already… uhm… well, I can't exactly ask her parents for permission, but I'm pretty sure she'd be willing."

"…excuse me son, I need to… you, you've managed to court a woman?"

"Yes?"

Brown interjected "I can personally attest, on my honor as a man and a Christian, that these two are quite close together."

"I… I never thought this'd happen! When are the grandkids coming?"

"…it's a bit early for that father."

A bit later in the 63rd​ of Summer, 5859
Yellowclover, Casamonu (League of Gileadites)​

Despite the great reception, the League of Gileadites had other things to do that day. So, without letting them laze off, Brown mustered the men once more. Things were looking Casamonuwards again. Unlike their departure from Azdavay, their departure from Yellowclover was a whole lot more eventful. Vaiz had to take his time to receive each and every blessing from the villagers, which took a good ten minutes. Some villagers had come along to join the soldiers in moving their supplies, and some had made generous donations to the League. After having made sufficient preparations, the League moved out with a promise to come back after sieging down Casamonu and capturing Sir Korvus II.

Shinasi was at the tail-end of the caravan as he was the one most busy with receiving farewells. Next to him was an ordinary cart being pulled by one of Ayomide's officers. It contained Ayomide warmed in a blanket. She was still deep asleep, and she'd remain so for a while. All Shinasi had to do was survive until she woke up and he could deliver the news from his father. He shuddered. Hopefully he hadn't just set a so-called "flag" by thinking about such things. Now, getting afraid of flags was only going to make it worse…

"Bah! I need a drink." exclaimed Shinasi, prompting everyone to look at him as if he was a deranged lunatic. Unfortunately, he had to stay sober on the march, otherwise he had a real chance of getting trampled on by a marching column if he stumbled and fell down.

"You need a drink? We're on the march!" This voice shocked Shinasi so much that he almost stumbled while mostly sober. It was Ayomide, who had risen up from her bed in the cart. "Good morning, you look like you've seen a ghost."

"How are you awake already? I mean, I'm glad, but-"

"Could you show your gratitude by getting me out of this cart?"

"Ah, yeah." Shinasi leaned down to embrace Ayomide and lift her up from under her shoulders. Despite her short stature she was quite heavy. He'd have stayed like this for a bit longer if not for the fact that they were on the march, so Shinasi eventually set Ayomide down on the ground.

"So, I don't know how I'm up." Ayomide stretched her body after having laid motionless for more than an entire day. "I heard you scream about needing a drink, which made me want to shout at you to not drink on the march. That's all I remember before I opened my eyes and shouted at you."

"As long as you're up… and I'm not going to drink anything on the march, don't you worry. Well, maybe a bit…" He thought of the sips he had stolen this morning from the communion wine.

"I'll go report to the old man now. Don't get anything while I'm away." With that, Ayomide speeded off to inform John Brown of her miraculous recovery.

Shinasi had extended his hands forward to try and catch Ayomide, but she sped of way too quickly. He retracted his hand and put it into the fashionable pockets of his gambeson. There was time yet for him.

With an awakened Ayomide, the League of Gileadites continued marching on…

 

[CabbagePreacher]

Even later on the 63rd​ of Summer, 5859
The walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

Sir Korvus II was anxious. Not because he was standing on walls which had only been newly rebuilt… okay, if he had to admit, standing on hastily rebuilt walls made him anxious as well. "Let's hope that these walls are good enough for you, Mister Dong."

"The Heavens will decide whether our fate shall crumble along with these walls or not." replied Master Long Dong. His eyes were half-closed and staring far into the distance while his long white robe fluttered in a most cool fashion along with his great beard. One looking at him from the outside would think that he was staring far into the future with his wise eyes. In reality, his eyes were just sore due to the sunlight directly hitting his eyes. The wind magic he cast to make his robes flutter only served to irritate his eyes further.

Korvus scoffed. "I'm sure that a horde of savages cannot bring down walls built by civilization. What are they going to do, hurl pebbles at the walls with their hands?"

Master Dong picked up a pebble left over from yesterday's repairs. He threw it up far towards the sky. "Perhaps." After a long minute, the pebble flew back down to his hand. "The Demon King is sure to be overpowered by himself. We'll be on watch for any cheat skills he surely has."

"…and you're thinking that whatever ragtag walls we have here can stop a demon king?" Korvus looked at the man right next to him. He suddenly felt that he had made a mistake by staying here, but there wasn't much he could do to escape the grip of an otherworlder cultivator.

Dong nodded. "We're here to melt his army down before things snowball out of control. I foresee that there will be no stopping him if we aren't to stop him now. Fortunately, I also foresee that we will stop him today."

Yes, Dong had seen it, but he hadn't understood it back then. The vision he had seen during his meditation had required reinterpretation with the intel he had gathered. The capital would burn, that much was true, but not from the armies of the Demon King. A new order would rise and the empire would fall, that was also true, but it would be a new order built from the ashes with the guiding hand of an old architect from another world. This Demon King was just a catalyst, a moving force to give the architect the push he needed to enact this new order. "There is good in every evil, and evil in every good. We shall see much good from this evil."

"If you say so…" Korvus really wanted to get away from the weirdos in the borderlands. He planned on taking all the money he got and locking himself away in a mansion in Hauptstadt with a load of jade beauties by his side. Maybe he'd buy a merchant ship or two to make passive income at the side so that his inheritance wouldn't dry out, and that's all the work he could bother to do. "I-"

"Ssh!" Dong put his hand over Korvus' mouth. Shushing a nobleman like that would have normally given him the death penalty, but Korvus was also beyond caring at that moment. Dong completely closed his eyes, focusing on the presence just beyond the horizon. He could feel him. "John…"

"John who?"

"John these…" Master Long Dong had to stop himself from making a very immature joke at that moment. Such a low-quality joke would have ruined his LARP. "John, the Demon King."

"A Demon King named John?" Korvus scanned Dong's face to see if he was joking. Dong looked all too serious however. "Really? Would a Demon King have such a lame name?" Korvus kept looking at Dong with disbelief.

"I'm not the one who named him John! Raise your complaints about his name to him, not me." Dong went quiet again to focus. There were many presences beyond the horizon. It must have been a decently-sized army, at least for Gemeinplatz standards. The cultivator opened his eyes again as his head began aching. He really needed to invent painkillers for such times. "They have an army coming here."

"They do?" Korvus looked at the horizon. Everything seemed clear to him.

"Yes, get your men ready!" shouted Dong. He hated the "dimwit normies" as he called them. "Qiánjìn!"

​

Even later, but not much later, on the 63rd​ of Summer, 5859
Somewhere near the walls of Casamonu, Casamonu

"Here we are, ladies and gentlemen." Brown rode his horse atop to a scenic hill overlooking Casamonu's walls. The captains followed behind him with the soldiers not far behind. "Take a second to admire the scenery, this wonderful scene of Creation." Brown did actually pause for a second. It was yet another hot summer day, the currently dry grass staying idle from a lack of wind. "Alright, I believe we have had enough of a break. Do your best to stay alive: we'll have much more time to admire the scenery if you do so. Now, make camp!"

On the orders of the commander-in-chief, the captains broke into their companies and made their way towards the flat land below them. A squad lead by Tubman stationed themselves on the hill to stay on the lookout while the rest intended to be hard-at-work digging ditches surrounding the walls and putting their sleeping bags down. The sky was darkening, and the men of the League didn't intend to attempt an assault after having marched for so long. Most of the soldiers were concerned with getting a good night's sleep under the watch of their poor comrades on patrol duty. The real fun would begin tomorrow when the big guns would come out to play.

The training of the League paid off as the men worked quickly, quietly, and efficiently from a distance just far away enough that crossbow shots wouldn't reach them from the walls. The garrison of Casamonu did have firearms, and a few stray shots did make their way to their camp, but the defenders stopped their shots as they got ready to conserve their ammunition in case of a breach. Slowly and surely, the men of the League surrounded the city wall with their encampment. A proper siege required that nothing went in or out, and all the soldiers patrolling around the city would do their best to make sure of that. Even if they failed to breach the walls, the garrison would ideally surrender after running out of food, water or the will to stand idle on some wall for days on end. Even more ideally, that time would come soon.

"Young lady, our job is done for today. We, especially you, should get some rest for tomorrow." Just as Brown was about to separate from his captains and lay down after a long day of setting up camp, he heard quite the commotion coming from nearby. A few crackles, a few shouts and suddenly-

"John!"

There was an odd man in robes speeding towards him at inhuman speeds.

 

[CabbagePreacher]

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---

​

Cultivation (noun): "Advancement or refinement in physical, intellectual, or moral condition."

For those who cultivate, it's an arduous process taking potentially myriads of years to get anywhere. Old masters with their flowing beards lock themselves in caves hidden in high mountains, young masters punch even younger masters for face-saving, and in the meanwhile the normies down below work hard for the sect.

Long Dong, despite being master of the Supreme Heavenly Immortal Taoist Sect, had at most cultivated for three years in total. All his other achievements had been made through convenient items left by respected masters he found by lucking out in auctions and other adventures which would require a novel of its own to describe in full. He hoped to gain power and ascend to yet another plane by slaying the Demon King there and then. His special attack, [Massive Ultimate Directional Attack], would rend the weak-looking old man right in front of him to shreds, smithereens, and several itty bitty pieces.

"John!"

Dong flew towards Brown, his robes frantically flapping in the wind from how fast he was leaping towards the Demon King. "[M.U.D.A.!]" he shouted. His vision became blur as his massive and ultimate attack swung towards Brown's direction. The attack was simple, yet effective: Dong swung his entire body with one of his fists raised up high. The force of his entire body spinning usually obliterated anything that it came across. It felt like time stopped as the qi came flowing into him, first to his legs to help him make the spin and then to his fists to disrupt the qi of the Demon King and send him to an otherworld.

BAM!

Dong and Brown collided, and yet, the old man was smitten without being made into smithereens. Brown had managed to raise his hand and cusp the hand flying towards him. "Who are you?!" screamed the old man.

"I'll ask the same thing, how did you block my secret attack?!" shouted back Dong. He jumped back to get a good deal of distance between him and the Demon King. He was just meant to be an old otherworlder in my vision… how can such a puny old man of no renown block the Dong?!

"It's rude to answer a question with another question." Brown leaped to get his M1 Garand before Dong could approach him again. Thankfully he had kept his rifle close at all times, it was right on the ground propped up against a tent this time, and the rifle was soon raised up against the cultivator. "Your intentions are no good, I assume."

"Vanquishing the Demon King is nothing but good. Kowtow now and I may consider leaving your corpse intact." Dong was biding for time, trying to read the old man. He was the Demon King of legend, sure, but "spawncamping" him should have led to an easy victory.

"I'm not kowtowing to anyone but the good Lord above, and with His help, none of us here will have to kowtow to anyone else." Brown looked around him. The other captains were already running towards him. Perhaps they could defeat this odd martial arts bloke the same way they had defeated Kim.

"You are courting death, John. I'll respect your choice." Dong began circling his arms around his head. This even-more-special technique would surely vanquish the Demon King. "[Seven Crane Cradling Tech-]"

BANG! Clink!

Dong immediately reflected the bullet back to its sender. Intervening while somebody was in the middle of chanting the name of their attack was a crime punishable by death.

Clink! "Cào!" Brown moved away from where he was just in time for the bullet to reflect from a rock nearby.

Clink! Dong reflected it back.

Clink! Brown moved away from where he was just in time for the bullet to reflect from a rock nearby again.

Clink! Dong finally reflected the bullet away from Brown towards the earth so that it couldn't reflect again. "Cào nǐ zǔzōng shíbā dài, what the hell are you?!"

"Avoid blaspheming please; God doesn't like those who blaspheme." Having given the cultivator a lesson in not saying "hell", Brown himself took time to be surprised by what had just happened. "I am just a mortal man, one of the many sinners put on the Earth by Our Father in Heaven."

"You…" Dong paused. He stood still to open his mind's eye. He sensed the flow of qi around him. The old man was… "What the… How long have you meditated for?! How can a Demon King have so much pure life energy?"

"All day every Sunday, and whenever I can for the rest of the days of the week." Brown was equally confused as the cultivator in front of him. Dodging bullets wasn't something he usually did. "I know not what you are rambling about." He had finally been the one to be confused by another's ramblings rather than another being confused by his.

"You have eyes, yet you can't see Mt. Tai?"

"What are you talking about…"

The meeting between a 19th​ century radical abolitionist and a cultivator from the 21st​ century wasn't going too well.

"I'm…" Dong noticed that Brown was now flanked by a shield-wielding guy and a gem-holding catgirl. "…I see you've bought yourself some time."

"I'm not buying anything." replied Brown. "Young lady, this man's quite the swift one. Young man, have your shield up."

"I'm not here to fight your goons!" replied Dong. He circled his hands around again, not bothering to verbally name his attack for time's sake. [Special Seven Crane Cradling Technique]!

Dong released a wave of energy around him, visible to the non-cultivators as a wave of dust and earth being kicked up towards his enemies. It was a pretty wide-area attack which meant that it didn't do much damage, but it fulfilled its purpose by isolating Brown from his allies. Ayomide and Shinasi were knocked far away along with the rest of the onlookers, leaving Brown and Dong to duel with each other.

The two men were facing each other, and only each other, now that the field had been cleared.

Brown honestly didn't know what was happening. He had somehow dodged a bullet flying towards him, and now he was facing a stranger in battle. The old man knew not that his years of meditation had caused him to cultivate a whole load of qi he had never managed to unleash until he had faced death with Dong. Now John Brown had awakened without even realizing it, and he was about to unleash God's fury on this Earth.

"I'll be honest, I know not what is happening." said Brown. He felt a great power surging within him, the power of cultivation. Plus, the old man was powered by the fact that he wanted to enact punishment on the man trying to stop abolition. "Regardless, let us duel." He muttered a quick prayer before lunging forth at Dong.

Dong lunged at him two, and the two otherworlders would have locked into combat with their fists if not for Brown smacking Dong with the butt of his rifle. Having expected only fists in a martial arts duel, the cultivator was taken off guard by the glorified club. A tooth flew off of his mouth, planting itself to the ground in anticipation of the tooth fairy. "Have you no honor?! You aren't supposed to use a club in this sort of duel!"

"Who said that?" asked Brown, readying his makeshift club for another strike. He flew right past Dong however, and ended up pounding nothing but air. Dong was ready for Brown's club this time. However, he was not ready for the bullet fired by Brown, and he barely manage to reflect it toward the heavens. They were jumping, practically flying in the air, trying to trade punches, clubs and bullets, only to end up missing each other. Both had gotten used to the simple tricks of the other by now.

Brown landed back on the ground, and Dong soon followed. Both men took a break after having been left breathless. John Brown's old body wasn't built for martial arts, and it had been a while since Long Dong had to exert himself this much. The cultivator hadn't expected to exert himself much at all today, and he was still in shock psychologically after having been countered by John Brown. ,

All they could do was stare each other down with killing intent…

 

[CabbagePreacher]

It's still the 63rd​ of Summer, 5859
Somewhere near the walls of Casamonu where two men have their fists raised against each other, Casamonu​

Menacing. If one needed to describe the current atmosphere between John Brown and Long Dong in one word, which is a thing that one isn't wont to do but let's have a hypothetical here for the sake of making overly complicated hypotheticals that drag on for too long, then "menacing" wouldn't be a bad word. Both men were staring directly into each other's eyes, piercing each other's gaze, and planning on piercing each other's skulls with fists. Things were quiet, except for the rustling grass and the hopping grasshoppers to-and-fro-to-yonder.

Unfortunately for the grass down below and Brown up above, Dong's patience was running thin. He clasped his hands together and pushed them forward while opening them in an awkward motion while making noises like he had severe constipation. Thankfully the concentrated ball of energy he released was shining so brightly that nobody could see him to make fun of his moves. Brown leaned sideways preparing to avoid the ball with a swift leap, but he had a better idea right before the ball hit him. It was too late for him to avoid it, so the old man simply kicked the ball back. This somehow worked, a greater flash of light emanated from the point of contact between his shoe and the ball. The ball of light bounced up of Brown and exploded into flame with an ear-shattering bang. On the path to Brown, the grass had been burnt up by the ball of light.

Old man Brown prayed in thanks to the Lord for having allowed him to deflect an enormous ball of pure energy. He intended to pray a bit more, but his prayers were rudely interrupted by the annoying heathen right in front of him launching eight smaller balls of energy at once. This time Brown didn't like his chances, and the balls were a bit slower, so he began running away while the balls chased him.

"You coward! You witless geezer! Stop running!" Unfortunately for Dong, Brown didn't listen to his advice. Eventually the balls of energy dissipated and exploded in a similar fashion to their bigger counterpart.

There was a trail of burnt and burning grass behind Brown. "I'd say that the real coward is the one trying to beat an old man." Despite his claims to being an old man however, Brown was proving to be quite nimble in this current moment. This time the energy balls came from the sky and Brown, being in his peak, leaped, somersaulted, and did a backflip just to not become part of the craters left behind by the balls of energy. His old bones were aching, but he felt the aching disappear as he breathed in, out, and let out a prayer or ten.

Time seemed to slow down when the old man closed his eyes. No, he needn't run away or even see anything. He could instinctively feel the balls of energy fly towards him. His body took over. With his power surging, he kicked, and then added a punch, and then headbutted the last one. There was even more burnt grass around him when he finally opened his eyes.

"What the…" Dong was beginning to lose order in his breathing. There was a line of blood streaming down his nose, both from exertion and from frustration. His opponent was getting better at cultivation in real-time. What had he unleashed upon this not-Earth? The best thing to do was retreat, and retreat Dong did with his tail between his legs. He jumped back, and then let loose a barrage of glowing chains from his sleeves to restrain the old man.

Brown, however, was not the type to be okay with being restrained by chains. He yanked the chain with both his hands and dragged the Dong back to himself. Dong flew towards Brown, confused about the fact that the old man wanted even more.

Long Dong was ready however. He raised his fists up high to protect against Brown punching or kicking him. He readied his instincts to matrix himself out of rifle fire. He even solidified qi around him to protect himself in case of any attacks using pure energy. He was sure that he could receive any attack he had seen from Brown up until now.

Then Brown took out something from his pockets and threw it towards Dong.

Soap? This was the last thing Dong thought before his head collided with a bar of soap in the air. He had expected a projectile to fly towards him, not for him to fly towards a projectile.

So quick was his collision that he passed out.

So quick was Brown's fist that he didn't wake up ever again.

Long Dong couldn't defy fate.

Yep, it's still the 63rd​ of Summer, 5859
Somewhere near the walls of Casamonu where a bunch of soldiers have been pushed to, Casamonu​

"Urgh…" Shinasi was trying to get closer and closer to the two men trading fists. However, there seemed to be some sort of invisible barrier he couldn't get past no matter how much he pushed it. He pushed and pushed forward, yet it felt like he was trying to get past a wall made of pure slime. "Captain, hang in there!"

"Old man!" Ayomide knocked on the barrier as well. However, she took a pause when she noticed what was happening inside the barrier. It was wild, to say the least. The old man in question was doing feats of acrobatics which she had never seen before in her life. "Hang- hang in there?!"

The next few minutes was jaw-dropping to the spectators outside of the cultivator's barrier. John Brown was dealing a beatdown the likes of which had never been seen before in the history of the remote edges of Gemeinplatz. It was quite hard to follow with all the balls of light flying around and old men jumping around, but it was still a good watch for the soldiers around the barrier. Some sat on the grass, watching the fight in lieu of entertainment. Some were cheering on. Some were biting their nails, thinking of what'd happen if they got enslaved again.

Thankfully, for the fans of John Brown, the old man's soap saved the day as the barrier came down with the defeat of the cultivator. Shinasi fell face-first as he had been leaning on the barrier, while Ayomide saved herself with a well-timed guest of wind to keep herself on her two feet. There was a rush towards the scene of the battle filled with craters. Brown had knelt down on the ground, breathing in and out deeply while his forehead was riddled with beads of sweat.

"Old man? Are you fine?" Ayomide had ran up to Brown, ready to cast some healing if need be. She didn't as the old man was fine, at least physically.

"Praise be to God, I'm fine." Brown coughed up some blood and stained his coat. "Mostly."

"Mostly?" Coughing up blood doesn't make you look fine…

"Mostly. I've been worse." added Brown, having literally died once after being hanged. "I just need some sleep." He yawned a bit too casually for someone who had died once.

"A-Alright…" Ayomide now looked at the lifeless body of Dong laying right next to where Brown was. She, and many of the men, were mostly desensitized to corpses by now. One of the soldiers covered the body with a blanket for later burial. Nobody really knew how to conduct a funeral for an otherworlder, neither did they really have enough respect to conduct proper rituals for those trying to kill them, so enemy bodies would simply be buried. The rest of the night passed with the League resetting their camp which had been destroyed by the unexpected cultivator attack.

Tomorrow, the siege would finally start.

Right around the end of 63rd​ of Summer, 5859
The walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

Sir Korvus was waiting. And waiting some more. The skies had darkened, yet he was waiting. From his position, he was only seeing a light show and he couldn't distinguish between the two vague humanoid blobs clashing down below. "It's taking Dong a while to cut off the head of the snake…"

Things would have been easy after the troops of the Demon King were demoralized with the aforementioned Demon King being defeated. Either they'd dissolve and Korvus wouldn't have to deal with them, or they'd try and siege the castle down in a futile attempt. There was no way that a bunch of headless savages had the ability to bring down the walls of civilization, so Korvus wasn't worried about potentially being sieged down.

All he needed to do was wait for Dong to come back with the good news.

Sir Korvus was waiting.

And waiting some more.

The stars had come out, yet he was still waiting.

He'd wait for a long while more.

 

[CabbagePreacher]

It's not the 63rd​ of Summer 5859 anymore, it's the 64th​ of Summer 5859
The walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

Things weren't looking so brightly for Sir Corvus. He had gone to sleep last night hoping that the situation would get brighter, but the only thing to brighten had been the sky and nothing else.

There were no Dongs in open sight, no cultivators who'd save him, only the siege camp which had surrounded the walls and blocked an easy escape for Sir Corvus. He was about to curse the fool who had made the decision to mount a defense, before he realized that he was about to curse himself. Not wanting to curse himself any further, he saved his curses for the Demon King, that damnable commander of savages. Staring down from the walls, he saw the savages down below who looked no different from ants. Oh, how he would love to crush them…

Sir Corvus had, of course, been busy with things other than fantasizing about crushing his enemies while standing atop a wall. While he didn't think that the savages mounting a successful siege was possible, he also wanted to be ready for any surprises like the one which had happened yesterday. He had commanded his troops to position what few cannons he had around the walls and fill them with shrapnel in case the savages tried to go over the walls. Casamonu didn't have much gunpowder in storage, nor could they get more when they were surrounded by enemies, so those cannons would only fire if the enemy got close enough to secure a hit. The garrison was marching 24/7 to make sure that nobody could even get close to the walls without being pelted with arrows until they were buried six feet under.

Corvus had also considered arming a militia composed of the citizens of the town, but then the concept of arming the common people made him a bit too scared to even think further about trying it out. He did still plan on looting the town of everything valuable when he left, and doing that would be hard with an armed population to resist him. For now, he was content with letting himself be seen as the last line of defense before the savage forces of the Demon King, nay, he was the last line of defense before the savage forces of the Demon King. As his noble blood demanded he'd defend the people of this town, and then leave after taking his just due. The ever-so noble Sir Corvus had already made all the justifications he needed to make himself feel good about being a glorified bandit. Perhaps, in another world, he would have become on Olympic-level mental gymnast.

With the ants below scurrying to conduct their pitiful siege, Corvus couldn't help but feel relieved and let out a boisterous laugh. "Ha! What was I worrying about?" What were these savages going to do, run up the walls and enter the city from above?

Suddenly, a BANG, and the earth below shook along with the heavens above. Corvus almost fell butt-first on to the ground. He looked below from his high walls, to where the explosion had come from. There was a newly-formed smoking crater down below. Was it some sort of magic summoned by the Demon King? He looked intently at the colony of ants down below. Where was the magic coming from?

All Corvus saw was a black blur pass above his head before he heard another explosion right above his head. This one grounded him and everyone around him as shrapnel whizzed past or into them. Corvus had gotten lucky and his helmet had blocked a broken shard of clay from shattering his cranium. A poor soldier right next to him hadn't been so lucky, and his brain wasn't functioning at all anymore. Those who had been injured were crying out in pain.

It was pure cacophony, one which Corvus had to quickly retreat from back to security. He crawled on the ground with his ears ringing, swearing to crush the dirty ants below him who had forced him to such an embarrassing position.

64th​ of Summer 5859
Below the walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

Ayomide squinted her eyes, trying to get a good view of the explosion which was very far away from her. She, and the others around her, only saw a distant brief fiery explosion followed by a cloud of thick gray smoke above the walls. It was so far away that she couldn't hear the explosion. "…did that even do anything?"

Brown nodded with satisfaction at the results of their artillery test. "I can assure you that they aren't too happy about the fireworks show that we are putting on, young lady. Load up another round, gentlemen!"

There was a veritable artillery crew around a copper tube which looked far from a proper piece. The tube was affixed on top of a few bags of grain held steady by planks. A few of the more muscle-laden soldiers had been tasked with repositioning the artillery every time it fired, and Rabanowicz was in charge of mentally doing ballistic calculations to make sure that they were positioning everything correctly. Watanabe was right next to her, drawing calculations on the earth with a stick to verify Rabanowicz's mental math.

However, theory and math enough were far from being enough to fire this cannon, or any other cannon for that matter. Bilal had sent a team of skilled kiln workers along with the cannon delivery to set up a kiln. Brown had originally requested cannonballs to be made at Libertycave, but Bilal had decided that it'd be far better to set up a simple kiln in the camp itself to make the cannonballs. The cannonballs in question were clay balls packed with pebbles, metal scrap, and anything else which would potentially hurt a person. Inside them were also a whole load of gunpowder, courtesy of the smugglers which had left the gunpowder in an unmarked location near Casamonu for them, and a fuse (hemp rope doused in oil) sticking out ready to be lit.

A soldier rolled a newly-baked cannonball into the copper tube. It rolled down the tube, eventually seating itself with a loud thunk at the bottom. Rabanowicz ordered some last-minute adjustments to the angle and position of the cannon before it was ready for fire. Firing the cannon was relatively easy: Ayomide first shone a concentrated beam of light to light the fuse and then, before the cannon exploded in their faces, she cast a very strong gust of wind right inside the cannon itself. The compressed air, stuck between the walls of the cannon and the cannonball, pushed the cannonball with great force that launched the cannonball fast enough to reach the walls. There was another flash of light and more smoke as the cannonball hit the wall directly this time. Unfortunately, the damage great enough to immediately bring down the walls, gunpowder as an explosive wasn't too strong and the clay cannonball itself wasn't hard or fast enough to do much damage, but the explosion by itself was enough to demoralize the garrison up above the weakening walls.

"We need it a bit down, to damage the foundations of the wall. Also, the explosion is too early, we need it to explode right next to the wall. Get a longer fuse." commented Rabinowicz, watching the explosion do its thing. Immediately the cannon was lowered and a longer fuse was attached to the cannonball. This was far from an exact science, with the cannon being wildly inaccurate and the fuses varying wildly in how fast they burned. Sometimes it was too early, sometimes it was too high, sometimes the fuse refused to light up.

Still, it was much better than having no cannon at all no matter how odd the cannon was compared to its contemporaries. Almost all cannons in Gemeinplatz would propel a cannonball through the explosion of gunpowder and break down walls with sheer kinetic force from the speeding hunk of metal or stone. However, the League didn't have enough bronze or iron to cast any cannons capable of handling an explosion inside its chambers. Therefore, they were using wind magic to propel a lighter projectile with explosives inside it to try and get a similar effect to a conventional cannon. It wasn't proving to be as effective, but the walls would have to come down eventually once they were pounded on enough. Probably. Hopefully.

The artillery crew loaded another cannonball into the Libertycave cannon, and the people on the wall got ready for another explosion. This was going to be a long siege.

 

[CabbagePreacher]

65th​ of Summer 5859
The walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

It was a hellish night, especially for those guarding the walls of Casamonu. Their day had been ruined by one simple thing:

BOOM! Crackle…

A group of noisy neighbors had arrived to pound their walls in quite the rude manner. What's worse, quite unlike a noisy neighbor's kid making noise, the League had grown large enough to be a danger to their livelihood. Plus, the neighbor's kids usually didn't have an explosive cannon manned by a revolutionary catgirl wizard capable of bringing down castle walls.

Without the HOA anywhere in sight, the defenders on the walls had to deal with their neighbors by their lonesome. Sir Corvus had ordered the cannons of the city to shoot at the one cannon down below, but with a lack of experienced artillery crew, his artillery only managed to pound the earth around the cannon. Soon he had found himself out of gunpowder, and that was that for their cannons. Now they stood idle like the useless bronze tubes they were.

All that Corvus could do, and what he was doing right now, was ordering his men around to make sure that they were plugging the walls. Every mason in Casamonu had been drafted to reinforce the side of the walls which were being pounded by the cannon. Such a draft was justified in the face of this aggression shown to them by the Demon King outside of the walls. It was a heroic effort in their eyes, suitable for those who were living to see the avatar of evil in the flesh attack their city. A line of clergymen lined up next to the hardworking masons, quoting scripture at them for motivation while doing no physical work themselves. Corvus himself joined the clergymen in doing no real work; a lord such as Corvus would never stoop so low to touch a bucket of mortar.

BOOM! Crackle…

Another section of the wall was hit, and pebbles along with dust flew of the wall and flew into the faces and mouths of the masons. There was a bout of coughing and swearing while the old stone masons tried to reorient themselves after the explosion. The section that they had been repairing had gotten hit again. Normally having to work on fixing the same thing again would have been mildly annoying, but it was more of a life-and-death situation than annoying for those on the walls.

BOOM! Crackle…

With their adversaries down below getting better and better at aiming, the explosions had gotten even more accurate and frequent. The same section had been hit again. The masons got to work to try and plug the cracks forming in the wall before it'd completely collapse.

BOOM!

This time, the explosion was right above their heads. A couple of the masons and the soldiers overwatching them were wounded from the shrapnel. The wall was yet to be patched up. As the cannons were loaded back up again, the masons saw that the wall wouldn't survive another round. They ignored the soldiers surrounding them and ran for it, running away from the weakened section.

BOOM! Crackle!

From a solitary old man in a cave, to a dozen fugitives, to a force numbered with three digits…

Brown and his men had gotten far in their march on, far enough to breach the walls of an actual castle.

65th​ of Summer 5859
Below the walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

Ayomide was feeling sleepy. Also bored. She was bored after having had to stand right next to this abominable copper tube without doing anything but cast wind magic. Everyone around her had stopped talking after having stood in the same spot with her for the last day. The excitement of battle had been, as is usually the case, replaced with sheer boredom as the siege dragged on to its second day.

"How are you faring, Lady Orange? Are the accommodations suitable around here for your royal tastes?" Here he was, to at least relieve her of some boredom. Shinasi dropped by the cannon after having finished patrolling the place and making sure that nobody inside Casamonu was trying to get out.

"It's not as good as my royal seat covered with purple satin attended by my team of a hundred servants, but it'll have to do." Ayomide yawned after having launched another cannonball. "Somebody should get me a chair to sit on, at least."

"Ayomide, we don't have any chairs in the entire camp." Such luxuries were far away from a makeshift siege camp "I haven't found any chairs in the wild either, so we're out of luck."

"Yeah, yeah." Yet another round was launched by Ayomide. They had been stockpiling cannonballs whenever her magic power ran out, and they had lots in the stockpile to quickly load into the cannon. "We'll get to sit all we want when we siege this place down. Who knows, you might even find yourself an actual seat covered by purple satin?"

"If I find such a good seat, I'm firmly planting my butt on it and never moving it again." replied Ayomide. The march, the scuffle in the village, she already had enough action to last her for the rest of her life despite her being only at the start of the battle against slavery. She'd have retired already if not for… well, Ayomide didn't exactly know it at herself at that moment.

"I'll make sure to shop for a good satin seat when we're in town, then. Hopefully the shopkeepers will be a bit more responsive to us in our second visit."

"I have the slightest suspicion that they'll have to be a bit more responsive to us."

Ayomide launched another cannonball, which cut their conversation in half. Following the great ball of smoke from the exploding cannonball was another greater ball of grey smoke as a wide section of the wall gave up on standing and crumbled down. There was a rumble which reached even the ears of the siege camp. After that, silence. The wall was rubble, and the rubble wasn't a wall.

Through the breached wall, Ayomide could see the city itself. Or, she could see the rooves of the building from this far away at least.

65th​ of Summer 5859
Casamonu, City of Casamonu​

Sir Corvus had, after having built up the courage to go up on the walls, almost been crushed under the rubble of the collapsing wall. His fine fur cape was now dirtied by dust, and his mood had been sullied by his new neighbors.

"Sir! Sir, are you fine?" A retainer ran to Corvus, helping him get up.

"I'm not! I'm not…" He looked at the breach. It was big, but… "They can't defeat us if we continue to defend in the city. Get the men to calm down and go back to their positions!"

The retainer responded with a salute "Yes, sir! Anything else?"

"We must make sure that they don't dare enter this breach. Station all available garrison members to around here, and make sure that the masons are here as soon as possible to repair this mess! That's all, now get out!"

"Understood, sir!" The retainer made a run for it, leaving Sir Corvus alone. An urban area, walls or not, was a defensible position to have. The savages below, with their copper spears and helmets, couldn't possibly win if they tried to assault the city itself. The cramped streets of a city made for excellent chokepoints which he'd use to choke the fugitives if they tried to enter the city. Hence, as long as Sir Corvus' men weren't forced out of the walls due to running out of food or water, they could defend this place indefinitely. Most luckily for Sir Corvus, he had already made quite the stockpile of food with all the raids he had conducted in the rural areas of Casamonu. He estimated that they could last for half a year, and by then reinforcements from the Empire would surely come to relieve his forces.

Sir Corvus would be fine as long as his food stocks were fine.

 

[CabbagePreacher]

65th​ of Summer 5859
Below the walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

A black, starry blanket had covered the entirety of Gemeinplatz. Under it was many things, from sleeping wild animals to awake "civilized" animals who were going about their illicit nighttime business.

Among these civilized animals was a human named Ayda, the head of an extensive smuggling ring in Casamonu and former love interest of some insignificant bloke named Shinasi. She was travelling in the middle of a forest, reached by the underground tunnel system that Brown and co. had passed before to smuggle textiles, all by herself in a move that even she found to be irrational. She had passed this place countless times before, so she had no problem navigating the trees by intuition. She went a bit north, then a lot west, before turning three times and walking ten steps forth to find herself out of the woods and into a path leading to Casamonu.

The full moon shined on Ayda, so bright was it that she felt like she was on the moon itself. She saw her surroundings somewhat clearly, as grey and pale as her surroundings were under the moonlight. What wasn't grey and pale were the campfires lit up by soldiers keeping watch for any intruders like her. It was odd to see such a large group of armed fugitives, but Ayda wasn't going to complain about those giving her extra business. She casually walked up to the soldiers, waving at them like she was walking into her own house. The soldiers, just doing their job with nothing personal, raised their spears up and got ready for their encounter with the strange woman who had come out of the dark. Her dark robes and fashionable leather gear didn't help her look less suspicious.

"Stop right there witch, or whatever you are!"

Just as she was about to open her mouth to explain the purpose of her visit, Ayda had to turn around and raise her arm. Behind her was an even shadier lady in dark robes, who had a knife wielded by her arm which had just been blocked by Ayda. "Good going, you just about got me."

"I wasn't trying to get you. I just wanted a closer look." replied the other lady in black, who had withdrawn her arm along with the knife.

"Do you usually take a closer look at people with a knife on your hand?"

"I don't have a knife in my hand right now."

"You just did- whatever." Ayda sighed and gave up on the futile argument. "I was called here by your boss."

"Yes, we, and I, were looking for you. I assume you're the correct person. I don't think there's anyone bold enough to walk into a military camp without permission." Kyauta had clearly not heard of what spies did.

"You'd be surprised at what people get up to for the right money."

"You'd be surprised at what some people have to get up to for no money. Follow me."

Ayda expected way more security for such a location of a military nature, but she was allowed to walk behind Kyauta without anyone else guarding her. Not that they needed to send anyone to guard and watch over her – the soldiers in the camp were closely watching the stranger who wore even stranger clothing. Walking through the camp, watching the armed fugitives, Ayda wondered what state the world had come to. She had been bombarded with clergymen in the streets rallying people in defense of the town against the Demon King, and then she had been bombarded with actual cannonballs as the walls of Gemeinplatz met Ayomide. She couldn't help but believe that someone capable of leading an army of fugitives against a walled city must be the Demon King of legend, and she was right in the middle of his lair.

After a brisk walk, Ayda found herself entering a modest tent. Far from the lair of a demonic entity, the tent was… to put it clearly, the inside of the tent looked like how she'd expect the inside of a tent to be. A bedroll on the side, a bag or two on another side, and nothing else but the earth beneath and the tent above to protect one from the elements. In the middle was an old man who looked nothing special except for his magnificent white beard. "Welcome, Miss Ayda was it?"

"Yes, top of the night to you." She sat on the floor, finding herself alone save for the old man right in front of her. He seemed to be judging her with his eyes, though his gaze didn't bore deep enough to actually read her mind through magical shenanigans. Aya stared back at the old man, pondering in the silence as to when the Demon King would show up. Sure, she had seen the old man before come to her, but such an old timer would definitely just be an underling and not the embodiment of all that is doom and gloom.

Brown ended the uncomfortable bout of silence with a cough. "…and I am Isaac Smith or, as the people here know me and you should refer to me from now on, John Brown. Glad to meet you again, you have been a great help to us."

Ayda looked around her again, making sure that she wasn't being fooled somehow. "…I was called here to meet your boss. Is he busy right now?"

Brown raised his brow, confused. "I'm the Commander-in-Chief of the League, though I definitely wouldn't call myself 'the boss'. The only one above us here is the good Lord above."

Ayda looked above, only seeing the walls of the tent again. Perhaps they preferred the title "Demon Lord" rather than "Demon King". "Then I want to see your lord as soon as possible."

"Miss Ayda, we'll all get to see Him eventually. No need to rush when you're so young." Sensing the point of the conversation float away from where it should be, Brown paused his evangelizing for a second. "I was the one who called you here, to ask for your help."

The old man did look to be some sort of right-hand man to the Demon King (Demon Lord?), so Ayda stopped trying to search for the big bad evil guy and get on with business. "Alright then. What do you need help for? More gunpowder? More textiles? More of anything? The only thing we can't find is food right now, the big git at the top has been rationing it pretty strictly."

"No, we have no need of any more physical goods for now. The opposite in fact – we need to have fewer physical goods in the hands of the count. Your last point is of particular interest. How is the food situation in Casamonu?"

"The men of Corvus have been selling food at a very high price. He practically has the market cornered, the clever bastard. You can see huge lines forming in front of the castle walls every day."

"So, all the food in town is stored in one location?" Brown raised his brow so high that his forehead disappeared amongst a sea of wrinkles.

"Yes, but they have… Well, I'm not your scout now, am I?" Ayda simply shrugged, and then extended an open palm forward. "A little donation, if you would be so kind."

"Greed is a horrible sin, Miss Ayda, and I pray that the Lord cures you of it, but I'll humor you and give you a great deal." He pretended to take out a pouch of money from his pockets, only to take out a folded piece of paper and leave it on Ayda's hands. She unfolded the paper expecting it to be a cheque or something else of a monetary nature, only to find some sort of contract written and signed by Commander-in-Chief John Brown.

Without waiting for Ayda to read it in full, Brown began laying the basics of his proposal through speech. "Simply put, Miss Ayda, we'll need a bit of help from enterprising individuals like you in the future. For now, you're considered a criminal from violating the laws of the Empire and the country, but we'll give you a pardon and funding to conduct your business legally. The League won't enact mercantile laws as strict as the Empire's, so you should be able to thrive without having to hide behind the backstreets."

Ayda took a pause. A very long pause, going over every word on the written contract. It was dangerous to make contracts with devilish influences like that of the Demon King, but she couldn't find anything unexpected in the text. She would be pardoned of all the times she broke the mercantile laws of Casamonu, receive funding for the production of gunpowder and facilitating trade into the League, and be given a certain amount of land to be appropriated from soon-to-be-isekai'd nobility. From her perspective, this seemed like an excellent deal as long as she helped the fugitives into the city. She understood this to be Brown's goal: she wouldn't be able to receive anything from the deal unless she threw Casamonu into the hands of the Demon King. It was truly a deal with the devil. Ayda wasn't the type to turn seedy deals down, but even this seemed too far for her. "This is the oddest deal I've ever received in my life."

"In which way, if I may ask? I think it's a pretty simple one."

"It's odd in that… well, you deal with fugitive slaves, you deal with demi-humans, and now you deal with some smuggler as if she were a respectable burgher." Ayda removed her eyepatch, revealing a closed eyelid behind which no eyeball stood. "I haven't a shred nor have ever had a shred of nobility or respectability Mister Brown – I lost this eye in my youth in the slums where my late mother had born me as the bastard. My father is a nameless slave whose name I don't know. I don't know where you come from, but you look to be a well-bred man, perhaps an otherworlder, the type to never deal with fugitives or bastards."

"Is that the problem?" This was definitely not the first time that Brown was receiving such a question. He had a simple answer. "I would rather have the small-pox, yellow fever and cholera all together in my camp, than a man without principles. Noble blood doesn't make up for principles, neither does ignoble blood mean a lack of principle. Far from it – I have seen that men of highest stature tend to also be men of lowest principle. In the eyes of Omnipotence all men are made equal; in my eyes, a shrewd woman like you who has conducted fair business with us is worth way more than any emperor."

Worth more than an emperor? These words had left Ayda shocked. Brown would have been drawn and quartered for having uttered the first letter of such a sentence. She was on the guard for flat flattery, but she could feel clearly that Brown was genuine in his speech.

Brown continued. "It's a mistake, madame, that people make, when they think that bullies are the best fighters. Give me men of good principles, God-fearing men, men who respect themselves, and with a dozen of them I will oppose any hundreds of such men as the ruffians hiding behind that castle."

Having felt that he evangelized enough, Brown procured a thin piece of charcoal for Ayda to write her signature with. Soon enough, she had signed the agreement, and less sooner but soon enough nonetheless, the League was cooking plans to infiltrate the castle thanks to Ayda's intel.

---

Hello, you may be wondering why this week's chapter has released early. It's because today is a special day, and I wanted to celebrate with an early chapter:

​

Today is the day that Touhou Renkyouto ~ Subterranean Festival of Love and Jealousy releases on Steam. It's a top-down bullet-hell shooter, and after a year of work, hopefully it's been worth the wait. If you're interested in the game (or supporting me), feel free to check its page on Steam. I'd be very happy to receive your support

 

[CabbagePreacher]

65th​ of Summer 5859
Casamonu Castle, Casamonu​

Casamonu Castle: a grand and somewhat new castle, established several millennia after the Empire of Gemeinplatz had been born. The castle overlooks Casamonu itself alongside the ruins of all the Casamonus before it which paint the environment in various shades of gray with rubble. For the last week, the castle had been housing the ever-important supplies of grain and other non-perishables required for Casamonu to survive the siege. Such an important castle requires excellent protection, and excellent protection requires experienced guards.

Unfortunately, experienced guards require money. Money that Sir Korvus definitely couldn't afford to spare for some men to stand around all day checking a gate.

"So, what're you doing this weekend?" asked Billy (whole real name was still Bilaleddin), who had survived many a political chaos and gotten himself reassigned to protect the castle of the count. Such a prestigious job meant that he had finally managed to afford himself a tabard to cover his gambeson filled with unfixed holes.

"…don't you have anything else to talk about?" replied Bob (who real name had been Boron until he had gone to court last week and legally changed his name to be Bob), who too had survived many a political chaos and found himself stuck with the idiot right next to him. He too had managed to save up to buy a tabard, and the tabard had made him look professional enough to be assigned right next to the castle gates.

"Not really. There hasn't been anything to do due to those bloody savages." Billy scoffed with such derision that one wouldn't be mistaken to think that he could bring down a whole sieging army down just with pure scorn.

"Right, everywhere is boarded up… even the nunnery!"

"The nunnery? My wife and I were planning to visit them to bless our marriage this weekend, are they not accepting visitors?" Billy had become visibly disappointed in not being able to get himself blessed as soon as possible.

Bob hadn't meant the sacred sort of nunnery, but he kept his cool. "…is the nunnery an appropriate place to bless one's marriage? Isn't that usually done in a temple?"

Billy shrugged. "When I showed my old man the girl I wanted to marry with, all he said was 'leave her at the nunnery', so I'm doing just that."

Bob gave up on trying to dig into Billy's family and instead turned forward to dig into the night. It was completely dark as the new moon was hidden behind a menagerie of clouds. The only thing lighting them were the lanterns they were generously given by the castle's owner. Everyone was asleep, so it was all quiet save for Billy's yappings. So quiet in fact, that Bob preferred to speak to Billy more instead of getting bored out here all alone. Bob was searching for some conversation topic to open to his comrade just before he heard faint footsteps approaching the door. "Halt! Who goes there?"

"Me goesh 'eer!" The reply came from a man who sounded most chemically inconvenienced. "Where thish?"

Bob sighed, even though he was happy to get some action. The drunk man approached them close enough for his spiky, disheveled black hair to be visible. His gambeson and a shield haphazardly attached to his back suggested that he was an adventurer of some sort. "Great, it's a drunk. Billy, do you know how to deal with them?"

"No, Bob."

"I'll show you then." Bob flipped his spear to have the blunt side facing the drunk man approaching him with bottle in hand. He then swiftly prodded at the man's stomach with the spear's shaft, pushing him away and making him lose breath.

The drunk man quickly retreated after having been defeated with this expert show of arms, though he apparently forgot his bottle on the ground. Bob took the bottle into his hand, realizing with a smile that it was still sealed with an unopened cork. "This looks like some good stuff." He opened the bottle with his bare hands like an uncivilized barbarian and had a sip for taste-testing. Then he almost spat it back out due to how strong it was.

"That's no fair, give me my share as well!" Billy received his own sip, then Bob another, until the bottle had reached its bottom and there was nothing else to drink. Boredom had made being blackout drunk seem very appealing to them.

It was not like anyone would dare infiltrate the castle of all places.

66th​ of Summer 5859
Casamonu Castle, Casamonu​

"Snore…"

It was morning.

"Zzz…"

Bob and Billy were still fast asleep.

"Yawn…" CRACKLE! "What the hell?!"

A burnt piece of wood had fallen right next to Billy. He jumped up, and turned around to see… "The granary… Bob, the damn granary!"

"Hm? What are you screaming bloody murder?" Bob slowly opened his eyes, though he could barely see anything with how hammered he was. He turned his head to where Billy was pointing to see… "The granary!" Or, to give a more accurate description, he turned around to see not the granary, but a burnt patch of land and rubble in the place where the granary behind the walls once was. There was a smell of burnt bread in the air, possibly from the wheat which had turned into ash alongside the building.

"So… w-what do we do?" asked Billy. His hands were shaky, both from being hammered and from having doomed an entire city with said hammering.

Bob gave an answer to Billy by dashing away from the castle before anyone could come to see their cockup. Billy joined him in the dash, running as far away from the castle as possible.

66th​ of Summer 5859
Some inconspicuous forest near Casamonu, Casamonu​

Shinasi raised his arms up, praising the sun finally brightening him up. "Phew, I hate these tunnels. They're dark, irritating, damp…"

The tunnel guides provided by Ayda had already gone back to the tunnels, leaving Shinasi alone with Ayomide whose ability to see in the dark had helped them greatly, and Kyauta who had helped them with being sneaky. He took in the fresh air, so unlike the oppressive air found in the underground tunnel system of Ayda. Fresh air, one of the only truly free things in this world, seemed most precious when he had been deprived of it for a measly couple minutes.

"Then, let's get away from these tunnels as fast as we can." Ayomide raised her crystal up and lit up the surroundings for her comrades.

Shinasi looked back at the exit of the tunnel, sighing. He was carrying an empty bottle. "Shame about the bottle of rectified spirits, the guards ended up drinking it all… I'm surprised they were able to wake up afterwards."

Kyauta pushed Shinasi forward towards the outside of the forest. "Are you really thinking about that right now?!"

"He did a good job Kyauta, don't be too harsh on the man." Ayomide took Shinasi by the hand to lead him. "Especially his drunken act. I was actually concerned for a second when I saw him limp like that…"

Kyauta shrugged. "Fine, whatever you say."

Ayomide and co. made their way out of the forest, unaware of the fact that they had set fire to something more than the granary.

 

[CabbagePreacher]

67th​ of Summer 5859
Sir Korvus' Not-So-Humble Dwelling, Casamonu​

Sir Corvus woke up, didn't brush his teeth because dental hygiene hadn't been invented yet, and then clapped his hands to call a servant to his bed for breakfast. He waited for a good second, and then he waited for a bad second, before finally realizing that nobody was coming. The young master got off his own hindside for once. It was certainly a struggle, and he made up his mind to whip the servants who had slacked off. Nearing the door, he heard some faint murmuring. A whole lot of it. Corvus opened the door to see a large congregation of servants, retainers, and other unmemorable personages of the castle arguing between each other.

"You tell him!"

"No, you tell him!"

"…people, he's right there."

The congregation immediately fell silent upon seeing their lord look at them with confusion. Corvus looked at them, they looked back at Corvus, and this would have gone on forever if not for Corvus opening his mouth. "What's going on here? Speak, or you'll all be hanging tomorrow!"

"S-sir!"

"Uhm…"

"Yeah… Nothing?"

Corvus could clearly see the congregation fidget and look at each other in anticipation. His birthday was a few months off, so this clearly couldn't be a birthday surprise. Nor could it be an assassination attempt of some sort considering nobody had tried to stab him yet. What was going on? "Just tell me what's going on!"

"Uhm…"

"Ahem…"

"So…"

Finally, a retainer with well-polished armor stepped forth. "Sir, the- the castle was infiltrated yesterday.

"And?" asked Corvus. He began pacing around while waiting for an answer with his brows furrowed deeply.

"And… Erm…"

"And?" asked Corvus once more. He had paced around to a window facing out towards the castle's gate. There he saw a pile of ash where his lovely granary used to be. "…and." He turned around to the congregation behind him as if he was waiting for them to confirm whether he hadn't gone mad or not.

"…as you can see, sir." concluded the well-polished retainer. "They burnt down the granary."

"I can see that, you bloody fool!" Corvus' plans about hanging someone for failing to serve him food had been thrown out the window now that excrement had hit the windmill. Now he wanted to hang someone for having doomed their defense. "Where are the fools who were guarding the gates yesterday?"

"We weren't able to find them, sir. They apparently ran away yesterday."

"The guards let the intruders burn the granary?!" To Corvus, it was obvious that the Demon King's army was behind this. Who else would come in and bribe his guards to burn the granary down? "Find those lousy guards and… and…" It was way too late. There was nobody who could unburn the granary, since no magician in Gemeinplatz had dared study into something as silly-sounding as "unburning magic". "…you know what, we don't have time for that! Everyone! Listen up!"

Silence fell upon the congregation in the room. The retainers of Corvus, those who knew at least a little bit about war, could feel the fact that their food stores being destroyed in a siege was no good. The rest of the servants could feel the fact that the retainers were feeling no good. Nobody felt good about a bunch of evil demon-lovers entering their castle.

"Now, let me say this clearly: We'll be starving to death in a couple of days." That much had been clear since the start, but clear mention of it by Corvus caused shoulders to be slumped and faces to be sullen. There was doom, gloom, and despair in the air. Doomsday had arrived, the one consistently preached by priests, and the people here were about to meet it head on. "They have us surrounded. There's no way we can simply escape unnoticed or unscathed. We have been unable to contact anyone outside the walls for reinforcements, and none will come before we run out of food and eat each other. Therefore!" He pointed out the window, towards the burnt granary "We have no choice but to sally forth and sortie, or we'll all be razed like this granary!"

"Being razed doesn't sound good…"

"It definitely doesn't."

"Mhm."

The people around Corvus weren't exactly motivated by their lord who had planned on looting the city and leaving in a similar fashion, but they couldn't help but agree on the fact that they didn't want to be the ones being razed.

"Then, if you agree that we should live standing than die kneeling, get everyone you can! We'll easily ride the savages down!"

68th​ of Summer 5859
Below the disintegrating walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

Brown was pacing around the camp. His hair would have whitened from the stress if not for the fact that it hadn't done that way before he had landed on Gemeinplatz.

"Armageddon, young lady, this is our Armageddon." The old man was followed by Ayomide, and around them were the thousand or so free soldiers. "Here we shall sever the wicked, and from our wounds the Lord shall let freedom flow."

From the perspective of the League, defending against a sortie wasn't easy. The walls around Casamonu had two gates, and there was also one breach made by Ayomide right next to one of the gates, so there were three locations in total the defenders could sortie from. The two gates were in opposite directions to each other, which meant that the League had to practically divide their forces in two to anticipate the attack, which an attack would surely come if the defenders didn't plan on starving to death while doing nothing. One force was being led by Brown and Ayomide while Tubman and Shinasi attended to the other.

"Old man, look." Ayomide pointed at the top of the wall "They don't have any men on the walls."

"This means that they must have gathered everyone for an attack." Brown stopped in middle of a group of troops. "This is good, they don't even have anyone checking the walls itself. Our little surprise won't be ruined."

"Little surprise? I haven't heard of such a thing."

Brown smiled. "You'll be hearing and seeing it soon, young lady. Providence provides to those who are patient."

Ayomide shrugged, not wishing to dig further into the old man's antics for now. "I've been more than patient, I'd say."

"You need to be more than more than patient then, young lady." Such quips were the only thing left to do while waiting for the attack. Brown had never considered what Julius Caesar must have been doing to pass the time while waiting for the barbarians to attack. The poor fellow must have died from boredom.

Suddenly, a soldier from the frontline screamed "I think I see them!" Their thought turned out to be correct. Brown saw the thick iron gates of the walls slowly roll up to reveal a mass of troops.

On the other side of the gate, Sir Corvus II had one simple command: "Cut them down!"

On one side was the men of Casamonu, comprised of Corvus' retainers, the city's garrison, reinforced with armed citizens and somewhat-armed adventurers. Sir Corvus' personal retainers were very well armed, some having full steel plate armor combined with state-of-the-art culverins. These men, being of excellent noble and chivalrous breed, stayed back to let everyone else graciously take the brunt of the attack.

In front of the retainers were the city's garrison, who had diminished greatly in quality and quantity during the recent period of turmoil that Casamonu had found itself in. Still, they were all armed with excellently tailored gambesons, and nobody could deny that their helmets looked mighty shine and fine. The garrison was frontmost, with their shields raised up and spears raised forward to protect the troops behind them.

Sandwiched between the noble and the ignoble folk were the truly ignoble folk: a collection of armed citizenry and paid adventurers. Casamonu's citizens, like many other cities in the Empire, were obliged to defend the city in case of an emergency like a siege. Legally speaking, at least one adult in a household had to keep a weapon and a helmet ready, though the level of readiness was shaky due to the corners cut by the citizens looking to pinch pennies here and there.

Lastly were the adventurers, whose skills in defeating low level mobs was high, and their skills in defeating besieging armies was about to be tested.

On the other side were the men of the League. In terms of numbers, they were outnumbered about three-to-one. The fact that the army of Corvus had to trickle out the gate negated this a bit. Their equipment was a whole lot more standardized compared to Corvus': a copper helmet/bowl, a copper spear, a gambeson, and a huge shield. They paled in comparison compared to Corvus' fine retainers. What they lacked in equipment however…

"Hold the line! Keep those shields up! Do not move an inch!"

…they made up in discipline and training. The League moved as if it was one giant body unlike the cacophony of Corvus' army. Sure, there were some kinks here and there, but the men of the League had quickly and efficiently formed a square before they had even met the enemy. No matter how much Corvus' retainers circled, they wouldn't be able to find an opening to charge in with their horses.

"Behave yourselves, do not charge yet! Wait for the adventurers to wear the enemy down."

Corvus wasn't an idiot however, so he kept his retainers back to let the lowly infantry smash against the square and create an opening. The retainers stayed back, the infantry began their charge, and one crossbowman fired the first bolt of the battle towards the square.

The Battle of Casamonu had begun.

 

[CabbagePreacher]

68th​ of Summer 5859
Below the disintegrated walls of Casamonu, Casamonu​

Casamonu: a grand ancient city, established several millennia before the Empire of Gemeinplatz had ever been born. The city stands above all the Casamonus before it, so much rubble had built up over the years that the city had found itself on a hill. For the last week, city's walls had been bombarded by a canon which had caused a breach. Such an important city required excellent protection from those protecting it, and excellent protection required excellent soldiers.

Unfortunately, experienced guards require money. Money that Sir Corvus definitely couldn't afford to spare for some men to stand around all day waiting for an attack from the sieging forces outside.

"So, what're you doing this weekend?" asked Billy (whole real name continued to be Bilaleddin), who had escaped being caught and gotten a place in the sortie. Thankfully, his gambeson being newly fixed was about to become really useful.

"…don't you have anything else to talk about? We're heading to battle, for my granny's sake!" replied Bob (who real name had been Boron until he had gone to court last week and legally changed his name to be Bob, and then he had illegally changed his name to Boraks while he had been under hiding), who too had survived again and found himself stuck with the idiot right next to him again. He had to sell his tabard to cover lodging costs during his stint in hiding, and now he looked like any ordinary soldier amongst the mob of soldiers.

Billy sighed and looked forward toward the ranks of fugitive slaves in formation. They had gotten close enough to them to see eye-to-eye, though the eyes of Billy were more focused on the spears that the fugitives held. They stood like a human porcupine, which definitely wasn't a pleasant sight, especially when one was potentially about to be on the sharp end of said porcupine.

The two sides met… or, they were about to meet, but Billy saw that the men around him slowed down right before they were about to be impaled. Billy and Bob stopped too as they wanted to continue being alive. They saw javelins, bolts and arrows whizz dangerously close as both sides exchanged fire without entering melee. Billy turned around to see if he could run away, but the crowd of soldiers behind him was too great. He was being pushed forward by the people behind him, and he was pushing the people in front of him. Eventually the push proved too great, and the brave souls in front of Billy were forced into contact. Those with shorter weapons crouched under the spears in order to close the distance, while those with longer weapons began clashing spears at a more respectable distance.

Billy and Bob joined their spears in the clash, though they were unable to do much in the chaos as their spears were practically lost in the forest of wooden shafts. They still had hold of their own spears, sure, but they were unable to control their weapons as the forest of spears moved seemingly randomly. It was chaos distilled to its purest and densest form.

​

Slowly, Bob saw holes forming in the shield wall of the fugitives. A few men had been downed thanks to the bold adventurers (who were looking to earn some extra pay by being in the front) crawling under many a spear. The fugitives who fell found themselves crushed either by enemies or friends trying to reposition themselves. The same was true of the men of Casamonu, who either went forward or went downward to never come up again. Neither Billy or Bob could tell who was winning and who was losing.

The fugitives were unable to reinforce their front properly however, and Billy had found himself being pushed forward towards a portion of the wall which had been left without spears. He was so close to an enemy soldier that he could feel them breathe on his neck. Spears became unwieldy at such close range, so both men dropped their weapons and began wrestling each other. Everyone around them was busy with the battle, so there wasn't much to bother them in their fight to the death. Billy punched the fugitive right in the face. He immediately drew his fist back when the fugitive responded by biting his arm while twisting it. The fugitive followed up with a kick to Billy's gut, and then a headbutt that threw him back and landed him on his backside.

With his head spinning like a windmill on a stormy day, Billy retreated back to the relative safety of Corvus' men. His comrades had done the same as well, the fighting winding down as both sides retreated to rest with no man's land in between them. Billy had felt hours pass by when, in actuality, only a couple minutes of fighting had occurred before everyone had been too tired to fight on. He felt like he had run an intense marathon, and it made sense: fighting was physically intense, especially when it was a fight where both sides were trying to dearly hold on to their lives. In the middle, where the no man's land was, were the poor souls who had failed in holding on to life. Worse than a graveyard the scene was, with the bodies just lying there exposed with no tombstone or any sort respect for the dead.

Billy looked away from the open-air graveyard. Corpses weren't the most pleasant of things to look at. He'd have noticed Bob amongst those in the pile of corpses if he did, but now was not the time for noticing such things. Projectiles were still flying to-and-fro. One man next to Billy collapsed after being hit right in the throat by a javelin.

He wondered how things were looking from the other side of the battle…

68th​ of Summer 5859
Below the disintegrated walls of Casamonu but a bit further, Casamonu​

"Hold, hold you-" shouted Ayomide to the crowd who were too busy to listen to her. All that training, all that drill, and it had gained them what? A few more minutes before the men of the League had begun slowly falling back from the enemy army? She watched as the copper spears of her comrades struggled to penetrate through simple gambeson. What'd happen when the more heavily armored retainers came to the frontline, would they not be able to penetrate their armor at all? Ayomide had done her best by casting wind there and then to make a few enemies trip, but she herself wasn't going to be able to turn the tide of battle. The old man, despite having made a remarkable show with the cultivator, had seemingly exhausted all his built-up power all in that one fight. He wasn't going to be of much use either, unless he could pray hard enough to summon a miracle or something.

Everything seemed to become silent for a moment, even if it was nothing but silent. Ayomide could see chains bind her again as the right flank of the shield wall completely broke off. She turned her head around to see that the flank had met the brunt of a cavalry charge by Corvus' retainers. "Turn around, there's cavalry to your right!" she shouted, and the few men who heard her tried their best to reform their ranks to face the charging cavalry. The horses stopped right before the spears, and the cavalrymen turned around to retreat after unloading a volley of fire at the men who had stopped them. Then came the enemy infantrymen who, looking to take advantage of the distracted men of the League, had already surrounded the men who had turned around to meet the charge.

Ayomide looked around her, seeing John Brown in the distance to her left. He was keeping his cool, calmly commanding men in the back to march forward to fill the broken ranks. Soon the right flank was built up again as the fresh and energetic reserves pushed back the tired enemy. This local retreat prompted a general retreat as both sides silently agreed on a brief truce to take a breather. Such brief, impromptu truces in mass combat were common in Gemeinplatz, or for any sort of melee battle everywhere for that matter. Ayomide ran to the left to meet up with Brown during this brief respite.

The old man welcomed Ayomide as she ran towards him. "Don't run, young lady. You need to conserve your energy for the rest of the day."

"Old man, we…" she broadly gestured at where the right flank had collapsed.

Brown broadly gestured to where the men from the flank had retreated to, which was right next to him. "Hm? We've reinforced that flank, haven't we? It's normal to have men retreat in battle, especially after such a devastating cavalry charge. What's important is that we don't break completely, and that they return to battle when they are ready." He looked at the enemy side. "Things might look bad here, young lady, but I can assure you that the enemy isn't feeling any better than us. Keep faith, and we'll be victorious. Especially as…" The old man's gaze went up to the walls. "I think they've arrived."

"What has arrived?" Ayomide looked up the wall as well. The walls were deserted, without soldiers, except for two dark figures in the distance. She could swear that there had been at least a skeleton crew of enemy soldiers there before. The dark figures threw some burning bags down towards the enemy soldiers and-

BOOM!

Before Ayomide could even reorient herself from the explosion, Brown shouted "Now is the time, charge!"